The city of Antalya was formerly founded 80 km to the east, on the location of today's Side of Selimiye village. Side meant pomegranate in the old language. That was a city with a strong castle and busy sea port on the Mediteranean, built by the local people. Attalos II, the King of Bergama spent much effort to conquer the famous city Side, two thousand years ago. And as he could not succeed, he founded another city on the present location of Antalya . This time the city was called “Attaleia” referring to its founder, King Attalos. With time, that name changed to Adalya and then to Antalya .

After the founding of Antalya , Side began to decline, whereas the new city Antalya began to prosper, and later it became one of the most famous Southern Anatolian sea trade ports on the Mediterranean sea .

The lands surrounding Antalya are full of ruins of old cities. Side, Perge, Termessos, Demre are the most famous ones. The Aspendos Theater that is called “ Balkiz Palace ” by the folk, located between Side and Antalya is considered to be an architectural marvel. As it is known, that theater was built by an architect called Zenon during the Roman era. That giant construction can host about fifteen thousand people. Several legends and stories are told about the Aspendos Theater. Here is one of them:

Once upon a time, there was a king in the city of Aspendos and his daughter Belkis, a very beautiful girl, who was incomparable to anyone. Countless famous people from near and distant countries wanted to marry that girl. But the king declared that he would give his daughter to the artist who would produce the best work od art and thus held a contest. Philosophers, poets, musicians, architects... All kinds of artists joined that contest, showing their best work to the king.

One of the architects constructed the Aspendos aquaducts - its ruins can still be seen today- and the king liked them. He decided to give his daughter to that architect. Meanwhile he received a message, informing him that another architect had built a theater that was as grand as a palace. The king went there to have a look. While he was sitting in the theater box, he heard the following whisper: “The king's daughter shall be mine.” The king could not understand from where the voice was coming, then he found out that it belonged to the man standing alone on the stage. That was the architect of the theater. The acoustics was designed so well that a whisper on the stage could be easily heard from every direction. The king said “Congratulations!” and gave his dearest Belkis to that architect. Their wedding was held at the theater which lasted for forty days and nights. The folk called Belkis 'Balkiz' [meaning Honey Girl] and the theater was known locally as “The Palace of Balkiz.”