Pergămum
（
Πέργαμον) or
Pergămus
(
Πέργαμος). The former by far the most usual form in the
classical writers, though the latter is more common in English, probably because of its use in
our version of the Bible (Rev. ii. 12). The word is significant, connected with
πύργος, “a tower.”
1.
The citadel of Troy, and used poetically for Troy itself; the poets also use the forms
Pergăma (
τὰ
Πέργαμα) and Pergamia (
ἡ
Περγαμία, sc.
πόλις).
2.
A celebrated city of Asia Minor, the capital of the kingdom of Pergamum, and afterwards of
the Roman province of Asia, was situated in the district of South Mysia called Teuthrania, on
the north bank of the river Caïcus, about twenty miles from the sea. The kingdom of
Pergamum was founded about B.C. 280 by Philetaerus, who had been intrusted by Lysimachus with
the command of the city. The successive kings of Pergamus were:
Philetaerus, b.c. 280-263; Eumĕnes
I., 263-241; Attălus I., 241-197; Eumĕnes II., 197- 159; Attălus II. Philadelphus, 159-138; Attălus
III. Philomētor, 138-133. The kingdom reached its greatest extent after the
defeat of Antiochus the Great by the Romans, in B.C. 190, when the Romans bestowed upon
Eumenes II. the whole of Mysia, Lydia, both Phrygias, Lycaonia, Pisidia, and Pamphylia.
It was under the same king that the celebrated library was founded at Pergamus, which for a
long time rivalled that of Alexandria, and the formation of which occasioned the invention of
parchment,
charta Pergamena. This library became the centre of a school of
great importance in the history of ancient learning; amoung its leaders were such
distinguished men as Crates of Mallos, who introduced philological studies into Rome. (See
Philologia.) The Pergamene Library was
afterwards presented by Antony to Cleopatra and united with the Alexandrian. On the death of
Attalus III., in B.C. 133, the kingdom, by a bequest in his will, passed to the Romans. The
city was an early seat of Christianity, and is one of the Seven Churches of Asia to which the
Apocalyptic epistles are addressed. Among the celebrated natives of the city were the
rhetorician Apollodorus and the physician Galen. The place is now called Bergama; and here
were excavated in 1875-86, by Humann, Bohn, Conze, and others for the German government, many
remains of magnificent buildings, such as temples, porticoes, theatres, baths, etc.
