Page 40 - Sarpedon’dan Keykubad’a Bir Zamanlar Antalya

According to the legend, Apollo’s priest at Delphi tells Laki-
os and Antiphemosis commanded to establish a sister city.
However, the seer tells Lakios that he must take the opposite
direction to that taken by his brother. At the same time, the or-
acle says that the Lakios ships will sink in a cape, that he will
walk north for a day from this cape where the sinking ships are
located, and that he will establish the city at the point where he
will arrive at sunset. Thereupon, Lakios, one of the two brothers,
sets out with his ships, following the order of the oracle. After
days of travel, the ships of Lakios sink at Cape Gelidonya, near
Adrasan. Seeing thise prophecy came true, Lakios then travels
north with his men. At the end of this one-day journey, Lakios’s
ship arrives at the point where Phaselis is located. Lakios, who
was impressed by the beauty of the geography they arrived in,
meets a shepherd named Kylabros here. He asks the shep-
herd who owns the land as he wants to buy it. Thereupon, the
shepherd says that the land belongs to him and states that he
can sell it to them. Surprised that this beautiful land belongs
to a shepherd, Lakios asks the shepherd if he wants barley
bread or salted fish in exchange for the land. Thereupon, the
shepherd Kylabros says, “I eat barley bread every day anyway,
my preference is for salted fish’. Thereupon, Lakios gives the
salted fish to the shepherd and in return builds the beautiful an-
cient city of Phaselis in this beautiful place he bought. So much
so that the people of Phaselis never forget the goodness of the
shepherd and in the following years they declared Kylabros
to be asemi-hero and they organized festivals in his name. So
much so that the people of Phaselis used to dedicate salted
fish to Kylabros every year in their offerings (Erhat 1996).
Today, the research and excavations at Phaselis are con-
ducted by Prof. Dr. Murat Arslan from Akdeniz University His-
tory department.

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