MYSIA: PERGAMUM

MYSIA: PERGAMUM

After leaving Ayvalık we return to highvvay E87/550 and con-tinue driving tovvard izmir, as we enter the part of ancient Mysia that extends eastvvard from the Aegean south of the Troad. The highway takes us souüı-southeast along the coast, with the moun-tains of Lesbos in view to our right across the strait. About 38 lometers from Ayvalık there is a turnoff to the right for Dikilli, a ittle port vvhere there is a car ferry service to Lesbos.
The site of ancient Atarnaeus is a short distance to the northeast f the Dikili turnoff. Atarnaeus is mentioned twice by Herodotus, e first time in connection wiuı an incident that took place there i. 510 B.C, and the second as being one of the places through hich Xerxes marched his army on the way from Sardis to the ellespont in 480 B.C. During the mid-fourth century B.C. the city was controlled by Hermeias, the Tyrant of Atarnaeus, and after his death in 344 B.C. it reverted to Persian nıle for a decade before being freed by Alexander the Great. Atarnaeus remained indepen-dent throughout the Hellenistic period, but then under Roman rule it was absorbed in the territory of Pergamum, and by the second century A.D. it had declined to the status of a village. Ali that remains of Atarnaeus are parts of the supporting wall of its citadel and fragments of the outer defense wall of the city.
Beyond the Dikili turnoff the highway leaves the coast and turns eastward. We then turn left from the highvvay on to the road for Bergama, which is eight kilometers to the east up the valley of the Bakır Çayı, the River Caicus of antiquity.
Bergama is a Turkish town that has grown up around the ruins of ancient Pergamum. The oldest of these ruins, dating from the Hellenistic period, are on the mountain that rises just to the north of Bergama, while the remains of Roman Pergamum are in the town


itself. The setting of the Hellenistic city is spectacular, its acropolis situated on the peak of the mountain more than 350 meters above the surrounding plain. This gigantic spire of rock rises precipi-tously from the plain on three sides, flanked by two tributaries of the Caicus, with the Selinus flowing around the mountain to the west and the Cetius to the east. AH of these features made this a natural fortress controlling the Caicus valley, the heart of vvhat came to be the Pergamene kingdom.
The oldest pottery shards found on the acropolis of Pergamum date from the eighth century B.C. These remains indicate that the first settlers on the acropolis were not Greeks, but by the beginning of historic times the settlement here had become thoroughly Helle-nized. The Greek form of its name—Pergamos—means the inner citadel of a city, so used by Homer in referring to Troy.
There are a number of myths concerning the origin of Pergamum and the Pergamene kingdom. According to one of these myths, the first ruler of Mysia was Teuthras, who gave his name to the king­dom of Teuthrania and the capital of the same name, vvhich was located farther down the Caicus valley to the southwest. Another myth concerns the princess Auge, daughter of King Aleos of Tegea, who was disovvned by her father after she was seduced by Heracles and gave birth to the god's son, Telephus. According to Pausanias, in his Guide to Greece, Aleos locked Auge and Telephus in a trunk and threvv them into the sea, after vvhich they floated ali the way to the northern Aegean coast of Asia Minör. There they vvere washed up at the mouth of the Caicus river and found by Teuthras, who married Auge and adopted Telephus as his son. Then when Teuthras died Telephus succeeded him as King of Teuthrania. One of the fabled exploits of Telephus was his defeat of an Achaian army led by Agamemnon, who in this version of the myth had mistakenly vvandered into Teuthrania before he besieged Troy, probably a folk memory of an early Hellenic invasion of northwestern Anatolia, at some unknovvn time just prior to the dawn of recorded history.
• The first recorded mention of Pergamum is by Xenophon in the last chapter of his Anabasis, where he describes how the Ten Thou-





The Acropolis at Pergamum. Allom Prim
sand made their way south "to the plain of Caicus, and so reached Pergamum and Mysia." This was in the spring of 399 B.C., when the remnants of the Ten Thousand joined forces vvith the Spartan general Thibron, who had come to aid the Greek cities of Asia Minör in a revolt against the Persian satrap, or govemor, Tissa-phemes. At Pergamum Xenophon was entertained by the widow Hellas, whose late husband Gongylus had been ruler of a small principality in the Caicus valley, and which after his death had been divided by his two sons. Hellas, realizing that her guests were in need of money, suggested that Xenophon and his men attack the fortified estate of a local Persian nobleman, which they succeeded in doing on their second attempt. Meanwhile Thibron had arrived in Pergamum, vvhereupon Xenophon gave över to him command of the Ten Thousand, and at the same time several Greek dynasts in the Caicus valley voluntarily surrendered to the Spartan general. Xenophon ends The Anabasis at this point, having given us a glimpse of life in the Caicus valley at the beginning of the fourth century B.C.
Pergamum appears briefly in history önce again in the last quar-ter of the fourth century B.C. as a footnote to the story of Alexander the Great. After Alexander's victory at the battle of the Issus in 333 B.C, he took as his mistress the Persian princess Barsine. Seven years later she bore him a son named Heracles. Alexander sent Barsine and her son back to Pergamum, where they remained for nearly two decades, until Heracles was put to death on the orders of Antipater, the regent of Macedonia.
Aside from these two minör incidents, Pergamum does not ap-pear in the full light of history until the end of the second decade of the third century B.C. it emerged then as an independent state after the wars of the Diadochi, the successors of Alexander. When Antigonus lost his life at Üıe battle of Ipsus in 301 B.C, ali of Asia Minör fell under the control of Lysimachus, King of Thrace. Soon aftenvards Lysimachus appointed a Paphlagonian named Philetaerus to be his govemor at Pergamum, leaving in his charge a İarge part of the royal treasury. After Lysimachus was defeated and killed in 281 B.C, Philetaerus managed to retain his position as govemor at Pergamum, keepıng the huge sum of money that had been depos-ited with him and using it for his own purposes. He then estab-lished an independent principality with its capital at Pergamum and adorned it with temples and ofher public buildings. He also made generous loans to neighboring cities to maintain good relations with them. At the same time he developed the Pergamene lands in the Caicus valley and created an army to defend his realm. Philetaerus died in 263 B.C. and was succeeded by his nephevv Eumenes, whom he had adopted as his son.
The year after his succession Eumenes defeated the Seleucid
g Antiochus I in a battle near Sardis. This preserved the inde-
dence of Pergamum from the Seleucid kingdom, the vast realm
ıat had been founded in Syria by the Macedonian general Seleucus
Nicator, another of Alexander's successors. During the two de-
des following this victory Eumenes enlarged his principality to
include the whole of the Caicus valley and most of the adjacent
Aegean coast. Eumenes ruled until his death in 241 B.C. and was



