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153-419: The ballista ( Latin , from Greek βαλλίστρα ballistra and that from βάλλω ballō , "throw"), plural ballistae or ballistas , sometimes called bolt thrower , was an ancient missile weapon that launched either bolts or stones at a distant target. Developed from earlier Greek weapons, it relied upon different mechanics, using two levers with torsion springs instead of a tension prod (the bow part of

306-498: A cella divided into two rooms. The foundations, measuring around 12.70 x 21.80 metres, are still visible today. The columns were around 5.25 metres high, 0.75 metres in diameter, and the distance between the columns was 1.62 metres, so the colonnade was very light for a temple of this period. This is matched by the shape of the triglyphs , which usually consist of a sequence of two triglyphs and two metopes , but are instead composed of three of triglyphs and three metopes. The columns of

459-485: A polybolos . Reconstruction and trials of such a weapon carried out in a BBC documentary, What the Romans Did For Us , showed that they "were able to shoot eleven bolts a minute, which is almost four times the rate at which an ordinary ballista can be operated". However, no example of such a weapon has been found by archaeologists. The cheiroballistra and the manuballista are held by many archaeologists to be

612-688: A detailed depiction in high relief of the Gigantomachy , the battle between the Olympian gods and the Giants. The frieze is 2.30 metres high and has a total length of 113 metres, making it the second longest frieze surviving from antiquity, after the Parthenon Frieze in Athens. A 20-metre-wide (66 ft) staircase cut into the base on the western side leads up to the upper structure, which

765-526: A faster pace. It is characterised by greater use of prepositions, and word order that is closer to modern Romance languages, for example, while grammatically retaining more or less the same formal rules as Classical Latin. Ultimately, Latin diverged into a distinct written form, where the commonly spoken form was perceived as a separate language, for instance early French or Italian dialects, that could be transcribed differently. It took some time for these to be viewed as wholly different from Latin however. After

918-743: A few in German , Dutch , Norwegian , Danish and Swedish . Latin is still spoken in Vatican City, a city-state situated in Rome that is the seat of the Catholic Church . The works of several hundred ancient authors who wrote in Latin have survived in whole or in part, in substantial works or in fragments to be analyzed in philology . They are in part the subject matter of the field of classics . Their works were published in manuscript form before

1071-459: A few traces of the Hellenistic structure survive. The majority of the surviving structure derives from a reconstruction of the temple which probably took place under Caracalla , or perhaps under Hadrian . Pergamon's oldest temple is a sanctuary of Athena from the 4th century BC. It was a north-facing Doric peripteros temple with six columns on the short side and ten on the long side and

1224-404: A few. Famous and well regarded writers included Petrarch, Erasmus, Salutati , Celtis , George Buchanan and Thomas More . Non fiction works were long produced in many subjects, including the sciences, law, philosophy, historiography and theology. Famous examples include Isaac Newton 's Principia . Latin was also used as a convenient medium for translations of important works first written in

1377-472: A free city. Henceforth the city was required to pay tribute and accommodate and supply Roman troops, and the property of many of the inhabitants was confiscated. Imported Pergamene goods were among the luxuries enjoyed by Lucullus . The members of the Pergamene aristocracy, especially Diodorus Pasparus in the 70s BC, used their own possessions to maintain good relationships with Rome, by acting as donors for

1530-529: A high retaining wall and was framed on the long side by a stoa . Coming from the Upper market, one could enter this from a tower-building at the south end. This terrace had no space for the circular orchestra , which was normal in a Greek theatre, so only a wooden stage building was built which could be taken down when there was no performance taking place. Thus, the view along the terrace to the Temple of Dionysos at

1683-557: A library might indicate, however, that the building was located in that area. Other notable structures still in existence on the upper part of the Acropolis include: The site is today easily accessible by the Bergama Acropolis Gondola from the base station in northeastern Bergama. A large gymnasium area was built in the 2nd century BC on the south side of the Acropolis. It consisted of three terraces, with

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1836-490: A modern crossbow ). The springs consisted of several loops of twisted skeins . Early versions projected heavy darts or spherical stone projectiles of various sizes for siege warfare . It developed into a smaller precision weapon, the scorpio , and possibly the polybolos . The early ballistae in Ancient Greece were developed from two weapons called oxybeles and gastraphetes . The gastraphetes ('belly-bow')

1989-560: A native language, Medieval Latin was used across Western and Catholic Europe during the Middle Ages as a working and literary language from the 9th century to the Renaissance , which then developed a classicizing form, called Renaissance Latin . This was the basis for Neo-Latin which evolved during the early modern period . In these periods Latin was used productively and generally taught to be written and spoken, at least until

2142-414: A power that allowed it to be successfully used against armored troops. The oxybeles were a bigger and heavier construction employing a winch and were mounted on a tripod. It had a lower rate of fire and was used as a siege engine. With the invention of the torsion spring bundle, the first ballistae could now be built. The advantage of this new technology was the fast relaxation time of this system. Thus it

2295-567: A result, the list has variants, as well as alternative names. In addition to the historical phases, Ecclesiastical Latin refers to the styles used by the writers of the Roman Catholic Church from late antiquity onward, as well as by Protestant scholars. The earliest known form of Latin is Old Latin, also called Archaic or Early Latin, which was spoken from the Roman Kingdom , traditionally founded in 753 BC, through

2448-447: A second neocorate, from Trajan in AD 113/4. Hadrian raised the city to the rank of metropolis in 123 and thereby elevated it above its local rivals, Ephesus and Smyrna . An ambitious building programme was carried out: massive temples, a stadium, a theatre , a huge forum and an amphitheatre were constructed. In addition, at the city limits the shrine to Asclepius (the god of healing)

2601-407: A separate language, existing more or less in parallel with the literary or educated Latin, but this is now widely dismissed. The term 'Vulgar Latin' remains difficult to define, referring both to informal speech at any time within the history of Latin, and the kind of informal Latin that had begun to move away from the written language significantly in the post-Imperial period, that led ultimately to

2754-467: A siege engine and field artillery. Historical accounts, for instance, cited that Philip II employed a group of engineers within his army to design and build catapults for his military campaigns. There is even a claim that it was Philip II with his team of engineers who invented the ballista after improving Dionysius's device, which was merely an oversized slingshot. It was further perfected by Alexander, whose own team of engineers introduced innovations such as

2907-709: A small number of Latin services held in the Anglican church. These include an annual service in Oxford, delivered with a Latin sermon; a relic from the period when Latin was the normal spoken language of the university. In the Western world, many organizations, governments and schools use Latin for their mottos due to its association with formality, tradition, and the roots of Western culture . Canada's motto A mari usque ad mare ("from sea to sea") and most provincial mottos are also in Latin. The Canadian Victoria Cross

3060-429: A sort of informal language academy dedicated to maintaining and perpetuating educated speech. Philological analysis of Archaic Latin works, such as those of Plautus , which contain fragments of everyday speech, gives evidence of an informal register of the language, Vulgar Latin (termed sermo vulgi , "the speech of the masses", by Cicero ). Some linguists, particularly in the nineteenth century, believed this to be

