Bodrum has two souls. On one side, it's the capital of glamour and partying on the Turkish coast. It's a bright white town of whitewashed houses with blue shutters and a marina full of yachts. Its streets are packed with bars and restaurants, and its beaches and clubs never stop in summer. It has a cosmopolitan atmosphere that draws the Turkish jet set and travellers from all over Europe alike. It's no surprise they call it 'the Saint-Tropez of the Aegean'. When night falls, Cumhuriyet street, by the sea, turns into a never-ending party.
On the other side, beneath the summer-resort surface lies thousands of years of history. This was ancient Halicarnassus, one of the great cities of the Greek world and birthplace of Herodotus, the 'father of History'. It was also home to one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World: the Mausoleum at Halicarnassus, the colossal tomb of King Mausolus that gave its name to every mausoleum since. Towering over the harbour is St. Peter's Castle, an imposing fortress built by the Crusader knights with stones from that same Mausoleum. Today it houses one of the best museums of underwater archaeology in the world.
This guide helps you enjoy both sides of Bodrum. There's the cultural side (the castle and its museum, the remains of the Mausoleum, the ancient theatre) and the sea-and-fun side (the best beaches and villages on the peninsula, gulet trips, nightlife). We tell you how to get around, what things cost, when to go depending on what you're looking for, and how to escape the summer crowds to quieter coves and villages. Bodrum is sun, sea, partying and history, all mixed together under the Aegean light.
Bodrum is the heir to ancient Halicarnassus, founded by Dorian Greek settlers and famous for two reasons. First, it was the birthplace of Herodotus (5th century BC), considered the 'father of History' for his work on the Greco-Persian Wars. Second, it was home to the Mausoleum at Halicarnassus, the monumental tomb that Artemisia II had built in the 4th century BC for her husband (and brother) King Mausolus, the Persian satrap of Caria. It was one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, and its name gave us the word 'mausoleum'. Alexander the Great took the city in 334 BC after a hard siege. The Mausoleum survived more than a thousand years until earthquakes brought it down. In the 15th century the Knights Hospitaller used its stones to build St. Peter's Castle, which still dominates the harbour. Under the Ottomans, Bodrum was a quiet village of fishermen and sponge divers. In the 20th century it turned into the major holiday and nightlife destination it is today. We tell its full story, from Herodotus to the Riviera, on our history page.
Read the full history ↓The coast where Greek philosophy was born and where Ephesus, Smyrna and Halicarnassus shone: a shoreline of Ionian cities, ancient wonders and the trauma of 1922.
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Origins, formation and what the sources say.
Long before Bodrum became a byword for yachts and parties, this was the site of Halicarnassus, one of the most remarkable cities of the Greek world. Founded by Dorian settlers around the first millennium BC on a sheltered bay on the coast of Caria (south-western Anatolia), Halicarnassus was for centuries a thriving Greek port city. It also sat on the frontier with the Persian and Anatolian worlds, where several civilisations met.
Its most famous son was born here in the 5th century BC: Herodotus of Halicarnassus, known to later generations as 'the father of History'. In his famous 'Histories', Herodotus told the story of the wars between the Greeks and the Persians (the Persian Wars). Along the way he described the peoples, customs, lands and legends of the whole known world of his time, from Egypt to Scythia. He was the first to investigate and recount past events systematically, looking for causes and comparing different versions instead of simply repeating myths. That's why he is considered the founder of Western historical writing. Bodrum is proud to be Herodotus's birthplace and makes a point of saying so.
In Herodotus's day, Halicarnassus was ruled by a remarkable queen, Artemisia I. She fought on the Persian side against the Greeks at the naval Battle of Salamis (479 BC), and King Xerxes himself admired her courage. Although the city was Greek in culture, it belonged to the vast Persian Empire and was governed by local dynasties of satraps (governors). One of those dynasties was about to give Halicarnassus its most famous monument.
In the 4th century BC, Halicarnassus enjoyed its golden age under Mausolus, the Persian satrap of Caria. He made the city his capital and filled it with city walls, palaces, temples and Hellenistic splendour. When Mausolus died in 353 BC, his grieving wife Artemisia II (who was also his sister, as was the dynastic custom in the region) decided to build the most magnificent tomb ever made in his honour.
