Ephesus

A major port city and cultural crossroads of Ionia, home to the Temple of Artemis, one of the seven wonders of the ancient world. Heraclitus was born into its old royal family and renounced his hereditary title to think instead. He is said to have deposited his book in the great temple: some say to keep it from the crowd, others so that only those worthy of it would climb the steps to read it.

Ephesus was one of the great ports of the ancient world, crowded with merchants, priests, and pilgrims arriving to see the Temple of Artemis, one of the Seven Wonders. The city smelled of incense, dye, and the sea. Heraclitus was born here around 535 BCE into an aristocratic family with hereditary rights to a religious office he reportedly gave away in contempt. He was difficult, reclusive, and wrote in riddles that confused his contemporaries and still challenge readers now. He argued that fire is the fundamental substance, that opposites are identical, and that the world follows a hidden logic he called the Logos. He distrusted the crowd, distrusted the senses, and distrusted most other philosophers. When he fell ill he rubbed himself with dung, following some theory of his own, and died.