3213-572: A spoken and written language by the scholarship by the Renaissance humanists . Petrarch and others began to change their usage of Latin as they explored the texts of the Classical Latin world. Skills of textual criticism evolved to create much more accurate versions of extant texts through the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, and some important texts were rediscovered. Comprehensive versions of authors' works were published by Isaac Casaubon , Joseph Scaliger and others. Nevertheless, despite

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3366-399: A staircase of eleven steps around 7.5 metres wide, descending from the front of the temple. The temple was about 7 metres wide by 12 metres long, and sat on a three-stepped foundation. It was a Doric tetrastyle prostyle temple, with three triglyphs and metopes for each span in the entablature. All the other buildings in the sanctuary were made out of trachyte , but the visible part of

3519-432: A strictly left-to-right script. During the late republic and into the first years of the empire, from about 75 BC to AD 200, a new Classical Latin arose, a conscious creation of the orators, poets, historians and other literate men, who wrote the great works of classical literature , which were taught in grammar and rhetoric schools. Today's instructional grammars trace their roots to such schools , which served as

3672-693: A vernacular, such as those of Descartes . Latin education underwent a process of reform to classicise written and spoken Latin. Schooling remained largely Latin medium until approximately 1700. Until the end of the 17th century, the majority of books and almost all diplomatic documents were written in Latin. Afterwards, most diplomatic documents were written in French (a Romance language ) and later native or other languages. Education methods gradually shifted towards written Latin, and eventually concentrating solely on reading skills. The decline of Latin education took several centuries and proceeded much more slowly than

3825-411: Is Veritas ("truth"). Veritas was the goddess of truth, a daughter of Saturn, and the mother of Virtue. Switzerland has adopted the country's Latin short name Helvetia on coins and stamps, since there is no room to use all of the nation's four official languages . For a similar reason, it adopted the international vehicle and internet code CH , which stands for Confoederatio Helvetica ,

3978-897: Is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages . Latin was originally spoken by the Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio ), the lower Tiber area around Rome , Italy. Through the expansion of the Roman Republic it became the dominant language in the Italian Peninsula and subsequently throughout the Roman Empire . By the late Roman Republic , Old Latin had evolved into standardized Classical Latin . Vulgar Latin refers to

4131-640: Is a reversal of the original phrase Non terrae plus ultra ("No land further beyond", "No further!"). According to legend , this phrase was inscribed as a warning on the Pillars of Hercules , the rocks on both sides of the Strait of Gibraltar and the western end of the known, Mediterranean world. Charles adopted the motto following the discovery of the New World by Columbus, and it also has metaphorical suggestions of taking risks and striving for excellence. In

4284-525: Is centered on a 335-metre-high (1,100 ft) mesa of andesite , which formed its acropolis . This mesa falls away sharply on the north, west, and east sides, but three natural terraces on the south side provide a route up to the top. To the west of the acropolis, the Selinus River (modern Bergamaçay) flows through the city, while the Cetius river (modern Kestelçay) passes by to the east. Pergamon

4437-552: Is found in any widespread language, the languages of Spain, France, Portugal, and Italy have retained a remarkable unity in phonological forms and developments, bolstered by the stabilising influence of their common Christian (Roman Catholic) culture. It was not until the Muslim conquest of Spain in 711, cutting off communications between the major Romance regions, that the languages began to diverge seriously. The spoken Latin that would later become Romanian diverged somewhat more from

4590-689: Is modelled after the British Victoria Cross which has the inscription "For Valour". Because Canada is officially bilingual, the Canadian medal has replaced the English inscription with the Latin Pro Valore . Spain's motto Plus ultra , meaning "even further", or figuratively "Further!", is also Latin in origin. It is taken from the personal motto of Charles V , Holy Roman Emperor and King of Spain (as Charles I), and

4743-569: Is mostly composed of volcanic rock, particularly andesite, and the Pergamon massif is also an intrusive stock of andesite. The massif is about one kilometre wide and around 5.5 km long from north to south. It consists of a broad, elongated base and a relatively small peak - the upper city. The side facing the Cetius river is a sharp cliff, while the side facing the Selinus is a little rough. On

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4896-661: Is not mentioned in Greek myth or epic of the archaic or classical periods. However, in the Epic Cycle the Telephus myth is already connected with the area of Mysia. Searching for his mother, Telephus visits Mysia on the advice of an oracle. There he becomes Teuthras ' son-in-law or foster-son and inherits his kingdom of Teuthrania , encompassing the area between Pergamon and the mouth of the Caicus. Telephus refuses to participate in

5049-471: Is only 26 km from the sea, but the Caicus plain is not open to the sea, since the way is blocked by the Karadağ massif. As a result, the area has a strongly inland character. In Hellenistic times, the town of Elaia at the mouth of the Caicus served as the port of Pergamon. The climate is Mediterranean with a dry period from May to August, as is common along the west coast of Asia Minor. The Caicus valley

5202-468: Is surrounded by a colonnade, and consists of a colonnaded courtyard, separated from the staircase by a colonnade. The interior walls of this colonnade had a further frieze, depicting the life of Telephus , the son of Heracles and mythical founder of Pergamon. This frieze is around 1.60 metres high and thus is clearly smaller than the outer frieze. In the New Testament Book of Revelation ,

5355-1011: Is taught at many high schools, especially in Europe and the Americas. It is most common in British public schools and grammar schools, the Italian liceo classico and liceo scientifico , the German Humanistisches Gymnasium and the Dutch gymnasium . Occasionally, some media outlets, targeting enthusiasts, broadcast in Latin. Notable examples include Radio Bremen in Germany, YLE radio in Finland (the Nuntii Latini broadcast from 1989 until it

5508-399: Is the steepest of all ancient theatres. The seating area ( koilon ) is divided horizontally by two walkways, called diazomata , and vertically by 0.75-metre-wide (2.5 ft) stairways into seven sections in the lowest part of the theatre and six in the middle and upper sections. Below the theatre is a 247-metre-long (810 ft) and up to 17.4-metre-wide (57 ft) terrace, which rested on

5661-543: The Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum (CIL). Authors and publishers vary, but the format is about the same: volumes detailing inscriptions with a critical apparatus stating the provenance and relevant information. The reading and interpretation of these inscriptions is the subject matter of the field of epigraphy . About 270,000 inscriptions are known. The Latin influence in English has been significant at all stages of its insular development. In

5814-557: The Bronze Age cannot be demonstrated, although Bronze Age stone tools are found in the surrounding area. The earliest mention of Pergamon in literary sources comes from Xenophon 's Anabasis , since the march of the Ten Thousand under Xenophon's command ended at Pergamon in 400/399 BC. Xenophon, who calls the city Pergamos, handed over the rest of his Greek troops (some 5,000 men according to Diodorus ) to Thibron , who

