The Temple of Trajan on the Upper Acropolis of Pergamon

Republication from followinghadrian.com

Today we celebrate the anniversary of the accession of Trajan to the imperial throne (28 January 98 AD). As a tribute, here is a selection of images from the Temple of Trajan at Pergamon, an ancient Greek city in Aeolis.

The Temple of Trajan (Trajaneum) was one of the most spectacular structures built on the upper acropolis of Pergamon. It is situated at the highest point of the acropolis and is the only building that is truly Roman. Its construction started around 114 AD during the reign of Trajan but was completed after his death during the rule of Hadrian. Both Emperors were worshipped here.

The expansion of Roman rule in Asia Minor

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The expansion of Roman rule in Asia Minor from Shepherd’s Atlas of World History.

ON THE PHYSICAL ANTHROPOLOGY OF THE ANCIENT CELTS

 

The  two  more  renowned  sculptures  of  the  Pergamene  School  on  the  Gauls/Galatians:  the  ‘Dying  Gaul’  and  the  ‘Gaul  who  commits  suicide  after  having  killed  his  wife’.

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By  Periklis  Deligiannis

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This  paper is actually a part of my published  book  The Celts (Γαλάτες), Periscope publ., Athens 2008, unfortunately available only in Greek.

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  I have to refer to an old theory on the Celtic physical anthropology, which even today has a great number of supporters although it is based mainly on a misunderstanding interpretation of the representation – especially of the physical type – of the Galatian warriors by the ‘Pergamene sculpture School’, of the reports of the ancient Greek and Latin authors on the Celts and of other secondary data. This theory is influenced by the ‘Teutonic School’ of physical anthropology in the 19th-early 20th centuries (the archaeologist Gustav von Kossinna and the anthropologist Hans Gunther being its last main representatives), which had a kind of obsession on discovering Nordic warrior nobilities as ruling elites on almost all the ancient European peoples, including the Mediterranean peoples, and also on the Iranians, the Indians, the Egyptians and others. According to the theories of that School, the Nordic noble warriors were the real creators of the Celtic, the Roman, the Greek, the Indian and other ancient civilizations.