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German Pages 359 [362] Year 2024
RBIS TERRARUM Alte Geschichte Franz Steiner Verlag
Band 21 (2023)
Internationale Zeitschrift für historische Geographie der Alten Welt Journal of Historical Geography of the Ancient World Revue internationale de la géographie historique du monde antique Rivista internazionale di geografia storica del mondo antico
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ORBIS TERRARUM Internationale Zeitschrift für historische Geographie der Alten Welt Journal of Historical Geography of the Ancient World Revue internationale de la géographie historique du monde antique Rivista internazionale di geografia storica del mondo antico Publikationsorgan der Ernst-Kirsten-Gesellschaft: Internationale Gesellschaft für Historische Geographie der Alten Welt begründet von Eckart Olshausen herausgegeben von Michael Rathmann Mitherausgeber (Rezensionen): Frank Daubner Veronica Bucciantini Wissenschaftlicher Beirat: Pascal Arnaud (Lyon), Serena Bianchetti (Firenze), Angelos Chaniotis (Princeton), Gonzalo Cruz Andreotti (Málaga), Anca Dan (Paris), Daniela Dueck (Ramat Gan), Hans-Joachim Gehrke (Freiburg), Francisco J. González Ponce (Sevilla), Herbert Graßl (Salzburg), Anne Kolb (Zürich), Andreas Külzer (Wien), Ray Laurence (Sydney), Felix K. Maier (Zürich), Alexander Podossinov (Moskau), Francesco Prontera (Perugia), Vera Sauer (Rangendingen), Mustafa Sayar (Istanbul), Pierre Schneider (Arras) www.steiner-verlag.de/brand/Orbis-Terrarum
ORBIS TERRARUM Internationale Zeitschrift für historische Geographie der Alten Welt Journal of Historical Geography of the Ancient World Revue internationale de la géographie historique du monde antique Rivista internazionale di geografia storica del mondo antico 21 (2023)
Franz Steiner Verlag
Das Emblem auf dem Cover der Zeitschrift ist abgeleitet von einem Relief in der Galleria Estense, Módena, Inv. Nr. 2627 (vgl. Vera Sauer, OT 1, 1995, 9–23). Bibliografische Information der Deutschen Nationalbibliothek: Die Deutsche Nationalbibliothek verzeichnet diese Publikation in der Deutschen Nationalbibliografie; detaillierte bibliografische Daten sind im Internet über dnb.d-nb.de abrufbar. Dieses Werk einschließlich aller seiner Teile ist urheberrechtlich geschützt. Jede Verwertung außerhalb der engen Grenzen des Urheberrechtsgesetzes ist unzulässig und strafbar. © Franz Steiner Verlag, Stuttgart 2024 www.steiner-verlag.de Druck: Beltz Grafische Betriebe, Bad Langensalza Gedruckt auf säurefreiem, alterungsbeständigem Papier. Printed in Germany. ISSN 1385-285X ISBN 978-3-515-13662-4 (Print) ISBN 978-3-515-13666-2 (E-Book) https://doi.org/10.25162/9783515136662
INHALTSVERZEICHNIS Preface M. Rathmann .............................................................................................. 9 Prefazione V. Bucciantini ...................................................................................... 10 Widmung Tønnes Bekker-Nielsen Laudatio for Eckart Olshausen .............................................................................. 11 Beiträge Serena Bianchetti Istmo Tanais e Mar Caspio: alla ricerca di un passaggio a Nord-Est ................... 13 Edoardo Bianchi “The place ... in the most favourable position of all in Sicily” (Diod. Sic. 14.58.4): Zancle-Messana and its sickle-shaped peninsula ................ 31 Tomislav Bilić Crates Gromaticus. The transmission of Crates’ theory of quadripartite earth in the corpus of works on Roman land surveying .................. 47 Francesco Cannizzaro Guerra civile, hybris o progresso? Rappresentazioni dell’istmo di Corinto nella letteratura Latina .......................................................................................... 61 Altay Coşkun Trapezus in Kolchis II. Mytho-Geography on the Tabula Peutingeriana ............ 77 Patrick Counillon Où est l’isthme de l’ Ὑλλική χερρόνησος? ........................................................ 113 Drusilla Firindelli Observations on IG IV2 3 1803: the term Hellas and the Isthmus of Corinth ........................................................................................ 125
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Onur Sadık Karakuş Between Narrative and History: Notes on the Gothic Presence in Late Antique Phrygia .......................................................................................... 147 Kyriakos Loulakoudis Wine production facilities in the Roman and Late Roman farmhouses of Southern Greece ............................................................................................. 167 Maria Lubello Ubique vitam agimus consularem et in Lucrino serii sumus (Symm. ep. 8, 23) . .............................................................................................. 193 Andrea Pierozzi La costa atlantica della Penisola Iberica in un frammento di Erodoro di Eraclea .......................................................................................... 205 Thomas Schmidts Die südthrakische Küste in der römischen Kaiserzeit ........................................ 229 Miszellen Pietro Zaccaria Sulle orme di Felix Jacoby tra continuità e innovazione .................................... 275 Buchbesprechungen Achim Lichtenberger Besprechung zu Hollis, Dawn / König, Jason (eds.), Mountain Dialogues from Antiquity to Modernity, Ancient Environments ....................... 283 Catherine Bouras Besprechung zu Mania, Ulrich (ed.), Hafen, Stadt, Mikroregion. Beiträge der Arbeitsgruppe 5 „Hafenorte“ des Forschungsclusters 6 „Connecting Cultures“ und einer Tagung am 26. und 27. Mai 2017 an der Abteilung Istanbul des DAI ................................................................................ 286 Rene Bloch Besprechung zu Papadodima, Evi (ed.), Ancient Greek Literature and the Foreign. Athenian Dialogues II ..................................................................... 289 Valeria Riedmann Lorca Besprechung zu Reitz-Joosse, Bettina / Makins, Marian W. / Mackie, C. J. (eds.), Landscapes of War in Greek and Roman Literature ......... 292
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Monika Schuol Besprechung zu Schulz, Raimund (ed.), Maritime Entdeckung und Expansion. Kontinuitäten, Parallelen und Brüche von der Antike bis in die Neuzeit ........... 297 Miriam A. Valdés Guía Besprechung zu Cataudella, Michele R., Ritorno alla Flat Tax. Un itinerario di Atene antica fra VII e IV secolo? .............................................. 301 Julian Degen Besprechung zu Dueck, Daniela, Illiterate geography in classical Athens and Rome ................................................................................................ 305 Philipp Köhner Besprechung zu Froehlich, Susanne, Reisen im Römischen Reich .................... 308 Gerhard Waldherr Besprechung zu Hettinger, Jasmin, Hochwasservorsorge im Römischen Reich. Praktiken und Paradigmen .................................................... 311 Johannes Engels Besprechung zu Irby, Georgia L., Conceptions of the Watery World in Greco-Roman Antiquity ..................................................................................... 315 Martin Steskal Besprechung zu Kerschbaum, Saskia, Fernwasserleitungen im kaiserzeitlichen Kleinasien. Ein Innovationsprozess und sein urbanistischer und soziokultureller Kontext ....................................................... 319 Matthew Shipton Besprechung zu König, Jason, The Folds of Olympus. Mountains in Ancient Greek and Roman Culture ..................................................................... 322 Tønnes Bekker-Nielsen Besprechung zu Lutz, Jan, Digital History als ‘experimental space’: Handels- und Transportnetzwerke in Gallien und Germanien sowie die Transportverbindung zwischen Mosel und Saône .............................. 325 Thorsten Fögen Besprechung zu Guillaumin, Jean-Yves, Les arpenteurs romains. Vol. IV: Agennius Urbicus – Marcus Junius Nypsius. Texte établi et traduit .................. 328 Annemarie Ambühl Besprechung zu Meyer, Anne-Sophie, Naturphänomene in Lucans Bellum civile ....................................................................................................... 332
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Livia De Martinis Besprechung zu Polemone di Ilio, I frammenti degli scritti periegetici. Introduzione, testo greco, traduzione e commento, a cura di Mariachiara Angelucci ........................................................................................ 335 Franco De Angelis Besprechung zu Rempe, Mario, Antike Siedlungstopographie und nachhaltiger Umgang mit Ressourcen im griechischen Sizilien ........................ 338 Florian Feil Besprechung zu Lippert, Andreas / Matzinger, Joachim, Die Illyrer. Geschichte, Archäologie und Sprache ................................................................ 341 Johanna Leithoff Besprechung zu Grainger, John D., The Straits from Troy to Constantinople. The Ancient History of the Dardanelles, Sea of Marmara & Bosporos ............. 347 Frank Daubner Besprechung zu Thonemann, Peter, The Lives of Ancient Villages. Rural Society in Roman Anatolia ....................................................................... 350 John Hyland Besprechung zu Wiesehöfer, Josef, Iran – Zentralasien – Mittelmeer. Gesammelte Schriften Teil I: Studien zur Geschichte der Achaimeniden ......... 353 Paul A. Yule Besprechung zu Hatke, Georg / Ruzicka, Ronald (eds.), South Arabian Long-Distance Trade in Antiquity “Out of Arabia” ........................................... 356
PREFACE Orbis Terrarum is the publication of the Ernst Kirsten Society and a forum for research in the field of Historical Geography of Antiquity. It provides an academic platform for studies by historians, geographers, philologists, and archaeologists, as well as other scholars of antiquity concerned with aspects of historical geography. The spectrum is deliberately broad: Studies on the geographic-topographic profile of the ancient world find a place here, as well as research on the historical interaction between humans and landscape and works on methodology or the history of science. Each volume also includes reviews of selected recent books within the field. Orbis Terrarum publishes articles in English, French, German, Italian, and Spanish. Orbis Terrarum uses double-blind peer review. For each contribution at least two expert opinions are anonymously obtained. For their collaboration on the present volume, I would like to thank the following colleagues: Cinzia Bearzot, Klaus Belke, Maria Broggiato, Luciano Canfora, Filippo Carlà-Uhink, Encarnacion Castro Perez, Thomas Corsten, Altay Coşkun, Gonzalo Cruz Andreotti, Anca Dan, Giovanna Daverio Rocchi, Salvatore De Vincenzo, Silke Diederich, Daniela Dueck, Hugh Elton, Johannes Engels, Klaus Freitag, Peter Funke, Bardo M. Gauly, Alkiviadis Ginalis, Dimitris Grigoropoulos, Jean-Yves Guillaumin, María Paz de Hoz García-Bellido, Ulrich Huttner, Olga Karagiorgou, Andreas Külzer, Franca Landucci, Jens-Olaf Lindermann, James Lockwood Zainaldin, Søren Lund Sørensen, Christian Marek, Giuseppe Mariotta, Annalisa Marzano, Chiara Maria Mauro, Eckart Olshausen, Alexander Podossinov, Francisco J. González Ponce, Francesco Prontera, Kai Ruffing, Roberto Sammartano, Patrick Sänger, Mustafa Sayar, Pierre Schneider, Andreas Schwarcz, Michael Speidel, Iris Sulimani, Anne Vial-Logeay, Everett Wheeler and Giuseppe Zecchini. Contributions for Orbis Terrarum should be submitted to Michael Rathmann, University of Eichstätt-Ingolstadt, Chair of Ancient History, Universitätsallee 1, D85072 Eichstätt, eMail: [email protected]. The review section is supervised by Veronica Bucciantini and Frank Daubner. The addresses are Veronica Bucciantini, Università degli Studi di Firenze, Dipartimento di Lettere e Filosofia, Via della Pergola 58-60, I-50121 Firenze, eMail: [email protected] and Frank Daubner, Universität Trier, Fachbereich III, Alte Geschichte, D-54286 Trier, eMail: [email protected]. Natalie Stöhr ([email protected]) was again responsible for the editorial work and layout. Eichstätt, October 2023
Michael Rathmann
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PREFAZIONE Vengono qui accolte per la pubblicazione le ricerche presentate e discusse nel quarto seminario fiorentino di geografia storica del mondo antico, svoltosi l’8 novembre 2021 presso il Dipartimento di Lettere e Filosofia dell’Università degli Studi di Firenze. L’iniziativa prosegue la consuetudine dei Seminari istituiti nel 2018 da Serena Bianchetti e intende proporre l’approfondimento e l’analisi, di volta in volta, di nuovi filoni di ricerca su tematiche storico-geografiche del mondo antico. Già alcuni contributi scientifici del primo seminario del 2018, dedicato ai racconti di viaggio, come fonte primaria di preziose informazioni su singoli contesti geografici, sono stati pubblicati in OT 18 (L. Buccino, O. Coloru, E. Giusti), così come quelli del terzo seminario del 2020, svoltosi online, e che affrontava la tematica della grecità periferica, sono stati editi in OT 19 (E. Franchi, G. Squillace, M. J. Olbrycht). In questa sede sono riunite quasi tutte le ricerche presentate nel novembre 2021 da parte di esperti riconosciuti a livello internazionale e da giovani studiosi fiorentini (S. Bianchetti, E. Bianchi, F. Cannizzaro, P. Counillon, D. Firindelli, M. Lubello, A. Pierozzi) relativamente a istmi e penisole, come concetti diversamente declinati in contesti storico-geografici e letterari. L’istmo inteso come luogo di passaggio e di separazione di spazi ecumenici è stato teorizzato già dalla fine dell’Ottocento da Hugo Berger, che ha posto in evidenza la triplice valenza – topografica, corografica ed ecumenica - del concetto. L’ importanza strategica e commerciale di istmi e penisole si coniuga, nella tradizione antica, anche ad un’interpretazione mitico-letteraria in rapporto alla realtà storicogeografica di contesti specifici e può contribuire verosimilmente alla comprensione dei processi mentali che hanno portato, con la progressiva conoscenza dei luoghi, da un parte ad una organica sistemazione dei dati geografici nel complesso di un patrimonio culturale condiviso e dall’altra a rappresentazioni cartografiche scientificamente aggiornate. Dal confronto di una documentazione che si è notevolmente arricchita, anche grazie all’apporto di materiali archeologici ed epigrafici, si può giungere ad una riflessione complessiva. L’argomento è tuttora al centro di un dibattito scientifico che negli ultimi anni si è considerevolmente intensificato, come dimostrano anche due pubblicazioni recensite in questo stesso volume e cioè quella di J. D. Grainger The Straits from Troy to Constantinople. The Ancient History of the Dardanelles, Sea of Marmara & Bosporos del 2021 (v. pag. 346) e di U. Mania, Hafen, Stadt, Mikroregion dell’anno successivo (v. pag. 286). Concludo con il sentito ringraziamento al direttore della rivista Orbis Terrarum Michael Rathmann, che ha generosamente accolto, finora, i contributi degli studi fiorentini e che ha sempre dimostrato un grande interesse e sostegno alle iniziative internazionali di Geografia storica del mondo antico. Firenze, ottobre 2023
Veronica Bucciantini
LAUDATIO FOR ECKART OLSHAUSEN In October 2023 Eckart Olshausen, founding editor of Orbis Terrarum and honorary president of the Ernst-Kirsten-Gesellschaft, will be celebrating his 85th birthday. Eckart Olshausen saw the light of day in Switzerland in 1938, but during the tumultuous years that followed, the family relocated several times, eventually settling in Erlangen, where his father held a job with Siemens. Young Olshausen completed his secondary education here and went on to study Classical languages and ancient history at the University of Erlangen, where in 1963 he presented his doctoral thesis on Rome and Egypt in the late Hellenistic period with Helmut Berve (1896–1979) as supervisor. From 1963 to 1970 he served as assistant to Horst Braunert (1922–1976) at the University of Kiel. (The Olshausens originally hailed from northern Germany and as it happens, the University of Kiel’s address is in the Olshausenstraße, named after a distant relative, the writer and politician Theodor Olshausen [1802–1869]). In 1972, Eckart Olshausen defended his thesis for the higher degree (Die hellenistischen Königsgesandten) at the University of Stuttgart. A few years later (1976) he was appointed to a newly created chair in ancient history, which he held until 2007. With characteristic energy, he engaged himself in university administration, serving several terms as dean and as vice-rector. It was, however, especially as a teacher and as initiator and organizer of collaborative projects, associations and colloquia that he made his mark on ancient studies and in particular on historical geography. The year 1980 witnessed the first Stuttgarter Kolloquium on the historical geography of the ancient world, jointly organized with Ernst Kirsten (1911–1987); the proceedings were published as volume 4 of the series Geographica Historica. These colloquia soon became the premier academic venue within ancient historical geography and continue to the present day, taking place on a triennial schedule (albeit syncopated due to Covid-19). So does Geographica Historica, now published jointly with his wife, Dr. Vera Sauer, in which more than forty volumes have appeared. Eckart Olshausen also initiated the Ernst-Kirsten-Gesellschaft for the historical geography of the ancient world, which was founded in 1989 and since 1995 has published Orbis Terrarum. At the end of 2012, Eckart Olshausen stepped down as president of the society and editor of Orbis Terrarum, his place being taken by Klaus Geus, newly appointed professor of ancient geography at the Free University of Berlin. Consequently, the next “Stuttgart Colloquium” took place in Berlin (2014), followed by two colloquia in Eichstätt under the auspices of our current president, Michael Rathmann (2017 and 2021). The upcoming colloquium, the fifteenth in the series, will take place in 2024 in Trier.
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The long list of Eckart Olshausen’s publications, mostly in German, is a testimony to his indefatigable energy and scholarly dedication. These include the fundamental Einführung in die Historische Geographie der alten Welt (Darmstadt 1991) and most recently the monograph Strabon von Amaseia (Hildesheim 2022) as well as the monumental Historischer Atlas der antiken Welt (Stuttgart 2007; English edition Leiden 2010), co-authored with Anne-Maria Wittke and Richard Szydlak as a supplement to Der Neue Pauly. Northern Anatolia and the Pontic kingdom hold a special interest for Eckart Olshausen. After a series of shorter papers on Pontic themes (1972, 1974, 1978, 1980), Historisch-geographische Aspekte der Geschichte des Pontischen und Armenischen Reiches, co-authored with Joseph Biller, appeared in 1984 in the series Tübinger Atlas des Vorderen Orients. The book firmly established Eckart Olshausen’s position as the leading academic authority on Pontos, nationally and internationally. Forty years on, it remains an invaluable tool for all students of ancient Pontos, not least for its detailed gazetteer of Pontic sites. A catalogue of Bronzemünzen aus der Zeit Mithradates’ VI. im Museum von Samsun appeared in 2009 as a supplement to Geographica Historica. Among many other Pontic initiatives, the “Pontischer Abend” deserves a special mention as an example of outreach to the wider public, something which has always had a high priority for Eckart Olshausen. For years, these convivial evenings with lectures on Pontic themes attracted a large audience from the city of Stuttgart and beyond. Though now free to enjoy ‘the cool shade of retirement’ in the charming village of Rangendingen not far from Tübingen, Eckart Olshausen in his eighty-fifth year remains active as a scholar and writer. Within the last few years, his published work has focused on Pontic epigraphy, on which no less than five papers co-authored with Vera Sauer have appeared, presenting numerous hitherto unpublished inscriptions from ancient Neoklaudiopolis (mod. Vezirköprü), the fruits of Eckart Olshausen’s own fieldwork in Türkiye during the late ‘eighties of the last century. An important contribution to our knowledge of ancient Pontos, these new inscriptions will be incorporated into a complete corpus of ancient inscriptions from the territory of Neoklaudiopolis by Sauer and Olshausen, to be published in the series Inschriften griechischer Städte aus Kleinasien.
TØNNES BEKKER-NIELSEN Classical studies, Department of Language, History, Culture and Communication University of Southern Denmark, DK - 5230 Odense M [email protected]
ISTMO TANAIS E MAR CASPIO ALLA RICERCA DI UN PASSAGGIO A NORD-EST Serena Bianchetti Abstract: The idea of Tanais, an isthmus linked or linkable to the Caspian – considered an open sea – helps to reconstruct the genesis of a mental map in which, at least until Ptolemy, the width of Eastern Europe is greatly reduced. In particular, the conception of an isthmus Tanais on the part of both Polybius and Posidonius in relation to the Northern Ocean suggests an in-depth knowledge of the work of Pytheas, who had fixed a Tanais (probably identifiable with Elba) as the end of his oceanic journey. The description of the Massalian explorer provoked, in fact, criticism from Polybius and it is in controversy with that description that I think we can read the geography of Polybius’ Europe and the definition of the spaces “between Tanais and Narbon”. Even for Posidonius, the link with Pytheas is strong and leads us to identity the Massalian explorer in the choice of data such as the Tanais and Narbon, the correlation between eastern and western geographical data being fundamental for the definition, which is entirely theoretical, of continental masses of relevant historical-political interest. Keywords: Isthmus Tanais, Caspian sea, Pytheas, Polybius, Posidonius. L’idea di un istmo Tanais collegato o collegabile al Caspio, considerato mare aperto, permette di ricostruire la genesi di una carta mentale che, almeno fino a Tolemeo, attribuisce una larghezza molto ridotta all’Europa nella sua sezione orientale. In particolare la concezione di Polibio e quella di Posidonio relative all’istmo Tanais in rapporto all’Oceano settentrionale lasciano intravedere un’approfondita conoscenza dell’opera di Pitea, che aveva fissato a un Tanais (probabilmente identificabile con l’Elba) il termine del suo viaggio oceanico. La descrizione del Massaliota aveva suscitato le critiche di Polibio ed è in polemica con quella descrizione che mi pare si possa leggere la geografia dell’Europa polibiana e la definizione degli spazi compresi “tra Tanais e Narbona”. Anche per Posidonio il legame con Pitea è forte e permette di riportare al Massaliota la scelta di dati quali il Tanais e Narbona con una correlazione tra dati geografici orientali e occidentali che risulta fondamentale per la definizione, tutta teorica, di masse continentali di rilevante interesse storico-politico. L’area in esame rappresenta un settore particolarmente importante nella geografia politica qui esaminata (V sec. a.C. – I sec. d.C.): il Tanais-Don, che sfocia
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nella Palude Meotide, costituisce infatti una possibile linea di confine Europa-Asia1 e il Caspio, la cui configurazione come mare aperto è presente ancora in Eratostene, aveva una sua rilevanza nella concezione achemenide che lo considerava un mare chiuso. Tale è l’idea che si ritrova anche in Erodoto e in Aristotele2 i quali difendono, contro l’antica concezione ionica3 che immaginava il Caspio come un’insenatura dell’Oceano, non solo l’idea di un mare chiuso ma anche quella di una grande estensione per il territorio a nord di questo mare. Cominciamo prendendo in considerazione l’area compresa tra Palude MeotideTanais e Oceano settentrionale: si tratta di un territorio di larghezza (direzione Nord-Sud) ignota non solo al tempo di Erodoto ma ancora all’altezza di Strabone. Va detto peraltro che l’ipotizzata origine del fiume dai Rifei4 permetteva di pensare a uno spazio – presumibilmente non molto ampio – tra questi monti e l’Oceano settentrionale sicché la distanza dal Ponto Eussino ai Rifei e da questi all’Oceano settentrionale si configurava come un istmo che connetteva il Ponto con l’Oceano settentrionale e che poteva essere definito con il nome del fiume che consentiva – almeno nella concezione piteana (v. oltre) – comunicazione tra i due mari. Preliminarmente bisogna anche intendersi sul significato di istmo al quale Prontera ha dedicato nel 19865 importanti riflessioni che insistono su un concetto basato sulla presenza di due punti di massima vicinanza tra due mari, separati da una lingua di terra. Lo studioso richiama, in quella sede, anche alcune acute osservazioni di Janni6 sul valore dell’istmo come “collegamento trasversale”, di norma il più breve possibile, tra due tratti degli opposti itinerari costieri. Quello del quale si intende qui discutere è un istmo “cartografico” per dirla con Prontera poiché riflette un itinerario ipotetico o ideale in linea d’aria da un mare all’altro, anche a fronte di un’obiettiva incertezza/ignoranza sul segmento che andava, nel caso qui in esame, dalla sorgente del Tanais all’Oceano settentrionale. Sappiamo che è un topos della mentalità antica elaborare l’ignoto/incerto e adattarlo alle esigenze della realtà del tempo: così il Tanais-Don, in qualità di
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Sul concetto di confine Europa-Asia ancora importanti osservazioni in BERGER 19032, 95 ss.; cfr. MYRES 1983 (1953), 115–34; GIANOTTI 1988, 51–92; BIANCHETTI 1990, 155–200; CORCELLA 1993, 268–9; GAUER 1995, 204–15; ZIMMERMANN 1997, 285–98; PRONTERA 2001, 127–35; BICHLER 2015, 3–20; ROMNEY 2017, 862–81. Sulla scansione dei due continenti tramite il Tanais cfr. la rappresentazione cartografica della Tabula Peutingeriana in RATHMANN 2016, 74–5. Hdt. 1.202–204; Aristot. Mete. 1.354a. Sul Caspio cfr. DAFFINÀ 1968, 372; HAMILTON 1969, 116; 1971,110–11; BOSWORTH 1993, 412; SISTI-ZAMBRINI 2004, 625. Cfr. FGrHist 1 F 18 con la descrizione del viaggio di ritorno degli Argonauti che dal Fasi avrebbero raggiunto l’Oceano dal quale sarebbero poi giunti al Nilo per arrivare infine al Mediterraneo. Cfr. anche il riferimento ai φυσικοὶ ἄνδρες in Plut. Al. 44. Sulla concezione ionica cfr. BIANCHETTI 1990, 158–65; ZIMMERMANN 1997, 285–98; PRONTERA 2001, 127–35. Cfr. TIMPE 1989, 312; RAUSCH 2013, 22–5; PODESTÀ 2016, 9–32. Sul rapporto di Alcmane (con la menzione dei Rifei F 90 PMG) con Aristea di Proconneso cfr. ora GAGNÉ 2021, 245 n. 274. PRONTERA 1986, 295–320, sul valore cartografico, topografico, corografico degli istmi. JANNI 1984, 154.
Istmo Tanais e Mar Caspio
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confine euroasiatico di verosimile matrice persiana7 e le cui sorgenti restarono a lungo misteriose, assume – o forse “eredita” – una rilevanza precipua al tempo di Alessandro, quando la geografia della conquista arriva a “costruire” mete coerenti con una concezione cosmografica dello spazio percorso dal Macedone. In particolare afferma Strabone (11.7.4 C 509): Infatti tutti concordano sul fatto che il fiume Tanais divide l’Europa dall’Asia e che il territorio intermedio tra il Tanais e il mare (scil. Caspio) che è gran parte dell’Asia, non era stato conquistato dai Macedoni: allora venne fatto il resoconto della spedizione in modo tale che si risapesse che Alessandro aveva dominato anche quelle zone. Così facendo un tutt’uno riunirono la Palude Meotide, in cui sfocia il Tanais, con il Caspio e quest’ultimo lo chiamano lago asserendo che entrambi i mari comunicano tra loro per via sotterranea e che l’uno sia parte dell’altro. (trad. NICOLAI / TRAINA 2000).
Strabone aggiunge una dimostrazione apportata da Policlito di Larissa8 per far credere che il Caspio fosse un lago e cioè il fatto che questo mare avrebbe nutrito dei serpenti con le sue acque dolci. Osservazioni analoghe sulla bassa salinità del Caspio si trovano in un passo della Vita di Alessandro di Plutarco (Al. 44): racconta il biografo che quando Alessandro nel 330 giunse in Ircania all’inseguimento di Besso, si trovò davanti una distesa d’acqua forse vasta come il Ponto e sulla quale non poté appurare niente di certo salvo che “per congettura ritenne che fosse una diramazione della Palude Meotide” della quale era noto il basso tasso di salinità. Nel contesto dunque della campagna asiatica di Alessandro prende corpo, da un lato, la possibilità – sostenuta dagli adulatori di Alessandro – che il fiume Iassarte (Syr Darya) raggiunto dal Macedone e che si immaginava sfociasse nel Caspio, potesse essere inteso come Tanais (e cioè come il confine euro-asiatico) e, dall’altro, la possibilità che il Caspio fosse in qualche modo connesso alla Palude Meotide piuttosto che all’Oceano. I legittimi dubbi suscitati nel Macedone dalla conformazione del Caspio gli dettarono perciò, nel 324, l’idea di inviare un esploratore – tale Eraclide altrimenti ignoto – a scoprire se questo mare fosse davvero unito alla Palude Meotide oppure se, a oriente, si aprisse verso l’Oceano, come avevano già ipotizzato i “fisici” ionici. La morte di Alessandro e quanto seguì impedirono la realizzazione del progetto ma un interesse precipuo per l’area caspica in rapporto alla Palude Meotide si coglie ancora in Clitarco – del quale preferisco accogliere una datazione alta9 – il quale immaginò un’inondazione stagionale dell’istmo caucasico compreso tra Palude Meotide e Caspio10. 7
8 9 10
Argomentazioni in questo senso in BIANCHETTI 1990, 170–200 per la possibile matrice persiana della concezione che attribuisce al Tanais la funzione di confine Europa-Asia. Si tratta di una concezione contrapposta a quella che vede il confine nel Fasi e che immagina dunque un’Asia più ampia e alla quale apparterrebbero i territori a est del Tanais, altrimenti europei se il confine fosse passata per il Fasi, fiume della Colchide. FGrHist 128 F 7 = F 7 SEKUNDA 2013. Su Policlito cfr. PEARSON 1960, 70–7; GOUKOWSKY 1978, 149–65; BIFFI 2002, 150. Cfr. PRANDI 1996, 69 ss.; 2012, 15–26 per la fine del IV sec. FGrHist 137 F 13 = Str.11.1.5 C 491.
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In sostanza quella lingua di terra sarebbe stata talmente stretta da venire sommersa da entrambi i mari riunitisi insieme per formare un unico bacino11. Si capisce da queste osservazioni preliminari come l’area del Caspio, collegata o collegabile con quella della Palude Meotide-Tanais rivestisse una grossa importanza strategica, facilmente amplificabile in chiave propagandistica. Oltre alle motivazioni di ordine politico, volte a presentare Alessandro come erede del Gran Re, confluivano nella geografia della conquista le opportunità di valutare possibili itinerari per ampliare il dominio del mondo: tra queste l’ipotesi di un Caspio mare aperto avrebbe lasciato immaginare un passaggio a Nord-Est che si apriva quale importante via alternativa verso mete estremo-orientali12. Per quanto riguarda la concezione delle aree che gravitavano intorno all’idea del Tanais quale emerge dalle nostre fonti, l’ipotizzata origine del fiume da monti posti in area nordica – i Rifei13 – permetteva di pensare a uno spazio – presumibilmente non molto ampio – tra queste montagne e l’Oceano settentrionale sicché la distanza dal Ponto ai Rifei e da questi all’Oceano poteva configurarsi come un istmo che poneva in relazione l’area del Ponto Eussino con il grande Oceano a Nord. Quanto misurasse questo istmo e quanto potesse essere dunque “larga” l’Europa nella sua sezione orientale è questione destinata a rimanere irrisolta nella tradizione geografica antica che non rinuncia tuttavia a ipotesi cartografiche costruite per analogia sulla base di singoli indizi collegati tra loro. Esemplificativo di tale metodo è un passo di Posidonio, riportato da Strabone, e secondo il quale l’istmo Tanais sarebbe stato grande quanto la distanza che separava il Caspio dalla Meotide e cioè circa 1.500 stadi14: La prima regione è quella del Tanais, che abbiamo definito come confine tra l’Europa e l’Asia. Si tratta di una regione più o meno peninsulare dato che è circondata a Espero dal fiume Tanais e dalla Palude Meotide fino al Bosporo e al tratto di costa dell’Eussino che termina in Colchide. Dalla parte settentrionale è circondata dall’Oceano fino all’imboccatura del mar Caspio; a oriente, da questo stesso mare fino ai confini dell’Albania e dell’Armenia, nei luoghi in cui sfociano i fiumi Kyros e Araxes. A Noto è circondata dalla terra che va dalla foce del Kyros fino alla Colchide per 3.000 stadi da mare a mare nelle terre degli Albani e degli Iberi si che possiamo definirla un istmo. Non bisogna dar retta a chi, come Clitarco, riduce l’istmo di parecchio. Questi disse che l’istmo può essere sommerso da entrambi i mari. Posidonio, invece, ha detto che l’istmo misura 1.500 stadi, come anche quello che da Pelusio va al Mar Rosso. Dice infatti: Ritengo che non sia molto diversa nemmeno la distanza dalla Meotide fino all’Oceano. (trad. NICOLAI / TRAINA 2000).
Colpisce innanzi tutto nel passo la definizione della regione del Tanais come penisola circondata dalle acque a occidente, a nord e a est. Per queste sue 11 12 13 14
GOUKOWSKY 1978, 162 sostiene che questa teoria sarebbe nata per spiegare la debole salinità del Caspio anche se questo non si deduce, in realtà, dalla testimonianza. Sull’imitatio Alexandri di Cesare, il quale avrebbe voluto muovere alla conquista della Germania partendo dai Caspia regna cfr. BRACCESI 1991, 14–6; 42–7. RAUSCH 2013, 22–5; GAGNÉ 2021, 331–2. Posid. F 206 EK = Str.11.1.5–6 C 491, Sul passo straboniano cfr. LASSERRE 1975, 41, 133.Sulla difficoltà di vedere nel passo un riferimento alla concezione che immaginava gli istmi come confini intercontinentali cfr. S. BIANCHETTI, Gli istmi come elementi di confine intercontinentale (in corso di stampa).
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caratteristiche Strabone calcola in 3.000 stadi l’ampiezza della penisola “da mare a mare” cioè dal Ponto Eussino al Caspio. Il geografo cita poi polemicamente Clitarco che avrebbe considerato l’istmo tra i due mari soggetto ad alluvioni per lo straripamento del Caspio e altrettanto polemicamente menziona Posidonio che avrebbe valutato 1.500 stadi l’istmo in questione, con una misura che sarebbe stata, per il filosofo di Apamea, uguale a quella che da Pelusio andava al mar Rosso. Questa analogia investiva anche la distanza Meotide-Oceano e stabiliva perciò una geometria degli spazi costruita simmetricamente e criticata da Strabone anche per la posizione di Posidonio che, pur essendo amico di Pompeo il quale aveva toccato i due mari – Caspio e Meotide negli anni ‘60 – “faceva discorsi assurdi su cose evidenti”. Osserva a ragione Kidd nel commento al F 20615 che l’atteggiamento di Strabone appare qui particolarmente critico poiché le affermazioni di Posidonio dovevano essere comprese nel Peri okeanou, precedente la campagna di Pompeo e la descrizione di essa da parte di Teofane di Mitilene (Str. 11.2.3–4 C 493)16. Se teniamo conto del carattere standard di un numero (1.500 stadi) applicato a tre realtà descritte, risulta evidente che siamo di fronte a approssimazioni delle quali proprio quella relativa alla distanza Meotide-Oceano ha il sapore di una deduzione tratta più per analogia che per conoscenza della geografia dei luoghi. Ancora Kidd sottolinea l’interesse per gli istmi da parte di Posidonio il quale forniva misure errate anche sull’istmo che separava Narbona sul Mediterraneo dall’oceano settentrionale17: i 3.000 stadi di Posidonio (circa 550 km) risultano infatti sovrastimati per una distanza che è circa 380 km. Quello che qui interessa è tuttavia l’attenzione di Posidonio per quegli “istmi cartografici”, che acquisivano un’importanza primaria nella valutazione dell’estensione di intere masse continentali: infatti gli istmi qui menzionati lasciano chiaramente intravedere una percezione limitata della larghezza dell’Europa orientale, poco conosciuta ancora al tempo di Tolemeo che collocava il mare d’Azov all’altezza delle foci del Reno (Geo. 2.9.1; 3.5.4). La concezione di Posidonio, con la centralità attribuita agli istmi nella valutazione della larghezza dell’Europa, può essere confrontata, a mio parere, con quella 15
16
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KIDD 1988, 739 sulla possibile dipendenza di Posidonio da Clitarco e quindi sulla sua scarsa attendibilità agli occhi di Strabone che verosimilmente seguiva la descrizione di Teofane. Sul rapporto di quest’ultimo con Pompeo, che accompagnò nella campagna contro Mitridate VI (67–62 a.C.) cfr. ROLLER 2018, 633. Sulle concezioni geografiche di Posidonio cfr. ENGELS 1999, 166–85; CLARKE 1999, 129–92. Sull’importanza delle fonti nella concezione etno-geografica di Posidonio e per un ridimensionamento della sua esperienza autoptica soprattutto in rapporto al pubblico al quale era diretta l’opera del filosofo di Apamea cfr. LAMPINEN 2014, 253–4 con ampi riferimenti bibliografici; PRONTERA 2021, 13–26. Contro l’ipotesi di JACOBY (FGrHist 87 F 101 comm. ad loc.) che considerava il passo parte de L’Oceano, LASSERRE 1975, 133, pensava che Posidonio si fosse basato sull’esplorazione dell’Iberia e dell’Albania da parte di Pompeo per contrastare la teoria eratostenica relativa all’Oceano. Posid. F 248 EK = Str. 4.1.14 C 188: Ἵδρυται δ’ ἡ Τολῶσσα κατὰ τὸ στενώτατον τοῦ ἰσθμοῦ τοῦ διείργοντος ἀπὸ τῆς κατὰ Νάρβωνα θαλάττης τὸν ὠκεανόν, ὅν φησι Ποσειδώνιος ἐλάττω τῶν τρισχιλίων σταδίων. Cfr. KIDD 1988, 852–3.
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espressa da Polibio18 che aveva definito come “la parte principale e più profonda d’Europa” quella che, sotto il settentrione, stava tra il fiume Tanais e il Narbone. Cosa intendesse precisamente Polibio e soprattutto su che base avesse scelto il fiume Tanais, il cui corso immaginava inclinato da Nord-Est a Sud-Ovest, quale corrispettivo orientale del Narbone, è difficile stabilire ma è verosimile che si possa pensare a una linea dal mare Interno (Meotide) all’Oceano, nella forma di un istmo (Tanais). Lo storico aggiunge (3.38.2): La zona protesa verso settentrione tra il Tanais e il Narbone ci è finora ignota a meno che in futuro non ci si impegni in qualche ricerca. E’da credere che coloro che ne dicono o scrivono qualcosa di diverso non ne sappiano nulla o divulghino favole.
Per quanto riguarda il fiume Narbone, si tratta dell’Aude, lungo circa 208 km e certo inconfrontabile con il Tanais-Don lungo 2.100 km. Tenuto conto del fatto che ancora Strabone (11.2.2 C 493)19 sottolinea l’assenza di conoscenza, ai suoi tempi, delle regioni a nord del Tanais, appare verosimile l’ipotesi di Dion20 che intende il passo polibiano riferito, nel caso dell’Aude, alla via terrestre che dal fiume attraversava la valle della Garonna e arrivava all’Oceano e che si configurava secondo Strabone come un istmo21 (4.1.14 C 188; 4.2.1 C 189). Polibio chiariva la forma dell’istmo anche attraverso il ruolo dei Pirenei (3.37) che “si estendevano senza interruzione dal mare interiore all’esterno”, con un tracciato che Strabone (3.1.3 C 137) contribuisce a disegnare in direzione Nord-Sud. Anche per il Tanis si deve pensare a un lungo percorso (Pol. 3.38.2) che tracciava una linea dal mare Interno (Meotide) all’Oceano formando un istmo (Tanais) paragonabile, per lo storico, a quello di Narbona (Fig. 1). Secondo Dion22 questa concezione – in particolare relativamente all’istmo Tanais – proveniva a Polibio dalle menzogne costruite dalla propaganda di Alessandro e che Strabone (11.7.4 C 509) riferiva in un contesto a cui abbiamo già fatto cenno. L’ignoranza dei luoghi a nord delle sorgenti del Tanais, associata all’operazione propagandistica di matrice macedone, avrebbero contribuito alla persistenza dell’idea di un istmo Tanais ritenuto meno esteso dell’istmo che separava, in Occidente, il golfo di Guascogna da quello del Leone. 18
19 20 21 22
Plb. 3.37.8: „L’Europa sta di fronte a entrambe queste regioni (Asia e Libia), a settentrione, stendendosi senza soluzione di continuità da oriente a occidente e la sua parte principale e più profonda si trova proprio sotto il settentrione tra il fiume Tanais e il Narbone (κεῖται δ’ αὐτῆς τὸ μὲν ὁλοσχερέστερον καὶ βαθύτερον μέρος ὑπ’ αὐτὰς τὰς ἄρκτους μεταξὺ τοῦ τε Τανάϊδος ποταμοῦ καὶ τοῦ Νάρβωνος), che non dista molto, a occidente, da Massalia e dalle foci del Rodano“. Sull’interpretazione del passo polibiano cfr. WALBANK 1957, 369 il quale sottolinea la posizione di Narbona, alla foce dell’omonimo fiume, quale vertice del triangolo avente gli altri due vertici alla Colonne d’Eracle e allo Stretto di Messina. Sul triangolo polibiano cfr. PRONTERA 1996, 335–41; 2004, 335–41; CASTRO PÁEZ 2023,94–5. Sul ruolo di Teofane di Mitilene nella ricostruzione del corso del Tanais che, dal Caucaso, si sarebbe diretto verso Nord per poi volgersi verso la Meotide, cfr. LASSERRE 1975, 134, seguito da ROLLER 2018, 633, DION 1977, 226–7 con l’ immagine qui riportata come Fig. 1. Str. 4.1.14 C 188;4.2.1 C 189–190 su cui cfr. LASSERRE 1966, 209; DION 1977, 227. DION 1977, 231.
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La persistenza di questa concezione23 si coglie ancora in Plinio Nat. (2.168), il quale afferma che la Palude Meotide può essere considerata un’insenatura dell’Oceano oppure una sua zona di ristagno, separata da esso da una breve striscia di terra (angusto discreti situ restagnatio). Nel cercare di capire l’origine della teoria polibiana sull’ istmo Tanais ritengo si possa andare in una direzione diversa da quella finora seguita dalla critica: non penso infatti che si debba guardare al contesto della propaganda macedone quanto piuttosto alle fonti di cui lo stesso Polibio disponeva sull’area del Tanais e che gli consentivano di costruire una propria rappresentazione di quell’area europea. Tra queste un ruolo di spicco ha Pitea il quale aveva affermato di aver percorso tutta la parokenitis da Gades al Tanais24 con una espressione che ho considerato autentica e nella quale ritengo di aver colto un riferimento al punto estremo, nordorientale raggiunto dall’esploratore nella sua navigazione oceanica. Avevo individuato, in quella espressione, il riferimento a un meridiano in nuce che seguiva il corso del fiume Tanais dalla sua foce fino alla sorgente e poi da essa lungo un altro fiume (forse l’Elba) dal corso rivolto verso Nord (quello percorso poi dagli Argonauti nella versione attribuita da Diodoro a Timeo e accolta da Scimno di Chio25). Polibio, come noto, è uno dei più acerrimi detrattori dell’opera di Pitea, conside-rata un concentrato di falsità. Tenendo conto del fatto che Polibio utilizza a più riprese i dati di Pitea e che a lui sembra alludere proprio nei passi del terzo libro centrati sulla necessità di una esplorazione di stato per avvalorare le notizie raccolte dai viaggiatori verso aree estreme26, acquista un sapore particolare l’accenno all’ignoranza che al tempo dello storico ancora si aveva sulla zona protesa a settentrione tra il Tanais e il Narbone “a meno che in futuro non ci si impegni in qualche ricerca. E’ da credere infatti – conclude Polibio – che coloro che ne dicono o scrivono qualcosa di diverso non ne sappiano nulla e divulghino favole”(3.38.2). Tutto il passo si configura, a mio parere, come un attacco diretto proprio contro colui che aveva menzionato il Tanais nella sua valenza di indicatore di un punto della costa oceanica settentrionale utile a valutare, in rapporto alla foce pontica del fiume, la larghezza dell’Europa. Intesa in questa chiave polemica nei confronti di Pitea, anche la valutazione della profondità del Golfo di Guascogna, posto da Polibio in relazione al golfo del Leone nel Mediterraneo, mi pare possa essere considerata una critica alla descrizione del Massaliota, il quale per primo aveva scoperto la reale entità del Golfo di Guascogna, confrontato nella sua ampiezza con quello mediterraneo Golfo del Leone.
23 24
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DION 1977, 232–3. Pyth. F 8d BIANCHETTI = Str. 2.4.1 C 104: ...Ταῦτα μὲν τὰ τοῦ Πυθέου, καὶ διότι ἐπανελθὼν ἐνθένδε πᾶσαν ἐπέλθοι τὴν παρωκεανῖτιν τῆς Εὐρώπης ἀπὸ Γαδείρων ἕως Τανάϊδος. Cfr. BIANCHETTI 1998; 2004,1-10. Il recente lavoro di SCOTT 2022 su Pitea pone in secondo piano la componente astronomica della descrizione piteana e considera una „hostile exaggeration“ l’espressione polibiana che fissa a Cadice e al Don gli estremi dell’esplorazione del Massaliota (F30 comm. ad loc.). Riserve sul volume di SCOTT in BIANCHETTI 2022, 194–8. Su Diod.4.56 e su Sch. Ap. Rh. 4.284 cfr. BIANCHETTI 1996, 73–84; 2004, 1–10. BIANCHETTI 2005, 255–70.
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Polibio, che ricordava27 le difficoltà di Scipione Emiliano nell’ ottenere informazioni dagli abitanti di Corbilon (all’altezza di Nantes), alla foce della Loira, di Narbona e di Marsiglia, contestava l’accurata descrizione di Pitea, il quale aveva individuato per primo l’effettiva consistenza del Golfo di Guascogna, navigato verosimilmente una volta lungo costa e l’altra tagliandone gli estremi. Lo stesso Pitea, che aveva accuratamente misurato le latitudini e consentito così di apprezzare l’ampiezza delle insenature atlantiche, doveva aver altrettanto accuratamente descritto il Golfo del Leone, nella rotta da Massalia a Gibilterra. Alla luce di queste argomentazioni mi pare dunque che il confronto polibiano tra i due Istmi (Tanais e Narbona) possa trarre spunto dal racconto di Pitea più che dai racconti degli alessandrografi, meno attuali in prospettiva degli interessi politico-geografici di Polibio. Il Tanais (identificabile nella sua irreale foce settentrionale forse con l’Elba) assumeva infatti nella concezione di Pitea un’importanza strategica in quanto punto estremo di una navigazione che proveniva da Ovest e che ignorava i territori a oriente di questo fiume. Pitea non prendeva infatti in considerazione, nel suo resoconto, la configurazione del Caspio, argomento pure dibattuto al tempo dell’esplorazione ma estraneo agli interessi del navigatore e non presente neppure nelle argomentazioni di Polibio relative all’ampiezza della massa continentale europea. L’importanza del Caspio, emersa, come si è già detto, nei progetti di conquista di Alessandro, risulta soprattutto dalle scelte politiche dei Seleucidi se è vero che il Nicatore inviò nel 285 un suo emissario, Patrocle, a esplorare quel mare. Questi dichiarò che si trattava di un mare grande quanto il Ponto Eussino (FGrHist 712 F 7= Str. 11.7.1 C 508) e Strabone dice28 immediatamente prima di introdurre la testimonianza di Eratostene, che “dall’imboccatura fino all’estremità dovrebbe avere una lunghezza poco superiore ai 5.000 stadi dato che più o meno confina con la zona disabitata”. Eratostene poi (F III B, 68 = Str. 11.6 C 507), verosimilmente riprendendo da Patrocle, “dice che il periplo di questo mare conosciuto dai Greci (ossia presso le terre egli Albani e dei Kadousioi) è 5.400 stadi mentre quello presso gli Anariakoi, i Mardoi e gli Ircani fino alla foce dell’Oxo ne misura 4.800. Di lì fino al fiume Iassarte 2.400”. Si tratta di dati indicativi di una navigazione che non dovette spingersi troppo a nord (forse fino a Baku), se è vero che l’esploratore concluse ben presto che il Caspio era un mare aperto.
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Plb. 34.10,6 = Str. 4.2.1.C 190: „Essendosi incontrati con Scipione alcuni Massalioti, nessuno di essi fu in grado di dare qualche risposta degna di memoria alle domande di Scipione sulla Britannia e non furono in grado neanche quelli di Narbona e di Corbilon che erano le città più importanti della regione. A tal punto di impudenza arrivò Pitea nel raccontare frottole“. Sulla geografia all’interno dell’opera storica di Polibio cfr. PÉDECH 1964, 515–97; ENGELS 1999, 157–65; CLARKE 1999,77–128. Str. 11.6.1 C507 su cui cfr. LASSERRE 1975, 138; RADT 2008, 270; ROLLER 2018, 652.
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La menzogna di Patrocle era destinata peraltro a perdurare a lungo nella dottrina geografica, come risulta da Mela e Plinio29 anche se è apparso a Kidd30 piuttosto curioso che Strabone non facesse riferimento all’esploratore seleucide nel passo (11.1.5 C 491) in cui ci si riferiva all’imboccatura di questo mare. Si tratta evidentemente di una selezione che, nel testo in discussione, privilegia le informazioni di età pompeiana, mentre a Patrocle, attraverso la mediazione di Eratostene, si rifà il passo menzionato (11.6.1–2 C 507) che mostra un chiaro andamento periplografico: “Per chi entra (nel Caspio) nella parte destra si trovano gli Sciti e i Sarmati contigui a quelli d’Europa e che si trovano tra il Tanais e questo mar (Caspio). A sinistra si trovano gli Sciti orientali, nomadi anch’essi, e che si estendono fino all’India”31. La rotta qui descritta pare riecheggiata in un altro passo di Strabone32 che fa riferimento ad “alcuni che avrebbero compiuto il periplo dall’India all’Ircania”, cosa sulla quale secondo Strabone c’era disaccordo ma che “secondo Patrocle sarebbe stata possible”. Strabone, che immediatamente prima dice di non conoscere spedizioni militari contro i nomadi delle aree nord-orientali, aggiunge che neppure Alessandro si spinse tanto lontano poiché Besso fu catturato vivo e Spitamene fu trucidato dai barbari sicché “i preparativi furono bloccati”. Unico testimone a favore della possibilità di navigare dall’India in Ircania restava dunque Patrocle. L’autorità di Patrocle sembra essere alla base della concezione di Eratostene che immaginava la possibilità di una navigazione dal Caspio all’India, come si ricava da una testimonianza di Strabone (2.1.17 C 74)33, il quale ribadiva anche in un altro passo, derivato da Patrocle attraverso Eratostene (11.7.3 C 509), che le merci provenienti dall’India venivano trasportate fino al mare d’Ircania e di lì poi attraverso l’Albania tramite il Kyros e i luoghi successivi, fino all’Eussino. Si può verosimilmente ipotizzare che dalla testimonianza di Patrocle derivi dunque il disegno messo a punto per congettura da Eratostene, il quale immaginava la costa oceanica dal Caspio all’ India con la forma di un manico di un coltello da macellaio. Si tratta di un paragone che ben si inquadra nel metodo eratostenico, caratterizzato da confronti utili a rendere chiari concetti e argomenti altrimenti complessi
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30 31 32 33
Mela 3.38–38: ut angusto ita longo etiam freto atque ubi recto alveo influxit in tres sinus diffunditur: contra os ipsum in Hyrcanium, ad sinistram in Scythicum, ad dextram in eum quem proprie totius nomine Caspium appellant. La differente rappresentazione del Caspio in Plinio Nat. (6.38) che parla di due golfi (Scythicus et Albanus) invece dei tre di Mela fa pensare a fonti diverse: cfr. SILBERMAN 1988, 272–3. Sull’informazione di Mela relativamente all’Europa settentrionale cfr. PARRONI 1984, 45; SILBERMAN 1988, XLI–XLII;1989, 571–81; SHCHEGLOV 2014, 77–94; IRBY 2019, 107–16. Sull’informazione di provenienza scientifica nelle descrizioni geografiche di Plinio cfr. BIANCHETTI 2020, 11–25 con bibliografia. Più in generale cfr. DIHLE 1980, 121–37; WINKLER 2000, 141–61; MURPHY 2004; ZEHNACKER 2004, 167–86. KIDD 1988, 740–1. Cfr. 7, 3, 6–9 C 298–303; 4, 6–8 C 311–2. Str. 11.11.6 C 518 = FGrHist 712 F 4 = Erat. F IIA 11; cfr. IIA 12; 13. e comm. BERGER 19032, 96; Cfr. Str. 11.7.3. C 509 su cui LASSERRE 1975, 139; ROLLER 2010, 204–5; 2018, 655. Str. 2.1.17 C 74 = Erat. F IIA 10 con 6.000 stadi per la dimensione nord-sud del Caspio.
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per il lettore, ignaro dei ragionamenti geometrici che stavano in ogni caso a monte della concezione dello scienziato34. Anche la costruzione eratostenica, come quella che si riscontrerà almeno fino a Tolemeo, immagina una scarsa larghezza del continente europeo nella sua sezione orientale e questa concezione può giustificare il racconto del curioso episodio riportato da Mela e da Plinio e relativo a due Indiani che, offerti dal re dei Booti o dei Suebi a Quinto Cecilio Metello Celere, proconsole della Gallia Cisalpina nel 62, navigarono dall’India verso Nord-Ovest e furono sbattuti dalla tempesta sulle coste della Germania35. Molto è stato scritto su questo episodio e che ha fatto pensare a Esquimesi o Veneti giunti attraverso un possibile itinerario marino o fluviale/terrestre sulle coste dell’Oceano settentrionale36. Se la finalità di Cornelio Nepote, al quale è riportata la notizia, è dichiarata e consiste nel dimostrare la circolarità dell’Oceano e la possibile analogia tra l’avventura degli Indiani e quella di Eudosso di Cizico che aveva raggiunto l’India con una rotta meridionale, dall’Africa, più difficile è capire il contesto della notizia e valutarne l’attendibilità. Bengtson, nel 1954–55, aveva già sottolineato l’importanza dei rapporti tra la gens Metella e Pompeo nonché il ruolo di quest’ultimo nell’ampliamento delle conoscenze sull’area tra Meotide e Caspio e sui traffici che provenivano dall’ India tramite vie fluviali e mari interni: Plinio, in particolare (Nat. 6.52), riferendo sulla scarsa salinità del Caspio riporta la notizia di Varrone il quale diceva che era dolce l’acqua del Caspio portata a Pompeo durante la sua spedizione militare nella regione. E’ noto che Varrone era stato legato di Pompeo nel 65, quando questi entrò nella regione del Caspio nella terza guerra mitridatica. Plinio scrive: Lo stesso Varrone aggiunge che, in seguito a una esplorazione condotta sotto la direzione di Pompeo, si appurò che in sette giorni si arrivava dall’India al fiume Battro, un affluente dell’Oxo in Battriana e che da questo, attraverso il Caspio fino al Ciro, le mercanzie provenienti dall’India potevano essere trasportate fino al Fasi sul Ponto in non più di cinque giorni per via di terra.
Si tratta di una notizia che pone in risalto la personalità di Pompeo ma che in realtà nulla aggiunge a quanto era noto, ad es. già a Eratostene, sulla possibile via delle merci che arrivavano dall’India per via di terra e di fiumi. Varrone, che attribuiva a Pompeo il merito dell’apertura di questa via commerciale, faceva del condottiero un “apripista” nell’ambito delle relazioni con l’India. Se ci interroghiamo su una possibile chiave di lettura per la notizia riferita da Cornelio Nepote sugli Indiani donati a Metello Celere, potremmo indagare nella
34 35 36
Sul metodo di Eratostene cfr. BIANCHETTI 2015b, 132–49 con bibliografia. Mela 3.45; Plin. nat. 2.170; cfr. Mart. Cap. 6. 621 Sull’episodio DETLEFSEN 1904, 38–9; BENGTSON 1954–55, 231–6; ANDRÉ 1982, 45–55; BIFFI 2003, 146–53; TAUSEND 1999, 115–25; PODOSSINOV 2014, 133–45; BIANCHETTI 2015a, 11– 31.
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direzione del ruolo di spicco di Metello indubbiamente sottolineato da Nepote attraverso il dono eccezionale tributatogli dal re dei Booti o Suebi (forse Ariovisto)37. Silberman ritiene che fonte di Nepote potrebbe essere qui proprio la gens Metella, impegnata a consolidare la propria immagine specialmente dopo la rottura dei rapporti con Pompeo, resa definitiva anche a seguito del divorzio di questi da Mucia, appartenente alla gens Metella. L’eccezionale dono poteva sottolineare il ruolo di primo piano svolto da Metello nella “scoperta” di una via di mare che, in aggiunta a quelle note, collegava l’India con l’Occidente. Che quella riportata da Nepote possa essere una sorta di risposta alla storia della via dall’India all’Occidente attribuita da Varrone a Pompeo si deduce anche dal carattere artificioso della notizia: gli Indiani sarebbero giunti, secondo Nepote, in Germaniae litora nella loro rotta dall’India ma, stante il quadro geografico fin qui delineato sull’istmo Caspico e presente per l’appunto anche in Mela e Plinio, si capisce che questi disgraziatissimi naufraghi sarebbero dovuti finire nell’imbuto del Caspio e comunque sarebbero poi incappati nella Penisola dello Jutland. Nel racconto di Mela – e in quello di Plinio – il Caspio non è menzionato così come l’episodio degli Indiani non è citato da Strabone, a meno che non si voglia vedere un riferimento indiretto ad esso nella frase già menzionata (11.11.6 C 518) “alcuni affermano che è possibile navigare dall’India alla regione Ircana”. Anche per quanto riguarda la conoscenza delle regioni oceaniche settentrionali le affermazioni di Strabone sono decise: il geografo ribadisce infatti la totale ignoranza da parte dei Romani (7.2.4 C 294) sulle regioni oceaniche al di là dell’Albis e fino alla bocca del Caspio e aggiunge che non conosceva alcuno che, prima del suo tempo, avesse fatto un viaggio lungo la costa fino alla bocca orientale del Caspio. Si tratta di affermazioni che riecheggiano la propaganda imperiale, la cui eco si coglie sia nelle Res gestae38 sia nella poesia di regime che inneggia all’ossequio alla potenza del princeps da parte di Sciti e Indiani39. In questo senso BIFFI 2003, 146–53. RG. 26: „La mia flotta navigò per l’Oceano dalla foce del Reno verso le regioni orientali fino al territorio dei Cimbri dove né per terra né per mare giunse alcun romano prima di allora“(trad. e commento DE BIASI- FERRERO 2003) . Sulla presenza di delegazioni indiane presso Augusto (RG 31.1) cfr. BIFFI 2003, 150 con le critiche di Floro 2.34.62 che calcolava in quattro anni la durata del viaggio degli ambasciatori i quali avrebbero raggiunto Augusto a Samo o a Tarragona. Sulla cultura geografica di età imperiale e in particolare su Strabone cfr. LASSERRE 1982, 867-896; NICOLET 1988, 49-89; PRONTERA 1992, 277-317; CLARKE 1999, 193-244; ENGELS 1999, 166-201; 2007, 123-134; DUECK 2000, 85-144; ILYUSHECHKINA, 2017, 60-68. 39 Horat.Carm 4.14.41–44: Te Cantaber non ante domabilis Medusque et Indus, te profugus Scytes miratur, o tutela presens Italiae dominaeque Romae. Carm. saec. 53-56 Iam mari terraque manus potentis Medua Albanasque timet securis: iam Scythae responsa petunt, superbi
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A fronte di questa documentazione letteraria, i dati archeologici testimoniano invece una fitta rete di rapporti che legavano il Mediterraneo a un Nord che comprendeva anche l’area baltica a est dello Jutland: se ne trova dimostrazione nel cosiddetto tesoro di Hoby, che comprende il corredo funerario di una tomba romana del I sec. d.C., localizzata nell’isola danese di Lolland40 (Fig. 2). Scoperto nel 1920 durante gli scavi di un canale di scolo da parte degli archeologi del Museo Nazionale di Danimarca, l’arredo comprende un intero servizio da tavola prodotto in Italia e tra il quale spiccano due coppe d’argento decorate con scene dall’ Iliade. Le coppe portano incisi il nome dell’artigiano Cheirisophos e quello del presunto proprietario degli oggetti, Silius, identificabile per alcuni con Caius Silius, comandante romano inviato a Magonza negli anni 14–2141. In tal caso le coppe potrebbero essere il dono di questo Silius all’uomo sepolto nella tomba ma, a prescindere dal loro ipotetico legame con il comandante romano, esse dimostrano comunque un livello di interazione tra cultura romana e cultura germanica spiegabile con la rete di rapporti commerciali che univano il Mediterraneo all’area delle isole danesi. Rispetto dunque alla documentazione letteraria che registra solo i dati della conquista, quella archeologica lascia intravedere una realtà fatta di scambi – di natura prevalentemente commerciale – sulla quale si innestavano anche racconti di viaggi e di esperienze che contemplavano itinerari non filtrati nella documentazione ufficiale e che potevano immaginare anche quel passaggio a Nord-Est che la storiografia su Alessandro lascia intuire e che Seleuco Nicatore ancora andava cercando con l’impresa affidata a Patrocle. In conclusione, lo studio della genesi e della fortuna dell’idea di un istmo Tanais collegato o collegabile a un’idea del Caspio-mare aperto lascia emergere alcuni dati che permettono di contestualizzare meglio i racconti presenti nelle nostre fonti e di ricostruire le mappe mentali sottese a ricostruzioni messe a punto su base teorica e collegando dati spesso risultanti da ragionamenti analogici più che da effettive conoscenze: – L’istmo Tanais nella descrizione di Posidonio e di Polibio che lo connettevano all’Oceano settentrionale lascia intravedere una approfondita conoscenza dell’opera di Pitea. Il Massaliota, che aveva fissato a un Tanais (probabilmente identificabile con l’Elba) il termine del suo viaggio oceanico aveva suscitato infatti le critiche di Polibio, il quale aveva cercato di definire la profondità dell’Europa ricorrendo a due concetti emersi dalla descrizione di Pitea: l’Istmo Narbone (3.37.8) e l’Istmo Tanais utilizzati per valutare la larghezza dell’Europa. Quanto a Posidonio, risulta dalle fonti un netto interesse per gli istmi, anche se non necessariamente collegati a una funzione di confine intercontinentale vista la posizione critica del filosofo che preferiva dividere l’ecumene per fasce climatiche42. Anche per Posidonio il legame con Pitea - la cui opera viene ripresa nel titolo di quella del
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nuper et Indi. Cfr. BRACCESI 1991, 34–5; 50–9; WEBB 2018, 35–58. Cfr. VON CARNAP-BORNHEIM 2020, 409–36 per i rapporti Germani-Romani (con bibliografia); KLINGENBERG, BLANKENFELDT, HOHLING SOSTED, NIELSEN, JENSEN 2018, 221–37. In questo senso con notizie sul personaggio cfr. ECK 1985, 3–6; 2001, 557. MANGANI 1983, 131–52; MARCOTTE 1998, 263–77; 2018, 89–118; FINK 2004, 45–107.
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filosofo di Apamea – è forte e permette di riportare al Massaliota la scelta di dati quali Tanais e Narbona per la costruzione di un’idea di Europa che trovava in Pitea importanti informazioni. – La definizione dell’istmo Tanais porta a una sottovalutazione dell’estensione dell’Europa nord-orientale che, almeno fino al I sec. d.C., non viene conosciuta nelle sue propaggini nord-orientali comprensive dello Jutland e della Penisola Scandinava. – Questa sottovalutazione è una probabile conseguenza della distorta rappresentazione del binomio Tanais-Meotide e del Caspio-mare aperto collegato all’Oceano settentrionale tramite un canale che permetteva di immaginare uno strategico passaggio a Nord-Est. Ricercata da Alessandro nei suoi progetti di conquista ecumenica e suggerita dall’esplorazione di Patrocle, questa nuova via lasciava immaginare la possibilità di disegnare i confini nord-orientali della carta e assumeva, nel disegno di Eratostene, le linee del manico di un coltello da macellaio. In questa carta mentale potevano trovare spazio storie come quella degli Indiani giunti dall’India alle coste della Germania e la propaganda imperiale poteva saldare, nell’ossequio a Augusto, Sciti e Indiani. – La documentazione archeologica (v. tesoro di Hoby) permette di intuire tempi e modi diversi da quelli descritti dalla tradizione letteraria ed entro i quali si svolsero fitti rapporti che unirono il Mediterraneo all’estremo Nord: i racconti legati a questo mondo fatto di scambi di merci e di idee dovevano alimentare le curiosità e le esperienze di chi avrebbe cercato lungo itinerari reali ulteriori opportunità di mercato. Echi di queste tradizioni filtrano sporadicamente nelle nostre fonti, impegnate comunque a trasmettere soprattutto un’idea del mondo coerente con le esigenze di governo e che la scienza con grande difficoltà, avrebbe cercato di smantellare. Serena Bianchetti Università degli Studi di Firenze Dipartimento di Lettere e Filosofia [email protected]
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Figura 1: Istmo Narbona e istmo Tanais (Dion 1977, 228–9).
Figura 2: Due coppe in argento dal „Tesoro di Hoby“ (KLINGENBERG, BLANKENFELDT, et alii 2018). Bibliografia ANDRÉ, I., 1982. Des Indiens en Germanie?, in: Journal des Savants, 45–55. BENGTSON, H., 1954–1955. Q.Caecilius Metellus Celer (cos 60) und die Inder, in: Historia 3, 231– 6. BERGER, H., 1880. Die geographischen Fragmente des Eratosthenes, Leipzig (ND Amsterdam 1964). BERGER, H., 19032. Geschichte der wissenschaftlichen Erdkunde der Griechen, Leipzig. BIANCHETTI, S., 1990. Plotà kai poreuta. Sulle tracce di una Periegesi anonima, Firenze.
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PRONTERA, F., 1992. La cultura geografica in età imperiale, in: G. PUGLIESE CARRATELLI (ed.), Optima hereditas. Sapienza giuridica e conoscenza dell’ecumene, Milano, 277–317. PRONTERA, F.,1994, Note sul Mediterraneo occidentale nella cartografia ellenistica, in: L’Africa Romana XI, Ozieri, 335–41. PRONTERA, F., 2001. Hekataios und die Erdkarte des Herodot, in: D. PAPENFUSS / V. M. STROCKA (eds.), Gab es das griechische Wunder? Griechenland zwischen dem Ende des 6. und der Mitte des 5. Jahrhunderts v. Chr., Mainz, 127–35. PRONTERA, F., 2004. Perché Narbona? Sulla rappresentazione polibiana dell’Europa e del Mediterraneo occidentale, in: U. LAFFI / F. PRONTERA / B. VIRGILIO (eds.), Artissimum memoriae vinculum, Scritti di geografia storica e di antichità in ricordo di Gioia Conta, Firenze, 335–41. PRONTERA, F., 2021. Viaggi e mappae mundi alla scuola di Aristotele, in: Rationes Rerum 17, 13– 26. RAUSCH, S., 2013. Bilder des Nordens: Vorstellungen vom Norden in der griechischen Literatur von Homer bis zum Ende des Hellenismus, Berlin. RADT, S., 2008, Strabons Geographika, Band 7, Buch IX–XIII: Kommentar, Göttingen. RATHMANN, M., 2016, Tabula Peutingeriana, eingeleitet und kommentiert, Darmstadt. ROLLER, D. W., 2010, Eratosthenes’ Geography, Princeton. ROLLER, D. W., 2018, A Historical and topographical Guide to the Geography of Strabo, Cambridge. ROMNEY, J. M., 2017. Herodotean Geography (4.36–45): A Persian Oikoumene?, in: GRBS 57, 862–81. SCOTT, L., 2022. Pytheas of Massalia, Texts, Translation and Commentary, London / New York. SEKUNDA, N., 2013. Polykleitos of Larisa [128] in: Jacoby Online. Brill’s New Jacoby, Part II, edited by IAN WORTHINGTON, Leiden. http://dx.doi.org/10.1163/1873-5363_bnj_a128 SHCHEGLOV, D. A., 2014. Pomponius Mela’s Chorography and hellenistic scientific Geography, in: A.V. PODOSSINOV (ed.), The Periphery of the Classical World in Ancient Geography and Cartography, Leuven / Paris / Walpole MA, 77–94. SILBERMAN, A., 1988. Pomponius Mela, Chorographie, Paris. SILBERMAN, A., 1989. Le premier ouvrage latin de géographie: la Chorographie de Pomponius Méla et ses sources grecques, in: Klio 7, 571–81. SISTI, F. / ZAMBRINI, A., 2004. Commento ai libri V–VII dell’Anabasi di Alessandro, Milano. TAUSEND, K., 1999, Inder in Germanien, in: OT 5, 115–25. TIMPE, D., 1989. s.v. Enteckungsgeschichte des Nordens in der Antike, in: RGA 7, 307–89. VON CARNAP-BORNHEIM, C., 2020. The Germani and the German Provinces of Rome, in: S. JAMES / S. KRMNICEK (eds.), The Oxford Handbook of the Archaeology of Roman Germany, Oxford, 409–36. WALBANk, F. W., 1957. A Historical Commentary on Polybius, Vol. I, Oxford. WEBB, L., 2018. Inter imperium sine fine: Thule and Hyperborea in Roman Literature’, in: D. JØRGENSEN / V. LANGUM (eds.), Visions of North in Premodern Europe, Turnhout, 35–58. WINKLER, G., 2000. Geographie bei den Römern: Mela, Seneca, Plinius, in: W. HÜBNER (ed.), Geographie und verwandte Wissenschaften, Stuttgart, 141–61. ZEHNACKER, H., 2004. L’Europe du Nord dans l’Histoire naturelle de Pline l’Ancien (N.H. IV, 88– 104), in: REL 82, 167–86. ZIMMERMANN, K.,1997. Hdt. IV 36, 2 et le développement de l’image du monde d’Hécatée à Hérodote, in: Ktema 22, 285–98.
