The Anatolian peninsula, in present-day T\u00fcrkiye, was the cradle of various peoples in ancient times, greatly influenced by the Greeks.<\/p>\n
One of these peoples was the Lycians, who lived in southern Anatolia.<\/strong> They had their own language and alphabet, both derived from Greek. Few traces of it remain, especially in tombs. Their funerary monuments were one of their distinctive features,<\/strong> since they combined a Persian tradition - the construction of tombs in rock walls - with typical features of Greek architecture, such as pediments and Ionic capitals. They were tombs built at a certain height,<\/strong> perhaps for show and to avoid looters, but today there is nothing left inside them that can be studied by archaeologists.<\/p>\n Lycia was an influential region in its time.<\/strong> The Lycians were good archers and traders, and they lived in a mountainous region that made possible invasions difficult, which did not prevent them from being finally subdued by Alexander the Great. As a curiosity, the Lycian League functioned with a system of representation that served as inspiration for the current democracy of the United States<\/strong> when it was formed at the end of the 18th century. Another fact worth mentioning is that in a city of Lycia, Batara, Saint Nicholas of Bari was born<\/strong>, a Christian bishop whose figure is the one that gave rise to the current Santa Claus.<\/p>\n About this lost civilization, Street Gems<\/a> published an interesting video showing its ruins and explaining its features<\/strong>, briefly reviewing its history:<\/p>\n
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