5967-552: The Corinthian order . A roofed stadium , known as the Basement Stadium is located between the middle terrace and the upper terrace. The upper terrace measured 150 x 70 metres square, making it the largest of the three terraces. It consisted of a courtyard surrounded by stoas and other structures, measuring roughly 36 x 74 metres. This complex is identified as a palaestra and had a theatre-shaped lecture hall beyond

6120-621: The First World War and were only resumed in 1927 under the leadership of Theodor Wiegand , who remained in this post until 1939. He concentrated on further excavation of the upper city, the Asklepieion, and the Red Basilica . The Second World War also caused a break in work at Pergamon, which lasted until 1957. From 1957 to 1968, Erich Boehringer worked on the Asklepieion in particular, but also carried out important work on

6273-672: The Fourth Crusade , Pergamon became part of the Empire of Nicaea . When Emperor Theodore II Laskaris ( r.  1254–1285 ) visited Pergamon in 1250, he was shown the house of Galen, but he saw that the theatre had been destroyed and, except for the walls which he paid some attention to, only the vaults over the Selinus seemed noteworthy to him. The monuments of the Attalids and the Romans were only plundered ruins by this time. With

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6426-661: The Hellenistic period , it became the capital of the Kingdom of Pergamon in 281–133 BC under the Attalid dynasty, who transformed it into one of the major cultural centres of the Greek world. Many remains of its monuments can still be seen and especially the masterpiece of the Pergamon Altar . Pergamon was the northernmost of the seven churches of Asia cited in the New Testament Book of Revelation . The city

6579-583: The Holy See , the primary language of its public journal , the Acta Apostolicae Sedis , and the working language of the Roman Rota . Vatican City is also home to the world's only automatic teller machine that gives instructions in Latin. In the pontifical universities postgraduate courses of Canon law are taught in Latin, and papers are written in the same language. There are

6732-574: The Middle Ages , borrowing from Latin occurred from ecclesiastical usage established by Saint Augustine of Canterbury in the 6th century or indirectly after the Norman Conquest , through the Anglo-Norman language . From the 16th to the 18th centuries, English writers cobbled together huge numbers of new words from Latin and Greek words, dubbed " inkhorn terms ", as if they had spilled from a pot of ink. Many of these words were used once by

6885-596: The Muslim conquests ; this community produced the emperor Philippicus ( r.  711–713 ). In 716, Pergamon was sacked again by the armies of Maslama ibn Abd al-Malik . It was again rebuilt and refortified after the Arabs abandoned their Siege of Constantinople in 717–718. Pergamon suffered from the Seljuk invasion of western Anatolia after the Battle of Manzikert in 1071. Attacks in 1109 and 1113 largely destroyed

7038-647: The Ptolemies derived themselves directly from Heracles, the Antigonids inserted Heracles into their family tree in the reign of Philip V at the end of the 3rd century BC at the latest, and the Seleucids claimed descent from Apollo . All of these claims derive their significance from Alexander the Great , who claimed descent from Heracles, through his father Philip II . In their constructive adaptation of

7191-576: The Roman Rite of the Catholic Church at the Vatican City . The church continues to adapt concepts from modern languages to Ecclesiastical Latin of the Latin language. Contemporary Latin is more often studied to be read rather than spoken or actively used. Latin has greatly influenced the English language , along with a large number of others, and historically contributed many words to

7344-569: The Romance languages . During the Classical period, informal language was rarely written, so philologists have been left with only individual words and phrases cited by classical authors, inscriptions such as Curse tablets and those found as graffiti . In the Late Latin period, language changes reflecting spoken (non-classical) norms tend to be found in greater quantities in texts. As it

7497-472: The Third Macedonian War , but the Romans heard rumours of his conducting secret negotiations with their opponent Perseus of Macedon . On this basis, Rome denied any reward to Pergamon and attempted to replace Eumenes with the future Attalus II, who refused to cooperate. These incidents cost Pergamon its privileged status with the Romans, who granted it no further territory. Nevertheless, under

7650-519: The Trojan War , but his son Eurypylus fights on the side of the Trojans . This material was dealt with in a number of tragedies, such as Aeschylus ' Mysi , Sophocles ' Aleadae , and Euripides ' Telephus and Auge , but Pergamon does not seem to have played any role in any of them. The adaptation of the myth is not entirely smooth. Thus, on the one hand, Eurypylus who must have been part of

7803-510: The Western Roman Empire fell in 476 and Germanic kingdoms took its place, the Germanic people adopted Latin as a language more suitable for legal and other, more formal uses. While the written form of Latin was increasingly standardized into a fixed form, the spoken forms began to diverge more greatly. Currently, the five most widely spoken Romance languages by number of native speakers are Spanish , Portuguese , French , Italian , and Romanian . Despite dialectal variation, which

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7956-423: The 13th century. Beginning with Ciriaco de' Pizzicolli in the 15th century, ever more travellers visited the place and published their accounts of it. The key description is that of Thomas Smith, who visited the Levant in 1668 and transmitted a detailed description of Pergamon, to which the great 17th century travellers Jacob Spon and George Wheler were able to add nothing significant in their own accounts. In

8109-437: The 3rd century BC, when the Attalids made him the chief god of their dynasty. In the 2nd century BC, Eumenes II (probably) built a temple for Dionysus at the northern end of the theatre terrace. The marble temple sits on a podium, 4.5 metres above the level of the theatre terrace and was an Ionic prostyle temple. The pronaos was four columns wide and two columns deep and was accessed by a staircase of twenty-five steps. Only

8262-553: The Ballista still retained some use in Medieval Siege Warfare, especially by city and castle garrisons, until it became finally extinguished by the more convenient medieval canons, already omnipresent in all major European Catholic cities by the first half of the 14th century. The Littere Wallie records the existence of 4 "balistas ad turrimi" at "Duluithelan" [Dolwyddelan] Castle in 1280, one "balistam de tur" at "Rothelano"[Rhuddlan] castle and one "magnam ballistam" at "Bere Blada" Castle [Castell y Bere?] in 1286. These all being held under

8415-451: The British Crown. The motto is featured on all presently minted coinage and has been featured in most coinage throughout the nation's history. Several states of the United States have Latin mottos , such as: Many military organizations today have Latin mottos, such as: Some law governing bodies in the Philippines have Latin mottos, such as: Some colleges and universities have adopted Latin mottos, for example Harvard University 's motto

8568-434: The Caicus, mistook it for Troy and began to ravage the land. On the other hand, the story was linked to the foundation of the city with another myth – that of Pergamus , the eponymous hero of the city. He also belonged to the broader cycle of myths related to the Trojan War as the grandson of Achilles through his father Neoptolemus and of Eetion of Thebe through his mother Andromache (concubine to Neoptolemus after

8721-486: The English lexicon , particularly after the Christianization of the Anglo-Saxons and the Norman Conquest . Latin and Ancient Greek roots are heavily used in English vocabulary in theology , the sciences , medicine , and law . A number of phases of the language have been recognized, each distinguished by subtle differences in vocabulary, usage, spelling, and syntax. There are no hard and fast rules of classification; different scholars emphasize different features. As