“THE PLACE ... IN THE MOST FAVOURABLE POSITION OF ALL IN SICILY” (DIOD. SIC. 14.58.4) ZANCLE-MESSANA AND ITS SICKLE-SHAPED PENINSULA Edoardo Bianchi Abstract: This article investigates the representation of the peninsula of ZancleMessana in ancient literary and epigraphic evidence. In particular, it analyses how and to what extent the image of the sickle-shaped peninsula (along with its port facilities, located as they were at the northern mouth of the Straits between Sicily and Italy) may have impacted on the general consideration of Zancle-Messana as an admirably situated city, giving rise to mythical and/or aetiological interpretations about the peninsula itself and the surrounding landscape. To this end, special attention is paid not only to passages from Thucydides’ History, Callimachus’ Aetia, and Diodorus’ Bibliotheke, but also to a recently published inscription from present-day Messina. Keywords: Zancle, Straits of Messina, sickle-shaped peninsula, Thucydides, Callimachus, Diodorus. 1. Introduction When waging war against the Syracusans (in 396/5),1 the Carthaginian commander Himilcon decided to conquer the city of Messana. In Diodorus’ words, the fundamental reason for doing so was that Messana was “the place ... in the most favourable position of all in Sicily”, i.e., that military control of the city was deemed to be crucial for better penetration into the island.2 In fact, Messana was also a strategic site for reasons other than military ones. Located as it was near the northern mouth of the homonymous straits between Sicily and Italy, the city was an obligatory stop on the maritime movement of men and goods that centred on it.3 It should be noted that, geographically speaking, the Straits of Messana (now Messina) was not 1 2
3
All dates are BCE, unless otherwise stated. Greek proper names are spelled according to the Oxford Classical Dictionary (20124). For the entire episode (which is to be seen in the context of the clash between Carthage and the city of Syracuse led by the tyrant Dionysius I), see Diod. 14.56–8, with the commentaries by SANDERS 1987, 148–9; CAVEN 1990, 110–1; MEISTER 1993, 75–6; and CONSOLO LANGHER 2002, 265–6. Diod. 14.56.3 rightly specifies that the distance between Messana and the northern mouth of the Straits (Cape Pelorus) was about 100 stadia.
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properly seen by the Greeks as a ‘dividing element’ or a ‘border’. Quite on the contrary, it was a ‘crossing place’ par excellence, because it was defined either as πορθμός (literally ‘straits’, thus alluding to its function as a link between Sicily and Italy) or as πόρος (literally ‘channel’, thus alluding to its function as a link between the Tyrrhenian and the Ionian Seas), both of these words deriving from the root of the verb περάω = to cross.4 If we consider the importance of maritime trade in the local economy, then it is no surprise that Messana was home to one of the busiest ports in the Western Mediterranean: this was built by the first inhabitants of the city where the coastal line provides a natural harbour by forming a sickle-shaped peninsula (the present-day San Raineri Peninsula), which facilitated the anchoring of ships and the construction of port facilities. Indeed, it can be argued that in the absence of such a coastal environment the city would probably have never been founded. It was not by chance, in the common perception of the Greeks, that there was an overlap between the port, the sickle-shaped peninsula, and the city itself: as we shall see below, Thucydides significantly informs us that Messana was originally called Zancle, a toponym modelled on the Sicel word zanclon, which meant sickle.5 In the present paper, I do not intend to investigate the strategic role played by the port of Messana within the web of Mediterranean traffic (for which I refer to a recent study of the material record by F. De Angelis).6 Rather, confining myself mostly to the level of literary and epigraphic documentation, I will analyse how and to what extent the image of the sickle-shaped peninsula (along with its port) may have impacted on the general consideration of Messana as an admirably situated city and may have given rise, at the same time, to mythical and/or aetiological interpretations concerning the peninsula itself and the surrounding landscape. 2. The origin of the toponym Zancle The first relevant testimony preserved to us is a famous passage from the sixth book of Thucydides’ History of the Peloponnesian War, where a brief description of the foundation of Zancle-Messana is offered (6.4.5): Ζάγκλη δὲ τὴν μὲν ἀρχὴν ἀπὸ Κύμης τῆς ἐν Ὀπικίᾳ Χαλκιδικῆς πόλεως λῃστῶν ἀφικομένων ᾠκίσθη, ὕστερον δὲ καὶ ἀπὸ Χαλκίδος καὶ τῆς ἄλλης Εὐβοίας πλῆθος ἐλθὸν ξυγκατενείμαντο τὴν γῆν· καὶ οἰκισταὶ Περιήρης καὶ Κραταιμένης ἐγένοντο αὐτῆς, ὁ μὲν ἀπὸ Κύμης, ὁ δὲ ἀπὸ Χαλκίδος. ὄνομα δὲ τὸ μὲν πρῶτον Ζάγκλη ἦν ὑπὸ τῶν Σικελῶν κληθεῖσα, ὅτι δρεπανοειδὲς τὴν ἰδέαν τὸ χωρίον ἐστί (τὸ δὲ δρέπανον οἱ Σικελοὶ ζάγκλον καλοῦσιν). Zancle was settled, in the beginning, by pirates who came from Cyme, the Chalcidian city in Opicia; but afterwards a large number of colonists came from Chalcis and the rest of Euboea and shared the land with them, the founders being Perieres and Crataemenes, the one from Cyme, the other from Chalcis. Its name at first was Zancle, and it was so called by the Sicels
4 5 6
See recently BIANCHI 2020, 9, with references and previous bibliography. Thus Thuk. 6.4.5, cited and commented on below. See DE ANGELIS 2016, 259 and 261–2, with a focus on the Archaic and Classical periods.
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because the place is sickle-shaped: for the Sicels call a sickle “zanclon” (transl. SMITH 1921, 189–91).
This passage is part of a longer section in Thucydides’ History – the so-called ‘Sicilian Archaeology’ (6.2–5) – which contains a general overview of the Sicilian cities founded by Greek colonists and sets the foundation of Syracuse as its chronological reference point.7 It is usually assumed that Thucydides derived (most of) his information from the historian Antiochus,8 who, as a Syracusan, was eager to shine a good light on the cities of Dorian foundation, including Syracuse, and to misrepresent the cities of Chalcidian foundation, including Zancle. An indirect confirmation of this assumption is sometimes detected in Thucydides’ depiction of Zancle as a city initially settled by a group of pirates: the reasoning would seem to be that, because piracy was considered a bad practice in the 5th century, then the view of Zancle as a pirates’ foundation reflects Antiochus’ hostile predisposition towards the city.9 Such a conclusion, however, requires closer scrutiny. First, although it is quite possible that Thucydides drew from Antiochus, we are not sure whether the latter felt an ideologically hostile predisposition towards Zancle: suffice it to notice that in the late 5th century (that is, when Antiochus wrote his History of Sicily)10 the city of Zancle – now called Messana – was no longer a Chalcidian city; on the contrary, it was considered, and of course considered itself, a Dorian community, all the more so because it was in fairly stable alliance with Syracuse.11 It is better, therefore, to reject any comment based on alleged ethnic (or, more precisely, subethnic) prejudices. Secondly, piracy was not always perceived as bad practice by the Greeks, especially in the Archaic period when it was an economic activity aimed at the circulation of men and goods, which complemented regular trade.12 If this is correct, then Thucydides can be credited here with simply giving voice, in a more or less conscious way, to a tradition enhancing the role of maritime trade in the local economy – a tradition dating from before the second half of the 5th century and Throughout this paper I use the title ‘Sicilian Archaeology’ (see e.g. TSAKMAKIS 1995, 157–9) instead of ‘Sikelika’ (for which see e.g. HORNBLOWER 2008, 262–3). 8 After being first made by B.G. Niebuhr, a similar assumption was elaborated by E. Wöllflin and was subsequently accepted by many other scholars. See e.g. VAN COMPERNOLLE 1960, 459–73; MAZZARINO 1965, 227–31; GOMME/ANDREWES/DOVER 1970, 198–210; LURAGHI 1991, 57–62; TSAKMAKIS 1995, 166; SAMMARTANO 1998, 212–6; CUSCUNÀ 2003, 14–6; and HORNBLOWER 2008, 272–4. As is recognised by the majority of these scholars, however, one cannot exclude that Thucydides may also have partly relied on alternative sources, among which Hellanicus of Lesbos’ Priestesses of Hera at Argos and Trojan Cycle (FGrHist/BNJ 4) are very good options. 9 See DOMÍNGUEZ 2006, 263–5. 10 For the title and structure of Antiochus’ work, see FGrHist/BNJ 555 and CUSCUNÀ 2003, 1–4. 11 See BIANCHI 2021, 25–6: the spelling of the toponym Messana, with its “a” that is typical of the Dorian dialect, is especially evocative (see also below, note 13). The suggestion, advanced by CONSOLO LANGHER 2002, 259–63, that Messana was ‘politically close’ to Athens until 427 and only then did it ally itself with Syracuse cannot be demonstrated. 12 For piracy in the Archaic period, see the classic work by MELE 1979, 58–78. Piracy only became closely linked to warfare in the Classical period: see FERONE 1997, 165–9, and DE SOUZA 1999, 26–30.
7
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possibly prior to the political upheavals that affected Zancle at the beginning of the 5th century, with its original name being irreparably lost.13 What is more, such a tradition may have developed in the city of Zancle. As is well stated by F. De Angelis, the attribution of a ‘pirate descent’ to Zancle may ultimately reflect a kind of Zanclean «self-representation», which «creates a genealogy that fits well for a trading city which occupied a highly strategic node in the web of maritime traffic».14 Against this background, it is noteworthy that Thucydides concluded his passage by focusing on the nerve centre of the Zanclean maritime traffic – the sickleshaped peninsula and its port. This is indirectly evoked through the presentation of Zancle as a toponym derived from zanclon, which was a Sicel word for sickle. A number of Ancient history scholars do not doubt this piece of information and are convinced that the toponym Zancle was really of Sicel origin, because the Sicels were the indigenous inhabitants of the territory where the city was installed.15 However, as little is known of the Sicel language (and of its impact on Greek lexicon),16 it is appropriate to leave the linguistic perspective aside,17 and to recognise, that it was the Zancleans who had an interest in valorising the association between their city and the sickle-shaped peninsula – an association which may have resulted in nothing more than an aetiological explanation of the name of their city.18 Moreover, Zancle – which was a name already known to Hecataeus of Miletus – also appears outside the literary records,19 in the alternative form Dancle: specifically on the earliest coins (drachmas and two fractional denominations) minted by the Zancleans at the end of the 6th century, where the evocative legend DANK or DANKL(E) contains the image of a dolphin surrounded by a sickle (sometimes a sickle with
13 The name Zancle was officially turned into Messene when the tyrant Anaxilas took control of the city ca. 488, as Thucydides himself recounts at 6.4.6; the final spelling Messana was introduced some decades later, after the so-called koinon dogma of 461/0 (Diod. Sic. 11.76.1–2): on these events, see recently BIANCHI 2020, 166–73. 14 DE ANGELIS 2016, 149. 15 See e.g. DOMÍNGUEZ 1989, 115 (cf. the more cautious remarks in DOMÍNGUEZ 2006, 266); ANTONELLI 1996, 322; PRESTIANNI GIALLOMBARDO 2002b, 133; GUZZO 2011, 114. 16 “Sicel language” is a label traditionally used to indicate the non-Greek language spoken in the central and northern parts of Sicily. For an overview of the evidence for this language and the serious difficulties in distinguishing it from the other non-Greek languages attested in Sicily, see recently POCCETTI 2012 and PRAG 2020. 17 Linguists generally agree that the toponym Zancle is of Indo-European origin. But, while some of them simply link it to the Sicel language (e.g. CHANTRAINE 1968, s.v. Ζάγκλη; ZAMBONI 1978, 972 and 982), there are others who believe that it can be ultimately traced back to the intensive prefix ζα- and the root of the noun ἀγκών = bend (e.g. BOISACQ 1916, s.v. ζάγκλον). For further discussion and bibliography see SIMKIN 2012, 166–170. Personally, although linguistics is not my field of expertise, I would not rule out the possibility that the presumed Sicel word zanclon is merely a Sicilian Greek dialect word: see PRAG 2020, 533. 18 Certainly, an aetiological explanation deprived of any mythical accessory by Thucydides, who notoriously disliked the mythodes. 19 Hecat. FGrHist/BNJ 1 F 72 (in Steph. Byz. s.v. Ζάγκλη). Hecataeus mentioned Zancle in the first book of his Periegesis, entitled Europe; unhappily, it is impossible to ascertain what kind of presentation of the city he offered there.
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four rectangular blocks on its surface, probably alluding to port installations).20 It is thus understandable that the close association between the name of the city and its sickle-shaped peninsula/port was long-lasting, because it still features in both Strabo’s Geography and in Stephanus of Byzantium’s Ethnica.21 Yet, different aetiological explanations of the name Zancle arose over time: for instance, we know of authors for whom Zancle either originated from the name of a Giant (or a Titan), Zanclus, or derived from the name of a local spring, Zancle.22 To return to Thucydides, the picture of the oikists Perieres and Crataemenes and of their foundational activity on the sickle-shaped peninsula should also be taken into account. Unfortunately, the historian was not interested in mythological digressions and thus limited himself to presenting the two characters with few details. Both of them are a dominant presence in a fragment of Callimachus’ Aetia, where the theme of the Greek colonial foundations in Sicily is recalled (Aet. 2, fr. 43 PFEIFFER = POxy. 2080). Interestingly enough, the poet introduced the case of Perieres and Crataemenes in order to explain why neither of them was officially recognised as the oikist of Zancle-Messana: ll. 68-79: ἀλλ᾿ ὅτε δὴ μόσσυνας ἐπάλξεσι [καρτυνθέ]ντας / οἱ κτίσται δρέπανον θέντο πε[ρὶ Κρόνιο]ν, / —κεῖθι γὰρ ᾧ τὰ γονῆος ἀπέθρισε ⸤μήδε᾿ ἐκ⸥ε⸤ῖν⸥ος / κέκρυπται γύπῃ ζάγκλον ὑπ⸤οχθονίῃ,— / ε̣[.]τ̣ισαν ἀμφὶ πόληος· ὁ μὲν θε[……….]εσθαι / ..]..[.]ν, ὁ δ᾿ ᾀντίξουν εἶχε διχο[φροσύνην, / ἀλλήλοις δ᾿ ἐλύησαν· ἐς Ἀπόλ[λωνα δ᾿ ἰόν]τ̣ε̣ς̣ / ε̣ἴρονθ᾿ ὁπποτέρου κτίσμα λέγοιτ[ο νέον. / αὐτὰρ ὁ φῆ, μήτ᾿ οὖν Περιήρεος ἄ[στυ]ρ̣[ον εἶ]ναι / κεῖνο πολισσούχου μήτε Κραταιμέ̣[νεος. / φῆ θεός· οἱ δ᾿ ἀΐοντες ἀπέδραμον, ἐ̣[κ δ᾿ ἔτι κεί]νου / γαῖα τὸν οἰκιστὴν οὐκ ὀνομαστὶ κ̣[αλε]ῖ.23 But when the builders made strong the wooden towers with battlements, and placed them around the sickle of Cronus—for there in a cave is hidden under the earth the sickle with which he cut off his father’s genitals—they quarrelled (?) about the city. The one wished (?) . . . and
20 On the earliest coin issues, see CACCAMO CALTABIANO 1993, 12–3; PRESTIANNI GIALLOMBARDO 2002b, 133–6; FISCHER-HANSEN/NIELSEN/AMPOLO 2004, 235. Numismatists generally have no doubt that the image of the sickle should be interpreted as an allusion to the San Raineri Peninsula and to its port: see also RUTTER 1997, 108–9. It should be noted that the ethnonym DANKLAIOI is also engraved on a couple of votive inscriptions coming from Olympia and dating to the beginning of the 5th century: see SEG 11, 1205 and 15, 246 = IGDS 2. 21 Strabo 6.2.3 links the name of the city to the crookedness of the coast and specifies that anything crooked was defined zanclion, but he does not mention the Sicels at all: see e.g. PRESTIANNI GIALLOMBARDO 2002b, 140. For Strabo’s use of metaphors and similes to describe shapes, see DUECK 2005. See also Steph. Byz. s.v. Ζάγκλη (with the translation by BILLERBECK/ZUBLER 2011, 197), where the view that Zancle was the ‘city of the sickle’ is explicitly attributed to Nicander of Colophon: FGrHist/BNJ 271–2 F 15. 22 These two explanations are mentioned by Steph. Byz. s.v. Ζάγκλη, where Zanclus is called γηγενής (= born of the earth), a term that can refer to both Giants and Titans (POWNALL, in BNJ 1 F 72, translates it as Titan). According to Diodorus (4.85.1), Zanclus was the name of a king: see below. 23 The Greek text is taken from Pfeiffer’s edition (PFEIFFER 1949, 50–2). For the many philological problems it raises, see also the updated editions by MASSIMILLA 1996, 112–4, and HARDER 2012a, 186–7. On a literary level, Callimachus’ fragment fits fully into the Hellenistic cultural context. This is why the Muse of History, Clio, takes over as narrator: see MORRISON 2011, 341–3, with a focus on the role attributed to the Muses in Aetia books 1–2.
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As is evident, Callimachus shows knowledge of a unique circumstance. Unlike the other Sicilian cities, where the (heroic) cult of the founder was commonly practised,24 Zancle-Messana could not invoke its founder by name because it did not have a recognised one.25 Such a peculiarity was apparently due to a quarrel arising between Perieres and Crataemenes at the time of the city foundation and to the subsequent decision of the god Apollo that neither of the two should be considered its ‘patron’ (πολισσοῦχος).26 Much has been written on the historicity of Callimachus’ testimony, the range of scholarly opinions varying between a substantial acceptance of it as proof of the actual (and complicated) process of city foundation and a reduction of it to a mere product of Hellenistic erudition.27 The problem is basically that the sources of information used here by the poet are not identifiable and, consequently, any stance should be based on caution. It appears, of course, that Callimachus knew the Thucydidean ‘Sicilian Archaeology’ very well, but his account of the earliest history of Zancle does not coincide with that of Thucydides.28 This is because Callimachus’ fragment is probably considered to be a refined collection of data taken from a number of authors (among whom, one cannot exclude the historians Philistus, Ephorus, and Timaeus); accordingly, some of the details we find there may depend on archaic traditions; others on re-elaborations based on later historical developments.29 It seems reasonable, for instance, to interpret the 24 Apart from Callimachus, it is Diodorus who attests to founder-cults practised in Sicilian cities, including those installed by the Deinomenids and the Emmenids: see Diod. 11.38.5 and 53.2 (concerning Gelon and Theron); 11.49.2 and 66.4 (concerning Hieron), with the commentary by MALKIN 1987, 187–203, 237–40. 25 In the following lines of the fragment (81–3), Callimachus specifies that, during the customary (annual) feast, the Zancleans were thus forced to sacrifice to an anonymous oikist: see MALKIN 1987, 198–9. 26 On πολισσοῦχος, usually an epithet of gods, see MALKIN 1987, 199 and 254, who interprets it as a term equivalent to «guardian hero and founder»; see also FABIAN 1992, 254, MASSIMILLA 1996, 350, and HARDER 2012b, 352. 27 When accepting Callimachus’ testimony as proof of the actual process of foundation, scholars debate the reason for the quarrel between the oikists and the exact role of the Apollonian oracle in the resolution of it. For a critical discussion of the bibliography, see RACCUIA 2002, 488–90, who reminds us that Callimachus also wrote a treatise specifically dedicated to colonial foundations. 28 Moreover, Callimachus precedes the lines dedicated to Zancle with a sort of catalogue of founders of Sicilian cities (ll. 28–55), which resembles but is not identical to Thucydides’ list of cities as it appears in the ‘Sicilian Archaeology’: see FABIAN 1992, 177–85, for a useful comparison of the two accounts. See also GREENE 2017, 22, for the theory that Callimachus «endeavors to create both associations and distances between his own writing and the work … of … Thucydides». 29 For the written sources possibly consulted by Callimachus, see especially FABIAN 1992, 171– 2, 186–7; MASSIMILLA 1996, 324, 340–1; for a synthesis, HARDER 2012b, 312, with further bibliography.
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assertion that the Zancleans did not have any recognised founders not as a mirror of an original situation but as a literary reflection of the many political upheavals that affected the city during the 5th century.30 What is most interesting is that, according to Callimachus, the argument between Perieres and Crataemenes developed after they had “made strong the wooden towers with battlements, and placed them around the sickle of Cronus”. To my mind, this piece of information is not a simple poetic addition. In all probability this is an intentional allusion to the port facilities and fortifications apparently installed from the outset at Zancle, which – as the poet goes on – was called ‘the sickle of Cronus’ from the sickle that Cronus had hidden there in a cave.31 This indirectly means that, unlike Thucydides, Callimachus did not accept the derivation of the name Zancle from the Sicel language.32 On the contrary, he had a mythological explanation and traced the name of the city back to the sickle which Cronus employed to castrate his father Uranus and buried there. As is well known, the mythical story of the castration/dethronement of Uranus by Cronus was elaborated much before Callimachus wrote his Aetia; nevertheless, the detail that the sickle used by Cronus for the conquest of supreme power was buried at Zancle is not attested elsewhere.33 For this reason, some scholars believe it is nothing more than Callimachus’ invention.34 Others, like L. Antonelli, are convinced that Callimachus relied on a Euboean tradition much earlier than the Hellenistic age.35 In my view, there is a clue that makes Antonelli’s point plausible.36 From fragments of both Alcaeus’ and Acusilaus of Argos’ works, we learn that the story of the burying of Cronus’ sickle was also set on the island of Corcyra, which is notoriously shaped like a sickle.37 This is crucial, because Corcyra was apparently home to colonists from Euboea before the arrival of the Corinthians and, above all, it was called Drepane from the Greek word for sickle – drepanon –, a name explicitly linked in our literary sources 30 Thus, e.g., DE SANCTIS 1928, 115–6; VALLET 1958, 63. For different views, see RACCUIA 2002, 489–90. 31 The idea that the port was fortified from the outset also recurs in Paus. 4.23.7, with the commentary by MORAKIS 2011, 474. As for Callimachus, the expression ‘sickle of Cronus’ was properly a reference to the «sacred spot» where Cronus had hidden the sickle and, as a consequence, was «pars pro toto to indicate the new town»: thus HARDER 2012b, 346. 32 Callimachus limited himself to using the word ζάγκλον to indicate the sickle hidden by Cronus (l. 72) – a mere reference to the original name of the city. 33 The earliest attestation of the myth is found in Hes. Theog. 159–84. Unfortunately, Hesiod does not say anything as to where Cronus buried the sickle: for a commentary see e.g. GANTZ 1993, 10–1. 34 See especially EHLERS 1933, 49; add MASSIMILLA 1996, 348, and PRESTIANNI GIALLOMBARDO 2002b, 138. 35 ANTONELLI 1996, 319–20. 36 For the reasons expressed above, however, I cannot follow ANTONELLI 1996, 319, when he maintains that the entire testimony by Callimachus reproduces an archaic Zanclean tradition faithfully preserved until the Hellenistic period. 37 See Alc. fr. 116 BERGK (= fr. Z 118 LOBEL-PAGE = fr. 441 VOIGT) and Acus. FGrHist/BNJ 2 F 4 (in Schol. Ap. Rhod. Argon. 4.992l). The same story is also recalled by Timaeus, according to whom, however, it was Zeus (not Cronus) who castrated his father on Corcyra: FGrHist/BNJ 566 F 79 (in Schol. Ap. Rhod. Argon. 4.982–92g).
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to Uranus’ castration by Cronus.38 It can thus be argued that the Euboeans had a special interest in the myth of the clash between Cronus and Uranus and contributed to its literary enrichment by insisting on the evocative image of the cutting tool used by the former to castrate the latter; likewise, it was probably the Euboeans who, on a literary level, determined the setting for the burial of the sickle in two alternative locations of the Mediterranean Sea affected by their colonial activity during the Archaic period.39 3. Orion’s deeds in the area of the Straits It is now to be noted that the Zanclean peninsula and its port became the setting for another mythical tale. Diodorus deals with it in a chapter of his Bibliotheke, when he presents the Sicilian achievements of Orion, the Boeotian hero famous for his extraordinary strength (4.85.1): κατὰ μὲν γὰρ τὴν Σικελίαν κατασκευάσαι Ζάγκλῳ τῷ τότε βασιλεύοντι τῆς τότε μὲν ἀπ᾽ αὐτοῦ Ζάγκλης, νῦν δὲ Μεσσήνης ὀνομαζομένης, ἄλλα τε καὶ τὸν λιμένα προσχώσαντα τὴν ὀνομαζομένην Ἀκτὴν ποιῆσαι. In Sicily, for instance, for Zanclus, who was king at that time of the city which was called at that time after him Zanclê but now Messenê, he [Orion] built certain works, and among them he formed the harbour by soil deposition and made the Actê as it is called (transl. OLDFATHER 1939, 85–7, modified).
38 For the name Drepane, see Ap. Rhod. Argon. 4, 980–90; Tim. FGrHist/BNJ 566 F 79 (in Schol. Ap. Rhod. Argon. 4, 982–92g); and Kallim. Aet. 1, fr. 14 PFEIFFER (= Plin. HN 4.12.52); with the commentary by ANTONETTI 2009, 325–6. For the notice that the first settlers came from the city of Eretria in Euboea and were evicted by the Corinthians, see Plut. qu.Gr. 11: this piece of information has sometimes been doubted because there are no archaeological traces of a Euboean presence on Corcyra (thus BAKHUIZEN 1976, 22–3; MORGAN 1998, 284–5). But one should not apply the argument from silence, all the more so because Strabo (10.1.15) attests, in fact, to the existence of a place called Euboea on the island, whereas the peninsula of Palaeopolis – the site of the ancient urban centre of Corcyra – was called Macridies (thus Ap. Rhod. Argon. 4.1175), which is apparently related to Macris, the ancient name of Euboea (Strabo 10.1.2): see MALKIN 1998, 75–8; ANTONELLI 2000, 15–7; METALLINOU 2010, 13–5; and ŠAŠEL KOS 2015, 6–9. 39 According to ANTONELLI 1996, 323–4, there may have been three alternative locations: the modern city of Trapani on the Western coast of Sicily was effectively called Drepanon (or Drepana) in Greek and, if we trust Lycophron (Alex. 869), it was also defined as Ἅρπη Κρόνου, i.e. the ‘Sickle of Cronus’. This would be proof that the story of the burying of Cronus’ sickle was set not only on Corcyra and at Zancle, but also at Trapani by the Euboeans. Unfortunately, there is no explicit evidence that the Euboeans founded any settlements on the Western coast of Sicily (which is complicated by the fact that Lycophron’s passage is actually unclear: see e.g. MANNI 1981, 34). Furthermore, Antonelli seems to be influenced by a sort of ‘pan-Euboean’ perspective that ends up overemphasising the historical role of the Euboeans in the Archaic period.
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Shortly afterwards Diodorus takes up the subject again when he discusses the possible causes of the formation of the Straits of Messina by presenting the opinions of different authors (4.85.5):40 Ἡσίοδος δ᾽ ὁ ποιητής φησι τοὐναντίον ἀναπεπταμένου τοῦ πελάγους Ὠρίωνα προσχῶσαι τὸ κατὰ τὴν Πελωρίδα κείμενον ἀκρωτήριον, καὶ τὸ τέμενος τοῦ Ποσειδῶνος κατασκευάσαι, τιμώμενον ὑπὸ τῶν ἐγχωρίων διαφερόντως. ταῦτα δὲ διαπραξάμενον εἰς Εὔβοιαν μεταναστῆναι κἀκεῖ κατοικῆσαι. διὰ δὲ τὴν δόξαν ἐν τοῖς κατ᾽ οὐρανὸν ἄστροις καταριθμηθέντα τυχεῖν ἀθανάτου μνήμης. But the poet Hesiod states the very opposite, namely, that when the sea extended itself in between, Orion built out the headland which lies at Peloris and also erected there the sanctuary of Poseidon which is held in special honour by the natives; after he had finished these works he removed to Euboea and made his home there; and then, because of his fame, he was numbered among the stars of heaven and thus won for himself immortal remembrance (transl. OLDFATHER 1939, 87).
This chapter dedicated to Orion is fundamental to the present investigation for a number of reasons.41 To begin with, it is clear that Diodorus distanced himself from both Thucydides and Callimachus in explicitly tracing back the toponym Zancle to the name of a local king, Zanclus. But, most importantly, Diodorus recounted that, at the time when Zanclus was king, it was Orion who constructed the landscape in the area between the northern mouth of the Straits of Messina and Zancle with his own hands. Particularly, not only did he build the peninsula with its port (simply called Ἀκτή, i.e., ‘promontory’, by Diodorus), but he also constructed Cape Pelorus (Πελωρίς), at the mouth of the Straits.42 The repeated use of the verb προσχώννυμι (= to heap upon) is especially evocative here, because it seems to reproduce the natural phenomenon of the overlapping of alluvial materials that, from a geomorphological viewpoint, was really at the origin of the conformation of the entire coastal area.43 It is no accident that Diodorus neglects to specifically consider the sickle shape of the Ἀκτή. Conversely, his testimony conveys an image of the Zanclean peninsula that can only be understood in relation to the wider morphology of the Straits: in other words, Diodorus seems to invite readers to consider the Zanclean peninsula not in isolation but in a structural comparison with Cape Pelorus. Such a perspective deserves special attention, because it probably has its roots in the Archaic period and may reveal a Euboean influence. On the one hand, the mention of Hesiod as an authority should not be overlooked, because it was effectively in one of Hesiod’s lost works that Orion’s deeds in the area of the Straits of Messina
40 Diodorus also deals with the Straits of Messina at 4.22–3: see SULIMANI 2011, 224–6. 41 As for Quellenforschung, see MEISTER 1967, 28, and especially DEBIASI 2010, 10: these scholars support the theory that Diodorus found the information about Orion (including the paraphrase of Hesiod’s passage) in Timaeus’ work. For an overall assessment of Diodorus’ use of sources, see recently RATHMANN 2016, ch. 4, with further bibliography. 42 For the Greek name(s) of Cape Pelorus (Peloris, Pelorias, Peloros, Peloron), see MANNI 1981, 59–60; PRESTIANNI GIALLOMBARDO 2002a, 146–50. 43 See PRESTIANNI GIALLOMBARDO 2002a, 155–7, and 2002b, 129–31, with bibliography.
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must have been fully valorised;44 on the other, the assertion that Orion, immediately after the completion of his exploits in Sicily, retired to Euboea and was eventually numbered among the stars of heaven seems to be a clear signal of ‘appropriation’ of the myth by the Euboeans,45 or better to say by the Zancleans.46 One testimony remains to be analysed where we find a close association between the Zanclean peninsula/port and Cape Pelorus. It is an inscription of the Roman Imperial age from Messina that was recently published by A. Ollà (and republished by D. Castrizio and C. Meliadò).47 The text, which is made up of five (hexa-)metric lines (entirely preserved) and is engraved on a marble slab, goes as follow: Χαῖρε μάκαρ χθονός ἡμετήρης βλάστημα σεβαστόν, Ζάγλης εὐλιμένου μεδέων ἄκρης τε Πελώρου, εἰσορόων στεινόν τε πόρον καὶ ῥεύματα πορθμοῦ, ἔνθα, πάλιν φοίτοιο διωκομένοιο κλυδῶνος ἀντικορύσσεται Ἀδριακῷ Τυρρηνικὸν ὕδωρ.48 Hail, thou fortunate and venerable offspring of our land, Guardian of good-harboured Zancle and of Cape Pelorus, Thou looking at the narrow channel and the stream of the straits, Where, the wave being pushed back and forth, The water of the Tyrrhenian (Sea) rises up against the Ionian (Sea).49
Such an inscription was originally intended as a dedication. Unfortunately, we cannot specify who made the dedication, or for whom the dedication was made, because personal names are completely absent from the text.50 In any case, the special care taken in carving the marble slab may suggest that it was the community of 44 Either in the Catalogue of Women or in the Astronomy: fr. 183 RZACH = fr. 149 MERKELBACH/WEST = fr. 245 MOST. See RENAUD 2004, 52–6. For the treatment of Orion by Diodorus, see MARIOTTA/MAGNELLI 2012, 294–6: of course, compared to the original Hesiodic one, Diodorus’ picture of Orion’s achievements in Sicily may contain certain modifications attributable to his own judgement. For the recent tendency to consider Diodorus’ contribution to the treatment of mythology as (at least partially) innovative, see SULIMANI 2011, 57–8, and MUNTZ 2017, 104 (with a focus on Diodorus’ interest in catasterismography). 45 DEBIASI 2010, 11, has rightly noted that Orion’s route from Zancle to Euboea is exactly the opposite of the route taken by the Euboeans, who historically directed their colonisation efforts from Euboea to Zancle. See also RENAUD 2004, 135–6. 46 As rightly observed by PRESTIANNI GIALLOMBARDO 2002a, 157–9, the myth of Orion’s deeds in Sicily was not a ‘foundation myth’ (because, according to Diodorus, Zancle already existed when Orion came to Sicily), but an ‘acculturation myth’ (because it was used to explain the introduction of the cult of Poseidon into the city). 47 See OLLÀ 2017; CASTRIZIO/MELIADÒ 2020. The inscription can be dated to the I-II centuries CE in light of its palaeographical features. 48 I reproduce here the text of the editio princeps by Ollà, with some modifications. 49 In my translation, I use the word Ionian for Ἀδριακῷ, because according to the current geographical definition it is the Ionian Sea (not the Adriatic Sea) which bathes the eastern coasts of Sicily. For the definitions of the Ionian and Adriatic Seas in the ancient sources, see e.g. MANNI 1981, 48–9. 50 Likewise, we cannot specify if the inscription was intended to accompany a statue, a donor or a building: see OLLÀ 2017, 174.
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Messana which decided to realise it, at public expense. Moreover, the invocation of the dedicatee through solemn expressions such as χθονός ἡμετήρης βλάστημα σεβαστόν (= venerable offspring of our land) and Ζάγλης εὐλιμένου μεδέων (= guardian of good-harboured Zancle) are not so much appropriate for a common citizen as for a god or a hero.51 If this is correct, then the suggestion made by Ollà, that the dedicatee was none other than Orion, takes on particular relevance.52 As we have seen, a probably archaic tradition linked the name of Orion to the city of Zancle and, particularly, presented him as the unique builder of both the Zanclean peninsula and Cape Pelorus. A similar association seems effectively to be detected behind the double appellation of “guardian of good-harboured Zancle and of Cape Pelorus”, where the term “good-harboured Zancle” serves as an implicit reference to the Zanclean peninsula and its safe harbour. We can go further. The author of the dedication really seems to have kept Diodorus’ testimony in mind, which can be inferred from the use of the toponym Zancle itself (which was no longer common in the Roman Imperial age):53 it is therefore no surprise that the image conveyed in the inscription is that of a peninsula dominating the coastal landscape of Zancle not on its own, but together with Cape Pelorus.54 4. Conclusion From the discussion above, we may conclude that the Zanclean sickle-shaped peninsula gave rise to aetiological and/or mythical interpretations, which contributed significantly to the literary depiction of Zancle-Messana as an admirably situated city. In particular, they were centred on the toponym Zancle, which was linked either to the presumed Sicel word for sickle or to the sickle used by Cronus to castrate his father Uranus. An alternative interpretation insisted on the construction of the natural harbour and surrounding landscape by Orion, with a focus on the wider morphology of the Straits. Establishing the antiquity of each of these interpretations proves to be very difficult, but it is not unfair to state that a number of them trace their origins to the Archaic period, when the city of Zancle was founded by the 51 Thus Meliadò in CASTRIZIO/MELIADÒ 2020, 67. 52 Thus OLLÀ 2017, 175. It is to be reminded that, according to a tradition cited by Ps.-Apollodorus (Bibl. 1.4.3), Orion was γηγενής (= born of the earth), an expression that seems to be equivalent to χθονός ἡμετήρης βλάστημα. Moreover, according to Nonnus of Panopolis (Dion. 4.338 and 48.419), Orion was υἱεὺς γαίης/ἀρούρης (= son of the earth): see RENAUD 2004, 129, 132– 3 and 161–2. As a consequence, I cannot follow Castrizio (CASTRIZIO/MELIADÒ 2020, 68–70) when he argues that the dedicatee of the inscription may have been Pheraimon – one of Aeolus’ sons presented by Diod. 5.8.1 as a ruler over the east coast of Sicily –, who figures on the coins issued at Messana from the end of the 5th century onwards. 53 The ethnonym Zanclaei only appears in Plin. HN 3.8.91, whereas the adjective Zanclaeus occurs in Sil. Pun. 14.48 and 113. 54 From a geographical perspective, it is worth noting that the inscription identifies the Straits of Messina by using the words πόρος and πορθμός (both in l. 3): in the light of what I stated at the beginning of my paper, these paired words are not redundant, but they express the two complementary functions of the Straits.
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Euboeans. To put it otherwise, it was probably the Euboean colonists (and subsequently the first generations of Zancleans) who played a primary role in the definition of the aetiological and mythical narratives concerning the newly founded city. Their aim was clearly to present Zancle in the best possible way, by emphasising the advantages of its geographical location. What is most striking, however, is that such narratives did not disappear when Zancle was transformed into Messana in the 5th century and, indeed, they continued to be handed down until the Roman age. This is the reason why the motif of the admirably situated city of Messana was also reflected in Latin sources: suffice it to mention Cicero, who in his Verrines still speaks of Messana quae situ … portuque ornata sit and, albeit indirectly, confirms that both situs and portus are regarded as distinctive features of the city.55 Edoardo Bianchi University of Verona, Department of Cultures and Civilizations Viale dell’Università 4, Verona, 37129, Italy [email protected] Bibliography ANTONELLI 1996 = L. ANTONELLI, La falce di Crono. Considerazioni sulla prima fondazione di Zancle, Kokalos 42 (1996), 315–25. ANTONELLI 2000 = L. ANTONELLI, Κερκυραικά. Ricerche su Corcira alto-arcaica tra Ionio e Adriatico, Roma 2000. ANTONETTI 2009 = C. ANTONETTI, Drepane, Scheria, Corcira: metonomasie e immagini di un’isola, in: C. AMPOLO (ed.), Immagine e immagini della Sicilia e di altre isole del Mediterraneo antico, Pisa 2009, 323–33. BAKHUIZEN 1976 = S.C. BAKHUIZEN, Chalcis-in-Euboea, Iron and Chalcidians Abroad. Chalcidian Studies III, Leiden 1976. BIANCHI 2020 = E. BIANCHI, Poros e porthmos. Lo Stretto al tempo di Anassilao, Alessandria 2020. BIANCHI 2021 = E. BIANCHI, Chalcidian Laws and Lawgivers: A Reappraisal, Politica antica 11 (2021), 7–30. BILLERBECK/ZUBLER 2011 = Stephani Byzantii Ethnica, Volumen II: Δ-Ι, recensuerunt Germanice vertunt adnotationibus indicibusque instruxerunt M. Billerbeck et C. Zubler, Berolini/Novi Eboraci 2011. BOISACQ 1916 = É. BOISACQ, Dictionnaire étymologique de la langue grecque, étudiée dans ses rapports avec les autres langues indo-européennes, Heidelberg/Paris 1916. CACCAMO CALTABIANO 1993 = M. CACCAMO CALTABIANO, La monetazione di Messana. Con le emissioni di Rhegion dell’età della tirannide, Berlin/New York 1993. CASTRIZIO/MELIADÒ 2020 = D. CASTRIZIO/C. MELIADÒ, Sulla prima iscrizione metrica da Zancle, ZPE 213 (2020), 66–71. CAVEN 1990 = B. CAVEN, Dionysius I: War-lord of Sicily, New Haven/London 1990. CHANTRAINE 1968 = P. CHANTRAINE, Dictionnaire étymologique de la langue grecque. Histoire des mots, Paris 1968. CONSOLO LANGHER 2002 = S.N. CONSOLO LANGHER, Zankle-Messana e Rhegion nel gioco politico interstatale del Mediterraneo dalle origini all’intervento romano, in: B. GENTILI/A. PINZONE (eds.), Messina e Reggio nell’antichità: storia, società, cultura, Messina 2002, 247–72.
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SULIMANI 2011 = I. SULIMANI, Diodorus’ Mythistory and the Pagan Mission. Historiography and Culture-heroes in the First Pentad of the Bibliotheke, Leiden/Boston 2011. TRYPANIS 1958 = Callimachus, Aetia. Iambi. Hecale and others fragments, edited and translated by C.A. Trypanis, Cambridge MA 1958. TSAKMAKIS 1995 = A. TSAKMAKIS, Thukydides über die Vergangenheit, Tübingen 1995. VALLET 1958 = G. VALLET, Rhégion et Zancle. Histoire, commerce et civilisation des cités chalcidiennes du Détroit de Messine, Paris 1958. VAN COMPERNOLLE 1960 = R. VAN COMPERNOLLE, Étude de chronologie et d’historiographie siciliotes, Bruxelles/Rome 1960. ZAMBONI 1978 = A. ZAMBONI, Il siculo, in: A.L. Prosdocimi (ed.), Popoli e Civiltà dell’Italia Antica. Vol. VI, Roma 1978, 951–1012.
CRATES GROMATICUS THE TRANSMISSION OF CRATES’ THEORY OF QUADRIPARTITE EARTH IN THE CORPUS OF WORKS ON ROMAN LAND SURVEYING Tomislav Bilić Abstract: The division of the earth’s surface into four equal quarters, accomplished by a meridional and an equatorial ocean, is a distinctive trait of Crates of Mallus’ 2nd c. BC system. It was recently claimed that there is no attestation of this system in Latin literature between Cicero and the very end of the 3rd c. AD. However, a more or less clear exposition of Crates’ arrangement of four landmasses appears in a late 1st/early 2nd c. AD treatise that is part of the corpus of Roman land-surveying technical writings. The author of this work, Hyginus “Gromaticus”, was recently dated back to the turn of the 1st to 2nd c., which necessitates a modification of the proposed interval in which Crates’ system was unattested in Latin. The text of Hyginus’ description is, however, problematic, and requires a careful study in order to be elucidated. An interpretation presented here builds upon previous efforts to explain the passage, including the proposed emendations in the text, while offering a novel explanation. Apart from Hyginus’ treatise, Crates’ theory was briefly presented in another land-surveying text, Agenus (Agennius) Urbicus’ late antiquity De controversiis agrorum, but it is unclear in what way the two are related. Keywords: Hyginus Gromaticus, Crates, Agenus (Agennius) Urbicus, Roman land surveying, Corpus Agrimensorum Romanorum, quadripartite earth, antipodes. 1. Introduction Until recently the study of Roman land-surveying technical writings was considered an obscure field of study, but it now appears to be enjoying a kind of renaissance.1 This is exemplified in a number of recent editions of the corpus cited in this paper.2 1 2
B. CAMPBELL, Rev. J.-O. LINDERMANN / E. KNOBLOCH / C. MÖLLER (eds.), Hyginus Gromaticus. Das Feldmesserbuch: Ein Meisterwerk der spätantiken Buchkunst. Darmstadt 2018, in: JRS 110 (2020), pp. 378–80, here pp. 378–9. B. CAMPBELL, The Writings of the Roman Land Surveyors: Introduction, Text, Translation, and Commentary, London 2000 (with an English translation); J.-Y. GUILLAUMIN, Les arpenteurs romains, Tome I: Hygin le gromatique, Paris 2005 (with a French translation); J.-O. LINDERMANN / E. KNOBLOCH / C. MÖLLER, Hyginus: Das Feldmesserbuch. Ein Meisterwerk der spätantiken Buchkunst, Darmstadt 2018 (with a German translation); J.-O. LINDERMANN, Hygini liber gromaticus de limitibus constituendis. Historisch-kritische Edition und
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Among the texts of different dates included in the corpus, the one written by a Hyginus is among the earliest. Although traditionally dated to the third century AD, Hyginus “Gromaticus” (as the author is traditionally called) wrote a treatise on land surveying probably in the last quarter of the first century AD (more securely in a wider interval ca. 75−120).3 If the earlier date for his treatise Constitutio limitum (its actual title being gromaticus de limitibus constituendis, but I will continue to use the traditional title) is indeed valid, the claim regarding the lack of secure references to Crates’ theory of quadripartite earth in Latin between the mid-first century BC and the last decade of the third century AD should indeed be modified.4 Indeed, although Campbell previously adhered to a date close to the traditional one, “no later than the second or third century”, he recently discarded it for “the second half of the first century AD”.5 Thus, a scholarly consensus seems to be converging on this early date for Hyginus Gromaticus. Hyginus’ traditional date would not invalidate the claim for the hiatus in the transmission of Crates’ system in Latin, or it would not challenge it seriously, but the new date for the treatise on land surveying certainly necessitates a revision of the previously proposed time interval (i.e., between the mid-first century BC and the last decade of the third century AD). Crates’ 2nd-c. BC theory of quadripartite earth involves the division of the earth’s surface into four equal quarters separated by the equinoctial and meridional (or two meridional) oceans, which prevent any communication between the four
3
4 5
Erläuterungen, Darmstadt 2022. I will use the latest edition (LINDERMANN, Hygini liber gromaticus), with occasional references to the earlier editors, when necessary. J.L. ZAINALDIN, Roman Technē: The Growth and Structure of the Artes in the Early Roman Empire, Doctoral dissertation, Harvard University 2020, pp. 15, 238, 240; J.-Y. GUILLAUMIN, Quels rapports entre les agrimensores romains et la science grecque?, in: F. LE BLAY (ed.), Transmettre les savoirs dans les mondes hellénistique et romain, Rennes 2010, pp. 119–32 (here § 3); GUILLAUMIN, Les arpenteurs romains, pp. 66−7 and Le discours des agrimensores latins: Caractéristiques et sources, transmission et adaptation, in: Studia Philologica Valentina 17 (2015), pp. 9–34, here p. 9 n. 1 dates the work ca. AD 75–7; S. RATTI, Le substrat augustéen dans la Constitutio limitum d’Hygine le Gromatique et la datation du traité, in: Dialogues d’histoire ancienne 22.2 (1996), pp. 220–38, here pp. 229–33 and À propos de quelques difficultés gromatiques: Sur la datation d’Hygin le Gromatique, d’Hygin et sur les mots decuria et pittacium (Hygin 73 Th.), in: Dialogues d’histoire ancienne 24.1 (1998), pp. 125–38, here pp. 127–9: AD 75–77, certainly not after AD 86; J.-O. LINDERMANN, Philologische Erläuterungen, in LINDERMANN / KNOBLOCH / MÖLLER, Hyginus: Das Feldmesserbuch, pp. 10–63, here p. 11–2 and LINDERMANN, Hygini liber gromaticus, p. 15: second half of the 1st c. at the earliest. LINDERMANN, Philologische Erläuterungen, p. 52 n. 26 notes with approval Campbell’s (CAMPBELL, The Writings of the Roman Land Surveyors, p. xxxvii) estimate (“no later than the second or third century”) further cited below. In his latest work) he is more confident on Hyginus’ date: “Im Text nachweisbare historische oder rechtshistorische Bezüge lassen die sichere Vermutung zu, daß Hyginus in der zweiten Hälfte des 1. Jahrhundert n. Chr. gelebt hat” (LINDERMANN, Hygini liber gromaticus, p. 15). T. BILIĆ, Orbis quadrifarius: The transmission of Crates’ theory of quadripartite earth in the Latin West, in: Geographia Antiqua 25 (2016), pp. 129–45; ZAINALDIN, Roman Technē, p. 301 n. 634. CAMPBELL, The Writings of the Roman Land Surveyors, p. xxxvii and JENS-OLAF LINDERMANN, respectively.
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postulated landmasses situated in each of the quarters.6 It is first recorded in Latin in Cicero’s Republic,7 but the history of its transmission in the Latin West during the late Hellenistic period and the first centuries of the Christian era remains rather obscure,8 in contrast to its transmission in Greek, which is much better attested (Geminus, Cleomedes, Achilles).9 A possible source for both Geminus and Cleomedes on one side and Cicero on the other might have been the all-present Posidonius, but this cannot be proved.10 Hyginus Gromaticus’ land-surveying text, with its unequivocal exposition of Crates’ system, would thus add significantly to our present knowledge of its transmission in Latin, but perhaps also – circumstantially – in Greek.
Crates of Mallus fr. 37 BROGGIATO = FGrHist 2113 F 13, compare Macr. Somn. 2, 9, 1–6 = fr. 35f METTE; H. J. METTE, Sphairopoiia: Untersuchungen zur Kosmologie des Krates von Pergamon, München 1936, pp. 75–8; C. NICOLET, Space, Geography, and Politics in the Early Roman Empire, Ann Arbor 1991, pp. 35, 51 n. 31, 63; G. AUJAC, La Sphère, instrument au service de la découverte du monde: D'Autolycos de Pitanè à Jean de Sacrobosco, Caen 1993, pp. 14, 28, 32 n. 19, 45, 96, 162–3, 237–8, 279, 306–7, 313, 339, 361; G. AUJAC, The ‘Revolution’ of Ptolemy, in: S. BIANCHETTI / M. R. CATAUDELLA / H.-J. GEHRKE (eds.), Brill’s Companion to Ancient Geography, Leiden 2015, pp. 313–34, here pp. 319 n. 20, 321; W. G. L. RANDLES, Classical Models of World Geography and Their Transformation Following the Discovery of America, in: W. HAASE / M. REINHOLD (eds.), The Classical Tradition and the Americas, Vol. 1: European Images of the Americas and the Classical Tradition, Berlin 1994, I, pp. 5–76, here pp. 6, 10–5, 19–21, 24–6, 31–3, 38, 51, 56–8, 75; M. BROGGIATO, Cratete di Mallo. I frammenti, La Spezia 2001, pp. liii, 224; T. BILIĆ, Crates of Mallos and Pytheas of Massalia: Examples of Homeric Exegesis in Terms of Mathematical Geography, in: Transactions of the American Philological Association 142 (2012), pp. 295–328, here p. 296; T. BILIĆ, Orbis quadrifarius, 129–32; D. DUECK, Geography in Classical Antiquity, Cambridge 2012, pp. 77–8; K. GEUS, Agennius Urbicus und die Antichthonen: Ein stoisches Weltbild im Corpus agrimensorum Romanorum, in: E. KNOBLOCH / C. MÖLLER (eds.), In den Gefilden der römischen Feldmesser. Juristische, wissenschaftsgeschichtliche, historische und sprachliche Aspekte, Berlin / Boston 2014, pp. 113−30, here pp. 119–22; M. KOMINKO, The World of Kosmas. Illustrated Byzantine Codices of the Christian Topography, Cambridge 2013, pp. 78–80; D. W. ROLLER, Ancient Geography. The Discovery of the World in Classical Greece and Rome, London 2015, p. 133; S. DIEDERICH, Kartenkompetenz und Kartenbenutzung bei den römischen Eliten - Teil 1, in: Orbis Terrarum 16 (2018), pp. 55–136, here pp. 92, 106; S. DIEDERICH, Kartenkompetenz und Kartenbenutzung bei den römischen Eliten - Teil 2, in: Orbis Terrarum 17 (2019), pp. 101– 84, here pp. 131, 139. For Crates as grammaticus, to which the paper title refers, see FGrHist 2113 T 2, 5, 18, 21, F 13, 20, 23a, 33, 34 (= T 2, 5, 18, 21, fr. 37, 54, 136, 137 BROGGIATO); Crates himself, however, preferred the term “critic”, see fr. 94 BROGGIATO (cf. BILIĆ, Crates of Mallos, p. 295 n. 1). 7 Resp. 6, 24; POWELL, The Dream of Cicero (cf. BILIĆ, Orbis quadrifarius, pp. 130, 141). 8 BILIĆ, Orbis quadrifarius, p. 129. 9 Gem. Elem. Astron. 16, 1−2 = Crates fr. 35i METTE; Cleom. De motu circ. 1, 1, 209−69 TODD = Crates fr. 35k METTE; Achill. Isag. 29−30 (cf. BILIĆ, Orbis quadrifarius, p. 130). 10 Cf. Posid. T 57 EDELSTEIN / KIDD; I. G. KIDD, Posidonius, Volume 2: The Commentary, Cambridge 1988, pp. 459−60; BILIĆ, Orbis quadrifarius, p. 130.
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Figure 1a–b. A modern interpretation of Crates’ system (based on G. AUJAC, Greek Cartography in the Early Roman World, in: J.B. HARLEY / D. WOODWARD, (eds.), The History of Cartography, Vol.1: Cartography in Prehistoric, Ancient, and Medieval Europe and the Mediterranean, Chicago 1987, pp. 161–76, here p. 163 Fig. 10.2; adapted by the author; the width of the equinoctial ocean is not represented in scale, for which see GEUS, Agennius Urbicus, pp. 121−2). On Fig. 1a the division into hemispheres is accomplished by the equator, on Fig. 1b by a meridian.
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2. Crates’s system in Hyginus Gromaticus’ Constitutio limitum (for the text see Appendix 1) The exposition of Crates’ system in Constitutio limitum (chs. 24−5 in Lindermann’s edition) is not without its problems and requires a careful analysis (most likely, including some not insignificant interventions in the received text), but what is beyond doubt is that the author of the treatise was familiar with the Pergamene scholar’s model of the earth.11 Hyginus first describes the five circles of the world, from the northern polar circle (septentrionalis) to its opposite (se(s)contrarium) circle austrinalis, the northern limit of the southern frigid zone.12 Here circuli apparently designate “circles”, rather than “zones”, since septentrionalis is described as “the boundary of the frigid part (pars) [i.e., zone of the earth]”.13 He further refers to nostrum tetartemorium, “our quarter [of the world]”,
11 E. KNOBLOCH, Les écrits des arpenteurs romains et l’influence de la cosmologie, in: P. CAYE / R. NANNI / P. D. NAPOLITANI (eds.), Scienze e rappresentazioni. Saggi in onore di Pierre Souffrin. Atti del convegno internazionale (Vinci, Biblioteca Leonardiana, 26−29 settembre 2012), Firenze 2015, pp. 49−68, here p. 57; E. KNOBLOCH, Wissenschaftsgeschichtliche Erläuterungen, in: J.-O. LINDERMANN / E. KNOBLOCH / C. MÖLLER (eds.), Hyginus: Das Feldmesserbuch, pp. 64–84, here pp. 64, 69, 72; ZAINALDIN, Roman Technē, p. 301 n. 634. 12 CAMPBELL, The Writings of the Roman Land Surveyors, p. 148.1; GUILLAUMIN, Les arpenteurs romains, p. 100.1−2 = LINDERMANN, Hygini liber gromaticus, p. 157.6. For Hyginus’ use of the term sescontraria see ZAINALDIN, Roman Technē, pp. 301−2 n. 635. In Lindermann’s edition a simpler contrarium is printed (ms. evidence: sicontrarium in the later section of the earliest manuscript, Lindermann’s “A” = Wolfenbüttel, Herzog−August−Bibliothek, Guelf. 36.23 Aug. 2°, late 5th / early 6th c.; secontrarium in three 9th-century manuscripts, Lindermann’s “P” = Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, Pal. lat. 1564, “G” = Wolfenbüttel, Herzog-August-Bibliothek, Guelf. 105 Gud. lat. 2°, and “y” = München, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, Clm 13084; contrarium in the earlier section of the earliest manuscript, Lindermann’s “B” = Wolfenbüttel, Herzog-August-Bibliothek, Guelf. 36.23 Aug. 2°, late 5th / early 6th c.; contrarius in Lindermann’s “E” = Erfurt, Wissenschaftliche Allgemeinbibliothek, Amplon. 4° 362 of the 11th−12th c., and “S” = London, British Library, Addit. 47679, 12th c.), but elsewhere (LINDERMANN, Hygini liber gromaticus, p. 158.2, 10) sescontrariae is kept, although the manuscript evidence is unequivocal (see Lindermann’s app. crit. ad loc.). As an anonymous reader pointed out, the ambiguity might reflect a difference between a technical term and a word in common usage, so the former might also be preferred at LINDERMANN 157.6. 13 CAMPBELL, The Writings of the Roman Land Surveyors, p. 146.35−6; GUILLAUMIN, Les arpenteurs romains, p. 99.14. Here LINDERMANN, Hygini liber gromaticus, p. 157.1–2 opts for the variant primae, rather than finem (cf. LINDERMANN, Hygini liber gromaticus, p. 115). The former is much better attested in the manuscript tradition, being present in the earliest manuscript, “A” and “B” in Lindermann = Wolfenbüttel, Herzog-August-Bibliothek, Guelf. 36.23 Aug. 2°, late 5th / early 6th c., as well as in Lindermann’s ms. “E” = Erfurt, Wissenschaftliche Allgemeinbibliothek, Amplon. 4° 362 of the 11th−12th c. (in Guillaumin’s app. crit. the reading finem is recorded for this ms.) and “S” = London, British Library, Addit. 47679 of the 12th c., while the latter is attested in three 9th-century manuscripts (Lindermann’s “P” = Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, Pal. lat. 1564, “G” = Wolfenbüttel, Herzog-August-Bibliothek, Guelf. 105 Gud. lat. 2°, and “y” = München, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, Clm 13084). Cf. LINDERMANN 157.8 for solistitialis – a plausible variant reading, one indeed accepted by Lindermann (for the manuscript evidence see below), for aequinoctialis – and brumalis as fines of the torrid zone, and
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which he compares with sescontraria pars (“the opposite part [of the world]”), characterised by the same daylight/night exchange as “our quarter”.14 Thus, “the opposite [here presumably quarter]” seems to be located in the same “upper” hemisphere as “our quarter”, i.e., among the antoeci from the perspective of the inhabitants of the Greco-Roman oikoumenê (thus on the same meridian). What follows is a somewhat confusing description of the four quarters of the earth. Hyginus first refers to parallelo nostri tetartemorii,15 literary translated as the “zone of our quarter”,16 which almost certainly refers to the northern temperate zone. Possibly the Greek word παράλληλος was used here specifically to distinguish “zones” from “circles”. Elsewhere, the term pars is generally used to designate “zone”, but unfortunately the author is inconsistent in his terminology. Thus, as already noted, the term pars was at one point used to designate “zone”, more precisely, the northern frigid zone.17 But later it will be used more ambiguously. Thus, at LINDERMANN 158.10−1 it most likely designates the southern temperate zone, describing regionem of the opposite pars, i.e. zone. Conceivably, it could also designate the antoecian quarter, since it is situated to the west/east,18 which suggests
14
15 16
17 18
LINDERMANN 159.2, where aequinoctialis is the limit between the northern and southern hemispheres. LINDERMANN, Hygini liber gromaticus, p. 158.1–3; cf. ZAINALDIN, Roman Technē, pp. 298, 301−3. τεταρτημόριον is a Greek word meaning “quarter”, equivalent of Latin quadrans (LSJ s.v.), “a fourth part” (cf. KNOBLOCH, Wissenschaftsgeschichtliche Erläuterungen, pp. 64, 72). It is used in this precise cosmographical/geographical sense at Str. 2, 5, 5 (employed only at the very start of Strabo’s discussion, which encompasses the entire chs. 2, 5, 5 and 6; in the remainder, the alternative term τετράπλευρος is used as much as eight times) and Ptol. Alm. 2, 1, 88.1, 17 HEIBERG (M. DE NARDIS, Elementi ed excursus di carattere geografico nel corpus dei Gromatici Veteres, in: Geographia Antiqua 22 (2013), pp. 99–108, here p. 103 n. 27). For Hyginus’ use of the word in a technical sense of a quarter of the earth’s surface divided by two perpendicular oceans see DE NARDIS, Elementi, p. 105. GUILLAUMIN, Quels rapports and Le discours des agrimensores latins does not address this particular subject. KNOBLOCH, Les écrits des arpenteurs romains, pp. 49, 51, 57, 59 and Wissenschaftsgeschichtliche Erläuterungen, pp. 64, 72−73 is quite certain that Hyginus was actually familiar with the Geographica, but Strabo’s work seems to have been completely unknown before Hadrian’s reign (a questionable use by Dionysius the Periegetes) and gained some modest currency only in the late 2nd c. (D. DUECK, Strabo of Amasia: A Greek man of letters in Augustan Rome, London 2000, p. 152; D. W. ROLLER, The Geography of Strabo, Cambridge / New York 2014, pp. 27−8; S. L. SØRENSEN, “So says Strabo”: the reception of Strabo’s work in antiquity, in: D. DUECK (ed.), The Routledge companion to Strabo, Abingdon / New York 2017, pp. 355−66, here pp. 355, 362−3), for which reason this seems unlikely. At the same time, Strabo was well-acquainted with Crates’ work, which is evidenced by the large number of grammarian’s fragments that appear in the Geographica (although Str. 2, 5, 5 is not printed among them by any of the editors). LINDERMANN, Hygini liber gromaticus, p. 158.4. Thus CAMPBELL, The Writings of the Roman Land Surveyors, p. 149.13; LINDERMANN / KNOBLOCH / MÖLLER, Hyginus: Das Feldmesserbuch, p. 153 have “Breitenkreis unseres Viertels”, which amounts to the same. GUILLAUMIN, Les arpenteurs romains, pp. 100−1 has “le parallèle terminant notre quadrant”, which goes somewhat beyond the text itself. LINDERMANN, Hygini liber gromaticus, p. 157.2. On the received text and the proposed emendations see below.
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a more circumscribed meaning, i.e., a quarter. Similarly, at LINDERMANN 158.12 pars likely refers to the northern temperate zone, with a description of the shadows pointing to the right and referring to it as nostrae esse partis, “of our pars”. These designations suggest a reference to a zone. Conceivably, it could specify only the Greco-Roman, quarter, since its positioning once more suggests a reference to a quarter. The same applies to LINDERMANN 158.13, where pars likely designates the northern temperate zone, with shadows pointing to the right, but conceivably is restricted only to the Greco-Roman quarter situated to the west/east. What is more, at LINDERMANN 158.2 and 158.6 the term unequivocally designates “quarter” and “quarters”, respectively. This particular inconsistency creates some difficult problems in determining to which of the four quarters Hyginus’ descriptions specifically refer and whether his text describes all four at all, even when the plausible emendations of the received text are accepted. In addition, Hyginus seems to be concerned with the existence of the meridional ocean, oceanus meridianus,19 a notable feature of Crates’ quadripartite earth, perpendicular to the equatorial ocean, and proceeds with a brief and not completely unequivocal exposition of the Pergamene scholar’s system. Hyginus emphasizes that the quattuor partes of the earth are separated from each other by the sea, which prevents any potential communication between any of the quarters.20 This much is clear; but now the author of the surveying manual apparently attempts to distinguish between the eastern (“upper”) and western (“lower”) hemispheres, but does so in a nonsensical exposition, intelligible only by serious interventions in the text, if at all. He claims that the eastern regions “between the aequinoctialis and the meridian” (inter aequinoctialem et meridianum circulum) are “beyond the path of the sun” (ultra cursum solis)21 and belong to the sescontraria pars, “the opposite zone [of the earth]”.22 As it stands, this description is nonsensical. Lindermann’s emendations, following Eberhard Knobloch’s seminal work,23 replacing aequinoctialis with brumalis and oriente with occidente, elucidate and significantly improve the text.24 With or without interventions, this description certainly refers to the southern
19 LINDERMANN, Hygini liber gromaticus, p. 158.5: secundum zodiaci circuli cursum oceanus meridianus interveniret. Cf. LINDERMANN, Hygini liber gromaticus, p. 158.7−8: oceanus meridianus subiacet circulo meridiano. For circulus meridianus as “meridian” see KNOBLOCH, Les écrits des arpenteurs romains, pp. 55, 58–9. 20 LINDERMANN, Hygini liber gromaticus, p. 158.5–7: nam totius terrae quattuor partes mari dividuntur, nec ultra hominibus quartae partis ire permittitur (cf. LINDERMANN, Hygini liber gromaticus, p. 158.7−8, quoted in the preceding note). Cf. DE NARDIS, Elementi, p. 105. 21 CAMPBELL, The Writings of the Roman Land Surveyors, p. 148.13−5; cf. GUILLAUMIN, Les arpenteurs romains, p. 101.5−7 (with solistitialem instead of aequinoctialem). 22 LINDERMANN, Hygini liber gromaticus, p. 158.10−1. 23 KNOBLOCH, Les écrits des arpenteurs romains, pp. 60−1. Cf. LINDERMANN, Hygini liber gromaticus, pp. 116, 158 ad loc. 24 LINDERMANN, Hygini liber gromaticus, p. 158.8−11. Lindermann’s edition faithfully prints Knobloch’s text as given in E. KNOBLOCH, Les écrits des arpenteurs romains, pp. 60–1. Incidentally, when Knobloch emends the transmitted aequinoctialem, he actually does so by way of replacing Guillaumin’s emendation solistitialem (GUILLAUMIN, Les arpenteurs romains, pp.
