Cave of the Seven Sleepers

This is east side of Ephesus but not within the ticketed area. It's a series of catacombs, part of the Roman city necropolis - only the highest nobles were buried within city limits. The area is free to access but a gate bars entry to the tombs. They were excavated in 1927 and findings are now in the Selçuk Ephesus museum. There's little to see here, the main attraction is the legend of the "Seven Sleepers", true believers who hid or were immured here circa 250 AD in a time of religious persecution. They re-emerged 300 years later, blinking in the sunlight to find Christianity blossomed into the official Roman religion, occasion for hallelujahs and high-fives. But these guys slept around - Ephesus is just one of seven sites with the same legend, from China to Tunisia. Best documented is the cave in al-Rajib district of Amman, Jordan, where according to the Surah al-Kahf (18th book of the Qur'an) the seven were accompanied by a dog, the one thing you will see here.