8874-416: The Grinch Stole Christmas! , The Cat in the Hat , and a book of fairy tales, " fabulae mirabiles ", are intended to garner popular interest in the language. Additional resources include phrasebooks and resources for rendering everyday phrases and concepts into Latin, such as Meissner's Latin Phrasebook . Some inscriptions have been published in an internationally agreed, monumental, multivolume series,

9027-400: The Pergamon museum in Berlin, where the parts of the frieze taken to Germany have been installed in a partial reconstruction. For the altar's construction, the required flat area was skillfully created through terracing, in order to allow it to be oriented in relation to the neighbouring Temple of Athena. The base of the altar measured around 36 x 33 metres and was decorated on the outside with

9180-403: The Persian Empire. Only with Alexander the Great were Pergamon and the surrounding area removed from Persian control. There are few traces of the pre-Hellenistic city, since in the following period the terrain was profoundly changed and the construction of broad terraces involved the removal of almost all earlier structures. Parts of the temple of Athena , as well as the walls and foundations of

9333-434: The Roman period, his image appears on civic coinage and he is said to have had a heroon in the city. Even so, he provided a further, deliberately crafted link to the world of Homeric epic. Mithridates VI was celebrated in the city as a new Pergamus. However, for the Attalids, it was apparently the genealogical connection to Heracles that was crucial, since all the other Hellenistic dynasties had long established such links:

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9486-408: The Salarian Gate a Goth of goodly stature and a capable warrior, wearing a corselet and having a helmet on his head, a man who was of no mean station in the Gothic nation, refused to remain in the ranks with his comrades, but stood by a tree and kept shooting many missiles at the parapet. But this man by some chance was hit by a missile from an engine which was on a tower at his left. And passing through

9639-414: The Temple, the former sharing it with the latter. The temple sits on a 2.9-metre-high (9.5 ft) podium on top of a vaulted terrace. The temple itself was a Corinthian peripteros temple, about 18 metres wide with six columns on the short sides and nine columns on the long sides, and two rows of columns in antis . To the north, the area was closed off by a high stoa, while on the west and east sides it

9792-409: The United States the unofficial national motto until 1956 was E pluribus unum meaning "Out of many, one". The motto continues to be featured on the Great Seal . It also appears on the flags and seals of both houses of congress and the flags of the states of Michigan, North Dakota, New York, and Wisconsin. The motto's 13 letters symbolically represent the original Thirteen Colonies which revolted from

9945-447: The University of Kentucky, the University of Oxford and also Princeton University. There are many websites and forums maintained in Latin by enthusiasts. The Latin Misplaced Pages has more than 130,000 articles. Italian , French , Portuguese , Spanish , Romanian , Catalan , Romansh , Sardinian and other Romance languages are direct descendants of Latin. There are also many Latin borrowings in English and Albanian , as well as

10098-567: The altar in the sanctuary of Demeter , go back to the fourth century. Lysimachus , King of Thrace , took possession in 301 BC, and the town was enlarged by his lieutenant Philetaerus . In 281 BC the kingdom of Thrace collapsed and Philetaerus became an independent ruler, founding the Attalid dynasty . His family ruled Pergamon from 281 until 133 BC: Philetaerus 281–263; Eumenes I 263–241; Attalus I 241–197; Eumenes II 197–159; Attalus II 159–138; and Attalus III 138–133. Philetaerus controlled only Pergamon and its immediate environs, but

10251-406: The archaeologist Alexander Conze took over direction of the department of ancient sculpture at the Royal Museums of Berlin , he quickly initiated a programme for the excavation and protection of the monuments connected to the sculpture, which were widely suspected to include the Great Altar. As a result of these efforts, Carl Humann, who had been carrying out low-level excavations at Pergamon for

10404-401: The army of the Roman Empire . It was used, just before the start of the Empire, by Julius Caesar during his conquest of Gaul and on both of his campaigns in subduing Britain. The first of Caesar's invasions of Britain took place in 55 BC, after a rapid and successful initial conquest of Gaul, in part as an expedition, and more practical to try to put an end to the reinforcements sent by

10557-423: The author and then forgotten, but some useful ones survived, such as 'imbibe' and 'extrapolate'. Many of the most common polysyllabic English words are of Latin origin through the medium of Old French . Romance words make respectively 59%, 20% and 14% of English, German and Dutch vocabularies. Those figures can rise dramatically when only non-compound and non-derived words are included. Pergamon During

10710-497: The authority of the English Crown. In remote and seemingly "savage" places like Ireland, however, where cannons were rare and personal firearms were almost non-existent, ballistae had recorded use well into late 15th century. While not a direct descendant mechanically, the concept and naming continues on as arbalest crossbows ( arcus 'bow' + ballista). Latin Latin ( lingua Latina , pronounced [ˈlɪŋɡʷa ɫaˈtiːna] , or Latinum [ɫaˈtiːnʊ̃] )

10863-429: The beginning of the 3rd century Caracalla granted the city a third neocorate, but a decline had already set in. The economic strength of Pergamon collapsed during the crisis of the Third Century , as the city was badly damaged in an earthquake in 262 and was sacked by the Goths shortly thereafter. In late antiquity , it experienced a limited economic recovery. In AD 663/4, Pergamon was captured by raiding Arabs for

11016-425: The benefit of those who do not understand Latin. There are also songs written with Latin lyrics . The libretto for the opera-oratorio Oedipus rex by Igor Stravinsky is in Latin. Parts of Carl Orff 's Carmina Burana are written in Latin. Enya has recorded several tracks with Latin lyrics. The continued instruction of Latin is seen by some as a highly valuable component of a liberal arts education. Latin

11169-410: The bow arms, which in turn, were attached to the bowstring. Drawing the bowstring back with the winches twisted the already taut springs, storing the energy to fire the projectiles. The bronze or iron caps, which secured the torsion bundles were adjustable by means of pins and peripheral holes, which allowed the weapon to be tuned for symmetrical power and for changing weather conditions. The ballista

11322-406: The brothers Eumenes II and Attalus II, Pergamon reached its apex and was rebuilt on a monumental scale. It had retained the same dimensions for a long interval after its founding by Philetaerus, covering c. 21 hectares (52 acres). After 188 BC a massive new city wall was constructed, 4 kilometres (2.5 mi) long and enclosing an area of approximately 90 hectares (220 acres). The Attalids' goal

11475-409: The careful work of Petrarch, Politian and others, first the demand for manuscripts, and then the rush to bring works into print, led to the circulation of inaccurate copies for several centuries following. Neo-Latin literature was extensive and prolific, but less well known or understood today. Works covered poetry, prose stories and early novels, occasional pieces and collections of letters, to name