succeeded by his adopted son Attalus, a grandnephevv of Philetaerus. Attalus began his reign with a great victory över the Gauls, the barbaric Celtic tribespeople who had crossed över from Europe in 278 B.C. and for the next generation terrorized western Asia Mi­nör. The Roman historian Livy vvrites thus of the Gauls and their defeat by Attalus in Book XXXVIII of his History:
...they [the Gauls] levied tribute throughout every part of Asia this side of the Taurus...and so great was the fear of their name...that even the kings of Syria [the Seleucids] did not refuse to pay them tribute. The fırst of ali the inhabitants of Asia who ventured a refusal was Attalus...and beyond the expectation of ali, fortune favoured his bold undertaking. He defeated them in a pitched battle.
This broke the power of the Gauls, ending forever the menace they had posed for the Greek cities of western Asia Minör. His great triumph earned Attalus üıe name of Soter, or Saviour, and led him to cali himself King of Pergamum, the fırst of the Attalid dynasty to assume that tide. He ruled for 44 years, the longest reign in the Attalid dynasty. Attalus spent much of this time in \varfare vvith the Seleucid kings of Syria, struggling for supremacy in Asia Minör, but by the time he died in 197 B.C. the boundaries of Pergamum were much the same as when he began his reign.
Attalus had entered into good relations vvith Rome, and when this policy was continued by his son and successor, Eumenes II, it soon resulted in rich benefits for the Pergamene kingdom. A Ro­man army under Scipio Africanus invaded Asia Minör in 190 B.C, joining forces vvith Eumenes and his troops in an effort to break the povver of the Seleucid kingdom, then ruled by Antiochus III. Scipio and Eumenes decisively defeated Antiochus at the battle of Magne-sia early in 189 B.C, after vvhich most of the former Seleucid possessions in Asia Minör vvere avvarded by Rome to Pergamum. The territory of the Pergamene kingdom vvas thus greatly increased, stretching along the Aegean coast from the Hellespont to the Maeander River, including also the islands of Euboea, Aegina and
Andros. The territory in the interior comprised most of Asia Minör vvest of Ancyrathe—modern Ankara, extending from the Black Sea and the Sea of Marmara south to the Mediterranean. As the histo­rian Polybius noted, Eumenes succeeded his father "in a kingdom reduced to a fevv petty tovvns, but this he raised to the level of the largest dynasties of his day." Eumenes used the vast vvealth of this huge kingdom to adom his capital vvith temples and other public buildings, including the famous library of Pergamum. During his reign Pergamum emerged as one of the leading cultural centers in the Greek vvorld, surpassed only by Athens and Alexandria. it vvas a focal point for Üıe advancement of Hellenism in Asia Minör. The city vvas also renovvned for its school of sculpture, vvhich produced some of the supreme masterpieces of Hellenistic art—works such as the "Dying Gaul," novv in the Capitoline Museum in Rome.
Eumenes died in 159 B.C. and vvas succeeded by his brother Attalus II, vvho ruled until 138 B.C Attalus continued the policies of his late brother, particularly the Pergamene alüance vvith Rome. He fought a long and difficult war against Nicomedes II of Bithynia, in vvhich Pergamum eventually emerged victorious. Attalus vvas also a great builder and patron of the arts. He is remembered today principally for the magnificent edifıce mat he endovved in Ath­ens—the Stoa of Attalus, vvhich has novv been fully restored. it is a fıtting monument to the greatness of Pergamum in its golden age.
But the golden age did not long outlive Attalus II. He vvas succeeded in 138 B.C. by his vveak and eccentric nephevv, Attalus III, vvho neglected affairs of state to dabble in alchemy and botany and allovved his kingdom to be dominated by Rome. Tovvard the end of his life Roman povver had grovvn so great that there seemed little future for an independent realm in vvestern Asia Minör, and so in his last vvill and testament Attalus bequeathed his kingdom to Rome. When Attalus died in 133 B.C. his bequest vvas quickly accepted by the Roman Senate. But then a pretender named Aristönicus appeared on the scene, claiming to be a bastard son of Eumenes II, and many Pergamenes enlisted in his cause. A three-year vvar foilovved before the Romans fınally defeated Aristönicus,