The result was the Mausoleum of Halicarnassus, a huge tomb about 45 metres high that blended Greek, Lycian and Egyptian styles. A tall rectangular base supported an Ionic colonnade, topped by a stepped pyramid. At the very top stood a gigantic marble quadriga (a chariot drawn by four horses) carrying statues of the king and queen. The finest Greek architects and sculptors of the day worked on its decoration and covered it in reliefs and statues of exceptional quality. Legend has it that Artemisia, inconsolable, mixed her husband's ashes with wine and drank them, becoming his living tomb herself. She is said to have died of grief shortly afterwards, before the work was finished.
The Mausoleum was so magnificent and so famous that it was counted among the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. Its name, taken from Mausolus, has been used ever since for any monumental tomb. In 334 BC, Alexander the Great besieged and took Halicarnassus during his campaign against the Persian Empire, in one of the toughest sieges of his advance through Anatolia. The Mausoleum still stood, however, and Greeks, Romans and travellers admired it for centuries as a testament to a queen's love and to the genius of Greek artists.
The Mausoleum survived for more than 1,500 years, but it was not immune to the earthquakes that shake this region. Between the 12th and 15th centuries, a series of earthquakes damaged and toppled the great tomb until it was reduced to ruins. It disappeared completely in the early 15th century, with the arrival of the Knights Hospitaller of St John. After the Crusades, this Christian military order was based on the nearby island of Rhodes.
Around 1402, the Hospitallers built a powerful fortress on the peninsula overlooking the harbour of ancient Halicarnassus and named it the Castle of St Peter (Castrum Sancti Petri). Over time, 'Petrum' would give the town its Turkish name, Bodrum. To build and strengthen the castle throughout the 15th century, the knights used the ruins of the Mausoleum as a quarry. They reused its stone blocks, its marble and even some of its reliefs, which you can still see set into the castle walls today. Stone by stone, a wonder of the ancient world became a medieval fortress.
For more than a century, the Castle of St Peter was a Christian stronghold on the Anatolian coast, a refuge for pilgrims and a strategic outpost against the Ottoman advance. But its fate was tied to that of Rhodes. When Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent conquered Rhodes in 1522, the Hospitallers surrendered and also left Bodrum, which passed to the Ottoman Empire in 1523. Under Ottoman rule, the fortress lost its military importance, and for centuries the place was little more than a modest village.
Through the centuries of Ottoman rule and the first decades of the Republic of Turkey, Bodrum was a quiet, out-of-the-way village of fishermen and sponge divers, with none of the glamour it is known for today. Its economy depended on the sea: fishing and, above all, harvesting natural sponges from the seabed. It was hard, dangerous work, and it shaped village life for generations. It was a remote, humble corner of the Aegean coast.
An unusual episode helped shape its identity. In 1925, the Turkish writer and dissident Cevat Şakir Kabaağaçlı was exiled to Bodrum as a political punishment. Far from becoming bitter, he was captivated by the place and its people. He fell in love with the village and wrote about it under the pen name 'the Fisherman of Halicarnassus' (Halikarnas Balıkçısı). His books made Bodrum known, celebrated its beauty and ancient history, and drew intellectuals and artists. They planted the seed of its future appeal.
The big change came from the 1960s onwards, and above all in the 1980s and 1990s, with the tourism boom. Bodrum became one of the most fashionable destinations in the Mediterranean. Its whitewashed houses, its castle, its bays with crystal-clear water and its bohemian vibe (later more and more chic) drew the Turkish middle class, the jet set and travellers from all over Europe. The 'Bodrum' brand was born: yacht marinas, legendary clubs such as the Halikarnas, beach clubs, luxury hotels and a nightlife that earned it the nickname 'the Turkish Saint-Tropez'.
Today Bodrum lives off this double legacy. It is one of the country's great centres for nightlife, summer holidays and glamour, full of the energy of Mediterranean tourism. It also holds an exceptional history going back thousands of years: it is the city of Herodotus, of the Mausoleum and of the Crusaders' castle. You can spend the morning among the ruins of one of the Seven Wonders and the wreck of a Bronze Age ship, then spend the night dancing by the sea. Few places bring the ancient past and holiday life together so intensely under the same Aegean light.