11628-620: The city acquired much new territory under Eumenes I. In particular, after the Battle of Sardis in 261 BC against Antiochus I , Eumenes was able to appropriate the area down to the coast and some way inland. Despite this increase of his domain, Eumenes did not take a royal title. In 238 his successor Attalus I defeated the Galatians , to whom Pergamon had paid tribute under Eumenes I. Attalus thereafter declared himself leader of an entirely independent Pergamene kingdom. The Attalids became some of

11781-457: The city and its ruins was first produced by Charles Texier when he published the second volume of his Description de l'Asie mineure . In 1864–5, the German engineer Carl Humann visited Pergamon for the first time. For the construction of the road from Pergamon to Dikili for which he had undertaken planning work and topographical studies, he returned in 1869 and began to focus intensively on

11934-541: The city, which was only rebuilt, by Emperor Manuel I Komnenos ( r.  1143–1180 ), around 1170. It likely became the capital of the new theme of Neokastra , established by Manuel. Under Isaac II Angelos ( r.  1185–1195 ), the local see was promoted to a metropolitan bishopric , having previously been a suffragan diocese of the Metropolis of Ephesus . After the Sack of Constantinople in 1204 during

12087-415: The classicised Latin that followed through to the present are often grouped together as Neo-Latin , or New Latin, which have in recent decades become a focus of renewed study , given their importance for the development of European culture, religion and science. The vast majority of written Latin belongs to this period, but its full extent is unknown. The Renaissance reinforced the position of Latin as

12240-422: The corselet and the body of the man, the missile sank more than half its length into the tree, and pinning him to the spot where it entered the tree, it suspended him there a corpse. The carroballista was a cart-mounted version of the weapon. There were probably different models of ballista under the cheiroballistra class, at least two different two-wheeled models and one model with four wheels. Their probable size

12393-465: The country's full Latin name. Some film and television in ancient settings, such as Sebastiane , The Passion of the Christ and Barbarians (2020 TV series) , have been made with dialogue in Latin. Occasionally, Latin dialogue is used because of its association with religion or philosophy, in such film/television series as The Exorcist and Lost (" Jughead "). Subtitles are usually shown for

12546-503: The death of Hector of Troy ). With his mother, he was said to have fled to Mysia where he killed the ruler of Teuthrania and gave the city his own name. There he built a heroon for his mother after her death. In a less heroic version, Grynos the son of Eurypylus named a city after him in gratitude for a favour. These mythic connections seem to be late and are not attested before the 3rd century BC. Pergamus' role remained subordinate, although he did receive some cult worship. Beginning in

12699-503: The decline in written Latin output. Despite having no native speakers, Latin is still used for a variety of purposes in the contemporary world. The largest organisation that retains Latin in official and quasi-official contexts is the Catholic Church . The Catholic Church required that Mass be carried out in Latin until the Second Vatican Council of 1962–1965 , which permitted the use of the vernacular . Latin remains

12852-479: The designs over many years of work. With the decline of the Roman Empire , resources to build and maintain these complex machines became very scarce, so the ballista was likely supplanted initially by the simpler and cheaper onager and the more efficient springald . However, while it remained less and less popular as more efficient siege engines such as the trebuchet and the mangonel became widespread,

13005-468: The development of the city. Numerous honorific inscriptions indicate Pasparus' work and his exceptional position in Pergamon at this time. Pergamon still remained a famous city, and was the seat of a conventus (regional assembly). Its neocorate , granted by Augustus , was the first manifestation of the imperial cult in the province of Asia. Pliny the Elder refers to the city as the most important in

13158-522: The discovery of a 1,800-year-old well-preserved geometric patterned floor mosaic around the Red Basilica. The most famous structure from the city is the monumental altar, sometimes called the Great Altar, which was probably dedicated to Zeus and Athena. The foundations are still located in the Upper city, but the remains of the Pergamon frieze, which originally decorated it, are displayed in

13311-652: The dynastic line as a result of the appropriation of the myth, was not mentioned in the hymn sung in honour of Telephus in the Asclepieion. Otherwise he does not seem to have been paid any heed. But the Pergamenes made offerings to Telephus and the grave of his mother Auge was located in Pergamon near the Caicus. Pergamon thus entered the Trojan epic cycle, with its ruler said to have been an Arcadian who had fought with Telephus against Agamemnon when he landed at

13464-528: The educated and official world, Latin continued without its natural spoken base. Moreover, this Latin spread into lands that had never spoken Latin, such as the Germanic and Slavic nations. It became useful for international communication between the member states of the Holy Roman Empire and its allies. Without the institutions of the Roman Empire that had supported its uniformity, Medieval Latin

13617-641: The expansion of the Anatolian beyliks , Pergamon was absorbed into the beylik of Karasids shortly after 1300, and then conquered by the Ottoman beylik . The Ottoman Sultan Murad III had two large alabaster urns transported from the ruins of Pergamon and placed on two sides of the nave in the Hagia Sophia in Istanbul . Pergamon, which traced its founding back to Telephus , the son of Heracles ,

13770-485: The faith of the Pergamon believers, who "dwell where Satan's throne is" is commended by the author . Many scholars believe that the " seat of Satan " refers to the Pergamon Altar, due to its resemblance to a gigantic throne . The well-preserved Theatre of Pergamon  [ de ] dates from the Hellenistic period and had space for around 10,000 people, in 78 rows of seats. At a height of 36 metres, it

13923-471: The finders, including technical manuals and journals, are used today by archaeologists to reconstruct these weapons. After Julius Caesar, the ballista was a permanent fixture in the Roman army and, over time, modifications and improvements were made by successive engineers. This included replacing the remaining wooden parts of the machine with metal, creating a much smaller, lighter and more powerful machine than

14076-743: The first time. As a result of the ongoing Arab threat, the area of settlement retracted to the acropolis , which the Emperor Constans II ( r.  641–668 ) fortified with a 6-meter-thick (20 ft) wall built of spolia . During the middle Byzantine period, the city was part of the Thracesian Theme , and from the time of Leo VI the Wise ( r.  886–912 ) of the Theme of Samos . 7th-century sources attest an Armenian community in Pergamon, probably formed of refugees from

14229-416: The form of a bow, but on the under side of them a grooved wooden shaft projects; this shaft is so fitted to the bow that it is free to move, and rests upon a straight iron bed. So when men wish to shoot at the enemy with this, they make the parts of the bow which form the ends bend toward one another by means of a short rope fastened to them, and they place in the grooved shaft the arrow, which is about one half

14382-595: The highly advanced Greek technology began to spread across many areas of Roman influence. This included the great military machine advances the Greeks had made (most notably by Dionysus of Syracuse), as well as all the scientific, mathematical, political and artistic developments. The Romans adopted the torsion-powered ballista, which had by now spread to several cities around the Mediterranean, all of which became Roman spoils of war, including one from Pergamon , which

14535-509: The idea of using springs made from tightly strung coils of rope instead of a bow to achieve more energy and power when throwing projectiles. Polybius reported about the usage of smaller, more portable ballistae, called scorpions , during the Second Punic War . Ballistae could be easily modified to shoot both spherical and shaft projectiles, allowing their crews to adapt quickly to prevailing battlefield situations in real time. As

