Side

Side was founded by Greek settlers from Cyme in Aeolia, probably in the 7th century BC, on a flat peninsula with a natural harbour on the Pamphylian coast. Ancient writers noted that the colonists soon lost their own dialect and adopted the local Anatolian speech, and inscriptions in that Sidetic language have been found in the city. It passed through Lydian, Persian and Hellenistic hands, and Alexander the Great took it without a fight in 333 BC.

Its harbour made it rich and, for a time, notorious: in the 1st century BC Side was the chief naval base of the Cilician pirates and one of the main slave markets of the eastern Mediterranean, until Roman campaigns ended the trade. Under Roman rule the city reached its height, building the theatre, colonnaded streets, baths, fountains and temples whose remains still stand, and minting its own coins. It was a bishop's seat in the Byzantine centuries, but Arab raids and earthquakes wore it down and the site was abandoned by the 10th century, its people moving to Antalya; a revival in the 12th century ended when the town was sacked again.

The peninsula stayed empty for centuries until the 1890s, when Muslim families from Crete were resettled among the ruins and founded the village of Selimiye, living in houses built from ancient stone. Archaeologists began systematic excavation in the 1940s, and the village slowly emptied of farmers and filled with pensions. Mass tourism arrived on the Antalya coast in the 1980s, and Side became one of its main resorts, with hotels spreading along the beaches on either side of the old city.

Side's culture today is the culture of a resort: a place whose year swings between a crowded season and a quiet winter, where a large part of the population works in hotels, restaurants, shops and boats, and where German, Russian and Turkish are all heard in the lanes. Many families in the old village trace their roots to Crete, and Cretan surnames and cooking survive alongside those of the Turkish highlands.

Because the ruins and the resort occupy the same ground, everyday life happens among protected monuments. Building is restricted on the peninsula, excavation continues in the middle of the town, and disputes over what may be built, parked or sold where are a constant local topic. The result is unusual: columns at the end of a shopping lane, a Roman gate as the way in, and a temple lit at night above the sea.

Beyond the season, the customs are those of the Turkish Mediterranean. Tea is drunk all day in small tulip glasses, evening strolls along the shore are a social ritual, and religious holidays and national days fill the squares in Manavgat rather than the resort. Weddings are large and public, football is followed closely, and hospitality to guests is taken seriously even in a town that sells it for a living.

Side itself is small — a village of a few thousand permanent residents — and belongs to the district of Manavgat, which has well over two hundred thousand people and provides the schools, hospital, market and offices. In summer the resident population is many times outnumbered by visitors; in winter much of the strip shuts, staff return to other provinces and the peninsula becomes a quiet place of cats and closed shutters.

The economy is tourism, and almost everything else serves it: hotels, beach clubs, boat operators, jewellers and carpet shops, transfer drivers and building firms. Behind the coast the Manavgat plain grows citrus, pomegranates and vegetables under glass, and the river supplies both irrigation and hydroelectric power. Seasonal workers arrive each spring from inland Anatolia, and many families run a shop in summer and something else the rest of the year.

Daily rhythms follow the heat. Work starts early, the middle of the day is slow, and the town wakes again in the late afternoon when the beaches fill and the restaurants set out tables. Water supply, traffic on the coast road and the pressure of building on an archaeological site are recurring concerns, along with the wildfire risk in the pine forests each summer.

The everyday cooking here is that of the Antalya coast. Piyaz, a white-bean salad with tahini, lemon and hard-boiled egg, comes alongside grilled meat; şakşuka of fried aubergine and pepper in tomato sauce, and stuffed vine leaves appear among the meze. Fish is the local speciality — levrek (sea bass), çipura (sea bream) and in season lagos and barbun — usually grilled whole and served with rocket, lemon and raw onion.

Kebab in its Turkish range is everywhere: adana and urfa on wide skewers, çöp şiş of small marinated cubes, and döner carved from the vertical spit. Pide, a boat-shaped flatbread baked with cheese, egg or minced meat, and lahmacun, a thin round topped with spiced meat and eaten rolled with lemon and parsley, are the cheap standbys. Gözleme, a thin pastry folded over cheese, potato or spinach and cooked on a griddle, is sold at markets and roadside stops.

Citrus, pomegranates and bananas grow within sight of the town, and pomegranate juice is pressed at street stalls. Sweets run to baklava, künefe — shredded pastry around soft cheese, soaked in syrup and eaten hot — and dondurma, the stretchy ice cream made with salep and mastic. Tea is drunk constantly, Turkish coffee after meals, and şalgam, a sour drink of fermented black carrot and turnip, turns up wherever Adana kebab is served.