who was captured and sent as a prisoner to Rome. Soon aftenvards he was strangled. Rome then incorporated the Pergamene kingdom into the newly organized province of Asia, which came into being in 129 B.C.
Pergamum prospered under Roman rule, becoming an. impor-tant center of trade. This led to a great increase in its population, which at its peak in the mid-second century A.D. numbered some 150,000, as the city spread out on to the plain to the south of the acropolis hill. A number of monumental edifices were erected in the lower city at this time, most notably the great healing shrine known as the Asclepieum, where the great physician Galen re-ceived his training and wrote the first of his medical treatises. But then in the third century the fortunes of Pergamum began to de-cline, as other cities in vvestem Asia Minör began to surpass it in trade and commerce. Nevertheless, Pergamum continued to be one of the cultural centers of the Graeco-Roman world. Julian the Apos-tate studied philosophy here in 351, a decade before he began his reign as emperor (361-63), indicating that ancient Greek culture was stili alive in Pergamum at that late date. But Christianiry had already struck its roots in Pergamum by then, for it was the site of a bishopric, one of the Seven Churches of Revelation. As the Evan-gelist, vvriting in the last years of the first Christian century, says in Revelation 2:12-13:
And to the angel of the chıırch in Pergamos write: "These things saieth he which hath the sharp svvord with two edges. I know thy works and where thou dwellest, even where Satan's throne is: and thou holdest my name, and hast not denied my faith, even in those days when Antipas was my faithful nıartyr, who was slain among you, where Satan dvvelleth."
Like ali of the other ancient cities of western Asia Minör, Pergamum was destroyed during the Persian and Arab invasions of the seventh and eighth centuries. it survived on a much smaller scale through the medieval period, captured in turn by the Crusad-
ers, Byzantines, Selçuks and then the Ottomans, who under Orhan Gazi took the city in 1336. Known to the Turks as Bergama, the lower city on the plain revived under Ottoman rule and became the lively town one sees today. The ruins of the ancient city were first excavated in 1878 by the German Archaeological Society under the direction of Cari Humann and Alexander Conze, a project that continues to the present day.
Our route takes us through the center of Bergama and then across the Bergama Çayı, the River Selinus of antiquity. On the other side of the bridge we come to the extraordinary edifice known as Kızıl Avlu, the Red Court. The building takes its name from the red brick with which it is constructed; this was originally revetted with colored marble, of which only bands of molding and blocks of consoles remain. This enormous structure, which together with its courtyard covered an area originally measuring 260 by 100 meters, was excavated by the Germans in the years 1927-38. Much of its court is stili hidden under the surrounding houses of the town. it is built directly över the river, vvhich flows diagonally under the court­yard through a large double tunnel. The Red Court has been identi-fied as a temple dedicated to the Egyptian deities Serapis, Isis and Harpocrates, and is dated to the first half of the second century A.D. During the early Byzantine period it was converted into a Byzantine church dedicated to St. John the Apostle. The main struc­ture consists of a monumental basilica measuring 60 by 26 meters ııd surviving up to a height of 19 meters. This is flanked by two cular tovvers fronted by courtyards surrounded on three sides by as, with an outer courtyard to the west 200 meters long and 100 ters wide. The great entryway of the main structure is seven ters wıde and 14 meters high. it opens into the marble-paved basilica, in whose center there is a shallovv marble basin önce used r ritual ablutions. Behind the basin there is a podium, 1.5 meters igh, that supported the base of ah enormous ten-meter-high cult statue of Serapis.
The high priest of Serapis approached this base via a subterra-nean passageway, after vvhich he made his way up inside the statue
to speak as if his was the voice of the god himself, uttering oracles. Serapis, god of the undenvorld, was worshipped here along with his associated goddess Isis and the god Harpocrates. On the west side of the courtyard there are a number of ancient architectural fragments, including several with inscriptions in Hebrevv, as well as some Jewish gravestones from the Ottoman period.
After leaving the Red Court we follovv signposts that direct us to the acropolis of ancient Pergamum, driving along a steep road that winds up to a car park within a short walk of the mountain's summit.
The ruins on the summit comprise the very oldest part of Pergamum, the citadel of the ancient city. During the Attalid period the citadel enclosed the royal palace, the theater, the arsenal, and several of the city's most important religious shrines. These institu-tions gave the citadel a sacred and ceremonial aura, in contrast to the more public character of the quarter farther down the mountain, which might be termed the middle city, to distinguish it from the lovver city of Roman times on the plain belovv. The citadel walls date from the late fifth or early fourth century B.C. Philetaerus presumably restored the fortifications of the citadel vvhen he took control of Pergamum, erecting vvithin it a palace that would be enlarged by his successors in the Attalid dynasty. Eumenes I ex-tended the defense walls of the city southward in two more or Iess parallel lines to the plain below, enclosing the new quarter that had developed during the first century of Attalid rule.
The pathvvay from the car park leads to what was önce the gateway of the upper city, near the southeastern comer of the city. Just outside the gateway we see on our left the remains of a heroon. This was a peristyle building, that is, with a surrounding colon-nade. it was probably dedicated to Attalus I and Eumenes n, vvho after their death were raised to the status of deified heroes.
We now pass through the remains of the propylon, the monu-mental gatevvay to the citadel, erected by Eumenes II. inside the propylon an ancient street leads out to the north end of the narrow-ing citadel. On the right side of the street we pass a series of