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hemisphere, and specifically to the southern temperate zone, but the reference to the east is unclear (although Knobloch’s emendation, accepted by Lindermann, is helpful), as is the position of the quidquid est in oriente/occidente (“whatever lies in the east/west”) “between the aequinoctialis/brumalis and the meridian”. The two spatial boundaries seem to refer to a horizontal boundary (the equator or, more likely, the southern tropic, since the regions are said to be located beyond the course of the sun) and a vertical one (the meridian), perhaps delimiting a quarter of the earth’s surface in the southern temperate zone, more precisely, the one to the west (accepting Knobloch’s plausible emendation) of the meridian. These boundaries are physically embodied in two perpendicular oceans that girdle the earth all around its spherical surface. In this way, the description would refer to the region traditionally called the antipodes, i.e., directly opposite the Greco-Roman oikoumenê (situated in the southern – opposite – temperate zone and to the west of the modern Atlantic). Since the antoecian quarter, described as sescontraria pars (“the opposite part”) and characterised by the same daylight/night exchange as “our quarter” was described earlier in the text, the present passage most likely refers to the antipodean quarter, necessarily accepting Knobloch’s emendations, including the change of oriente for occidente (otherwise, the present description would once again refer to the already described antoecian quarter). The following passage raises yet further textual problems. Hyginus goes on to describe “whatever [lies] in the west” (quidquid… in occidente [KNOBLOCH / LINDERMANN: oriente]) as located “between the brumalis [KNOBLOCH / LINDERMANN: solistitialis] and the meridian” (inter brumalem [KNOBLOCH / LINDERMANN: solistitialem] et meridianum circulum); this region belongs to “our zone”, nostrae partis.25 The boundaries of this region are clearly erroneously delimited in the received text, and Knobloch’s substitution solistitialis for brumalis must be accepted if one desires a coherent description: in the received text the horizontal boundary is represented by the southern tropic (brumalis), which can be associated only in delimitations of the regions situated in the southern hemisphere. The proposed replacement of brumalis with solistitialis solves the confusion. Indeed, the received text is contradicted by Hyginus’ reference to nostrae partis, as well as by the continuation of his exposition, where he relates how shadows are cast to the north in omnibus terris in hac parte, “all lands in this zone”.26 I would argue that here nostrae partis and hac parte primarily refer to the northern temperate zone as a whole and that the spatial indication quidquid… in occidente should be kept. This would allow the interpretation of this section as referring to the region of the perioeci, situated in the northern temperate zone to the west of the modern Atlantic. Indeed, it seems that Hyginus ventured to describe, however briefly, the quadripartite division of the earth’s surface (totius terrae quattuor partes). The interpretation offered here would entail that he was true to his word 101.5−6, 196 n. 158); see KNOBLOCH, Les écrits des arpenteurs romains, pp. 58, 60 and LINHygini liber gromaticus, p. 158.9 app. crit. 25 CAMPBELL 148.15−7; GUILLAUMIN 101.8−10 = LINDERMANN 158.11−2. 26 LINDERMANN, Hygini liber gromaticus, pp. 158.13−159.1. DERMANN,
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and actually gave an account of all its four landmasses. It also has the advantage of allowing Hyginus the understanding of what was relayed in his source. Otherwise, if Knobloch’s emendation to in oriente is accepted – and it does offer certain symmetry with the preceding passage27 – the entire following discussion would apply only to the Greco-Roman quarter and the perioeci would nowhere be mentioned. In any case, the pattern of shadow-casting described in this passage only applies to the northern hemisphere, although in practical terms Hyginus might indeed have had only “our” quarter of the earth in mind. Certainly, as noted above, in both present uses of the word pars it likely designates the northern temperate zone as a whole, but conceivably also only the Greco-Roman oikoumenê. It appears that the latter is supported by the next clause, where the region between the southern borders of Egypt and the equinoctial ocean (ab Aegypti fine usque ad oceanum, qua finit circulus aequinoctialis) is noted as an exception from this rule.28 Indeed, Hyginus claims that in this section of the northern hemisphere the shadows point to the south.29 Now this is not completely true for the northern section of the torrid zone, which is referred to here. In this region, between the northern tropic and the equator, the shadow would undeniably occasionally point south, but not exclusively. Nevertheless, this suggests that Hyginus had primarily the Greco-Roman quarter of the earth’s surface in mind, although he might have illustrated the description of the entire zone with an example from the only part that was known to the inhabitants of the oikoumenê. Hyginus finishes his account with an error, placing the region to the south of Egypt “beyond the course of the sun” (ultra solis cursum),30 i.e., in the southern temperate zone. The description of the region between the northern tropic and the equator (in Hyginus’ terms, between the solistitialis and aequinoctialis) seems to be merged here with an account of the situation between the southern tropic and the antarctic circle (i.e., between brumalis and austrinalis), a zone he refers to as “opposite” (sescontraria).31 3. A summary interpretation of Hyginus’ exposition Hyginus’ exposition of Crates’ quadripartite earth can only be understood in a coherent and intelligible way if Knobloch’s emendations of the text (save for one), printed in Lindermann’s edition, are accepted. The exposition could then be read in the following way: the four quarters of the earth are divided from each other by an equatorial ocean that separates the northern hemisphere from the southern, and a meridional ocean – roughly conforming to the modern Atlantic Ocean on one half 27 It also has the advantage of explaining the conditional proposition si solis corsum sequamur, “if we follow the sun’s course” (LINDERMANN, Hygini liber gromaticus, p. 158.12–3), i.e., along the ecliptic from – with Knobloch’s switch of the two terms as they stand in the text – west to east (KNOBLOCH, Les écrits des arpenteurs romains, p. 60). 28 LINDERMANN, Hygini liber gromaticus, p. 159.1−2. 29 LINDERMANN, Hygini liber gromaticus, p. 159.3−4. 30 LINDERMANN, Hygini liber gromaticus, p. 159.4−5. 31 LINDERMANN, Hygini liber gromaticus, p. 158.8−11.
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of the earth’s surface, with a corresponding counterpart removed 180° in longitude – separating the “upper” hemisphere from the “lower”. The four landmasses are described in the text of Hyginus in the following way: (1) the Greco-Roman quarter, situated to the east and north (LINDERMANN, Hygini liber gromaticus, p. 158.1; cf. LINDERMANN, Hygini liber gromaticus, pp. 158.11−159.2): … in hoc nostro tetartemorio… quidquid a media terra in occidente (LINDERMANN: oriente) inter et meridianum circulum subiaceat, nostrae esse partis, si solis cursum sequamur, quoniam omnibus terris in hac parte in occidentem spectantibus umbras in dextrum emittit, exceptis illis, quae sunt ab Aegypti fine usque ad oceanum, qua finit circulus aequinoctialis. (2) the opposite (sescontraria) quarter, situated to the east and south, i.e., the antoeci (LINDERMANN, Hygini liber gromaticus, p. 158.2–3): Ab hoc enim exemplo sescontrariae partis, quae videtur eisdem horis inluminari, umbra describitur. (3) another opposite (sescontraria) quarter, but situated to the west and south, i.e., the antipodes (LINDERMANN, Hygini liber gromaticus, p. 158.8−11): … inter et meridianum circulum a media terra quidquid est in , ultra cursum solis esse, quam regionem quidam sescontrariae partis appellant (4) another landmass in the same zone as the Greco-Roman quarter, but situated to the west and north, i.e., the perioeci (LINDERMANN, Hygini liber gromaticus, pp. 158.11−159.1): … quidquid a media terra in occidente (LINDERMANN: oriente) inter et meridianum circulum subiaceat, nostrae esse partis, si solis cursum sequamur, quoniam omnibus terris in hac parte in occidentem spectantibus umbras in dextrum emittit…
Figure 2. Presentation of Hyginus’ exposition of Crates’ system according to the interpretation proposed in the present text (based on AUJAC, Greek Cartography in the Early Roman World, p. 163 Fig. 10.2; adapted by the author; the width of the equinoctial ocean is not represented in scale, for which see GEUS, Agennius Urbicus, pp. 121−2). The names of the quarters are not present in Hyginus’ text.
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4. Conclusion All things considered, Hyginus Gromaticus was, as already noted, certainly aware of Crates’ system and arguably understood its structure, even if he did not present it as unequivocally and accurately as one might hope for. Perhaps errors were present in the tradition upon which Hyginus was relying, or they crept in during the textual transmission, as evidenced by J.-O. LINDERMANN, Hygini liber gromaticus, 157.8, where the two terms used in different manuscripts − aequinoctialis (almost all the manuscripts, including the earliest, Lindermann’s “A” and “B” = Wolfenbüttel, Herzog-August-Bibliothek, Guelf. 36.23 Aug. 2°, late 5th / early 6th c.) and solistitialis (a single manuscript, Lindermann’s “S” = London, British Library, Addit. 47679, 12th c.) − distinguish between a nonsensical and an easily understandable reading.32 Unfortunately, no such manuscript variants are recorded in the remainder of Hyginus’ exposition of Crates’ system, and interventions in the text are required. The appearance of Greek terms τεταρτημόριον and παράλληλος suggests that the author of Constitutio limitum or his source had before him a Greek text treating the subject in some detail, which Hyginus or his hypothetical predecessor – if we ignore the textual transmission − did not fully comprehend or did not manage to relate unambiguously.33 Since Crates’ works have been completely lost, it is hard to estimate whether Hyginus used the original text of the Pergamene author or, which seems more likely, used an intermediary Greek text. Such text might have been similar to Geminus’ or Cleomedes’ treatises, or their possible source, the doxographical section of Posidonius’ Peri ôkeanou, which might have also been used by Cicero.34 Given Hyginus’ attested familiarity with Greek texts and technical terminology, it does not seem necessary to postulate an intermediary Latin text (it would have to be a completely hypothetical work, since none are attested in the sources), although this cannot be completely excluded. All things considered, the recently established date for the treatise requires a modification of the conclusion on the lack of secure references to Crates’ system in Latin,35 which would now have to be restricted to the period between the turn of the 1st to 2nd c. AD and the last decade of the third century AD.36 32 C. THULIN, Corpus agrimensorum Romanorum, Vol. 1, fasc. 1: Opuscula agrimensorum veterum, Leipzig 1913, p. 150.5 app. crit.; KNOBLOCH, Les écrits des arpenteurs romains, p. 56; ZAINALDIN, Roman Technē, p. 298 n. 628. LINDERMANN / KNOBLOCH / MÖLLER, Hyginus: Das Feldmesserbuch, p. 148.32 and LINDERMANN, Hygini liber gromaticus, p. 157.8 indeed print solistitiali here. 33 LINDERMANN, Hygini liber gromaticus, p. 15 (cf. LINDERMANN, Philologische Erläuterungen, p. 12) notices Hyginus’ free use of Greek professional terminology and cautiously suggests he might have been a Greek freedman; KNOBLOCH, Les écrits des arpenteurs romains, pp. 57, 60 and Wissenschaftsgeschichtliche Erläuterungen, pp. 64, 73 emphasized his familiarity with Greek sources and technical terms. 34 BILIĆ, Orbis quadrifarius, p. 130. 35 BILIĆ, Orbis quadrifarius. 36 Other references to Crates’ system not recorded in BILIĆ, Orbis quadrifarius, are all later than the late 3rd c. and do not require the modification of the postulated interval. Thus, in the earliest (5th c.) redaction (A) of Iulius Honorius’ Sphaera (GLM, p. 55 RIESE), in an epilogue from a
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Appendix 1 – the text of chs. 24–25 of Hyginus Gromaticus’ treatise (ed. LINDERMANN, Hygini liber gromaticus)
Septentrionali deinde contrarium austernalem appellant. Circulus autem zodiacus, cuius fines sol negatur excedere, a circulo solistitiali ad brumalem per diagonum ostenditur ita, ut meridianum circulum ex utraque parte medium secet. Per hunc sol, hoc est infra, ire fertur et orbem terrarum viginti et quattuor horis circumire. Harum ferunt XXIIII horarum iuncturam semper unum esse interuallum. nam increscendi aut decrescendi inter ipsas horas alternam esse mutationem. Hoc ipsum per umbrarum motus ostenditur. Nam cum sol orbem medium conscendit, umbras omnium rerum in hoc nostro tetartemorio meridiano axi facit ordinatas. Ab hoc enim exemplo sescontrariae partis, quae videtur eisdem horis inluminari, umbra describitur. [25] Dubium fortasse esset de parallelo nostri tetartemori, si secundum zodiaci circuli cursum oceanus meridianus interveniret. Nam totius terrae quattor partes mari dividuntur, nec ultra hominibus quartae partis ire permittitur. Sed quoniam oceanus meridianus subiacet circulo meridiano, quem zodiacus medium secat, apparet, inter et meridianum circulum a media terra quidquid est in , ultra cursum solis esse, quam regionem quidam sescontrariae partis appellant; et quidquid a media terra in inter et meridianum circulum subiaceat, nostrae esse partis, si solis cursum sequamur, quoniam omnibus terris in hac parte in occidentem spectantibus umbras in dextrum emittit, exceptis illis, quae sunt ab Aegypti fine usque ad oceanum, qua finit circulus aequinoctialis. Has terras ferunt professed student of Iulius Honorius (himself dated to the 4th or 5th c., P. GAUTIER DALCHÉ, L’enseignement de la géographie dans l’antiquité tardive, in: Klio 96.1 (2014), pp. 144−82, here p. 157), four oceans named after cardinal directions are described. Although no mention of actual quadripartite division is present, it is reasonable to recognise here a reference to Crates’ system (DIEDERICH, Kartenkompetenz und Kartenbenutzung 2, pp. 129, 131, 133). Honorius’ work is further referred to by Cassiodorus (Inst. 1, 25, 1), where a quadrifaria distinctione (DIEDERICH, Kartenkompetenz und Kartenbenutzung 2, p. 133) can be compared with orbis quadrifariam in Crates fr. 35h METTE (BILIĆ, Orbis quadrifarius, pp. 130−1). Further, Nonnus (mid-5th c., D. ACCORINTI, The Poet from Panopolis: An Obscure Biography and a Controversial Figure, in: D. ACCORINTI (ed.), Brill’s Companion to Nonnus of Panopolis, Leiden / Boston 2016, pp. 11−53, here pp. 28−32), briefly referred to four separate parts of the world surrounded by the Ocean (D. 2, 247−9, cf. 33, 63), which almost certainly refers to Crates’ arrangement. Finally, a Byzantine-period (GAUTIER DALCHÉ, L’enseignement, p. 157 n. 43) brief anonymous treatise on Ptolemaic geography contains a short description of four parts of the earth, which includes a division of the globe on the visible and invisible hemisphere but does not mention the two oceans (Anon. Sum. rat. 2 GGM 2, p. 488 MÜLLER); it could plausibly represent a reference to Crates’ system (DIEDERICH, Kartenkompetenz und Kartenbenutzung 2, p. 131 n. 135). The date of treatise is contested: according to A. DILLER, The Tradition of the Minor Greek Geographers, Lancaster 1952, pp. 1 n. 1, 13, 177, it is as late as the 13th or 14th c., but W. WOLSKA-CONUS, Deux contributions à l'histoire de la géographie, in: Travaux et Mémoires 5 (1973), pp. 259−79, here pp. 263−72, argues for a 6th-c. date. The question seems to remain unresolved (I. PÉREZ MARTÍN / G. CRUZ ANDREOTTI, Geography, in: S. LAZARIS (ed.), A Companion to Byzantine Science, Leiden / Boston 2020, pp. 231−60, here p. 258), but the authors’ censure of those who apparently wish to refute the sphericity of the earth (Anon. Sum. rat. 8 GGM 2, p. 490 MÜLLER) suggests the appropriateness of the 6th-c. milieu (WOLSKA-CONUS, Deux contributions, pp. 266, 268, 271; D. MARCOTTE, Géographes Grecs I, Introducion générale. Ps.-Scymnos: Circuit de la terre, Paris 2000, p. cv, supporting Diller’s dating, discards this argument, maintaining that a 13th or 14th c. author could have reacted to the notions expressed in a 6th c. text).
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inhabitare Arabas, Indos et alias gentes; apud hos in occidentem spectantibus umbrae in sinistrum emittuntur, ex quo apparet eos ultra solis cursum positos…37
Appendix 2 Hyginus Gromaticus’ exposition has left few traces in the corpus of literature on Roman land surveying. Crates’ system, however, does appear several centuries later, in the 4th or 5th c. De controversiis agrorum by Agenus (Agennius) Urbicus.38 Concisely, but in no uncertain terms, Urbicus describes the quadripartite division of the earth’s globe, with a major longitudinal division on two hemispheres, and two further subdivisions. He divides the “other” (western) hemisphere (hemisphaeriou aliud latus, GUILLAUMIN, Agennius Urbicus, p. 61.8−9) on the regions of the antichthones (to the south) and the antipodes (to the north of the equinoctial ocean), with the Greco-Roman oikoumenê and the opposite antoecian quarter (contraria pars, GUILLAUMIN, Agennius Urbicus, p. 61.2), specifically called the antoecumene, situated to the north and south, respectively, of the equinoctial ocean in the eastern hemisphere.39 As opposed to Hyginus’ account, this exposition is very clear and leaves no room for speculation. It reads as a competent summary of a longer composition and has little in common with the extended and more tedious account of Gromaticus.40 Furthermore, it applies technical names to various quarters (oecumene, antoecumene, antictonon, antipodon),41 which were not used by Hyginus. It does, however, use the term tetartemorion once,42 which points to a source somehow related to the earlier treatise. Although this cannot be completely discarded, it cannot be claimed that Hyginus Gromaticus’ work was known to Urbicus and that the latter simplified
37 LINDERMANN, Hygini liber gromaticus, pp. 157.6−158.5. 38 The date of the treatise is tentative: see GUILLAUMIN, Les arpenteurs romains, p. 43, Quels rapports, § 18 and Les arpenteurs romains, Tome IV: Agennius Urbicus. Marcus Junius Nypsius, Paris 2021, pp. 42−43; CAMPBELL, The Writings of the Roman Land Surveyors, pp. xxxi–xxxii. For the form of the name “Agenus” see LINDERMANN, Hygini liber gromaticus, p. 13 with n. 7 (I would like to thank the anonymous reader for drawing my attention to this issue). The latest edition of Urbicus’ text, which I will use throughout, is GUILLAUMIN, Agennius Urbicus (with a French translation). For Urbicus’ exposition reflecting Crates’ system see KNOBLOCH, Les écrits des arpenteurs romains, p. 57, BILIĆ, Orbis quadrifarius, p. 131 and GUILLAUMIN, Agennius Urbicus, p. 100 n. 40; against this view, GEUS, Agennius Urbicus, p. 122 (even though he recognizes some resemblances with Crates’ arrangement). Although GEUS, Agennius Urbicus, pp. 119–22 and KNOBLOCH, Les écrits des arpenteurs romains, p. 57 insist upon the Stoic background of Crates’ system, a more nuanced approach to the Pergamene scholar’s worldview seems to be more in line with the available evidence (BILIĆ, Crates of Mallos, p. 296). 39 GUILLAUMIN, Agennius Urbicus, pp. 60−1; cf. GEUS, Agennius Urbicus, pp. 114−7 (text, translation and commentary), 122−3 with Abb. 3 (discussion and reconstruction of the system). 40 GEUS, Agennius Urbicus, pp. 126−7 raises the possibility that the entire passage represents a self-contained brief exposition of a problem that was only subsequently integrated into the landsurveying corpus, which is quite in line with the analysis of the composition of Urbicus’ text in general at GUILLAUMIN, Agennius Urbicus, pp. 37−8. The suggestion is entirely possible, but for the purposes of the present study it is enough to acknowledge that the passage was indeed eventually incorporated into the collection. 41 GUILLAUMIN, Agennius Urbicus, p. 61.1, 4, 7−8, 11. 42 GUILLAUMIN, Agennius Urbicus, p. 61.9.
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and clarified it and thus made an intelligible digest.43 Also, it is impossible to know whether Crates used the word in his own elaboration of the quadripartite earth system, since it is not recorded in any other text, save the two land-surveying works studied here.44 This represents a tangible connection between the two works, but does not decidedly prove the existence of a common source.45
Tomislav Bilić The Archaeological Museum in Zagreb Trg Nikole Šubića Zrinskog 19 HR - 10000 Zagreb [email protected]
43 KNOBLOCH, Les écrits des arpenteurs romains, pp. 49, 57 takes it for granted that Urbicus was familiar with Hyginus’ work but offers no argument in support of this thesis. 44 See BROGGIATO, Cratete di Mallo, p. 347 (index). Incidentally, Hyginus Gromaticus is not mentioned either in BROGGIATO, Cratete di Mallo, FGrHist 2113 (also by BROGGIATO) or METTE, Sphairopoiia (neither is Urbicus). KNOBLOCH, Les écrits des arpenteurs romains, p. 57 and GUILLAUMIN, Agennius Urbicus, p. 36 notice that both authors use the word tetartemorion. 45 GUILLAUMIN, Agennius Urbicus, p. 36, discussing the presence of the term tetartemorion in Hyginus and Urbicus (cf. p. 101 n. 44), similarly does not commit either to an unknown common Latin source, itself dependent upon a Greek text, or to Urbicus’ dependence on Hyginus.
GUERRA CIVILE, HYBRIS O PROGRESSO? RAPPRESENTAZIONI DELL’ISTMO DI CORINTO NELLA LETTERATURA LATINA Francesco Cannizzaro Abstract: The Isthmus of Corinth is a recurrent image in Latin literature, especially from the Augustan age onwards, when it becomes a powerful symbol of both union and division under geographical, narrative, and metapoetical points of view. In post-Ovidian epic and Seneca’s tragedies the rupture of the Isthmus and the mingling of the seas are frequently associated to civil war and intra-familiar strife. But carving a canal through the Isthmus is a project that some generals and emperors tempted in the ancient world, in particular Nero. Many authors (e.g., Pliny and Pausanias) condemn this endeavor as an act of hybris towards the natural order, while others (e.g, Suetonius and Philostratus) consider it a sign of human progress and civilization. A comparison between some relevant Lucan’s (6.55–60) and Statius’ (Silv. 4.3.56–60) passages makes clear that the attitude of the ancient authors (praise or blame) changes dramatically according to their rhetorical strategies and the political environment. This is confirmed by other passages where the emperors’ subjugation of natural elements (e.g, the river Araxes or the Scottish sea) is focused upon. Keywords: Isthmus of Corinth, canalization, Nero, Domitian, intertextuality. Tra gli elementi geografici dell’area mediterranea, ha sempre esercitato grande fascino nell’immaginario romano l’istmo di Corinto, la sottilissima lingua di terra (pertenue discrimen, in Cic. leg. agr. 2.87) con cui inizia il Peloponneso e che, fino all’apertura del canale di Corinto del 1893, ha separato il Mar Ionio dall’Egeo. Questa fascinazione, dovuta certamente all’indubbia suggestione paesaggistica del luogo e all’importanza strategica (militare, economica, etc.) di Corinto e del suo istmo, è testimoniata dall’alta frequenza con cui l’istmo compare nella letteratura latina, in particolare da quando in età augustea Orazio conia il fortunato epiteto bimaris (carm. 1.7.2), calco del greco δίποντος (Eur. Tro. 1097). In questo contributo si intende dapprima sottolineare brevemente la valenza metaletteraria che l’istmo di Corinto assume in svariati testi della letteratura dall’età augustea all’età flavia, specialmente in contesti di guerre civili e conflitti familiari. In un secondo capitolo, ci si soffermerà sui tentativi antichi di taglio dell’istmo, da Periandro a Erode Attico, con particolare attenzione all’impresa di Nerone: essa ha destato una vasta eco presso contemporanei e posteri, i quali la giudicano talora
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come somma manifestazione di hybris nei confronti degli dei, talora come un’opera che, se portata a termine, avrebbe permesso il progresso dell’umanità. Infine, tale dialettica tra empietà e civilizzazione sarà alla base dell’interpretazione di due testi (Luc. 6.55–60 e Stat. Silv. 4.3.56–60), in rapporto intertestuale tra loro e che, sembra, adottano una medesima “poetica del rovesciamento” nel modo in cui trattano il taglio dell’istmo. 1. Immaginario poetico e retorica del bellum civile Raramente in poesia latina il paesaggio ha puro valore esornativo, tanto più se si tratta di elementi che giocano in qualche modo con l’idea del confine, del limen. L’istmo di Corinto, come del resto l’Ellesponto o lo stretto di Messina, non fa eccezione1 e porta spesso con sé implicazioni di natura narrativa e metaletteraria. L’Ovidio delle Metamorfosi, nello specifico, usa Corinto e il suo istmo come un trait d’union narrativo, in un catalogo di città, tra due sezioni del suo poema, cioè “l’età degli dei” (che termina con Niobe) e “l’età degli eroi” (che inizia con Tereo e Procne)2. Sempre Ovidio (Tr. 1.10.9 e 1.11.5), forse sulla scorta di Prop. 3.21.19– 22, sembra utilizzare l’istmo di Corinto, da lui attraversato durante il viaggio da Roma a Tomi, come immagine della transizione verso una nuova fase della vita (l’esilio) – e della produzione poetica (l’elegia triste)3. La valenza metaletteraria dell’istmo si specializza in età giulio-claudia nell’ambito della retorica della guerra civile: la rottura dell’istmo e la mescolanza dei due mari di Corinto, cioè, divengono metafore dello scontro che oppone concittadini o addirittura consanguinei. Il primo a usare questa immagine è Lucano in una celebre similitudine all’inizio del suo poema. Crasso, triumviro insieme a Cesare e Pompeo, unico fattore ritardante della guerra civile imminente (Luc. 1.99–100: […] sola futuri/ Crassus erat belli medius mora) tra due uomini per giunta legati tra loro da rapporti di parentela4, è paragonato all’istmo che tiene separati lo Ionio e l’Egeo; venuto meno l’istmo – fuor di metafora, morto Crasso a Carre –, lo scontro è inevitabile (vv. 100–6: […] Qualiter undas/ qui secat et geminum gracilis mare separat Isthmos/ nec patitur conferre fretum, si terra recedat,/ Ionium Aegaeo frangat *
1 2 3 4
Degli argomenti approfonditi in questo contributo ho avuto occasione di parlare a Firenze (novembre 2021) e a Villa Vigoni (aprile 2023). Ringrazio i professori Veronica Bucciantini e Michael Rathmann, organizzatori dei seminari, e tutti i partecipanti e ascoltatori per i loro preziosi suggerimenti: vorrei ricordare, in particolare, Klaus Freitag e Hans Kopp sia per le loro relazioni, da cui molto ho imparato, sia per la loro disponibilità e gentilezza. Un ringraziamento anche ai referees e alla redazione di Orbis Terrarum; di eventuali imprecisioni e sviste rimango io l’unico responsabile. Cfr e.g. BRIGUGLIO 2020 e RIMELL 2018 (su questo contributo si tornerà infra). Cfr. Ov. Met. 6.419–20, con BARCHIESI 1994, 247–8 (poi ripreso in contributi successivi). Sul possibile valore metaletterario dell’istmo di Corinto in Prop. 3.21 si veda JACOBSON 1976, 176, il quale però crede che il viaggio properziano sia del tutto metaforico. Sui passi ovidiani cfr. soprattutto VIDEAU-DELIBES 1991, 60–1. Sono, infatti, suocero e genero, cosa su cui pongono enfasi non solo Lucano ma anche e.g. Verg. Aen. 6.830–1.
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mare, sic, ubi saeva/ arma ducum dirimens miserando funere Crassus/ Assyrias Latio maculavit sanguine Carrhas,/ Parthica Romanos solverunt damna furores)5. In quest’ottica acquista pregnanza un passo della Medea senecana finora poco valorizzato, se non come parallelo per Lucano: la fantasia di Medea, che vede Corinto (legata alla mora) bruciare e causare il rimescolamento dei due mari (Sen. Med. 35– 6: gemino Corinthos litore opponens moras/ cremata flammis maria committat duo; l’istmo è poi nominato al v. 45), porta su un piano geografico lo scontro che oppone lei a Giasone e alla famiglia regale di Corinto e che si concluderà con l’infanticidio. Come nel poema lucaneo, dunque, l’unione di Ionio ed Egeo è proiezione sull’ordine cosmico di uno sconvolgimento intrafamiliare6. Una variazione sul tema si trova, invece, nel Tieste: qui, al passaggio dell’ombra di Tantalo che sta per gettare scompiglio nella casa dei nipoti Atreo e Tieste, l’istmo di Corinto si allarga (Sen. Thy. 111–4: […] et qui fluctibus/ illinc propinquis Isthmos atque illinc fremit/ vicina gracili dividens terra vada/ longe remotos latus exaudit sonos). Si tratta sempre di un turbamento dell’ordine naturale, ma stavolta è causato da una creatura infernale e si dà rilievo, più che allo scontro, alla discordia totale che separa i fratelli nemici Atreo e Tieste7. Gli esempi di Lucano e Seneca lasciano il segno anche nell’epica d’età flavia, specialmente nella Tebaide staziana, in cui l’istmo di Corinto è nominato di continuo8. La sua prima, e per il nostro discorso più significativa, menzione è in Stat. Theb. 1.120–2 ([…] geminis vix fluctibus obstitit Isthmos./ Ipsa suum genetrix curvo delphine vagantem/ abripuit frenis gremioque Palaemona pressit): quando passa Tisifone, che porta guerra sia civile sia intrafamiliare (tra Eteocle e Polinice) 5
6
7
8
Su questa similitudine si vedano soprattutto MYERS 2011, 407 (con bibliografia precedente); astutamente, MASTERS (1992, 50, nota 15) fa notare che il fatto stesso che ci sia un istmo separatore è indice di discordia e guerra civile. Cfr. i commenti di WUILLEUMIER / LE BONNIEC 1962 e ROCHE 2009 ad loc. Della Medea senecana sono disponibili numerosi e ottimi commenti (da ultimo, BOYLE 2014), ma non mi pare sia stata posta debita attenzione a questo elemento; nella stessa direzione, per la contrazione e la perversione dello spazio geografico nella Medea si veda RIMELL 2012 (230– 1, per l’incendio che dalle viscere di Medea si espande fino a Corinto). Il passo senecano può essere messo in rapporto (più che con eventi del principato neroniano quali l’incendio di Roma o il tentativo di taglio dell’istmo, su cui cfr. infra) con Ov. Met. 7.395: Medea, vendicandosi, brucia la reggia la Corinto e l’incendio viene visto da entrambi i mari (flagrantemque domum regis mare vidit utrumque). Inutile sottolineare come l’immagine senecana sia più pregnante e, data la sua collocazione nei primi versi della tragedia, ominosa. Cfr. soprattutto TARRANT 1985, 104, e BOYLE 2017, 144–5. Per quanto la tragedia non sia ambientata a Corinto, i riferimenti al suo istmo abbondano nel corso del Tieste: inoltre, la scelta e la disposizione delle parole sia nel passo citato (basti pensare al v. 113, con il participio dividens al centro) sia negli altri riguardanti l’istmo (cfr. e.g. mare dissidens al v. 125, con le sue risonanze politiche, e geminum mare al v. 181, in cui i mari gemelli dovrebbero essere uniti solo in nome di una guerra civile e fratricida) testimoniano la grande importanza simbolica di questo elemento geografico. In generale, Seneca è particolarmente attratto dall’immagine dell’istmo e la utilizzerà in numerose altre occasioni (e.g. Ag. 562–5 e Herc. f. 1164–5). Anche nella pur breve Achilleide, in contesto catalogico (1.406–11), l’istmo di Corinto viene menzionato insieme all’Ellesponto come elemento che delimita le aree del mondo coinvolte dal fervore di guerra.
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nella reggia di Tebe, l’istmo minaccia di non reggere l’urto delle correnti marine e Ino stringe a sé il figlio Palemone/Melicerte. Il contesto è analogo al Tieste: qui, però, l’istmo non si allarga bensì è sul punto di annullarsi e si rischia il rimescolamento delle acque, come in Lucano – e come nella Medea senecana9. Tra gli altri passi della Tebaide, bisogna almeno ricordare in questa sede 7.105–7 (Iam pronis Gradivus equis Ephyraea premebat/ litora, qua summas caput Acrocorinthos in auras/ tollit et alterna geminum mare protegit umbra): nel “nuovo inizio” della Tebaide dopo la mora nemea, un personaggio divino passa nuovamente da Corinto e instillerà ardore bellico fratricida, questa volta con l’ausilio di Pavor (vv. 108–44); stavolta non è ricordata la reazione dell’istmo al passaggio di Marte, ma qualche verso dopo, tra i presagi funesti che precedono lo scoppio delle ostilità, comparirà Palemone piangente (vv. 420–1). Al contrario di quanto si verifica nella Tebaide, nei Punica di Silio Italico l’immaginario della guerra civile, evocato attraverso l’istmo di Corinto e chiari riferimenti a Lucano, è depotenziato e “metabolizzato”10. Il passo di riferimento è il seguente (Sil. Pun. 15.153–7): It comes Ausonia atque in terras transit Hiberas,/ ut, cum saeva fretis immisit proelia, Corus/ Isthmon curvata sublime superiacit unda/ et spumante ruens per saxa gementia fluctu/ Ionium Aegaeo miscet mare11. La mescolanza dei mari causata dalla rottura dell’istmo è similitudine sì per l’inizio di una guerra12, ma della guerra di Scipione contro Annibale, pia e voluta da Giove (cfr. vv. 138–45, immediatamente precedenti). Con l’eccezione di Silio, sulla base di quanto è emerso da questa breve rassegna, sul piano metaforico la rimozione dell’istmo e il rimescolamento dei mari è immagine di guerre esecrabili o terribili azioni umane. Il presupposto è che tagliare l’istmo e unire i mari sia considerato un impossibile stravolgimento dell’ordine naturale: questo, infatti, rientra tra gli adynata della tradizione classica come testimoniano due passi attribuiti a Seneca: nell’epigramma Anth. Lat. 440 R.2 (= 438 SHACKLETON BAILEY; Epigr. 33 ZURLI = 48 PRATO), l’autore afferma che rinuncerebbe alla vita tranquilla solo dopo che si sia seccato il mare intorno alla Sicilia e si sia aperto l’istmo di Corinto (vv. 5–6); inoltre, nell’Ercole Eteo, altra tragedia attribuita a Seneca, tra le grandi imprese che il semidio potrebbe compiere, oltre al congiungimento della Sicilia alla penisola italica (vv. 80–2), ci sarebbe il taglio dell’istmo di Corinto (vv. 82–4)13.
9 10 11 12 13
Su questo passo staziano (e su altri concernenti l’istmo) rimando ai recenti PARKES 2014, 421– 3, e BRIGUGLIO 2017, 203–4: il precedente della Medea senecana meriterebbe forse maggiore considerazione. Mutuo questo termine da FUCECCHI 2018, sulle dinamiche di appropriazione del bellum civile nell’epica flavia. Per un’analisi stilistica della similitudine, specialmente in rapporto al modello lucaneo, cfr. BROUWERS 1982, 74–6, e SPALTENSTEIN 1990, 350. VON ALBRECHT (1964, 107–8), sottolinea bene come sia in Lucano sia in Silio la similitudine con l’istmo marchi il «Wendepunkt» della narrazione. Su questi due testi cfr. rispettivamente BREITENBACH 2009, 423–5, e DEGIOVANNI 2017, 218– 9.
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2. Nerone e i suoi predecessori: il taglio dell’istmo tra empietà e civilizzazione Eppure, fin dall’antichità greca, allo scavo dell’istmo di Corinto si sono accinti svariati celebri personaggi: Periandro (Diog. Laert. 1.99), Demetrio Poliorcete (Eratostene in Str. 1.3.11), Cesare (Plut. Caesar 58.4; Suet. Iul. 44; Cass. Dio 44.5), Caligola (Suet. Calig. 21) e Nerone, che, durante la permanenza a Corinto alla fine del suo regno (67 d.C.), più di tutti si è spinto avanti nell’impresa, tanto che ne rimangono ancora delle tracce dove sono stati effettuati i lavori nel XIX secolo14. Il tentativo neroniano, in particolare, per il quale sono stati mobilitati numerosi uomini, soldati e prigionieri (tra cui prigionieri ebrei mandati da Vespasiano: Jos. BI 3.10.10)15, e che è stato interrotto bruscamente a causa della rivolta di Giulio Vindice e della di poco successiva morte dell’imperatore, ha avuto vasta eco in letteratura: secondo alcuni studiosi lo stesso epigramma appena citato e il passo dell’Ercole Eteo si inseriscono nel quadro dell’impresa neroniana, che non a caso voleva essere assimilato a Ercole (persona loquens in apertura della tragedia)16 e che nella tradizione storiografica e dossografica è stato assimilato a Periandro17. Alla base di questi tentativi, oltre a una certa dose di esibizionismo, c’è una motivazione di ordine economico-pratico relativa al trasporto delle merci. Navi come le triremi militari, infatti, potevano essere portate da un punto all’altro dell’istmo ed esisteva anche una strada lastricata (il cosiddetto diolkos), riconducibile all’età arcaica o, forse più plausibilmente, a un periodo più tardo, che facilitava il passaggio; tuttavia, le navi commerciali di grandi dimensioni dovevano doppiare il temuto Capo Malea oppure era necessario utilizzare due navi e far passare le merci attraverso l’istmo con carri18. 14 Per un quadro generale si vedano già GERSTER 1884, proprio durante i lavori sul canale, e PETTEGREW 2016, 166–89; in sintesi, cfr. WERNER 1997, 114–6, e OLSHAUSEN / LIENAU 1998. A questa lista di personaggi che hanno tentato di perforare l’istmo di Corinto, un passo dell’Academicorum historia di Filodemo di Gadara (P.Herc. 1021, col. XII, 12–6, p. 225 Gaiser) permette di aggiungere il tiranno Cherone di Pellene, vissuto nel IV sec a.C. Quanto alle ambizioni di Nerone, cfr. (con, da ultimo, PETTEGREW 2016, 180) il discorso da lui tenuto nel 67 d.C. (IG 7.2713), in cui, nel proclamare la libertà dei Greci, allude al fatto che presto il Peloponneso cambierà nome (12–3: πάντες οἱ τὴν Ἀχαΐαν καὶ τὴν ἕως νῦν Πελοπόννησον κατοικοῦντες Ἕλληνες): perché, dopo il taglio del canale di Corinto, diventerà davvero un’isola e prenderà il nome dell’imperatore? Dopo Nerone, sarà Erode Attico a fantasticare il taglio dell’istmo (Philostr. VS 2.1.6). 15 Cfr. Cass. Dio 63.16.2 e, inoltre, [Lucian.] Nero 84.3 (cito quest’opera secondo MCLEOD 1987) e Philostr. VA 5.19: uno dei prigionieri sarebbe il filosofo Musonio. 16 Si vedano soprattutto BORTONE POLI 1967–1969 e CHAMPLIN 2005, 176–7, il quale dà enfasi a un bassorilievo raffigurante Ercole presso il canale neroniano (immagine e discussione in WISEMAN 1978, 48–50, e WERNER 1997, 115). Cfr. anche [Lucian.] Nero 84.3: con il taglio dell’istmo a Nerone sembra di aver superato le imprese di Ercole. 17 Al riguardo cfr. ANTONELLI 2013, in particolare 76–9, e CAZZUFFI 2013, 265. Un regesto di fonti antiche sul taglio di istmi, incluso l’istmo di Corinto, è offerto da FELICI 2018 (già prima cfr. FELICI 2016, 188–92). 18 Sul diolkos e sulle testimonianze archeologiche e letterarie ad esso relative rimando agli studi tradizionali di WISEMAN 1978, 45–8; SALMON 1984, 136–9; RAEPSAET / TOLLEY 1993; WERNER 1997, 98–114. LOHMANN 2013 fornisce una nuova visione del problema, separando il
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Nel mondo antico le conoscenze tecniche necessarie per il taglio dell’istmo non erano considerate sufficienti. Erastotene (in Str. 1.3.11), ad esempio, informa che Demetrio Poliorcete è stato dissuaso da motivazioni matematico-ingegneristiche legate al diverso livello del Mar Ionio e del Mar Egeo (φησὶ γὰρ καὶ Δημήτριον διακόπτειν ἐπιχειρῆσαι τὸν τῶν Πελοποννησίων ἰσθμὸν πρὸς τὸ παρασχεῖν διάπλουν τοῖς στόλοις, κωλυθῆναι δ' ὑπὸ τῶν ἀρχιτεκτόνων ἀναμετρησάντων καὶ ἀπαγγειλάντων μετεωροτέραν τὴν ἐν τῷ Κορινθιακῷ κόλπῳ θάλατταν τῆς κατὰ Κεγχρεὰς εἶναι): il rischio sarebbe stato l’inondazione di alcune zone limitrofe a Corinto e della stessa Egina. Qualcosa di simile è riportato dallo pseudo-Luciano (forse, Flavio Filostrato) e da Filostrato a proposito del tentativo di Nerone: egli avrebbe giustificato la propria decisione di abbandonare gli scavi sull’istmo per evitare l’allagamento di Egina19. Ma al di là dei problemi tecnici, per la mentalità antica un’opera come il taglio dell’istmo è connotata come un atto di hybris, paragonabile al perforamento del monte Athos e all’aggiogamento dell’Ellesponto da parte di Serse (non a caso, più volte menzionati nella raccolta di epigrammi attribuiti a Seneca, prima chiamati in causa)20: l’uomo che tenti di modificare i limiti che la natura ha posto si macchia di empietà e tracotanza e, spesso, va incontro a una brutta fine, come afferma Plinio il Vecchio a proposito di coloro che tentarono di scavare l’istmo di Corinto (Plin. HN 4.10: perfodere navigabili alveo angustias eas temptavere Demetrius rex, dictator Caesar, Gaius princeps, Domitius Nero, nefasto, ut omnium exitu patuit, incepto)21. Sempre a proposito di tagli di istmi, è esemplare quanto Erodoto (1.174.2–6) racconta sugli Cnidi: per esigenze difensive vorrebbero tagliare l’istmo che li tiene uniti alla Ionia, ma Apollo li dissuade dicendo di non fortificare né scavare l’istmo, perché Zeus, se avesse voluto, avrebbe fatto un’isola. Citando questo episodio, Pausania biasima Alessandro Magno, il quale tentò di scavare un istmo tra Clazomene e Teo, e colui che si accinse al taglio dell’istmo di Corinto (forse Nerone, anche se non viene nominato nessuno), concludendo che “è così difficile per un uomo far violenza alle realtà divine” (Paus. 2.1.5: οὕτω χαλεπὸν ἀνθρώπῳ τὰ θεῖα diolkos dall’antico percorso delle triremi da un punto all’altro dell’istmo. Sulle motivazioni del taglio dell’istmo cfr. e.g. ALCOCK 1994, 101–3. 19 [Lucian.] Nero 84.4: ἔφασαν δὲ τοὺς Αἰγυπτίους γεωμετροῦντας τῆς ἑκατέρας θαλάττης τὰς φύσεις οὐκ ἰσοπέδοις αὐταῖς ἐντυχεῖν, ἀλλ’ ὑψηλοτέραν ἡγουμένους τὴν ἐκ τοῦ Λεχαίου περὶ τῇ Αἰγίνῃ δεδοικέναι, πελάγους γὰρ τοσούτου νήσῳ ἐπιχυθέντος κἂν ὑποβρύχιον ἀπενεχθῆναι τὴν Αἴγιναν. Analogamente, cfr. Philostr. VA 4.24.3. 20 Per esempio, per quanto riguarda l’aggiogamento dell’Ellesponto, ben noti sono i passi (innanzitutto, Hdt. 7.34–5 e Aesch. Pers. 745-50) e la condanna da essi espressa – nella prospettiva greca, ovviamente (cfr. e.g. HAUBOLD 2012); dal punto di vista dell’antropologia e della storia delle religioni, un quadro sulla sacralità dell’acqua (in particolare, dei fiumi) è in SEPPILLI 1977; ULF 2008; DIOSONO 2010. Numerosi studi si potrebbero citare sulla mentalità antica in relazione alla tecnica umana e agli interventi sull’ordine naturale: mi limito a rimandare ai classici FEDELI 1990 e TRAINA 1994 (in ambito tedesco cfr. KISSEL 2002); da ultimo, cfr. FELICI 2016, 91–107, forse troppo focalizzato sulla hybris ancora nella prima età imperiale. 21 Plinio stesso, comunque, riconosce che lungo e pericoloso è il giro che devono fare le navi troppo grosse per essere trasportate via terra attraverso l’istmo: ciò non toglie che, pur rispondendo a un’esigenza reale, il taglio dell’istmo sia un nefastum inceptum.
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βιάσασθαι). Per quanto riguarda nello specifico il taglio dell’istmo di Corinto, l’impresa di Cesare viene stigmatizzata da Plutarco (Caesar 58.4–10) come esempio del suo delirio e della sua megalomania; persino Cassio Dione, che normalmente ha un giudizio non ostile nei confronti di Cesare, scrive che il taglio dell’istmo gli sarebbe stato suggerito dai senatori per farlo diventare arrogante (Cass. Dio 44.5, ma cfr. l’intera pericope che inizia a 44.3)22. Ancora più drastiche alcune fonti antiche sul tentativo di Nerone: lo stesso Cassio Dione (63.16) parla di terribili presagi, quali sangue, gemiti e apparizioni misteriose, che hanno accompagnato l’inizio dei lavori, al punto che Nerone in persona decide di dare alcuni colpi simbolici23. Altre testimonianze, però, si pongono in una prospettiva diversa. La biografia di Apollonio di Tiana e il già citato dialogo dello pseudo-Luciano, opere entrambe riconducibili all’ambiente dei Filostrati24, non sono certamente fonti favorevoli a Nerone: anzi, il dialogo si conclude proprio con la notizia lieta della morte dell’odiato imperatore. Eppure, a differenza di quanto accade in altri testi anti-neroniani quali l’opera di Plinio in Vecchio, lo scavo dell’istmo non è criticato in sé, come emerge soprattutto da Philostr. VA 5.7.4: ‘ἀλλ᾽ ἔμοιγε’, ἔφη ‘ὦ Ἀπολλώνιε, τὸ περὶ τὴν τομὴν ἔργον ὑπερφωνεῖν δοκεῖ τὰ Νέρωνος πάντα, ἡ γὰρ διάνοια ὁρᾷς, ὡς μεγάλη.’ ‘δοκεῖ μὲν’ ἔφη ‘κἀμοί, ὦ Δάμι, τὸ δὲ ἀτελὲς αὐτῆς διαβάλλει αὐτόν, ὡς ἀτελῆ μὲν ᾄδοντα, ἀτελῆ δὲ ὀρύττοντα. Ciò che viene criticato e dà biasimo a Nerone è l’incompiutezza dell’opera, non l’opera stessa25. Parallelamente, nello pseudo-Luciano Musonio afferma che lo scavo dell’istmo sarebbe meritorio per navi e marinai, un esempio di progresso e di “mentalità greca” o addirittura “più che greca”26 ([Lucian.] Nero 84.1); è, invece, irriso il fatto che Nerone non porti l’opera a compimento, adducendo a pretesto calcoli matematici, quando il vero motivo che lo allontana da Corinto è la rivolta di Giulio Vindice (84.4–5). Perfino il paradigma di Serse, usato sia da Filostrato (VA 5.7.4) sia dallo pseudo-Luciano (insieme ad altri paradigmi di μεγαλουργία: Nero 84.2) assume carattere positivo: la macchia di hybris svanisce – o, comunque, passa in secondo piano – e Nerone non 22 Su Cesare e il taglio dell’istmo cfr. soprattutto BEARZOT 2000 e MONTERO 2012, 112–5; PICCALUGA (2010) tratta di Cesare, in qualità di pontefice massimo, e del controllo sulle acque da lui esercitato (inutile, in questa sede, soffermarsi sul valore politico e simbolico del passaggio del Rubicone nel 49 a.C.). 23 Dio. Cass. 63.16.1–2: αἷμά τε γὰρ τοῖς πρώτοις ἁψαμένοις τῆς γῆς ἀνέβλυσεν, καὶ οἰμωγαὶ μυκηθμοί τέ τινες ἐξηκούοντο, καὶ εἴδωλα πολλὰ ἐφαντάζετο. Λαβὼν δὲ αὐτὸς δίκελλαν καί τι καὶ ἀνασκάψας ἔπεισε καὶ τοὺς ἄλλους ἀνάγκῃ αὐτὸν μιμήσασθαι. Sulla partecipazione personale di Nerone cfr. anche [Lucian.] Nero 84.3 e Suet. Nero 19.2. Stigmatizzano l'impresa neroniana anche gli oracoli sibillini (cfr. 5.137–40), che qui non saranno presi in considerazione. 24 Già nell’edizione di Kayser il dialogo Nero era stampato tra quelle di Filostrato; cfr. KORVER 1950, ripreso da critici successivi, per l’attribuzione del Nero a Flavio Filostrato e per una proposta di datazione dell’operetta. 25 Sullo stesso problema dell’incompiutezza dell’opera cfr. Philostr. VA 4.24.2–3, con la profezia di Apollonio (οὗτος […] ὁ αὐχὴν τῆς γῆς τετμήσεται, μᾶλλον δὲ οὔ). 26 Qualunque cosa ciò voglia dire (da, in senso negativo, inclinazione alla luxuria a, in senso positivo, evergetismo in favore delle città greche o, ancora, senso dell’utopia): cfr. al riguardo TRAINA 1987, 43–6, e WHITMARSH 1999.
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sarebbe tracotante nel concepire un’impresa simile: semplicemente, è canzonata la sua buffonaggine da «tirannello», incapace di finire le cose che comincia27. In una prospettiva simile, Svetonio, che parla in modo neutro del progetto di Cesare (Iul. 44.3: [scil. destinabat] perfodere Isthmum) e non infierisce sul pur detestato Caligola (Calig. 21: destinaverat […] ante omnia Isthmum in Achaia perfodere, miseratque iam ad dimetiendum opus primipilarem), annovera esplicitamente lo scavo dell’istmo da parte di Nerone tra le cose “in parte, degne di nessun rimprovero, in parte, degne persino di non piccola lode” (Nero 19.2–3: In Achaia Isthmum perfodere adgressus praetorianos pro contione ad incohandum opus cohortatus est tubaque signo dato primus rastello humum effodit et corbulae congestam umeris extulit. […] Haec partim nulla reprehensione, partim etiam non mediocri laude digna in unum contuli, ut secernerem a probris ac sceleribus eius)28. In un’ottica “progressista”, dunque, opposta a quella “hybristica” tradizionale, anche autori ostili a Nerone, quali i Filostrati e Svetonio, si esprimono a favore del taglio dell’istmo. 3. Lucano e Stazio: Nerone, Domiziano e la “poetica del rovesciamento” Una testimonianza esplicita del fatto che scavare l’istmo di Corinto non sarebbe in sé atto di hybris viene proprio da Lucano: dopo aver evocato l’istmo come comparatum per Crasso nel libro I (cfr. supra), nel libro VI, forse suggestionato dai progetti neroniani, il poeta scrive che le mani che stanno realizzando fortificazioni cesariane a Durazzo avrebbero potuto unire Sesto e Abido, elidendo l’Ellesponto, o tagliare l’istmo di Corinto o mutare in meglio qualche luogo nonostante l’opposizione della natura (Luc. 6.55–60)29. Tot potuere manus aut iungere Seston Abydo ingestoque solo Phrixeum elidere pontum, aut Pelopis latis Ephyren abrumpere regnis et ratibus longae flexus donare Maleae, aut aliquem mundi, quamvis natura negasset, in melius mutare locum.
(55)
(60)
Lucano sembra abbracciare un approccio progressista alla questione del rapporto uomo/natura, in accordo con il medio stoicismo paneziano, ma questo non è affatto tipico del suo poema, di solito in linea con il moralismo tradizionale: in altri passi, 27 TRAINA 1987, 45. Fondamentale è questo studio anche per quanto è detto subito infra su Svetonio. 28 Sui paragrafi svetoniani della vita di Nerone cfr. soprattutto BRADLEY 1978, 115–9, e KIERDORF 1992, 184–5. Anche riguardo a Caligola, lo scavo dell’istmo (peraltro, parallelo al ponte di barche tra Baia e Pozzuoli a emulazione di Serse, su cui cfr. Calig. 19) è annoverata tra le opere quasi de principe, opposte a quelle ut de monstro (Calig. 22.1). 29 Questo passo non è solitamente considerato negli studi sui tentativi di scavo dell’istmo nell’antichità. Un cenno in GRENADE 1948, 281–2 (in un contributo sullo scavo del canale dell’Averno ad opera di Nerone), e RIMELL 2018, 277 (il focus è, in realtà, l’Ellesponto nell’immaginario letterario romano).
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ad esempio, proprio il congiungimento delle due rive dell’Ellesponto, sul modello di Serse, è considerato un’impresa empia, usata come comparatum per biasimare Cesare e le sue opere d’assedio a Brindisi30. Come spiegare questa inversione? Una risposta possibile31 chiama in causa l’atteggiamento sistematicamente ostile di Lucano nei confronti di Cesare e del bellum civile. Come nel proemio del poema domare il fiume Arasse sarebbe auspicabile (in quanto bellum externum) a fronte del sangue speso per guerre intestine (Luc. 1.19)32, laddove normalmente nella Pharsalia domare fiumi è un atto empio riconducibile a Cesare33, così adesso tagliare l’istmo o unire l’Ellesponto sarebbero imprese meritevoli, di fronte alla costruzione ad opera di Cesare di fortificazioni per la guerra civile. In Lucano, insomma, il taglio dell’istmo nel libro VI è giudicato un’opera positiva non perché il poeta abbia normalmente un approccio teso al progresso (come altri autori che sono stati considerati nel capitolo precedente) bensì in opposizione a Cesare e alle opere della guerra civile. Si tratta, per così dire, di una “poetica del rovesciamento”, adottata in nome dell’odio per Cesare. Lo scavo dell’istmo di Corinto è evocato anche in Silv. 4.3, in cui Stazio esalta la costruzione della via Domitiana tra Sinuessa e Pozzuoli, in Campania34. Riporto di seguito i vv. 56-60. 30 Cfr. Luc. 2.672–7. La critica ha notato che il paradigma dell’Ellesponto è usato in entrambi i casi a proposito di opere di fortificazione (e.g. BARRIÈRE 2016, 263, oltre agli stessi GRENADE 1948 e RIMELL 2018 sopra citati), ma non si è focalizzata sul fatto che il comparatum è impiegato dal poeta per finalità opposte. Secondo SAYLOR 1978, 246, l’allusione a Serse, anche nel VI libro, connota l’impresa cesariana come hybristica: il fatto che l’opera di Cesare sia giudicata in questo modo (cfr. 6.314–5: deserit averso possessam numine sedem/ Caesar), tuttavia, non impedisce che il paradigma di Serse e dell’Ellesponto abbia, contrariamente al solito, valore “positivo” proprio in opposizione a Cesare. 31 In linea teorica, l’elogio del taglio dell’istmo potrebbe essere spiegato in ottica filo-neroniana e in linea con l’elogio di Nerone nel libro I del Bellum civile: com’è noto, i rapporti tra Lucano e Nerone sono fortemente problematici e dividono ancora la critica lucanea, ma all’altezza cronologica della composizione del VI libro – e degli eventuali progetti preliminari dell’impresa neroniana – ritengo impensabile che il poeta intenda tessere le lodi dell’imperatore regnante. 32 Non è escluso, comunque, che dietro la menzione del fiume Arasse sia adombrato un riferimento alle campagne orientali di Nerone o, addirittura, una polemica nei confronti delle campagne di Augusto e della lode tributatagli da Virgilio nell’Eneide (8.728): cfr. CASAMENTO 2013 con bibliografia precedente. Sull’Arasse e la concezione geografica che ne hanno i Romani, nonché sulla sua identificazione con l’Armenia, si veda recentemente TRAINA 2018. 33 Basti pensare, pochi versi dopo, all’attraversamento del Rubicone (Luc. 1.213.27) e, più avanti nell’opera, alla canalizzazione del Sicoris da parte di Cesare (4.137–43). Su Cesare e i corsi d’acqua cfr. BEXLEY 2014, 389–95; più in generale, sulla violenza di Cesare contro la natura si vedano SAYLOR 1978, 246–7 e, di recente, KERSTEN 2018, 41–154. Sulla natura in Lucano è appena uscito un volume a firma di A.-S. MEYER (Naturphänomene in Lucans Bellum civile, Basel, 2023), che purtroppo non ho avuto modo di consultare. 34 Vastissima è la bibliografia su questo componimento, soprattutto dopo il commento di COLEMAN 1988. Tra i contributi recenti si segnalano SMOLENAARS 2006; RÜHL 2006, 321–7; MARTELLI 2009, 156–8; MORGAN 2010, 52–76, HEINEN 2011, 53–7 e 113–6; LÓIO 2012; KREUZ 2016, 276–304; CHINN 2017, 189–95; RIMELL 2018, 280–3; ESPOSITO 2019, 109–11; MEIJER 2021, 57–118; HARDIE 2021; CORDES 2021 (e 2017, 180–95); cfr. anche HETTINGER 2022,
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Francesco Cannizzaro Hae possent et Athon cavare dextrae et maestum pelagus gementis Helles intercludere ponte non natanti. His †parvus†, nisi di viam vetarent, Inous freta miscuisset Isthmos.
v. 59: parvus M: parens Postgate: ruptus Courtney di viam Barth: deviae (vel cleviae) M: cliviae Voss
Stazio afferma che le mani delle maestranze impegnate nella costruzione della via Domitiana avrebbero potuto compiere altre grandiose imprese, cioè scavare il monte Athos, unire l’Ellesponto con un ponte stabile e tagliare l’istmo di Corinto causando il rimescolamento dei mari35. È molto probabile che Stazio abbia presente in questo passo il testo lucaneo appena esaminato: identico è l’attacco delle manus/dextrae (tot potuere manus in Luc. 6.55 e hae possent […] dextrae in Stat. Silv. 4.3.56); identica è la successione degli exempla (cui Stazio aggiunge il perforamento del monte Athos); analogamente espressa è l’opposizione da parte di forze superiori (quamvis natura vetasset in Luc. 6.59 e nisi di viam vetarent in Stat. Silv. 4.3.5936). È vero che siamo di fronte a temi ricorrenti nelle scuole di retorica del I sec. d.C. (e.g. Quint. Inst. 3.8.16 a proposito dell’istmo di Corinto), ma il contesto narrativo, ossia la costruzione di una grande opera, e la dizione poetica sono fin troppo simili per non far pensare a un rapporto diretto tra Lucano e Stazio. Tale rapporto va ulteriormente sviscerato e sostanziato. Secondo Stazio, come nota la critica, le maestranze di Domiziano potrebbero non solo raggiungere ma addirittura superare le imprese di Serse e Nerone: Serse ha usato un precario ponte di barche per aggiogare l’Ellesponto, mentre gli operai di Domiziano potrebbero eri-gere un ponte non natante; Nerone nonostante le sue intenzioni non è riuscito a 369–72. Sul tracciato e sui resti della via Domitiana cfr. almeno LONGOBARDO 2004. Secondo NEWLANDS 2002, 284–325, Stazio presenterebbe la costruzione della via come un attacco contro la natura, ma non pare che il testo supporti una tale lettura, quasi antifrastica, del componimento; semmai, come afferma da ultimo HARDIE 2021, 287–93, le connotazioni peggiorative dell’impresa di Domiziano sono soltanto suggerite per poi essere annullate dall’intervento in prima persona del dio-fiume Volturno e della Sibilla. 35 Purtroppo il testo del v. 59 è problematico, come si evince dal testo sopra stampato (secondo l’edizione di LIBERMAN 2010, 334–5, cui rinvio per una discussione filologica) e dall’apparato sottostante. Al posto di parvus verosimilmente si cela un participio come ruptus o come parens, stampato da SHACKLETON BAILEY 2015, 242–3, e HALL 2021 (vol. IV), 180; d’altra parte, di viam è congettura per il tradito deviae/cleviae che molti studiosi hanno proposto di leggere come cliviae (“uccelli del malaugurio”), ma il termine sarebbe quasi un hapax (per una contestazione di cliviae cfr. HÅKANSON 1969, 115–6). La scelta di COURTNEY (1990, 94) di stampare il testo da parvus a vetarent tra parentesi non appare risolutiva né metodologicamente condivisibile. Una lunga lista di congetture si trova in HALL 2021 (vol. V), 443–5: tra di esse, ha avuto una certa fortuna (ed è recentemente difesa da HARDIE 2021, 295) l’emendazione di parvus in laurus e deviae in Deliae (“gli allori di Delo”). In ogni caso, il senso del v. 59 forse non è troppo danneggiato: gli uccelli del malaugurio o l’alloro di Apollo risponderebbero comunque a una certa volontà divina, la quale evidentemente vieta lo scavo dell’istmo. 36 Si consideri anche che in Stat. Silv. 4.3.135 Domiziano è detto Natura melior potentiorque.
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scavare l’istmo di Corinto, mentre le maestranze di Domiziano lo potrebbero fare37. Eppure Stazio, il quale celebra dappertutto nelle Silvae il dominio dell’uomo sulla natura e che in Silv. 4.3 sta esaltando il taglio della via Domitiana, afferma che lo scavo dell’istmo è un nefas che gli dei – o gli uccelli ominosi, se al v. 59 si adotta la proposta cliviae – vietano. Tale apparente contraddizione è spiegabile proprio alla luce dell’antecedente lucaneo, cosa che conferma il legame intertestuale tra i due passi considerati in questo capitolo. Si è già sottolineato che in Lucano, normalmente moralista, il taglio dell’istmo è visto positivamente solo in contrapposizione a Cesare e alle opere della guerra civile. Secondo la stessa “poetica del rovesciamento”, ripresa da Lucano e segnalata dal riferimento intertestuale, in Stazio, normalmente a favore dell’intervento umano sulla natura, lo scavo dell’istmo è visto come un atto empio solo in contrapposizione alla via Domitiana. E Stazio sente il bisogno di istituire un tale contrasto per distanziare quanto più possibile l’impresa (tentata) di Nerone38 da quella di Domiziano. È vero che si tratta in entrambi i casi di una grande opera pubblica, di committenza imperiale, che modifica la natura, ma il messaggio che Stazio vuole comunicare è che un’opera simile, se è realizzata da Domiziano o da uno dei suoi collaboratori, è positiva, laddove, se è concepita dal monstrum Nerone39, è empia40. 37 Cfr. e.g. COLEMAN 1988, 119 e LEBERL 2004, 212 (ma già CANCIK 1965, pp. 109–10). RIMELL 2018, 281: «At lines 55–60, Domitian is all set to trump Xerxes, Caesar, Caligula, and Nero, who were only adept at bridging the Hellespont, or who only metaphorically filled in the strait (e.g. at Lucan, 6.51–2), [sic] and who famously failed to dig a channel through the Isthmus of Corinth»; questo, insieme a GRENADE 1948, 281, è a mia conoscenza l’unico punto in cui si cerca di discutere criticamente il legame tra Luc. 6.55–60 e Stat. Silv. 4.3.56–60 (in un quadro interpretativo, peraltro, piuttosto diverso), benché già HASKINS (1887, 193) citasse il passo staziano a confronto con quello lucaneo. 38 Ai vv. 7–8 viene citato un altro grande progetto neroniano rimasto incompiuto: si tratta della cosiddetta fossa Neronis, ossia il taglio di un canale tra l’Averno e Ostia; evidenti sono le affinità con il contemporaneo progetto del taglio dell’istmo di Corinto. La fonte antica più famosa sulla fossa Neronis è Tac. Ann. 15.42: per la bibliografia moderna, dopo il già citato GRENADE 1948, rimando alle discussioni e alle rassegne critiche di LONGOBARDO (2004, 280) e FELICI (2016, 233–7). I lavori per la fossa sono assimilati da Stazio niente meno che alle devastazioni di Annibale in Campania (Stat. Silv. 4.3.4–6): ancora una volta, la via Domitiana prende nettamente le distanze dall’opera di Nerone (cfr. SCHUBERT 1998, 308, ma anche e.g. TRAINA 1994, 46, e da ultima CORDES 2021, 137), benché, in effetti, le due imprese siano in continuità l’una con l’altra (LONGOBARDO 2004, 280–1). 39 Su Nerone nella letteratura d’età flavia cfr. SCHUBERT 1998, 254–337 e 439–43; DEGL’INNOCENTI PIERINI 2007; NAUTA 2010; CORDES 2017; REBEGGIANI 2018. 40 Ciò riceverebbe ulteriore conferma se davvero in età flavia, per la quale sono attestate monete con raffigurazioni di Ino e Melicerte, fossero stati intrapresi massicci lavori presso il santuario di Poseidone Istmico (HARDIE 2021, 290, e cfr. GREGORY / MILLS 1985): la “tutela” degli dei che presidiano l’istmo sarebbe un segno evidente del desiderio degli imperatori flavi di prendere le distanze da Nerone, che scavando l’istmo si sarebbe macchiato di empietà contro di loro (non a caso, prima di intraprendere i lavori, Nerone avrebbe cantato un inno per propiziarsi le divinità marine: [Lucian.] Nero 84.3). Purtroppo, incerte e lacunose sono le testimonianze letterarie e archeologiche: in generale, molte grandi opere a Corinto sono riconducibili sia all’età neroniana sia all’età flavia (si veda PETTEGREW 2016, 179–80).
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Un discorso analogo vale anche per interventi sulla natura di altro tipo: si consideri, ad esempio, la domesticazione dell’Arasse, fiume che al tempo di Stazio ha già una cospicua fortuna letteraria essendo stato nominato in punti strategici dell’Eneide e del Bellum civile41. Nelle Silvae staziane l’Arasse, che ormai sopporta pacificamente il ponte a seguito delle vittorie di Rutilio Gallico (1.4.79), gioirà qualora il giovane Crispino sia mandato come governatore in Armenia (5.2.141); lo stesso (dio-)fiume, tuttavia, e l’intera Armenia erano restii al giogo romano mentre il ferus Nerone era imperatore (5.2.31–4, soprattutto 32–4: pharetratum […] Araxen/ […] indocilemque fero servire Neroni/ Armeniam). L’assoggettamento dell’Arasse, dunque, che in potenza è un atto di hybris come la sottomissione di qualunque fiume, è pienamente legittimo sotto Domiziano e i suoi collaboratori (il fiume addirittura coopera con loro), mentre sotto Nerone – e, potremmo aggiungere, persino sotto Augusto (Verg. Aen. 8.728) – il fiume e l’Armenia protestavano la propria maestà violata42. E, se si considera un altro poeta d’età flavia, Valerio Flacco, immediato predecessore di Stazio secondo la cronologia maggiormente accettata dagli studiosi, nel proemio delle sue Argonautiche (1.7–9) saluta Vespasiano come colui le cui navi sono state trasportate dall’Oceano, lo stesso Oceano che si era indignato di fronte a Cesare e ai membri della dinastia giulio-claudia ([…] tuque o pelagi cui maior aperti/ fama, Caledonius postquam tua carbasa vexit/ Oceanus Phrygios prius indignatus Iulos). Si tratta di versi assai discussi – non è neanche del tutto chiaro a quali imprese in Britannia si alluda di preciso –43, ma in questa sede va sottolineato che in Valerio Flacco si presenta lo stesso meccanismo usato da Stazio a proposito dell’istmo di Corinto. Infatti, domare l’Oceano e, in generale, solcare i mari44, come scavare una nuova strada o un canale, sono imprese in bilico tra hybris e progresso e la loro valutazione morale vira verso il polo dell’empietà se esse sono compiute da “nemici politici” (come Nerone e i Giulio-Claudî) mentre sono giudicate positive e civilizzatrici se compiute dagli (o sotto gli) imperatori d’età flavia. Questa discussione permette di riflettere sulle dinamiche del panegirico nel I sec. d.C., nella misura in cui mostra bene come i codici dell’elogio, pur mantenendo alcune strutture di fondo, varino a seconda dell’imperatore regnante45. Sotto i principi d’età flavia, nella fattispecie, i letterati legati alla corte imperiale privilegiano 41 Nonché e.g. della Medea senecana (v. 372). Cfr. supra, nota 32. 42 Si veda da ultimo CANNIZZARO 2021, 222–3 e 226–7; cfr. anche SCHUBERT 1998, 308–9, e DEGL’INNOCENTI PIERINI 2007, 145 («La definizione di ferus […] suona anche paradossale in quanto attribuita ad un sovrano romano in contrapposizione ad un popolo barbaro e quindi stigmatizza ancora di più la degradazione tirannica di Nerone»). 43 Rimando al commento di ZISSOS 2008 ad loc. (una succosa nota in SCHUBERT 1998, 305); da ultimo, CAIRNS (2019, 16–23) propone che l’impresa di Vespasiano cui Valerio Flacco allude sia la circumnavigazione della Gran Bretagna compiuta (in suo nome) dal generale Giulio Agricola. Cfr. lo stesso CAIRNS (2019, 14–5) per la casta domus, forse di Vespasiano, a contrasto con quella, incesta, di Nerone. 44 Sullo psogos nautilies cfr. a titolo di esempio il celeberrimo Hor. Carm. 1.3.21–4: Nequiquam deus abscidit/ prudens Oceano dissociabili/ terras, si tamen impiae/ non tangenda rates transiliunt vada. 45 Rimando, in riferimento a Nerone e Domiziano, a CORDES 2017 e REBEGGIANI 2018.
