ANTALYA

Excavations at the 3,000-year-old Syedra ancient city, about 20 kilometers (12.4 miles) east of Alanya in Türkiye’s Antalya province, show the site was a major olive oil production hub during the Hellenistic and Roman periods, with nearly 20 workshops uncovered so far and more than 100 identified citywide.

Researchers say the findings indicate Syedra was not only a regional producer but one of the Mediterranean’s key suppliers in antiquity, challenging earlier assumptions about the city’s economic role.

The work is being carried out by Alanya Alaaddin Keykubat University under the Culture and Tourism Ministry’s “Heritage for the Future” project, which accelerated efforts after systematic excavations began in 2019.

Speaking to Anadolu Agency, excavation director Professor Ertug Ergurer said the findings highlight the city’s industrial scale.

"Through excavations, we have uncovered nearly 20 olive oil workshops. Beyond that, we have identified over 100 such workshops across the entire ancient city. This indicates very intensive olive oil production here," he said.

Researchers say almost every structure in Syedra contains an olive oil or other production workshop beneath it, with large storage vessels known as “pithoi” used for keeping olive oil.

Ergurer said the placement of the workshops is unusual.

"The presence of olive oil workshops within the city was intriguing for us. Typically, production occurs outside the city, beyond the walls. Here, however, they are under nearly every building, which is noteworthy. This shows that olive oil production was carried out on a massive scale."

According to the excavation team, the volume of production suggests goods were exported across the Mediterranean, including to North Africa and the Levant, rather than serving only local needs.

Visitors to the site can observe demonstrations of ancient production methods with olives crushed, pressed using wooden lever systems and mechanisms, and transferred into storage containers before being moved to larger pithoi.

Archaeologists note that olive cultivation in the Eastern Mediterranean dates back to around 6000 BCE and spread widely by the Bronze Age, with the Mediterranean basin — including Türkiye’s coastal regions — remaining a core production and trade area for millennia.