Anatolian Civilizations and Historical Sites - TEDA

ANATOLIAN CIVILIZATIONS:10x19 antik kentler 8/1/11 10:51 AM Sayfa
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surrounded on three sides by two-storied stoa in the Doric order.
Within the precinct was a temple dedicated to the Athena (7),
Measuring 12.72x21.77 m. at the base, this temple was of the
'peripteros' plan in the Doric order and had six columns on the ends
and 10 along each side.
Today only sections of the foundation remain whereas fragments of
the temple displayed in the Berlin Museum indicate that it was built
in the early-3 rd century BC. The Temple of Athena was apparently
adorned with many bronze statues depicting the victories of the
Pergamon kings. While the originals are lost, marble copies of some
do exist. One found in the Museum of Rome is of a defeated Galatian
warrior committing suicide with a dagger, having just killed his wife.
The round structure in the center of the precinct was the base of a
bronze statue of Emperor Augustus, a marble copy of which is now
in the Vatican Museum. Adjacent to the northern stoa of the sacred
precinct was the famous Pergamon Library (8) built during the reign
of Eumenes II. In the middle of the library's main reading room is the
podium on which there stood at one time 3.5 m. high statue of Athena
that is now in the Berlin Museum. Ancient authors tell us that the
Pergamon Library once contained 200,000 volumes. Mark Anthony
carted them off to Egypt as a gift for Cleopatra, ostensibly to replace
the ones that had been lost when the library in Alexandria, Egypt was
burned during Caesar's campaign in that city. To the left of the
library (9) are the remains of a big house. If we leave the Temple of
Athena by the stone-paved road at the entrance, the stairway (5)
before us leads to the old palace of Eumenes II. The smaller ruin (11)
is the palace of Attalos I. Both palaces were of the peristyle type in
which a set of colonnades surrounded an open courtyard. Mosaics
found in these palaces are also displayed in the Berlin Museum. We
come now to the magnificent theater of Pergamon, rising up a steep
hillside below the Temple of Athena. This impressive Hellenistic
theater attained its present magnificent state during the reign of
Eumenes II. There was undoubtedly an earlier theater situated on
the same slope whereas very few fragments of its retaining walls may
still be seen.
The auditorium had 80 rows of seats that are divided horizontally into
three sections. Stairs 74 cm. wide divide the lower section into seven
parts and the middle and upper sections into six parts. The Pergamon
Theater once accommodated 10,000 spectators. Just above the