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ciò che differenzia Vespasiano, Tito e Domiziano dai predecessori (di cui Nerone è l’esempio da aborrire) anche se, a livello pratico, le opere imperiali elogiate sono simili o pressoché identiche46. Ogni aspetto del reale, dunque, diviene fortemente politicizzato nelle mani degli autori e il rapporto uomo/natura non fa eccezione: queste pagine dedicate all’istmo di Corinto, “paesaggio letterario” per eccellenza nella letteratura latina imperiale, e in particolare all’intertestualità tra Stazio e Lucano, contribuiscono a far comprendere la portata del fenomeno. Francesco Cannizzaro Università degli Studi di Firenze Dipartimento di Lettere e Filosofia Via della Pergola 60 50121 - Firenze (Italia) [email protected] Riferimenti bibliografici ALCOCK, S. E. (2014), Nero at play? The emperor’s Grecian odyssey, in: J. ELNSER / J. MASTERS (eds.), Reflections of Nero, London, 98–111. ANTONELLI, L. (2013), Nerone e la maschera di Periandro, in: F. RAIOLA / M. BASSANI / A. DEBIASI / E. PASTORIO (eds.), L’indagine e la rima. Scritti per Lorenzo Braccesi, Roma, 63–82. BARCHIESI, A. (1994), Il poeta e il principe. Ovidio e il discorso augusteo, Roma / Bari. BARRIÈRE, F. (2016), Lucain. La Guerre Civile. Chant II, Paris. BEARZOT, C. S. (2000), Cesare e Corinto, in: G. URSO (ed.), L’ultimo Cesare. Scritti riforme progetti poteri congiure. Atti del Convegno Internazionale, Cividale del Friuli, 16-18 settembre 1999, Roma, 35–53. BEXLEY, E. M. (2014), Lucan’s Catalogues and the Landscape of War, in: M. SKEMPIS / I. ZIOGAS (eds.), Geography, Topography, Landscape. Configurations of Space in Greek and Roman Epic, Berlin / Boston, 373–403. BORTONE POLI, A. (1967-1969), Il taglio dell’istmo di Corinto in un componimento dell’Anthologia Latina, in: Annali dell’Università di Lecce. Facoltà di Lettere e Filosofia 4, 61–70. BOYLE, A. J. (2014), Seneca. Medea, Oxford. BOYLE, A. J. (2017), Seneca. Thyestes, Oxford. BRADLEY, K. R. (1978), Suetonius’ Life of Nero. An Historical Commentary, Bruxelles. BREITENBACH, A. (2009), Kommentar zu den Pseudo-Seneca-Epigrammen der Anthologia Vossiana, Hildesheim. BRIGUGLIO, S. (2017), Fraternas acies. Saggio di commento a Stazio, Tebaide, 1, 1–389, Alessandria. BRIGUGLIO, S. (2020), Consortia terrae: un capitolo sulla geografia della guerra civile nell’epica latina, in: F. REALI (ed.), Ricerche a confronto. Dialoghi di Antichità Classiche e del Vicino Oriente. Bologna-Pisa 2014, Zermeghedo, 349–62. BROUWERS, J. H. (1982), Zur Lucan-Imitation bei Silius Italicus, in: J. DEN BOEFT / A. H. M. KESSELS (eds.), Actus. Studies in Honour of H. L. W. Nelson, Utrecht, 73–87.
46 Non è questa la sede per interrogarsi sulla sincerità dell’elogio di Domiziano (e dell’odio per Nerone) da parte, e.g., di un poeta come Stazio: il dibattito ferve tra gli studiosi e condiziona l’interpretazione anche di opere come la Tebaide. Personalmente, in linea con gran parte della critica recente, preferisco limitarmi a studiare le modalità espressive dei testi piuttosto che indulgere alla critica del sospetto e avanzare interpretazioni che a volte paiono alquanto tendenziose.
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CAIRNS, F. (2019), The Prologue of Valerius Flaccus’ Argonautica (1.1-21): Quindecimvirate, Cortina and Caledonian Sea, in: CCJ 65, 1–28. CANCIK, H. (1965), Untersuchungen zur lyrischen Kunst des Publius Papinius Statius, Hildesheim. CANNIZZARO, F. (2021), Dal Reno al Tevere: poetica e politica fluviale nelle Silvae di Stazio, in: M. L. DELVIGO (ed.), Centro e periferia nella letteratura latina di Roma imperiale, Udine, 219– 34. CASAMENTO, A. (2013), In trionfo sull’Arasse? A proposito di Luc. Phars. 1,19, in: Paideia 68, 57– 77. CAZZUFFI, E. (2013), Uxoricidio, necrofilia, incesto e altri aneddoti della leggenda tirannica da Periandro a Nerone, in: Eikasmos 24, 255–73. CHAMPLIN, E. (2005), Nerone, Roma / Bari (ediz. orig. 2003, Cambridge MA / London). CHINN, C. (2017), The Ecological Highway: Environmental Ekphrasis in Statius, Silvae 4.3, in: C. SCHLIEPHAKE (ed.), Ecocriticism, Ecology, and the Cultures of Antiquity, London, 113–29. COLEMAN, K. M. (1988), Statius. Silvae IV, Oxford. CORDES, L. (2017), Kaiser und Tyrann. Die Kodierung und Umkodierung der Herrscherrepräsentation Neros und Domitians, Berlin / Boston. CORDES, L. (2021), Looking Back When Foretelling the Future: Panegyric Prophecies in Augustan, Neronian, and Domitianic Poetry, in: R. MARKS / M. MOGETTA (eds.), Domitian’s Rome and the Augustan Legacy, Ann Arbor, 125–40. COURTNEY, E. (1990), P. Papini Stati Silvae, Oxonii. DEGIOVANNI, L. (2017), [L. Annaei Senecae] Hercules Oetaeus. Atti I-III (vv. 1-1030), Firenze. DEGL’INNOCENTI PIERINI, R. (2007), Pallidus Nero (Stat. silv. 2,7,118 s.): il ʽpersonaggioʼ Nerone negli scrittori dell’età flavia, in: A. BONADEO / E. ROMANO (eds.), Dialogando con il passato. Permamenze e innovazioni nella cultura latina d’età flavia, Firenze, 136–59. DIOSONO, F. (2010), Pratiche cultuali in relazione a porti fluviali e canali, in: H. DI GIUSEPPE / M. SERLORENZI (eds.), I riti del costruire nelle acque violate. Atti del convegno internazionale Roma, Palazzo Massimo, 12-14 giugno 2008, Roma, 91–105. ESPOSITO, P. (2019), Campanian Geography in Statius’ Silvae, in: A. AUGOUSTAKIS / R. J. LITTLEWOOD (eds.), Campania in the Flavian Poetic Imagination, Oxford, 151–75. FEDELI, P. (1990), La natura violata. Ecologia e mondo romano, Palermo. FELICI, E. (2016), Nos flumina arcemus, derigimus, avertimus. Canali, lagune, spiagge e porti nel Mediterraneo antico, Bari. FELICI, E. (2018), Salum iungere. Tagli di istmi, in: L’Archeologo Subacqueo 67, 1–12. FUCECCHI, M. (2018), Flavian Epic: Roman Ways of Metabolizing a Cultural Nightmare?, in: L. D. GINSBERG / D. A. KRASNE (eds.), After 69 CE – Writing Civil War in Flavian Rome, Berlin / Boston, 25–49. GERSTER, B. (1884), L’Isthme de Corinthe. Tentatives de percement dans l’antiquité, in: BCH 8, 225–32. GREGORY, T. E. / MILLS, H. (1985), The Roman Arch at Isthmia, in: Hesperia 53, 407–45. GRENADE, P. (1948), Un exploit de Néron, in: REA 50, 272–87. HÅKANSON, L. (1969), Statius’ Silvae. Critical and Exegetical Remarks with Some Notes on the Thebaid, Lund. HALL, J. B. (2021), P. Papinius Statius, Volume IV; Silvae. P. Papinius Statius, Volume V; Silvae, Readings and Conjectures, Newcastle upon Tyne. HARDIE, A. (2021), Statius’ Via Domitiana: Inaugural carmen in Roman Campania, in: F. CAIRNS (ed.), Papers of the Langford Latin Seminar, vol. XVIII. Roman Poetry, Republican and Imperial, Prenton, 271–323. HASKINS, C. E. (1887), M. Annaei Lucani Pharsalia, London. HAUBOLD, J. (2012), The Achaemenid empire and the sea, in: MHR 27, 4–23. HEINEN, D. (2011), Dominating Nature in Vergil’s Georgics and Statius’ Silvae, diss. Gainesville FL.
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HETTINGER, J. (2022), Hochwasservorsorge im Römischen Reich. Praktiken und Paradigmen, Stuttgart. JACOBSON, H. (1976), Structure and Meaning in Propertius Book 3, in: ICS 1, 160–73. KERSTEN, M. (2018), Blut auf Pharsalischen Feldern. Lucans Bellum Ciuile und Vergils Georgica, Göttingen. KIERDORF, W. (1992), Sueton: Leben des Claudius und Nero, Paderborn. KISSEL, Th. (2002), Veluti naturae ipsius dominus: Straßen und Brücken als Ausdruck des römischen Herrschaftsanspruchs über die Natur, in: AW 33, 143–52. KORVER, J. (1950), Neron et Musonius. À propos du dialogue de pseudo-Lucien „Neron”, ou Sur le percement de l’Isthme de Corinthe, in: Mnemosyne 3, 319–29. KREUZ, G. E. (2016), Besonderer Ort, poetischer Blick. Untersuchungen zu Räumen und Bildern in Statius’ Silvae, Göttingen. LEBERL, J. (2004), Domitian und die Dichter. Poesia als Medium der Herrschaftdarstellung, Göttingen. LIBERMAN, G. (2010), Stace. Silves, Paris. LÓIO, A. (2012), Commemorating Events: The Victoria Sosibii in Statius, Silvae 4.3, in: CQ 62, 281–5. LOHMANN, H. (2013), Der Diolkos von Korinth – eine antike Schiffsschleppe?, in: K. KISSAS / W.D. NIEMEIER (eds.), The Corinthia and the Northeast Peloponnese. Topography and History from Prehistoric Times until the End of Antiquity. Proceedings of the International Conference, Loutraki, March 26 - 29, 2009, München, 207–30. LONGOBARDO, F. (2004), Problemi di viabilità in Campania: la via Domitiana, in: Atlante Tematico di Topografia Antica, ATTA 13. Viabilità e insediamenti nell’Italia antica, 277–90. MARTELLI, F. (2009), Plumbing Helicon: Poetic Property and the Material World of Statius’ Silvae, in: MD 62, 145–77. MASTERS, J. (1992), Poetry and Civil War in Lucan’s ʽBellum Civileʼ, Cambridge. MCLEOD, M. D. (1987), Luciani Opera (4 voll.), Oxonii. MEIJER, E. (2021), All Roads Lead to Home: Navigating Self and Empire in Early Imperial Latin Poetry, diss. Durham. MONTERO, S. (2012), El emperador y los ríos. Religión, ingeniería y política en el Imperio Romano, Madrid. MORGAN, L. (2010), Musa Pedestris: Metre and Meaning in Roman Verse, Oxford. MYERS, M. Y. (2011), Lucan’s Poetic Geographies: Center and Periphery in Civil War Epic, in: P. ASSO (ed.), Brill’s Companion to Lucan, Leiden / Boston, 399–415. NAUTA, R. R. (2010), Flauius ultimus, caluus Nero. Einige Betrachtungen zu Herrscherbild und Panegyrik unter Domitian, in: N. KRAMER / Chr. REITZ (eds.), Tradition und Erneuerung. Mediale Strategien in der Zeit der Flavier, Berlin / New York, 239–71. NEWLANDS, C. E. (2002), Statius’ Silvae and the Poetics of Empire, Cambridge. OLSHAUSEN, E. / LIENAU, C. (1998), Isthmus, in: DNP 5, 1148–9. PARKES, R. (2014), The Long Road to Thebes. The Geography of Journeys in Statius’ Thebaid, in: M. SKEMPIS / I. ZIOGAS (eds.), Geography, Topography, Landscape. Configurations of Space in Greek and Roman Epic, Berlin / Boston, 405–26. PETTEGREW, D. (2016), The Isthmus of Corinth. Crossroads of the Mediterranean World, Ann Arbor. PICCALUGA, G. (2010), Cesare e il controllo sacrale delle acque, in: H. DI GIUSEPPE / M. SERLORENZI (eds.), I riti del costruire nelle acque violate. Atti del convegno internazionale Roma, Palazzo Massimo, 12-14 giugno 2008, Roma, 161–6. RAEPSAT, G. / TOLLEY, M. (1993), Le diolkos de l’Isthme à Corinthe: son tracé, son fonctionnement. Annexe: Considérations techniques et mécaniques, in: BCH 117, 233–61. REBEGGIANI, S. (2018), The Fragility of Power: Statius, Domitian, and the Politics of the Thebaid, Oxford.
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RIMELL, V. (2012), The Labour of Empire: Womb and World in Seneca’s Medea, in: SIFC 105, 211–37. RIMELL, V. (2018), Rome’s Dire Straits. Claustrophobic Seas and imperium sine fundo, in: W. FITZGERALD / E. SPENTZOU (eds.), The Production of Space in Latin Literature, Oxford, 261–87. ROCHE, P. (2009), Lucan. De Bello Civili. Book 1, Oxford. RÜHL, M. (2006), Literatur gewordener Augenblick. Die Silven des Statius im Kontext literarischer und sozialer Bedingungen von Dichtung, Berlin / New York. SALMON, J. B. (1984), Wealthy Corinth. A history of the city to 338 B.C., Oxford. SCHUBERT, Chr. (1998), Studien zum Nerobild in der lateinischen Dichtung der Antike, Stuttgart / Leipzig. SEPPILLI, A. (1977), Sacralità dell’acqua e sacrilegio dei ponti, Palermo. SHACKLETON BAILEY, D. R. (2015), Statius. Silvae. Corrected Edition, Cambridge MA / London. SMOLENAARS, J. J. L. (2006), Ideology and poetics along the Via Domitiana: Statius Silv. 4.3, in: R. R. NAUTA / H.-J. VAN DAM / J. J. L. SMOLENAARS (eds.), Flavian Poetry, Leiden, 223–44. SPALTENSTEIN, F. (1990), Commentaire des Punica de Silius Italicus (livres 9 à 17), Genève. TARRANT, R. J. (1985), Seneca’s Thyestes, Oxford. TAYLOR, C. F. (1987), Belli Spes Inproba: The Theme of Walls in Lucan, Pharsalia VI, in: TAPhA 108, 243–57. TRAINA, G. (1987), L’impossibile taglio dell'Istmo (Ps. Lucian. Nero 1-5), in: RFIC 115, 40-9. TRAINA, G. (1994), La tecnica in Grecia e a Roma, Roma / Bari. TRAINA, G. (2018), La «découverte» de l’Araxe, in: A. DAN / S. LEBRETON (eds.), Études des fleuves d’Asie Mineure dans l’Antiquité. Tome II, Arras, 235–44. ULF, Chr. (2018), Vom Anfang des Kosmos bis zum Menschen. Antike Konzeptionen von Wasserräumen und Wasserformen, in: D. G. EIBL / L. ORTNER / I. SCHNEIDER / CHR. ULF (eds.), Wasser und Raum. Beiträge zu einer Kulturtheorie des Wassers, Göttingen, 143–81. VIDEAU-DELIBES, A. (1991), Les Tristes d’Ovide et l’élégie romaine. Une poétique de la rupture, Paris. VON ALBRECHT, M. (1964), Silius Italicus. Freiheit und Gebundenheit römischer Epik, Amsterdam. WERNER, W. (1997), The largest ship trackway in ancient times: the Diolkos of the Isthmus of Corinth, and early attempts to build a canal, in: IJNA 26, 98–119. WHITMARSH, T. (1999), Greek and Roman in Dialogue: The Pseudo-Lucianic Nero, in: JHS 119, 142–60. WISEMAN, J. (1978), The Land of the Ancient Corinthians, Göteborg. WUILLEUMIER, P. / LE BONNIEC, H. (1962), M. Annaeus Lucanus. Bellum Ciuile. Liber Primus, Paris. ZISSOS, A. (2008), Valerius Flaccus’ Argonautica Book 1. A Commentary, Oxford.
TRAPEZUS IN KOLCHIS II MYTHO-GEOGRAPHY ON THE TABULA PEUTINGERIANA Altay Coşkun* Abstract: The Greek colony Trapezus is located in Pontic Asia Minor in the southeastern angle of the Black Sea littoral, whereas the Tabula Peutingeriana locates it on the north-eastern coast. Instead of trying to trace this error back to the naval campaign of Marcus Agrippa (14 BCE) and the world map in the Porticus Vipsania, it should rather be explained by the tradition that situates Trapezus in or adjacent to Kolchis. Since around 500 BCE, this hard-to-access country was identified with the legendary kingdom of Aia, reached by the Argonauts on their quest for the Golden Fleece. While the Greek mainstream tradition soon chose a location on the Phasis, many cities competed with their claims of occupying the site of Aia. Around 400 BCE, Xenophon encountered a virtual Kolchis that had been extended into the area of the Pontic mountains, to include Trapezus and Kerasus on its margins. At a later stage, the name of the Sannoi, the mountain-dwellers neighbouring Dioskurias-Aia, migrated from northern Kolchis to the neighbourhood of Trapezus and superseded the name of the local Drilai, at least virtually in the Greek literary tradition. The implication seems to be the same as the fact that the Tabula Peutingeriana locates Trapezus in the north-eastern ‘recess’ of the Black Sea at the foothills of the Greater Caucasus: Trapezus had appropriated Dioskurias’ claim to continuing Aia and even replaced Dioskurias-Aia in a cartographical tradition that is pictured on the Tabula Peutingeriana. Keywords: Tabula Peutingeriana, Trapezus, Dioskurias, Heniochoi, Sannoi/Sannigai. 1. Introduction Historical research on the eastern Black Sea region faces a set of peculiar difficulties. If compared with the northern, western, and southern littorals, the coast of Kolchis played only a marginal role in the long-distance trade networks of the ancient Greeks and Romans, a fact which resulted in poorer documentation in the surviving literary accounts as well as in the epigraphic and numismatic evidence. The strong *
I would like to thank Ben Scolnic for encouraging feedback on an earlier draft as well as Kai Brodersen and Michael Rathmann for bibliographical support. A shorter version was presented at the Lampeter and West Wales Classical Association (24 March 2023).
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sedimentation of the Caucasian rivers and their estuaries resulted in relatively short life spans of harbour places and quickly changing river courses, conditions which might even require the relocation of settlement places (Fig. 1).1 In recent publications, I have tried to show how such challenges for the ancients have translated into significant problems for modern researchers: locating ancient poleis attested in the eastern bend of the Euxine anywhere between Pitzunda by the Bzipi river and Gonio by the Tchorokhi / Çoruh river is (even) more difficult than hitherto admitted, as is the identification of archaeological sites by ancient names anywhere between Pityous (II) by the Korax river and Apsaros by the mouth of the Akampsis-Apsaros (Fig. 2). In these studies, I emphasize one additional factor that enhanced the confusion in the ancient literary and cartographical tradition: the conception of Kolchis as the exotic landscape explored, settled, or at least toponymically appropriated by Greek traders and colonists.2 This in itself is nothing new. Uncertainty regarding the myths of Phrixos, Aietes, and the Argonauts is likewise admitted, including the exact location of Aia, the kingdom of Aietes. He became the father-in-law of Phrixos, after this one had escaped his hometown Iolkos on the back of the Golden-Fleeced Ram; a generation later, he would be the difficult host of the Argonauts, who eventually took the Golden Fleece and his daughter Medeia from him.3 It is near common opinion that the Greeks accepted one settlement in Kolchis as the city of Aia from early on, whether beginning with the first Milesian colonial activities in the area in the mid-6th century or around the time when the Greeks began their first naval explorations perhaps by 700 BCE, if not as early as the Mycenaean period. Most scholars now opt for Kytaia on the middle Phasis (modern Kutaisi on the Rioni).4 But such an early chronology depends on the questionable assumption that the Phasis was always genuine to the landscape of Aia, although this connection is only attested since the 5th century BCE, whereas our oldest witness, the 7th-century poet Mimnermos, regarded Aia as an island in the Ocean.5 Another problematic assumption is that our potentially oldest witness 1 2
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Cf. SENS 2009; DAN 2016; TSETSKHLADZE 1998. For surveys on most recent archaeological research, see TSETSKHLADZE 2018 and 2022. See also the subsequent notes. COŞKUN 2019a; 2020a; 2020b; 2021c; 2022a; in preparation a and c. More generally on the interrelation of myth, colonial politics, ethnic constructs, geography, and/or toponomy, see EHRHARDT 1988; 1999; DOUGHERTY 1993; BRAUND 1998; 2005a; 2010; 2019; 2021; DE SIENA 2001; DAN 2009; SWEENEY 2013; HAWES 2017; DANA 2019; MÜLLER 2022. On the myths of Phrixos, Jason, and Medeia, see KEYßNER 1941; GANTZ 1993; BRUNEAU 1994; DRÄGER 2001; LOVATT 2021; COŞKUN 2021c; NIKOLAIDOU-ARAMPATZI 2022. Most scholars believe that Aia was identified with a city on the Phasis-Rioni in Kolchis since the earlier Archaic period (hence prior to the Milesian settlement on the eastern Euxine coast after 600 BCE) and that this was Kytaia: LORDKIPANIDZE 1996, 55; BRAUND 1994, 15f. and 1998, 289; TSETSKHLADZE 1998, 171f.; IVANTCHIK 2005, 82–5 (the tradition of Aia in the Ocean and in the Kaukasian region / in Kolchis was developed from the 8th to the 5th centuries); DAN 2016, 248; SCHMITT 2022. (For a confusion of Kyta on the Bosporus with Kytaia, see MOLEV / MOLEVA 2010, 295.) But Kytaia is for the first time attested by Apollonios Rhodios in the early-Hellenistic period, just as Kytissoros, the son of Phrixos (Arg. 2.1155). Some scholars have argued that the name Phasis is genuine to the Caucasian languages. LORDKIPANIDZE 2000, 10f. relates it to the Georgian root psa- for ‘water’. This is followed by
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Eumelos lived in the 8th century BCE, whereas the 4th century BCE is much more likely.6 In contrast to much previous Black Sea scholarship, my work tries to show that the highly-variegated literary evidence is not solely the result of confusion, but also of an evolving ‘Argonautic’ or ‘Phrixean’ land- and riverscape. The Greek reconceptualization of the eastern Black Sea region was not a uniform and linear development that yielded a commonly accepted toponomy. The process was complicated by the dynamics of settling and resettling as well as by the rivalry of different Greek and indigenous groups who were laying claim to occupying the ground of Aia. Such presumptions also affected the Kolchian riverscape. Confusions were not limited to the Phasis, but they also affected many other rivers that were (at some point) called Lykos, Glaukos, Hippos, Kyaneos, and Korax (Fig. 3).7 The present paper will explore a seemingly disconnected problem: the location – or mislocation – of Trapezus on the Tabula Peutingeriana. After describing this oddity on the Tabula in some detail, I shall try to show that the appearance of randomness diminishes, once we acknowledge the mytho-geographical traditions looming in the background. An essential part of the argument will be the
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COŞKUN 2019a, 82, though without accepting the assumption that many rivers in the area genuinely had this name (except for confused or creative Greek literary traditions). However, a much broader tradition is claimed by DAN 2016, and also accepted by LEBEDEV 2021, 730, 733; the latter further draws on Bronze-Age archaeology around Apsaros / Gonio to claim an early-Kolchian kingdom extending far into Pontos (contra below, ns. 39f.). SCHMITT 2022, 21, in turn, insists on a Greek etymology of Phasis, with WEST 2007, 194f., who suggests an original *Bhātis ‘Radiant’ (fitting for a river in the land of the Sun / Aia), speaking of an old nomen agentis (rather than a feminine nomen actionis) and acknowledging the survival of the long α instead of η. To me, this would rather seem to be an excellent reinterpretation of an originally non-Greek name. The name Phasis is nowhere attested in a genuinely Greek topographical context, unless one draws on Hesiod’s river catalogue for this (Hes. Theog. 340), but this mentions it just after the Hister / Danube. Be this as it may, SCHMITT 2021 and WEST 2007, 195 (‘we may assume that he knew it in connection with the Argo story, as it had no existence in any other context’) still converge with the traditional view that Aia and Phasis were connected beginning with the earliest literary tradition. But this is circular and rather questionable in light of its omission in Hes. Theog. 992–1002 and Strabo 1.2.40 (46–47C) = Mimnermos F 11 + 11a. ENDSJØ 1997 claims that Kolchis became part of the Aia tradition only in the 5th century, while the Phasis had been part of it long before, albeit as an imagined Mediterranean river connecting with the Ocean; his misassumption is based on a scholion on Apollon. Arg. 4.289– 291, which purports that Hesiod named the Phasis as part of Jason’s way. Most likely, however, Phasis – as Kolchis – entered the mythographic tradition around 500 BCE, see COŞKUN 2019a, 82; in preparation a. For a terminus a quo of the mid-6th century BCE, see M. WEST 2002, 109f. and S. WEST 2003, 161, pace BRAUND 2005c. Even more convincincly, TAUSEND 2012 argues for the 4th century BCE; COŞKUN forthcoming c will expand the argument. The broader conclusions for the history of Greek colonization and mytho-geography of the Black Sea region have not yet been drawn; they will also have to consider the important works by WILL 1955 and DEBIASI 2020. Note in particular that Strabo’s (1.2.10) insistance on Homer knowing Aia’s location in Kolchis (thus recently endorsed by PODOSSINOV 2022, 751f.) should rather be read in light of Strabo’s admiration of the poet as a geographer (ROLLER 2018, 9f.; 38f.). See especially COŞKUN 2019a; 2020a. Further references in n. 66 below.
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documentation of three rivalling literary traditions on the location of Trapezus in respect to Kolchis. The argument will then be expanded to address various elements of the Argonautic landscape, which Kolchis had become and which the branch of the tradition represented by the Tabula transferred to Trapezus. 2. The Mislocation of Trapezus on the Tabula Peutingeriana The Greek colony Trapezus, the predecessor of the modern town Trabzon, was located in Pontic Asia Minor in the south-eastern angle of the Black Sea littoral, but Segment X of the Tabula Peutingeriana misplaces it on the north-eastern coast. On this map, we find the city close to what appears to be the Greater Caucasus rather than the Pontic mountain range consisting of the Paryadres and Skydises (Fig. 6). The southern road that connected Trapezus with Satala (the modern village of Sadak) in Armenia Minor appears directed straight to the east. Nearly the same is the case for the route leaving Trapezus via Apsaros (now Gonio) towards Sebastopolis.8 The latter is attested as the Roman successor to the prominent Milesian colony of Dioskurias, traditionally identified with Sukhumi in Abchasia, but earlier settlements with these names were likely situated further to the southeast on the Euxine coast.9 However, this second road is depicted as leaving Trapezus in a north-easteast direction, misplacing Sebastopolis on the northern Ocean (Fig. 6). On all other sides, Trapezus appears isolated: the Black Sea borders its south; one of those
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Parallel to the land route on the Tabula ran the sea route described by Arrian (PPE 1–11). Both itineraries are analysed by COŞKUN 2020b (Phasis to Sebastopolis) and 2022a (Apsaros to Phasis); cf. BELFIORE 2009, 150–85. But see also WHEELER 2022, 794, who rejects the idea that a land route from Apsaros to Sebastopolis existed. On the earlier locations of Dioskurias-Aia (especially at Ochamchire) and Sebastopolis-Dioskurias (especially at Skurcha), see COŞKUN 2020a and 2020b. SCHMITT 2022, however, tries to reinforce the traditional view of a single location of Dioskurias-Sebastopolis at Sukhumi: he argues convincingly that Sukhumi claimed to be the successor of Sebastopolis sometime in the Middle Ages, but he does not sufficiently engage with the mytho-geographical indications, insisting on the Phasis as the only possible location for a potential city of Aia (cf. notes 4f. above); he does not accept either the relocation of a settlement as a viable solution; and the title of the bishop of Sukhumi, episcopus Sanastupolitanus inferioris Georgiae, is better explained with a titular reconnection with the erstwhile ecclesiastical centre in northern Kolchis; see COŞKUN in preparation c with documentation and historical context. The most complete survey of the archaeological evidence for coastal settlements in Kolchis is by SENS 2009; cf. the latest updates by TSETSKHLADZE 2018 and 2022: despite the progress, the material and epigraphic remains remain inconclusive. Not yet engaging with the present debate, TP Online s.v. ‘Sebastoplis’ acknowledges Sebastopolis as former Aia, though without change of location. Cf. WHEELER 2022 for an in-depth discussion of Roman sites in Kolchis, esp. 802f., where he concedes that Ptolemy Geogr. 5.6.7 regarded Dioskurias and Sebastopolis as distinct (different co-ordinates and the questionable manuscript tradition for the equation of the two); and 804–6, where WHEELER suggests that it was Pythodoris who renamed Dioskurias as Sebastopolis, also proposing that the fortresses at Apsaros and Sebastopolis were originally Polemonid.
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unnamed rivers flows to its west and, after bending eastwards, also encircles it from the north.10 The scholarly community paid little attention to this inaccuracy, which appeared as just one among so many on the most famous map that has come down to us from antiquity. A major source of such flaws would have been the severe reduction of the north-south extension due to the Tabula’s shape as a book scroll; the only-extant medieval copy measures 33 cm in width and 672 cm in length.11 The art of producing scaled maps was confined to very few experts in antiquity, and it remains controversial how much detail and accuracy one might expect from a scaled world map based, say, on the co-ordinates of Claudius Ptolemy in the 2nd century CE. No meaningful example from the ancient world has come down to us; the map ascribed to Ptolemy is now recognized as medieval, even if based on the ancient scholar’s information. Besides, the now-lost physical map that Ptolemy presumably produced was spherical and cannot but have contained much less topographical information than the Tabula. The latter, however, stood in the broader (though still somewhat elitist and never really popular) tradition of partly visualized compilations of itineraries or, following the terminology of Michael Rathmann, ‘chorographical maps’.12 It is further noteworthy that Asia Minor has suffered in particular from spatial constraints, given that the densely populated Aegean coast is represented not in a north-south but west-east extension. This resulted, among other things, in a significant reduction of the Kilikian coast on the one hand and in the placement of many Anatolian towns further east beyond the eastern confines of the Black Sea and the Mediterranean Sea respectively.13 10 The detailed commentaries in TP Online s.vv. ‘River no. 109’ and ‘River no. 110’ admit to the difficulty of identifying unnamed rivers on the Tabula, but still suggest identifying the upper (northern) river with the Phasis (while also considering the Apsaros) and the lower (southern) river with either the Ophis or Hyssos, as mentioned by Arrian PPE 7.1 (see below with n. 33) as the eastern boundaries of the Trapezusia. 11 MILLER 1916, 332f. was the first to relate the mislocation of Trapezus to the general flaws of the Tabula. Useful more recent descriptions are by SALWAY 2004; TALBERT 2010; RATHMANN 2016; 2020; 2022; PODOSSINOV 2019. The best edition of the only extant manuscript is now TP Online (with prolific commentary); cf. MILLER 1887 (first modern edition); RATHMANN 2022 (printed edition with introduction, annotations, and index); various facsimilia can be accessed under https://www.tabula-peutingeriana.de. In addition to the practical implication of a papyrus scroll, which limits the vertical extension in comparison to the horizontal dimension, PRONTERA 2009 observes the cartographer’s particular interest in west-east road connections; cf. KÜLZER 2020, 136–9. 12 BRODERSEN 2003 (cf. 1995/2003; 2004; 2011) may go too far when he denies the existence of ancient scaled maps altogether, although he would have a point if Ptolemy’s coordinates should have been derived from itineraries. For the discussion of their origin and Ptolemy’s methods and results, see also STÜCKELBERGER / GRAßHOFF 2006 (which is the standard edition with introduction, commentary, and maps); KLEINEBERG et al. 2010/11; MARX 2013; RINNEBERG 2013. For the geographical and cartographical traditions of the ancients, see RATHMANN 2020, 198–207, 215, 238–42; cf. 2016; 2022, 11–21; for more context, see GEUS / THIERING 2012. 13 PRONTERA 2009, 37 does not want to exclude a particular cartographic tradition to account for the distortion of Asia Minor. RATHMANN 2020, 228, however, rejects the idea that this flaw goes back to the Hellenistic ‘archetype’ of the Tabula, but it is somewhat inconsistent to credit
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But are such constraints sufficient to explain all the flawed locations on the Tabula in general and that of Trapezus in particular? Alexander Podossinov argues that the specific error can be traced to the naval campaign of Marcus Agrippa in 14 BCE. He wrote geographical notes on which the world map in the Porticus Vipsania in Rome was based. His friend and father-in-law Augustus commissioned it shortly after his death.14 Others have likewise suggested that the prestigious imperial map could have been the root of the Tabula Peutingeriana. Although it was last edited substantially in Late Antiquity, it must have originated before the outbreak of the Vesuvius destroyed Pompei in 79 CE.15 the copyist with an overly ‘effective’ compression on the one hand and denying him talent on the other. Still, he blames the mislocation of Trapezus with those distortions; cf. TP Online s.v. ‘Trapezunte’. As a partial solution to the problem, I suggest we consider that inland Anatolia and the southern coast from Pamphylia to the Amanos Mountain had been much less populated; many more settlements followed in the early-Hellenistic period and once more in the High Roman Empire. If RATHMANN (see n. 12 above and n. 15 below) is correct to assume an earlyHellenistic ‘archetype’ (I would rather speak of a ‘base map’, i.e. an outline of the land masses) whose content was sporadically updated until Late Antiquity, then this would explain a gradual increase of the distortions, without necessarily accounting for every single mislocation. 14 PODOSSINOV 2003 passim (building on WEBER 1976; cf. WEBER 2012, 212, 215) and 2012, 205f., with Cass. Dio 54.24.4–6; cf. PODOSSINOV 2019, 226–8; 2020, 169, 184–7. PODOSSINOV 2021 adds that some of the ethnics around the northern Black Sea reflect geographical knowledge of the 1st century CE (although none of the examples would be incompatible with the 1st century BCE). For other references, though without emphasis on the political role of Agrippa, see next note. On Agrippa’s campaign, see also Josephus AJ 16.2.1f. (12–23); Orosius 6.21.28; HEINEN 2011; most recently COŞKUN / STERN 2021, 204–7 and 2023 (rejecting the assumption that Agrippa influenced the Tabula, as below, with next note). 15 After MILLER 1887 proposed a certain Castorius (cf. GAUTIER-DALCHÉ 2003, 45) as the author of the map in the 4th century, Levi 1967, 171–5 explained the Tabula as one of the ‘official’ maps used for the cursus publicus, reflecting layers from the 3rd to the early-5th centuries. DILKE 1985, 113f. vaguely dated the map’s last revision to the 4th century, while admitting earlier stages going back to the 1st century CE; cf. BRODERSEN 2003 (also adducing the 1st-centuryCE Artemidoros papyrus ‘Routendiagramm’; FELLMETH 2006. Likewise, TALBERT 2010, 133– 8 (also 142–57), although he suggests ca. 300 CE for the main design, followed by BRODERSEN 2011, 87; ROLLER 2015, 203. SALWAY 2004 entertained similar thoughts, yet concluded with a terminus post quem of Constantine I and settled, as before him Franz Christoph von Scheyb (1753) and WEBER 1989, on Theodosius II for the last ancient edition, with reference to a poem celebrating a mapping project under Theodosius II, as composed by a certain Aemilius Probus (quoted by Dicuil, Liber de mensura orbis terrae 5.4 = Anthologia Latina 724 = ed. RIESE 1878, pp. 19f.). ROLLER 2015, 166f. and 244f. (with bibliography) and IRBY 2019, 105 consider the Augustan map an ‘inspiration’ for the Tabula. TALBERT 2010, 136f., in contrast, is more skeptical of an Augustan origin, and DILKE 1985 (esp. 114, 170) does not even consider Agrippa among the sources of the Tabula. Most outspoken for a Hellenistic ‘archetype’ is RATHMANN 2020, 198–207, 215, 238–42; cf. 2016; 2022, 11–21: his argument that the main design of the land masses dates to the early-Hellenistic period is convincing; an analysis of the representation of the Middle- and Farther East as well as the traces of the early Alexander Romance, as documented by PODOSSINOV 2020 (esp. 171, 188) and STONEMAN 2020, lend further support to this view. Later additions, corrections, and adaptations were largely confined to the filling of those shapes. One exception that RATHMANN acknowledges is the Bay of Naples, although there are certainly a few more, such as the disproportionately large Thracian
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Be this as it may, Agrippa should have been much more familiar with the geography of the Black Sea. Pliny credits him with substantial knowledge of the Euxine coastlines.16 Most of his expertise was probably derived from the ambitious world-mapping project initiated by Julius Caesar and concluded around 20 BCE.17 Agrippa’s cooperation with king Polemon of Pontos and his presence in Sinope, a major player in the Black Sea for centuries, might have gained him further insights. None of this is compatible with the shockingly poor coverage of the Black Sea on the Tabula: not even the two capital cities Pantikapaion and Phanagoreia are properly included: the latter’s name has been deformed to Phamacorium, the former’s – unless this is any other random toponym – to Cabacos, though neither is located on the straights, since the Maiotis appears as an inland lake with no access to the sea (Fig. 4). The overall negligence with which the Black Sea littoral is represented on the Tabula seems to predate Agrippa’s role as Augustus’ deputy and may tentatively be ascribed to an earlier stage of Julius Caesar’s geographical or cartographical interests. But the roots of the misplacement of Trapezus reach much farther.18 Bosporus, which came into focus only with the foundation of Constantinople in 325/330 CE. Although RATHMANN 2020, 230–32 rightly excludes the epigram quoted by Dicuil from the discussion, he maintains the early-5th century as the likely date for the last ancient revision or edition of the Tabula; cf. TP Online; RATHMANN 2022, 8–10. I have argued independently (COŞKUN 2023) for Caesar compiling a first draft of a Tabula-style world map from heterogeneous Hellenistic materials, while suggesting the end of ancient editing in the 4th century CE. I would not even exclude a year prior to Constantine I’s death in 337 or soon thereafter – but this is for a different paper. Decisive criteria will be the mention, location, or omission of Germanic peoples on the map (e.g., the Vanduli north of the Danube or the absence of the Goths; cf. LICCARDO 2020, though with different perspectives), the choice of first-class imperial cities (Rome, Constantinople, and Antioch), and the effective or seeming Christian edits near Rome, Antioch, Jerusalem, and the Negev (for now, cf. WEBER 2006; RATHMANN 2020, 244f., n. 159; 2022, 10, 25, 94; also TP Online ad locos). Other modifications are generally acknowledged as much later, potentially Carolingian or around 1200 and 1500 respectively; see RATHMANN 2020, 243–6. It is widely acknowledged that the Middle Ages only left a stylistic imprint on the map and a few localized touch-ups (especially in the German area); pace GAUTIER-DALCHÉ 2003, however, they do not support the idea of a first translation of an originally Greek map into Latin around 800. 16 Pliny NH 4.77, 78, 81, 83, 91; 6.3. 17 GLM ed. RIESE 1878, pp. 21–23: Iulio Caesare et Marco Antoni[n]o consulibus omnis orbis peragratus est per sapientissimos et electos viros quattuor: Nicodemo orientis, Didymo occidentalis, Theudoto septemtrionalis, Polyclito meridiani. A consulibus supra scriptis usque in consulatum Augusti IIII et Crassi annis XXI mensibus quinque diebus novem oriens dimensa est. Et a consulibus supra scriptis usque in consulatum Augusti VII et Agrippae III annis XXVI mensibus III diebus XVII occidui pars dimensa est. A consulibus supra scriptis usque in consulatum Augusti X annis XXVIII mensibus VIII septemtrionalis pars dimensa est. A consulibus supra scriptis usque in consulatum Saturnini et Cinnae annis XXXII mense I diebus XX meridiana pars dimensa est. See COŞKUN 2023; also, though in different contexts, DILKE 1985, 40; IRBY 2019, 104f. 18 On Sinope’s historical role in the Black Sea region, see EHRHARDT 1988; 1999; TSETSKHLADZE 1993; BARAT 2006; BURCU ERCIYAS 2007; DAN 2009; HIND 2012; COŞKUN 2021d; MANOLEDAKIS 2022. More on Sinope also below. On the Bosporus, see TP Online s.vv. ‘Cabacos’ and ‘Phamacorium’; also COŞKUN 2023, all with further references. COŞKUN 2023 also argues for
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3. Trapezus by Kolchis in Strabo’s Geography The location of Trapezus on the Tabula Peutingeriana has a lot in common with the Strabo’s account. Not that the geographer from Pontic Amaseia is as confused as the author of the map. His description of the northern-Euxine cities (11.2.14–19) culminates in his appraisal of Dioskurias, the former international trade hub of the Caucasus. It may well be that Strabo’s source for this was a few hundred years old, since he shows no awareness of the long decline the city had undergone, let alone of its refoundation as Sebastopolis, which must have happened in his lifetime.19 In contrast, he who designed the first version of the Tabula did not even know about Dioskurias on the Black Sea, and the addition of Sebastopolis far off to the northeast must stem from a later revision based on the knowledge of written itineraries, but not of the geographical context.20 Strabo’s north-Pontic account ends with the less significant settlement of Phasis at the mouth of the homonymous river.21 However, what is most striking is that he offers a detailed description of Anatolia’s northern coastline, with Trapezus as its end point (12.3.13, 17, 18, 28, 29). In addition, Strabo conveys many insights into the Pontic-Armenian hinterland, sometimes contextualized with military exploits of Mithradates VI, under whom the geographer’s ancestors had served, sometimes by linking the information with his queen Pythodoris, whom he admired (12.3.18–42). In the face of his solid knowledge of these areas, it is astounding that he has nothing specific to say about what lay east of Trapezus or south of Phasis. This is a remarkable ‘blindspot’.22 On
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an earlier product of Caesar’s cartographical endeavours as the origin of the Tabula Peutingeriana. Pace PODOSSINOV 2021, who discusses several of the toponyms and ethnics from the northern Black Sea coast, arguing that some point to the 1st century CE. I do not understand how he is trying to derive a further argument from different spellings of Bosporni / Bosphorani for the influence of Agrippa on the cartographical tradition. COŞKUN 2020a, 355–7 (with GEUS / GUCKELSBERGER 2017, 168) on Strabo’s source and 2022a, 255–7 on Sebastopolis; for further references on Dioskurias-Sebastopolis, see n. 9 above. On Strabo of Amaseia, his Pontic roots, and the controversial discussion on the sources of his Pontic account, see BRAUND 2005b; KUIN 2017; COŞKUN 2018. For the broader discussion of Strabo as a Pontic aristocrat, historian, and geographer, see SYME 1995; ENGELS 1999; NICOLAI / TRAINA 2000; DUECK 2000 and 2017; BIFFI 2010; ROLLER 2014, 1–34. My recent studies on the political and physical geography of north-eastern Anatolia show repeatedly not only Strabo’s precise and detailed knowledge, but also, at the same time, astounding lacunae and heavily outdated elements in his information: COŞKUN 2019b on Pontic Athens and 2021a on the Pontic possessions of Deiotaros; 2021c and 2022a on Kolchis; also 2021b on Pompey’s Pontus-Bithynia and 2022b, 35–50 on adjacent Galatia. The alternative would be to fall back on Miller’s and Rathmann’s technical explanation, to which I have even added plausibility in n. 13 above – yet not for the case of Dioskurias or Sebastopolis: these were just too important harbour cities in Hellenistic or Roman times to be disconnected from the Black Sea in a deliberate act. On the settlement of Phasis, see LORDKIPANIDZE 2000; SENS 2009; LICHELI 2016; COŞKUN 2020b, 656–60; TSETSKHLADZE 2022, 918–20. Admittedly, Strabo does not feel obliged to mention every insignificant detail he knew of, as he clearly states in 1.1.23 (13f.C); cf. 6.3.10 (285C). But at least the Apsaros river and the
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one occasion, Strabo even details its extent. He specifies the distance between Trapezus and Phasis as 1,400 stades for a sailor (12.3.17), with no particulars on the intermediate coastline. Other sailing routes he mentions include Sinope or Amisos on the Anatolian side and Dioskurias in Kolchis, but never Pontic Athens, Apsaros, (the ancient equivalents for) Tsikhisdziri and Pichvnari, or Petra, which had been important settlements or fortresses at some point(s) between the Archaic and early-Byzantine periods. All the latter places were located more narrowly in the south-eastern corner of the Black Sea. We do not even know whether they were still settled or amounted to more than hamlets in the lifetime of the geographer.23 Most outstanding among those omissions is the river system of the Akampsis (Tchorokhi / Çoruh) and Apsaros (Acharitsqali), whose combined waters pour into the sea by Apsaros (Gonio). Strabo is not the only one who lacks awareness of these rivers. More than half a millennium later, Prokopios wrote the first books of his Gothic Wars without knowing about them. This led to significant geostrategic distortions of his historiographic account. In this, he conveys the impression that the Moschian mountains rise nearly immediately on the southern bank of the Phasis river, with no room left for the south-Kolchian plain. It was only in his later books that Prokopios seized the opportunity to gently correct the picture. Other authors conflated the upper reaches of the Phasis or its tributary, the Barimela, with parts of the Akampsis or Apsaros. Such errors result from a similar uncertainty about the south-eastern corner of the Black Sea.24 Doubts about the boundary between Pontos and Kolchis belong to the same context. It is perhaps naïve to surmise that the territorial borders remained stable over the centuries. Milesian, Achaimenid, Athenian, Sinopean, Seleukid, Mithradatic, and Roman influence must have impacted geopolitics and toponomastics frequently. And yet, the lower course of the Akampsis-Apsaros would be plausible as a long-term dividing line. This, at least, is the explicit choice of Pseudo-Skylax in his description of the Euxine coastline, thus of an author from the 4th century BCE, who drew on information in part going back to the 6th.25 About a millennium later, fortified settlement at its mouth should have been mentioned (see the references in the previous note). See below for the broader tradition in which this ‘blindspot’ stood. 23 For latest descriptions or discussions of the evidence for those places, see TSETSKHLADZE 2018; 2022; COŞKUN 2019b; 2021a; 2021c; 2022a; MAMULADZE / KAKHIDZE 2022; MANOLEDAKIS 2022. 24 COŞKUN 2019a, 98–100; also COŞKUN 2022a, 246–8, 250–5, with Prokop. BG 2.15.2.9–13; 2.17.1.1–2.17.2.13; 2.29.1.1; 2.29.3.18–25; etc. There is a widespread belief (BRAUND 1994, 158 with references) that some ancient authors (App. Mithr. 101.465; Plin. NH 6.4.12f., on which see below) confused the Apsaros and the Akampsis rivers, but these are unnecessary assumptions. 25 Ps.-Skylax, Asia 81 names the Apsaros as end point of the Kolchians and no longer mentions them among the neighbouring tribes of Trapezus (Asia 82–85: Ekecheireis, Beicheroi, Makrokephaloi – were these the same as the Makrones mentioned by Xenophon, as below?). The map of BRAUND / SINCLAIR 1997/2000 (BA 87R) distinguishes between the fortress Apsaros (near Gonio) south on the mouth of the Akampsis and the river Apsaros, but, in the BA Directory, the same authors identify the river with the ‘Tchorokhi estuary’ (p. 1229). However, with BRAUND 1994, 88; 184, this should be the Acharistsqali river, which merges into the Akampsis
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the aforementioned historiographer Prokopios still shared this view, at least once he had corrected his misassumption that the Lazoi (as the Kolchians were then called) lived only north of the Phasis; what he meant to say is that they lived north of the Apsaros.26 The account of Pliny the Elder is compatible with this division, despite his limited understanding of the information compiled from heterogeneous sources.27 But we can add Strabo himself to this group, regardless of his lacunose knowledge. In his account of Pontos, he lists the Tibarenoi, Chaldaioi, Sannoi and Appaitai in the hinterland of Pharnakeia and Trapezus, before going on as follows: ‘two mountains cross the country of these people, not only the Skydises, a very rugged mountain, which joins the Moschian Mountains above Kolchis (its heights are occupied by the Heptakometai), but also the Paryadres, which extends from the region of Sidene and Themiskyra to Lesser Armenia and forms the eastern side of Pontos.’28
Accordingly, the easternmost extension of the Pontic Mountains (Skydises) was adjacent to the Lesser Caucasus (Moschian Mountains), which forms the southern boundary of Kolchis in Strabo’s description. Since, in addition, Strabo regards both Pontos and Kolchis as contiguous with Armenia,29 it appears that the lower course of the Akampsis formed the most natural divide between Kolchis and Pontos, whereby the land enclosed by the Akampsis and Apsaros formed the northern tip of Armenia.30 One layer in the account of Arrian seems to be pointing into the same direction, especially when he states that ‘Pontos’ was extending up to Apsaros where the coast takes a turn up north. However, there is no certain implication for a political
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some 20 km inland (see pp. 181–7 for a description of the archaeological site of the Roman fortress and its geostrategic context, now to be complemented by MAMULADZE / KAKHIDZE 2022). Prokop. BG 8.2.1.3 ends the territory of Trapezus with the village Susurmena near the Rhizaios River at a distance of a two-days march. Mentioning repeatedly the direction to the Lazoi, he specifies at the end of the same section (8.2.1.8) that they lived north of the Akampsis. For his earlier mistakes, see n. 24 above. Pliny NH 6.4.12 (quoted and translated below, with n. 44) believed that the Akampsis and the Apsaros were two rivers merging into the Black Sea independently; he groups the Akampsis with the Kolchian rivers, though beyond the fortress of Apsaros (for a travellor coming from Trapezus). BRAUND 1994, 185 suggests including the fortress into the Kolchian territory, but this is not what Pliny suggests. See COŞKUN 2022a, 245–8, where many further modern cartographical attempts are discussed. Strabo 12.3.18 (548C): τῆς δὲ Τραπεζοῦντος ὑπέρκεινται καὶ τῆς Φαρνακίας Τιβαρανοί τε καὶ Χαλδαῖοι καὶ Σάννοι, οὓς πρότερον ἐκάλουν Μάκρωνας, καὶ ἡ μικρὰ Ἀρμενία: καὶ οἱ Ἀππαῗται δέ πως πλησιάζουσι τοῖς χωρίοις τούτοις οἱ πρότερον Κερκῖται (summarized above). διήκει δὲ διὰ τούτων ὅ τε Σκυδίσης ὄρος τραχύτατον συνάπτον τοῖς Μοσχικοῖς ὄρεσι τοῖς ὑπὲρ τῆς Κολχίδος, οὗ τὰ ἄκρα κατέχουσιν οἱ Ἑπτακωμῆται, καὶ ὁ Παρυάδρης ὁ μέχρι τῆς μικρᾶς Ἀρμενίας ἀπὸ τῶν κατὰ Σιδήνην καὶ Θεμίσκυραν τόπων διατείνων καὶ ποιῶν τὸ ἑωθινὸν τοῦ Πόντου πλευρόν (quoted above in a transl. adapted from the Loeb ed. by JONES 1924). Strabo 12.3.1 (540f.C); cf. 12.3.13 (547C), where he mentions Trapezusia, Kolchis and Lesser Armenia. This is at least compatible with the BA map 87R by BRAUND / SINCLAIR 1997/2000, which, however, puts the names much farther to the west or east respectively.
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territory, since Arrian may just be referring to the Euxine coastline.31 Yet a nearcontemporary Roman military inscription seems to be counting the fortress of Apsaros into the province of Pontus (Polemoniacus).32 However, Arrian elsewhere claims the Ophis river (270 stades east of Trapezus) as the boundary between the Thiannike and the Kolchians. Moreover, he even mentions Kolchians in the territory west of the Ophis, as far as the Hyssos river, which he presents as the eastern boundary of the Trapezusia (180 stades away from the city).33 The latter territorial division would make the Trapezuntines neighbours of both the Kolchians and the inhabitants of the Thiannike. One might be inclined to think that Arrian was confused, were it not that Strabo himself repeatedly states the same thing.34 Most explicit (though somewhat obscure) is the formulation in his description of the north-eastern coast of the Black Sea, which I here translate according to the mainstream: After Dioskurias comes the remaining coast of Kolchis and the adjacent coast of Trapezus, which makes a considerable bend, and then, extending approximately in a straight line, forms the right-hand side of the Pontos, which faces the north.35
31 The report begins with Trapezus and its environs until Athenai (Arr. PPE 1–5) before turning to the fortress and mythical traditions of Apsaros / Apsyrtos (6). The next chapter measures the distances from one estuary to another between Trapezus and Apsaros or from the Hyssos to the Akampsis respectively (7.1–4), before continuing the list of rivers until reaching Phasis (7.5– 8.1). Arrian later says (11.4): Μέχρι μὲν δὴ Ἀψάρου ὡς πρὸς ἕω ἐπλέομεν ἐν δεξιᾷ τοῦ Εὐξείνου, ὁ δὲ Ἄψαρος πέρας ἐφάνη μοι εἶναι κατὰ μῆκος τοῦ Πόντου· ἔνθεν γὰρ ἤδη πρὸς ἄρκτον ὁ πλοῦς ἡμῖν ἐγίνετο ἔστε ἐπὶ Χῶβον ποταμόν, καὶ ὑπὲρ τὸν Χῶβον ἐπὶ τὸν Σιγάμην. ‘As far as Apsaros our course was towards the East, on the right side of the Euxine Sea. Apsaros appears to me to end the Pontic Sea at its greatest extension. From there, our course was north to the river Chobos, and after the Chobos to Sigames.’ Text by BELFIORE 2009; transl. adapted from FALCONER 1805. 32 CIL 10.1.1202 = ILS 2660: praeposit(o) numerorum tendentium in Ponto Absaro. For a full discussion of Roman military presence in the area, see now WHEELER 2022, with 810f. on praepositi and similar office holders in the area. 33 Arr. PPE 7.1. 34 Strabo 11.2.17, 18 (499C); 12.3.13, 17 (548C); 12.3.28, 29 (555C). This description has found little attention among the recent commentators of Strabo (LASSÈRE 1981; NICOLAI / TRAINA 2000, 241; ROLLER 2018, 701f., 704), but more among those who explored the territories that Pompey granted Deiotaros according to Strabo 12.3.13 (547C): καὶ τὰ περὶ Φαρνακίαν καὶ τὴν Τραπεζουσίαν μέχρι Κολχίδος καὶ τῆς μικρᾶς ᾿Αρμενίας … COŞKUN 2021a (with bibliography) argues that Strabo included part of Kolchis into the new territory of the Galatian king, suggesting a supervisory function over the regent Aristarchos. Alternatively, Strabo’s wording might reflect no more than his assumption that the north-eastern corner of Pontos was part of Kolchis. 35 Strabo 11.2.14 (497C): μετὰ δὲ τὴν Διοσκουριάδα ἡ λοιπὴ τῆς Κολχίδος ἐστὶ παραλία καὶ ἡ συνεχὴς Τραπεζοῦς καμπὴν ἀξιόλογον ποιήσασα, εἶτα εἰς εὐθεῖαν ταθεῖσά πως πλευρὰν τὴν τὰ δεξιὰ τοῦ Πόντου ποιοῦσαν τὰ βλέποντα πρὸς ἄρκτον. Text and (slightly adapted translation) follow JONES 1924, vol. 5, 207; cf. ROLLER 2014, 480 (without comment: 2018, 639). Radt’s text is identical, but his translation relates the bend to the Kolchian coast (RADT 2004, vol. 4, 303f.): ‘nach Dioskurias kommt die übrige kolchische Küste und das anschließende Trapezunt; inzwischen hat sie eine erhebliche Krümmung gemacht und sich zu der ungefähr geraden Linie gestreckt die die nach Norden blickende Rechte Seite des Pontos bildet.’
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This might look like an enticing interpretation, since it would be the closest parallel to the Tabula Peutingerina, which locates Trapezus past the northern bend of the southern Black Sea coast. But this reading would be in open contradiction to the other references in Strabo’s account, where Trapezus is always in the place where it belongs. Moreover, Strabo’s use of Trapezus instead of Trapezusia is at least problematic, his emphasis on the coastal nature of (the remainder of) Kolchis would be lost in such a translation. I would thus be inclined to slightly amend the transmitted text, perhaps as follows: After Dioskurias, the remainder of Kolchis is coastal and contiguous Trapezus, making a noteworthy bend ...36
However, I do not want to press this suggestion in an analysis of Strabo’s understanding of the city’s location, since this might be seen as circular and weaken an otherwise strong argument. Either way, Trapezus and Kolchis directly neighbour each other in Strabo’s account. This challenges the more likely historical role of the Akampsis-Apsaros as the outer limit of Kolchis at a significant distance from the Trapezusia. But let us remember that Strabo did not know this river system, as we have seen above. So, we must accept that Strabo, too, draws on two competing traditions, apparently without being aware of the contradictions. 4. Trapezus in Kolchis Key to understanding the geographical problems we have encountered so far seems to be Xenophon’s Anabasis, one of Arrian’s most important sources.37 After Kyros the Younger had been defeated at Kunaxa in Mesopotamia (401 BCE), his 10,000 Greek mercenaries marched north-north-west, first along the Tigris, then crossing the Armenian mountains before making friends with the Makrones in the Pontic Mountains and reaching Trapezus. In-between these two last-mentioned stages, the Greeks fought a battle against the ‘Kolchians’ (Anab. 4.8.8–19). They confronted However, his commentary (RADT 2008, vol. 7, 252) leaves the problem open: ‘Der Name der Stadt impliziert ihr ganzes Territorium.’ But note that Strabo has Τραπεζουσίαν in 12.3.13 (547C), where it is likewise uncertain whether the city’s territory ended before or after the bend of the coast; see the previous note. If we want to maintain the transmitted text in 11.2.14 (497C), we should at least acknowledge the emphasis on the coastal nature: ‘… the remainder of Kolchis is coastal and the contiguous Trapezus (is likewise coastal), making a significant bend ...’ I wonder, however, whether the original text was not rather ἡ λοιπὴ τῆς Κολχίδος ἐστὶ παραλία καὶ {ἡ} συνεχὴς Τραπεζοῦ (or Τραπεζου?), so that ποιήσασα would refer back to ἡ λοιπὴ τῆς Κολχίδος. This would also make better sense of the aorist of ποιήσασα: from the perspective of a sailor coming from Dioskurias, Kolchis becomes contiguous with Trapezus after the (purportedly Kolchian) coast bends. 36 See previous note. 37 ROOD 2011, 137–9. It would take us too far to dive deeper into the difficulties of reconstructing Xenophon’s itinerary and to discuss the implications of its much later presentation in the autobiographical Anabasis. See, e.g., LENDLE 1995; FOX 2004; WATERFORD / ROOD 2005; ROOD 2010; DAN 2014.
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them while still in the mountains, although the latter’s settlement areas are said to have extended into the (coastal) plains. The Greeks pillaged some of them after their victory (4.8.19, 22), another part they befriended through the mediation of the Trapezuntines (4.8.23). It is with reference to Xenophon, one of the commanders back then and later the author of the detailed report, that Arrian calls the Trapezuntines ‘neighbours’ of the Kolchians (PPE 11.1): Τραπεζουντίοις μέν, καθάπερ καὶ Ξενοφῶν λέγει, Κόλχοι ὅμοροι. But there is a noteworthy nuance in Xenophon’s original account, in which he locates Trapezus explicitly within the territory of Kolchis (4.8.22–24): From there they marched two stages, seven parasangs, and reached the sea at Trapezus, an inhabited Greek city on the Euxine Sea, a colony of the Sinopeans in the territory of Kolchis. There they remained about thirty days in the villages of the Kolchians, and from these as a base plundered Kolchis. / And the Trapezuntines supplied a market for the army, received the Greeks kindly, and gave them oxen, barley-meal, and wine as gifts of hospitality. / They likewise took part in negotiations with the Greeks on behalf of the nearby Kolchians, who dwelt for the most part on the plain, and from these people also the Greeks received hospitable gifts of oxen.38 Further down in his account, Xenophon even addresses Kerasus as a colony of the Sinopeans ‘in Kolchis’ (Anab. 5.3.2). Othar Lordkipanidze regarded these indications as traces of an early-Iron-Age Great kingdom of Kolchis. But this is more wishful thinking than historically ascertained or even remotely plausible.39 Most scholars therefore more cautiously explain the heterogenous sources as reflecting historical and toponomastic change, albeit without shedding much light on the overall development.40 The problem is, in fact, even more complex and involves various peoples in the closer and farther vicinity of the Trapezuntines. 38 Xen. Anab. 4.8.22–24: ἐντεῦθεν δ᾽ ἐπορεύθησαν δύο σταθμοὺς παρασάγγας ἑπτά, καὶ ἦλθον ἐπὶ θάλατταν εἰς Τραπεζοῦντα πόλιν Ἑλληνίδα οἰκουμένην ἐν τῷ Εὐξείνῳ Πόντῳ, Σινωπέων ἀποικίαν, ἐν τῇ Κόλχων χώρᾳ. ἐνταῦθα ἔμειναν ἡμέρας ἀμφὶ τὰς τριάκοντα ἐν ταῖς τῶν Κόλχων κώμαις: [23] κἀντεῦθεν ὁρμώμενοι ἐλῄζοντο τὴν Κολχίδα. ἀγορὰν δὲ παρεῖχον τῷ στρατοπέδῳ Τραπεζούντιοι, καὶ ἐδέξαντό τε τοὺς Ἕλληνας καὶ ξένια ἔδοσαν βοῦς καὶ ἄλφιτα καὶ οἶνον. [24] συνδιεπράττοντο δὲ καὶ ὑπὲρ τῶν πλησίον Κόλχων τῶν ἐν τῷ πεδίῳ μάλιστα οἰκούντων, καὶ ξένια καὶ παρ᾽ ἐκείνων ἦλθον βόες. Text and (adapted) transl. drawn from the Perseus Collection, based on the Loeb ed. by BROWNSON 1922. 39 LORDKIPANIDZE 1996, 71–6 first considers the ‘Kolchoi’ mentioned by Xenophon (as below) were a separate people, not belonging to the Kolchian Kingdom (although he describes it in n. 94 as ranging originally from Phasis to Kerasus), but then prefers to see them as a reflection of ‘Großkolchis’, for which he also draws on Hdt. 4.37, which is difficult (see also Hdt. 1.104 and 6.84). 40 Critical of Lordkipanidze is also TSETSKHLADZE 2013, 296f., who concedes no more than this: ‘There is no doubt that some kind of proto-kingdom existed in Colchis from the 5th century BC, certainly by its middle or later years.’ The character and extension of this reign still remains uncertain, but see below after n. 64 on king Aietes; further TSETSKHLADZE 2022, 948–55 for the latest survey of the evidence. In a merely descriptive approach, ROLLER 2018, 704 says that ‘this region was considered the beginning of the territory of Kolchis’, leaving it open whether Xenophon’s campaign from Trapezus might have reached as far as the Phasis. The discussion of BRAUND 1994, 132–5 is mainly interested in the biased constructions of ethnic identities by
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5. Drilai, Sannoi, Sannigai, and Heniochoi While Xenophon mentions the Makrones as the tribe in the Pontic Mountains that helped the 10,000 on their way to Trapezus, the Drilai are singled out by name as the enemy of Trapezus and thus the target of a joint campaign of the Greek mercenaries and the Trapezuntines. Their stronghold was situated in the mountains and could be reached in probably two days from the city (Anab. 5.2.1–2). Xenophon’s terminology is vague. He never specifically claims that the Drilai were a subethnic of the Kolchians, but this would seem to me the most plausible reading of his account. Although the Greeks inflicted heavy losses on them, they did not extinguish the people, who had been able to hold the citadel of their unnamed city, besides many others who had been able to escape the raid (5.2.3–32). The name of the Drilai disappeared from the historiographical record sometime afterwards, but resurfaces once more in Arrian’s Periplus (PPE 15) in a list of the major tribes between Trapezus and Dioskurias (Sebastopolis), though with explicit reference to Xenophon: The nations which we sailed by on our voyage are as follows. The Kolchians, who, as Xenophon observes, border on the Trapezuntines; as do the Drilai, as he calls them, but who seem to me to be more properly called the Sannoi; a people, whom he records to be of a warlike disposition, and very hostile to the Trapezuntines; both which characters they preserve to the present time. They dwell in strongly fortified places, and do not live under a monarchical government. They were formerly tributary to the Romans; but of late, being addicted to plunder, they do not pay the tribute regularly: however, now, by the Gods’ assistance, we will either oblige them to be more punctual, or exterminate them. The Machelones and the Heniochoi border on these people, the latter of whom have a King called Anchialos. Next to these lie the Zydretai, subject to Pharasmanes; and adjoining to the Zydretai are the Lazoi, a people subject to King Malassas, who holds his kingdom from You. Bordering on the Lazoi are the Apsilai, governed by King Julian, who received his kingdom from your Father. The Abaskoi border on the Apsilai, whose King, Rhesmagas, received his crown from You. The Sanigai border on the Abaskoi. Sebastopolis is a city of the Sanigai, who are subject to King Spadagas, who received his kingdom from You.41
Xenophon, but he addresses at least some of the problems in passing. E.g., p. 132, n. 45: ‘“Colchis” was always a flexible term: while Xenophon places Trapezus firmly within it, Strabo seems to locate it only near Colchis.’ Cf. TSETSKHLADZE 1998, 107 on the frequent changes of borders. Cf. VON MARGWELASCHWILI 1914, 14–6; MAREK 1993, 38; BALLESTEROS PASTOR / ÁLVAREZ OSSORIO 2001, 4 (‘un topónimo referido a una región de límites difusos’), 6–8; LENDLE 1995, 274, 283f. 41 Ἔθνη δὲ παρημείψαμεν τάδε. Τραπεζουντίοις μέν, καθάπερ καὶ Ξενοφῶν λέγει, Κόλχοι ὅμοροι· καὶ οὓς λέγει τοὺς μαχιμωτάτους καὶ ἐχθροτάτους εἶναι τοῖς Τραπεζουντίοις, ἐκεῖνος μὲν Δρίλλας ὀνομάζει, ἐμοὶ δὲ δοκοῦσιν οἱ Σάννοι οὗτοι εἶναι. Καὶ γὰρ μαχιμώτατοί εἰσιν εἰς τοῦτο ἔτι καὶ τοῖς Τραπεζουντίοις ἐχθρότατοι, καὶ χωρία ὀχυρὰ οἰκοῦσιν, καὶ ἔθνος ἀβασίλευτον, πάλαι μὲν καὶ φόρου ὑποτελὲς Ῥωμαίοις, ὑπὸ δὲ τοῦ λῃστεύειν οὐκ ἀκριβοῦσιν τὴν φοράν· ἀλλὰ νῦν γε διδόντος θεοῦ ἀκριβώσουσιν, ἢ ἐξελοῦμεν αὐτούς. Τούτων δὲ ἔχονται Μαχέλονες καὶ Ἡνίοχοι· βασιλεὺς δ' αὐτῶν Ἀγχίαλος. Μαχελόνων δὲ καὶ Ἡνιόχων ἐχόμενοι Ζυδρεῖται· Φαρασμάνου οὗτοι ὑπήκοοι· Ζυδρειτῶν δ' ἐχόμενοι Λαζοί· βασιλεὺς δὲ Λαζῶν Μαλάσσας, ὃς τὴν βασιλείαν παρὰ σοῦ ἔχει. Λαζῶν δὲ Ἀψίλαι ἔχονται· βασιλεὺς δὲ αὐτῶν Ἰουλιανός· οὗτος ἐκ τοῦ πατρὸς τοῦ σοῦ τὴν βασιλείαν ἔχει. Ἀψίλαις δὲ ὅμοροι Ἀβασκοί· καὶ
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In his various works on Kolchis, David Braund has accepted Arrian’s list of mountain dwellers, including the Drilai-Sannoi.42 But Strabo offers a different version. Without mentioning the Drilai, he equates the Sannoi with Xenophon’s Makrones.43 Yet differently, Pliny seems to equate the Sannoi with the Heniochoi (‘Charioteers’), or at least to make the former the subunit of the latter: On the coast before reaching Trapezus is the river Pyxites, and beyond Trapezus the SannoiHeniochoi (or ‘Charioteer Sannoi’ in the Loeb translation), and the river Absarros with the fortress of the same name in its gorge, 140 miles from Trapezus. Behind the mountains of this district is Hiberia, and on the coast the Heniochoi (‘Charioteers’), the Ampreutai and the Lazoi, the rivers Akampseon, Isis, Mogros and Bathys, the Kolchian tribes, the town of Mation, the River of Herakles and the cape of the same name, and the Phasis, the most celebrated river of the Black Sea region.44
It remains unclear whether the Sannoi-Heniochoi formed part of the gentes Colchorum from Pliny’s perspective. A linear reading of this compiled text would make them distinct from the Kolchoi, but the same principle would also exclude the possibility that the Lazoi were Kolchians, which would be problematic. At any rate, Arrian seems to be following a similar tradition as Pliny, when he names the Heniochoi as neighbours of the Sannoi and Machelones in eastern Pontos.45 In a different context, Pliny mentions the Sannoi in Pontos also among the producers of a
42
43 44
45
Ἀβασκῶν βασιλεὺς Ῥησμάγας· καὶ οὗτος παρὰ σοῦ τὴν βασιλείαν ἔχει. Ἀβασκῶν δὲ ἐχόμενοι Σανίγαι, ἵναπερ καὶ ἡ Σεβαστόπολις ᾤκισται· Σανιγῶν βασιλεὺς Σπαδάγας ἐκ σοῦ τὴν βασιλείαν ἔχει. Greek text established by MÜLLER 1855, drawn from ToposText; cf. BELFIORE 2009. Transl. adapted from FALCONER 1805, drawn from ToposText. BRAUND 1994, 132 specifies that the ethnic Kolchoi is used collectively for the Drilai in the Trapezuntine hinterland, ‘the forerunners of the Sanni of the Roman period and the Tzani of the Byzantines’. Accordingly, his map of Pontos (BA 87R = BRAUND / SINCLAIR 1997/2000) locates some Kolchoi just up the hills behind Trapezus and north-west of the Makrones, also named Machelones, and presented as western neighbours of the Heniochoi. TP Online s.v. ‘Sebastoplis’ goes even one step further and identifies the abovementioned Spadages, king of the San(n)igai appointed by Hadrian, with the ruler of Pontic rather than Kolchian Sebastopolis; this is unconvincing; see also COŞKUN 2022, 255–7 on the various Sebastopoleis. Without engaging with the problem of identity, WHEELER 2022, 797 rightly calls Arrian’s announcement of a potential campaign ‘idle posturing’; there is no evidence for such a campaign, and he would have no first-hand knowledge of the mountain dwellers. He (n. 27) accepts the Ophis river with Arrian as an ethnic border and further identifies the Sannoi with the Tzanoi, despite the concerns of Prokopios, BG 8.1.1.8–11 (quoted in n. 55 below). Strabo 12.3.18 (548C). LASSÈRE 1981, 162 ascribes this identification to either Poseidonios or Theophanes, thus friends of Pompey. ROLLER 2018, 704f. does not realize any problem here. Note that Ps.-Skylax, Asia 82–85 (as in n. 25 above) mentions Makrokephaloi in the area. Pliny NH 6.4.12: in ora ante Trapezunta flumen est Pyxites, ultra vero gens Sannorum Heniochorum, flumen Absarrum cum castello cognomini in faucibus, a Trapezunte cxl. eius loci a tergo montium Hiberia est, in ora vero Heniochi, Ampreutae, Lazi, flumina Acampseon, Isis, Mogrus, Bathys, gentes Colchorum, oppidum Matium, flumen Heracleum et promunturium eodem nomine, clarissimusque Ponti Phasis. Latin text and English transl. adapted from the Loeb ed. by RACKHAM 1942/62. Arrian PPE 11.1–2. Cf. Ptol. Geogr. 5.8.25: Soannokolchoi; LORDKIPANIDZE 1996, 188.
