Building on a mountain
Most Greek cities spread across flat ground around a central agora. Pergamon did the opposite. Its royal city was built on a narrow, steep-sided hill that rises several hundred metres above the plain, and the Attalid kings, especially Eumenes II in the early second century BCE, shaped the slope into a series of terraces. Buildings were arranged so that a visitor climbing the hill would see each in turn, with the theatre and altar facing outward over the valley.
The solution was practical as well as theatrical. There was little level space, so the architects used retaining walls, long colonnades and platforms to create flat areas. Many of these supporting structures survive and are impressive in their own right.
The steep theatre
The theatre of Pergamon is cut into the western face of the hill and is one of the steepest known from the ancient Greek world. Its auditorium has around eighty rows, and the figure of about 10,000 spectators is often quoted, though that is an estimate. The seats rise sharply, giving a view over the valley that surprises modern visitors.
Because the slope left no room for a permanent stage building in front of the audience, the arrangement was unusual. Below the auditorium a long terrace ran along the hillside. According to the usual reconstruction, a temporary wooden stage was set up for performances and taken down afterwards, so that the terrace could be used for walking at other times. At the end of the terrace stood a small temple of Dionysus, the god of theatre. For the origins of the form, compare the account of theater architecture elsewhere in Greece and the Dionysian festivals at which plays were staged.
The acropolis
At the top of the hill stood the main sanctuary of Athena, the city’s patron. The temple of Athena was an older Doric building, and around it the Attalids added colonnaded porticoes, which housed the library described in the article on the Pergamon library. The citadel also contained the royal palaces and barracks, as well as cisterns and a complicated system for supplying water to a hill. Pipelines running under pressure brought water up from sources in the mountains, a feat of Hellenistic engineering.
A large temple of Trajan, the Trajaneum, was added at the summit in the Roman period, resting on massive vaulted substructures. It shows how the Romans continued to use the acropolis as a stage for power, a story that continues in the Roman era after the Attalid bequest.
The Great Altar
The Great Altar is the most famous monument of Pergamon. It was probably built under Eumenes II, around 180 to 160 BCE, though the exact dates and the identity of the gods honoured are debated. A common view links it to the victories of the Attalids over the Galatians and to the dynasty’s self-image as defenders of Greek culture, but this is an interpretation. Ancient sources do not describe it in detail, and its original name and function remain subjects of discussion.
The altar stood on a high podium with a monumental staircase leading up to a colonnaded court. The most striking feature is the frieze that ran around the base, more than a hundred metres long, showing the Gigantomachy, the battle between the Olympian gods and the giants. The figures are carved in extremely high relief, so that bodies seem to burst out of the stone. Gods, goddesses and monstrous giants are shown in violent combat, with serpents, winged creatures and animals. Inscriptions beside the figures named many of them. For the background to the mythical conflict, the Olympian gods and monsters of Greek tradition are the subject of a separate article.
A second, smaller frieze inside the colonnaded court told the story of Telephos, the legendary founder of the Pergamene royal line. It is a continuous narrative, an unusual form in Greek sculpture, and it linked the dynasty to heroic ancestry.
From Pergamon to Berlin
The altar’s modern story begins in the 1870s. The German engineer Carl Humann, who was working in the region, noticed marble fragments being burned for lime and brought the site to the attention of scholars. After agreements with the Ottoman authorities, German excavations from 1878 to 1886 uncovered the altar’s remains. A large share of the frieze and architectural parts was taken to Berlin under the terms of the arrangements at the time, and the altar was reassembled in a museum building, later in the Pergamon Museum, which opened in 1930.
The rebuilt monument in Berlin is a partial reconstruction. The frieze is largely original, while the staircase and the colonnade are rebuilt around it. The altar hall has been closed for restoration work for a number of years, so anyone planning a visit should check the current opening status. Turkey has asked at times for the return of some objects, and the question of who should hold such finds continues to be debated in museum circles. At Pergamon itself, only the foundation of the altar is visible.
Why it matters
Pergamon shows how Hellenistic kings used architecture to state their ambitions. The setting, the water system and the sculpture together made the hilltop a sort of showpiece. For readers interested in the long career of the city, from the library to the physician Galen, the other articles in this cluster fill in what the buildings could not say on their own.