AN EX-LIBRARIAN IN EPHESUS

Hello members of the Worldmappin community! I’m back again to write about a wonderful place I visited back in 2022. This is a place that both piqued my curiosity yet it is psychologically bizarre to me. Back in school, I used to be a librarian and completed reading the entire collection of Enid Blyton’s books but standing in front of the Library of Celsus made me felt like a happy idiot, happy to be there and yet still an idiot because if I was born then, I’d be an illiterate as I am unable to read in Greek and Latin. The only Latin verse I’m familiar with is “In nomine Patris, et Fillii, et Spiritus Sancti, Amen.” It’s probably useful during an exorcism 🤣

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This picture was taken from a ruin that used to be a public toilet

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The Library of Celsus was able to accommodate roughly 16,000 Papyrus scrolls so if I were to read one scroll a day without fail then it would perhaps take me about 44 years to complete reading every single scroll. That’s a huge commitment to undertake. I was also curious about the cost of constructing a library back then. In the present, a personal private library will cost around USD500,000 while a public library can easily cost between USD15 to 20 million. Although expensive, still a necessity for the betterment of society. A library is after all a sanctuary for those without better resources and sometimes heaven to homeless people.

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Ephesus is indeed a spectacular place with well-preserved ruins plus a magnificent amphitheater. My curiosity for the world felt partially satiated being there surrounded by such beauties. This library is categorized under partly restored ruins. The leading archeologist in charge of restoration was Volker Michael Strocka, a German. It was excavated from 1903 to 1904 by Austrian archeologists then restored between 1970 to 1978. The archeologists did a great job. The care taken to preserve the structures made the experience of standing there in real time truly remarkable. It’s almost effortless to imagine the grandeur of the ruin in its prime glory.

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Female Personification of Virtues - Sophia

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Celsus, the person the library was named after was actually buried within a decorated marble sarcophagus exactly beneath this very library. I find this common practice then rather peculiar. The library was commissioned to be constructed by Celsus’s son, Aquila in honor of his father’s legacy but was only completed after Aquila’s death in around 110 CE. There were scholarly debates that Celsus was the first Greek to become a Roman Senator. Regardless of the real truth, Celsus was definitely a very important figure within Imperial Rome.

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This particular library was among one of the many architectural marvels ranked third behind the Library of Alexandria as well as the Library of Pergamum. It was sadly destroyed in a fire probably either due to an earthquake or an invasion in 262 CE. All precious scrolls were unfortunately a collateral damage in the fire. In addition, all the physical labor dedicated into producing scrolls vanished in flames. Digital or cloud storage was still unavailable then. Perhaps a joy to lazy students since they have less to learn but a heartbreaking news to poor scholars with hunger for knowledge in particular.

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Last but not least, I was very intrigued by the statues of female personification of virtues within the four aediculae. Sophia represented wisdom, Episterne represented knowledge, Ennoia represented intelligence and Arete represented excellence. The presence of the statues indicated the dual functionality of the building both as a library and a mausoleum. The person the library was named after possessed the virtue of such qualities so that scholars studying in the library can cultivate towards those desirable qualities. So much detail put into the transfer of knowledge and in promoting literacy. Indeed, human occupy the highest level within the hierarchy of the animal kingdom due to our ability to read, write, analyze and think critically, and then execute plans accordingly.

Thank you for reading! 💗

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