Nereid Monument

The Nereid Monument is a sculptured tomb from Xanthos in classical period Lycia, close to present-day Fethiye in Mugla Province, Turkey. It took the form of a Greek temple on top of a base decorated with sculpted friezes, and is thought to have been built in the early fourth century BC as a tomb for Arbinas (Lycian: Erbbina, or Erbinna), the Xanthian dynast who ruled western Lycia.

The tomb is thought to have stood until the Byzantine era before falling into ruin. The ruins were rediscovered by British traveller Charles Fellows in the early 1840s. Fellows had them shipped to the British Museum: there some of them have been reconstructed to show what the East façade of the monument would have looked like.

Lycia was conquered by Harpagus for the Achaemenid Persian Empire in approximately 540 BC, and his conquest of Xanthos is described by both Herodotus and Appian. For much of the 5th century BC, Athens dominated the lands bordering the Aegean Sea, and many of them, including Lycia, were paying protection money into the exchequer of the Athenian maritime empire, the Delian League, and land tax to the Persians. There is evidence of a fire that destroyed the wooden tombs and temples of Xanthos in around 470 BC. This fire was probably caused by Cimon of Athens when he attacked the sacred citadel in retaliation for the destruction of the Athenian Acropolis by the Persians and their allies, including the Lycians, in 480 BC. The Xanthians, under their dynast, Kuprilli, rebuilt the buildings in stone.

In around 440 BC, Kheriga, Kuprilli's grandson, succeeded him, and in turn Kheriga's brother, Kherei, is thought to have succeeded him in around 410 BC. Arbinas was Kheriga's son, but had to take Xanthos and other Lycian cities by force of arms in around 390 BC in order to reclaim his birthright. Arbinas then ruled Western Lycia from Xanthos, and he built the Nereid Monument as his tomb. He died in around 370BC.

...
Wikipedia