Mantha Zarmakoupi in Smithsonian Magazine

Archaeologists Discover Mosaics of Two Fighting Cupids and a Mysterious Inscription at an Ancient Greek City Hall

New research is shedding light on the bouleuterion building that once stood in the ancient city of Teos, located in present-day Turkey

Sonja Anderson | March 18, 2025 | Smithsonian Magazine

The ruins of ancient temples, roads, a harbor and a cistern for collecting rainwater lie near Turkey’s western coast. Some 2,000 years ago, these structures stood in the ancient city of Teos—a thriving metropolis across the sea from Athens.

Founded around the tenth century B.C.E., Teos grew into a populous “city of art” that “opened its doors to important philosophers and artists of antiquity,” according to Turkish Museums. The Greek historian Herodotus once called the city “the center of Ionia,” Greece’s territory in present-day Turkey.

Now, researchers from the University of Pennsylvania have learned new details about the city’s bouleuterion, its city council building. As Marilyn Perkins writes in Omnia, the university’s arts and sciences alumni magazine, researchers studied the timeline of the bouleuterion’s multi-phase construction, pieced together its “monumental” inscription and unearthed detailed mosaics depicting animals and dueling cupids. Funded by the Gerda Henkel Foundation, the project is a collaboration with the Teos Archaeological Project at Ankara University in Turkey.

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