Zeugma: The Museum

After breakfast at the hotel, we hopped in a cab and went to the Zeugma Mosaic Museum … one of my favorite museums anywhere in the world. Operated under the auspices of the Turkish Ministry of Culture & Tourism, our MüzeKart covered the admission.

We arrived just as the museum opened its doors at 9:00a. Our time there was sandwiched between two tour groups, one of which was practically out the door already, and neither of which spent much time at the museum. Thus leaving us to enjoy this great museum without the crowds with which we shared it in 2018.

The museum was purpose-built to exhibit and preserve some of the archaeological treasures of Zeugma, a city of antiquity overlooking the Euphrates River … which we hope to visit on our way out of the city in a few days’ time. It is the largest museum of its kind in the world.

There are amazingly well-preserved floor and wall mosaics of varying sizes throughout the museum. Each deserving of careful attention to the beautiful details. But the highlight is a small fragment known as the Gypsy Girl … though there is some question as to the actual gender of the figure since no other parts of the body were featured amongst the pieces found. It is the hauntingly beautiful eyes that draw those that behold the piece that has since become a symbol of the city. The fragment, which dates back to the 2nd-3rd centuries AD, is part of a much bigger mosaic, parts of which were smuggled out of Turkey in the 1960s … and some of which have since been returned.

(Unless otherwise noted, all mosaics date back to the 2nd and 3rd centuries AD.)Read more