Altar of Zeus

The Altar of Zeus at Pergamon stood on a terrace of the acropolis of the Attalid capital in Asia Minor. King Eumenes II raised it in the first half of the second century BC, after the Treaty of Apamea of 188 BC made Pergamon the chief power of western Anatolia under Roman protection.

Its base, more than thirty-five metres wide, carried a high-relief frieze showing the Olympian gods battling the Giants. A second frieze in the inner court depicted the life of Telephus, son of Heracles and legendary founder of the city.

The fire altar ceased to be used with the rise of Christianity. In the seventh century the acropolis was fortified against the Arabs, and the monument was partly dismantled for building stone before the Arabs took the city in 716. In 1625 agents of the Earl of Arundel carried two frieze panels to England.