36:53.14N 030:40.83E - Antalya Museum

Yachtforeverfreedom
Sun 5 Dec 2010 12:17
Antalya Museum - 4th Dec 2010

The founding and development of the Antalya Museum is unusual. On 25 March 1919 the Italians occupied Antalya. One or two archeologists, who came to Antalya with the occupying forces, started to collect the antique items found in the course of their exploration of the region and transported them to the Italian Consulate, "in the name of civilisation". At that time, a teacher named Suleyman Fikri Bey, who opposed the Italians who claimed they were doing this, arranged for the artefacts to be taken to the small abandoned mosque next to the Tekeli Mehmet Pasa Mosque; and thus, the foundation of the Antalya Museum was laid. When the Italians evacuated Antalya, the works of art they had collected remained behind.  Today's Antalya Museum on Org.Kenan Evren Bulvari on the ouskirts of the city, is one of Turkey's largest museums, with 14 exhibition halls and an open air gallery. It covers an area of 7000 m² and 5000 works of art are exhibited.
The majority of the marble statues on display have come from Perge, which we visited after the museum.  The scale of the statues is awe-inspiring, when compared with Pauline and Isobel