14688-443: The information necessary to reconstruct the weapons, all their measurements were in their native language and therefore highly difficult to translate. Attempts to reconstruct these ancient weapons began at the end of the 19th century, based on rough translations of ancient authors. It was only during the 20th century, however, that many of the reconstructions began to make any sense as a weapon. By bringing in modern engineers, progress

14841-703: The invention of printing and are now published in carefully annotated printed editions, such as the Loeb Classical Library , published by Harvard University Press , or the Oxford Classical Texts , published by Oxford University Press . Latin translations of modern literature such as: The Hobbit , Treasure Island , Robinson Crusoe , Paddington Bear , Winnie the Pooh , The Adventures of Tintin , Asterix , Harry Potter , Le Petit Prince , Max and Moritz , How

14994-704: The language of the Roman Rite . The Tridentine Mass (also known as the Extraordinary Form or Traditional Latin Mass) is celebrated in Latin. Although the Mass of Paul VI (also known as the Ordinary Form or the Novus Ordo) is usually celebrated in the local vernacular language, it can be and often is said in Latin, in part or in whole, especially at multilingual gatherings. It is the official language of

15147-440: The large areas where it had come to be natively spoken. However, even after the fall of Western Rome , Latin remained the common language of international communication , science, scholarship and academia in Europe until well into the early 19th century, by which time modern languages had supplanted it in common academic and political usage. Late Latin is the literary language from the 3rd century AD onward. No longer spoken as

15300-635: The late 18th century, these visits were reinforced by a scholarly (especially ancient historical) desire for research, epitomised by Marie-Gabriel-Florent-Auguste de Choiseul-Gouffier , a traveller in Asia Minor and French ambassador to the Sublime Porte in Istanbul from 1784 to 1791. At the beginning of the 19th century, Charles Robert Cockerell produced a detailed account and Otto Magnus von Stackelberg made important sketches. A proper, multi-page description with plans, elevations, and views of

15453-467: The late seventeenth century, when spoken skills began to erode. It then became increasingly taught only to be read. Latin grammar is highly fusional , with classes of inflections for case , number , person , gender , tense , mood , voice , and aspect . The Latin alphabet is directly derived from the Etruscan and Greek alphabets . Latin remains the official language of the Holy See and

15606-431: The later part of the Roman Republic , up to 75 BC, i.e. before the age of Classical Latin . It is attested both in inscriptions and in some of the earliest extant Latin literary works, such as the comedies of Plautus and Terence . The Latin alphabet was devised from the Etruscan alphabet . The writing later changed from what was initially either a right-to-left or a boustrophedon script to what ultimately became

15759-441: The legacy of the city. In 1871, he organised a small expedition there under the leadership of Ernst Curtius . As a result of this short but intensive investigation, two fragments of a great frieze were discovered and transported to Berlin for detailed analysis, where they received some interest, but not a lot. It is not clear who connected these fragments with the Great Altar in Pergamon mentioned by Lucius Ampelius . However, when

15912-444: The length of the ordinary missiles which they shoot from bows, but about four times as wide...but the missile is discharged from the shaft, and with such force that it attains the distance of not less than two bow-shots, and that, when it hits a tree or a rock, it pierces it easily. Such is the engine which bears this name, being so called because it shoots with very great force... The missiles were able to penetrate body-armour: And at

16065-421: The less prestigious colloquial registers , attested in inscriptions and some literary works such as those of the comic playwrights Plautus and Terence and the author Petronius . While often called a "dead language", Latin did not undergo language death . By the 6th to 9th centuries, natural language change eventually resulted in Latin as a vernacular language evolving into distinct Romance languages in

16218-500: The lower city as a whole and performed survey work, which increased knowledge of the countryside surrounding the city. In 1971, after a short pause, Wolfgang Radt succeeded him as leader of excavations and directed the focus of research on the residential buildings of Pergamon, but also on technical issues, like the water management system of the city which supported a population of 200,000 at its height. He also carried out conservation projects which were of vital importance for maintaining

16371-485: The main entrance at the southeast corner of the lowest terrace. The lowest and southernmost terrace is small and almost free of buildings. It is known as the Lower Gymnasium and has been identified as the boys' gymnasium. The middle terrace was around 250 metres long and 70 metres wide at the centre. On its north side there was a two-story hall. In the east part of the terrace there was a small prostyle temple in

16524-482: The massif falls gradually to the east and south, widening to around 350 metres (1,150 ft) and then descends to the plain towards the southwest. Settlement of Pergamon can be detected as far back as the Archaic period , thanks to modest archaeological finds, especially fragments of pottery imported from the west, particularly eastern Greece and Corinth , which date to the late 8th century BC. Earlier habitation in

16677-712: The material remains of Pergamon. Since 2006, the excavations have been led by Felix Pirson . Most of the finds from the Pergamon excavations before the First World War were taken to the Pergamon Museum in Berlin, with a smaller portion going to the İstanbul Archaeological Museum after it was opened in 1891. After the First World War the Bergama Museum was opened, which has received all finds discovered since then. In May 2022, archaeologists announced

16830-637: The most complete possible exposure and investigation of the historic city and citadel that was possible. He was followed by the architectural historian Wilhelm Dörpfeld from 1900 to 1911, who was responsible for the most important discoveries. Under his leadership the Lower Agora, the House of Attalos, the Gymnasion, and the Sanctuary of Demeter were brought to light. The excavations were interrupted by

16983-456: The most distinctive trait of the Attalids: a pronounced sense of family without rivalry or intrigue - rare amongst the Hellenistic dynasties. Attalus II bore the epithet 'Philadelphos', 'he who loves his brother', and his relations with Eumenes II were compared to the harmony between the mythical brothers Cleobis and Biton . When Attalus III died without an heir in 133 BC, he bequeathed

17136-643: The most loyal supporters of Rome in the Hellenistic world. Attalus I allied with Rome against Philip V of Macedon , during the first and second Macedonian Wars . In the Roman–Seleucid War , Pergamon joined the Romans' coalition against Antiochus III , and was rewarded with almost all the former Seleucid domains in Asia Minor at the Peace of Apamea in 188 BC. The kingdom's territories thus reached their greatest extent. Eumenes II supported Rome again in

17289-490: The myth, the Attalids stood within the tradition of the other, older Hellenistic dynasties, who legitimized themselves through divine descent, and sought to increase their own prestige. The inhabitants of Pergamon enthusiastically followed their lead and took to calling themselves Telephidai ( Τηλεφίδαι ) and referring to Pergamon itself in poetic registers as the 'Telephian city' ( Τήλεφις πόλις ). The first mention of Pergamon in written records after ancient times comes from

17442-499: The native Britons to fight the Romans in Gaul. A total of eighty means of transport, carrying two legions, attempted to land on the British shore, only to be driven back by the many British warriors assembled along the shoreline. The ships had to unload their troops on the beach, as it was the only one suitable for many miles, yet the massed ranks of British charioteers and javeliners were making it difficult. Seeing this, Caesar ordered