foundations that have been identifıed as belonging to the palaces of the Attalid kings. There are fıve palaces in ali, and each öne of these has been attributed to one of the Pergamene rulers, partly on the basis of objects found in them and partly by conjecture. The first of these that we pass has been attributed to Eumenes n, fol-lowed in turn by those of Attalus II, Eumenes I, Attalus I, and finally that of Philetaerus.
Behind the palaces on the right side of the street we see first the remains of a complex of Hellenistic houses, and then a barracks and a defense tower. Ali these structures were undoubtedly used by the garrison of the citadel, whose arsenal formed a walled enclo-sure at the long and narrovv northem end of the acropolis.
The principal sanctuaries of the upper city are ali on the precipi-tous western side of the acropolis, arrayed in an are above the theater. At the northern end of this are we see the newly restored Trajaneum, a Corinthian temple built for the deified emperor Trajan (r. 98-117). it was completed ca. 125 by his successor Hadrian, who after his death in 138 was also vvorshipped in this sanetuary. The Trajaneum is of the type known as hexastyle peripteral, with six columns at the ends and nine along the sides, and with a pair of columns in antis in its pronaos. The temple stands in the center of a vast temenos, or sacred enelosure—an area measuring some 60 by 80 meters, bordered on its sides and rear by tovvering colonnades. The columns to the rear stand on a retaining wall five meters high, so that the colonnade would be visible from the theater terrace belovv. The reereeted columns are crowned with several varieties of palm leaf capitals, which are late variants of the so-called Pergamene capital. Colossal cult statues of Trajan and Hadrian stood at the rear of the temenos flanking the temple. The heads of the statues of both emperors were discovered early in the excavations and are preserved in the Pergamum Museum in Berlin.
Direcüy above the central axis of the theater we see the ruins of the temple of Athena Polias Nikephorus, the Bringer of Victory to the City. Ali that remains of the temple is its crepidoma, or stepped platform. There is reason to believe that Zeus was vvorshipped here




along with Athena. This is the oldest extant temple in Pergamum, dating from the early third century B.C. it is one of the rare Doric temples in Asia Minör, a peripteros with six columns at its ends and ten along its sides. it has two columns in antis in both its pronaos and its opisthodomos, or rear porch. its cella is divided by a wall into two equal chambers. The temple stood at the öpen front end of a temple nearly as large as that of the Trajaneum, bordered on the other three sides by two-storied stoas, in each of which the lower story was in the Doric order and the upper one in the lonic. These stoas were later additions; the one on the north was erected by Eumenes II, while those on the south and east sides were prob-ably built later in the second century B.C. The magnificent two-storied propylon was at the south end of the east stoa. Within the pediment of this entryvvay was a frieze that included sculptures of the owl of Athena and the eagle of Zeus, reassembled in the Berlin Museum from fragments discovered on the site. The double-aisled northern stoa had on its lower story a central colonnade with Pergamene capitals. The marble parapets of the upper stories were decorated with reliefs representing the captured vveapons and chari-ots of conquered enemies, most notably the Gauls. Within the temenos there stood a number of bronze statues on marble bases, most of them commemorating the great victory that Attalus I won över the Gauls at the beginning of his reign. A number of these bronzes were later copied in marble, the most famous being the "Dying Gaul."
Adjoining the temenos of Athena on the south are the remains of the celebrated Library of Pergamum, built by Eumenes U at the same time as he erected the north stoa of the temple. The library, which was dedicated to Athena, the goddess of wisdom, was ap-proached through the upper stories of the stoa. According to an-cient sources, the Pergamene library possessed some 200,000 scrolls. This means that most of these works must have been stored else-where, for it is estimated that the rooms here had space for less than a tenth of that number. These scrolls were made of parchment, an invention attributed to both the Pergamenes and the Ionian
Greeks, replacing the papyrus used by the Egyptians. The fame of the Pergamene library rivalled that of Alexandria, a tribute to the love of learning of the Attalid kings, who were known throughout the Greek world as patrons of scholarship. Apollonius of Perge, one of the greatest mathematicians of the Hellenistic period, stud-ied for a time at Pergamum as a guest of Attalus I, to whom he dedicated some of his works. The fate of the Pergamene library after the Attalid period is uncertain. Mark Antony promised to give it to Cleopatra to make up for the destruction of the library at Alexandria, but it is not known vvhether he ever did so. it would appear that most if not ali of the collection remained at Pergamum, for the city continued to be a great center of learning up until late antiquity. This would not have been possible vvithout the full re-sources of the library.
The reading room of the library is the largest of the four extant chambers. One can stili see there the wall sockets that supported the shelves where the scroll collection was kept. Also visible is a pedestal ıhal orıce supported a large statue of Athena. The pedestal
was originally three meters in height and the statue itself was three and one-half meters tali, giving one some idea of the grand dimen-sions of the room. The statue, which is now preserved in the Berlin Museum, is a marble copy in reduced size of the colossal chryselephantine (gold and ivory) cult figüre of Athena Parthenos, the Virgin Goddess, which stood in the Parthenon of Athens, a work of the great sculptor Pheidias.
Just to the south of Athena's sanctuary are the remains of a Hellenistic stoa. South of that is the great Altar of Zeus, of which only the stepped platform remains. The altar was unearthed by Cari Humarın in 1881 and was later reconstructed in the Berlin Museum from fragments found on the site. it remains one of the supreme masterpieces of Hellenistic architecture and art.
The Altar of Zeus was built by Eumenes II soon after his vic-tory över Antiochus III at the battle of Magnesia in 189 B.C., and commemorates his own victory and the earlier triumph of Attalus I över the Gauls. Like the temple to its north, the altar was dedicated to both Zeus and Athena. it stood in the center of a vast temenos measuring 69 by 77 meters. Aligned precisely with the temple of Athena, which loomed above it on its terrace some 50 meters to the north, both edifices could be seen in one harmonious view. The monument was set on a fıve-stepped crepidoma of nearly square form. Above this in turn were a three-stepped podium, a frieze, and a colonnaded stoa in the form of an enclosing wall. This wall and its Ionic colonnade extended around the north, east and south sides of the monument, leaving two projecting vvings to flank the mag-nifıcent stainvay on the vvestern side. A score of 20-meter-wıde marble steps led up to the öpen rectangular area on vvhich the altar, a marble offering table set on a three-stepped podium, was erected. The colonnade extended completely around the periphery of the enclosing wall and across the top of the steps. A similar portico vvas planned for the central court around the altar, but was never completed.
The sculptural decoration on the Altar of Zeus was meant to symbolize the heroic role of the Attalids and their mythical ances-