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poisonous honey.46 This recalls the drugging effect of the honey that Xenophon’s men had consumed after the victory against the ‘Kolchoi’ not too far from the territory of the Makrones, shortly before descending from the Skydises into the plain of Trapezus. The honey of the same region is also adduced in a Roman tradition (attested by Strabo) as an excuse for the slaughter of three of Pompey’s maniples by the Heptakometai.47 However, Strabo’s more detailed account on the northern Black Sea coast locates the Heniochoi in the Greater Caucasus east of the Bosporan Kingdom, neighbouring Kolchis to the north or north-west.48 A similar view is underlying those accounts that situate Dioskurias in the territory of the Heniochoi. We can seize this tradition beginning with the fragment of the Aristotelian Politeia of the Phasians.49 A more friendly perspective on them is reflected in the work of Pomponius Mela, but he, too, locates them around or even past the north-western Greater Caucasus: ‘In the territory of the Heniochoi (in Heniochorum finibus), Dioskurias was founded by Kastor and Pollux, who came to the Pontos with Jason.’ The sentence goes on to contrast their case with the Sindones: ‘and Sindos, in the territory of the Sindones, was founded by the actual cultivators of the land.’50 The latter might be the same as the Sindoi from Sindike, themselves probably a Scythian people otherwise attested on the tip of Taman peninsula facing the Crimea since Darius’ Scythian campaign or at least its report by Herodotus. They were considered of particularly low status in the Greek tradition.51 46 Pliny NH 21.45.77: Aliud genus in eodem Ponti situ, gente Sannorum, mellis quod ab insania quam gignit maenomenon vocant. id existimatur contrahi flore rhododendri quo scatent silvae. gensque ea, cum ceram in tributa Romanis praestet, mel, quoniam exitiale est, non vendit. 47 Xen. Anab. 4.8.20 and Strabo 12.3.18 (549C). Further note that Strabo 11.2.19 (499C) ascribes poisonous arrow points to the Soanians in the mountainous hinterland of Dioskurias: is this a related motif? LASSÈRE 1981, 162 and ROLLER 2018, 704f. provide some pharmacological comments on the poison caused by rhododendron pollen widespread in the area, albeit without addressing the different ethnic and geographical implications. 48 Strabo 11.2.1 (492C) and 11.2.12–14 (495f.C) emphasizes their piratical nature, a theme explored by EMIR 2022. The aporia on their whereabouts is glossed over by ROLLER 2018, 638 (‘… Sochi, and then the Heniochians, who extended for over 150 km, perhaps even as far as Phasis’), though expressed more clearly by LIDDLE 2003, 104: ‘Arrian seems to distinguish a separate tribe of that name (sc. Kolchoi), and identifies them with the Sannoi, whom Pliny sees as part of the Heniochoi, pace Strabo, who assimilates them to the Macrones’. LORDKIPANIDZE 1996, 161 and 194f. also voices uncertainty, wavering between a confusion of the tradition and the migration of part of the Heniochoi, whom he otherwise locates north of Kolchis (pp. 189– 95). 49 BRAUND 1994, 75f.; LORDKIPANIDZE 1996, 224f.; cf. EMIR 2022, 85. 50 Pomp. Mela 1.100 (111): In Heniochorum finibus Dioscorias a Castore et Polluce Pontum cum Iasone ingressis, Sindos in Sindonum ab ipsis terrarum cultoribus condita est. Latin text and English transl. adapted from ToposText. 51 Hdt. 4.28. Strabo’s references to the Sindoi or the Sindike are mostly just to their location: 11.2.1, 10–12 (492–495C); 12.3.29 (556C), but one instance qualifies them as farmers subject to the Scythians: 7.4.6 (311C). This may be connected to another traditions that makes them usurp the wives and farmland of the Scythians during their Asian campaign: Amm. 22.8.41, with IVANTCHIK 2005, 225, also adducing Val. Flacc. 6.86.
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The mythical tradition made the Heniochoi the descendents of the ‘charioteers’ of Kastor and Pollux, themselves the founders of Dioskurias. Strabo names them Rhekas and Amphistratos, Pliny Amphitos and Thelchios. Pliny adds that the Heniochoi destroyed the Greek colony Pityus, which is located between Dioskurias and Herakleia on the northern Euxine littoral.52 However, Argonautic mytho-geography extends even further to the north-west. Another people living along the northEuxine coast as western neighbours of the Heniochoi and as eastern neighbours of the Kerketikoi and Sindones were the Achaioi, as mentioned by Mela and Pliny. Strabo once again stresses their piratical lifestyle and links them explicitly with Argonauts. This Caucasian people probably had a name that sounded similar as that of the Peloponnesian Greeks in Homer’s time, so that they could likewise be presented as descendants of Jason’s companions (among alternative traditions).53 Similarly, the Tabula Peutingeriana pictures the Heniochoi, or rather the Lazi Eniochi, behind the Greater Caucasus, closer to the Taman peninsula, followed by the Achei and Acheon along the southern foothills of the Caucasus, whereas the Sannigae figure as the inhabitants of the westernmost part of this mountain.54 Until the days of Prokopios, the confusion had increased further, but the Byzantine historiographer eventually made an effort to curb some of the misconceptions: ‘Some of these writers have stated that the Sannoi, who today are called Tzanoi, are neighbours of the Trapezuntines or are Kolchians, and they call another people Lazoi, who are actually
52 Strabo 11.2.12 (495f.C), attesting to a Lakonian origin, and Pliny NH 6.5.15–16: Subicitur Ponti regio Colica, in qua iuga Caucasi ad Ripaeos montes torquentur, ut dictum est, altero latere in Euinum et Maeotium devexa, altero in Caspium et Hyrcanium mare. reliqua litora ferae nationes tenent Meanclaeni, Coraxi, urbe Colchorum Dioscuriade iuxta fluvium Anthemunta nunc deserta, quondam adeo clara, ut Timosthenes in eam CCC nationes dissimilibus linguis descendere prodiderit; et postea nostris CXXX interpretibus negotia gesta ibi. / sunt qui conditam eam ab Amphito et Telchio, Castoris ac Pollucis aurigis, putent, a quibus ortam Heniochorum gentem fere constat. C a Dioscuriade oppidum Heracle distat, a Sebastopoli LXX. Achaei, Mardi, Cercetae, post eos Seri, Cephalotomi. in intimo eo tractu Pitys oppidum opulentissimum ab Heniochis direptum est. a tergo eius Epagerritae, Sarmatarum populus in Caucasi iugis, post que Sauromatae. See COŞKUN 2020b, 670–2 and WHEELER 2022, 807–9; cf. ASHERI 1998; EMIR 2022, 91, n. 66; SCHMITT 2022, 21– 8 for Pliny’s cultural historical implications, though not for Schmitt’s suggested new reading. 53 Pomp. Mela 1.99 (110), after the Kimmerian Bosporus: Reliqua eius ferae incultaeque gentes vasto mari adsidentes tenent, Melanchlaena, Toretica, sex Colicae, Coraxici, Phthirophagi, Heniochi, Achaei, Cercetici, et iam in confinio Maeotidis Sindones. Pliny NH 6.5.16, quoted in the previous note. Strabo 11.2.12 (495f.C). See ASHERI 1998; ROLLER 2018, 637f.; cf. XYDOPOULOS 2021, who explores their representation as barbarians and the tradition that made them descendents from Orchomenians, developed in the 5th century BCE during the conflicts between Athens, Thebes, and Sparta; also PODOSSINOV 2021, 45f. for name forms and attestations. 54 Tab. Peut. IX–X, see Figs. 6 and 4 above. There is also a cursory note on the Heniochoi in Tac. Ann. 2.68.1, which leaves their exact location uncertain; by association, they might be neighbours of the Albanians or Scythians. The latest reference is to the murder of their king by Vologaises in a Parthian War under Marcus Aurelius, whose allies they were, in ca. 172 CE (Cass. Dio 71.14.2 ed. BOISSEVAIN p. 259). Whether the Heniochoi where then forced to resettle or the name that the Greeks and Romans used for them became obsolete is an open question.
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Altay Coşkun addressed by this name at the present day. [9] Yet neither of these statements is true. The Tzanoi live at a very great distance from the coast as neighbours of the Armenians in the interior, and many mountains stand in between that are thoroughly impassable and vertically steep, and there is an extensive area always devoid of human habitation, canyons from which it is impossible to climb out, forested heights, and impassable chasms – all this prevents the Tzanoi from being on the sea. [10] In the second place, it is impossible that the Lazoi should not be the Kolchians, because they live by the Phasis river; and the Kolchians have merely changed their name at the present time to Lazoi, just as nations of men and many other things do. In addition, a long time has elapsed since these accounts were written, and this, along with the march of events, has caused constant changes, with the result that many conditions that were formerly obtained have been replaced by new conditions, because of the migration of nations and the succession of rulers and names.’55
Prokopios uses the name Sannoi as the most generic term for all the tribes that lived in the mountains above Trapezus, whereas he confines the Kolchoi to the inhabitants of the plains around the Phasis, who, by his day, had become the Lazoi. And he no longer surmises a presence of the Heniochoi in Pontos, thus he might even have agreed with Strabo about their northern location.56 One may wonder whether the Sannoi north of the Kolchoi were identical or at least related with the Sannigai, whom Arrian (as quoted above) situates in the vicinity of Dioskurias, or with the Soanoi mentioned by Strabo (11.2.19) in the same area. And what about the Sannicae, whom Pliny locates in northern Kolchis between the Phasis and Sebastopolis (Dioskurias)? His compiled account names them beside the Suani and the Sanni in the same area.57 But should we not rather consider 55 Prokopios, BG 8.1.1.8–11: [8] ὧν γέ τινες Τραπεζουντίων ὁμόρους ἢ Σάνους ἔφασαν, οἳ τανῦν Τζάνοι ἐπικαλοῦνται, ἢ Κόλχους εἶναι, Λαζοὺς ἑτέρους καλέσαντες οἳ καὶ νῦν ἐπὶ τούτου προσαγορεύονται τοῦ ὀνόματος. [9] καίτοι ἔστι τούτων οὐδέτερον. Τζάνοι μὲν γὰρ τῆς παραλίας ὡς ἀπωτάτω ὄντες προσοικοῦσι τοὺς Ἀρμενίους ἐν τῇ μεσογείᾳ καὶ ὄρη πολλὰ μεταξὺ ἀποκρέμαται, λίαν τε ἄβατα καὶ ὅλως κρημνώδη, χώρα τε πολλὴ ἔρημος ἀνθρώπων ἐς ἀεὶ οὖσα καὶ χαράδραι ἀνέκβατοι καὶ λόφοι ὑλώδεις καὶ σήραγγες ἀδιέξοδοι, οἶς δὴ ἅπασι μὴ ἐπιθαλάσσιοι εἶναι διείργονται Τζάνοι. [10] Κόλχους δὲ οὐχ οἷόν τέ ἐστι μὴ τοὺς Λαζοὺς εἶναι, ἐπεὶ παρὰ Φᾶσιν ποταμὸν ᾤκηνται: τὸ δὲ ὄνομα μόνον οἱ Κόλχοι, ὥσπερ ἀνθρώπων ἔθνη καὶ πολλὰ ἕτερα, τανῦν ἐς τὸ Λαζῶν μεταβέβληνται. [11] χωρὶς δὲ τούτων καὶ μέγας αἰὼν μετὰ τοὺς ἐκεῖνα ἀναγραψαμένους ἐπιγενόμενος ἀεί τε συννεωτερίζων τοῖς πράγμασι τὰ πολλὰ τῶν καθεστώτων τὰ πρότερα νεοχμῶσαι ἴσχυσεν, ἐθνῶν τε μεταστάσεσι καὶ ἀρχόντων καὶ ὀνομάτων διαδοχαῖς. Greek text drawn from the Perseus Database (ed. DEWING 1914–1928). English transl. adapted from DEWING / KALDELLIS 2014, 463f. 56 Lordkipanidze’s argument is somewhat inconsistent (1996, 162f.): he also draws on this passage of Prokopios to prove the identity of the Sannoi and Tzanoi, the latter being the ancestors of the ‘Tschani … einer der westkartwelischen Stämme’, which descended from the Kolchoi and were identical with or part of the Lazoi – the clear contradiction to Prokopios is not addressed anymore. Lordkipanidze also mentions the possibility that the Thiannike (Arr. PPE 7.1) could be the land of the Sannoi, although he rejects this because the manuscripts have the variant readings Tiannike and Tyannike. The actual reason for Lordkipanidze’s denial is that accepting the Sannoi as the inhabitants of the Thiannike would make them neighbours of the Kolchoi rather than Kolchians themselves in Arrian’s eyes. 57 Pliny NH 6.4.14: inde aliud flumen Charien, gens Saltiae antiquis Plithirophagi dicti et alia Sanni, flumen Chobum e Caucaso per Suanos fluens, dein Rhoan, regio Cegritice, amnes Sigania, Thersos, Astelphus, Chrysorroas, gens Absilae, castellum Sebastopolis a Phaside
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the possibility that the Sanni, Suani, Soanoi, and Sannicae were variants meant to denote the same people? The Tabula Peutingeriana (Segments IX and X, Figs. 6 and 4 above) preserves similar and even further variations of this ethnic: the Sannigae are located in the westernmost extension of the unnamed (Caucasian) mountain range, not too far from the Heniochoi to the West, whereas the Svani appear in the easternmost Caucasus, neighbouring Trapezus. In addition, the Tabula also mentions Svanisarmatae across the middle course of the (unnamed) river whose lower course surrounds the west and north of Trapezus.58 The balance should be tipped by the fact that Xenophon does not mention any of them in the context of Trapezus, nor is he aware of a people named Heniochoi. We are thus left with largely three choices: (1) the Kolchoi from the Phasis region migrated to the area of the Skydises and Paryadres before 400 BCE, and with them their subgroups called Heniochoi and Sannoi, albeit without being singled out by Xenophon; (2) they arrived only after Xenophon had left; or (3) the evidence does not reflect the migration of people but of ethnics, which was well progressing but not yet consolidated around 400 BCE. Most plausible is the third option, since it best accounts for the inconsistency in our diverse evidence.59 But the sources do agree by being silent about a migration of any of the Kolchian neighbours. Most importantly, the unclear ethnics around Greek settlements in this remote corner of the ancient world reflect Argonautic or Phrixean landscapes, which had become synonymous with Kolchis since the early-5th century BCE. Let us now turn to such virtual migration in the environs of Trapezus. 6. Aia-Trapezus in an Extended Argonautic Landscape As mentioned in the introduction, the myths of Phrixos’ exile and the Argonauts’ quest for the Golden Fleece in far-away Aia were commonly connected with Kolchis in Classical antiquity, if not since the outgoing Archaic period. Mythical toponomy continued being highly volatile well into the 4th century. It seems that rivalling settlements or competing trade networks of the Greeks, starting with the Milesians, drove the creation and further development of mythical landscapes. The process was multidirectional: names were borrowed from the Greek literary
c(entum), gens Sanicarum, oppidum Cygnus, flumen et oppidum Penius; deinde multis nominibus Heniochorum gentes. 58 Cf. LICCARDO 2020, 154–6, with further examples of double names on the Tabula, whose use seems to imply a conflation or harmonisation of diverse or changing ethnics; also PODOSSINOV 2021, 46 with other examples of duplication, which was not limited to the Tabula. 59 For some caution not to infer migration too rashly from lacunose or inconsistent evidence, see WIEDEMANN / HOFMANN / GEHRKE 2017.
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tradition for newly discovered or appropriated territories, while a few non-Greek Kolchian names penetrated Greek mythography.60 My explanation of the mislocation of Trapezus on the Tabula Peutingeriana against the background of Argonautic mytho-geography is, of course, in part conjectural, since the Greek evidence is inconsistent and non-Greek accounts on the ethnic identities in the Pontic-Kolchian areas are largely absent. Even the onomastic data must be treated with caution, as it appears to have been heavily reshaped from multiple Greek-colonial perspectives. However, it is noteworthy that there is a broad (Greek) tradition affirming the presence of Kolchians, Heniochoi, and Sannoi (or Sannigai) in the neighbourhood of Trapezus on the one hand, while another (also Greek) tradition denies this implicitly or explicitly. The negative tradition is quite variegated, ranging from the confinement of Kolchis by the Akampsis-Apsaros river or the Moschian mountain to the equation of the Kolchoi with the Lazoi around the Phasis river, while denying their identity with the Tzanoi in the Armenian mountains. The earliest mention of Kolchoi living around the Skydises and Paryadres coincides with the arrival of Xenophon and the 10,000 shortly before 400 BCE. The evidence for Sannoi and Heniochoi in the same area is even younger and remains likewise vague: there is uncertainty as to whether these were Kolchian subethnics or ethnically distinct neighbours within or adjacent to Kolchian territories. Not one of their settlements is named, and their characteristic features are merely ‘barbarian’ stereotypes. In the later sources (Strabo, Pomponius Mela, Pliny, Arrian), the Sannoi and/or Heniochoi seem to have superseded the Drilai or Makrones (unless the latter reappear as Machelones in Appian’s account). Admittedly, even the other Sannoi and Heniochoi remain shady entities to us. They are pictured as northern or north-western neighbours of the Kolchians dwelling in or beyond the Greater Caucasus. The Heniochoi are defined by their Greek (or pseudo-Greek) etymological meaning ‘Charioteers’. Irrespective of its intended meaning,61 information is a bit more specific than in the Trapezusia, since the Milesian colony Dioskurias is addressed as a ‘city of the Heniochoi’ (Aristotle, Pomponius Mela, Pliny), whereas Arrian calls Sebastopolis a ‘city of the San(n)igai’. Remembering that Pliny conflates the two ethnics to ‘Sannoi Heniochoi’ (even if in the environs of Trapezus), I venture the suggestion that Sannoi was the name of the indigenous neighbours of the Greek settlers of Dioskurias, for which later generations used the derivative Sannigai.62 Heniochoi appears to be a superimposed
60 For non-Greek names, see especially Gyenos (developed into Kyaneos / Kyknos) and Kytaia; most controversial is the etymology of Phasis, which I still prefer to classify as Greek re-interpretation. References are given in notes 2–6 above. 61 ‘Chariots’ are not a typical feature of mountain dwellers, so that ‘Heniochoi’ are apparently motivated by their subordination to the ‘Dioskuroi’, the legendary founders of Dioskurias. For the latest discussion, see TSETSKHLADZE 2022, 946–8. 62 Alternatively, the different ethnic might also be due to the relocation of Dioskurias-Sebastopolis, as I have argued on different grounds elsewhere; see n. 9 above.
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ethnic to denote multiple indigenous peoples throughout the Caucasus, including the Sannoi/Sanigai.63 The fact that Dioskurias-Sebastopolis is entirely missing on the Black Sea coast of the Tabula Peutingeriana has previously led me to the intermediate conclusion that the eastern road extension from Trapezus to Sebastopolis (located on the Ocean) reflects a later revision of the map (Segments X–XI, Figs. 4–5 above). It would now seem to me that the end-point location of Trapezus and the omission of Dioskurias were not simply due to an oversight, but rather imply a tradition in which Trapezus took on the role of Dioskurias-Aia in the land of Kolchis. This would explain best why the author of the original map (or its most pertinent source) attributes Trapezus a position in the north-eastern ‘recess’ of the Black Sea, a typical characteristic first of mythical Aia64 and then of Dioskurias-Aia: Be this as it may, since Dioskourias is situated in such a gulf and occupies the most easterly point of the whole sea, it is called not only the recess of the Euxine, but also the “farthermost” voyage. And the proverbial verse, “To Phasis, where for ships is the farthermost run”, must be interpreted thus, not as though the author of the iambic verse meant the river, much less the city of the same name situated on the river, but as meaning by a part of Kolchis the whole of it, since from the river and the city of that name there is left a straight voyage into the recess of not less than six hundred stadia. The same Dioskourias is the beginning of the isthmus between the Caspian Sea and the Euxine, and also the common emporion of the tribes who are situated above it and in its vicinity; at any rate, seventy tribes come together in it, though others, who care nothing for the facts, actually say three hundred. All speak different languages because of the fact that, by reason of their obstinacy and ferocity, they live in scattered groups and without intercourse with one another. The greater part of them are Sarmatians, but they are all Caucasians. So much, then, for the region of Dioskourias.65
63 Other examples could be added, such as Xenophon (Anab. 4.4.18, 35; 4.6.5; 4.7.15) mentioning Chalybians, who may likewise have been transferred from the Greater Caucasus to the hinterland of Trapezus: see OLSHAUSEN 2012, 339–42, with Aisch. Prom. 714–6; also JANSSENS 1967, 50. A different case is that of the Mossynoikoi, who lived a bit further west of Trapezus and were also introduced into the Greek literary tradition by Xenophon, who even calls them ‘most barbarous’ after their violent conflict with the Greeks (Anab. 5.4.2–34, with an excellent discussion by MANOLEDAKIS 2021b). They even entered the Argonautic landscape of Apollonios (2.1015–29), though not due to their closeness to Trapezus, but because they lived on the Black Sea coast and were passed by Jason on his way to the Phasis; yet their barbarian nature depicted by Xenophon invited their inclusion into the 3rd-century epic. 64 See Strabo 2.1.39 (92C) = Eratosth. F 52; also Strabo 1.2.10 (21C) and 1.2.40 (46C) on Homeric Aia ‘in the recess of the Pontos’; further Strabo 1.2.40 (46–47C) = Mimnermos F 11 + 11a = Skepsios (Demetrios of Skepsis?) F 50, locating Aia on the edge (cheilos) of the Okeanos. Pace SCHMITT 2022, 29. 65 Strabo 11.2.16 (497–498C): ἡ δ᾽ οὖν Διοσκουριὰς ἐν κόλπῳ τοιούτῳ κειμένη καὶ τὸ ἑωθινώτατον σημεῖον ἐπέχουσα τοῦ σύμπαντος πελάγους, μυχός τε τοῦ Εὐξείνου λέγεται καὶ ἔσχατος πλοῦς: τό τε παροιμιακῶς λεχθὲν οὕτω δεῖ δέξασθαι “εἰς Φᾶσιν ἔνθα ναυσὶν ἔσχατος δρόμος”, οὐχ ὡς τὸν ποταμὸν λέγοντος τοῦ ποιήσαντος τὸ ἰαμβεῖον, οὐδὲ δὴ ὡς τὴν ὁμώνυμον αὐτῷ πόλιν κειμένην ἐπὶ τῷ ποταμῷ, ἀλλ᾽ ὡς τὴν Κολχίδα ἀπὸ μέρους, ἐπεὶ ἀπό γε τοῦ ποταμοῦ καὶ τῆς πόλεως οὐκ ἐλάττων ἑξακοσίων σταδίων λείπεται πλοῦς ἐπ᾽ εὐθείας εἰς τὸν μυχόν. ἡ δ᾽ αὐτὴ Διοσκουριάς ἐστι καὶ ἀρχὴ τοῦ ἰσθμοῦ τοῦ μεταξὺ τῆς Κασπίας καὶ τοῦ Πόντου καὶ ἐμπόριον τῶν ὑπερκειμένων καὶ σύνεγγυς ἐθνῶν κοινόν: συνέρχεσθαι γοῦν εἰς αὐτὴν ἑβδομήκοντα, οἱ δὲ καὶ τριακόσια ἔθνη φασίν, οἷς οὐδὲν τῶν ὄντων μέλει, πάντα δὲ
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The relocation of Trapezus close to the Caucasus on the Tabula Peutingeriana and the placement of the Suani (Sannoi) in the city’s vicinity further support my assumption that Trapezus superseded Dioskurias-Aia in this mytho-geographical and cartographical tradition. In contrast, Trapezus was still claiming only a peripheral location in or near the phantastic kingdom of Aia, when Xenophon visited it. This is implied in Xenophon’s (unexecuted) plan to conquer the land around the Phasis, where he was hoping to obtain more ships for the 10,000’s return to Greece. The author of the Anabasis apparently thought (or wanted his readers to believe) that the king of the area was a grandson (or descendant) of a certain Aietes (Anab. 5.6.37). Xenophon does not go into detail or evoke the association with the father of Medeia explicitly, so that his own understanding and his intentions as an author remain unclear. The Trapezuntines would have conveyed him reliable information on the distance of that kingdom, but did this also pertain to its topography and the ethnic identity of its subject? Xenophon is explicit about ships, which could be obtained from there, but only after sailing there. 7. Further Virtual Extensions of Kolchis Around 400 BCE, the process of colonial appropriation or adaptation was still in flux. Argonautic Kolchis had only recently been enlarged to also include north-east Pontos. The instigators of this development were most likely the Sinopeans. They were keen on associating themselves with the exotic glamour of Phrixos and the Argonauts, whose exploits were then retold to have affected ever more places in the orbit of Sinope, including Kerasus and Trapezus. Particularly susceptible to geo-mythology were the names of rivers. The fact that there are multiple Lykoi in northern Asia Minor is worth a note: not only the upper- and middle course of the Kelkit Çayı, which flows along the Paryadres and merges into the Black Sea as the Iris west of Amisos (modern Samsun) went by this name; at least in one tradition, the Akampsis south of the Skydises was called Lykos as well, and one of the latter’s tributaries is addressed as Glaukos in Ptolemy’s Geography in the 2nd century CE. One might argue that these are just confusions, if only they were isolated – but they are not.66 Another indication of a largely extended ‘Kolchis’ may be that Xenophon had previously crossed a river in the Armenian mountains called Phasis, probably the ἑτερόγλωττα διὰ τὸ σποράδην καὶ ἀμίκτως οἰκεῖν ὑπὸ αὐθαδείας καὶ ἀγριότητος: Σαρμάται δ᾽ εἰσὶν οἱ πλείους, πάντες δὲ Καυκάσιοι. ταῦτα μὲν δὴ τὰ περὶ τὴν Διοσκουριάδα. The Greek text follows Meineke 1877 (cf. JONES 1924 and RADT 2004); the transl. has been adapted from the Loeb ed. by JONES 1924. Cf. Strabo 1.3.2 (47C) = Eratosth. F 13 ed. Roller on the ‘recess’ of Dioskourias. See COŞKUN 2020a for a full discussion, with further references in n. 9 above. 66 Ptol. Geogr. 5.6.7, whereas Strabo 11.2.17 (497C) names the Hippos and Glaukos as the major tributaries of the Phasis. See COŞKUN 2019a, 93–8 on the Lykos-Iris, Lykos-Akampsis, and Glaukos, with further references. Cf. COŞKUN 2020a, 268–70 on the mythical riverscape of Kolchis and DAN 2015 on the Thermodon.
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Araxes (Turkish Aras), which merges into the Upper Euphrates.67 At first sight, the Tabula Peutingeriana is (also) disappointing for its representation of this Armenian river system. The confluence should be somewhere south of Kerasus, whereas the Tabula ignores the Araxes entirely and places the western bend of the Upper Euphrates far east of Polemonion (Segment X, Fig. 1 above), though still in a nearreasonable alignment with Melitene (Melentenis), Samosata, and Zeugma in southeastern Asia Minor (Segment XI, Fig. 6 above). Where we might have expected the confluence of the Araxes and the Euphrates, the latter is crossed instead by a thin and lengthy mountain belt, the Taurus (as it is called explicitly only further east in the area of Persia on Segment XII, Fig. 7/8). It begins just east of Tyana (Segment X, Fig. 5 above) and extends horizontally as far as the eastern Ocean (Segment XII).68 Somewhat surprisingly, the people living in the bend of the Upper Euphrates are addressed as Colchi (Segment XI). They live shy north of the mountain range where we might otherwise envision the Phasis-Araxes (with Xenophon). The Tabula hence provides us with another hint at a pseudo-Kolchian landscape, which could have the same root as Xenophon’s Phasis-Araxes. At the same time, these Kolchoi are placed south of a smaller mountain called Mons Paruerbes, which seems to be conflating the abovementioned range of the Paryadres, Skydises, and Moschike.69 In reality, the Armenian portion of the Taurus rises just south of the Skydises and Moschike, in whose northern parts the Euphrates has its springs. The Tabula has collapsed this area into the Mons Paruerbes as well, where it locates the origin of the Euphrates. This might, once more, appear as a gross mistake or clumsy simplification at a first glance. However, there is broader literary tradition that likewise reflects an extension of the Argonautic (or Phrixean) landscape deep into the Moschike and even beyond, to reach into Iberia. Towards the end of his description of Kolchis, Strabo writes (11.2.17f.): Above the aforesaid rivers in the Moschian country lies the temple of Leukothea, founded by Phrixos, and the Oracle of Phrixos, where a ram is never sacrificed. It was once rich, but it was
67 Xen. Anab. 4.7.18–19. Likewise, previous scholarship explained the river name as a result of the loose usage of the Kolchian ethnic in the whole region; see KIEßLING 1912, 2086f.; DIEHL 1938, 1885f.; WATERFORD / ROOD 2005, 212. While a Kartvelian etymology might provide a viable explanation (see n. 9 above), I wonder if Xenophon only named the river Phasis after ‘completing’ his information during his stay in Trapezus. TRAINA 2018, 235f. is undecided whether the confusion was due to the river’s Armenian name Basean (but can we be sure that this was not influenced by the Greek tradition?) or a potential misinterpretation of Hdt. 1.202 and 4.40. 68 TALBERT 2010, 137 traces this back to the ‘concept of an east-west axis (diaphragma)’ by Dikaiarchos; cf. PODOSSINOV 2020, 168–70; RATHMANN 2020, 206. 69 TP Online s.v. ‘Parverdes’ reads the name slightly differently and explains, without discussion of the mislocation: ‘Teil des alpidischen Faltengürtels im Bereich von Pontos und Armenia, etwa mit dem Ostteil des nordanatol. Randgebirges (Karadeniz Dağları, mit dem Kaçkar Dağı, 3937 m) und dem Elburs (mit dem Damāvand, 5604 m) gleichzusetzen’. Although the Paruerbes runs parallel with the last stretch of the road from Trapezus to Sebastopolis (misplaced on the northern Ocean) on the Tabula, this is barely a plausible explanation for the location of the Kolchoi at such a distance from the Black Sea. See also above with n. 8 on the road and ns. 13 and 20 above on the possible causes of its mislocation.
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Altay Coşkun robbed in our time by Pharnakes, and a little later by Mithradates of Pergamon. … / … Now the Moschian country, in which the sanctuary is located, is divided into three parts: one part is held by the Kolchians, another by the Iberians, and another by the Armenians. There is also a small city in Iberia, the City of Phrixos, the present Ideëssa, well fortified, on the confines of Kolchis.70
Previous scholars have thought of a single place for a sanctuary devoted to Leukothea and Phrixos, but there is no reason to conflate all the information. Othar Lordkipanidze even adds Pomponius Mela’s reference to the sacred grove of Phrixos in the city of Phasis, yet claims a single sanctuary in Vani (ancient Surion, located on the (modern) Sulori river, on a tributary of the Phasis-Rioni).71 David Braund, in turn, located the Leukotheion (with or without the Oracle) around Akhaltsikhe or in Atsquri in the Mtkvari valley.72 But this does not do justice to Strabo either. The geographer requires the Leukotheion to be located on the coast, whereas the Oracle of Phrixos is never described as contiguous with the sanctuary of the ‘White Goddes’. Strabo rather situates it deeper in the Moschike near the boundaries of the Kolchian, Armenian, and Iberian territories, both in his Kolchian section of book 11 and in his methodological discussion of book 1.73 And there may yet be another place with a sanctuary of Phrixos, as one should surmise for a city called by his name: (hitherto unlocated) Ideëssa in Iberia, Strabo’s ‘City of Phrixos’ – unless the geographer failed to connect independent information and the Oracle of Phrixos was in fact located in Ideëssa. Tacitus likewise mentions that the Iberians and Albanians were devout to an Oracle of Phrixos. This is obviously literary flourish in the context of the RomanParthian war and lacks a topographical anchor. It may not tell us anything about the realities on the ground, but it does reveal that there was a Greek tradition picturing a southern or south-eastern extension of mythical Kolchis.74 After all, this should not surprise us, since there is a further (probably Athenian) tradition making 70 Strabo 11.2.17f. (498f.C): ὑπέρκειται δὲ τῶν λεχθέντων ποταμῶν ἐν τῇ Μοσχικῇ τὸ τῆς Λευκοθέας ἱερὸν Φρίξου ἵδρυμα, καὶ μαντεῖον ἐκείνου, ὅπου κριὸς οὐ θύεται, πλούσιόν ποτε ὑπάρξαν, συληθὲν δὲ ὑπὸ Φαρνάκου καθ᾽ ἡμᾶς καὶ μικρὸν ὕστερον ὑπὸ Μιθριδάτου τοῦ Περγαμηνοῦ. ... / ... ἡ δ᾽ οὖν Μοσχική, ἐν ᾗ τὸ ἱερόν, τριμερής ἐστι: τὸ μὲν γὰρ ἔχουσιν αὐτῆς Κόλχοι, τὸ δὲ Ἴβηρες, τὸ δὲ Ἀρμένιοι. ἔστι δὲ καὶ πολίχνιον ἐν τῇ Ἰβηρίᾳ Φρίξου πόλις ἡ νῦν Ἰδήεσσα, εὐερκὲς χωρίον ἐν μεθορίοις τῆς Κολχίδος. The Greek text follows MEINEKE 1877 (cf. JONES 1924 and RADT 2004); the transl. has been adapted from the Loeb ed. by JONES 1924; cf. COŞKUN 2021c, 300. 71 LORDKIPANIDZE 2000, 98f., with Pomp. Mela 1.19.108: Phrixi templum et lucus; but 1.19.109 (hinc orti montes ...) means that the temple and grove were in the Kolchian plain. 72 BRAUND 1994, 148f.; cf. 170. The City of Phrixos is not identified by BRAUND 1997/2000, BA 88, cf. BA Directory p. 1283. 73 Strabo 1.2.39 (45C): first mention of the Phrixeion (without Leukotheion). 74 COŞKUN 2021c, esp. 300–3, for a full discussion of Strabo 11.2.17f. (498f.C) and Tac. Ann. 6.34.1–2: ... atque illis sola in equite vis: Pharasmanes et pedite valebat. nam Hiberi Albanique saltuosos locos incolentes duritiae patientiaeque magis insuevere; feruntque se Thessalis ortos, qua tempestate Iaso post avectam Medeam genitosque ex ea liberos inanem mox regiam Aeetae vacuosque Colchos repetivit. multaque de nomine eius et oraclum Phrixi celebrant; nec quisquam ariete sacrificaverit, credito vexisse Phrixum, sive id animal seu navis insigne fuit. The Latin text has been drawn from The Latin Library; cf. WOODMAN 2017.
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Medeia’s son Medos the conqueror of Media. This trivial folk etymology relates to the idea that either his father Jason or his mother Medeia returned to Kolchis, whence further conquests to the south-east were made.75 8. Conclusions Neither the spatial constraints of the Tabula Peutingeriana nor the general isolation of the east-Euxine coast can explain sufficiently the unusual position and context of Trapezus in this unique map. Likewise, the campaign of M. Agrippa does not provide a plausible historical context for mapping Trapezus beside the Greater Caucausus on the north-eastern coast of the Black Sea. Instead, I have argued for a Greek colonial background in which the ethnic and territorial names Kolchis and Kolchians respectively were extended to the south of the Moschian mountains. This process resulted in virtual Argonautic or Phrixean landscapes along the north-eastern coast of Asia Minor, even reaching into the Armenian and Median mountains. Xenophon’s Anabasis offered multiple clues for such a development, although the near-contemporary account of Pseudo-Skylax accurately delimited the territory of the Kolchians by the Apsaros-Akampsis river. The mytho-geographical trend also affected, among others, the Sannoi and Heniochoi. After they had been encountered effectively or envisioned only virtually in the environs of Aia-Dioskurias in the 6th or 5th centuries, they gradually became part of the Trapezuntine hinterland, at least from a Greek-colonial perspective. Later authors perpetuated both traditions. Strabo, Pomponius Mela, Pliny, Arrian, and Prokopios thus produced partly harmonized, partly inconsistent versions, besides some attempts at disentangling the confusion. The Tabula Peutingeriana shows multiple traces of this broad mytho-geographical discourse, such as the articifial vicinity of the Trapezuntines and Sannoi and the extension, if not transfer, of Kolchis to the area south of the Moschike (Paruerbes). In addition, this map seems to attest to one – otherwise lost – tradition according to which Trapezus superseded Aia-Dioskurias at some point in history. This, at least, seems to be the most plausible explanation of why Trapezus – for many sailors the end point of the route along the south-Euxine coast – was eventually imagined to be located in the ‘recess’ of the eastern Black Sea coast by the edge of the Greater Caucasus, in the neighbourhood of the Sannoi and Heniochoi, and surrounded by major rivers of uncertain names. Altay Coşkun Classical Studies, University of Waterloo, ML 228 Waterloo, Ontario Canada N2L 3G1 [email protected]
75 According to Strabo 11.13.10 (526C) (cf. 11.2.18 [498C]), Medeia returned together with Jason, and they were succeeded by their son Medos; see also Apollod. Bibl. 1.9.28 (147); Hygin. Fab. 27; Just. 42.2.12; 42.3.5. For discussion, see KOESTERMANN 1965, 323; GANTZ 1993, 372f.; DE SIENA 2001, 90–3; BRAUND 2005c; MARIOTTA / MAGNELLI 2012, 195; WOODMAN 2017, 236; COŞKUN 2019b, 18f.; LOVATT 2021, 127.
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(eds.), Connecting East and West. Studies Presented to Gocha Tsetskhladze, Leuven, vol. 1, 241–60. COŞKUN, A. 2022b: ‘A Survey of Recent Research on Ancient Galatia (1993–2019)’, in A. COŞKUN (ed.), Galatian Victories and Other Studies into the Agency and Identity of the Galatians in the Hellenistic and Early-Roman Periods (Colloquia Antiqua 33), Leuven, 3–94. COŞKUN, A. 2023: ‘Trapezus in Kolchis, Part I: The Origin of the Tabula Peutingeriana under Julius Caesar’, forthcoming in A. PODOSSINOV (ed.), The Black Sea Region in Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages: Problems of Historical Geography (The Earliest States of Eastern Europe 23), Moscow 2023. COŞKUN, A. in preparation a: ‘Multiple Aiai in Kolchis: On the Creation and Proliferation of Mythical Landscapes in the Eastern Black Sea Region.’ COŞKUN, A. in preparation b: ‘From Dioskurias / Aia (Ochamchire) over Sebastopolis / Dioskurias (Skurcha) to Sukhumi / Sebastopolis: The Letter of the episcopus Sanastupolitanus inferioris Georgiae Reconsidered.’ COŞKUN, A. in preparation c: ‘When Was the Argonautic Tradition First Connected with Kolchis? Notes on the Literary Tradition from Homer to ‘Eumelos’ (8th–4th Centuries BC)’. COŞKUN, A. / STERN, G. 2021: ‘Dynamis in Rome? Revisiting the South Frieze of the Ara Pacis Augustae’, in A. COŞKUN (ed.), Ethnic Constructs, Royal Dynasties and Historical Geography around the Black Sea Littoral, Stuttgart 2021, 199–230. DAN, A. 2009: ‘Sinope, «capitale» pontique, dans la géographie antique’, in H. BRU / F. KIRBIHLER, / S. LEBRETON (eds.), L’Asie mineure dans l’Antiquité: échanges, populations et territoires: Regards actuels sur une péninsule, Rennes 2009, 67–131. https://books.openedition.org/pur/98385#ftn1 (without pagination). DAN, A. 2009: ‘La plus merveilleuse des mers’: Recherches sur la représentation de la mer Noire et de ses peuples dans les sources antiques, d’Homère à Eratosthène, unpublished PhD, Reims. DAN, A. 2014: ‘Xenophon’s Anabasis and the Common Greek Mental Modelling of Spaces’, in K. GEUS / M. THIERING (eds.), Features of Common Sense Geography. Implicit Knowledge Structures in Ancient Geographical Texts, Zürich, 157–98. DAN, A. 2015: ‘Le Thermodon, fleuve des Amazones, du Pont-Euxin et de la Béotie: un cas d’homonymie géographique qui fait histoire’, in V. NAAS / M. MAHE-SIMON (eds.), De Samos à Rome: personnalité et influence de Douris, Paris, 157–93. DAN, A. 2016: ‘The Rivers Called Phasis’, AWE 15, 245–77. DANA, M. 2019: ‘Regards sur les Pont-Euxin: réflexions changeants d’un espace «colonial»’, in V. COJOCARU, / L. RUSCU / T. CASTELLI / A.-I. PAZSINT (eds.), Advances in Ancient Black Sea Studies. Historiography, Archaeology and Relgion, Cluj-Napoca, 55–78. DE SIENA, A.A. 2001: ‘Medea e Medos, eponimi della Media’, in G. TRAINA (ed.), Studi sull’ XI libro dei Geographika di Strabone, Lecce, 85–94. DEBIASI, D. 2020: Eumelo, la saga argonautica e dintorni. La documentazione papirologica, (Hesperìa. Studi sulla grecità in occidente 36), Milan. DIEHL, E. 1938: ‘Phasianoi’, RE 19.2, 1885f. (Corrigendum). DILKE, O.A.W. 1985: Greek and Roman Maps, London. DOUGHERTY, C. 1993: The Poetics of Colonization: From City to Text in Archaic Greece, New York. DRÄGER, P. 2001: Die Argonautika des Apollonios Rhodios. Das zweite Zorn-Epos der griechischen Literatur, Leipzig. DUECK, D. 2000: Strabo of Amasia : a Greek man of letters in Augustan Rome, London. DUECK, D. (ed.) 2017: The Routledge Companion to Strabo, Abingdon. EHRHARDT, N. 1988: Milet und seine Kolonien, 2nd ed. Frankfurt a.M. EHRHARDT, N. 1999. ‘Ktistai in den Argonautika des Apollonios Rhodios. Beobachtungen zur Entwicklung von Gründungstraditionen in Kyzikos, Kios, Herakleia Pontike und Sinope’, in Asia Minor Studien 16: Studien zum antiken Kleinasien, Bonn, 23–46.
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EMIR, O. 2022: ‘Piracy Activities Along the Eastern Black Sea Coasts in Antiquity, and A People Who Made Their Living by Pirating: Heniochoi’, Phaselis 8, 83–95. http://dx.doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.6954297. ENDSJØ, D.Ø. 1997: ‘Placing the Unplaceable: The Making of Apollonius’ Argonautic Geography’, GRBS 38.4, 373–85. ENGELS, J. 1999: Augusteische Oikumenegeographie und Universalhistorie im Werk Strabons von Amaseia, Stuttgart. FELLMETH, U. 2006: ‘Tabula Peutingeriana’, BNP online. FOX, R.L. 2004: The Long March. Xenophon and the Ten Thousand, New Haven. GANTZ, T. 1993: Early Greek Myth. A Guide to Literary and Artistic Sources, Baltimore. GAUTIER-DALCHÉ, P. 2003: ‘The Medieval and Renaissance Transmission of the Tabula Peutingeriana’, in F. PRONTERA (ed.), Tabula Peutingeriana. Le Antiche Vie del Mondo, Florence, 43– 52. GEUS, K. / THIERING, M. (eds.) 2012: Features of Common Sense Geography. Implicit Knowledge Structures in Ancient Geographical Texts, Berlin. GEUS, K. / GUCKELSBERGER, K. 2017: ‘Measurement Data in Strabo’s Geography’, in DUECK 2017, 165–77. HAWES, G. 2017: Myths on the Map. The Storied Landscapes of Ancient Greece, Oxford. HEINEN, H. 2011: ‘Kaisareia und Agrippeia: das Tor zur Maiotis als augusteisches Monument’, in N. POVALAHEV / V. KUZNETSOV (eds.), Phanagoreia und seine historische Umwelt. Von den Anfängen der griechischen Kolonisation (8. Jh. v.Chr.) bis zum Chasarenreich (10. Jh. n.Chr.) (Altertümer Phanagoreias 2), Göttingen, 225–40. HIND, J.G.F. 2012: ‘Milesian and Sinopean Traders in Colchis (Greeks at Phasis and the Ransoming of Shipwrecked Sailors)’, in G.R. TSETSKHLADZe (ed.), The Black Sea, Paphlagonia, Pontus and Phrygia in Antiquity. Aspects of Archaeology and Ancient History, Oxford, 105–8. IRBY, G.L. 2019a: ‘Tracing the Orbis Terrarum from Tingentera’, in D.W. ROLLER (ed.), New Directions in the Study of Ancient Geography, 103–34. IVANTCHIK, A. 2005: Am Vorabend der Kolonisation. Das nördliche Schwarzmeergebiet und die Steppennomaden des 8.–7. Jhs v.Chr. in der klassischen Literaturtradition, mündlichen Überlieferung, Literatur und Geschichte, Berlin / Moscow, 2005. JANSSENS, E. 1967: Trébizonde en Colchide, Brussels. KEYßNER, K. 1941: ‘Phrixos (1)’, RE 19.1, 763–9. KIEßLING, E. 1912: ‘Gymnias’, RE 7.2, 2086f. KLEINEBERG, A., / MARX, C. / KNOBLOCH, E. / LELGEMANN, D. 2010/11: Germania und die Insel Thule. Die Entschlüsselung von Ptolemaios’ “Atlas der Oikumene”, Darmstadt 2010, 2nd ed. 2011. KUIN, I.N.I. 2017: ‘Rewriting Family History: Strabo and the Mithridatic Wars’, Phoenix 71.1–2, 102–18. KÜLZER, A. 2020: ‘Kleinasien in der Tabula Peutingeriana: Reale und fiktionale Kommunikationswege zwischen Ephesos und Ankara’, Orbis Terrarum 18, 125–45. LEBEDEV, A.V. 2021: ‘Indo-Aryan Names in the Saga of Argonauts. Onomastics of Colchis and Greek Inscription of the Northern Black Sea Region’, in Indo-European Linguistics and Classical Philology XXV (1). Proceedings of the 25th Conference in Memory of Professor Joseph M. Tronsky, June 21–23, 2021, St. Petersburg, 728–82 (in Russian, with extended English abstract on pp. 728–30). LENDLe, O. 1995: Kommentar zu Xenophons Anabasis, Darmstadt. Levi, A. / Levi, M. 1967: Itineraria picta, contributo allo studio della Tabula Peutingeriana, Rome. LICCARDO, S. 2020: ‘Geography of Otherness. Ethnonyms and non-Roman Spaces in the Tabula Peutingeriana’, Orbis Terrarum 18, 147–65. LICHELI, V. 2016: ‘Geoarchaeology of Phasis (Georgia) – Géoarchéologie du Phasis (Géorgie)’, Méditerranée 126, 119–28. LORDKIPANIDZE, O. 1991: ‘Vani: An Ancient City of Colchis’, GRBS 32, 151–95.
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Fig. 1: Satellite image showing the effect of sedimentation up to 30 km offshore along the coast from Gonio to Ochamchire. Photograph (2007) by courtesy oft he European Space Agency (ESA): https://www.esa.int/ESA_Multimedia/Images/2007/05/Georgia.
Fig. 2: Ancient Kolchian Littoral from Apsaros to Herakleia. http://www.altaycoskun.com/map-black-sea-07.
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Fig. 3: The Phasis / Rioni / Kvirila, The Araxes / Aras and the Riverscape of Kolchis-IberiaArmenia. http://www.altaycoskun.com/map-black-sea-03.
Fig. 4: Tabula Peutingeriana, Segment IX, ed. K. MILLER
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Fig. 5: Tabula Peutingeriana, Segment IX/X, ed. K. MILLER
Fig. 6: Tabula Peutingeriana, Segment X/XI, ed. K. MILLER
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Fig. 7: Tabula Peutingeriana, Segment XI/XII, ed. K. MILLER
Fig. 8: Tabula Peutingeriana, Segment XII, ed. K. MILLER
OÙ EST L’ISTHME DE L’ὙΛΛΙΚΗ ΧΕΡΡΟΝΗΣΟΣ? Patrick Counillon Abstract: The words isthmos and chersonesos were commonly used by ancient geographers, but the associated landscape was difficult to describe, most of all in periplographic literature. Even the common association of these words with the image of the Corinthian isthmus and its connection to the Peloponnesus is full of ambiguities. In the case of the Adriatic Eastern coast, ancient geographers like [Skylax], [Scymnus] and Dionysius Periegetes used the word chersonesos to compare the Primošten peninsula with the Peloponnesus for nautical, economic or literary reasons. In doing so, they ended up adding an isthmus to the peninsula, inventing a new and imaginary landscape which gained an existence of its own, even in the XIXth century scholarly cartography. Keywords: Adriatic, Illyria, [Scylax], [Scymnus], Dionysius Periegetes. 1. Qu’est-ce qu’un isthme? Comme l’a montré F. Prontera, la multiplicité de ses champs d’application fait du mot ἰσθμός une source de contradictions et de confusions dans le domaine des descriptions géographiques, ce qui tient à “la triplice valenza – topografica, corografica ed ecumenica- del concetto”.1 Si l'on s’en tient aux définitions des lexicographes, le mot ἰσθμός désigne un passage étroit, une langue de terre, qui réunit deux masses continentales;2 mais ἰσθμός désigne aussi une partie du corps, le cou ou la gorge dès l’époque homérique, et, géographiquement, comme αὐχήν, il peut même être utilisé pour un bras de mer.3 Pour tenter d’en préciser le sens je passerai d’abord par ce dernier mot, αὐχήν, et son usage chez Hérodote: pour celui-ci, outre le sens commun de “nuque”, “cou”, αὐχήν désigne un détroit montagneux, la partie la plus étroite de la Chersonèse de Thrace, la pointe du delta de l’Istros, la partie la plus étroite du Bosphore, mais aussi tout le Bosphore par opposition au Pont d’un côté, et à la Propontide de
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PRONTERA 1993. Pour un élargissement de la question et sa mise en perspective dans l'histoire de la géographie ancienne, MARCOTTE 2019. Et.Gen., s.v., ἰσθμὸς μὲν γάρ ἐστι γῆς στενῆς δίοδος, ἑκατέρωθεν θαλάσσῃ περιεχόμενος, πορθμὸς δὲ στενὸς θαλάσσης πόρος ἑκατέρωθεν ὑπγῆς περιεχόμενος. CHANTRAINE, 1977, s. ἰσθμός, p. 469–70; LSJ, s.v.
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l’autre;4 enfin et surtout, dans le cadre de cette comparaison à ἰσθμός, c’est le mot qu’Hérodote utilise pour décrire le resserrement de la péninsule anatolienne au niveau de la vallée de l’Halys:5 s’il n’a donc pas de spécificité terrestre ou maritime, le mot αὐχήν décrit le point le plus étroit d’un passage, pont, défilé, détroit, souscontinent.6 Toujours chez Hérodote, le mot ἰσθμός est, lui, spécifiquement, l’appendice terrestre reliant une chersonèse (une presqu’île), à la terre ferme: c’est le cas de la péninsule de Cnide, de l’isthme qui relie la Chersonèse de Thrace à la terre ferme, de celui qui relie le mont Athos au continent, et bien sûr de l’isthme de Corinthe:7 la principale fonction de ces isthmes est le passage, y compris s’il s’agit de l’empêcher en les fortifiant, ou de les percer (d’un canal pour faciliter le passage d’une flotte, ou pour transformer la chersonèse en île).8 Αὐχήν désigne donc la partie étroite d’un passage, alors qu’ἰσθμός en soulignera la fonction. Chez Strabon, αὐχήν est pareillement utilisé pour désigner le “cou” de l’isthme, sa partie la plus étroite, comme dans la description de la Carrière d’Achille.9 Et il utilise, comme Hérodote, le mot ἰσθμός dans ce que Prontera appelle son sens “topographique”, par exemple pour l’isthme de Corinthe, bien sûr, ou pour Carthage ou Sinope.10 Mais chez Strabon on observe aussi la généralisation de l’usage cartographique du mot ἰσθμός, qu’il soit chorographique ou écuménique, et en particulier pour l’αὐχήν anatolien d’Hérodote, qu’il appelle systématiquement ἰσθμός.11 Prontera souligne très justement que la source de cette généralisation est à chercher chez Éphore, dont la description géographique, utilisant la mer comme guide, implique naturellement la valorisation d’isthmes d’une mer à l’autre pour la construction cartographique de sa description de la Grèce comme un emboîtement
Respectivement, Hdt. 7.223 (Thermopyles), 6.37 (Chersonèse de Thrace), 4.89 (Istros), 4.118 (détroit du Bosphore), 4.85 (Bosphore). 5 Hdt. 1.72, ἔστι δὲ αὐχὴν οὗτος τῆς χώρης ταύτης ἁπάσης. 6 Chez Xen. An. 6.4.3, il est utilisé pour décrire la jonction de Calpè avec le continent (il ne parle pas d’isthme), et plus tard par Ptolémée pour définir la partie la plus étroite de la Pallènè (Geog. 3.2.10). 7 Cnide, Hdt. 1.174; Chersonèse 6.36; Athos, 7.22–4; isthme de Corinthe, quarante fois dans les livres 7 à 9. 8 Thuc. 3.81.1, καὶ ὑπερενεγκόντες τὸν Λευκαδίων ἰσθμὸν τὰς ναῦς, ὅπως μὴ περιπλέοντες ὀφθῶσιν, ἀποκομίζονται. Chez Thucydide (qui n’utilise pas αὐχήν), l’usage d’ἰσθμός est le même que chez Hérodote, v. PRONTERA 1986, 299. 9 Strab. 7.3.19 C 307, ὁ Ἀχίλλειος δρόμος, ἁλιτενὴς χερρόνησος· ἔστι γὰρ ταινία τις ὅσον χιλίων σταδίων μῆκος ἐπὶ τὴν ἕω, πλάτος δὲ τὸ μέγιστον δυεῖν σταδίων, ἐλάχιστον τεττάρων πλέθρων, διέχουσα τῆς ἑκατέρωθεν τοῦ αὐχένος ἠπείρου σταδίους ἑξήκοντα, ἀμμώδης, ὕδωρ ἔχουσα ὀρυκτόν· κατὰ μέσην δ' ὁ τοῦ ἰσθμοῦ αὐχὴν ὅσον τετταράκοντα σταδίων· τελευτᾷ δὲ πρὸς ἄκραν ἣν Ταμυράκην καλοῦσιν, ἔχουσαν ὕφορμον βλέποντα πρὸς τὴν ἤπειρον. 10 Carthage, Strab. 17.3.14 C 832; Sinope, Strab. 12.3.11 C 545, ἵδρυται γὰρ ἐπὶ αὐχένι χερρονήσου τινός, ἑκατέρωθεν δὲ τοῦ ἰσθμοῦ λιμένες καὶ ναύσταθμα καὶ πηλαμυδεῖα θαυμαστά. 11 Strab. 2.5.24 C 126; 11.1.7 C 492; 12.1.3 C 534; 14.1.1 C 632; Strab. 14.3.1 C 664; 14.5.11 C 673; 14.5.22, C 677; 14.5.24 C 678.
4
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de chersonèses, déterminées par une succession d’isthmes de plus en plus longs.12 Prontera souligne le rôle cartographique des isthmes ainsi déterminés. Avec Éphore, cette nouvelle définition entre dans le vocabulaire géographique puisque Théopompe y a recours avec son isthme adriatico-pontique (voir infra); et que, dans la Périégèse iambique, l’αὐχήν anatolien est défini comme ἰσθμωδέστατον.13 La généralisation du mot ἰσθμός caractérise donc un point de vue particulier à la géographie écuménique, mais l’idée qu’un isthme est défini par les mers qui le baignent devient apparemment si commune que Denys d’Alexandrie peut utiliser le mot à propos de l’Italie ceinturée par trois mers.14 Pour autant, l’ἰσθμός de Corinthe, isthme physique, mais aussi région et point d’entrée vers la chersonèse du Péloponnèse en reste l’image-type, l’ἰσθμός par excellence des Grecs, qui, depuis l’Acrocorinthe, donne une vue simultanée sur les deux mers séparées par l’isthme, ce qui permet à F. Prontera d’en illustrer trois définitions qu'on ne peut que paraphraser: on pourra parler de cités ishmiques sur le plan topographique, de régions délimitées par des isthmes sur le plan chorographique, et, sur le plan écuménique, de continents déterminés grâce aux isthmes.15 2. L’isthme et le périple La contextualisation de l’usage du mot dans le discours géographique des Anciens, permet d’apporter quelques nuances complémentaires. La description cartographique, adopte un point de vue aérien – une façon devenue naturelle pour nous à travers les images des satellites, tant au niveau régional qu’au niveau continental: cette utilisation du terme, qui procède par agrandissement de l’image spécifique d’un isthme jusqu’à l’échelle de l’oikoumène, est de nature paradigmatique, un jeu métaphorique sur le signifié d’ἰσθμός, comme la comparaison de la nuque à un isthme dans les descriptions du corps humain.16 Lorsque la description est topographique, usage que le géographe partage avec l’historien, elle individualise le lieu où l’isthme est situé, et en décrit les particularités physiques, comme le fait Strabon à propos de la presqu’île de Sinope, ou comme [Skylax] pour la Pallènè ou 12 Strab. 8.1.3 C 335–6: Isthme de Corinthe 40 stades; de Mégaride, 120 stades; isthme CrissaThermopyles, 550 stades; Ambracie-Thermopyles 800 stades; Ambracie-Golfe Thermaïque, 1000 stades, cf. PRONTERA 1986, 297. 13 [Scymn.] 921–7, Κατὰ τὴν πόλιν ταύτην δὲ τῆς Ἀσίας σχεδόν / στενότατος αὐχήν ἐστιν εἰς τὸν Ἰσσικόν /κόλπον διήκων τήν τ' Ἀλεξανδρούπολιν, / τῷ Μακεδόνι κτισθεῖσαν· ἡμερῶν δ' ὁδόν / εἰς τὴν Κιλικίαν ἑπτὰ τῶν πασῶν ἔχει· /τὸ τῆς Ἀσίας λέγεται γὰρ ἰσθμωδέστατον /εἰς τὸν περὶ αὐτὸν ὄντα συνάγεσθαι μυχόν. 14 DP 98: elle est ailleurs définie comme ἄκρη, 339. Cet usage métaphorique montre sa banalisation, Lucian. Hist. conscr. 7, ἀγνοοῦντες ὡς οὐ στενῷ τῷ ἰσθμῷ διώρισται καὶ διατετείχισται ἡ ἱστορία πρὸς τὸ ἐγκώμιον. 15 PRONTERA 1986, 301. 16 [Long.] sublim. 32.5, τὴν μὲν κεφαλὴν αὐτοῦ φησιν ἀκρόπολιν, ἰσθμὸν δὲ μέσον διῳκοδομῆσθαι μεταξὺ τοῦ στήθους τὸν αὐχένα, σφονδύλους τε ὑπεστηρίχθαι φησὶν οἷον στρόφιγγας, καὶ τὴν μὲν ἡδονὴν ἀνθρώποις εἶναι κακοῦ δέλεαρ, γλῶσσαν δὲ γεύσεως δοκίμιον.
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pour le site de Cyzique.17 Mais chez les géographes, le mot ἰσθμός est également utilisé dans un discours non pas cartographique ou chorographique, mais périplographique. Dans un périple, comme on l’a vu, l’isthme n’est plus un lieu de passage, mais un obstacle qu’il faut contourner ou franchir par un canal ou un diolkos, comme à Corinthe.
Fig. 1. L’isthme de Sinope depuis la Chersonèse, photo de l’a.
Fig. 2. Sinope et sa presqu'île depuis Aklimanı (Armènè), photo de l’a.
17 Strab. 12.3.11 C 545. [Scylax] §66, Pallènè, Παλλήνη ἄκρα μακρὰ εἰς τὸ πέλαγος ἀνατείνουσα καὶ πόλεις αἵδε ἐν τῇ Παλλήνῃ Ἑλληνίδες· Ποτίδαια ἐν τῷ μέσῳ τὸν ἰσθμὸν ἐμφράττουσα,… Κανάστραιον τῆς Παλλήνης ἱερὸν ἀκρωτήριον. Ἔξω δὲ τοῦ ἰσθμοῦ πόλεις αἵδε…; § 94, Cyzique, καὶ πόλις Πλακία καὶ Κύζικος ἐν τῷ ἰσθμῷ ἐμφράττουσα τὸν ἰσθμὸν, καὶ ἐντὸς τοῦ ἰσθμοῦ Ἀρτάκη.