17595-458: The north side, the rock forms a 70 metres (230 ft) wide spur of rock. To the southeast of this spur, which is known as the 'Garden of the Queen', the massif reaches its greatest height and breaks off suddenly immediately to the east. The upper city extends for another 250 metres (820 ft) to the south, but it remains very narrow, with a width of only 150 metres (490 ft). At its south en d

17748-466: The northern end was unimpeded. A marble stage building was only built in the 1st century BC. Additional theatres were built in the Roman period, one in the Roman new city and the other in the sanctuary of Asclepius. On the highest point of the citadel is the Temple of Trajan , the Traianeum or Trajaneum. The Temple is also called the Temple of Zeus Philios , as both Zeus and Trajan were worshiped in

17901-504: The northern stoa, which is probably of Roman date and a large banquet hall in the centre. Further rooms of uncertain function were accessible from the stoas. In the west was a south-facing Ionic antae temple , the central sanctuary of the gymnasium. The eastern area was replaced with a bath complex in Roman times. Further Roman baths were constructed to the west of the Ionic temple. The sanctuary of Hera Basileia ('the Queen') lay north of

18054-466: The other varieties, as it was largely separated from the unifying influences in the western part of the Empire. Spoken Latin began to diverge into distinct languages by the 9th century at the latest, when the earliest extant Romance writings begin to appear. They were, throughout the period, confined to everyday speech, as Medieval Latin was used for writing. For many Italians using Latin, though, there

18207-560: The previous few years and had discovered for example the architrave inscription of the Temple of Demeter in 1875, was entrusted with carry out work in the area of the altar of Zeus in 1878, where he continued to work until 1886. With the approval of the Ottoman Empire , the reliefs discovered there were transported to Berlin, where the Pergamon Museum was opened for them in 1907. The work was continued by Conze, who aimed for

18360-406: The province and the local aristocracy continued to reach the highest circles of power in the 1st century AD, like Aulus Julius Quadratus who was consul in 94 and 105. Yet it was only under Trajan and his successors that a comprehensive redesign and remodelling took place, with the construction of a Roman 'new city' at the base of the Acropolis. The city was the first in the province to receive

18513-497: The rise of the city; the story that it was invented by the Pergamenes, to circumvent the Ptolemies ' monopoly on papyrus production, is not true. Surviving epigraphic documents show how the Attalids supported the growth of towns by sending in skilled artisans and by remitting taxes. They allowed the Greek cities in their domains to maintain nominal independence, and sent gifts to Greek cultural sites like Delphi , Delos , and Athens. The two brothers Eumenes II and Attalus II displayed

18666-464: The role of battlefield artillery became more sophisticated, a universal joint (which was invented just for this function) was integrated into the ballista's stand, allowing the operators to alter the trajectory and firing direction of the ballista as required without a lengthy disassembly of the machine. After the absorption of the Ancient Greek city-states into the Roman Republic in 146 BC,

18819-542: The same weapon. The difference in name may be attributable to the different languages spoken in the Empire. Latin remained the official language in the Western Empire , but the Eastern Empire predominantly used Greek, which added an extra 'r' to the word ballista. The manuballista was a handheld version of the traditional ballista. This new version was made entirely of iron, which conferred greater power to

18972-403: The stand. The main stand had a slider on the top, into which were loaded the bolts or stone shot . Attached to this, at the back, was a pair of ' winches ' and a 'claw', used to ratchet the bowstring back to the armed firing position. The slider passed through the field frames of the weapon, in which were located the torsion springs (rope made of animal sinew ), which were twisted around

19125-408: The strange shape of the warships, the motion of the oars, and the unfamiliar machines, the natives halted and retreated. (Caesar, The Conquest of Gaul , p.99) In Gaul, the stronghold of Alesia was under a Roman siege in 52 BC, and was completely surrounded by a Roman fortification including a wooden palisade and towers. As was standard siege technique at the time, small ballistae were placed in

19278-405: The temple are unfluted and retained bossage , but it is not clear whether this was a result of carelessness or incompleteness. A two-story stoa surrounding the temple on three sides was added under Eumenes II, along with the propylon in the southeast corner, which is now found, largely reconstructed, in the Pergamon Museum in Berlin. The balustrade of the upper level of the north and east stoas

19431-459: The towers with other troops armed with bows or slings . The use of the ballista in the Roman siege strategy was also demonstrated in the case of the Siege of Masada . During the conquest of the Empire, the ballista proved its worth many times in sieges and battles, both at sea and on land. It is from the time of the Roman Empire that many of the archaeological finds of ballistae date. Accounts by

19584-408: The upper terrace of the gymnasium. Its structure sits on two parallel terraces, the south one about 107.4 metres above sea level and the north one about 109.8 metres above sea level. The Temple of Hera sat in the middle of the upper terrace, facing to the south, with a 6-metre-wide (20 ft) exedra to the west and a building whose function is very unclear to the east. The two terraces were linked by

19737-404: The warships – which were swifter and easier to handle than the transports, and likely to impress the natives more by their unfamiliar appearance – to be removed a short distance from the others, and then be rowed hard and run ashore on the enemy’s right flank, from which position men on deck could use the slings, bows, and artillery to drive them back. This maneuver was highly successful. Scared by

19890-473: The weapon, since it was smaller, and less iron (an expensive material before the 19th century), was used in its production. It was not the ancient gastraphetes , but the Roman weapon. However, the same physical limitations applied as with the gastraphetes. Archaeology, and in particular experimental archaeology has been influential on this subject. Although several ancient authors (such as Vegetius ) wrote very detailed technical treatises, providing us with all

20043-462: The weapons had decorative metal plates to shield the operators), to Iraq (the Hatra Machine) and even Scotland (Burnswark siege tactics training camp), and many other sites between. The most influential archaeologists in this area have been Peter Connolly and Eric Marsden, who have not only written extensively on the subject but have also made many reconstructions themselves and have refined

20196-401: The whole of Pergamon to Rome. This was challenged by Aristonicus , who claimed to be Attalus III's brother and led an armed uprising against the Romans with the help of Blossius , a famous Stoic philosopher . For a period he enjoyed success, defeating and killing the Roman consul P. Licinius Crassus and his army, but he was defeated in 129 BC by the consul M. Perperna . The Attalid kingdom

20349-490: The width of the Danube River." Ballistae were not only used in laying siege: after AD 350, at least 22 semi-circular towers were erected around the walls of Londinium ( London ) to provide platforms for permanently mounted defensive devices. During the 6th century, Procopius described the effects of this weapon: But Belisarius placed upon the towers engines which they call "ballistae". Now these engines have

20502-470: The wooden version, which required less maintenance (though the vital torsion springs were still vulnerable to the strain). The largest ballistae of the 4th century could throw a dart further than 1200 yards (1,100 m). The weapon was named ballista fulminalis in De rebus bellicis : "From this ballista, darts were projected not only in great number but also at a large size over a considerable distance, such as across