tors as the saviours of Hellenic civilization in its struggle against barbarism. The enclosing wall that surrounded the altar on three sides vvas carved with reliefs depicting incidents from the life of Telephus, son of Heracles: his birth, his landing vvith his mother Auge in Mysia, his adoption by King Teuthras, his succession to the throne, his defeat of Agamemnon's army, his founding of Pergamum, and finally his death. This decoration symbolized the semi-divine origins of the Attalid dynasty and its ancient connec-tion with the heroes of the Homeric epics. The frieze under the Ionic portico was adorned vvith a Gigantomachia, the mythical battle betvveen the Olympian gods and the ancient giants. This vast scene, some 120 meters long and 2.3 meters high, contained about fıfty Olympian deities and an equal number of giants—the most com-plete representation of the Greek pantheon in existence. One art historian has estimated that the reliefs represent the efforts of some forty sculptors, who together produced the most extraordinary vvork of art that has survived from the Hellenistic age in Asia Minör, it has been suggested that the Altar of Zeus may have been

what the author of Revelation was referring to his letter to the church in Pergamum, where he vvrites of the city as the place "vvhere Satan's throne is." When the Evangelist passed through Pergamum in the last years of the first century A.D., the Altar of Zeus was stili standing in ali of its pagan glory; the Olympian deities wese stili being \vorshipped in their magnificent temples and altars on the Pergamene acropolis.
Just belovv the Altar of Zeus to the south, at the southernmost end of the acropolis, we come to the market square known as the upper agora. This irregular-shaped area, little more than half of a square, is formed by a Doric stoa dating from the third century A.D. At its northvvestern end we see the remains of the agora temple, a little structure with mixed Doric and Ionic elements erected in the second century B.C. it was probably dedicated to either Zeus or Hermes. The agora is cut through its center by an ancient street that led down from the acropolis to the middle city, which \ve will explore after we visit the theater.
The northvvestern end of the upper agora opens out on to the theater terrace, a long and narrovv shelf that stretches for nearly 250 meters to the north belovv the tiered seats of the auditorium. The terrace vvas bordered on its vvestern side by a Doric stoa, vvhich vvas one story high on its inner side and three on the outside, vvhere it vvas supported by a retaining vvall vvith internal chambers. This vvall, together vvith the stoa above it, vvas in places five stories high because of the very steep slope of the hillside. The vievv from the terrace is stupendous, looking out över the valley of the Caicus stretching off tovvards the Aegean coast—the land that comprised the realm of Pergamum when1t first became an independent state.
At the northern end of the terrace a flight of 25 steps leads up to the ruins of a small Ionic terrace dedicated to Dionysus, worshipped here as the god of the theater. The original andesite temple vvas erected in the first half of the second century B.C. The present structure dates from the second decade of the third century A.D., vvhen it was rebuilt in marble and dedicated to the deified emperor Caracalla (r. 211-17), who vvas vvorshipped here as the "nevv

Dionysus." it is a prostyle temple, the colonnade of its pronaos arrayed vvith four columns in front and two on the sides, counting corner columns tvvice. The temple faces south from its podium at the top of the steps, 4.5 meters above the level of the theater ter­race.
The theater is one of the most impressive in Asia Minör surviv-ing from the Hellenistic period. it vvas originally constructed in the third century B.C, then rebuilt by Eumenes II and altered önce again in Roman times. The cavea, or auditorium, forms part of the natural contour of the steeply sloping vvest front of the acropolis rock. From the top of it, the principal sanctuaries of the upper city of Pergamum vvould have been dramatically visible to the audience as they entered from the theater terrace. The auditorium is excep-tionally steep, with 80 rovvs of seats ascending the slope through an elevation of 36 meters. Because of the topography the cavea com-prises a much smaller angle than in a typical Greek theater. The seats are arranged in three tiers separated by broad horizontal pas-sages called diazomata, vvith narrovv stairvvays dividing these into six or seven cunei, or vvedges. There vvere seats for some 10,000 spectators, vvith the king's marble box stili in place just above the center of the front row. The orchestra extends out on to the theater terrace, vvhere in Hellenistic times a wooden skene, or stage build-ing, vvas erected on the day of a performance. it vvould be dis-mantled immediately aftervvards, so as not to obscure the superb vievv.
We now follovv the ancient road from the upper agora to the middle city. The middle city represents an expansion of Pergamum by Eumenes II, vvho extended the line of fortifications from the citadel to form a nevv quarter about halfvvay down the mountain. On the vvay dovvn vve pass an archaeological zone that vvas first explored in 1973, a site knovvn as the City Excavations. Its pur-pose vvas to study the form and grovvth of Pergamum beyond the official buildings and thus to learn more about the daily life of the Pergamenes. The first of the structures in this group that we come to is a bath on the right of the road about 100 meters from the
upper agora. Originally erected in the Hellenistic period, it was rebuilt in the Roman era.
Another 100 meters along we come to the main area of the City Excavations. The most important structures unearthed here are a Roman bath and gymnasium complex, an odeion and a heroon, the latter known as the Marble Hail. These three buildings appear to have been erected ca. 70 B.C. by, or in honor of, a vvealthy Pergamene philanthropist named Diodoros Pasparos. His portrait büst is now in the Bergama Museum in the lower town, replaced in the heroon by a plaster büst. The eighteen reliefs in tfıe heroon are also plaster copies of the originals in the museum»Among these are representations of vveapons and armor, a fighting cock, a war-rior (now headless), and an erect phallus—symbol of good luck and prosperity. Other structures unearthed in the City Excavations include a tavern, a shop that sold vvine and olive oil, a sanctuary of a Dionysian cult, a peristyle house with a bath, and a well house, along with a large number of ramshackle Byzantine houses dating from the tvvelfth century to the fourteenth.
The road winds on beyond the City Excavations and eventually brings us to the middle city. The surviving monuments here include the lower agora, three gymnasia, four temples, two public foun-tains, and a number of other structures, including altars, stoas and propylaea, or monumental entryways.*
The temple of Demeter stands belovv the road at the northwest-ern corner of the middle city. This*is the oldest of the temples in the middle city, founded by Philetaerus and his brother Eumenes in memory of their mother Boa. Later additions were made by Queen Apollonia, wife of Attalus I. it is of the type called a templum-in-antis, that is, with columns only between its antae—the extensions of the side walls of the cella. This interesting little structure com-bined ali of the Greek architectural orders; its columns were Doric and their capitals were Aeolic, with Ionic and Corinthian elements added in the Roman period. The temenos of the temple was sur-rounded on three sides by stoas erected by Queen Apollonia. The one on the southern or dovvnhill side was supported by massive