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Il arrive que le périple détaille les deux parcours, le parcours terrestre et le parcours maritime.18 Mais pour des descriptions moins précises, par exemple lorsque le périple est un catalogue ethnographique, le périplographe peut se contenter de répéter le nom du même peuple de part et d’autre d’un isthme occupé par un autre peuple, ou une autre cité, comme [Skylax] le fait pour les Scythes, de part et d’autre de la Chersonèse Taurique.19 3. La chersonèse des Hylloi C’est également ce qu’il fait pour le peuple des Boulinoi de part et d’autre de la chersonèse des Hylloi en Illyrie, sur laquelle désormais nous nous arrêterons. 3.1 La chersonèse des Hylloi dans le Périple de [Skylax] 22 Dans le Périple, l’Illyrie s’étend du sud de la Liburnie jusqu’à la côte de Chaônie qui fait face à Corcyre.20 Dans la progression linéraire du périple, après les Hierastamnai sont nommés les Boulinoi, puis viennent les Hyllinoi/Hylloi habitants de la chersonèse, puis reviennent les mêmes Boulinoi au moment où la description retrouve le continent:21 leur nom revient à l’arrivée au détroit d’Otrante, confirmant leur position littorale sur la côte illyrienne.22 Le périple proprement dit a été enrichi 18 [Scylax] §110, Ἀπὸ δὲ Νέας πόλεώς ἐστιν εἰς ἰσθμὸν στάδια ρπʹ πεζῇ πρὸς τὴν ἑτέραν θάλασσαν τὴν πρὸς Καρχηδόνα. Ἔστι δὲ ἀκτὴ, δι' ἧς ἰσθμός ἐστι. Παράπλους ἀπὸ τοῦ ποταμοῦ ἐντεῦθεν εἰς Καρχηδόνα ἥμισυ ἡμέρας. 19 [Scylax] §68, Μετὰ δὲ Θρᾴκην εἰσὶ Σκύθαι ἔθνος. Ἐπὶ δὲ τῇ Σκυθικῇ ἐποικοῦσι Ταῦροι ἔθνος ἀκρωτήριον τῆς ἠπείρου· εἰς θάλατταν δὲ τὸ ἀκρωτήριόν ἐστιν… Μετὰ δὲ ταῦτά εἰσι Σκύθαι πάλιν. 20 [Scylax] §22: ΙΛΛΥΡΙΟΙ. Μετὰ δὲ Λιβυρνούς εἰσιν Ἰλλυριοὶ ἔθνος, καὶ παροικοῦσιν οἱ Ἰλλυριοὶ παρὰ θάλατταν μέχρι Χαονίας τῆς κατὰ Κέρκυραν τὴν Ἀλκινόου νῆσον. Καὶ πόλις ἐστὶν Ἑλληνὶς ἐνταῦθα, ᾗ ὄνομα Ἡράκλεια, καὶ λιμήν. Εἰσὶ δὲ καὶ οἱ λωτοφάγοι καλούμενοι βάρβαροι οἵδε· Ἱεραστάμναι, Βουλινοὶ, Ὑλλινοί Βουλινῶν ὁμοτέρμονες. Ὕλλοι. Οὗτοι δέ φασιν Ὕλλον τὸν Ἡρακλέους αὐτοὺς κατοικίσαι· εἰσὶ δὲ βάρβαροι. Κατοικοῦσι δὲ χερρόνησον ὀλίγῳ ἐλάσσω τῆς Πελοποννήσου. Ἀπὸ δὲ χερρονήσου †παραστόνιον† ὀρθόν· ταύτην παροικοῦσι Βουλινοί. Βουλινοὶ δ' εἰσὶν ἔθνος Ἰλλυρικόν. Παράπλους δ' ἐστὶ τῆς Βουλινῶν χώρας ἡμέρας μακρᾶς ἐπὶ Νέστον ποταμόν. Illyriens. Après les Liburnoi vient le peuple des Illyriens, et les Illyriens habitent le long de la mer jusqu'à la région de Chaônie qui fait face à Corcyre, l'île d'Alkinoos. Et il y a là une cité grecque du nom d'Hérakléia et son port. Il y a également les barbares que l'on appelle Lotophages que voici: Hierastamnai, Boulinoi, Hyllinoi voisins des Boulinoi. Hylloi: ces gens disent qu'ils ont été installés par Hyllos fils d'Héraclès, mais ce sont des barbares. Ils habitent une chersonèse un peu plus petite que le Péloponnèse. À partir de la chersonèse, la côte s'avance sur une courte distance tout droit: elle est habitée par les Boulinoi; les Boulinoi sont un peuple illyrien. La durée de la navigation le long du territoire des Boulinoi jusqu'au golfe du Nestos est d'une journée longue. 21 Une notice sur les Hylloi a été intégrée dans le périple à partir d’une source complémentaire – ce qui explique le doublon Ὑλλινοί / Ὕλλοι. 22 [Skylax] § 27, Οἱ δὲ (Ἀμαντιεῖς) εἰσὶ μέχρι ἐνταῦθα Ἰλλυριοὶ ἀπὸ Βουλινῶν. Τὸ δὲ στόμα τοῦ Ἰονίου κόλπου ἐστὶν ἀπὸ Κεραυνίων ὀρῶν μέχρι ἄκρας Ἰαπυγίας.
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de deux notices. L’une, à caractère ethnographique, explique vraisemblablement le doublon Ὑλλινοί/Ὕλλοι. La seconde, κατοικοῦσι δὲ χερρόνησον ὀλίγῳ ἐλάσσω τῆς Πελοποννήσου, signale la présence d’une péninsule “à peine moins grande que le Péloponnèse”, ce qui est considérable, à la fois par la dimension suggérée et par la signification géographique de cette comparaison: elle vise à donner un ordre de grandeur, mentionne une chersonèse, et ne dit rien d’un isthme qui la relierait au continent.23
Fig. 3. Carte Ps. Skylax, Illyrie (Y. Marion, ad COUNILLON 2006, Fig. 1. p. 28).
3. 2. La chersonèse des Hylloi dans la Périégèse iambique Une notice similaire se retrouve dans la Périégèse iambique de [Scymnos] (120– 110 a. C).24 On relève, certes, quelques différences notables: il s’agit d’une région intermédiaire entre Liburnie et Illyrie; les Boulinoi ne sont mentionnés qu’une fois, avant les Hylloi – le Ps.-Scymnos n’est pas un périplographe, mais un périégète, et 23 Pour une analyse de cette partie du Périple, COUNILLON 2006, 19–29. 24 [Scymnos] Périégèse iambique 404–15: Τούτοις συνάπτον δ' ἐστὶ Βουλινῶν ἔθνος·/ἑξῆς δὲ μεγάλη χερρόνησος Ὑλλική/πρὸς τὴν Πελοπόννησόν τι ἐξισουμένη·/πόλεις δ' ἐν αὐτῇ φασι πέντε καὶ δέκα/Ὕλλους κατοικεῖν, ὄντας Ἕλληνας γένει·/τὸν Ἡρακλέους γὰρ Ὕλλον οἰκιστὴν λαβεῖν,/ἐκβαρβαρωθῆναι δὲ τούτους τῷ χρόνῳ/τοῖς ἔθεσιν ἱστοροῦσι τοῖς τῶν πλησίον,/ὥς φασι Τίμαιός τε κἀρατοσθένης./Νῆσος κατ' αὐτοὺς δ' ἔστιν Ἴσσα λεγομένη,/Συρακοσίων ἔχουσα τὴν ἀποικίαν./Ἡ δ' Ἰλλυρὶς μετὰ ταῦτα …, à ces derniers [Liburniens] touche le peuple des Boulinoi et, dans la suite, il y a l’imposante péninsule Hyllique, qui au Péloponnèse peut s’assimiler. On dit qu’elle compte quinze villes, peuplées par les Hylloi, qui sont de souche grecque; la tradition rapporte en effet que le fils d’Héraclès, Hyllos, est leur oeciste, mais qu’avec le temps ce peuple a pris de ses voisins les coutumes barbares, comme le signalent Timée et Ératosthène, éd. et trad. MARCOTTE 2000, 401; il relève ad loc qu'Ératosthène reprenait la même comparaison et trouve la source de ce passage chez Apollodore, 268.
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son catalogue a des perspectives historiques et ethnographiques, secondairement géographiques. Mais on retrouve l’aition ethnographique, et l’assimilation de la chersonèse au Péloponnèse, l’imposante péninsule Hyllique, qui au Péloponnèse peut s’assimiler. On soulignera que, chez les deux auteurs, l’assimilation de la chersonèse des Hylloi au Péloponnèse ne porte pas sur sa forme (une feuille de platane, par exemple), mais sur ses dimensions, qu’elle soit décrite comme un peu plus petite pour l’un (ὀλίγῳ ἐλάσσω), ou à peu près égale pour l’autre (πρὸς τὴν Πελοπόννησόν τι ἐξισουμένη). L’auteur de la notice originale, quel qu’il soit, cherchait à donner à son lecteur un ordre de grandeur. En réalité, comme on va le voir, c’est l’obstacle qu’elle présente à la navigation qui explique son assimilation au Péloponnèse. 4. Les origines de la chersonèse des Hylloi Il est en effet assez difficile pour un cartographe de repérer une péninsule particulière dans cette région de l’Adriatique, et encore bien moins une péninsule de l’étendue du Péloponnèse, ce qui explique les hésitations des commentateurs modernes sur sa délimitation. En revanche, les historiens et les archéologues qui s’y sont intéressés, en particulier M. C. d’Ercole et nos collègues croates, en particulier Slobodan Čače,25 ont bien expliqué l’obstacle qu’avait représenté cette partie de la côte pour la pénétration grecque dans le nord de l’Adriatique. Les Grecs, arrivés par la côte occidentale, se sont établis dès la fin du VIe siècle à Atria et Spina. Par contre, sur la côte orientale, leur progression s’arrête alors à Issa. Comme l’écrit M. C. d’Ercole, après la fondation d’Épidamne vers 627 et Apollonia vers 600, “Les contacts entre Grecs et populations adriatiques … sont plutôt le produit de relations commerciales nouées depuis la fin de l’âge du Bronze dans la lagune vénète, autour du delta du Pô et dans l’Adriatique centrale et méridionale”.26 Au nord d’Issa, une double barrière culturelle et géographique se présentait à la navigation: il fallait aux bateaux obliquer vers l’ouest, soit pour entreprendre une navigation à longue distance en mer ouverte dans la zone maritime qui sépare les îles Dalmates centrales des îles plus nordiques de Zadar et Šibenik, soit pour basculer vers la côte occidentale de l’Adriatique. L’obstacle qui s’opposait à la navigation côtière sur la côte orientale, et dont le premier rempart est la péninsule de Primošten, représentait une barrière tout aussi importante que le Péloponnèse, qu’il fallait contourner pour arriver au fond du golfe, comme on contourne le cap Malée pour arriver au golfe de Corinthe. Il faut attendre Pline pour que la péninsule des Hylloi reçoive une dimension plus précise.27
25 Notre collègue nous a quitté l’an dernier, et je suis heureux d’avoir l’occasion de saluer ici sa mémoire. 26 D’ERCOLE 2005, 166–7. 27 Plin. HN 3.141, promunturium Diomedis uel, ut alii, paeninsula Hyllis circuitu C, Tragurium ciuium Romanorum.
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La zone d’Issa représentait donc un point d’articulation privilégié pour la navigation, signalé par les cultes de l’île (ou des îles) de Diomède, les îles Termile et surtout Palagruža.28 L’île de Diomède trouve d’ailleurs son pendant sur la péninsule des Hylloi au début du IVe s. avec la fondation du temple de Diomède au cap Ploča, fondation que Čače et Šešelj attribuent à Issa.29 Et de fait, comme l’a montré Čače, la tradition d’Hyllos est corcyréenne, et les traditions dont se fait l’écho [Scymnos], doivent être associées aux tentatives de Corcyre du début du VIe au deuxième tiers du Ve.30
Fig. 4. Routes maritimes en Adriatique, C. Finetin (ad D’ERCOLE 2006, fig. 7, p. 101).
28 D’ERCOLE 2006. 29 Sur le culte de Diomède dans cette région de l'Adriatique, KIRIGIN, B./ČAČE, S. 1998; ČAČE, S./ŠEŠELJ, L. 2005; D’ERCOLE 2018. 30 ČACĚ , S. 2015 souligne qu’Issa est rattachée chez [Scymnos] à la péninsule des Hylloi, alors que Pharos et Kerkyra Melaina le sont à l’Illyrie.
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Pour conclure cet excursus historique et en revenir aux questions de terminologie, on comprend bien que dans nos textes, la comparaison entre les deux chersonèses portait sur leur similitude fonctionnelle d’obstacle à la navigation, et sur la similitude supposée de leur étendue, et non sur leur forme (qui aurait donné à la péninsule des Hylloi une forme comparable à la forme de feuille de platane à laquelle on rapporte ordinairement le Péloponnèse), et encore moins sur la présence d’un isthme similaire à l’isthme de Corinthe, qui n’est mentionné par aucun des deux géographes. 5. L’invention d’un isthme Mais cette identification au Péloponnèse a fini par pourvoir la péninsule des Hylloi d’un isthme, chez un autre géographe, Denys d’Alexandrie, au IIe s. p. C.31 Comme dans la Périégèse iambique, il s’agit d’un territoire intermédiaire entre la Liburnie et l’Illyrie. Les Boulimeis (Boulinoi) sont ici mentionnés après les Hylleis, font partie d’un même ensemble géographique et sont sans doute sur le continent, comme chez les autres géographes. Mais l’interprétation cartographique est difficile, sinon impossible: où est l’isthme auquel toute la terre fortifiée des Hylleis s’accote? L’hémistiche ὅση παρακέκλιται ἰσθμῷ est emprunté à l’Hymne à Délos de Callimaque (h 4, 72): ce vers décrit la fuite des îles qui refusent de donner asile à Létô, et en particulier le Péloponnèse, φεῦγε δ'ὅλη Πελοπηὶς ὅση παρακέκλιται ἰσθμῷ, et fuyait toute la terre de Pélops, proche de l'isthme, désignant ainsi, à l’évidence, l’isthme de Corinthe: la correspondance terme à terme entre Denys et Callimaque implique que les Hylloi occupent une péninsule reliée au continent par un isthme, aussi caractérisé que l’isthme de Corinthe. Chez les prédécesseurs de Denys, la comparaison de la chersonèse des Hylloi au Péloponnèse visait à donner une idée de la dimension de celle-ci - bien que cette dimension fût surévaluée pour des raisons autres que géographiques, on vient de le voir. Mais Denys reprend la comparaison en pourvoyant la chersonèse d’un isthme qu’il invente par jeu littéraire, par ignorance de la réalité géographique, et prégnance de l’image stéréotypée de l’isthme de Corinthe. Pour ajouter à la confusion, le vers suivant mentionne une Ἰλλυρικὴν χέρσον: le mot χέρσον, dans la langue poétique est un équivalent de χθών ou d’ἤπειρος: ce pourrait être la “terre d’Illyrie”. Toutefois, ce mot est hapax chez Denys, ce qui suggère qu’il mentionne bien une chersonèse, mais pas la péninsule des Hylloi de 31 Denys le Périégète, 384–97, κεῖθεν δ' εἰς αὐγὰς στρεπτὴ περισύρεται ἅλμη / θῖνας ὑποξύουσα Λιβυρνίδας, ἀμφί τ' ἐρυμνὴν / Ὑλλήων χθόνα πᾶσαν ὅση παρακέκλιται ἰσθμῷ, / Βουλιμέων τ' ἀκτάς· ἐπὶ δ' ἄσπετον ὁλκὸν ἄγουσα, / Ἰλλυρικὴν ἐπὶ χέρσον ἑλίσσεται ἄχρι κολώνης /οὐρέων τ' ἠλιβάτων, τὰ Κεραύνια κικλήσκουσιν. À partir de là, la mer infléchit son cours vers l’orient en rongeant les grèves de Liburnie, et autour de toute la terre fortifiée des Hylleis aussi loin qu’elle s’accote à l’isthme, et des côtes des Boulimeis; traçant ensuite un immense sillon, elle s'enroule à chersonèse illyrienne jusqu'au promontoire d’inaccessibles montagnes qu’on nomme monts Kérauniens.
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[Scylax] et de [Scymnos], puisque celle-ci appartient à une portion plus septentrionale de la côte. Le mot doit donc désigner la partie de l’Illyrie méridionale dont la façade donne sur la côte adriatique, entre Split et Oricum (Ὠρικός), au nord-est de la Grèce. S’il faut donner au mot son sens géographique on y trouvera donc un souvenir de Théopompe (FGrH 115 F 130) qui faisait de l’Illyrie un isthme entre Adriatique et Pont-Euxin, v. Marcotte ad [Scymn.] 371, ὡς δὴ συνισθμίζουσα πρὸς τὴν Ποντικήν, p. 197–8, comme le confirme Strab. 7.5.9 C 317 = Théopompe FGrH 115 F 129.32 Dans la Périégèse, il est possible que cette chersonèse corresponde à la région décrite aux vers 320–30, qui cataloguent les peuples du sud de l’Istros jusqu’à la Thrace pontique depuis les Alpes, et d’y trouver un parallèle entre le balayage du nord de la Grèce des v. 428–33 et l’isthme qu’Éphore trace du golfe Thermaïque au golfe d’Ambracie.33 6. Postérité On reconnaît dans ces vers du Périégète l'une des acrobaties littéraires dont il fait ses délices, et sa géographie faite de mots et de toponymes associés, ingénieurs de paysages géographiques, une chersonèse, un aition, une merveille géographique, le mot dans sa créativité autonome prenant le dessus sur ce qu’il prétend décrire.34 Ces inventions sont moins anodines qu'il y paraît peut-être: lorsque C. Müller établit ses cartes pour le tome I des GGM, en 1855, la carte qu'il invente pour représenter l'Adriatique chez [Skylax] donne à la péninsule Hyllique non seulement les dimensions, mais aussi la forme du Péloponnèse, indubitablement sous l'influence de Denys le Périégète (qu'il cite dans sa note).
Fig. 5. La péninsule Hyllique chez [Scylax], C. MÜLLER, 1855, GGM III, Tabulae, Tab. III (extrait).
32 Sur cette question, BIANCHETTI 2012. 33 V. n. 12. 34 COUNILLON 2015; COUNILLON 2020.
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Mais c'est également la représentation qu'il donne de la péninsule Hyllique dans sa carte d'Ératosthène, puisqu'il pensait que celui-ci avait adopté l'opinion de Timée et Théopompe, comme d'ailleurs Berger en 1880 (ad F III B, 113, p. 355–8).35
Fig. 6. L’Adriatique dans la carte d’Eratosthène, MÜLLER/DÜBNER 1853, Strabonis Geographica, II, Tabulae, Tab. I
7. Conclusion générale Ces définitions successives de la péninsule des Hylloi dans les trois textes que j’ai envisagés n’enregistrent pas les progrès de la connaissance de l’Adriatique, par exemple après que la Méditerranée fut devenue un lac romain. Les mots ont eu leur vie propre, et ont inventé un paysage, aussi bien par métaphore – avec les ambiguïtés de la comparaison (dimension, rôle), et des changements d’échelle (isthmes de ville et de continent); que par métonymie, le mot chersonèse engendrant syntactiquement un isthme pour la création d’un nouveau paysage complexe.
Patrick Counillon [email protected]
35 Je remercie vivement F. Prontera de son aide, tant scientifique que matérielle, dans l'élaboration de ce passage.
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Bibliographie BIANCHETTI, S. (2012), L’Adriatico nella „carta“ alessandrina/Jadran u aleksdrijskoj „karti“, in: Adriatico/Jadran, Rivista di cultura tra le due sponde, 1/2 2012, 16–32. ČAČE, S./ŠEŠELJ, L. (2005), Finds from the Diomedes' sanctuary on the cape Ploča: new contributions to the discussion about the Hellenistic period on the east Adriatic, in: Illyrica Antiqua, 2005, Zagreb, 183–5. ČAČE, S. (2015), The Adriatic Islands in the Periegesis of Pseudo-Scymnus: Two remarks, in: Miscellanea Hadriatica et Mediterranea 2, 2015, 9-23 (en croate et en anglais). CHANTRAINE, P. (2009), Dictionnaire Étymologique de la langue grecque. Histoire des mots, Paris. COUNILLON, P. (2006), Le Périple du Ps.-Skylax et l'Adriatique (§17–24), in: S. ČAČE/A. KURILIĆ/F. TASSAUX (ed.), Les routes de l'Adriatique antique: géographie et économie: actes de la Table ronde du 18 au 22 septembre 2001, Zadar = Putovi antičkog Jadrana: geografija i gospodarstvo: radovi s Okruglog stola održanog u Zadru od 18. do 22. rujna 2001, Bordeaux, Ausonius éditions (Mémoires, 17), 19–29. COUNILLON, P. (2015), La Périégèse de Denys d’Alexandrie: langue géographique et poésie, in: F. J. GONZÁLEZ PONCE/F. J. GÓMEZ ESPELOSÍN/A. L. CHÁVEZ REINO (eds.): La letra y la carta: descripción verbal y representación gráfica en los diseños terrestres grecolatinos, Estudios en honor de Pietro Janni, Servicio de Publicaciones, Universidad de Alcalá de Henares, 259–74. COUNILLON, P. (2020), Pinax Dionysii, in: E. CASTRO-PÁEZ/G. CRUZ ANDREOTTI (eds.), Geografía y cartografía de la Antigüedad al Renacimiento. Estudios en honor de Francesco Prontera (Monografías de GAHIA, 6), Alcalá de Henarez/Sevilla 2020, 331–47. D’ERCOLE, M. C. (2005), Identités, mobilités et frontières dans la Méditerranée antique: l’Italie adriatique, VIIIe–Ve siècle avant J.-C., in: Annales. Histoire, Sciences sociales, Jan.-Fev. 2005, 60e Année, N° 1 (Cambridge University Press), 165–81. D’ERCOLE, M. C. (2006), Itinerari e scambi nell’Adriatico preromano (VIII–V sec. a. C), in: ČAČE/KURILIĆ/TASSAUX 2006, 91–106. D’ERCOLE, M. C. (2018), Isole, Promontori e oracoli. Circolazione marittima e culti nel medio e basso Adriatico (VI sec. a.C.-II sec. a.C.), in: G. DE BENEDETTI (ed.), Realtà medioadriatiche a confronto: contatti e scambi tra le due sponde, Atti del convegno. Termoli, 22–3 juillet 2016, Universita degli Studi del Molise, Campobaso (Lampo ed.), 11–22. KIRIGIN, B. /ČACĚ , S. (1998), Archaeological Evidence for the Cult of Diomedes in the Adriatic, in: Hesperia, 63–110. MARCOTTE, D. (ed.) (2000), Ps.-Scymnos, Circuit de la Terre (Géographes grecs, I). MARCOTTE, D. (ed.) (2000), Les fragments du Περὶ γῆς d’Apollodore d'Athènes (Géographes grecs, I, Appendice A, 266–70). MARCOTTE, D. (2019), De la physique à la géographie. Le cas des détroits dans la science grecque, in: F. DES BOSCS/Y. DEJUGNAT/A. HAUSHALTER (eds.), Le détroit de Gibraltar (Antiquité– Moyen Âge). I Représentations, perceptions, imaginaires, Madrid, 121–31. MÜLLER, C./F. DÜBNER (1853), Strabonis Geographicorum II, Paris. MÜLLER, C. (1855), GGM, Tabulae, pars prima, Paris. PRONTERA, F. (1986), Imagines Italiae. Sulle più antiche visualizzazioni e rappresentazioni geografiche dell'Italia, in: Athenaeum LXIV, 1986, 295–320. PRONTERA, F. (1993), Lo stretto di Messina nella tradizione geografica antica, in: Lo stretto crocevia di culture: atti del ventiseiesimo Convegno di Studi sulla Magna Grecia; Taranto, Reggio Calabria, 9–14 ottobre 1986 (Atti del Convegno di Studi sulla Magna Grecia, 26), Taranto, 107–31 (Appendice: porthmoí et póroi, 128–30).
OBSERVATIONS ON IG IV2 3 1803 THE TERM HELLAS AND THE ISTHMUS OF CORINTH*
Drusilla Firindelli Abstract: The famous inscription of Victorinus from the Isthmus of Corinth (IG IV2 3 1803) was found during a large excavation carried out in 1883 by Paul Monceaux at the South Gate of the Hexamilion, a 7,600 meter long wall across the Isthmus probably built during the reign of Theodosius II (408–450 AD) in order to preserve the Peloponnese from invasions. It records the restoration works at the fortification on the Isthmus carried out by the emperor Justinian (cf. also Prokop. aed. 4.2.27– 28). The inscription, probably inserted in the fortification wall, had already been found in the late Byzantine age during the restoration works carried out by Emperor Manuel II Palaiologos (1391–1425 AD). IG IV2 3 1803, placed at the heart of the Hellas/Achaia province, as portrayed in the Synecdemus, in a symbolically and strategically important place as the Isthmus, and whose dating could be restricted, according to most scholars, to years 548–554 AD, invokes the protection of God for the emperor, his faithful servant Victorinus and all those who live in Hellas (l. 7). This contribution aims to reflect on the possible value and meaning of the use of the term Hellas in the inscription not only in the context of Justinian’s age but especially in relation to its position on the Isthmus of Corinth. Keywords: Inscription, Victorinus, Isthmus of Corinth, Hexamilion, Hellas.
1. Introduction The idea for this short article stems from participation in a seminar on historical geography about Isthmus and Peninsulas. Directly related to this issue could be mentioned a rather famous inscription on a fortification wall along the Isthmus of Corinth restored under Emperor Justinian and already found in the late Byzantine age during the restoration works carried out by Emperor Manuel II Palaiologos (1391–1425 AD). 1 In this inscription (IG IV2 3 1803), the geographical term Hellas appears in l. 7. In fact, protection is invoked for those living in Hellas (τοῖς / οἰκοῦσειν ἐν Ἑλάδι). As we shall see later, it has been already pointed out that the *
1
I would like to thank Veronica Bucciantini (University of Florence) for allowing me to participate as a speaker in the Fourth Seminar on Historical Geography of the Ancient World, which was the occasion for the writing of this paper. Chr. Pasch. II, 254; Sphrantzes 4.1–2.
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term does not refer to the Peloponnese alone, but to the entire province of Achaia or Hellas. This hypothesis is largely confirmed by contemporary literary and historical-geographical sources, and should not be questioned. Given these premises, however, it is interesting to reflect on the value, the possible causes and consequences of the use of a term always referred elsewhere to a geographical area that has its northern borders at about the height of Thermopylae, but which here appears on a fortification that was in fact intended to protect only a part of the province of Hellas, the southern one, corresponding roughly to the Peloponnese. The purpose of these brief remarks is neither a detailed analysis of the palaeographic, historical-political aspects of the inscription nor of those relating to its support, which has already been accomplished in the numerous editions that have followed one another over time, from the 15th century up to the latest edition in the Inscriptiones Graecae in 2016. 2 Similarly, it is not our intention to provide an exhaustive presentation of the historical, geographical and political context of the Isthmus of Corinth, whose history spanning more than a thousand years would make such an operation impossible, as well as being beyond the scope of this paper. Therefore, only those aspects that are of interest will be presented, referring in the notes to the relevant bibliography. The aim is to stress how the peculiar meaning with which the term appears in IG IV2 3 1803 is probably justified by the geographical location of the inscription on the Isthmus of Corinth.
2. The archaeological context: the Isthmus region and the Hexamilion The Isthmus region, which connected Central Greece to the Peloponnese until the construction of the Canal in 1893, stretches from the Canal area in the north, to Mount Oneion in the south, from the settlement of Hexamilia in the west to the port of Kenchreai in the east. The site, inhabited as early as the Neolithic and Bronze Age, is best known as the site of the Panhellenic sanctuary dedicated to Poseidon and the site of the Isthmian games. It derives its importance from its privileged geographical location, between the two cities of Athens and Corinth. 3 2 3
IG IV2 3 1803. For a general presentation of the site, complete with photographs, plans and reconstructions of each monument, as well as a section on history and myth, see the webpage of the excavations conducted by the Michigan State University. (https://msuisthmia.org/) and University of Chicago (https://lucian.uchicago.edu/blogs/isthmia/). Modern excavations began in 1952 under the direction of O. Broneer (University of Chicago), and P. A. Clement (University of California, Los Angeles) has carried out exploration in the region since 1967. Research continued under E. Gebhard (University of Chicago) in 1976 and in 1987 T. E. Gregory (Ohio State University) was named to succeed Prof. Clement as Director at Isthmia. With this transition, Ohio State University undertook sponsorship of the excavation. In 2020, J. M. Frey and Michigan State University assumed the responsibility of continuing the work of Clement and Gregory. Reports of excavation campaigns conducted since 1952 are published in the journal Hesperia (see e.g. Hesperia 22, No. 3 Jul. – Sep. 1953, 182–95). Moreover, the American School of Classical Studies at Athens (ASCSA), under whose auspices the excavations take place, has published
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Already starting from the 15th century and then until the end of the 19th century, many travellers came to the area, attempting to recognize in the visible structures what was attested in the literary sources. 4 The importance of the site as a symbol of freedom, Greek unity, and its resistance against external enemies is not limited to the Classical, Hellenistic and Roman ages but continued into the Late Antique and Byzantine period, when its history and past were still to be well known and confirmed not only by historical and literary sources but also by the ruins of monuments from previous ages. Today, the scarcity of visible remains in the elevation, is linked precisely to its continuous attendance through the centuries. In the Late Antique and Byzantine period, Isthmia became the main bastion of the defence of southern Greece: in fact, probably during the reign of Theodosius II (408–450 AD), a wall was built along the Isthmus, known in later centuries as the Hexamilion (i.e., “six miles”) for the construction of which, requiring an enormous amount of material, many buildings of the sanctuary were demolished. In this context, the temple of Poseidon was demolished from the foundations. 5 The massive fortification, approximately 7,600 meters long, was a barrier wall (διατείχισμα) or lateral fortification stretching across the Isthmus of Corinth, 6 from the Corinthian
4
5
6
and continues to publish archaeological research results in the Isthmia series, which consists of eleven volumes published from 1971 to 2022. Each volume, devoted to a monument or category of materials that emerged from the excavations, contains general information on the history and topography of the site, along with detailed plans, aerial views, reconstructions, and images of major finds. See also BRONEER 1976; KARDULIAS 2005. On Isthmia and Corinthia in general, see also KISSAS 2013. The identified archaeological areas, in addition to the temple of Poseidon, which is located in the Upper Sanctuary, are the temple of Palaimon, the two Stadia (from the Classical and Hellenistic periods, where consul Flamininus declared in 196 BC the freedom of the Greek cities), the Theatre and “Cult Caves”, the Roman baths (built over a similar structure from the 4th century BC), the so-called East Field (a maze of walls of poor quality), the Hexamilion wall, and the Byzantine fortress. One of the earliest western visitors to the area in modern times was the epigraphic pioneer and merchant Cyriacus of Ancona (1391–1452), who arrived in the region probably in 1436 and observed mainly Byzantine fortifications. The bibliography on Cyriacus of Ancona is endless: see e.g. BODNAR 1960; COLIN 1981; PACI / SCONOCCHIA 1998; GEYER 2003; BODNAR 2003. Later, the English priest and writer George Wheler around 1676 recorded the ruins of a city, ancient walls, churches, and a theatre (WHELER 1682, 437; SPON / WHELER 1678, II 293 with mention of the Hexamilion). He was followed by the British Colonel William Leake in 1806 (LEAKE 1830 III, 285–305) and the French historian Paul Monceaux in 1883 (MONCEAUX 1884) and others, as the Irish painter and traveller Edward Dodwell (DODWELL 1819 II, 183– 4). For the reuse of spolia, FREY 2015, 312; KARDULIAS 2005, 39. We know that around the 5th century AD the sanctuary of Poseidon had already been abandoned. To the defensive wall and fortress is dedicated the entire volume V of the Isthmia series, published by ASCSA and here indicated as GREGORY 1993. Here, the archaeological remains of the Hexamilion are described in great detail and plotted with topographical maps. A brief summary of the history and structure of the fortification can also be found in GREGORY 2000, 110–3. In Late Antiquity the word indicates a fortification that isolates an entire region by blocking its access to the enemy. The best-known example was the so-called Long Wall in Thrace, the
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to the Saronic Gulf. It was designed to protect the Peloponnese from incursions from the north, and was in use until the 17th century, when the Venetians attempted to maintain control of Southern Greece against the Turks. 7 As for the structure, it consists of a wall with rectangular towers (fig. 2) along its entire length (except for those of the Gates, which were differently shaped) and a fortress located directly east and northeast of the sanctuary of Poseidon, which constitutes the most completely excavated area. 8 The Hexamilion coincides with the northern side of the Fortress. 9 The wall as we see it today (figg. 3–4) consists of two faces made of large ashlar masonry blocks and a fill of mortar and rubble (ἔμπλεκτον). 10 This extensive system of fortifications is the largest new infrastructure of the Late Antique period, probably the imperial response to insecurity in Illyricum from the invasions of the 3rd and late 4th centuries AD. 11 According to the most recent studies, there is no archaeological evidence of a successful attempt to fortify the entire Isthmus before the early byzantine age, the initiative for which should be placed under emperor Theodosius II (408–450 AD): the project, involving the control of the entire Peloponnese and the expenditure of great human and material resources, was probably part of a definite plan to defend against invasions and an example of Byzantine strength and strategy against the enemies. 12 outlying defence of Constantinople and the way to protecting its water sources (e.g. GREGORY 1992; WIEWIOROWSKI 2012). For further bibliography, see GREGORY 1993, 128. 7 It is likely that the expulsion of the Venetians (1715) and the unchallenged control of the territory by the Turks led to the decline of the fortification, accelerated by modern construction interventions. Despite this fate, its ruins attracted many European scholars and visitors: LEAKE 1830 III, 286–7; 297; 302 (a plan of the fortress appears here for the first time, albeit with some mistakes); MONCEAUX 1884 and 1885 (he conducted excavations in three areas and published a plan of the Fortress correcting Leake’s one, but dated the wall no later than the 1st century AD); for the other studies and excavations undertaken in the 20th century, up to those under Paul Clement (1967–78) and the 6th Ephoreia of Byzantine Antiquities (1992), see GREGORY 1993, 2–4. For a complete list of works on the site, from Wheler’s 1676 visit to the campaigns of American Universities in the 20th century, see KARDULIAS 2005, 41–6. 8 For the purpose of the tower, see GREGORY 1993, 132 with further bibliography. For the fortress, see KARDOULIAS 2005 and FREY 2015. 9 Throughout its history, the Fortress was renovated and used by Byzantines, Venetians, Franks, and Turks, and remained in use until the 17th century: see KARDOULIAS 2005, 41 which also provides a brief history of the site and fortress from the age of Justinian to the short Venetian reoccupation of Morea in the late 17th century. Excavations in the northern areas of the fortress have uncovered many burial areas, sometimes containing several tombs, testifying how entire families lived there in Late Antiquity. Originally there were only two gates to the Fortress, the Northeast, which incorporated a Roman monumental arch that was the northern approach to the Sanctuary of Poseidon from the second half of the 1st century AD (description in GREGORY 1993, 52–6), and the South one (GREGORY 1993, 90–4). 10 For the construction technique, see GREGORY 1993, 136–40. 11 KARDOULIAS 2005, 40; FREY 2015, 312, 318. On the types and purposes of defensive works in the Early Byzantine period, see GREGORY 1992. 12 GREGORY 1993, 142; ZANINI 1994, 184; AVRAMÉA 1997, 60: despite quoting Zosimus and Claudian and talking about “reconstruction (my italics) des remparts après le passage des
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As for the construction, a date to the second decade of the 5th century AD is provided, according to T. Gregory, by the archaeological record, and linked by the scholar to Alaric’s invasion. Given the size of the project, it was probably undertaken by the central power in Constantinople rather than by private individuals. 13 As for the works undertaken by Justinian, among contemporary sources we have a passage from Procopius (aed. 4.2.27–8) stating that Justinian was not responsible but merely restored something earlier, which had suffered damage, 14 and Wisigoths”, seems to agree for a dating consistent with other more recent studies; KARDOULIAS 2005, 38; FREY 2015, 312 (who suggests that it was a response to the Visigothic raid of 396 AD). The much-discussed references to the presence of a wall on the Isthmus before this period are contained in Zosimus (Zos. hist. 1.29 and 5.6, who seems to mention a fortification on the Isthmus as early as the time of Emperor Valerian, 253–60 AD) and Claudian (Claud. De bello gothico 188–90). According to T. Gregory (GREGORY 1993, 11) Zosimus’ use of the imperfect form διετείχιζον in the first passage might indicate that a wall was planned or was about to be built but perhaps the undertaking was not completed. Moreover, the second passage, according to the same scholar, would not indicate the presence of a fortification on the Isthmus at the time of Alaric, but only that it was believed that the geographical position and the troops of Gerontius provided adequate defence. Archaeology, thanks to monetary finds and pottery, unequivocally attests that both the Hexamilion and the fortress were built at the same time, and excavations suggest a date in the early 5th century (GREGORY 1993, 142; see following note). The same construction technique is also used in the Late Roman wall of Corinth: see GREGORY 1979 for further discussion. 13 GREGORY 1993, 142–3: identifies as terminus post quem a coin of Arcadius (402–8 AD) found in the roadway of the Northeast Gate and as terminus ante quem two coins, of Marcianus (450– 7 AD) and Leo I (457–74 AD), found in a grave used when the fortress was out of use. The scholar rejects the mid-5th century date proposed in HOHLFELDER 1977 as based on a misreading of the numismatic evidence. CAMERON 1985, 109 instead follows Hohlfelder in dating the wall in the last years of the reign of Theodosius II (408–50 AD). As for the historical occasion of the construction in the 5th century AD, in CLEMENT 1977 a date around 410 AD is proposed, in response to Alaric’s sack of Rome (the same context as the fortifications built in Constantinople and Corinth); according to AVRAMÉA 1997, 63, the explanation is to be sought in the political conjuncture created in the early 5th century for the West’s interventions in the East and Stilicho’s attempts to annex the prefecture of eastern Illyricum. In 407 AD, when Honorius appointed Alaric magister militum per Illyricum and Stilicho was preparing for an attack on the East, laws were addressed to the praetorian prefect of Illyricum about fortifications to be restored. 14 Ταῦτα διαπεπραγμένος Ἰουστινιανὸς βασιλεύς, ἐπεὶ τὰς ἐν Πελοποννήσῳ πόλεις ἁπάσας ἀτειχίστους ἐμάνθανεν εἶναι, λογισάμενος ὅτι δή οἱ πολὺς τετρίψεται χρόνος, εἰ κατὰ μιᾶς ἐπιμελοῖτο, τὸν Ἰσθμὸν ὅλον ἐν τῷ ἀσφαλεῖ ἐτειχίσατο, ἐπεὶ αὐτοῦ καταπεπτώκει τὰ πολλὰ ἤδη. φρούριά τε ταύτῃ ἐδείματο καὶ φυλακτήρια κατεστήσατο. τούτῳ δὲ τῷ τρόπῳ ἄβατα τοῖς πολεμίοις ἅπαντα πεποίηκεν εἶναι τὰ ἐν Πελοποννήσῳ χωρία, εἰ καί τι ἐς τὸ ἐν Θερμοπύλαις ὀχύρωμα κακουργήσοιεν. ἀλλὰ ταῦτα μὲν τῇδε κεχώρηκε. «Having accomplished all these things [i.e. the fortification of Greece between Thermopylae and the Isthmus], the Emperor Justinian, having learned that all the cities of the Peloponnese were without walls and having thought that a long time would be taken up if he took care of one by one, securely fortified the entire Isthmus, since much of that had already collapsed; and he built forts and guard posts there. In this way he made all the cities of the Peloponnesus inaccessible to the enemies, even if they had forced the fortification at Thermopylae. Thus these things were accomplished» (my translation). Procopius states that the defence adopted in the Peloponnese was different than elsewhere, i.e., the Hexamilion was used as the main barrier, while the cities to the south were
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our inscription IG IV2 3 1803, placed on the occasion of the completion of the restoration works. 15 The absence of Theodora in it and the date of publication of De Aedificiis has led some scholars to date the inscription between 548 and 554/5 AD, although not all agree: according to D. Feissel, a date after 548 AD, while possible, would not be proven by the absence of mention of the empress. 16
3. The inscription and the term Hellas The inscription walled up in the Hexamilion that testifies to the rebuilding work undertaken under the emperor Justinian is already mentioned in Late Byzantine sources such as George Sphrantzes (15th century): 17 this is IG IV2 3 1803 (fig. 5), published numerous times and the subject of an extensive bibliography. 18
15
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left unprotected with walls (except perhaps the walls of Corinth, see 4.2.24). The historian tends to exaggerate Justinian's restoration work (see e.g. CROKE/CROW 1983) so we do not know how cautiously should be taken the statement that by the 6th century the Hexamilion was in disrepair. For an analysis of this passage from Procopius, see GREGORY 2000, 108–9. For archaeological records of the 6th century interventions at the Northeast Gate, see GREGORY 1993, 80–3. On Procopius’ De Aedificiis, see also ROQUES 2011 and GREGORY 2000 (specifically for Greece). On the impact that Justinian’s intervention had to have in any case, in terms of the increase in the local population that needed to be fed and needed new construction such as religious buildings, see CARAHER 2015, 339–40. On Justinian’s fortification policy illustrated by Procopius, see also GREGORY 1992, 246–50. For a systematic comparison of Procopius’ De Aedificiis with epigraphic evidence in Constantinople and other provinces of the empire, see FEISSEL 2000, who reports about 80 texts, divided by region, following a plan similar to that of Procopius. 548 AD is the year of the death of the empress who is usually mentioned with her husband in official dedications: see e.g. AVRAMÉA 1997, 65; GREGORY 1993, 13. Feissel, in FEISSEL 1990, 143, for the same reason proposes a date after 548 AD, but more recently (FEISSEL 2000, 86, 92) argues that since Theodora’s mention in the inscriptions together with her husband was not constant, her absence alone does not constitute evidence for dating the inscription after the empress’s death. M. Guarducci (GUARDUCCI 1978, 329) proposes instead to date the works before the invasion of the Huns in 539 or 540, based on the statement in Procop. Aed. 4.2.24 that the walls of the cities of Greece had fallen into ruin πολλῷ πρότερον (much earlier), due to terrible earthquakes: this, according to the scholar, would exclude the earthquakes of 551 and 522 AD, but refers to those of the late 4th century AD. On the earthquakes of 522 and 551 AD, see AMBRASEYS 2009, 182, 204–5. 554/5 AD is the year of the publication of Procopius’ work according to CAMERON 1985, 8–11 (rather than 559/60 AD, as in the traditional interpretation). The scholar believes that the works should be placed after the earthquake of the 551 AD. See also HOHLFELDER 1977, 177; AVRAMÉA 1997, 65; GREGORY 1993, 13. The security provided by such an intervention for Procopius could be one of the many exaggerations contained in the historian’s works, since at the end of the century Avars and Slavs passed the Isthmus without finding obstacles; however, we can believe Procopius if we think that the fortifications were damaged by the earthquake of 580 (AVRAMÉA 1997, 66). Sphrantzes 4.1–2. The inscription is also reported in Chron. Byz. Brev. 286. Editions: CIG IV 8640; GazArch 9, 277; IChUR II 1, nr. 367; Arch. Eph. 1893, 123 nr. 13; IG IV 204; DeltChrA 6, 46–7; IG IV 204; KAUFMANN 1917, 144; BEES 1941, 1–5; CORINTH VIII 3, 168–9 nr. 508; FEISSEL 1977, 221 (also mentioned in FEISSEL 1980, 473); GUARDUCCI 1978, 326–30; FEISSEL / PHILIPPIDIS-BRAAT 1985, 279–81 nr. 16; ICG 2892; IG IV2 3 1803.
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Here the text of the inscription: 19 ☩ φῶς ἐκ φωτός, Θεὸς ἀληθινὸς ἐκ Θεοῦ ἀληθινοῦ, φυλάξῃ τὸν Αὐτοκράτορα Ἰουστινιανὸν καὶ τὸν ornamentum πιστὸν αὐτοῦ δοῦλον Βικτωρῖνον ἅμα τοῖς ornamentum οἰκοῦσειν ἐν Ἑλάδι τοὺς κ(α)τ(ὰ) Θεὼν ζῶντας ☩
1
5
Light from Light, true God from true God, should keep safe Emperor Justinian and his faithful servant Victorinus together with those who dwell in Hellas and live according to God.
The inscription, now preserved at the Archaeological Museum of Isthmia (object number 1390), is a reused marble cornice (63.5 x 95.8 x 26.5-35.5 cm) in which the inscription is made on a tabula ansata. 20 Its first discovery dates back during the restoration work under Manuel II Paleologus (1391–1425 AD) in 1415 AD. 21 It has Bibliography e.g.: ABSA 32, 76; ACIAC X, 1, 655; BODNAR 1960b, 166 note 8; SEG XI 52; BARKER 1962, 54; FEISSEL 1990, 136 nr. A; GREGORY 1993, 12–3; FEISSEL 2000, 92–3; SEG LX 326; FRIESEN / SCHOWALTER / WALTERS 2010 273, 275, 301. Other bibliographical references will be given in the course of the paragraph. 19 I follow the text published in the most recent edition, IG IV2 3 1803. The translation is mine. 20 A Ionic frame can be seen behind the inscription (figg. 6–7): it was an architectural piece that must have been on top of a frieze, possibly of late Hellenistic age because of the rectangular shape of the dentils. As already mentioned, many buildings of the sanctuary were demolished for the construction of the Hexamilion and the fortress (see above). The size, content, and shape suggest that it was placed on a gate, perhaps over an archway, as happens elsewhere in the Mediterranean in the Justinian age: CARAHER 2015, 329 with further bibliography: he suggests the Northeast Gate as more elaborate, while other scholars state it was walled up at the South Gate, probably based on where it was found (e.g. FEISSEL 1977, 223; GREGORY 1993, 13). 21 On the activities of Manuel II (recorded by Chr. Pasch. II, 254; Sphrantzes 4.1–2, Chron. Byz. Brev. 286, and Chalk. 183–4) see BARKER 1962. The inscription was later rediscovered during the 1883 excavation by Paul Monceaux in loose fill near the South Gate of the Hexamilion: BEES 1941, 1,4; FEISSEL 1977, 221; GREGORY 1993, 15; CARAHER 2015, 329. The text of the inscription is given by various medieval sources including Cyriacus of Ancona, who visited the Isthmus a few years after Manuel II and probably copied it in a letter, itself copied into a manuscript by Felix Felicianus: see FEISSEL 1977. The manuscript is now lost but seen by Giovanni Battista De Rossi in a library in Milan in 1850 and included in his collection IChUR II 367. Here a chapter traces the career and fate of the manuscript by Cyriacus, who visited the Isthmus either in 1444 or 1436 and copied the two inscriptions (IG IV2 3 1802 and 1803, although De Rossi does not reproduce the first inscription). The copy has inconsistencies, but unlike the Byzantine chronicles, Cyriacus made an effort to respect the text of the last lines. From the headword it is clear that the two inscriptions were “at the gates of the old bastion and fortress” so probably Cyriacus saw the two stones at two different gates of the fortress. Cyriacus’ manuscript goes on and records that “at another newer door” there was another inscription, copied by Cyriacus and bearing the date of date 6923 (or 1415 of our era, the same as assigned by the chronicles to the work of Manuel II). The stone seems lost, but Cyriacus’ copy makes it possible to add a forgotten document to the Isthmus corpus.
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always been related to IG IV2 3 1802, preserved in Verona at the Museo Maffeiano, which invokes the Virgin Mary as Theotokos to guard, “the kingdom of Justinian, his sincere servant Victorinus and those who dwell in Corinth”. 22 The text of the inscription follows a recurring pattern in Christian inscriptions: the initial invocation is followed by a request for the protection to the divine. Also typical are grammatical irregularities 23 and the appellation πιστὸν δοῦλον for an imperial official. 24 The identity of Victorinus, mentioned in the inscription as Justinian’s πιστὸν δοῦλον, and the geographic extent of his intervention has been debated. However, he appears to be a technician specializing in defence works that are part of a Balkan defence program desired by Justinian and entrusted to a single master builder. 25 W. Caraher again examines these two texts (IG IV2 3 1802 and 1803), reprinting and translating them, and offering full bibliography and extensive analysis. His punctual analysis of the inscription in the context of Late Roman ritual and in the political context of Constantinople and the province of Achaia, lead to the conclusion that IG IV2 3 1803 (perhaps along with IG IV2 3 1802) is an expression of imperial power on the Isthmus. 26 This hypothesis also seems to be reinforced by 22 Editions: IChUR II 1, 368; IG IV 205; BEES 1941 6–9; FEISSEL 1977, 221 (also mentioned in FEISSEL 1980, 473); GUARDUCCI 1978, 326–30; RITTI 1981, 82–3; FEISSEL / PHILIPPIDISBRAAT 1985, 281 nr. 17; ICG 2891; IG IV2 3 1802. It is unclear whether this text had connections with the Hexamilion (as FEISSEL 1977, 223 and CARAHER 2015, 330 indicate) or whether it stood on the walls of Corinth (GREGORY 1993, 14). On the Christianization of Corinth, which had public expressions no earlier than the late 5th century, see SANDERS 2005. 23 Οἰκοῦσειν (for οἰκοῦσιν); Ἑλάδι (for Ἑλλάδι); Θεών (for Θεόν): for the evolution of the Greek language in the Byzantine age, see HORROCKS 2010, 273 ff. 24 For a detailed analysis of the text, see BEES 1941. See also GUARDUCCI 1978, 329–30; FRIESEN / SCHOWALTER / WALTERS 2010, 275 (on the meaning of δοῦλον); CARAHER 2015, 329–30. 25 He appears in a group of inscriptions from Byllis, in the province of Epirus Nova, originally placed within the city walls and now partly preserved in the Archaeological Museum of Tirana: SEG XXXVIII 530–3; PRASCHNIKER 1922–4, Beiblatt, col. 194–5; FEISSEL 1990. One of these inscriptions seems lost but we have the drawing of C. Praschniker, also reproduced in ANAMALI 1990, 133. The inscriptions recall the rebuilding of the ruined city walls and mention various regions where Victorinus would have intervened with fortification works, i.e. Moesia, Scythia, Illyricum and Thrace, geographically corresponding to the Balkan Peninsula but administratively not of the same nature. Although GREGORY 1993, 13 claims that Victorinus could be the Praetorian Prefect of Illyricum, then an official who exercised a government position, according to FEISSEL 1990, the clues for his identification as a master builder would be various: this hypothesis is also based on the extent of his intervention as specified in one of these inscriptions, since provinces belonging to different dioceses and prefectures are named. For the identification of Victorinus as an architect, see also FEISSEL 2000, 87; ZANINI 2007, 390–1. On the profession of the architect/master builder in Late Antiquity, ZANINI 2007; SCHIBILLE 2009. 26 CARAHER 2014: the imperial way to project political and ecclesiastical power into the region would be carried out through monumental architecture, including not only fortifications but also the construction of large basilicas; see also CARAHER 2015, 331–8. He notes, for example, that the use of the subjunctive of the verb φυλάσσω in combination with the name of the emperor and an imperial office recalls acclamatory rituals frequent in Late Antiquity. The hierarchical structure of acclamatory texts echoes the idea that the emperor is a mediator between the subjects and the divine. Moreover, archaeological and literary sources seem to converge in
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the absence of local patronage and the likely position of the inscription. W. Caraher analyzes both texts as part of the politicized theological disputes that shook the Mediterranean in the 5th and 6th century and regards IG IV2 3 1803 as emblem of Justinian’s efforts to promote imperial and religious unity across the empire. The invocation that recalls the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed, according to a rare usage in monumental inscriptions, is perhaps of particular value at that time on the Isthmus: 27 in fact, considering the religious and political turmoil (the Acacian schism recomposed with Justin I, the Tricapitoline schism involving Justinian and Pope Vigilius) and the divisions that arose in Illyricum because of these religious contrasts, 28 the Creed is a commitment to the Christology of Nicaea and a reminder of the times before Chalcedon (council of 451 AD), which instead had divided the church of Rome and Constantinople from the Monophysite churches: the presence of an important text for both Monophysites and Chalcedonians may reflect Justinian’s effort to promote a unified imperial faith that transcends regional varieties. 29 The previous considerations must be dropped into the contexts of Greece and the Isthmus, placed in the province of Achaia, important as a crossroads of the Mediterranean, and where political and religious authority are interrelated. In fact, although Justinian attempts to reorganize the political and ecclesiastical structure of the prefecture of Illyricum Orientalis, Achaia and the bishop of Corinth remain under two authorities, namely the imperial political jurisdiction and the ecclesiastical jurisdiction of the papacy. 30 These divided loyalties between Rome and Constantinople fit poorly with Justinian’s strategy toward a unified imperial role and provoked imperial policies that sought to unify political and religious authority;
27 28
29
30
indicating that the Constantinopolitan liturgy became prevalent in Greece from the second half of the 6th century. Such reference to the Constantinopolitan rite seems to be a statement of imperial primacy in Greece and in general in the western provinces. The influence of the capital of the empire would be reflected in the quoting of the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed of the first two lines of the inscription, since, as W. Caraher points out, there is no evidence in the West of the use of the Creed in the liturgy before the end of 6th century. Therefore, given the oral character of the inscription and the non-widespread circulation of the Creed at this time, the mention of it in the inscription should be interpreted as evidence of the influence of Constantinopolitan liturgy in Greece. For a history of the Creed, see KELLY 1950, 332–67; TAFT 1975 396 ff. The inscription probably has other echoes of liturgical language (see also FEISSEL 1983, 190–1), thus testifying the “liturgification” of Late Antiquity. CARAHER 2015, 330, 336–8. On these events, see ODB s.v. Three chapters, affair of the [T. E. Gregory]; HALDON 2005, 22; MAAS 2006, 215–90 passim; COSENTINO 2010, 253–6 and, in particular, CHAZELLE / CUBITT 2007 (with further bibliography). CARAHER 2015, 337. See also MEYENDORFF 1968. From 544 AD Justinian inaugurated a new phase of religious policy (accentuated with the death of Theodora): in fact, on the one hand he sought to impose his own vision of orthodoxy, based on the idea of the emperor’s responsibility for the spiritual salvation of his subjects. On the other hand, he sought an agreement with Rome, the most authoritative seat because of the belief that orthodoxy was defined by the agreement between basileia and priesthood (COSENTINO 2010, 252–3). MARKUS 1979, 289–92 and AVRAMÉA 1997, 35–8 (with further bibliography on the political and ecclesiastical organization of Illyricum in Late Antiquity); MAAS 2006, 281; CARAHER 2015, 336; BROWN 2018, 31, 202.
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moreover, continued military and political involvement in Italy and the West made it necessary to secure the loyalty of the Isthmus crossroads. 31 In summary, an analytical reading of the inscription and the historical and archaeological context (i.e., Justinian interventions on Isthmus) shows, as rightly pointed out by W. Caraher “the close ties between imperial authority, ecclesiastical unity, military security, and even economic change on the Justinianic Isthmus”. 32 At line 7 of IG IV2 3 1803, placed as we said on the Isthmus wall, protection is invoked for “those who inhabit Hellas” (τοῖς οἰκοῦσειν ἐν Ἑλάδι). As already pointed out by some editors, 33 the term Hellas does not refer only to the Peloponnese, but, more widely, to Greece and in particular to the province of Achaia or Hellas. In fact, in accordance with 6th century sources we can state that this term traces the boundaries of the province of Achaia, having Thermopylae as its northern border. 34 The administrative framework of the Illyrian prefecture in the 6th century AD is shown by Hierocles in the Synecdemus, 35 which provides a list of the provinces and cities of the Byzantine Empire. It indicates that the prefecture of Illyricum (Eastern Illyricum) includes 13 provinces, among which Hellas or Achaia has Corinth as its capital and extends north at least as far as Thebes in Boeotia, which is included in the list of cities that are part of the province. Procopius confirms that 31 32 33 34
CARAHER 2015, 340. See also CARAHER 2014, 144, 160. CARAHER 2015, 340. See most recently IG IV2 3 1803 with previous bibliography. Definitely constituted by Augustus in 27 BC, the province of Achaia had become part, under Diocletian, of the diocese of Moesia: in fact, as part of this diocese is mentioned in the Laterculus Veronensis (BARNES 1982, 201–11). In the mid-4th century, Achaia also appears in the Expositio totius mundi et gentium 52–3 (for the dating of which see GRÜLL 2014, 630) but it is debated whether the term follows administrative boundaries (see the commentary in the critical edition at p. 290). After the division of this diocese into two dioceses, it became part of the diocese of Macedonia. The latter, which together with Dacia and Pannonia go under the name of Illyricum, were part of the prefecture of Italy in Constantinian times. Illyricum, an area of contact between East and West and the scene of invasions and political games since the 3rd century AD, has precisely because of this a complicated administrative history. At the end of the 4th century the Notitia Dignitatum distinguishes between a diocese of Illyricum (i.e., western Illyricum, subject to the Praetorian prefect of Italy) and a prefecture of Illyricum (eastern Illyricum), which includes the dioceses of Dacia and Macedonia, belonging to the East; the diocese of Macedonia includes six provinces (Achaia, Macedonia, Crete, Thessaly, Epirus vetus and Epirus nova) and Achaia is the only one in the East along with Asia to have a proconsul at its head, an important position justified by the political conjuncture. In fact, as mentioned above, the Balkan area since the 3rd century AD had problems of instability, and the pressure exerted on it was always difficult to solve, since it was the terminal outlet of nomadic flows from central Eurasia to the West. For the administrative history of the province of Achaia up to the 5th century AD, see AVRAMÉA 1997, 31–4 with extensive bibliographical references; TIB I 49 ff.; FOWDEN 1995; HALDON 2005, 33–4; ΔΡΑΚΟΥΛΗΣ 2009a, 129–40; ΔΡΑΚΟΥΛΗΣ 2009b, 47–8. For the text of the Notitia, see the new critical edition with illustrations, discussion of the history of the text and bibliography edited by C. Neira Faleiro: NEIRA FALEIRO, 2005); on the division of Illyricum in the Notitia, see e.g. CLEMENTE 1968, 105 ff. and 2010, 126–7. 35 Syn. 642 ff. The geographical list of the cities of the Eastern Empire, probably based on material from the mid-5th century AD, is generally dated before 535: e.g. ODB s.v. Hierocles [T.E. Gregory].
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Thermopylae formed the border between Illyricum and Hellas. 36 This administrative situation seems to remain unchanged until at least the 7th century, while a new organization, namely the thematic one, is attested only from the late 7th century onward. 37 A confirmation of the meaning and limits of the term Hellas in the Justinianic Age comes from an article by P. Charanis, who analyses the term in the sources of the 6th, 7th and 8th centuries AD by considering all occurrences in which it appears in order to identify its boundaries. The analysis shows that for Procopius the term Hellas, whether used in a strictly administrative or cultural-historical sense, alludes to the region of classical Greece, particularly south of Thermopylae, including the Peloponnese. The same can be said for other 6th-century sources such as Hierocles, as we have seen, Agathias, Evagrius, Malalas. 38 In addition to the geographical delimitation of the term, it is interesting to stress how in these sources the Isthmus is associated with Thermopylae to represent the two points of defence of Greece. 39 36 Procop. Aed 4.2.1–24 passim: Μετὰ δὲ τὴν Ἤπειρον ὅλην Αἰτωλούς τε καὶ Ἀκαρνᾶνας παραδραμόντι ὅ τε Κρισαῖος ἐκδέχεται κόλπος καὶ ὅ τε Ἰσθμὸς ἥ τε Κόρινθος καὶ τὰ ἄλλα τῆς Ἑλλάδος χωρία. […] ἐξ Ἰλλυριῶν ἐς Ἑλλάδα ἰόντι, ὄρη δύο ἐπὶ μακρότατον ἀλλήλοιν ὡς ἀγχοτάτω ξυνίασι, στενωπὸν ἐν βραχεῖ ἀπεργαζόμενα τὴν μεταξὺ χώραν (κλεισούρας νενομίκασι τὰ τοιαῦτα καλεῖν) […]. ἐνθένδε τοῖς βαρβάροις εἰσιτητὰ ἐπί τε Θερμοπύλας οὐδενὶ πόνῳ ἐγίνετο καὶ τὴν ταύτῃ Ἑλλάδα. […] Καὶ πόλεις δὲ τῆς Ἑλλάδος ἁπάσας, αἵπερ ἐντός εἰσι τῶν ἐν Θερμοπύλαις τειχῶν, ἐν τῷ βεβαίῳ κατεστήσατο εἶναι, τοὺς περιβόλους ἀνανεωσάμενος ἅπαντας. κατερηρίπεσαν γὰρ πολλῷ πρότερον, ἐν Κορίνθῳ μὲν σεισμῶν ἐπιγενομένων ἐξαισίων […]. «After the whole of Epirus, Aetolia and Acarnania, travelling along the coast one comes to the gulf of Chryseus, the Isthmus and Corinth and the other parts of Hellas. [...] Descending from Illyricum into Hellas, one is confronted by two mountains that rise very close together for a long distance, forming between them a narrow passage of the kind they are wont to call cleisurae [...]. From here it was possible for the barbarians without effort to enter both Thermopylae and that part of Greece. [...] He also made safe all the cities of Hellas that lay within the walls at Thermopylae by renovating their walls. For they had fallen into ruin long before, in Corinth by the terrible earthquakes that had struck the city […]». In 4.2.17 Procopius uses the term Illyricum for the northern part of the prefecture, from which he dissociates the province Hellas. 37 On the byzantine themata of Hellas and Peloponnese, De them. 51–4; ODB s.v. Hellas and Peloponnesos [T. E. Gregory]; TIB I 50–78; NESBITT / OIKONOMIDES 1994, 22, 62; KARAGIORGOU 2021a, 83–8; KARAGIORGOU 2021b; HALDON 2021, 184–91. The topic of thematic organization and military lands is very complex and debated: see recently COSENTINO 2010b and 2018; HALDON 2016; PRIGENT 2020. With the creation of the themata of Hellas and Peloponnesus these two parts will be separated. The former was created perhaps between 688 and 695 AD, and although its extent is not known precisely in the early period of its existence, it probably included the older province of Achaia, including all of the Peloponnese, along with other regions. It was reduced in proportion as new themata were established: the Peloponnese, with Corinth as its capital, constituted a separate thema perhaps from the beginning of the 9th century. 38 CHARANIS 1972. In Procopius, the term occurs in aed., BG, BV, BP, HA; in Agathias, three times; in Euagrios, six times. The scholar also examines later sources, such as the Chronicon Paschale, the Miracula Sancti Demetri and the Chronicle of Theophanes the Confessor. For a discussion about terminology, see also TIB I, 38–40. 39 E.g. Prok. aed. 4.2.27–8. Thermopylae and Isthmus were two of the natural lines of defence of Achaia (FOWDEN 1995, 550).
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In our inscription, placed along the Isthmus wall, thus well away from the province boundary, protection is invoked for “those living in Hellas”. If we had only the Isthmus inscription, we might think that the fortification to which it refers marks the boundary of Hellas. However, it is clear from 6th century sources that this term is always used to refer to a wider area, which roughly has Thermopylae as its northern limit (both where Hellas is used in an administrative sense and where the sense is more generically “cultural”). In Victorinus’ inscription Hellas seems thus to be used “improperly” or at any rate reductively, since it refers only to the territory south of the Isthmus, while the boundary line was attested much further north. Since, therefore, Hellas is, administratively and culturally, a much wider region, not reducible to the Peloponnese alone, we can ask ourselves whether the use of an apparently improper term does not have a value related to the position in which the inscription was located. Throughout the paper we have seen how the province of Achaia/Hellas in the 6th century is a place of overlapping ecclesiastical and political jurisdiction: despite proximity to the imperial capital, Hellas remains part of the ecclesiastical province of Illyricum, under the jurisdiction of papacy. Justinian’s policy on the Isthmus and in the Mediterranean emphasizes the territorial and religious unity of the empire and he works to promote loyalty and stability of strategically important provinces. In that framework, the Isthmus is a military and religious frontier zone. The 6th century sources show not only the boundaries of Hellas (understood both as a province, as in Hierocles, and as a geographical concept unrelated to the administrative division) but also that the Isthmus area represented together with Thermopylae the other key point, the second line of defence of Greece. An inhabitant of the empire in the 6th century who had arrived on the Isthmus would thus have had before him a fortification that in fact served to protect the Peloponnese, but in which the entire province of Achaia was mentioned. The use of a reference to a much wider geographical space is therefore interesting, and could be explained in various ways. Surely the use of a term indicating a larger geographical area than that protected by the fortification was due to the fact that it protected the capital of the province, Corinth (referred to precisely by the Hierocles as the “metropolis of Hellas”), 40 whose presence might justify this synecdoche. In this sense, therefore, the presence of the fortification guarantees the survival of its capital and thus, of the province itself. However, we can also keep in mind the historical-geographical context of the Isthmus: in the initial part of this paper, I briefly mentioned the history of the site precisely in order to recall its importance as a symbol of freedom, Greek unity and its resistance against external enemies, which continues into the Late Antique and Byzantine ages, when precisely it became the main bastion of the defence of southern Greece. This importance is reaffirmed within the inscription by the religious reference to the Nicene-Constantinopolitan creed: as I have tried to make clear, the presence of an important text for both Monophysites and Chalcedonians may reflect Justinian’s effort to promote a unified imperial faith that transcends regional 40 Syn. 646.
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varieties. The desire to emphasise a value such as unity, therefore, could be achieved not only through the mention of the Creed at lines 1–2, but also through the use of a geographical term referring to a much wider area: although the wall protects only a part of classical Greece, its location on the Isthmus may justify the reference to Greece as a whole. From these two aspects it emerges how the Isthmus was synonymous with Greekness and unity: the use of the term Hellas must be thought of within the great Justinian effort of political and religious unity, so it does not matter that it is actually the geographical boundary of Hellas but, more important than accuracy in geographical-administrative terminology is the reference to a concept of Greekness that the Isthmus, because of its centuries-long history, continues to represent very well even in Late Antiquity.
4. Conclusions We have tried to show how this inscription fits well within the Justinian’s effort to exalt the political and religious unity of the empire. Indeed, in addition to the aspects already emphasised by other scholars, the use of the term Hellas al line 7 could probably also point in this direction. It was obviously meant to extol the commissioner of the work carried out on this defensive work, and it does so perhaps also by bending a geographical term to its purpose. This practice could open up interesting avenues of study, relating for instance to the use of geographical terms by the imperial power in contexts where self-celebration is paramount.
Drusilla Firindelli Italian Archaeological School at Athens Odos Parthenonos 14 11742 Athens [email protected]
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Images
Fig.1: Isthmian Sanctuary of Poseidon with the fortress and part of the Hexamilion wall (el. after https://msuisthmia.org/). Fig. 2: Tower of the Hexamilion visible along the Palea EO Athinon Corinthou (author D. Firindelli).
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Fig. 3: The construction technique of the Hexamilion as we see it today along the Palea EO Athinon Corinthou (author D. Firindelli).
Fig. 4: The construction technique of the Hexamilion as we see it today along the Palea EO Athinon Corinthou (author D. Firindelli).
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Fig. 5: The inscription IG IV2 3 1803 (Archaeological Museum of Isthmia object number 1390, photo and processing D. Firindelli).
Fig. 6: IG IV2 3 1803, upper side (Archaeological Museum of Isthmia object number 1390, photo and processing D. Firindelli).
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Fig. 7: IG IV2 3 1803, right side of the marble cornice (Archaeological Museum of Isthmia object number 1390, photo and processing D. Firindelli).
Fig. 8: Boundaries of the provinces in the age of Justinian, with Achaia at N. 74 (el. after HALDON 2005, 34).
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Primary sources Agathias = Agathiae Myrinaei historiarum libri quinque, ed. R. Keydell, Berlin 1967. Chalk. = Laonici Chalcocondylae Atheniensis Historiarum libri decem, ed. I. Bekker, Bonn 1843. Chron. Byz. Brev. = Chronica Byzantina Breviora, ed. P. Schreiner, Wien 1975–9. Chron. Pasch. = Chronicon Paschale, ed. L. Dindorf, Bonn 1832 Claud. = Claudien, Oeuvres. Poèmes politiques (399–404), Texte établi et traduit par J.L. Charlet, Paris 2017. De them. = De thematibus, Costantinus VII Porphirogenitus, ed. A. Pertusi, Città del Vaticano 1952. Expositio totius mundi et gentium = Expositio totius mundi et gentium. Introduction, texte critique, traduction française, notes et commentaire, ed. Jean Rougé, Paris 1966. Euagrios = Evagrius Scholasticus, The Ecclesiastical History of Evagrius with the scholia, ed. J. Bidez, L. Parmentier, London 1898. Sphrantzes = Georgii Sphrantzae Chronicon, ed. R. Maisano, Roma 1990. Syn. = Le Synekdèmos d’Hieroclès et l’opuscule géographique de Georges de Chypre. Texte, introduction, commentaire et cartes, ed. E. Honigman, Brussels 1939. Procop. = Procopii Caesariensis Opera omnia, ed. I. Haury, G. Wirth, Teubner 1964. Zos. = Zosime, Histoire nouvelle I, Livres I-II, Texte établi et traduit par Fr. Paschoud, Paris 1971.
