Taşköprü: A Roman Bridge Across the Seyhan River in Adana
Site at a Glance
- Rating
- 4.5
- Popularity
- High
- Country
- Turkey
- Primary era
- Classical
- External website
- Open
- Eras represented
- Classical, Medieval, Modern
- Civilizations
- Byzantine, Ottoman, Roman
- Site type
- Infrastructure
- Remains
- Bridge
On this page10 sections
History
Taşköprü is a Roman bridge in Adana, Türkiye, built during the first half of the second century AD, probably around AD 120–135. It carried routes linking the Mediterranean with Anatolia and Persia, crossing the river now called the Seyhan. The bridge has remained an important crossing through Roman, Byzantine, Islamic, Ottoman, and modern periods.
Earlier traditions and Roman construction
Local tradition attributes an earlier bridge at Adana, across the river then known as the Sarus, to Hattusili I, an early Hittite king associated with military expansion in Anatolia and Syria. He was said to have built it while preparing for a campaign in Syria, although the tradition does not establish whether this was Adana’s first bridge.
The surviving Roman bridge has been known by several names, including Ponte Sarus, the Saros Bridge, the Bridge of Justinian, and the al-Walid Bridge. Its Turkish name, Taşköprü, means “Stone Bridge.” Victor Langlois, who visited Adana in 1852 and 1853, attributed the structure to the emperor Hadrian, who ruled from AD 117 to 138 and travelled through Anatolia between AD 120 and 135. Langlois stated that an inscription bearing Hadrian’s name had remained on the bridge until approximately two decades before his visit.
Another attribution connects the bridge with Auxentius, a Roman architect of the late fourth century. That identification remains uncertain. The Greek inscription used to support it appears, on closer examination, to refer to an aqueduct supplying waterwheels rather than to the construction of the bridge itself.
Byzantine rebuilding
By around AD 557, the bridge required major intervention. Procopius of Caesarea, a sixth-century Byzantine historian, described in Buildings of Justinian how the emperor Justinian I ordered its reconstruction. The river current had badly eroded the submerged parts of the piers. To carry out the work, the river was temporarily diverted, damaged masonry was removed and rebuilt, and the channel was then returned to its former course.
Islamic and Ottoman repairs
Repairs continued after the Byzantine period. Work in 742, under the Umayyad caliph al-Walid II, led to the name Jisr al-Walid, meaning the Bridge of al-Walid. Further work took place in 840 during the reign of the Abbasid caliph al-Mu’tasim, and additional repairs are associated with the Abbasid caliphs Harun al-Rashid and al-Ma’mun.
Under Ottoman rule, the earliest recorded repair took place in 1713 during the reign of Sultan Ahmet III. Osman Pasha, governor of Adana, ordered work on the older parts of the bridge. In 1847, during the reign of Sultan Abdülmecid I, another restoration addressed a structure described as having been in poor condition for a long time.
Further work was commissioned by Governor Osman Pasha during the reign of Sultan Abdülhamid II. Worn sidewalks and arches were repaired, and a walled sidewalk was built to reduce the danger of people and animals falling from the bridge. These interventions formed part of the structure’s long sequence of repairs rather than a single rebuilding event.
Modern use
During the expansion of cotton cultivation in Cilicia under Ibrahim Pasha of Egypt in the mid-nineteenth century, seasonal migrant workers gathered on the bridge for a weekly spring labor market. The crowds became so large that residents of Adana could not cross it. Later changes included the closure of the bridge to motorized traffic in 2007. It thereafter served pedestrians and became a setting for social and cultural events.
Surveys conducted in 1996 and 2008 found that Taşköprü was the landmark most commonly associated with Adana by local residents. Its prominence in local awareness was attributed mainly to its function as a city landmark rather than to widespread knowledge of its history. The bridge remains in pedestrian use and is regarded as one of the world’s oldest bridges still in service.
Remains
Taşköprü crosses the Seyhan River in central Adana, connecting the Seyhan and Yüreğir sides of the city. It is an arch bridge with a current length of 310 metres and a width of 11.4 metres, including the sidewalks. Its surviving fabric combines Roman construction with later repairs, widening, and changes caused by work along the riverbanks.
Arches and overall construction
The bridge originally had 21 arches. Fifteen principal arches carried the roadway across the river, while six smaller relieving arches, secondary arches that reduce the load on larger arches or piers, were set within the large piers. Parts of the approaches and some arches were later buried during efforts to stabilize or regulate the riverbanks, reducing both the bridge’s length and the number of openings in service.
Tufa, marble, and spolia, architectural materials reused from earlier structures, form much of the bridge’s fabric. Later repairs introduced additional materials. The eastern section preserves especially clear traces of the original construction, whose masonry uses a wall-filling technique. The roadway is paved with cobblestones, commissioned by Adana Governor Süleyman Bahri Pasha during his tenure from 1899 to 1908.
Roadway and later widening
The original roadway was thought to have been no more than about 3 metres wide, making it too narrow for two horse-drawn carriages to pass side by side. It was widened during the early twentieth century, reaching approximately 8 to 8.5 metres. The widening added arches on the downstream side, although the date of those additions is uncertain. An extensive restoration by the State Highway Agency took place in 1948.
A pavilion supported by four columns once stood at the middle of the bridge. Governor Mahmut Pasha commissioned it, but the structure was later demolished. The cobblestone surface and the widened roadway remain part of the bridge’s later physical history, while the current sidewalks reflect successive changes to the crossing.
Piers and water management
The piers are considerably worn. On the downstream sides of the eastern piers, the masonry displays bossage, a finish made with projecting blocks. Their upstream faces have stepped cutwaters and stepped footings characteristic of Roman bridge construction. A cutwater is a projecting structure on a pier that divides and deflects flowing water.
Two relieving arches, the fifth and seventh from the western end, remain open on their upstream sides but are filled on their downstream sides. Their differing dimensions reflect the bridge’s complex construction and repair history. The upstream faces of the piers now carry triangular cutwaters that were rebuilt during Ottoman restorations and consequently have a relatively uniform appearance.
Decoration and entrances
The surviving sculptural decoration includes a lion relief on the north side of the eleventh arch, together with several star-and-crescent designs. Both entrances once had monumental gate structures, but those gates no longer survive.