retaining walls. Apollonia also added the propylon at the west end of the temenos, its columns surmounted by Aeolic capitals that have recently been put back in place.
The second of the four temples of the middle city is a short distance to the east of Demeter's temenos. This was dedicated to Hera Basileia, the Queen of the Gods. it is a small four-columned Doric prostyle edifice, probably erected by Attalus I. East of the temple there is a stoa and to its west an exedra, or semicircular niche. Within the exedra there is a marble altar dedicated to the Anatolian god Men. This was excavated elsewhere on the site and reerected here, though it has no connection with the temple of Hera. Although of modest size, the temple of Hera stood in a promi-nent position at the top of the middle city and could be seen from a considerable distance.
Betvveen the temenos of Hera and that of Demeter we see the remains of a tiny temple dedicated to Asclepius, the healing god, whose main sanctuary in Pergamum is in the lower city. The temple here was first erected in the third century B.C. as a Doric edifice, but in the latter half of the second century B.C. it was rebuilt in the Ionic order. in its present form it is a six-columned prostyle temple, vvith four columns in front of its pronaos and two on the sides.
The largest secular building complex in the middle city is the gymnasium, which is situated on three terraces tiered one above the other. The upper gymnasium was built by Attalus II and the lower two by Eumenes II, with ali three of them rebuilt during the Roman period. The upper gymnasium was reserved for grown men, the middle for ephebes—youths undergoing military training in addi-tion to their other studies, and the lower one for young boys. The upper one, knovvn as the Ceremonial Gymnasium, occupied a ter-race measuring approximately 200 by 45 meters, vvith a central courtyard 74 meters long and 36 meters wide. The courtyard was surrounded by a two-storied stoa, originally in the Doric order but rebuilt in the Corinthian order during Üıe Roman era. The struc-tures to the east and west of this courtyard formed part of a baths complex, vvhich in the Roman era was an integral part of ali gym-
nasia. At the northvvest corner of üıe gymnasium there are üıe remains of an auditorium vvith a seating capacity of about 1,000. At Üıe center of the norüıern side of Üıe gymnasium there vvas a İarge chamber knovvn as the Ephebion, vvhere ali of the ceremonies con-nected vvith the gymnastic activities took place. The chamber to the east of this was in Roman times reserved for Üıe emperor, vvho presided över the ceremonies in Üıe Ephebion vvhenever he vvas in Pergamum, as Hadrian did during his visit to Üıe city in 125.
The middle gymnasium occupies a narrovv terrace measuring 150 by 36 meters vvith a Corinthian stoa extending along üıe entire length of its norüıern side. On üıe vvestern side of the terrace vve see the foundations of a small prostyle temple of the Corinthian order, vvith four columns in front of its porch. An inscription records that the temple vvas dedicated to Hermes and Heracles, Üıe gods of physical culture, vvith the deified emperor also being vvorshipped here in Roman times. Other inscriptions record the names of ephebes dating from Hellenistic to Roman times. The lovver gymnasium stands on an irregularly-shaped and tapering terrace about 80 meters
in length. The entrance to both this and the middle gymnasium was via a vvinding vaulted stainvay at the eastern end of the lovver terrace. Even in its ruined state this is stili a very impressive struc-ture. Professor Ekrem Akurgal, in his Ancient Civilizations and Ruins of Turkey, describes the stainvay as "one of the oldest and most beautiful arch-and-vault constructions of the ancient Greek world."
Belovv the lovver gymnasium an ancient street leads downward to the southwest, its paving of large andesite blocks deeply rutted by the vvheels of carts and chariots. About 100 meters beyond the gymnasium the road veers to the west as it passes on the right a peristyle structure, with a Doric stoa surrounding a central court-yard measuring 20 by 13.5 meters. This two-storied structure vvas originally erected in the Hellenistic period and rebuilt in Roman times by a consul named Attalus. An inscription welcomes the owner's guests and bids them to join with him in enjoying the good things of life. The house has two stories, with the lovver stoa in the Doric order and the upper one in the Ionic. One can stili see traces of vvall paintings and a well-preserved floor mosaic, ali dating from the imperial Roman era.
Beyond the House of Attalus the street passes through a com-plex of ancient shops and houses. The most impressive of these is a peristyle structure similar to the House of Attalus. The modern building in the central courtyard of this structure houses the staff of the German Archaeological Society.
Directly across the street from this peristyle house we see the northvvest side of the lovver agora, erected during the reign of Eumenes II. This agora occupies an area measuring 64 by 34 meters, surrounded on ali sides by tvvo-aisled Doric stoas, each of vvhich had shops lining its inner aisle. The stoa vvas in tvvo stories except for the back of its south side, vvhere the sloping terrain required a third story. The stone missiles piled in the courtyard vvere found in the arsenal of the upper city, vvhere they vvould have been used by the catapaults in the fortress there. During the excavation of the agora, beginning in 1900, a superb head of Alexander the Great

