Museum on the way in ancient Lycian city

ANTALYA - Doğan News Agency

The open-air museum will be constructed in Myra’s Roman granary.

Construction work has started on the establishment of the Lycian Museum in the southern province of Antalya’s Demre district. The open-air museum will be constructed in the Roman granary in the Andriake port of the ancient city and trade agora of Myra.

Ticket booths, administrative offices, cafes and toilets have been constructed under the consultancy of the head of the Myra-Andriake excavations and Akdeniz University Archaeology Department, Professor Nevzat Çevik.

As part of the project, which is expected to be finished on Nov. 25, 2013, a granary will be turned into a museum for the first time in Turkey. The Hadrian granary, which dates back to the Roman period in Andriake, will be the enclosed portion of the Lycian Museum. The granary, which was one of the largest in the Roman period, was constructed in 126 A.D. and is made up of seven rooms, each of which is 65 meters in length and 32 meters wide.

The new structures that will be revealed in the trade agora and the Andriake Port City will be the open-air sections of the museum, where the region’s artifacts will be displayed.

“Turkey will have a very important open-air museum,” said Çevik. “People will be able to visit the Lycian Museum here next year.”