Side (mod. Eski Adalia), was an ancient city on the Pamphylian coast about 12 miles east of the mouth of the Eurymedon.
Possessing a good harbour in the days of small craft, it was the most important place in Pamphylia. Alexander visited and occupied it, and there the Rhodian fleet defeated that of Antiochus the Great, and in the succeeding century the Cilician pirates established their chief seat.
An inscription found on the site shows it to have had a considerable Jewish population in early Byzantine times. The great ruins, among the most notable in Asia Minor, cover a large promontory, fenced from the mainland by a ditch and wall which has been repaired in medieval times and is singularly perfect.
Within this is a maze of structures out of which rises the colossal ruin of the theatre, built up on arches like a Roman amphitheatre for lack of a convenient hill-side to be hollowed out in the usual Greek fashion. The auditorium is little less perfect than that of Aspendus and very nearly as large; but the scena wall has collapsed over stage and proscenium in a cataract of loose blocks. Besides the theatres, three temples, an aqueduct and a nymphaeum are noticeable.
This entry was originally from the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