vvas discovered in the nortfrvvest corner of the courtyard. Novv pre-served in the istanbul Archaeological Museum, this is one of the finest extant examples of Hellenistic sculpture. it is a copy done in the third century B.C. of the original carved by Lysippus in the second half of the fourth century B.C.
The ancient street goes around the north and east sides of the agora and then leads dovvn to the south gate of the city. This inter-esting and complicated portal vvas erected by Eumenes II vvhen he extended the fortifications of Pergamum to enclose the middle city.
We novv return to Bergama to see the remains of the lovver city, beginning vvith the Asclepieum, to vvhich vve are directed by a signpost on the main street of the town. Starting at the car park of the archaeological site there, vve approach the Asclepieum along a splendid colonnaded vvay knovvn in Roman times as the Via Tecta. The Via Tecta began at the center of the Roman city belovv the acropolis hill and extended for half a Roman mile to the Asclepieum, vvith the last stretch flanked by Corinthian stoas. This vvas a bazaar street lined vvith shops catering to the pilgrims vvho came to the Asclepieum, one of the most famous therapeutic shrines in the ancient Graeco-Roman world.
The cult of Asclepius seems to have spread from Epidaurus to Mysia early in the fourth century B.C, vvhen the first sanctuary of his cult vvas built on this site. The Pergamene Asclepieum vvas extended and rebuilt at various times in the Hellenistic and Roman periods. The ruins vve see today for the most part date from the first half of the second century A.D., vvhen the shrine here reached Üıe height of its popularity, surpassing Epidaurus as the principal heal-ing sanctuary in the Graeco-Roman vvorld.
The fame of the Pergamene Asclepieum during the latter Ro­man imperial era vvas largely ovving to the renovvn of the physician Galen, vvho vvas bom in Pergamum in the year A.D. 129. Galen, the greatest physician and medical vvriter of the Roman era, re-ceived his first training in medicine and philosophy at the Pergamene Asclepieum. Galen also served his medical internship here, vvhere among his other duties he vvould have treated the vvounds of the


gladiators who fought at the local amphitheater. Later, after mov-ing to Rome, Galen served as personal physician to three Roman emperors: Marcus Aurelius (r. 161-80), Lucus Verus (co-emperor, r. 161-69), and Commodus (r. 180-92). Galen's vvritings system-atized ali of the Greek anatomical and medical knowledge that had accumulated since the pioneering work of Hippocrates of Cos in the fifth century B.C. His treatises formed the basis for medical science from the Roman imperial era up to the Renaissance, when he was known as the "Prince of Physicians."
We enter the Asclepieum through what vvas önce the propylon, the forecourt of which formed the westem end of the Via Tecta. An inscription records that this was erected during the reign of Antoninus Pius (138-61) by the Pergamene historian and consul Claudius
Via Tecta Charax as a gift to the city of his birth. Here we pass into the main area of the shrine, a vast courtyard measuring 130 by 110 meters, with colonnaded stoas on ali sides except the east. These stoas were originally in the lonic order, but after an earthquake in A.D. 178 the columns at the east end of the north stoa were given Corinthian capitals. The structure at the corner of the courtyard to the right was the library, where there vvas also a shrine to the deifıed em-peror. The two large circular buildings on the left inside the propylon were the principal edifices of the shrine. The building just inside the gatevvay vvas the temple of Asclepius, and the one beyond that, at the southeast corner of the shrine, vvas the main hospital.
An inscription records that the temple vvas erected ca. A.D. 150 through the generosity of the consul Lucius Rufinus. This is the most impressive building in the Asclepieum, a somevvhat larger than half-size copy of the Pantheon that Hadrian had erected in Rome some tvvo decades earlier. it originally had a dome 24 meters in diameter, and both its walls and floor vvere covered vvith marble mosaics. Around its interior there vvere a series of recesses, alter-