Abbreviations ABSA = The Annual of the British School at Athens. ACIAC = Actes du Xe Congrès international d’archéologie chrétienne, Thessalonique, 28 septembre-4 octobre 1980. Arch. Eph. = Ἀρχαιολογικὴ Ἐφημερίς. CORINTH = Corinth. Results of the Excavations conducted by the American School of Archaeology at Athens. Voll. I-XXII (1932–). DeltChrA = Δελτίον τῆς Χριστιανικῆς Ἀρχαιολογικῆς Ἑταιρείας. GazArch = Gazette archéologique. ICG = Inscriptiones Christianae Graecae. A Digital Collection of Greek Early Christian Inscriptions from Asia Minor and Greece. https://icg.uni-kiel.de/icg/ICG_webapp/. IChUR = Inscriptiones Christianae Urbis Romae septimo saeculo antiquiores. Voll. I–II, G. B. De Rossi (ed.), Roma 1857–88. ODB = Oxford Dictionary of Byzantium, 3 voll., A.P. Kazhdan (ed.), New York 1991. SEG = Supplementum Epigraphicum Graecum, Voll. I–XI, ed. J.E. Hondius, Leiden 1923–1954. Voll. XII–XXV, ed. A.G. Woodhead, Leiden 1955–1971. Voll. XXVI–XLI, eds. H.W. Pleket and R.S. Stroud, Amsterdam 1979–1994. Voll. XLII–XLIV, eds. H.W. Pleket, R.S. Stroud and J.H.M. Strubbe, Amsterdam 1995-1997. Voll. XLV–XLIX, eds. H.W. Pleket, R.S. Stroud, A. Chaniotis and J.H.M. Strubbe, Amsterdam 1998–2002. Voll. L- , eds. A. Chaniotis, R.S. Stroud and J.H.M. Strubbe, Amsterdam 2003-. TIB = Tabula Imperii Byzantini I. Hellas und Thessalia, hrsg. H. Hunger, Wien 1976.
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BETWEEN NARRATIVE AND HISTORY NOTES ON THE GOTHIC PRESENCE IN LATE ANTIQUE PHRYGIA Onur Sadık Karakuş Abstract: The relationship of the Goths with the Roman Empire are recognized as an important phenomenon in the Late Antique world. Although it is known that the western provinces of the Empire had more interaction with the Goths, the eastern cities of the Roman Empire were also affected by the Goths in various ways. Starting in the 3rd century with the sacking of the Black Sea and cities of Asia Minor, the process continued in the 4th century with the settlement of Gothic prisoners of war in Phrygia and ended in 399/400 with the revolt of the Phrygian Goths, which was initiated by Tribigild. In this article, the interactions and economic activities of the Goths with the local peoples after their settlement in Phrygia, as well as the causes and consequences of the rebellion are discussed. Keywords: Late Antiquity, Settlement Policy, Phrygia, Goths, Tribigild. The Goths came to Asia Minor in the 4th century as settlers after plundering it in the 3rd century. They were among the main subjects of the works of late antique writers. In modern times, scholars of Late Antiquity such as H. WOLFRAM, P. HEATHER, G. ALBERT, W. LIEBESCHUETZ, J. HALDON, A. SCHWARCZ, S. MITCHELL, U. HUTTNER, R. MATHISEN and others have directly or indirectly studied the Goths living in Asia Minor. Although the plundering activities of the Goths in the 3rd century are now well known, their settlement in Phrygia in the 4th century, their relations with the local population, and the revolt of Tribigild and Gainas have not been studied comprehensively. This paper aims to provide some suggestions and current information on three main issues: firstly, the settlement of Gothic peoples in Phrygia, secondly, the process of Gothic integration into the local population, and finally, the causes, course, and consequences of Gothic revolt in Phrygia in the late 4th and early 5th centuries1. Undoubtedly, the Phrygian Goths are not only a subject that raises many questions waiting to be answered, but also a subject with several difficulties. The main problems that come to the fore are the insufficiency of sources and some reliability problems (e.g., whether the works of the Christian Orthodox Socrates, the pagan Zosimus or the politicised pagan poet Claudian are unbiased), the lack of 1
I am very grateful to all anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments, and suggestions. I would also like to thank Emanuel Zingg (Paris) and Erkan Iznik (Eskişehir) for suggestions and reading the earlier drafts of this paper.
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archaeological finds of Gothic settlers, and the difficulty of determining the status of the Gothic settlers. 1. Looking to the past: Cities of Asia Minor and the Goths in the 3rd century Before the settlement of the Goths in Phrygia in the 4th century, many barbarian peoples, called Goths, had various encounters with Anatolia. For many of the Goths in the 3rd century, the lands of the Roman Empire were no more than cities full of riches. The Goths, who spread from the Baltic Coasts and Northern Poland to the Black Sea coast of Ukraine and Romania, first started plundering the banks of the Danube River and the Dacian borders in the mid-3rd century. After a while, they attacked, plundered, and razed many cities in Thrace, Moesia, the Caucasus, and on the Black Sea coasts2. Having pillaged the western and eastern coasts of the Black Sea, the Goths began to enter Anatolia from the north-west via the Hellespont, the Bosporus and Bithynia in 255/256 and 257. During this period, the Goths mostly plundered Chalcedon, Nicomedia, Nicaea, Apamea and Prusa ad Olympum3. The plundering began on the coasts of Mysia and Bithynia and was then extended to central and eastern Anatolia (i.e. Phrygia, Galatia and Cappadocia up to Comana Pontica)4. Some epigraphic finds, which can be linked to the Gothic and other barbarian raids, probably indicate that the rural inhabitants of the provinces were more severely affected by these events. An inscription from Phrygia dated to the mid-3rd century likely marks the spread of the first Gothic raids. The names of Tatianos, along with Ammiante and their son Trophimos, who lost their lives “among the barbarians”5, can be read on the stele found in the territory of Cotyaeum in Phrygia (plain of Altıntaş in Kütahya)6. Tatianos is depicted with a small shield and dagger, suggesting he died fighting the barbarians. The dating to the Sullan era (ca. 255) makes it possible to associate this grave stele with the first Gothic invasion7. Indeed, according to Zosimus, Goths had also plundered Pessinus during the same period8. It seems some units of the Goths also reached settlements in central Anatolia and continued their plundering activities.
2
3 4 5 6 7 8
SHA Max. Balb. 16,3. In the Ethnika of Stephanus of Byzantium, the Goths are defined as a people living in the west of the Maiotis Lake (Sea of Azov) and later descending towards Thrace. See Steph. Byz. Ethnika. s.v. Γότθοι, Iord. Get. 91, 103, SHA Gord. 31,1, Amm. Marc. 31,4,15, Zos. 1,32–34. Iord. Get. 107, SHA Gall. 4,7–8, Zos. 1,35,1–2, BLECKMANN 1992, p. 190, KETTENHOFEN 1992, p. 292, GOLTZ / HARTMANN 2008, p. 247–8. HEATHER / MATTHEWS 2004, p. 11, 134, BERNDT / STEINACHER 2014, p. 46. TYBOUT 1992, p. 40–2, HOSTEIN 2017, p. 47–8, f.n. 37. SEG 39, 1379, TYBOUT 1992, p. 35–42. TYBOUT 1992, p. 36. Zos. 1,28,1.
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Image 1. Grave stele of Tatianos and his family killed by Goths, (TYBOUT 1992, Plate 2).
In addition, some men of Anatolian origin like Wulfila’s grandfather (also known as Oulphilas, Ourphilas, or Ulfila) from Sadagolthina (near Parnassus) in Cappadocia, whose grandson later became the protagonist of the Christianization of the Goths9, were seized as prisoners by Gothic raiders10. Gregory Thaumaturgus (213270), Bishop of Neocaesarea, mentioned that the Goths and Borani plundered and enslaved the inhabitants11. Canonical epistles of Gregory also stated there were some people of Pontus who joined the barbarians and together with them persecuted the indigenous population12. Another bishop, Basil of Caesarea (330–379), referred to the martyrdom of some Cappadocian figures such as Eutyches13. In 262 and 263, the Goths, who serving under Respa, Veduco, Tharvo, came together with other barbarian tribes and sailed again across the Black Sea and down to the Hellespont with many ships and warriors14. In this period, they plundered Chalcedon, Nicomedia, Alexandria Troas and Ilium and the Artemis temple in
9 10 11 12 13 14
For Wulfila (311-383) and Christianization of Goths see KHAZDAN 1991, p. 2139, WOLFRAM 2004, p. 83–6; for barbarian bishops see MATHISEN 1997, p. 664–97, KAÇAR 2015, p. 52–68. See Philostorgius Hist. eccl. 2,5, MCKECHNIE 2019, p. 260. Epistulae Canonica, Canon V–VII. SCHWARCZ 2020, p. 393 makes a connection between this event and the capture of Trapezus by the Goths in 256/257. Epistulae Canonica, Canon. VII. It has been explained by BEKKER-NIELSEN 2017, p. 51–4 that the descriptions of Pontus by Gregory Thaumaturgus and various Cappadocian writers may not be the coastal Pontus as we know it. Basil Ep. 164,1–2. Iord. Get. 107, SCHWARCZ 2020, p. 392.
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Ephesus15. According to Chronography of Georgius Syncellus, the Goths had also seized Phrygia after ravaging Troas, Cappadocia and Galatia16. As can be seen from the funerary epigram of 14-year-old Domitilla from Karzene / Karza (Çankırı / Eskipazar-Köyceğiz) in Paphlagonia, she and many Paphlagonian women around Karzene were also abducted and violated by the Goths in 26217. Another inscription reveals that a slave Serapas from Lydia was also captured by the Goths18. The last barbarian raiding activity in which the Goths were active, and which affected Asia Minor is mainly known as the Heruli invasion19. In 267–269, after looting coastal cities such as Byzantium (and Chrysopolis) and Cyzicus, the Herules and Goths, split up into three groups20. One of these groups sailed across the Aegean Sea and attacked the shores of Asia Minor, but ultimately failed21. They besieged the cities of Pamphylia, especially Side22, and then sailed down to the Mediterranean and plundered islands such as Crete, Rhodes, and Cyprus in 26923. Despite all these attacks, most of the barbarian raiding fleets were sunk by Roman fleets 24. Apart from these battles, the Romans won many land battles against the Goths, especially during the times of Claudius II, Aurelian, and various later emperors25. Three different types of findings of mid and late Roman coins of Anatolian cities around the Chernyakhov culture north-west of the Black Sea can perhaps be linked to lootings from 253 to 26926. 2. Questions and observations on the interactions of the Goths in Phrygia One of the main policies of the Roman Empire focused on pacifying “combatant” barbarians by settling them on imperial territory and using them both in agricultural exploitation and military service. It is known that since the 2nd century, emperors such as Marcus Aurelius and Severus Alexander settled enemy soldiers who were prisoners of war on Roman land27. Like other Germanic tribes, the Goths were 15 Iord. Get. 107, Synk. 466–7, GOLTZ 2008, p. 458. The research of ESCH / MARTIN 2008, p. 102–7 has shown that Ilium, as well as Troas, was sacked by the Goths. Cf. TIB XIII, p. 121. 16 Synk. 467–8, cf. SHA Gall. 11,1. A few inscriptions associated with the Roman city wall in Ancyra is also known to be related to Gothic (or Sassanid) attacks. See MITCHELL / FRENCH 2019, p. 65–70. 17 SEG 34, 1271, SGO II, no. 10/02/12, KAYGUSUZ 1984, p. 61–2, MAREK 1993, p. 197–8, no. 28, ESCH / MARTIN 2008, p. 102–3. 18 MALAY 1994, p. 114, Nr. 382, ESCH / MARTIN 2008, p. 102. 19 Synk. 468, KETTENHOFEN 1992, p. 291–313, SCHWARCZ 2020, p. 389–402. 20 Zos. 1,43, SHA Gall. 13,8, Suda s.v. Σκύθαι. 21 SHA Claud. 9,4, 12,1, Zos. 1,42,2, 1,46,1, HARTMANN 2008, p. 302–3. 22 Dexippus FGrHist 100 F 26. 23 Amm. Marc. 31,6,16, KETTENHOFEN 1992, p. 304. 24 SHA Claud. 8,1–5. 25 GOLTZ 2008, p. 460–5. 26 See MYZGIN 2012, p. 197–201, HOSTEIN 2017, p. 43–5. 27 MERRONY 2017, p. 108.
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gradually becoming important in the Roman military system, and in this respect, the Goths were both a people to be battled and a people whose support was needed. The first encounters of the Goths and other Germanic tribes with Anatolian cities were through the series of campaigns and raids mentioned above. The Goths were also the first barbarian prisoners of war settled in the late Roman cities in Asia Minor. According to BURNS, first Gothic prisoners of war were mainly Thervingi and Taifali. The latter were allied with the Goths from at least 29128. The earliest example of mass settlement based on historical data is in the 4th century29. A controversial hagiography suggests that after Constantine’s victory over the Goths in 332, Taifali prisoners of war may have mixed with other Goths settled in Phrygia30. MCKECHNIE also argues that the father of Selenas, a Gothic bishop, was probably among the first captive Goths to arrive during this period31. In 386, some Greuthungi tribes, who were presumably captured by the Romans in the battle against the Gothic troops (led by Odotheus) around the Danube, were settled in Phrygia by Emperor Theodosius I (379–395), with the proviso that they lived according to Roman laws32. The Gothic column (Gotlar Sütunu) located in Gülhane Park in the Fatih district of Istanbul was erected in honor of that victory over the Goths possibly during the reign of Theodosius I. The legible part of the 8line inscription on the pedestal of the victory column is as follows33: Fortunae reduci ob devictos Gothos (To Fortuna Redux, because of the defeat of the Goths). It is thought the Goths were settled in Phrygia in large groups after this war34. ALBERT notes the Gothic prisoners of war should not be thought of only as men who took up arms, as their wives, children and old men were also sent to Phrygia35. According to WOLFRAM, the practice of “Gothicization”, which had been going on 28 BURNS 1991, p. 35. Some of the Gothic prisoners may have been settled in various parts of the empire after the wars with the Goths led by chieftain Cannabaudes in the period of Aurelian (270–275). 29 WOLFRAM 2004, p. 61, MCKECHNIE 2019, p. 260 30 According to Nicholas of Sion, Bishop of Myra (Lycia), the Taifali groups in Phrygia revolted during the reign of Constantine I. His generals Ursus, Nepotianus and Herpylion suppressed the revolt. However, as BLECKMANN 1995, p. 40–2 points out, the information on the Taifali groups in Phrygia, which is first referred to in the Hagiography of Symeon Metaphrastes, is also questionable. Symeon Metaphrastes Vita S. Nicolai 17, in PG 116,337. Also see Zos. 2,31,3, LENSKI 2003, p. 351, MCKECHNIE 2019, p. 260, cf. SCHIPP 2023, p. 109. See for Gothic Campaign of Constantine I SEECK 1889, p. 190, 230, BLECKMANN 1995, p. 38–66. 31 MCKECHNIE 2019, p. 260; also see below. 32 Zos. 4,35,1, Consularia Constantinopolitana s.a. 386, CAMERON ET AL. 1993, p. 113, WOLFRAM 1997, p. 124, THONEMANN 2011, p. 50. Jerome (Hier. Chron. s.a. 378) states that the Goths, who were defeated in the war in 378, also dispersed to Thrace. Also, some captives from the followers of Gothic chief Farnobius were settled around towns in Italy as agrarian labors. Cf. HEATHER 1991, p. 166. 33 IByz. 58, p. 44–6, no. 15, PESCHLOW 1991, p. 215–28. PESCHLOW 1991, p. 220 suggests the reign of Theodosius I as date of the column. 34 WOLFRAM 2004, p. 61. Amm. Marc. 31,9,3 writes that in an event during the reign of Gratian (375–83), Taifali tribes, understood to be of Eastern Germanic origin, were ruled by Gothic nobles. 35 ALBERT 1984, p. 90.
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in the Balkans and around the Danube, was spread to Phrygia with the settlement policy of Theodosius I36. At this point, the question may arise: why was Phrygia chosen to settle the Goths? Above all, Phrygia was a much safer region than Thrace for the resettlement of the Goths and had no direct connection to the sea. As the Latin panegyrist Pacatus (late 4th century) pointed out, the Goths were soldiers for the army and farmers for the lands of the Romans37. Undoubtedly, to create an additional agricultural labor and the provision of surplus products were the main reasons why the Roman Empire settled these tribes in Phrygia. In this sense, it is possible to establish a connection between the “awful famine” that occurred in Phrygia in 370–371 and the deportation of the Goths38. Socrates Scholasticus writes that the Phrygians, who suffered from famine due to a food shortage, fled to Constantinople and other provinces, and that grain was supplied from overseas provinces and the Black Sea to meet the nutritional needs of the remaining people in Phrygia39. In fact, Phrygia had vast agricultural lands that could easily feed its own people, and with sufficient labour, production could have been increased. There is also a hint that the Phrygians (and apparently Phrygia as well) were functional for imperial politics: Themistius (317–388) comments in Oration 16 (after the peace with the Goths in 382) that the Roman Empire should solve the problems with the Goths through various relocation policies40. In this oration, he obviously perceived the Phrygians and Bithynians as elements that could spread Roman culture. In this respect, Phrygia may have been considered by the Roman authorities as a place where the inhabitants could easily integrate the Goths as new settlers into Rome. Themistius also presents the integration and assimilation of the Galatians to the Roman Empire as a similar example41. As a matter of fact, in the 4th century, the Gothic presence was mentioned in the sources as settlers in Phrygia. A remark by the Latin poet Claudian, “Ostrogothis colitur mixtisque Gruthungis Phryx ager” (Ostrogoths mixed with Greuthungi cultivate the Phrygian land), shows that some Goths (Ostrogoths and Greuthungi) were placed in Phrygia42. In another passage, Claudian hints at the fact the Goths who settled in that region were interested in agriculture. Go then, busy yourself with the plow, cleave the soil, bid your followers lay aside their swords and sweat over the harrow. The Greuthungi will do good farming and will plant their vines in due season. Happy those other women whose glory is seen in the towns their husbands have conquered, they whose adornment is the spoils so hardly won from an enemy, whose servants
36 WOLFRAM 1997, p. 124. 37 Paneg. Pacatus 22,3. 38 Jerome (Hier. Chron. s.a. 371) indicates year 371 for the great famine in Phrygia. Consularia Constantinopolitana s.a. 370,1, BECKER ET AL. 2016, p. 122. Stephanus of Byzantium also mentions that there was a famine in Aezani (Çavdarhisar-Kütahya) near Cotyaeum in Phrygia and that the shepherds sought religious solutions. See Steph. Byz. Ethnika. Ἀζανοί. 39 Socr. Hist. eccl. 4,16, LENSKI 2013, p. 388–90. 40 Them. Or. 16,211b. 41 Them. Or. 16,211c–d, MIRKOVIC 1997, p. 96–7. 42 Claudian In Eutr. 2,153–4.
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are fair captives of Argos or Thessalia, and who have won them slaves from Sparta. Fate has mated me with too timid, too indolent a husband, a degenerate who has forgotten the valor of Ister's tribes, who deserts his country's ways, whom a vain reputation for justice attracts, while he longs to live as a husbandman (colonus) by favor rather than as a prince (dominus) by plunder… 43. (Trans. by M. PLATNAUER)
It is possible to follow the view that the Goths were probably settled as laeti or coloni in the territory of Phrygia44. Although there is no legal text of this policy in any detail, Codex Theodosianus provides some worthy hints about the status of Phrygian Goths. According to the Codex Theodosianus (5,6,3), the Sciri prisoners of war, who had participated in the campaigns of the Huns against the Roman Empire, were settled as coloni on Roman territory45. The eyewitness, Sozomen also noted that
43 See Claudian In Eutr. 2,194–205. 44 ALBERT 1984, p. 90, SCHARF 2001, p. 25, THONEMANN 2011, p. 50. For a comprehensive study on this issue, see GREY 2007, p. 155–75, SCHMIDT-HOFNER 2017, p. 389–95. 45 Cod. Theod. 5,6,3: Idem aa. Anthemio praefecto praetorio. Scyras barbaram nationem maximis chunorum, quibus se coniunxerunt, copiis fusis imperio nostro subegimus. Ideoque damus omnibus copiam ex praedicto genere hominum agros proprios frequentandi, ita ut omnes sciant susceptos non alio iure quam colonatus apud se futuros nullique licere ex hoc genere colonorum ab eo, cui semel adtributi fuerint, vel fraude aliquem abducere vel fugientem suscipere, poena proposita, quae recipientes alienis censibus adscriptos vel non proprios colonos insequitur. Opera autem eorum terrarum domini libera utantur ac nullus sub acta peraequatione vel censui ...acent nullique liceat velut donatos eos a iure census in servitutem trahere urbanisve obsequiis addicere, licet intra biennium suscipientibus liceat pro rei frumentariae angustiis in quibuslibet provinciis transmarinis tantummodo eos retinere et postea in sedes perpetuas collocare, a partibus Thraciae vel Illyrici habitatione eorum penitus prohibenda et intra quinquennium dumtaxat intra eiusdem provinciae fines eorum traductione, prout libuerit, concedenda, iuniorum quoque intra praedictos viginti annos praebitione cessante. Ita ut per libellos sedem tuam adeuntibus his qui voluerint per transmarinas provincias eorum distributio fiat. Dat. prid. id.april. Constantinopoli Honorio viii et Theodosio iii conss. “The same Augusti to Anthemius, Praetorian Prefect. We have subjected the Scyrae, a barbarian notion, to our power after We had routed a very great force of Chuni (Huns), with whom they had allied themselves. Therefore, We grant to all persons to opportunity to supply their own fields with men of the aforesaid race. But all persons shall know that they shall hold those whom they have received by no other title than that of colonus, and that no one shall be permitted either fraudulently to take anyone of this class of coloni away from the person to whom he had once been assigned or to receive such a one as a fugitive, under the penalty which is inflicted upon those who harbor persons that are registered in the tax rolls of others or coloni who are not their own. Moreover, the owners of lands may use the free labor of such captives… but no one shall be forced to undergo a tax equalization for the tax rolls… and no one shall be permitted, because of the shortage of farm produce, to retain them for a two year period in any provinces they please, provided that these provinces are across the sea, and thereafter to place them in permanent homes, for which purpose their residence in the regions of Thrace and Illyricum shall be absolutely prohibited to them. Only within a five-year period shall it be permitted to make a transfer openly and freely within the confines of the same province. The furnishing of recruits also shall be suspended during the aforesaid twenty-year period. The distribution of these people throughout the transmarine provinces shall be made to those who so wish through petitions to apply to your court. Given on the day before the ides of April
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Scirii were settled in various regions because it would have been dangerous for them to remain together, and that many of them were engaged in agriculture (and possibly even mining activities) in the valleys and hills around Mount Olympus (Uludağ) in 40946. Based on all above information, it is understood that the Scirii were settled in Bithynia as coloni adscripti. GREY also states that prisoners of war, may have been used as rural cultivators, which is in line with our view of the Goths in Phrygia47. The practice of placing settlers as coloni – tenant farmers – in the agricultural labour of vast estates was not new, at least in imperial Phrygia. The early 3rd century colonies Tymion and Simoe are a well-known example of this practice, which is of another type48. However, it can be recognised that the peace of 382 provided a more favourable situation for some Gothic settlers49. According to SCHARF, as a policy of Theodosius I, the status of the Gothic settlers was variable. They were alternated between serving as coloni and being part of the comitatenses50. It is not yet possible to determine precisely where the Phrygian Goths settled. Nevertheless, some Late Antique sources and a few epigraphic finds point us predominantly to two points and their immediate surroundings where the Goths lived in Phrygia51: The area between Dindymus (Arayit Dağı/or Günyüzü Dağı, a peak of the Sivrihisar Dağları)52 and Turkmen (Türkmen Dağları) Mountains53. The regional centre of the Gothic population was the city of Nacolea and its territory, a small town on the plain east of the Turkmen Mountain54. Geographical works do not provide any information about the settlement of these peoples. We have various pieces of information regarding the geographical and topographical features of the region. The most important information we know is that this area is mostly plain, watery, and suitable for cultivation. However, the routes between Nacolea-Cotyaeum, Dorylaeum-Nacolea, and Nacolea-Pessinus were not densely populated areas and there were no major cities or towns nearby. We may guess that the Goths were settled not directly in the city of Nacolea, but rather in the arable, yet sparsely populated area in the hinterland of Nacolea.
46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54
(April 12, 409) at Constantinople in the year of eighth consulship of Honorius Augustus and the third consulship of Theodosius Augustus.” (Trans. by C. PHARR, p. 108) Sozom. 9,5. GREY 2007, p. 163. SEG 53, 1517, TABBERNEE / LAMPE 2008, p. 68–9, MITCHELL 2013, p. 168–9. It is also known that tenant farmers of Tymion and Simoe were being illegally exacted tribute (by soldiers?). See TABBERNEE / LAMPE 2008, p. 61, KANTOR 2013, p. 160. Claudian In Eutr. 2,576-578. SCHARF 2001, p. 26–7. See below. TIB IV, p. 158–9. However, archaeological finds belonging to the Chernyakhov and Wielbark cultures and attesting Gothic presence in this area are still missing. Philostorgius Hist. eccl. 11. 8. A minor Celtic population is also known to have existed in Nacolea. See AVRAM 2015, p. 199–229, COSKUN 2022, p. 3–94.
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There were also some imperial estates in Nacolea, and most likely Gothic settlers cultivated these lands55. The agricultural products, grains, grapes, and animal husbandry of Phrygia were renowned and the Goths were likely to have cultivated these crops or to have herded livestock56. Looking at the territory of Nacolea, it can be seen it that is suitable for agriculture, and even today the main economic activity in the region is agriculture and animal husbandry.
Image 2. A View from Turkmen Mountain.
According to Socrates, the Goths established a marriage relationship with the Phrygians, and even after the Gothic revolt57, a considerable number of Goths continued to live in Phrygian towns58. The main information that enables us to reach this conclusion is that Selenas (Selinas) was named ‘the Bishop of the Goths59’, the son of a Phrygian mother and a Gothic father60. He was of ἐπίμικτον γένος (mixed descent) and fluent in ἀμφοτέραις ταῖς διαλέκτοις (in both languages) according to the sources. Therefore, he was able to preach in Gothic and Neo-Phrygian languages in the church61. JANSE suggests that Selenas may have been trilingual, which is also a possible62. In any case, Arian bishop Selenas was a well-known figure who showed the consequences of the Gothic presence in Late Antique Phrygia. KHAZDAN 1991, p. 1434. For the imperial estates in Cotyaeum cf. TAKMER 2018, p. 428–33. THONEMANN 2011, p. 53. See below. Socr. Hist. eccl. 5,23, ROLLER 2018, p. 124–5. According to Sozom. 7,17,12, Selenas was formerly secretary of Wulfila, and after him became bishop of the Goths. MITCHELL 1993, p. 174 identifies Selenas as the bishop of Cotyaeum without does not cite a primary source. 60 Γότθος μὲν ἦν ἐκ πατρός· Φρὺξ δὲ κατὰ μητέρα. Socr. Hist. eccl. 5,23, MATHISEN 1997, p. 674, BRIXHE 2002, p. 252, FALLUOMINI 2015, p. 10, MITCHELL 1993, p. 174. 61 Socr. Hist. eccl. 5,23, MITCHELL 1993, p. 174, LEVICK 2013, p. 46; cf. Sozom. 7,17,12, ROLLER 2018, p. 124–5, OBRADOR-CURSACH 2020, p. 23. The word dialektos must refer to vernacular languages other than Greek. 62 JANSE 2002, p. 350.
55 56 57 58 59
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An undatable epitaph of the Gothic primicerius Ourfilas (Wurphilas) of Pessinus also shows that the Goths spread to other nearby cities in Galatia, such as Pessinus63, and that some of them served in churches in Late Antiquity64. Based on the inscription on a marble stoup found at Cotyaeum, Eugenius, son of Toutila, may also have been a descendant of the Phrygian Goths65. In addition, a building (possibly a church) inscription, found in territory of Dorylaeum (in the village of Yenisofça south-west of Eskişehir) has a similar feature66. The Biarkhos Auxiagathon (called with his agnomen Arinthaios) mentioned in this inscription was probably of Gothic origin and married to a Phrygian woman named Alexa67. The revolt of the Phrygian Goths, led by Tribigild, was the last time specific individuals of them appear as historical subjects, since none of the Goths who appear in the historical record after the revolt seem to be related to the Phrygian Goths68. Gothic personal names have also largely disappeared, probably due to their small population, and they did not remain a permanent population like the Celtic and Jewish communities in Asia Minor after the Seleucid period. A document dated to the end of the 5th century shows that under Anastasius (491–518), Gothic soldiers were used in the battle against the Isaurian rebels at Cotyaeum69. In any case, these were Ostrogoths led by Theoderic the Amal (454– 526) and have nothing to do with Phrygian Goths. In the works of Theophanes, who lived in the 8th and early 9th centuries, some soldiers from Opsician theme were called Γοτθογραῖκοι (i.e. Hellenized Goths?)70. However, some modern scholars believe the Γοτθογραῖκοι (Gotthograikoi) were not the descendants of the Phrygian Goths either71. 3. Geography of Turmoil: Revolts of the Phrygian Goths The Roman settlement policy and the integration of the Gothic settlers did not have the desired outcome, and after a while, the Goths caused trouble in Phrygia. In light of some statements of Gregory of Nyssa, ZUCKERMAN dates the first Gothic revolt in Roman Anatolia to 379–80, which has no connection with the later Tribigild’s revolt72. The revolt of Taifal (probably including the Goths) during the reign of See for Pessinus COSKUN 2022, p. 3–94. DEVREKER ET AL. 2010, No. 7, p. 69–70, AVRAM 2012, No. 3, p. 272–4. NIEWÖHNER 2006, p. 452, Nr. 76, see for comment of MITCHELL, ICG 4506. SEG 34, 1294, see HUTTNER 2018, p. 189–90. SEG 34, 1292, NAZAROV 2022, p. 39–40, cf. HUTTNER 2018, p. 190. See below. Joh. Ant. fr. 239,5, Marcellinus Comes s.a. 492, also see ONUR 2014, p. 147. Theophanes 386, TIB VII, p. 80, KHAZDAN 1991, p. 862. For Cosmas of Jerusalem’s definition on Gothograecia, see ZUCKERMAN 1995, p. 234–42, HALDON 1995, p. 45–54. 71 TIB XIII, p. 580–1, cf. HALDON 1984, p. 201–26, HALDON 1995, p. 45–54. Onomastic studies in this region also do not give any hint of a relationship with the Goths. 72 ZUCKERMAN 1991, p. 479–86 also supports his claim with the data from a passage in Amm. Marc. 31,16,8. Cf. SPEIDEL 1998, p. 503–6.
63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70
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Constantine I can also be considered within the scope of the first Gothic revolts in Phrygia, which shows there was already some unrest73. Although before 399 there is only vague evidence of rebellions, it is likely that the circumstances in Phrygia provided a favourable situation for the Gothic revolt led by Tribigild. The military forces in Phrygia, most of them considered Goths from the Roman perspective, also revolted under the leadership of the comes Tribigild (Tarbigilos / Tirbingilus)74. The main reason for this revolt was that Tribigild had not been rewarded like Alaric after a successful campaign against the Huns75. Although some of the Goths were settled in Roman territory and lived with the Hellenized Phrygians, they were not free farmers while living in Roman territory. According to ALBERT, because of the foedus granted to Alaric's Goths, the Goths in Phrygia thought that they could improve their status and acted accordingly76. Moreover, religious compulsions forced on the Arian (or semi-Arian) Goths, and the possible anti-barbarian behaviors they had to deal from the Romans can be the answers the question as to why there was a Gothic revolt in Phrygia77. It is clear that some of the non-Gothic Phrygians also participated in or indirectly supported the Gothic revolt in Phrygia. According to Zosimus, soon after Tribigild’s arrival in Nacolea, he ‘had gathered around him such a multitude of slaves and other desperate men’, with whom he made the revolt even stronger78. It can be stated as a hypothesis that there may have been some religious groups in Phrygia, such as disaffected pagans, Novatians, and Montanists79, who opposed the religious views of Constantinople and supported – or did not resist the Goths – many “marginal” groups80. It is also possible that the Goths who settled in Phrygia had the means to maintain their Arian creed over time and established a close relationship with some Phrygians, who were regarded as heretics.
73 See above. 74 Claudian In Eutr. 2,174–237, 2,399, Zos. 5,13. According to MIRKOVIC 1997, p. 100, f.n. 49, Tribigild was probably the rector of the Phrygian Goths. Cf. PLRE II, Tribigildus, BARNISH 1986, p. 185, TIB VIII, p. 79, WOLFRAM 1997, p. 125, ELTON 2018, p. 156. According to SCHARF 2001, p. 26, Tribigild and his troops were not foedarati class, but regular comitatenses. 75 Claudian In Eutr. 1,242. Cf. Claudian In Eutr. 2,235–236. 76 ALBERT 1984, p. 144. 77 Cf. CAMERON ET AL. 1993, p. 115. 78 Zos. 5,13,4. 79 See for anti-montanist policy of Constantine I, Sozom. 2,32,2–5. In addition, in canon 7 of the first Council of Constantinople in 381, Montanism was listed among the heretics far from Orthodox Christianity. Cf. TANNER 1990, p. 35. 80 See for various Christian groups in Phrygia and their relations with the empire, MITCHELL 2013, p. 168–97, MITCHELL 2017a, p. 125–41, MITCHELL 2017b, p. 271–86, IZNIK 2019, p. 282–4.
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Image 3. Map of Late Antique Phrygia. (RAC 27, p. 694).
According to Philostorgius, Tribigild and Goths garrisoned in the territory of Nacolea took over many Phrygian cities, especially Nacolea81. Claudian writes that the cities of Phrygia were once very fertile but that the Gothic rebels (as Claudian’s calls them desertoresque Gruthungos and Geticis populatibus82) seized and destroyed them easily because the Phrygians were peaceful and the city walls old and neglected after those peaceful years. There was no chance of staying safe or escaping in that period83. Claudian wraps the fall of Phrygia in a mythical story: … meanwhile, Cybele was seated amid the hallowed rocks of cold Ida, watching, as is her habit, the dance, and inciting the joyous Curetes to brandish their swords at the sound of the drum, when, the golden-turreted crown, the eternal glory of her blessed hair, fell from off her head and, rolling from her brow, the castellated diadem is profaned in the dust. The Corybantes
81 Philostorgius Hist. eccl. 11,8. SCHARF 2001, p. 26 states that Nacolea was the garrison of comitatenses. 82 Claudian In Eutr. 2,274, 2,399. 83 Claudian In Eutr. 2,274–278.
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stopped in amazement at this omen; general alarm checked their orgies and silenced their pipes. The mother of the gods cried …84 (Trans. by. M. PLATNAUER)
In fact, Claudian’s expression symbolizes the surrender of the cities of Phrygia to the Goths and the fall of Phrygia. Tribigild's rebellion was also chronicled by Claudian also as the intervention of Bellona, the Roman goddess of war (disguised as his wife), in Eutropius’ misrule85. He also cites that the streams of Sangarius (Sakarya) River turned red because of the blood of those who died and that the bodies of the Phrygians were so many that they slowed the streams of Meander (Menderes) River to show the severity of the attacks by the Goths86. Based on this information it is understood that the Goths captured the Phrygian cities from Tembris to the Upper Meander Valleys cruelly and killed the local population. Claudian’s exaggerated expression of the red colour of these two great rivers (also the two longest rivers in Western Asia Minor) must be a means to show the severity of the attacks by the Goth rebels. The inscription of Ursinianus, who served as a soldier in the cohors Stablesianorum, and the inscription of Flavius Buraido, protector of the schola peditum, found at Sebaste, shows that there were some troops in Phrygia87. It is likely that Phrygia was not completely vulnerable when the Goths were settled in this region. It is difficult to answer with certainty whether it was only because the cities of Phrygia were unprotected, as Claudian suggests, that the Goths moved so easily or that there was almost no resistance. Considering that Claudian wrote his work while living in the Western Roman Empire, such details should be treated with caution88. The local Roman troops in Phrygia were apparently ineffective against the Gothic rebels. Circumstances became dangerous for the Roman Empire after the imperial army under magister militum Leo89, who was sent from Constantinople to quell the revolt in Phrygia, was defeated by Tribigild90. Gainas, who was firstly a commander of the eastern comitatus, then magister utriusque militiae, and tasked with protecting Thrace, tried to solve this problem, but Gainas’ soldiers did not support Leo’s side against Tribigild91. 84 Claudian In Eutr. 2,279–287. 85 Claudian In Eutr. 2,175–229, CAMERON ET AL. 1993, p. 278, f.n. 103. Through the representation of Bellona as Tribigild's wife, the main aim is to satirize femininity and misrule in the East and the eunuch Eutropius. 86 Claudian In Eutr. 2,290–291. 87 SPEIDEL 1984, p. 381–9, MAMA XI 72, AKYÜREK-ŞAHIN / UZUNOĞLU 2021, p. 336. In addition to Nacolea, it is known that there are protectores of Thraco-Dacian origin in Cyzicus and Nicomedia. Cf. DREW-BEAR 1977, p. 262. 88 LONG 1994, p. 4. It should be noted that the conflict between the imperial courts in Mediolanum and Constantinople may also have been reflected in Claudian’s work. Moreover, considering the chaos in the West, perhaps he was also envious of the relationship of the authorities in Constantinople with the Goths and their integration. 89 PLRE II, Leo II. 90 Zos. 5,14,2, Claudian In Eutr. 2. 436. 91 Zos. 5,14–15, Philostorgius Hist. eccl. 11,8; for Gainas see Socr. Hist. eccl. 6,1–6, Joh. Ant. fr. 216,1–4; cf. PLRE I, Gainas, ALBERT 1984, p. 199–120, HEATHER 1988, p. 171–2, LIEBESCHUETZ 1990, p. 111–2, CAMERON ET AL. 1993, p. 204–30, PFEILSCHIFTER 2013, p. 488.
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Therefore, Gainas, instead of fighting the rebel Goths in Phrygia, negotiated with them, and reported to Constantinople that he could suppress this revolt on the condition that Eutropius, the consul, court chamberlain (cubicularius) and patricius was banished from Constantinople92. Tribigild and his followers moved to southern parts of Asia Minor to gain distance from Gainas or as a part of the common plot with Gainas93. They first came to Pamphylian cities and sacked Selge but changed direction with the ambush attacks of the Selgeians and local bandit supporters who were hired with money, then moved towards Side and Aspendus94. The mention that Tribigild, who returned to Phrygia from the south, had three hundred men indicates that not all the rebels in the revolt that started in Phrygia participated in plundering campaigns95. Fearing the name of Tribigild the people spread rumors about where the next attack would be, and all cities of Asia Minor were worried they would be occupied96. However, following plundering in Pisidia and Pamphylia and heavy losses during the wars in Isauria, Tribigild escaped over the Hellespont to Thrace and died sometime later97. Meanwhile, the magister militum praesentalis Gainas tried to use this chaotic situation for his own political aims98. Eventually Arcadius (395–408) met Gainas in a church near Chalcedon, increased his authority in the capital and made a fragile peace99. Then, when Gainas, who was a zealous Arian, and his Goths entered the capital Constantinople, they demanded that the church (ἐκκλησία τῶν Γότθων) in the city be opened for the Arian Goths100. The forces that entered Constantinople under the command of Gainas were apparently not in rebellion after the meeting in Chalcedon, and had probably achieved their demands101. The sources controversially imply that Gainas and his followers attempted to take control of the city (and even imply that his real intention was to usurp the throne)102. However, the orthodox fundamentalist Archbishop of Constantinople John Chrysostom provoked a counter-movement against the Goths among the population of the capital. Allegedly, 7,000 Goths (without any doubt an 92 Zos. 5,17, 5–18,3, Claudian In Eutr. 2,501–602, Eunapius fr. 67,10–11, Sozom. 8,4,2; PLRE II, Eutropius 1, CAMERON ET AL. 1993, p. 162. 93 CAMERON and LONG make a strong argument that the relationship between Tribigild and Gainas was not that of allies, and that the two were not in a joint and planned action. CAMERON ET AL. 1993, p. 223–33, cf. PFEILSCHIFTER 2013, p. 213. 94 Zos. 5,15–16. According to Eunapius, the rebellious Goths also attacked Lydia. Eunapius fr. 67,2. 95 Zos. 5,16. 96 Claudian In Eutr. 2,465–471. 97 Philostorgius Hist. eccl. 11,8. Zosimus notes that Tribigild captured Lampsacus and its environs while Gainas was in Chalcedon. Zos. 5,18,6. 98 Zos. 5,13, 5,18. 99 Sozom. 8,4, DEMANDT 2007, p. 193, PFEILSCHIFTER 2013, p. 498–9. 100 Phot. Bibl. 96,11. 101 PFEILSCHIFTER 2013, p. 497, JURIK 2021, p. 88. 102 Zos. 5,18–19, Joh. Ant. fr. 216,1.
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exaggerated number) were squeezed into the church by the imperial armies of Emperor Arcadius on July 12, 400, and burned within the church where they took refuge, relying on their right to asylum103. Gainas wanted to escape and cross to the Anatolian peninsula via the Thracian Chersonese but was killed by Hunnic troops while trying to escape from Thrace towards the Danube shores after his boats were sunk in the Hellespont104. The massacre of the Goths of Gainas was also depicted on the Column of Arcadius, which stood in the Aksaray Neighborhood of Fatih District in Istanbul and of which only the pedestal is left today105. This event is not only depicted on monuments. It is also chronicled according to Socrates, heroic poems of Eusebius Scholasticus, a pupil of the sophist Trollus, and a poem by Ammonius Epigrammaticus mentioned the battle with Gainas106. It is unclear whether the Phrygian Goths followed Tribigild in all his campaigns, but it is unlikely that they arrived in Constantinople after Tribigild’s death and followed Gainas. However, after the massacre in the church, our knowledge of the Goths who participated in the revolt, and even the existence of Gothic settlers in Phrygia is mostly cut off. Even if they did not support Gainas, there is no doubt that many Goths in Phrygia were adversely affected by the whole episode. 4. Conclusion This paper focused on the relatively little-studied Phrygian Goths of the 3rd-5th centuries in Late Antique Central Anatolia. There are still many details about the Phrygian Goths that remain obscure not only about the ordinary prisoners of war in Phrygia, but also about the actions of Tribigild and Gainas and the real causes and consequences of the revolt. The main achievement of this paper is presenting some discussions and material on the Phrygian Goths to try to keep the subject up to date and to make some new suggestions. The relations of the Goths with the Roman cities in Asia Minor can be analysed under three main headings: 1. the period of plunder in mid and late 3rd century, 2. the period of settlement as prisoners of war in the 4th century, and 3. the period of revolt in Phrygia. The last two heading constitute the centre of this paper. In 386, Gothic settlers most probably settled as laeti or coloni not only in one city of Phrygia (i.e. the town of Nacolea), but in more than one city. At the very least, it is possible to say that 103 Malalas 13,348, Phot. Bibl. 96,11, Marcellinus Comes s.a. 399, DEMANDT 2007, p. 193, FABER 2011, p. 126–35. 104 Zos. 5,20–22, Eunapius fr. 69,4, Philostorgius Hist. eccl. 11,8, Marcellinus Comes s.a. 400–1. The date January 3, 401 is given for this event. CAMERON ET AL. 1993, p. 242, FABER 2011, p. 132. While these events were taking place, the presence of Romanized people of Gothic origin serving Rome should be considered as an imperial policy of Rome. See MATHISEN 2020, p. 269–84. 105 LIEBESCHUETZ 1990, p. 120–1. 106 Socr. Hist. eccl. 6,66.
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they interacted with the neighbouring towns and imperial estates in Phrygia as well. Almost all the cities with some connection to the Phrygian Goths are between and around the Turkmen and Arayit mountains. The settlement of the Goths in Phrygia was apparently not a continuous practice, but a small number of Gothic communities continued to make a living by associating with other indigenous peoples of the city and town with agriculture and animal husbandry. Some of them also served in religious service. It is also noteworthy that the Roman Empire sent Gothic settlers directly or indirectly to inland Anatolian cities and regions unconnected to the sea. At this point, the great famine in Phrygia during the reign of Valens should be the answer to why Phrygia was chosen for settlement. However, it is possible to say that the Late Roman Empire's settlement policy in Phrygia was largely a failure. On the one hand, it aimed to pacify some of the enemies, and on the other hand, to provide new agricultural labour and military support, but none of these were at the desired level. On the contrary, the problem arose that Tribigild (and indirectly also Gainas), who had low loyalty to Roman Empire, used these Goths and some local groups for his own advantage. Tribigild, who was the leader of the rebellion in Phrygia, and magister militum Gainas were undoubtedly good examples of barbarians in the Eastern Roman Empire who were eager to gain influence and titles in the late Roman military and political ranks. Nevertheless, there was no common idea of Gothicness during Tribigild’s revolt in Phrygia. There were Germanic communities, showing loyalty or disloyalty to the emperor and the legislation. As a final point, Claudian’s (and partly Zosimus’) narrative probably also dramatised the Gothic revolt in Phrygia, since some intermarriage with indigenous peoples contrasts sharply with the massacres of indigenous peoples in the Phrygian cities. Although not as influential as the Celtic or Jewish communities, Gothic settlers also had a regional impact on the geographical relations and demography of Asia Minor. Onur Sadık Karakuş Department of History/ Faculty of Art and Sciences Düzce University, 81620 Düzce, Turkey [email protected] Bibliography AKYÜREK ŞAHIN / NALAN EDA / HÜSEYIN UZUNOĞLU, “On the History of Sebaste (Phrygia) in Antiquity and its New Inscriptions”, in: TAŞTEMÜR, EMRE / MÜNTEHA, DINÇ (eds.): City and Its Surrounding: Results of the Excavations 1966-1978 and the Survey 2016-2020 - Sebaste (Phrygia), Ankara 2021, p. 329–70. ALBERT, GERHARD, Goten in Konstantinopel: Untersuchungen zur oströmischen Geschichte um das Jahr 400 n. Chr., München 1984. ANTONY, HOSTEIN, “Note sur les dariques de Cniva (Dexippus Vindobonensis) et autres curiosités « barbares »”. Revue numismatique, 6e série - Tome 174, 2017, p. 37–64.
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WINE PRODUCTION FACILITIES IN THE ROMAN AND LATE ROMAN FARMHOUSES OF SOUTHERN GREECE Kyriakos Loulakoudis Abstract: The present work examines wine production facilities of farmhouses of the Roman and Late Roman period in the Roman province of Achaia, as they were formed by the consolidation of Roman rule in southern Greece, from 146 BC until the Late Roman period, as well as the transition from older production units of the Late Hellenistic period in this area. Specifically, the focus is on archaeological remains of wine production facilities of Roman farmhouses in southern Greece, as well as on testimonies of ancient texts that provide information about the way of wine production in Roman antiquity. The typology of wine making installations and other facilities related to the wine production process is also examined. Furthermore, the location of the wine production facilities, the method, and the technology of construction of these facilities, the production process, and the organization of the production within Roman farmhouses are also examined. Keywords: Wine production, South Greece, Roman province of Achaia, Roman period, Late Roman period, villa rustica, Roman agricultural economy, wine making installations. 1. Introduction The farmhouse as a production and residential unit in Greece predated the Roman conquest. The development of these new agricultural facilities does not mean that older smaller agricultural structures disappeared or that traditional economy was affected; in fact, in many cases, older facilities coexisted with the new ones. During Roman times a significant change took place in terms of rural house arrangement and the organization of agricultural production, which is related to the appearance of the villa.1 The basic functions and design of a rural villa are mentioned in texts
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1
I would like to thank Vyron Antoniadis, Researcher of Section of Greek and Roman Antiquity of National Hellenic Research Foundation, for his valuable comments on this paper and for his help. The meaning of the word villa in Latin texts varies over time. In the texts of Cato (1st half of the 2nd century BC) the word villa is used to describe a medium-sized farmhouse, which is a house with few amenities, possibly permanent (N. TERRENATO, The Auditorium site in Rome and the origins of the villa, JRA 14 (2001) p. 24–5). Already from the Varro’s texts, the term
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by Latin authors, such as in the work De Agricultura by Cato,2 in De Re Rustica by M. T. Varro3 and in De Re Rustica by Columella,4 while in several cases they are confirmed by archaeological research, both in the Italian peninsula and in the provinces of the Roman Empire.5 The major difference between the farmhouse of the Classical and Hellenistic period and the Roman villa rustica lies mainly in the different way the production process was organized.6 This is reflected in the architectural form but mainly in the effort to combine more agricultural and craft workshops within an agricultural complex, in order to achieve self-sufficiency for the needs and the production process. The ultimate goal of this is to increase productivity and obtain a larger surplus which will be channelled to urban centers. Roman villae rusticae included living quarters, animal stables, storage areas, and of course agricultural production workshop areas, including wine-making facilities. The present work examines the wine production facilities of the farmhouses of the Roman and Late Roman period in the Roman province of Achaia, as they were formed by the consolidation of Roman rule in southern Greece, from 146 BC until the Late Roman period, as well as the transition from older production units of the Late Hellenistic period in this area. The wine production facilities of Late Roman period, which studied in this paper, dates from the 3rd century AD to the end of the 5th century AD. Specifically, archaeological remains are examined along with the location of the wine production facilities, the construction method, the production process, and the organization of the production within the Roman farmhouses. More specifically, the focus will be on the permanent wine production facilities of the Roman farmhouses and in particular, on the built wine production installations and other facilities related to the wine production process. 2. The wine production process The vine and the processes of viticulture and wine production have been known in Greece since distant prehistory. The first evidence of wine production, not only in
2 3 4 5 6
seems to have a relatively vague meaning, as in later texts it is used to describe the settlement and the land owned by many owners and may also be used to identify a village. In the texts of Gregory, the Bishop of Tours of the 5th century AD. The word villa is now used to describe a place that includes accommodation facilities and arable land, belonging to the residents living on the premises (A. MARZANO, Roman villas in Central Italy: a social and economic history, Leiden 2007, p. 3). Cato, De Agricultura, I–LII, 1–52. Varro, De Re Rustica, I. Columella, De Re Rustica, I–IV. Regarding the area of the Italian peninsula see A. MARZANO, Roman villas in Central Italy: a social and economic history, Leiden 2007, p. 770–96. More about the phenomenon of the Roman villa in region of Greece see M. PAPAIOANNOU, Villas in Roman Greece, In A. MARZANO / G.P.R. MÉTRAUX, The Roman Villa in the Mediterranean Basin. Late Republic to Late Antiquity, Cambridge, 2018, p. 328–76.
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Greece but generally in eastern Mediterranean, is found in Philippi, Macedonia in the prehistoric settlement of Dikili Tash (end of the 5th millennium BC).7 Charred seeds were discovered there, and after archaeobotanological studies, it emerged that the fruits were grapes and raisins.8 In the rest of Greece, there are no remains of local vine varieties before the middle of the 3rd millennium BC.9 Although according to indirect evidence the production of wine in mainland Greece is certain, there are no confirmed archaeological remains of wine making installations of the 2nd millennium BC.10 On the contrary, in Minoan Crete, the existence of wine presses is confirmed.11
Β. ΛΟΓΟΘΕΤΗΣ, Η εξέλιξης της αμπέλου και της αμπελουργίας εις την Ελλάδα κατά τα αρχαιολογικά ευρήματα της περιοχής, Επιστημονική Επετηρίς Γεωπονικής Σχολής ΑΠΘ 13 (1970), p. 60–1, 69; Σ. Μ. ΒΑΛΑΜΩΤΗ, Η διατροφή στη βόρεια Ελλάδα κατά την προϊστορική περίοδο, με έμφαση στα φυτικά συστατικά της τροφής, ΑΕΜΘ 18 (2004), p. 420; Σ. Μ. ΒΑΛΑΜΩΤΗ, Η αρχαιοβοτανική έρευνα της διατροφής στην προϊστορική Ελλάδα, Θεσσαλονίκη, 2009, p. 100; Ε. ΣΑΛΑΒΟΥΡΑ, Ο οίνος στη Μυκηναϊκή Πελοπόννησο, In Οίνον Ιστορώ IX, Πολυστάφυλος Πελοπόννησος, Athens, 2009., p. 68; S. M. VALAMOTI et al., An Archaeobotanical Investigation of Prehistoric Grape Vine Exploitation and Wine Making in Northern Greece: Recent Finds from Dikili Tash, In A. DILER / K. ŞENOL / A. AYDINOGLU (eds.), Olive Oil and Wine Production in Eastern Mediterranean during Antiquity International Symposium Urla-İzmir-Turkey, 17–9 November 2011, Izmir, 2015, p. 130. 8 Μ. ΜΑΓΚΑΦΑ, et. al., Νεολιθικός οίνος: αρχαιολογικές μαρτυρίες από τον προϊστορικό οικισμό Φιλίππων Ντικιλί Τας, In Τέχνη και Τεχνική στα αμπέλια και τους οινεώνες της Β. Ελλάδας, Θ' Τριήμερο Εργασίας Αδριαβή Δράμας, 25–7 Ιουνίου 1999, Athens, 2002, p. 23–4 fig. 3, 29; E. ΣΤΕΦΆΝΗ, Το κρασί στον ελληνικό κόσμο: από τις απαρχές στον Όμηρο, In Il dono di Dioniso, Mitologia del vino nell’ Italia centrale (Molise), e nella Grecia del Nord (Macedonia). Το δώρο του Διονύσου, Μυθολογία του κρασιού στην κεντρική Ιταλία (Molise) και τη βόρεια Ελλάδα (Μακεδονία), Θεσσαλονίκη, 2011, p. 72–3. 9 P. E. MCGOVERN, Ancient Wine. The search for the origins of viniculture, Princeton and Oxford, 2003, p. 257; Ε. ΣΑΛΑΒΟΥΡΑ, Ο οίνος στη Μυκηναϊκή Πελοπόννησο, p. 68. The discovery of a set of charred grape stones and their imprints on the Early Helladic pottery of Lerna in Argolida, confirms the coexistence of cultivable and wild varieties of the vine (Β. ΛΟΓΟΘΕΤΗΣ, Η εξέλιξης της αμπέλου και της αμπελουργίας εις την Ελλάδα κατά τα αρχαιολογικά ευρήματα της περιοχής, p. 39–41; J. HANSEN, Agriculture in the Prehistoric Aegean, AJA 92 (1988), p. 48; P. E. MCGOVERN, Ancient Wine. The search for the origins of viniculture, p. 257; Ε. ΣΑΛΑΒΟΥΡΑ, Ο οίνος στη Μυκηναϊκή Πελοπόννησο, p. 68. 10 For viticulture and wine in Mycenaean times see R. PALMER, Wine in the Mycenaean Palace Economy, Aegaeum 10, Austin, 1994. 11 Κ. ΚΟΠΑΚΑ, Αρχαία Αιγιακά πατητήρια, In Αρχαία Ελληνική Τεχνολογία, Πρακτικά 1ου Διεθνούς Συνεδρίου, Θεσσαλονίκη 4–7.9.1997, Θεσσαλονίκη, 1997, p. 239–43, fig. 1–6; Κ. ΚΟΠΑΚΑ, Οίνος παλαιός και άνθρωποι: Σκηνές από την καθημερινότητα της μινωικής οινοπαραγωγής, In Α. ΜΗΛΟΠΟΤΑΜΙΤΑΚΗ (ed.), Οίνος Παλαιός Ηδύποτος. Το κρητικό κρασί από τα προϊστορικά ως τα νεότερα χρόνια, Heraklion, 2002, p. 31–4 fig. 8.1–2, 9.2α, 9.4; Ε. ΠΑΓΩΜΕΝΟΥ, Αρχαιολογικές ενδείξεις για την παραγωγή κρασιού κατά την εποχή του Χαλκού στην Κρήτη, In Α. ΜΗΛΟΠΟΤΑΜΙΤΑΚΗ (ed.), Οίνος Παλαιός Ηδύποτος. Το κρητικό κρασί από τα προϊστορικά ως τα νεότερα χρόνια, Heraklion, 2002, p. 53 fig. 3–4; Ε. ΠΛΑΤΩΝ, Τα μινωικά αγγεία και το κρασί, In Α. ΜΗΛΟΠΟΤΑΜΙΤΆΚΗ (ed.), Οίνος Παλαιός Ηδύποτος. Το κρητικό κρασί από τα προϊστορικά ως τα νεότερα χρόνια, Heraklion, 2002, p. 9 fig. 1–3; P. E. MCGOVERN, Ancient Wine. The search for the origins of viniculture, p. 252–4 fig. 10.3.
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According to literary sources,12 the planting of a vineyard could be done in three ways: i) with full excavation of the field, ii) in elongated ditches, a technique mentioned as «μέθοδος του ταφρεύειν», and iii) in dug pits.13 According to archaeological findings so far, the most common way of planting vines in Greece was in ditches, while there are indications of vineyards having been planted in dug pits too. Ancient vineyards have been found in southern Greece, in the region of Kato Achaia in Patras (western Peloponnese),14 at the sanctuary of Zeus in Nemea (northeastern Peloponnese),15 in Megara (Attica),16 and at ancient Echinos (southeastern Fthiotida).17 The harvesting process took place in September of each year. Initially, the fruits of the grapes were collected together with the green shoots, in large baskets, then the shoots were separated from the grapes (αποβοστρύχωση), and finally, they were crushed in the wine press to produce the must (γλευκοποίηση). The Greek word “γλευκοποίηση”, which means the production of must, is a compound derivative of the Greek word “γλεῦκος”, that is must (mustum in Latin).18 Grape crushing was performed with hands, with mortars and pestles, with cylindrical crushers, and crushing in sacks (μέθοδος του σακκίζειν). From the 1st century BC onwards various types of mechanical presses were also involved. The most common way of crushing grapes, from the most ancient prehistory to the 20th century AD, was crushing in the wine production tanks with the feet. The wine making facilities were 12 Strabo, Geographica, XV 3, 11 (732). Columella, De arboribus I 6 and IV 2. Xenophon, Economicus XIX, 2–3. In addition to the above authors, Theophrastus has written about viticulture in Περὶ φυτῶν Ιστορίας (I, II, VI 4, V), Virgil in his text Georgics (Georgica II, 298), Columella in De re rustica (LII 1, XXXIII 1-4). For more on wine production in ancient literary sources, see E. K. DODD, Roman and Late Antique Wine Production in the Eastern Mediterranean. A comparative archaeological study at Antiochia ad Cragum (Turkey) and Delos (Greece), Oxford, 2020, p. 17–21. 13 Γ. Α. ΠΙΚΟΥΛΑΣ, Οι αρχαίοι αμπελώνες στο ιερό του Διός στη Νεμέα, Ηόρος 14–6 (2000– 2003), p. 395–6; Γ. Α. ΠΙΚΟΥΛΑΣ, Αμπελοφυτεύειν, In Οίνον Ιστορώ ΙΙΙ, Τα αμπελανθίσματα, Επανομή Θεσσαλονίκης 2004, p. 20; Α. Γ. ΒΟΡΔΟΣ, Διαχρονικές τεχνικές στη φύτευση αμπελώνων, η περίπτωση των Μεγάρων, In Γ. ΚΑΖΑΖΗ, Πρακτικά, 2ο Διεθνές Συνέδριο Αρχαίας Ελληνικής Τεχνολογίας, Athens, 2006, p. 381. 14 Μ. ΠΕΤΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΣ, Ρωμαϊκοί ληνοί της Πάτρας, In (ed.) Γ. Α. ΠΙΚΟΥΛΑΣ, Οίνον Ιστορώ, Αμπελοοινική Ιστορία και Αρχαιολογία της Πελοποννήσου, Athens, 2001, p. 47–8, tab. 13; Μ. ΠΕΤΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΣ, Γενική θεώρηση της αγροτικής παραγωγής στην Αρκαδία των ρωμαϊκών χρόνων, In A. D. RIZAKIS / I. P. TOURATSOGLOU (eds.), Villae Rusticae. Family and MarketOriented Farms in Greece under Roman Rule, Patrai 23–4 April 2010, Athens, 2013, p. 308 fig. 15. 15 Γ. Α. ΠΙΚΟΥΛΑΣ, Οι αρχαίοι αμπελώνες στο ιερό του Διός στη Νεμέα, p. 398–400. 16 Α. Γ. ΒΟΡΔΟΣ, Μια περίπτωση αμπελοφυτείας στα Μέγαρα, In (ed.) Γ. Α. ΠΙΚΟΥΛΑΣ, Οίνον Ιστορώ ΙΙ, Μεγαρίς, Η αμπελοοινική της Ιστορία, Athens, 2002, tab. 10; Α. Γ. ΒΟΡΔΟΣ, Διαχρονικές τεχνικές στη φύτευση αμπελώνων, η περίπτωση των Μεγάρων, 380, 383, fig. 1, 384 fig. 2, 386 fig. 3. 17 Μ. ΣΙΨΗ, Ενδείξεις καλλιέργειας της γης στον Αχινό, In (ed.) Ι. Ε. ΜΑΚΡΗΣ, Φθιωτική ιστορία: πρακτικά 5ου Συνεδρίου Φθιωτικής ιστορίας: ιστορία-αρχαιολογία-λαογραφία, 16, 17 και 18 Απριλίου 2010, Lamia 2015, p. 97, 99 fig. 4–5, 100–1 fig. 6–9. 18 ΠΊΚΟΥΛΑΣ 2005, 20.
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simple constructions that featured the mainly wine making installation (ληνός) with taps and the must collection tank (υπολήνιo). The wine making installations were either built structures, or carved on the rock, wooden structures, or clay vessels. They consisted of a single system including a mainly wine making installation and a collection tank, or formed a larger production system with multiple tanks. The word “ληνός” first appears in the Homeric hymn to Mercury and denotes the vessel used to feed the animals.19 According to the sources, the word “ληνός” takes the meaning of the wine making installation much later, from the Hellenistic times onwards.20 The oldest bibliographic reference to archaeological remains of a wine making installation in Greece can be found in the paper of W. Döerpfeld (1895), “Die Ausgrabungen am Westabhange der Akropolis. II. Das Lenaion oder Dionysion in den Limnai” which mentions a wine making installation of classical times, found west of the rock of the Acropolis of Athens, in an area where there were other production facilities.21 Τhe first synthetic paper for wine making installations in Greece is the paper of M. Petropoulos (2001) “Ρωμαϊκοί ληνοί της Πάτρας”, where the first recording of the basic characteristics of these facilities is made 3. Wine making installations in Antiquity – Typology and Evolution The first archaeological evidence of wine making installations in Greece comes from Minoan Crete, in the settlements of Zakros, Palekastro, Myrtos, and Gournia.22 These are installations consisting of clay pots, with a wide tap at their base and a clay vessel that functioned as a collection tank for the must (υπολήνιο). Although they are mobile pots, they have been found placed in a specific part of the room, which testifies to their permanent establishment.23 In the Late Minoan villa in Epano Zakros,24 the clay vessel of the wine making system had been replaced at
19 Hom. H. Hermes, 103–4. “'ἀδμῆτες δ’ ἵκανον ἐς αὔλιον ὑψιμέλαθρον καὶ ληνοὺς προπάροιθεν ἀριπρεπέος λειμῶνος'”. 20 Theophrastus VII, 25 και XXV 28; Diodorus Siculus, ΙΙΙ, 63, 4. τὸν δ’ οὖν Διόνυσον ἐπελθόντα μετὰ στρατοπέδου πᾶσαν τὴν οἰκουμένην διδάξαι τήν τε φυτείαν τῆς ἀμπέλου καὶ τὴν ἐν ταῖς ληνοῖς ἀπόθλιψιν τῶν βοτρύων ˙… 21 W. DÖERPFELD, Die Ausgrabungen am Westabhange der Akropolis. II. Das Lenaion oder Dionysion in den Limnai, ΑΜ 20 (1895), p. 168–71, fig. 5–7. 22 Κ. ΚΟΠΑΚΑ, Αρχαία Αιγιακά πατητήρια, p. 239–43, fig. 1–6; Κ. ΚΟΠΑΚΑ, Οίνος παλαιός και άνθρωποι: Σκηνές από την καθημερινότητα της μινωικής οινοπαραγωγής, p. 31–4 fig. 8.1–2, 9.2α, 9.4; Ε. ΠΑΓΩΜΕΝΟΥ, Αρχαιολογικές ενδείξεις για την παραγωγή κρασιού κατά την εποχή του Χαλκού στην Κρήτη, p. 50, 53 fig. 3–4; Ε. ΠΛΑΤΩΝ, Τα μινωικά αγγεία και το κρασί, p. 9 fig. 1–3. MCGOVERN, Ancient Wine. The search for the origins of viniculture, p. 252–4 fig. 10.3. 23 Κ. ΚΟΠΑΚΑ, Οίνος παλαιός και άνθρωποι: Σκηνές από την καθημερινότητα της μινωικής οινοπαραγωγής, p. 31–2 fig. 8.1; Ε. ΠΛΑΤΩΝ, Τα μινωικά αγγεία και το κρασί, p. 10–1. 24 Κ. ΚΟΠΑΚΑ, Οίνος παλαιός και άνθρωποι: Σκηνές από την καθημερινότητα της μινωικής οινοπαραγωγής, p. 32 fig. 8.2.
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a later chronological phase with a rectangular built tank. It is perhaps the oldest case of a built wine making installation in Greece.25 According to archaeological data, the wine making installations or production means of the historical period, can be classified into three groups, based on the way they are made.26 The first group includes the mobile wine presses,27 the second includes the built wine making installations, and the third includes the rock-cut wine making installations. The latter are mostly located away from residential areas, on the slopes of mountains or hills, very often in vineyards and have timeless use throughout antiquity. The classification of wine making installations within a strict chronological context is a particularly difficult task mainly due to the slow evolution of the production process. The exact dating of the wine making installations can be done based on the general archaeological context where the press was found. The built wine making installations located within the farmhouse, consist of one or more sets of presses and tanks. The dimensions of these sets vary: there are wine making tanks and collection tanks of very small dimensions, as well as specially designed floors in large rooms, which function as presses. The built wine making installations, based on the way their floor is constructed, can be classified into three subgroups. The first subgroup includes wine making installations with paved floors and watertight joints. The second subgroup features wine making installations with floors lined with hydraulic lime mortar and fragments of ceramics (opus signinum).28 The third subgroup includes wine making installations with floors that are fully coated with hydraulic lime mortar. Later on, the archaeological remains of the built wine making installations of southern Greece will be studied based on this classification. There have been found archaeological remains of built wine making installations from the Classical period and even more from the Hellenistic period, that were 25 The construction of built wine making installations was probably known in ancient Egypt since the time of the Old Kingdom. There is an iconographic representation, which depicts a built wine making installation in the Egyptian tomb of Khety, (T. G. H. JAMES, The Earliest History of Wine and Its Importance in Ancient Egypt, In P. E. MCGOVERN / S. J. FLEMING / S. H. KATZ (eds.), The origins and Ancient History of Wine, Singapore, 1996, p. 210 figs. 13.9, 13. 10), and also a similar iconographic representation which exists in the period of the New Kingdom of Egypt (Σ. ΚΟΥΡΑΚΟΥ-ΔΡΑΓΩΝΑ, Οινολογική ματιά στην εκχύμωση των σταφυλιών ανά τους αιώνες, In Γ.Α. ΠΙΚΟΥΛΑΣ (ed.), Οίνον Ιστορώ ΙV, Θλιπτήρια και πιεστήρια. Από τους ληνούς στα προβιομηχανικά Τσιπουρομάγγανα, Athens, 2005, p. 283, tab. 85–6 fig. 9–11). 26 For more information on the classification and study of archaeological findings of wine presses and wine making installations of the historical period, see Κ. ΛΟΥΛΑΚΟΥΔΗΣ, Οι αγροτικές εγκαταστάσεις και η οικονομία στη νότια και δυτική Ελλάδα από την ύστερη ελληνιστική μέχρι την ύστερη ρωμαϊκή περίοδο, PhD, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, 2021, p. 100–59. 27 The mobile wine presses were either clay, stone or wooden, see Κ. ΛΟΥΛΑΚΟΥΔΗΣ, Οι αγροτικές εγκαταστάσεις και η οικονομία στη νότια και δυτική Ελλάδα από την ύστερη ελληνιστική μέχρι την ύστερη ρωμαϊκή περίοδο, p. 100–5. 28 About opus signinum see J. P. ADAM, Roman Building. Materials and Techniques, London / New York, 2005, p. 475 fig. 542.