20655-453: Was a siege weapon . All components that were not made of wood were transported in the baggage train. It would be assembled with local wood, if necessary. Some were positioned inside large, armored, mobile siege towers or even on the edge of a battlefield. For all of the tactical advantages offered, it was only under Philip II of Macedon , and even more so under his son Alexander , that the ballista began to develop and gain recognition as both

20808-410: Was a handheld crossbow. It had a composite prod and was spanned by bracing the front end of the weapon against the ground while placing the end of a slider mechanism against the stomach. The operator would then walk forward to arm the weapon while a ratchet prevented it from shooting during loading. This produced a weapon that, it was claimed, could be operated by a person of average strength but which had

20961-407: Was a highly accurate weapon (there are many accounts of single soldiers being picked off by ballistarii ), but some design aspects meant it could compromise its accuracy for range. The maximum range was over 500 yards (460 m), but the effective combat range for many targets was far shorter. The Romans continued the development of the ballista , and it became a highly prized and valued weapon in

21114-557: Was added to the UNESCO World Heritage List in 2014. Pergamon lies on the north edge of the Caicus plain in the historic region of Mysia in the northwest of Turkey. The Caicus river breaks through the surrounding mountains and hills at this point and flows in a wide arc to the southwest. At the foot of the mountain range to the north, between the rivers Selinus and Cetius, there is the massif of Pergamon which rises 335 metres (1,099 ft) above sea level. The site

21267-530: Was decorated with reliefs depicting weapons which commemorated Eumenes II's military victory. The construction mixed Ionic columns and Doric triglyphs (of which five triglyphs and metopes survive). In the area of the sanctuary, Attalos I and Eumenes II constructed victory monuments, most notably the Gallic dedications. The northern stoa seems to have been the site of the Library of Pergamon. The Library of Pergamon

21420-404: Was depicted among a pile of trophy weapons in relief on a balustrade. The torsion ballista, developed by Alexander, was a far more complicated weapon than its predecessor and the Romans developed it even further, especially into much smaller versions, that could be easily carried. The early Roman ballistae were made of wood, and held together with iron plates around the frames and iron nails in

21573-472: Was divided between Rome, Pontus , and Cappadocia , with the bulk of its territory becoming the new Roman province of Asia . The city itself was declared free and served briefly as capital of the province, before this distinction was transferred to Ephesus . In 88 BC, Mithridates VI Eupator made Pergamon his headquarters in his first war against Rome, in which he was defeated. The victorious Romans deprived Pergamon of all its benefits and of its status as

21726-414: Was expanded into a lavish spa. This sanctuary grew in fame and was considered one of the most famous healing centers of the Roman world. In the middle of the 2nd century Pergamon was one of the largest cities in the province, and had around 200,000 inhabitants. Galen , the most famous physician of antiquity aside from Hippocrates , was born at Pergamon and received his early training at the Asclepieion. At

21879-413: Was free to develop on its own, there is no reason to suppose that the speech was uniform either diachronically or geographically. On the contrary, Romanised European populations developed their own dialects of the language, which eventually led to the differentiation of Romance languages . Late Latin is a kind of written Latin used in the 3rd to 6th centuries. This began to diverge from Classical forms at

22032-642: Was made with the ancient systems of measurement. By redesigning the reconstructions using the new information, archaeologists in that specialty were able to recognise certain finds from Roman military sites, and identify them as ballistae. The information gained from the excavations was fed into the next generation of reconstructions and so on. Sites across the empire have yielded information on ballistae, from Spain (the Ampurias Catapult), to Italy (the Cremona Battleshield, which proved that

22185-496: Was much more liberal in its linguistic cohesion: for example, in classical Latin sum and eram are used as auxiliary verbs in the perfect and pluperfect passive, which are compound tenses. Medieval Latin might use fui and fueram instead. Furthermore, the meanings of many words were changed and new words were introduced, often under influence from the vernacular. Identifiable individual styles of classically incorrect Latin prevail. Renaissance Latin, 1300 to 1500, and

22338-441: Was no complete separation between Italian and Latin, even into the beginning of the Renaissance . Petrarch for example saw Latin as a literary version of the spoken language. Medieval Latin is the written Latin in use during that portion of the post-classical period when no corresponding Latin vernacular existed, that is from around 700 to 1500 AD. The spoken language had developed into the various Romance languages; however, in

22491-671: Was planning an expedition against the Persian satraps Tissaphernes and Pharnabazus , at this location in March 399 BC. At this time Pergamon was in the possession of the family of Gongylos from Eretria , a Greek favourable to the Achaemenid Empire who had taken refuge in Asia Minor and obtained the territory of Pergamon from Xerxes I , and Xenophon was hosted by his widow Hellas. In 362 BC, Orontes , satrap of Mysia, used Pergamon as his base for an unsuccessful revolt against

22644-459: Was possible to shoot lighter projectiles with higher velocities over a longer distance. By contrast, the comparatively slow relaxation time of the bow or prod of a conventional crossbow such as the oxybeles meant that much less energy could be transferred to light projectiles, limiting the effective range of the weapon. The earliest form of the ballista is thought to have been developed for Dionysius of Syracuse , c. 400 BC. The Greek ballista

22797-433: Was roughly 1.47 m (4 ft 10 in) width, i.e., 5 Roman feet. The cart system and structure gave it a great deal of flexibility and capability as a battlefield weapon, since the increased maneuverability allowed it to be moved with the flow of the battle. This weapon features several times on Trajan's Column . It has been speculated that the Roman military may have also fielded a 'repeating' ballista, also known as

22950-482: Was shut down in June 2019), and Vatican Radio & Television, all of which broadcast news segments and other material in Latin. A variety of organisations, as well as informal Latin 'circuli' ('circles'), have been founded in more recent times to support the use of spoken Latin. Moreover, a number of university classics departments have begun incorporating communicative pedagogies in their Latin courses. These include

23103-463: Was surrounded by simple ashlar walls, until further stoas were inserted in Hadrian's reign. During the excavations fragments of statues of Trajan and Hadrian were found in the rubble of the cella , including their portrait heads , as well as fragments of the cult statue of Zeus Philios. At Pergamon, Dionysus had the epithet Kathegemon , 'the guide', and was already worshiped in the last third of

23256-520: Was the second largest in the ancient Greek world after the Library of Alexandria , containing at least 200,000 scrolls. The location of the library building is not certain. Since the 19th century excavations, it has generally been identified with an annex of the northern stoa of the sanctuary of Athena in the Upper Citadel, which was built by Eumenes II. Inscriptions in the gymnasium which mention

23409-507: Was to create a second Athens , a cultural and artistic hub of the Greek world. They remodeled their Acropolis after the Acropolis in Athens, and the Library of Pergamon was renowned as second only to the Library of Alexandria . Pergamon was also a flourishing center for the production of parchment , whose name is a corruption of pergamenos , meaning "from Pergamon". Despite this etymology, parchment had been used in Asia Minor long before

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