Of Turkey's 81 provinces only Hatay, a small but picturesque Turkish enclave bordered to the south and east by Syria and to the west by the Mediterranean, can claim such honor.

The movie was, of course, "Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade," starring Harrison Ford and Sean Connery, who were attempting to prevent the Holy Grail from falling into the hands of a bunch of cartoon-like Nazi villains. The plot of the movie is complete make-believe, but the setting is historical. In one of those "truth is stranger than fiction" episodes, there really was an independent, pint-sized Republic of Hatay, with its own flag and parliament, which lasted from September 1938 until June 1939, when it became a part of the Republic of Turkey following a referendum.

Unfortunately for Hatay's local tourism authorities, ‘’Last Crusade’’ was actually shot in Jordan's famous Petra valley, cutting off a potential source of income from hordes of Indiana Jones movie freaks and Ford groupies who might otherwise have made the pilgrimage to southeast Mediterranean Turkey. But the province, with its mix of fertile plain, high mountains, rolling hills, sandy beaches, a diverse ethnic mix, long history and arguably the best cuisine in the country, is one of the nation's most interesting. The administrative capital of Hatay, Antakya (ancient Antioch) with its wonderful mosaic museum, cave-church of St. Peter and wide range of hotels and restaurants, is the first and often only goal for visitors to the province -- but there is so much else to see round and about.

As you head into the province from the north, it's worth noting that one of the most important battles in history took place not far from the modern settlement of Dörtyol. Here, in 333 B.C., Alexander the Great defeated the Persian King Darius at the Battle of Issos. Over 110,000 of Darius' troops met their end here and the once mighty Persian Empire was fatally wounded. South again, near the town of Yakacık, are the remains of a fine Ottoman caravanserai and associated buildings, the Sokullu Mehmet Paşa complex, including a mosque and medrese (religious school). Twenty kilometers further south is a port city originally founded by Alexander after his victory at Issos and named, immodestly, after himself as Alexandria. This transmuted over time to Alexandretta, finally taking the name by which it is known today, İskenderun (actually, just the Turkish form of Alexander), when it became part of Turkey in 1939. Laurie, the eccentric and lovelorn heroine of Rose Macaulay's classic comic novel "The Towers of Trebizond," written in the 1950s, describes the town as a "charming pretty Frenchified town curving round the gulf, set with palm trees and very gay." Despite rapid growth and industrialization, İskenderun has retained much of this charm, with a broad seafront esplanade, still lined with palms, the dramatic backdrop of the lush Amanus mountain range, and a number of excellent restaurants. It has also retained traces of its cosmopolitan, Levantine past, with still functioning Greek Orthodox, Armenian and Catholic churches.

Reaching Antakya from the north requires crossing the Amanus range via the spectacular Belen Pass, some 700 meters above sea level. It's well known to bird lovers as it lies astride a major migration route, with early October the best time to see huge flocks of migrant birds heading south for the winter. Close by is the spectacular Bagras Castle, perched on a rocky outcrop above the village below. Controlling the "Crusader" route from Europe via Anatolia to the Holy Land in Palestine, it was once a major stronghold of the Knights Templar.

Just south of Antakya is Harbiye, ancient Daphne, from where many of the beautiful, intricately constructed mosaics on show in the archeological museum in Antakya were found, in what was a wealthy suburb of Antioch. Two of history's most famous lovers, Anthony and Cleopatra, honeymooned here while Daphne had a reputation for decadence in ancient times. Rose Macaulay's Laurie commented wryly on the place as it was in the 1950s. "We drove to the groves of Daphne, once the haunt of votaries of pleasure from Greece and Rome, very licentious and a perpetual festival of vice, so Vere and I went to see it, but it must have been better once, when all the temples and shrines and orgies were there."

Although there's not a great deal to be seen here now, it's a pleasantly wooded spot, suffused with the odor of the laurel bushes which grow here in abundance and are used to scent the wonderful, locally produced olive-oil soap. Indeed the Turkish word for laurel, defne, clearly derives from Daphne, in Greek mythology a nymph who, pursued by Apollo, was saved from the gods amorous attentions by her father, who turned her into a laurel tree at this very spot. There's a cool, splashing stream, tea-gardens and a spot or two for the harder stuff and is much favored by picnickers from the city.

The Romanized inhabitants of Daphne were famed for their licentiousness, but in the hills to the south and west of Antakya are the remains of the St. Simeon Monastery. Here, back in the fifth century, an early Christian, Simeon Stylites the Younger, took asceticism to new levels. Appalled by the decadence of Antioch and Daphne, he wandered into the hills outside the city and chained himself to the top of a pillar. All in all he spent some 25 years sitting atop progressively higher pillars (the final one was around 13 meters high) meditating and haranguing all-comers for their moral laxity. Pilgrims came from all over to see the holy hermit (you can still see the remains of the steps they climbed to consult the ascetic, who they believed was a conduit between God and mankind) and a monastery grew up around his pillar. There's little to be seen there now bar the stumpy, meter-high remains of the pillar and the tumbled remnants of the monastic buildings, but it's a beautiful, peaceful spot with fine views over the surrounding countryside and across to the blue waters of the Mediterranean.

Hatay is noted for its religious diversity, with Sunni Muslims, Alevis, Jews, Greek Orthodox Christians and Armenians living side by side in the province. Indeed, head towards Samandağ from the St. Simeon Monastery then up into the lower slopes of towering Musa Dağı (Moses Mountain) and you'll find Vakıflı, the only remaining rural Armenian community in Turkey. The Church of St. Asdvadzadzin in the center of the village is not particularly old, but has been restored quite recently and is worth a look. Samandağ itself is not particularly prepossessing, but a few kilometers beyond it is the modern village of Çevelik, in ancient times Seleucia Piera, the port city of Antioch. Apart from the vast expanse of beach here, the main point of interest is the impressive Titus-Vespasian Tunnel. Built during the reign of these two Roman emperors in the late first century A.D., the purpose of the 1400-meter-long tunnel, cut from solid rock by soldiers and prisoners, was to divert water from a nearby stream and stop it flooding the town. The settlement was founded, like Antioch itself, by one of Alexander the Great's successors, Seleucus, back in 300 B.C.

If you tire of Hatay's wealth of historical sites, you can always console yourself with its fabulous food, quite different from mainstream Turkish fare, displaying as it does a distinct Arab influence (hardly surprising given the proximity of Syria and the fact that Hatay was part of French-mandated Syria between World War I and World War II). Specialties range from pulse dishes like humus and bakla (a broad-bean puree) to muhamara (a spicy walnut, hot pepper and bulgur wheat dip) and from tuzlu tavuk (whole chicken baked in salt) to the delicious desert künefe (baked kadayıf wheat and cheese soaked in syrup).

Hatay is, at once, very Turkish, a little Arab and, as Laurie puts it in "The Towers of Trebizond," "quite Frenchified" -- and well worth a few days of anyone's time.