Iotape
City in Cilicia Aspera, 9 km NW of Gazipaşa. Founded by Antiochos IV of Kommagene, but otherwise unknown to history. It is listed by Ptolemy, Hierokles, and the Notitiae, and perhaps by Pliny (HN 5.92). The name Aidap is applied solely to the site and evidently preserves the ancient name. The ruins are on a small promontory defended by a circuit wall and on the shore of a small bay below it to the E; the present highway passes through the site.
Conspicuous is a double row of large honorific statue bases facing each other across an ancient street. Numerous buildings, for the most part of poor quality, surviving in various states of collapse, include a structure with a number of vaulted rooms. A small stream, dry in summer, enters the bay. Above this on the E, beside the modern road, are the foundations of a modest temple dedicated by an inscription to Trajan. On the higher ground to the E is an extensive necropolis; most of the tombs are of squared blocks originally covered with stucco. They usually have a main chamber and antechamber and are in some cases enclosed in a peribolos.
BIBLIOGRAPHYR. Heberdey & A. Wilhelm, Reisen in Kilikien (1896) 147-48; R. Paribeni & P. Romanelli, MonAnt 23 (1914) 174f; J. Keil & A. Wilhelm, JOAI 18 (1915) Beibl. 111; G. E. Bean & T. B. Mitford, Journeys in Rough Cilicia in 1962 and 1963 (1965) 24-29; id., Journeys in Rough Cilicia 1964-1968 (1970) 149-52.
G. E. BEAN