Arsameia: The Hellenistic Royal Center of Commagene in Turkey
Visitor Information
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Country: Turkey
Civilization: Greek
Site type: City
History
Arsameia, in the municipality of Eski Kahta/Kâhta in Turkey, was established by the Armenian king Arsames and belongs to the Hellenistic Kingdom of Commagene.
The settlement began in the mid-third century BCE when Arsames renamed an earlier town called Nymphaios after himself. Under the Commagenian kings it became a royal center and a summer residence, reflecting the kingdom’s mixture of Persian and Greek cultural traditions. The site is closely linked to the family of Mithridates I Callinicus and his son Antiochus I Theos. Antiochus I commissioned the hierothesion, a holy burial and cult complex, for his father and enlarged the palace on the hilltop.
Throughout the Hellenistic period Arsameia lay in a contested landscape. It saw strategic importance during the Syrian Wars and in conflicts involving the Seleucid realm and neighboring Armenia. Documentary reliefs and inscriptions from the site record royal piety and cult practice, including scenes that associate kings with deities such as Mithras and the hero Herakles.
The town continued in use until the Roman emperor Vespasian incorporated Commagene into the Roman realm in 72 CE. After annexation soldiers quarried building stone from the site for construction projects, including material later used at the nearby Cendere Bridge, and the settlement was no longer occupied as a royal seat. The modern rediscovery began in 1951 when the German archaeologist Friedrich Karl Dörner recognized carved reliefs and inscriptions; systematic investigations started in 1953 and continued into the 1960s, with collaboration from American archaeologist Theresa Goell. Many objects found during these campaigns are now conserved in the Archaeological Museum of Gaziantep.
Remains
The site is organized along a winding processional route that climbs the slope and links three principal rock-cut complexes often labeled Sites I, II, and III. Much of the work at Arsameia is carved directly into the living rock, where relief sculpture and inscribed faces confront the approach, while the hilltop preserves building foundations and paved floors from later activity.
Site II is best known for a dexiosis, a handshake scene, that pairs a royal figure with the sun god Mithras. Mithras appears with a radiant head, a Phrygian cap, and holds a barsom, which are ritual twigs used in Zoroastrian and related rites. Only the right portion of this relief is preserved in place; the separated left fragment has been identified as a dressed royal by its clothing and was originally part of the same composition.
At Site I a monumental niche was carved into the rock with an arched ceiling and an entrance leading down a flight of 14 steps into a tall chamber roughly eight by eight meters in area and about nine meters high. Scholars have debated the chamber’s role; one proposal described it as a Mithraeum, a temple for the god Mithras, while others have considered it as a funerary space connected to the royal cult. Close by stand a fragmentary dexiosis relief and rock faces covered with dense inscriptions on several sides, attesting to the ceremonial character of this sector.
Site III contains the most complete dexiosis in Commagene, showing a handshake between King Mithridates, who wears a kitaris crown (a ceremonial royal headdress), and the nude hero Herakles holding his club. Directly beneath this relief Antiochus I had a five-column inscription carved in Greek. That text records the founding of Arsameia, the construction of the hierothesion, and instructions for associated rites; it survived exceptionally well because it remained covered and protected until modern excavation. From below the inscription a steep, rock-cut tunnel runs for almost 160 meters, drops sharply, and then ends without a known function; the passage is dark, partly waterlogged, and contains some sherds of ancient pottery.
On the summit or acropolis archaeologists uncovered foundations of buildings with mosaic pavements dating to the second century BCE. Broken sculpture found among these remains has led specialists to reconstruct a commemorative mausoleum for Mithridates I on the hilltop, once ornamented with statues representing Antiochus I and his mother Laodice. Elsewhere on the site teams recorded relief fragments, inscribed stones, pottery shards, and carved portrait heads, including a head identified as Antiochus I that was later lost or removed abroad.
The hill stands on the east-facing bank of the Kahta River opposite the old fortress known locally as Eski Kale. Around two kilometers across the river lie later fortifications, including a Mamluk-period stronghold called Yenikale and a pigeon-house water structure with nesting niches. Field surveys and excavation in the surrounding plain revealed ironworking activity, called the Field of Iron, where furnace remains, slag, and pig iron residues attest to metallurgical production in the site’s hinterland.
Later uses and disturbances are visible in the stones themselves: material was removed in Roman times for construction elsewhere, and many carved fragments survive in situ or in a fragmentary state. Excavation records from the 1950s and 1960s document both the archaeological evidence and the trajectory by which these monuments entered museum collections.