nately round and rectangular; these contained statues of the healing deities associated with the shrine, the central one being a coiossal figüre of Asclepius.
The hospital was probably built soon after the temple of Asclepius. The building is circular in form, with three apses on either side flanking its two portals, one of them outside the court-yard and the other vvithin. The most remarkable feature of the building is the vaulted passageway that leads from u"ıe hospital to the sacred spring at the center of the courtyard, a distance of some 80 meters. Knovvn as the cryptoporticus, the tunnel was designed to shelter the patients from the elements on their way to and from the sacred spring. The treatment in the hospital stressed good diet, mud baths and bathing in the sacred spring, even in the depths of winter, hence the need for the cryptoporticus. Psychotherapy was also used for patients suffering from mental and emotional prob-lems, and included an imaginative interpretation of dreams, eigh-teen centuries before Freud. One of the psychological complaints recognized by Galen was love-sickness, which he believed to be one of the main causes of insomnia. in one of his treatises he notes mat "the quickening of the pulse at the name of the beloved gives the clue."
Outside the vvestern end of the north stoa we see the restored Roman theater of the Asclepieum, which was dedicated to Asclepius and Athena Hygieia, goddess of health. The auditorium has a single diazoma and is divided into five cunei, with a seating capacity of some 3,500. There vvas originally a three-storied stage building, but this has vanished. The patients and their visitors were entertained here by performances of drama and music, for the Asclepieum was very much a spa in the old-fashioned European sense. But it vvas also a spa vvith very deep religious roots; in the central courtyard near the theater were several small temples, dedicated to Asclepius and other deities associated vvith him in his healing cult, including his daughter Hygieia. The site of one of these sanctuaries, a small temple dedicated to Asclepius, is marked by rectangular rock cut-tings in the courtyard in front of the theater.
Hellenislic Stoa at West End of Asclepieum
A crack in the rock betvveen this temple of Asclepius and the ater marks the site of the sacred spring that vvas the heart of the sclepieum. Just to the north of this there is a Roman fountain, vvhere the patients drank from the spring and bathed in its healing aters, vvhich vvere probably radioactive. There is another fountain the center of the vvest stoa, vvhere patients also bathed in a ck-cut pool. A third vvater source vvas the spring that stili supplies ater to the pool at the center of the courtyard, near the end of the yptoporticus. This spring vvas önce covered by a fountain house, ^signed to shield the patients from the elements vvhen they bathed id drank at the pool.
Mud baths vvere part of the treatment prescribed for patients at [.e Asclepieum. A graphic account of this treatment is given in the " ritings of Aelius Aristides, a distinguished orator and scholar vvho ed in Smyrna in the second "century A.D. Aristides vvas a Iife-ag hypochondriac; his complaints brought him irequently to the Asclepieum, as he vvrites in his account of one of his visits to the shrine:

One summer, my stomach gave me a lot of trouble. I was suffering from thirst day and night, sweated abundantly and felt as weak as a rag: when I needed to get up it took two or three men to get me out of bed. The god [Asclepius] gave me a sign to leave Smyrna, where I was at the time, so I decided to start at önce on the road to Pergamum....
Another complaint brought Aristides to the Asclepieum in mid-winter, and it was then that Asclepius spoke to him in a dream and recommended that he undergo a regime of mud baths. Though it was in the dead of night and bitter cold Aristides arose at önce and took the god's advice. He smeared himself with mud and ran three times around the temples in the courtyard, after which he washed himself off in the sacred fountain. He telis us that two friends started out to accompany him in this regime, but one of them turned back at önce while the other was seized with a spasm and ad to be carried to the hot baths to be thawed out.
Beyond the temenos of the Asclepieum to the west there are the :mains of a Doric stoa. The stoa was about 100 meters in length, ith a colonnade along its southern side and a row of 18 arcaded ıbers along its northern side. This was undoubtedly another azaar street, similar to the Via Tecta though much shorter.
There are three more monuments of the Roman city some 800-,000 meters to the northeast of the Asclepieum, but since they are a military zone they are off-limits to civilians. These are the ieater, the amphitheater and the stadium. The theater is at the stern end of the Via Tecta, with the amphitheater about 300 îters to its north and the stadium about the same distance to its Mtheast. Ali three structures date from the mid-second century ..D., when the Roman city of Pergamum reached the peak of its asperity and population.
After leaving the Asclepieum we return to the main street of
ergama to visit the Archaeological Museum. The Bergama mu-
~um is one of the most attractive and interesting institutions of its
nd in Turkey, with antiquities from Pergamum and other sites on
; northern Aegean coast. The more recent finds include the sculp-


tures and reliefs from the Marble Hail in the City Excavations in Pergamum.
The town of Bergama itself is interesting and picturesque, with a number of monuments dating from the Ottoman period, including mosques, hans, hamams and fountains, as well as a Selçuk minaret dating from the fourteenth century. The oldest Ottoman monument is the Ulu Cami, built in 1398 by Beyazit I (r. 1389-1402), just four years before his catastrophic defeat by Taınerlane at the battle of Ankara.
We leave Bergama along the same road by which we entered the town. As we do so we pass on our left an ancient tumulus known locally as Maltepe, whose tomb chamber was excavated by Wilhelm Dörpfeld when he was director of the Pergamum excavations. The tumulus is entered through a long passagevvay that leads into the tomb proper, a tripartite chamber dating from the late Hellenistic era. Pausanias believed that this was the tomb of Auge, mpther of Telephus, the mythical founder of Pergamum. He recounts the myth ofTelephus:

According to Heketaios, Herakles lay with Auge when he came to Tegea, and in the end she was caught with Herakles' child, and Aleos shut her and the boy in a chest and sent them out to sea; she landed and met Teuthras, who was a povverful man in the Kaikos plain, and he loved and married her; and today Auge's monument is at Pergamos on the Kaikos, a tumulus of earth surrounded by a stone platform and surmounted by a naked woman in bronze.
We now continue along until we come to the turnoff for îzmir, which soon brings us back to highway E87/550. There we drive southvvest along the valley of the Caicus, crossing the river itself a short way beyond the Bergama exit.
Some three kilometers to the vvest of this bridge archaeologists have identified the site of ancient Teuthrania, the capital of the fırst kingdom to emerge in the Caicus valley. The ruins, which amount to little more than a few stone fragments and traces of walls and foundations, are on the slope of a very prominent hill known as Kalarga Tepesi. As the site is on the summit of a hill, and as it is accessible only by goat paths, it is rarely visited. But travelers passing by on the highvvay to îzmir might at least glance off to the vvest from this bridge över the Caicus river, for the hill of Kalarga is where the story of the illustrious Pergamene kingdom begins. As the poet knovvn as Pseudo Scymnus vvrote early in the Byzantine era, recalling the golden age of this vanished kingdom: "The glory of the kings of Pergamum, even if they are dead, shall remain ever living among us ali."