Travel Guide Knidos

This superb archaeological site presents ruins of the Hellenistic period. Knidos was a prestigious city of the Antiquity. Its prosperity, proved by the size of its treasure found in Delphi, allowed it to commission Praxiteles to make a statue of naked Aphrodite (a choice hardly usual at the time). This statue in marble from Paros, painted with such perfection that she seems to be made of flesh, is placed in a temple surrounded by trees. This work of Praxiteles, often reproduced, was transported by the Byzantines to Constantinople and destroyed in a fire. One of the most successful copies of the Aphrodite of Knidos is in the Vatican Museum.