TEMPLE OF DOMITIAN, EPHESUS

During the imperial period, the firt neokorate came from the emperor Domitian. The Ephesians wished to reciprocate appropriately, and so erected a 6 to 7 meter statue of him in front of the cella (main room) of the Temple of Domitian.

This temple once stood on a terrace south of Domitian Street. It was a prostyle temple with eight columns on the short sides and thirteen on the long sides. Four additional columns stood in front of the cella. The altar was U-shaped.

A flight of stairs led up to it.

Domitian was a rather unpopular emperor. His own servants finally murdered him. This caused great confusion in Ephesus, since Domitian was, after all, the first Roman emperor to grant them the signal honor of building an imperial neokorate temple.

They owed him a debt of gratitude. Because of his unpopularity, Ephesus stood to lose the right to build such temples. They turned the difficulty to good account by re-dedicating the temple to his father, Vespatian, and honoring him from that point onward.