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PERGE

PERGE

ANCIENT CITY

Antalya ProvinceTurkey / ANATOLIA

 

Perga or Perge  was an ancient Greek city in Southern Anatolia. it was  once the capital of Pamphylia Secunda. Now it is located in Antalya Province on the southwestern Mediterranean coast of Turkey.

Today it is a large site of ancient ruins 15 kilometres (9.3 mi) east of Antalya.

A unique and prominent feature for a Roman city was the long central water channel in the centre of the main street which contained a series of cascading pools and which would have been remarkable even today in a semi-arid area where summer temperatures reach over 30 deg. C.

Perga's most celebrated ancient inhabitant was the mathematician Apollonius (c.262 BC – c.190 BC) who lived and worked there. He wrote a series of eight books describing a family of curves known as conic sections, comprising the circle, ellipse, parabola, and hyperbola.

Category:         Ancient City

Civilisation       Greek /Asia Minor

Perge theatre detail

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Perge Theater

Perge was situated on the coastal plain between the Rivers Catarrhactes (Düden Nehri) and Cestrus (Aksu), about 11 km from the mouth of the latter.

Excavations in the original settlement on the acropolis date it to the early Bronze Age, 4000-3000 BC.

From a bronze tablet discovered in 1986 in Hattusas, a treaty between the Hittite Great King Tudhaliya IV and his vassal, the king of Tarhuntassa, defined the latter's western border at the city "Parha" and the "Kastaraya River". The river is assumed to be the classical Cestrus. West of Parha were the "Lukka Lands". Parha likely spoke a late Luwian dialect like Lycian and that of the neo-Hittite kingdoms.

Perge_nymphaeum

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Perge nymphaeum

A nymphaeum in ancient Greece and Rome, was a monument consecrated to the nymphs, especially those of springs. These monuments were originally natural grottoes, which tradition assigned as habitations to the local nymphs. They were sometimes so arranged as to furnish a supply of water, as at Pamphylian Side. A nymphaeum dedicated to a local water nymph, Coventina, was built along Hadrian's Wall, in the northernmost reach of the Roman Empire. Subsequently, artificial grottoes took the place of natural ones. In perge the water coming out under the statuse was floatinf through the city in a channel and the houses were able to build small pipes to take water for inhouse use.

Perge_Nymphaeum_of_Artemis_Pergaia_in_2012_3852.jpg

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Perge Nymphaeum of Artemis

The settlement probably became a Greek colony of Rhodes in the 7th c. BC. Perge was later a Pamphylian Greek city, and came under successive rule by Persians, Athenians, and Persians again. Alexander the Great, after quitting Phaselis, occupied Perge with a part of his army in 334 BC. Alexander's rule was followed by the Diadochi empire of the Seleucids. The walls around the lower city were built in this period starting from 223 BC. In the 2nd c. BC the city became prosperous and started minting its own coins with the image of Artemis and her temple. Perge became renowned for the worship of Artemis, whose temple stood on a hill outside the town, and in whose honour annual festivals were celebrated

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Perge_Columned_Western_Street_Caracalla_Nymphaeum_in_2015_5216_edited.jpg

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Perge Columned Western Street

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