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used at the same time with mobile wine making installations. Typical cases of such installations of the Classical period are the built wine making installations in the 4th century BC farmhouse at Tsoukaleika in Patras and in the 4th century BC farmhouse in Piraeus. 29 In Palekastro Aseas of Arcadia, a wine production facility was found, in a farmhouse of the Early Hellenistic times.30 A wine making installation of similar type has also been found in a farm of the Hellenistic period at Lousoi of Kalavryta, west of the sanctuary of Artemis (no. 25).31 From the end of the Hellenistic period and especially during Roman times, the findings of the built wine production facilities multiplied, which testifies to the increase of production in Roman times. 4. Wine production facilities of the Roman and Late Roman period 4.1. Wine making installations (ληνοί) –Archaeological remains The built wine making installations of the first subgroup with the paved floors, are located in farmhouses and date from the Hellenistic to the Late Roman period. The use of ceramics gives the floor the required hardness for grape crushing, and the hydraulic mortar ensures that the floor remains watertight.
29 Μ. ΠΕΤΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΣ, Τοπογραφικά της χώρας των Πατρέων, In Α. Δ. ΡΙΖΑΚΗΣ (ed.), Πρακτικά Α' Διεθνούς Συνεδρίου Αρχαία Αχαΐα και Ηλεία. Αθήνα 19–21 Μαΐου 1989, Μελετήματα 13 (1991), p. 253; Μ. ΠΕΤΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΣ, Τσουκαλέικα, ADelt 52 (1997), Chron. Β1, p. 289; Μ. ΠΕΤΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΣ, Ρωμαϊκοί ληνοί της Πάτρας, p. 41; Μ. ΠΕΤΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΣ, Κρασί και λάδι: πήλινοι κινητοί ληνοί και διαχωριστήρες, In Γ. Α. ΠΙΚΟΥΛΑΣ (ed.), Οίνον Ιστορώ ΙV, Θλιπτήρια και πιεστήρια. Από τους ληνούς στα προβιομηχανικά Τσιπουρομάγγανα, Athens, 2005, p. 35–6, tab. 8, tab. 14, fig. 4–5; Μ. ΠΕΤΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΣ, Μόνιμες εγκαταστάσεις και κινητά σκεύη για την αγροτική παραγωγή στις ρωμαϊκές αγροικίες της Πάτρας, In A. D. RIZAKIS / I. P. TOURATSOGLOU (eds.), Villae Rusticae. Family and Market-Oriented Farms in Greece under Roman Rule, Patrai 23–4 April 2010, Athens, 2013, p. 162–3 fig. 6. M. ΣΑΛΛΙΩΡΑ-ΟΙΚΟΝΟΜΑΚΟΥ, Ο αρχαίος δήμος του Σουνίου. Ιστορική και τοπογραφική επισκόπηση, Athens, 2004, p. 61 fig. 42. It should be noted that in the farmhouse at Tsoukaleika (Μ. ΠΕΤΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΣ, Μόνιμες εγκαταστάσεις και κινητά σκεύη για την αγροτική παραγωγή στις ρωμαϊκές αγροικίες της Πάτρας, 164 figs. 7–8) and in Piraeus (Μ. ΣΑΛΛΙΩΡΑΟΙΚΟΝΟΜΑΚΟΥ, ,Ο αρχαίος δήμος του Σουνίου. Ιστορική και τοπογραφική επισκόπηση, 61 figs. 44) in addition to the built structures, clay mobile wine presses were also found. 30 Ι. Α. ΠΙΚΟΥΛΑΣ, Οδικό δίκτυο και άμυνα. Από την Κόρινθο στο Άργος και την Αρκαδία, Athens, 1995, p. 276–7; B. FORSÉN, Οινοπαραγωγή και οινοποσία στην κοιλάδα της Ασέας, In Γ. Α. ΠΙΚΟΥΛΑΣ (ed.), Οίνον Ιστορώ VI, Αρκαδικά Οινολογήματα, Athens, 2007, p. 34, tab. 5–6 fig. 1–3; Μ. ΠΕΤΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΣ, Γενική θεώρηση της αγροτικής παραγωγής στην Αρκαδία των ρωμαϊκών χρόνων, p. 303–5 fig. 11. 31 Β. ΜΗΤΣΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ-LEON, Οι ληνοί στις οικίες των Λουσών, In Γ. Α. ΠΙΚΟΥΛΑΣ (ed.), Οίνον Ιστορώ VI, Αρκαδικά Οινολογήματα, Athens, 2007, p. 42, p. 46–7, tab. 13, 17–8, fig. 3, 7–8, 12–4.
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Map I. Archeological sites of wine production facilities in Patras (no. 1-20).
Map II. Archeological sites of wine production facilities in southern Greece (no. 21-48).
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A typical case is the wine making installation that was found in a farmhouse of the Late Roman period, in Marathon, at Seferia or Skintza (no. 32), on the east side of the Athens-Marathon Avenue (38th km).32 The wine making tank featured a paved floor, lined with clay plates and hydraulic mortar. A similar construction has been found in Rafina, in the area of the “Roman Balneum” complex, in the north of Alexander Fleming Avenue (no. 35).33 The wine production facility in Rafina was located on the southwest of the central sector of the excavation and is a set of wine making installation and must collection tank that was installed there in the Late Antiquity. 34 Wine making installations of similar type have been located in several farmhouses in Patras, as is the case of the farmhouse located in the area of Agyia, in Veaki Street (no. 1),35 as well as the wine production facility located in Georgiou Olympiou Street (no. 11).36 In Berbati of Argolis, at Pyrgouthi (no. 22), a wine making installation with paved floor was found, inside a tower of a Late Roman rural complex.37 In Phigalia, on Kourdoumbouli hill, at the far north side of the 32
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Ε. ΜΩΡΟΥ-ΚΑΠΟΚΑΚΗ, Μαραθώνας, οικόπεδο Γ. Μπούσουλα, ADelt 39 (1984), Chron. Β, p. 47–8; Μ. ΠΩΛΟΓΙΩΡΓΗ, 1993. Σεφέρια ή Σκιντζίζα, οικόπεδο Ευάγγελου Σούρλα, ADelt 48 (1993), Chron. Β1, p. 63–6, tab. 25 α–δ; D. D' ACO, L' Attica in eta' Romana: Le Fattorie dal I sec. A.C. al V sec. D.C, In A. D. RIZAKIS / I. P. TOURATSOGLOU (eds.), Villae Rusticae. Family and Market-Oriented Farms in Greece under Roman Rule, Patrai 23–4 April 2010, Athens, 2013, p. 460–1 no. 7. J. TRAVLOS, Bildlexikon zur Topographie des antiken Attika, Tübingen 1988, p. 380, p. 478– 9; Σ. ΚΑΤΑΚΗΣ / Β. ΝΙΚΟΛΟΠΟΥΛΟΣ, Ραφήνα. ‘’Ρωμαϊκό Βαλανείο’’, ADelt 68 (2013), Chron. Β1, p. 76–81 fig. 23–33; Ε. Σ. ΚΑΤΑΚΗΣ et al., Νέες έρευνες στον αρχαιολογικό χώρο του λεγομένου Ρωμαϊκού Βαλανείου στη Ραφήνα: Ιδιωτικός ή δημόσιος χώρος, In V. DI NAPOLI et al. (eds.), What’s New in Roman Greece? Recent Work on the Greek Mainland and the Islands in the Roman Period. Proceeding of a Conferences held in Athens, 8–10 October 2015, Μελετήματα 80, Athens, 2018, p. 317–9 fig. 1–2, p. 321–2 fig. 7. In the greater area of the so-called Roman Balneum there are probably other wine making installations that have not been fully revealed, as the excavation research is in progress. The walls of the wine making installation structure are made of a combination of cast material and raw stones (opus mixtum). Μ. ΣΤΑΥΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ-ΓΑΤΣΗ / Γ. ΑΛΕΞΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ, Αγροικίες της Πάτρας και της χώρας της, In A. D. RIZAKIS / I. P. TOURATSOGLOU (eds.), Villae Rusticae. Family and Market-Oriented Farms in Greece under Roman Rule, Patrai 23–4 April 2010, Athens, 2013, p. 122 no. 39; Γ. ΑΛΕΞΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ, Έξω Αγυιά, οδός Βεάκη (ιδιοκτησία Δ. Βαχλιώτη), ADelt 56–9 (2001–2004), Chron. Β4, p. 544–5. Ι. Α. ΠΑΠΑΠΟΣΤΟΛΟΥ, Οδός Γ. Ολυμπίου 16, ADelt 29 (1973–1974), Chron. Β2, p. 354–5, tab. 219 γ–δ; Μ. ΠΕΤΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΣ, Αγροικίες της Πατραϊκής, IN P. N. DOUKELIS / L. G MENDONI (eds.), Structures Rurales et societes Antiques. Actes du colloque de Corfu (14–16 mai 1992), Paris, 1994, p. 419, no 85; Μ. ΣΤΑΥΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ-ΓΑΤΣΗ / Γ. ΑΛΕΞΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ, Αγροικίες της Πάτρας και της χώρας της, p. 134 no. 133. A. PENTTIENT, From the Early Iron Age to Early Roman Times, In J. HJOHLMAN et al. (eds.), Pyrgouthi: a rural site in the Berbati Valley from the early iron age to late antiquity: excavations by the Swedish Institute at Athens 1955 and 1997, Stockholm, 2005, p. 37–50, 94, 116– 8; J. HJOHLMAN, Pyrgouthi in the Late Antiquity. In J. HJOHLMAN et al. (eds.), Pyrgouthi: a rural site in the Berbati Valley from the early iron age to late antiquity: excavations by the
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ancient temple of Athena of Zeus Soter (no. 29), a Late Roman wine making installation with paved floor and a collection tank were discovered, made with the material of the temple.38 A similar type of paved wine making installation was also found in a rural complex of the 3rd-4th century AD (no. 30) in Laconia, 39 at the first km of Sparta-Karava street. In Boeotia, in the area of Tanagra, a press of the Late Roman period was also found, featuring a paved floor and a collection tank with hydraulic mortar (no. 38).40 Similarly, a wine making installation with paved floor was found (no. 39) in Chaeronia of Boeotia, at Korvas site.41 The second subgroup includes wine making tanks with floors coated with fragments of ceramics on hydraulic lime mortar. The oldest construction of this subgroup of built wine making installations was located in Palekastro of Arcadian Asea, at a building of the Early Hellenistic times, located inside the acropolis of ancient Asea. From the Early Roman times onwards, the number of such constructions increased, with the majority dating to Roman and Late Roman times. Wine making installations located in the agricultural complex at Kyparissi, Locris (no. 43) date back to early Roman times.42 In Patras, at Paliourgias site, in 25 Martiou
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Swedish Institute at Athens 1955 and 1997, Stockholm, 2005, p. 137–9 fig. 7–12; Ι. ΒΑΡΑΛΗΣ, Αμπελοκαλλιέργεια και οινοπαραγωγή στη βυζαντινή Αργολίδα, In Γ. Α. ΠΙΚΟΥΛΑΣ (ed.), Επιστημονικό συμπόσιο: Πολυστάφυλος Πελοπόννησος, Οίνον ιστορώ ΙΧ, Athens, 2009, p. 137; Ε. ΣΑΡΡΗ, Αγροτικές εγκαταστάσεις της ρωμαϊκής εποχής στην Αργολίδα, A. D. RIZAKIS / I. P. TOURATSOGLOU (eds.), Villae Rusticae. Family and Market-Oriented Farms in Greece under Roman Rule, Patrai 23–4 April 2010, Athens, 2013, p. 216, no. 2α. Ξ. ΑΡΑΠΟΓΙΑΝΝΗ, Ληνοί της Φιγάλειας, In Γ. Α. ΠΙΚΟΥΛΑΣ (ed.), Οίνον Ιστορώ, Αμπελοοινική Ιστορία και Αρχαιολογία της ΒΔ Πελοποννήσου, Athens, 2001, p. 55 tab. 25 fig. 2, Two more wine making installations were discovered in the same area, see Ξ. ΑΡΑΠΟΓΙΑΝΝΗ, Ληνοί της Φιγάλειας, p. 55–6, tab. 25–8 fig. 1–10; ΠΕΤΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΣ, Γενική θεώρηση της αγροτικής παραγωγής στην Αρκαδία των ρωμαϊκών χρόνων, p. 307. Ε. ΖΑΒΒΟΥ / Α. ΘΕΜΟΣ, Έργα κατασκευής νέας οδού Σπάρτης-Καστορίου, ADelt 56–9 (2001– 2004), Chron. Β4, p. 282, 284; E. ΖΑΒΒΟΥ, Αγροικίες και εργαστηριακές εγκαταστάσεις στην Λακωνία των Ρωμαϊκών χρόνων (1ος αι. π.Χ.-6ος μ.Χ.), In A. D. RIZAKIS / I. P. TOURATSOGLOU (eds.), Villae Rusticae. Family and Market-Oriented Farms in Greece under Roman Rule, Patrai 23–4 April 2010, Athens, 2013, p. 365 no. 10. Α. Κ. ΑΝΔΡΕΙΩΜΕΝΟΥ, Τανάγρα. Η ανασκαφή του νεκροταφείου (1976–1977,1989), Athens, 2007, p. 262–3, fig. 64, tab. 164, 1–2; Ε. ΒΛΑΧΟΓΙΑΝΝΗ, Αγροικία ρωμαϊκών χρόνων στην Αρχαία Ακραίφια (Ακραίφνιο Βοιωτίας), In A. D. RIZAKIS / I. P. TOURATSOGLOU (eds.), Villae Rusticae. Family and Market-Oriented Farms in Greece under Roman Rule, Patrai 23–4 April 2010, Athens, 2013, p. 518 no. 25. Ε. ΚΟΥΝΤΟΥΡΗ / Ν. ΠΕΤΡΟΧΕΙΛΟΣ, Αγροτικές εγκαταστάσεις και εκμετάλλευση της γης στην περιοχή της Χαιρώνειας, In A. D. RIZAKIS / I. P. TOURATSOGLOU (eds.), Villae Rusticae. Family and Market-Oriented Farms in Greece under Roman Rule, Patrai 23–4 April 2010, Athens, 2013, p. 545–6 fig. 4–5. C. BLEGEN, The site of Opous, AJA 30 (1926), p. 403; L. E. LORD, A history of American School at Athens 1882–1942. An intercollegiate project, Cambridge, 1947, p. 118; M. KRAMERHAJOS, Beyond the palace: Mycenaean East Lokris, Oxford, 2008, p. 43; Φ. ΔΑΚΟΡΩΝΙΑ/Π. ΜΠΟΥΓΙΑ, Η Οπούντια εκδοχή της αγροικίας κατά την ύστερη αρχαιότητα, In A. D. RIZAKIS / I. P. TOURATSOGLOU (eds.), Villae Rusticae. Family and Market-Oriented Farms in Greece under Roman Rule, Patrai 23–4 April 2010, Athens, 2013, p. 557–61 fig. 2; G. A. ZACHOS,
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street (no. 19), in a Roman villa rustica,43 a wine making tank and collection tank complex were detected. The floor of the wine making tank was coated with watertight mortar according to the Roman opus spicatum technique. The most typical specimen of this subgroup of wine making installation was found in Boeotia, in the area where the ancient city of Akraifia was located (no. 36). On this site a Roman farmhouse was found, which was built between the 1st century BC and the 1st century AD.44 During the 3rd century AD the press was installed in one of the rooms of the farmhouse (fig. 1).45 Wine making installations of the second subcategory have also been located in southern Greece: in Eglykada of Patras in Pelopos Street (no. 17),46 in Argolida at Kourtaki site (no. 23), and at Kranidi at “Doroufi” site (no. 24).47 A similar type of this wine making installation was found in Boeotia, in a Roman farmhouse (no. 37)
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Tabula Imperii Romani, Achaia Phtiotis-Malis-Aenis-Oitaia-Doris-Eurytania-East and West Locris-Phokis-Aitolia-Akarnania, J34, Athens, 2016, p. 86, αρ. 4:4D, map 4. Γ. ΑΛΕΞΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ, Θέση Παλιουργιάς 25ης Μαρτίου 84 (εργατικές κατοικίες), ADelt 49 (1994), Chron. Β1, p. 231–3, tab. 72γ; Μ. ΠΕΤΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΣ, Ρωμαϊκοί ληνοί της Πάτρας, p. 43; Μ. ΣΤΑΥΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ-ΓΑΤΣΗ, Το έργο των σωστικών ανασκαφών στην πόλη των Πατρών και την ευρύτερη περιοχή της: νεότερα πολεοδομικά και τοπογραφικά στοιχεία, In Α' Αρχαιολογική Σύνοδος Νότια και Δυτικής Ελλάδος. ΣΤ' Εφορεία Προϊστορικών και Κλασικών Αρχαιοτήτων-6η Εφορεία Βυζαντινών Αρχαιοτήτων Πάτρα 9–12 Ιουνίου 1996, Athens, 2006, p. 95; Μ. ΣΤΑΥΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ-ΓΑΤΣΗ / Γ. ΑΛΕΞΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ, Αγροικίες της Πάτρας και της χώρας της, p. 144–5 no. 220. Ε. ΒΛΑΧΟΓΙΑΝΝΗ, Αγροικία ρωμαϊκών χρόνων στην Αρχαία Ακραίφια (Ακραίφνιο Βοιωτίας), p. 488–91 fig. 1–4; Β. ΣΑΜΠΕΤΑΪ, Ακραίφνιο, ADelt 50 (1995), Chron. Β1, p. 301–4. Ε. ΒΛΑΧΟΓΙΑΝΝΗ, Αγροικία ρωμαϊκών χρόνων στην Αρχαία Ακραίφια (Ακραίφνιο Βοιωτίας), p. 505. Μ. ΣΤΑΥΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ-ΓΑΤΣΗ, 1984. Οδός Πέλοπος 90-Εγλυκάδα, ADelt 39, Chron. Β, p. 90–2, tab. 30γ; Μ. ΠΕΤΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΣ, Αγροικίες της Πατραϊκής, p. 418 no. 71; Μ. ΣΤΑΥΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΥΓΑΤΣΗ / Γ. ΑΛΕΞΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ, Αγροικίες της Πάτρας και της χώρας της, p. 142 no. 195. Ε. ΣΑΡΡΗ, Αγροτικές εγκαταστάσεις της ρωμαϊκής εποχής στην Αργολίδα, p. 229 no 12γ; Ο. ΨΥΧΟΓΙΟΥ, Ίχνη Ρωμαϊκών Αγροικιών στην Ερμιονίδα, In A. D. RIZAKIS / I. P. TOURATSOGLOU (eds.), Villae Rusticae. Family and Market-Oriented Farms in Greece under Roman Rule, Patrai 23–4 April 2010, Athens, 2013, p. 284–5.
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Figure 1. The floor of the wine making tank (ληνός) of the farmhouse in ancient Akraifia of Boeotia, with the built collection tank (υπολήνιο) and stony compression base (After Ε. ΒΛΑΧΟΓΙΑΝΝΗ, Αγροικία ρωμαϊκών χρόνων στην Αρχαία Ακραίφια (Ακραίφνιο Βοιωτίας), In A. D. RIZAKIS / I. P. TOURATSOGLOU (eds.), Villae Rusticae. Family and Market-Oriented Farms in Greece under Roman Rule, Patrai 23-24 April 2010, Athens, 2013, p. 493 fig. 6).
8 km west of Thebes,48 as well as in the area of Davleia, at Agios Vlasios site (no. 41), in a farmhouse of the Late Roman period.49 In Chaeronia, at Karamouza site (no. 40), a wine making installation was found in a rural complex.50 Its floor was covered with small parallel bricks, embedded in a layer of hard mortar with pebble substrate (opus pseudospicatum).51 In Fthiotida, at Paleochori Bralou site (no. 44)
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Β. ΑΡΑΒΑΝΤΙΝΟΣ, Νεκροταφείο περιοχής Καβειρίου, Αγροικίες Ι και ΙΙ, ADelt 49 (1994), Chron. Β1, p. 285–6; Β. ΑΡΑΒΑΝΤΙΝΟΣ, Από τη «σιωπηλή» γη της αρχαίας Θήβας. Η σημασία των πρόσφατων αρχαιολογικών δεδομένων, In Α. ΜΑΖΑΡΑΚΗΣ ΑΙΝΙΑΝ (ed.), ΕΘΣΕ 1 (2003), Βόλος 27.2–2.3.2003, Volos, 2006, p. 731. G. A. ZACHOS, Tabula Imperii Romani, Achaia Phtiotis-Malis-Aenis-Oitaia-Doris-EurytaniaEast and West Locris-Phokis-Aitolia-Akarnania, J34, p. 124, no. 5:3 B/C, map 5; Ε. ΒΛΑΧΟΓΙΑΝΝΗ, Άγιος Βλάσιος (Πανοπεύς), ADelt 55 (2000), Chron. Β1, p. 403–4. Ε. ΚΟΥΝΤΟΥΡΗ / Ν. ΠΕΤΡΟΧΕΙΛΟΣ, Αγροτικές εγκαταστάσεις και εκμετάλλευση της γης στην περιοχή της Χαιρώνειας, p. 546–7 fig. 6. The wine making installation facility was in use from the 2nd AD until the 3rd AD century. J. P. ADAM, Roman Building. Materials and Techniques, p. 474 fig. 541.
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and in Doris, 52 at Paliovrisi site (no. 45),53 two more wine making installations of the second subcategory have been identified. The third subgroup includes wine making tanks with floor made of hydraulic lime mortar only. This flooring technique is the oldest and, as mentioned above, most of the wine making installations of the Classical period are made this way. Archaeological findings of built wine making installations of the Roman period date back to the 1st century BC until Late Antiquity. The oldest wine making installation of the Roman period in southern Greece belonging to this subgroup was located in Megalopolis of Arcadia, at Veligosti site (no. 26).54 In an agricultural facility that was in use from the Late Hellenistic period to the Late Roman period, a large press was found, which is made of raw stones and hydraulic mortar.55 Many wine making installations of the third subcategory have been found in Patras. Specifically, a wine production installation of a Roman farmhouse was excavated in Agyia, in Ladonos and Kalomiri Street (no. 5),56 and a Late Roman wine production facility was discovered in Ellinos Stratiotou Street (no. 6).57 Also in Patras, wine production facilities of similar construction were found in Korinthou
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Φ. ΔΑΚΟΡΩΝΙΑ, Θέση Παληόβρυσι 147ο χλμ, ADelt 50 (1995), Chron. Β1, p. 346–7; Φ. ΔΑΚΟΡΩΝΙΑ / Π. ΜΠΟΥΓΙΑ, Η Οπούντια εκδοχή της αγροικίας κατά την ύστερη αρχαιότητα, p. 569. Γ. ΖΑΧΟΣ, Δωρίδα- Φωκίδα- Δυτική Λοκρίδα, In A. D. RIZAKIS / I. P. TOURATSOGLOU (eds.), Villae Rusticae. Family and Market-Oriented Farms in Greece under Roman Rule, Patrai 23– 4 April 2010, Athens, 2013, p. 652, no. 1–2; G. A. ZACHOS, Tabula Imperii Romani, Achaia Phtiotis-Malis-Aenis-Oitaia-Doris-Eurytania-East and West Locris-Phokis-Aitolia-Akarnania, J34, 76, αρ. 2:3D, map 2. Σ. ΦΡΙΤΖΙΛΑΣ, Αγροικία στη θέση “Βελιγοστή“ Αρκαδίας, In Αρχαιολογικό Συνέδριο Αγροικίες και Αγροτική Οικονομία στην Ελλάδα κατά τη Ρωμαϊκή εποχή, 23–4 Απριλίου 2010, Patrai, 2010, p. 1–14, fig. 1–4; Σ. ΦΡΙΤΖΙΛΑΣ, Αγροτική και Βιοτεχνική Εγκατάσταση στη θέση Βελιγοστή στη Νότια Μεγαλοπολίτικη χώρα, In Αρχαιολογικό Συνέδριο Αγροικίες και Αγροτική Οικονομία στην Ελλάδα κατά τη Ρωμαϊκή εποχή, 23–4 Απριλίου 2010, Patrai, 2010, p. 1–8, fig. 1–5; Σ. ΦΡΙΤΖΙΛΑΣ, Αγροικία στη θέση “Βελιγοστή“ Αρκαδίας, In A. D. RIZAKIS / I. P. TOURATSOGLOU (eds.), Villae Rusticae. Family and Market-Oriented Farms in Greece under Roman Rule, Patrai 23–4 April 2010, Athens, 2013, p. 328–43. Σ. ΦΡΙΤΖΙΛΑΣ, Αγροικία στη θέση “Βελιγοστή“ Αρκαδίας, p. 4–5; Σ. ΦΡΙΤΖΙΛΑΣ, Αγροτική και Βιοτεχνική Εγκατάσταση στη θέση Βελιγοστή στη Νότια Μεγαλοπολίτικη χώρα, p. 1, 6–8; Σ. ΦΡΙΤΖΙΛΑΣ, Αγροικία στη θέση “Βελιγοστή“ Αρκαδίας, p. 329–30. Μ. ΠΕΤΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΣ, Αγροικίες της Πατραϊκής, p. 417 no 31; Α. ΓΚΑΔΟΛΟΥ, Οδός Λάδωνος και Καλομοίρη (οικόπεδο Αθ. Χρυσανθοπούλου), ADelt 50 (1995), Chron. Β1, p. 211–2; Γ. ΑΛΕΞΟΠΟΎΛΟΥ, Έξω Αγυιά, Οδός Λάδωνος 44 (οικόπεδο Αθ. Χρυσανθόπουλου), ADelt 5659 (2001–2004), Chron. Β4, p. 511; Μ. ΣΤΑΥΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ-ΓΑΤΣΗ/Γ. ΑΛΕΞΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ, Αγροικίες της Πάτρας και της χώρας της, p. 104–5, 124 no. 55. Μ. ΠΕΤΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΣ, Αγροικίες της Πατραϊκής, p. 417, no 34; Μ. ΣΤΑΥΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ-ΓΑΤΣΗ / Γ. ΑΛΕΞΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ, Αγροικίες της Πάτρας και της χώρας της, p. 128 αρ. 84.
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Street (no. 9),58 in Stamati Voulgari Street (no. 12) at Thermopylon Street (no 7, fig. 2), 59 and in the area of Eglykada of Patras, in Anaximandrou Street (no. 14).60
Figure 2. The wine making installation of the third group and the collection tank with the built stair from the farmhouse at Thermopylon Street in Patras (After Μ. ΠΕΤΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΣ, Μόνιμες εγκαταστάσεις και κινητά σκεύη για την αγροτική παραγωγή στις ρωμαϊκές αγροικίες της Πάτρας, In A. D. RIZAKIS / I. P. TOURATSOGLOU (eds.), Villae Rusticae. Family and MarketOriented Farms in Greece under Roman Rule, Patrai 23-24 April 2010, Athens, 2013, p. 169 fig. 20).
In Laconia, at Kokkineiko Magoulas site (no. 31), archaeological remains of a square wine production tank were found.61 In Attica, in the area of Argyroupoli, a wine production installation of similar construction was located, which was part of
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Ι. Α. ΠΑΠΑΠΟΣΤΟΛΟΥ, Οδός Καρόλου 61, ADelt 39 (1979), Chron. Β1, p. 134; Μ. ΠΕΤΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΣ, Αγροικίες της Πατραϊκής, p. 418, no 45α; Μ. ΣΤΑΥΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ-ΓΑΤΣΗ/Γ. ΑΛΕΞΟΠΟΥΛΟυ, Αγροικίες της Πάτρας και της χώρας της, p. 132 no. 115. Π. ΑΓΑΛΛΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ, Οδός Νοταρά 9, ADelt 29 (1973–1974), Chron. Β2, p. 370–1, tab. 237γ– δ; Μ. ΠΕΤΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΣ, Αγροικίες της Πατραϊκής, p. 418 no 65; Μ. ΣΤΑΥΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ-ΓΑΤΣΗ / Γ. ΑΛΕΞΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ, Αγροικίες της Πάτρας και της χώρας της, p.135 no 140; ΣΤΑΥΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΥΓΑΤΣΗ / Γ. ΑΛΕΞΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ, Αγροικίες της Πάτρας και της χώρας της, p. 128–9 no 88. Μ. ΠΕΤΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΣ, Μόνιμες εγκαταστάσεις και κινητά σκεύη για την αγροτική παραγωγή στις ρωμαϊκές αγροικίες της Πάτρας, p. 168–70 fig. 20, 22. Ι. ΔΕΚΟΥΛΑΚΟΥ, Οδός Αναξιμάνδρου 40, ADelt 30 (1975), Chron. Β1, p. 112–3, tab. 62α–β.; Μ. ΠΕΤΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΣ, Αγροικίες της Πατραϊκής, p. 418 no 67α; Μ. ΣΤΑΥΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ-ΓΑΤΣΗ/Γ. ΑΛΕΞΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ, Αγροικίες της Πάτρας και της χώρας της, p. 137 no 155. Ε. ΖΑΒΒΟΥ, Θέση Κοκκινέικα (οικόπεδο Ευαγγελίας Αλεξοπούλου και Σπύρου Θωμόπουλου, ADelt 51 (1996), Chron. Β1, p. 126–7; E. ΖΑΒΒΟΥ, Αγροικίες και εργαστηριακές εγκαταστάσεις στην Λακωνία των Ρωμαϊκών χρόνων (1ος αι. π.Χ.–6ος μ.Χ.), p. 365 no 12.
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a Late Roman farmhouse (no. 34).62 One of the most typical cases was excavated in the area of Echinos in eastern Fthiotida (no. 42). A wine production facility was located in a farm complex of the Late Antiquity (4th-6th century AD),63 which included two wine production tank and two must collection tanks. Also, in the same area, archaeological remains of viticulture were found.64 4.2. Collection tanks (υπολήνια)–Typology and archaeological remains Collection or harvesting tanks are constructions in which must is collected after pressing the grapes. In antiquity either jars or built tanks were used as collection tanks. The use of jars or tanks as must collection vessels is related to the production needs of each region and time period. The built collection tanks, although used since the Classical period and even more in Hellenistic times,65 only obtained fixed technical characteristics in the Roman period. On the other hand, jars continued to be used as must collection vessels, but now their size is bigger to serve the needs of the larger and faster production of the Roman period. The interior side of built collection tanks of the Roman period was made of hydraulic mortar. The bottom of these constructions is coated entirely with hydraulic mortar or with pieces of ceramics with hydraulic mortar at the joints, as is the case of the tank at the wine production facility found in Australias Street (no. 3) in Patras.66 At the bottom of each built tank there is a cleaning cavity, where the sediments and the skins of the grapes settle. These cavities are either coated with hydraulic mortar, or with the bottom of various ceramic pots, as in the case of the tank at the wine production complex (no. 13) in Petmetza and Navarinou streets, in Patras.67 Most tanks featured small built stairs, or holes that testify to the existence of wooden stairs, for easier access to the inside of the tanks for cleaning or must collection. In some cases, there are no stairs but a ledge approximately in the middle
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Α. ΛΙΑΓΚΟΥΡΑΣ, Αργυρούπολις, ADelt 22 (1967), Chron. Β1, p. 140–1; D. D’ Aco, L’ Attica in età’ Romana: Le Fattorie dal I sec. a.C. al V sec. d.C, In A. D. RIZAKIS / I. P. TOURATSOGLOU (eds.), Villae Rusticae. Family and Market-Oriented Farms in Greece under Roman Rule, Patrai 23–4 April 2010, Athens, 2013, p. 464 no 13. Μ.-Φ. ΠΑΠΑΚΩΝΣΤΑΝΤΙΝΟΥ et al., «Αχινός. Αρχαίος Εχίνος», In Μ.-Φ. ΠΑΠΑΚΩΝΣΤΑΝΤΙΝΟΥ (ed.), Καθ' οδόν...: αρχαιότητες και δημόσια έργα στη Φθιώτιδα 2004-2014, Lamia, 2015, p. 73–5 fig. 4, 5α–β. Μ. ΣΙΨΗ, Ενδείξεις καλλιέργειας της γης στον Αχινό, p. 97, 99 fig. 4–5, p. 100–1 fig. 6–9. A typical case is the collection tank of the wine making installation of the Classical period, that was found west of the rock of the Acropolis of Athens, in an area where other production facilities were located. A ceramic pot, 0.65 m in diameter and about 0.60 m deep was used as a collection tank (W. DÖERPFELD, Die Ausgrabungen am Westabhange der Akropolis. II. Das Lenaion oder Dionysion in den Limnai, p. 168–71, fig. 5–7). Μ. ΠΕΤΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΣ, Αγυιά, Οδός Αυστραλίας 103 (οικόπεδο Παπαδημητροπούλου), ADelt 37 (1982), Chron. Β1, tab. 90 α. Ι. Α. ΠΑΠΑΠΟΣΤΟΛΟΥ, Οδός Νοταρά 9, ADelt 31 (1976), Chron. Β1, tab. 76 α.
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of the height of the tank. In general, must collection tanks were not very deep, the depth of built squares or rectangular tanks ranging from 0.30 m to 1.10 m. The tanks in most cases communicate with the wine making installation through clay or built pipes. Masonry tanks were either quadrilateral (square or rectangular) or cylindrical (or conical). Archaeological remains of built quadrilateral tanks have been detected in Piniou and Kladeou Street (no. 4) in Patras, at Thermopylon Street (fig. 2), 68 at Anaximandrou Street (no. 14) in Eglykada of Patras, at Saravali of Patras (no. 18),69 at Kalliani (no. 27) in western Arcadia, and in the area of Tanagra, Boeotia (no. 38).70 Archaeological remains of cylindrical or conical built tanks have been found in Nafpaktos, at stadium site (no. 46).71 Ιn Manari, Arcadia, (no. 28) a wine making installation with a cylindrical must collection tank was found, which belonged to a Roman farmhouse complex (fig. 3).72 Special cases are the cylindrical built tanks that are located in the center of the wine making installations, as are the cases of multiple wine making installations in Karolou Street (no. 8) and in Lambrou Katsoni Street (no. 10) in Patras.73
68 69 70 71
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Μ. ΠΕΤΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΣ, Μόνιμες εγκαταστάσεις και κινητά σκεύη για την αγροτική παραγωγή στις ρωμαϊκές αγροικίες της Πάτρας, 169 fig. 18. Μ. ΣΤΑΥΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ-ΓΑΤΣΗ, Έργο 2ης ΔΕΚΕ, ADelt 52 (1997), Chron. Β1, p. 286–7, tab. 114 γ. Μ. ΣΤΑΥΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ-ΓΑΤΣΗ / Γ. ΑΛΕΞΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ, Αγροικίες της Πάτρας και της χώρας της, p. 144 αρ. 218. Α. Κ. ΑΝΔΡΕΙΩΜΕΝΟΥ, Τανάγρα. Η ανασκαφή του νεκροταφείου (1976–1977, 1989), p. 262– 3, tab. 164. The wine making installation was formerly interpreted as a water tank (A. Κ. ΑΝΔΡΕΙΩΜΕΝΟΥ, Τανάγρα. Η ανασκαφή του νεκροταφείου (1976–1977, 1989), p. 262–3). Φ. ΣΑΡΑΝΤΗ, Θέση γήπεδο, οικόπεδο Τσαμαδιά, ADelt 56–9 (2001–2004), Chron. Β2, p. 116; Μ. ΣΤΑΥΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ-ΓΑΤΣΗ / Φ. ΣΑΡΑΝΤΗ, Εγκαταστάσεις στην ύπαιθρο της Αιτωλοακαρνανίας κατά τη ρωμαϊκή περίοδο, In A. D. RIZAKIS / I. P. TOURATSOGLOU (eds.), Villae Rusticae. Family and Market-Oriented Farms in Greece under Roman Rule, Patrai 23– 4 April 2010, Athens, 2013, p. 673 map 1, p. 679–80 no. 29; Φ. ΣΑΡΑΝΤΗ / Β. ΣΤΑΪΚΟΥ, Αγροικίες ρωμαϊκών χρόνων στην περιοχή δυτικά της Ναυπάκτου, In A. D. RIZAKIS / I. P. TOURATSOGLOU (eds.), Villae Rusticae. Family and Market-Oriented Farms in Greece under Roman Rule, Patrai 23–4 April 2010, Athens, 2013, p. 727 fig. 6; G. A. ZACHOS, Tabula Imperii Romani, Achaia Phtiotis-Malis-Aenis-Oitaia-Doris-Eurytania-East and West LocrisPhokis-Aitolia-Akarnania, J34, 170, no. 6: 1C, map 6. Μ. ΠΕΤΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΣ, Γενική θεώρηση της αγροτικής παραγωγής στην Αρκαδία των ρωμαϊκών χρόνων, p. 304 fig. 9–10; Λ. ΣΟΥΧΛΕΡΗΣ, Αγροτικές και Βιοτεχνικές εγκαταστάσεις στην Ασεατική χώρα της νότιας Αρκαδίας και στη Βελμινατίδα χώρα της βορειοδυτικής Λακεδαίμονος, In A. D. RIZAKIS / I. P. TOURATSOGLOU (eds.), Villae Rusticae. Family and Market-Oriented Farms in Greece under Roman Rule, Patrai 23–4 April 2010, Athens, 2013, p. 146 fig. 1. Μ. ΣΤΑΥΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ-ΓΑΤΣΗ, Οδός Λάμπρου Κατσώνη 10 (Σαμακιά), ADelt 44 (1989), Chron. Β1, p. 122–3, tab. 78. Μ. ΠΕΤΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΣ, Αγροικίες της Πατραϊκής, p. 418, no 57. Μ. ΣΤΑΥΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ-ΓΑΤΣΗ / Γ. ΑΛΕΞΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ, Αγροικίες της Πάτρας και της χώρας της, p. 133 no. 120.
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Figure 3. The wine making installation with the cylindrical collection tank at Manari site in ancient Asea of Arcadia (After Λ. ΣΟΥΧΛΕΡΗΣ, Αγροτικές και Βιοτεχνικές εγκαταστάσεις στην Ασεατική χώρα της νότιας Αρκαδίας και στη Βελμινατίδα χώρα της βορειοδυτικής Λακεδαίμονος, In A. D. RIZAKIS / I. P. TOURATSOGLOU (eds.), Villae Rusticae. Family and Market-Oriented Farms in Greece under Roman Rule, Patrai 23-24 April 2010, Athens, 2013, p. 346 fig. 1).
4.3 Multiple wine production installations and other constructions In some large Roman farmhouses, there have been found multiple wine making installations, which were used for large productions. The construction technology of the multiple wine making installations was similar to the three subcategories of built wine making installations mentioned above. Several cases of such multiple wine making installations were identified in the area of Patras.74 In the north and within the borders of ancient Patras, in the current area of Agyia, Piniou and Kladeou Street (no. 4), a complex of four wine making installations was found, within a greater agricultural complex, as well as two tanks, which were used for the
74
Many Roman farmhouses have been excavated in Patras, in comparison with other areas of the rest of southern Greece. The list of sites of rural interest of Patras is in Μ. ΣΤΑΥΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΥΓΑΤΣΗ / Γ. ΑΛΕΞΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ, Αγροικίες της Πάτρας και της χώρας της, 118–49 no. 1–256. The first study about farmhouses in Southern Greece was made in the context of the conference on Structures Rurales et societes Antiques, which took place in Corfu in 1992 and the first paper published on the subject of farmhouses in Patras was by M. Petropoulos with title Αγροικίες Πατραϊκής.
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collection and cleaning of grapes.75 These facilities did not belong to a farmhouse but to a greater rural community complex, of which the entire four large and five small rectangular rooms were revealed.76 The hypothesis that they do not belong to a farmhouse is reinforced by Vitruvius reporting that the living rooms in typical Roman farmhouses were in the northern side, 77 while agricultural facilities were in the south, which is not the case here. In another agricultural facility in Patras, which is a farmhouse, in Thermopylon Street (no. 7), a double wine making installation with a common collection tank was found (fig. 4).78 In Karolou and Korinthou Street in Patras (no. 8), four wine making installations were found internally coated with hydraulic mortar, three of them with a collection tank in the center.79 Also in Patras, in Petmetza and Navarinou streets (no.
Figure 4. Double wine making installation with a common collection tank (υπολήνιο) from the farmhouse in Thermopylon Street in Patras (After Μ. ΠΕΤΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΣ, Μόνιμες εγκαταστάσεις και κινητά σκεύη για την αγροτική παραγωγή στις ρωμαϊκές αγροικίες της Πάτρας, In A. D. RIZAKIS / I. P. TOURATSOGLOU (eds.), Villae Rusticae. Family and Market-Oriented Farms in Greece under Roman Rule, Patrai 23-24 April 2010, Athens, 2013, p. 170 fig. 22).
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Μ. ΠΕΤΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΣ, Ρωμαϊκοί ληνοί της Πάτρας, p. 40–3, tab. 16–7 fig. 3–6; Μ. ΣΤΑΥΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ-ΓΑΤΣΗ / Γ. ΑΛΕΞΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ, Αγροικίες της Πάτρας και της χώρας της, p. 124 no 47. Πετρόπουλος 2013, 167–8. Μ. ΠΕΤΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΣ, Μόνιμες εγκαταστάσεις και κινητά σκεύη για την αγροτική παραγωγή στις ρωμαϊκές αγροικίες της Πάτρας, p. 167–8, fig. 13. Vitruvius, De Architectura, VI 6. Μ. ΠΕΤΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΣ, Ρωμαϊκοί ληνοί της Πάτρας, p. 43, tab. 18, fig. 8. Μ. ΠΕΤΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΣ, Κρασί και λάδι: πήλινοι κινητοί ληνοί και διαχωριστήρες, p. 36–7, tab. 15 fig. 6–7; Μ. ΣΤΑΥΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ-ΓΑΤΣΗ / Γ. ΑΛΕΞΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ, Αγροικίες της Πάτρας και της χώρας της, p. 128– 9 no 88. Μ. ΠΕΤΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΣ, Μόνιμες εγκαταστάσεις και κινητά σκεύη για την αγροτική παραγωγή στις ρωμαϊκές αγροικίες της Πάτρας, p. 170 fig. 22. Ν. ΚΟΚΚΟΤΑΚΗ, Οδός Καρόλου 85 και Κορίνθου 133, ADelt 44 (1989), Chron. Β1, p. 125–6, tab. 79α–β; Μ. ΠΕΤΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΣ, Αγροικίες της Πατραϊκής, p. 418, no 43β; Μ. ΣΤΑΥΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΥΓΑΤΣΗ / Γ. ΑΛΕΞΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ, Αγροικίες της Πάτρας και της χώρας της, p. 131 no 109.
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13), a farm complex of the Roman period (1st-3rd century AD) was discovered, which included three wine making installations.80 In Patron Klaus Street (no. 15), a part of an agricultural complex was discovered, which included three wine making complexes and three collection tanks, the use of which dates from the end of the 1st century BC until the beginning of the 2nd century AD.81 Also in Patras, two Roman wine making installations with a common must collection tank were found in Tsertidou Street (no. 16) and four wine making installations were discovered in Australia Street (no. 3).82 The agricultural complex in Australia Street also had three rooms with many storage jars, which shows a large production.83 In Derveni, Corinth, at Svarnos site (no. 21), an agricultural production facility was discovered with a wine production complex, which consisted of two wine making installations and two collection tanks.84 In Arcadia, in the area of ancient Asea, at Manari site (no. 28) two wine making complexes were found inside a farmhouse complex along with a storage tank of grapes, which date back to Late Roman times.85 Finally, there are two complexes of multiple wine making tanks in the area of Nafpaktos. The first is located at Eleostasi site (no. 47), in an agricultural building of the 2nd-3rd century AD and the second at Paliopanagia site (no. 48) in an
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Μ. ΠΕΤΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΣ, Αγροικίες της Πατραϊκής, 419 no 84; Μ. ΣΤΑΥΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ-ΓΑΤΣΗ / Γ. ΑΛΕΞΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ, Αγροικίες της Πάτρας και της χώρας της, p. 135–6 no 142; Μ. ΠΕΤΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΣ, Μόνιμες εγκαταστάσεις και κινητά σκεύη για την αγροτική παραγωγή στις ρωμαϊκές αγροικίες της Πάτρας, p. 168–9 fig. 19. There was also a fourth wine making installation that was built at a later chronological phase than the other three and was of poor construction compared to the other wine making installations. Μ. ΠΕΤΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΣ, Οδός Πατρών-Κλάους 3 (οικόπεδο Παπαναγιώτου), ADelt 43 (1988), Chron. Β1, p. 162–3, tab. 92–3; Μ. ΣΤΑΥΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ-ΓΑΤΣΗ / Γ. ΑΛΕΞΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ, Αγροικίες της Πάτρας και της χώρας της, p. 138 no 161. The agricultural complex was abandoned due to the need to expand the eastern cemetery of Patras, in the middle of the 2nd century AD. In the 3rd century AD northwest of the excavation site, a torrent flood destroyed the cemetery. Γ. ΑΛΕΞΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ, Πάροδος Τσερτίδου 41 (ιδιοκτησία Ηλία Θανασενάρη), ADelt 47 (1992), Chron. Β1, p. 133–4, tab. 40. Μ. ΣΤΑΥΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ-ΓΑΤΣΗ / Γ. ΑΛΕΞΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ, Αγροικίες της Πάτρας και της χώρας της, p. 99 fig. 14, 139 no 171. Μ. ΠΕΤΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΣ, Αγυιά, Οδός Αυστραλίας 103 (οικόπεδο Παπαδημητροπούλου), 144-5, tab. 90-1; Μ. ΣΤΑΥΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ-ΓΑΤΣΗ / Γ. ΑΛΕΞΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ, Αγροικίες της Πάτρας και της χώρας της, p. 90, 123 no 43; Μ. Πετροπουλος, Μόνιμες εγκαταστάσεις και κινητά σκεύη για την αγροτική παραγωγή στις ρωμαϊκές αγροικίες της Πάτρας, 166–7 fig. 11–2. Ζ. ΑΣΛΑΜΑΤΖΙΔΟΥ-ΚΩΣΤΟΥΡΟΥ, Ρωμαϊκές αγροικίες στο Νομό Κορινθίας, In A. D. RIZAKIS / I. P. TOURATSOGLOU (eds.), Villae Rusticae. Family and Market-Oriented Farms in Greece under Roman Rule, Patrai 23–4 April 2010, Athens, 2013, p. 192 no Α12. Μ. ΠΕΤΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΣ, ΛΘ Εφορεία Προϊστορικών και Κλασικών Αρχαιοτήτων, Μάναρη, In Μ. ΑΝΔΡΕΑΔΑΚΗ ΒΛΑΣΑΚΗ (ed.), Ανασκαφικό Έργο των Εφορειών 2000–2010, Αθήνα, 2012, p. 125–6 fig. 6; Λ. ΣΟΥΧΛΕΡΗΣ, Αγροτικές και Βιοτεχνικές εγκαταστάσεις στην Ασεατική χώρα της νότιας Αρκαδίας και στη Βελμινατίδα χώρα της βορειοδυτικής Λακεδαίμονος, 346–7 fig. 1; Μ. ΠΕΤΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΣ, Γενική θεώρηση της αγροτικής παραγωγής στην Αρκαδία των ρωμαϊκών χρόνων, 303–4 fig. 9–10.
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agricultural facility of the Late Roman times where two wine making tanks and two collection tanks were detected.86 In some cases of complexes with multiple wine making tanks, except for the basic structures, that is the wine making tank and the must collection tank, there have been found other tanks too, which served the process of wine production. These tanks were used for the storage of grapes before the process of crushing in the wine making tank. According to Hesychius of Alexandria, the place where the grapes were stored before pressing was called σταφυλοβολεῖον.87 These tanks were used as waiting tanks for the grapes before they were crushed in the wine making tanks. In traditional and modern wine production the tanks for grapes are called σταφυλοδόχοι, which means grape containers. These tanks also served for washing the grapes before being crushed in the wine making tanks.88 The first time the term σταφυλοβολεῖον was used to describe the storage area for grapes in such a production facility was in the paper by S. Kourakou-Dragona «Επίμετρο, Σταφυλοβολεῖον στις Πηγές Βοϊράνης».89 In this paper, three tanks of the Late Roman Period were described, which were excavated in the area of Voirani Springs, near Philippi of Macedonia. Two of the tanks were used as wine making tank and one as a place for storing grapes before pressing. These facilities probably served an additional function. Certain types of ancient wines required the use of dried grapes for their production, such as the production of sweet dried wine. The grapes had to be sun-dried in a specially designed large, outdoor tank (λιάστρα), which was usually located in the vineyard. This structure is described for the first time in Homer's Odyssey as θειλόπεδον.90 A special variety of sun-dried sweet wine was the Sweet Cretan Wine, known as Passum Creticum, produced in Crete from the 2nd century BC up to the period of Venetian rule (vini
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87 88 89
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Φ. ΣΑΡΑΝΤΗ, Θέση Ελαιοστάσι (οικόπεδο Ιω. Σπυρόπουλου), ADelt 52 (1997), Chron. Β1, p. 302–3, πιν. 119 α–β; Μ. ΣΤΑΥΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ-ΓΑΤΣΗ / Φ. ΣΑΡΑΝΤΗ, Εγκαταστάσεις στην ύπαιθρο της Αιτωλοακαρνανίας κατά τη ρωμαϊκή περίοδο, p. 680 no 30. Φ. ΣΑΡΑΝΤΗ / Β. ΣΤΑΪΚΟΥ, Αγροικίες ρωμαϊκών χρόνων στην περιοχή δυτικά της Ναυπάκτου, p. 723–7, fig. 1, 3; G. A. ZACHOS, Tabula Imperii Romani, Achaia Phtiotis-Malis-Aenis-Oitaia-Doris-Eurytania-East and West Locris-Phokis-Aitolia-Akarnania, J34, p. 170, no 6: 1C, map 6. Φ. ΣΑΡΑΝΤΗ/Β. ΣΤΑΪΚΟΥ, Αγροικίες ρωμαϊκών χρόνων στην περιοχή δυτικά της Ναυπάκτου, p. 728–30 fig. 8–10. Μ. ΣΤΑΥΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ-ΓΑΤΣΗ / Φ. ΣΑΡΑΝΤΗ, Εγκαταστάσεις στην ύπαιθρο της Αιτωλοακαρνανίας κατά τη ρωμαϊκή περίοδο, p. 680 no 33. G. A. ZACHOS, Tabula Imperii Romani, Achaia Phtiotis-Malis-Aenis-Oitaia-Doris-Eurytania-East and West Locris-PhokisAitolia-Akarnania, J34, p. 170, no 6: 1C, map 6. Hesychius, λ. «...ἐν ᾦ δε τας σταφύλας βάλλουσιν οἱ τρυγῶντες σταφυλοβολεῖον ὀμοίως δέ ᾦ ἐμπατοῦνται ληνός». Μ. ΠΕΤΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΣ, Μόνιμες εγκαταστάσεις και κινητά σκεύη για την αγροτική παραγωγή στις ρωμαϊκές αγροικίες της Πάτρας, p. 168. Σ. ΚΟΥΡΑΚΟΥ-ΔΡΑΓΩΝΑ, Επίμετρο, Σταφυλοβολεῖον στις πηγές Βοϊράνης, Γ. Α. Πικουλας, Οίνον Ιστορώ VII, Στα οινόπεδα του Παγγαίου, Athens, 2007, p. 117–8; About the word σταφυλοβολεῖον in the ancient literature see S. KOURAKOU-DRAGONA, Vine and Wine in the ancient Greek world, Athens, 2015, p. 176. Hom. Od. 8, 122–5 «ἔνθα δὲ οἱ παλύκαρπος ἀλωὴ ἐρρίζωται, τῆς ἕτερον μὲν θειλόπεδον λευρῷ ἐνὶ χώρῳ τέρσεται ἠελίῳ, ἑτέρας δ’ ἄρα τε τρυγόωσιν, ἄλλας δὲ τραπέουσι».
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dolzi).91 Sun-dried wines are also mentioned in Dioscorides' text Περί ὓλης ἰατρικῆ, where we find the term θειλοπεδευθεῖσαι σταφυλαί, identified with sun-dried grapes.92 The production of Passum Creticum, apart from the written testimonies, is also confirmed by archeological findings, i.e. the carved wine making installations that have specially designed large outdoor tanks for the deposition and drying of the grapes, which have been found in several areas of Crete.93 In some cases, the grapes were deposited in these tanks for a few days, in order to be dehydrated and then processed. In southern Greece, a tank with a similar function was excavated in the area of Agyia in Patras, in Piniou and Kladeou Street (no. 4), where, as mentioned above, a complex of multiple wine making installations with four must collection tanks was located. In the same complex, two more tanks were excavated that were used for the collection and washing of grapes.94 A waiting tank (σταφυλοβολεῖον) for the grapes to be placed before being crushed is located in the agricultural facility in Stamati Voulgareos Street in Patras (no. 12).95 Smaller waiting tanks were located in wine production facilities at Manari site (no. 28) in Arcadia, and in Rafina (no. 35). Waiting tanks are mainly related to mass production. The cases of large multiple wine making installations are related to the production of large quantities of wine. It is possible that these facilities were public and were used by small farmers. The various small producers used the public facilities, which may have belonged either to the respective Roman Emperor or to the community. This hypothesis could justify the existence of waiting tanks in these large agricultural complexes. Finally, in the area of Midilogli in Patras (no. 20),96 at Vakros site, a unique find was revealed that is not related to mass production but is particularly interesting: a wine distillation facility. A farmhouse with two phases was investigated, one
91
92 93
94 95 96
A. MARANGOU-LERAT, Le vin et les amphores de Crète: de l'époque classique à l'époque impériale, Thessaloniki, 1995, p. 5–29; A. ΜΑΡΑΓΚΟΥ-LERAT, Το κρητικό κρασί στους ιστορικούς χρόνους, In Α. ΜΗΛΟΠΟΤΑΜΙΤΑΚΗ (ed.), Οίνος Παλαιός Ηδύποτος. Το κρητικό κρασί από τα προϊστορικά ως τα νεότερα χρόνια, Heraklion, 2002, p. 132. Dioscorides, Περί ὓλης ἰατρικῆ, V 6, 4, «ὁ δὲ ἐκ τῆς θειλοπεδευθείσης σταφυλῆς ἢ ἐπὶ τῶν κλημάτων ὀπτηθείσης καὶ τριβομένης γινόμενος γλυκύς, καλούμενος δὲ Κρητικὸς ἢ πρότροπος ἢ Πράμνειος, ἢ καθεψομένου τοῦ γλεύκους σίραιος ἢ ἕψημα καλούμενος...». About carved wine making installations also see Α. ΑΘΑΝΑΣΑΚΗ, Εγκαταστάσεις οινοποίησης στην ευρύτερη περιοχή του Ηρακλείου, η αρχαιολογική μαρτυρία, In Η. ΑΝΑΓΝΩΣΤΑΚΗΣ (ed.), Μονεμβάσιος οίνος-Μονοβασ(ί)α- Malvasia, Athens, 2008, p. 321–32, 488-90 fig. 3–8; Κ. ΓΙΑΠΙΤΖΟΓΛΟΥ / Γ. ΜΟΣΧΟΒΗ, Λαξευτά πατητήρια και πιεστήρια στην Κρήτη. Μια τυπολογική και τοπογραφική προσέγγιση, In Α. ΜΗΛΟΠΟΤΑΜΙΤΑΚΗ (ed.), Οίνος Παλαιός Ηδύποτος. Το κρητικό κρασί από τα προϊστορικά ως τα νεότερα χρόνια, Heraklion, 2002, p. 169–91, where there is a detailed list of carved wine making installations from the areas of Rethymno and Heraklion as well as data on the number and their topographic distribution. Μ. ΣΤΑΥΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ-ΓΑΤΣΗ / Γ. ΑΛΕΞΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ, Αγροικίες της Πάτρας και της χώρας της, p. 124 no 47; Μ. ΠΕΤΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΣ, Μόνιμες εγκαταστάσεις και κινητά σκεύη για την αγροτική παραγωγή στις ρωμαϊκές αγροικίες της Πάτρας, p. 167–8. See footnote 62. Μ. ΠΕΤΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΣ, Ρωμαϊκοί ληνοί της Πάτρας, 48; Μ. ΣΤΑΥΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ-ΓΑΤΣΗ / Γ. ΑΛΕΞΟΠΟΥΛΟΥ, Αγροικίες της Πάτρας και της χώρας της, p.146 no 230.
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from the Hellenistic period and one from the Roman period. At the farmhouse three basic agricultural products were processed: oil, wine, and wheat.97 Among the archeological finds was a wine distillation facility of the Roman period, from which a pipeline is preserved with smaller cylindrical pipes, which ended in a jar. 5. The features of wine production facilities
Map III. The distribution of wine production facilities in South Greece.
Most of the archaeological remains of built wine making installations of Roman and Late Roman times are located within rural complexes. Maps III and IV show the distribution of archaeological finds of wine production facilities per archaeological site, of Roman and Late Roman period. In Roman times, jars or other smaller pots were used as collection tanks for must. From the Late Hellenistic period and especially in Roman times, the use of separate built tanks as must collection tanks is widespread. The technology and construction method used for built wine making installations were determined according to production needs and production size of each agricultural facility. Built wine making installations are classified according to the way their floor was constructed: i) with paved floors and watertight joints, ii) with floors coated with hydraulic lime mortar and fragments of ceramics, and iii) with floors fully coated with hydraulic lime mortar. The different construction style of the floors also served different needs during production process. The surface of the paved floor of 97
Μ. ΠΕΤΡΟΠΟΥΛΟΣ, Μιντιλόγλι, θέση Βάκρου, ADelt 52 (1997), Chron. Β1, p. 288.
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the wine making tanks was harder, enabling grape crushing. Perhaps such wine making installations were used for crushing dehydrated grapes for the production of sweet wines.98 For a better result during the production process, various cylindrical stone crushers may have been used for more efficient crushing.
Map IV. The distribution of wine production facilities in the region of Patras.
The floors of the wine making installations of the second group enabled the more effective crushing of the grapes. In addition, they provided greater safety in the crushing process by reducing slipperiness, thus preventing accidents. The problem of slipperiness of the press during production process can be seen even in iconographic representations of wine production. The people who pressed the grapes during the production process used handles, ropes or sticks that helped them to balance while pressing the grapes. Typical is the depiction on the mosaic of the House of the Months in Thysdrus (El Djem) Tunisia, which depicts two people holding ropes hanging above them and helping them not to lose their balance.99 Coating tank floors with fragments in mortar is an especially common technique in Roman times. The way the floor is constructed is similar to the opus spicatum technique except that these are fragments of ceramics, most of the times placed without
98 99
Dehydration, as well as the ripening of the grape fruits changes their chemical composition and increases the sugars in their composition. K. M. D. DUNBABIN, The Mosaics of Roman North Africa. Studies in Iconography and Patronage, Oxford, 1978, p. 111, 260 no 22d, tab. XXXVIII 99.
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any specific arrangement (opus pseudospicatum).100 The coating of wine making tanks floors entirely with hydraulic mortar served the sealing of the space but it was also the easiest and least costly way of construction. For this reason, most of the wine making installations of Roman and Late Roman times in rural complexes are constructed in this way. It should also be noted that most farm complexes and farmhouses with more than one wine making installations are designed this way. Table I depicts the number per group of built wine making installations and wine production facilities of the Roman and Late Roman agricultural complexes. 20
11
12
12 5 1
1st group
2nd group
3rd group
Multiple wine Waiting tanks Distillation of making wine installations
Wine making installations
Multiple wine making facilities in rural complexes date back to the Roman period and beyond, as well as other structures related to large-scale mass production, such as waiting tanks or large outdoor tanks. Τhe existence of more than one must collection tanks in wine production complexes demonstrates intensive production of large quantities of wine during Roman times. A typical case is a second waiting tank of must found next to the collection tank of the wine production complex at Eleostasi in Nafpaktos (no. 47). When the first tank was full and had to be emptied, the second tank was used in order to save time. From the 1st century AD onwards, due to the high consumption of wine in Rome,101 there is an increase in demand. This increase combined with the growth
100 The floor of the Roman type opus spicatum is made by placing rectangular bricks in such a way that their visible side is shaped like a “herringbone” (J. P. ADAM, Roman Building. Materials and Techniques, p. 474 fig. 541). 101 A. ΜΑΡΑΓΚΟΥ-LERAT, Το κρητικό κρασί στους ιστορικούς χρόνους, p. 132; A. TCHERNIA, Le vin en Italie romaine: essai d’ histoire économique d’ après les amphores, BEFAR 261, Rome, 1986, p. 26–7.
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of trade within the Roman Empire, led to the expansion of production in the provinces of the Roman Empire to meet the growing needs.102 From written sources and from the study of commercial amphorae, it appears that Greek wines were in demand in antiquity and were exported to many regions of the Mediterranean.103 Greek wines were known to Latin and Greek writers of the Roman period, while from the 1st century BC several varieties of Greek grapes were also known.104 Therefore, the establishment of multiple wine making complexes approximately within this chronological context served the needs of mass production for the growing demand that came up from the 1st century onwards. It should be noted that fragments of commercial amphorae have been found in most rural roman complexes, at sites with archaeological remains of wine production. In addition, in several cases, ceramic kilns have been detected, which were used for the production of commercial amphorae or storage jars, so that the agricultural complex operates as a complete and self-sufficient production unit. The large Roman agricultural complexes functioned as units for production and storage and possibly standardization of the agricultural products they produced. There are cases of amphorae production workshops that have been located close to farmhouses, which were probably exploited by farmhouse owners. In Greece, before the Roman conquest, part of the population owned large areas of land and large farmhouses and there was a significant number of owners of small or medium-sized pieces of land. Since the establishment of Roman rule in Greece and beyond, Roman large landowners emerged too, and coexisted with a smaller number of Greek large landowners and a significant number of small or mediumsized pieces of land.105 Large complexes of wine production facilities did not only
102 A typical case is the region of Crete, which at that time belonged to the Roman Province of Crete-Cyrenaica, where from the 1st century AD and onwards Cretan wine (Passum Creticum) is exported, and was transported in the well-known Cretan amphorae (A. MARANGOU-LERAT, Le vin et les amphores de Crète: de l'époque classique à l'époque impériale, p. 69–94). 103 About the trade of amphorae in the Roman period, in Crete but also in the Mediterranean in general, see Α. ΜΑΡΑΓΚΟΥ, Το εμπόριο κρασιού στην αρχαιότητα, In Ιστορία του Ελληνικού κρασιού, Β' τριήμερο εργασίας, Σαντορίνη 7–9 Σεπτεμβρίου 1990, Athens, 1992, p. 93–6; A. MARANGOU-LERAT, Le vin et les amphores de Crète: de l'époque classique à l'époque impériale, p. 6; A. ΜΑΡΑΓΚΟΥ-LERAT, Το κρητικό κρασί στους ιστορικούς χρόνους, 133 map 2. and for the trade of amphorae throughout the Roman Empire see A. WILSON, Approaches to Quantifying Roman Trade, In A. BOWMAN / A. WILSON (eds.), Quantifying the Roman Economy, methods and problems, Oxford, 2009, p. 229–37 fig. 9.7–11. 104 Pliny (Natural History, XIV 81), Virgil (Georgika, II 93, IV 269) and Columella (De Re Rustica, III 2,24) mention the Greek grape varieties from which the so-called sun-dried wines are produced. Polybius in the Histories (X 440) mentions the then known wines produced in Aegosthena of Megara, while Cato writes the wines of Kos, which matured in amphorae stored in the sea water (τεθαλασσομένους οίνους), more about these ancient varieties of wines and grapes see S. KOURAKOU-DRAGONA, Vine and Wine in the ancient Greek world, p. 21, 44, 51, 57, 152. 105 Α. ΡΙΖΑΚΗΣ, Οικονομία και οικονομικές δραστηριότητες των ελληνικών πόλεων από την Πύδνα έως το Άκτιο, In ΣΤ’ Επιστημονική Συνάντηση για την Ελληνιστική Κεραμική.
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serve the need for mass production and large-scale export trade. They were also for public or community use, under the protection of the Roman Emperor, and served the production needs of the smaller owners too. 6. Conclusion Agricultural production of the Classical and Early Hellenistic period is characterized by small-scale production that enabled producers to be self-sufficient and commercialize smaller quantities of products. From the Late Hellenistic period and especially during Roman times, production increased and the surplus served the growing needs of large Roman cities. The Roman production model is introduced in the Greek countryside according to the size and local needs of the regions of southern Greece. The general increase in production from the Late Hellenistic period onwards is clearly reflected in the archaeological remains of the farm workshops. From the Late Hellenistic times and mainly from the period of the Roman conquest and onwards, agricultural facilities of farmhouses, large built tanks or specially designed rooms are constructed, serving the needs of wine production. The larger built wine making installations replace, almost entirely, the older clay mobile wine presses, which served the needs of a smaller-scale production. During the Roman period, large complexes with multiple wine making tanks and waiting tanks existed. These facilities testify to mass and intensive production of large quantities of wine, which served the needs of Roman urban centers.
Kyriakos Loulakoudis Department of History and Archaeology National and Kapodistrian University of Athens Athens 15784 [email protected]
Προβλήματα Χρονολόγησης, κλειστά σύνολα-εργαστήρια, Βόλος 17–23 Απριλίου 2000, Αθήνα, 2004, p. 21.
«UBIQUE VITAM AGIMUS CONSULAREM ET IN LUCRINO SERII SUMUS» (SYMM. EPIST. 8,23) LA VITA SULL’ISTMO FLEGREO NEL IV SECOLO D.C. Maria Lubello Abstract: In epigram 1,62 Martial describes the deleterious effects produced by the Phlegraean waters on the pure Levina, who needed only one bath in the Lucrine lake to turn herself from a faithful Penelope into an uninhibited Helen. Since the 2nd century BCE, the lacus Lucrinus has been considered a place of vitia: the lake was a basin of brackish water located on the Phlegrean coast and separated from the sea by a narrow isthmus with the via Herculea, where the Roman aristocracy used to own luxurious houses. Still, in the second half of the 4th century CE the orator Quintus Aurelius Symmachus, owner of a property on the isthmus felt the need to justify his stay, worthy of an old consul, at the Lucrine lake (Symm. epist. 8,23). The aim of the paper, after a more general introduction to the lacus Lucrinus based on literary (Strab. 5,4,5–6) and archaeological evidence, is to reconstruct the lifestyle of the Roman senatorial aristocracy on the shores of the lake in the 4th century CE. The main source used will be Symmachus’ correspondence: the orator, in fact, talks not only about his own personal experience, but also about the Phlegraean habits of the eminent members of the senatorial elite, such as Vettius Agorius Praetextatus, the Nicomachi Flaviani and the future emperor Priscus Attalus. Keywords: Quintus Aurelius Symmachus, Letter Collection, Lacus Lucrinus, Otium, Roman Senatorial Aristocracy. 1. Introduzione Durante un soggiorno sulla costa campana tra la primavera e l’estate del 396 d.C. il senatore e oratore romano Quinto Aurelio Simmaco indirizza all’amico Marcianus l’epistola 8,23, una lunga ed elaborata missiva al termine della quale inserisce un’apologia tesa a dimostrare la rettitudine del proprio stile di vita:1 Amicorum subinde mihi adfluentium largiter est. Non vereor ne me lascivire in tanta locorum amoenitate et rerum copia putes. Vbique vitam agimus consularem et in Lucrino serii sumus.
1
Per Symm. epist. 8,23 si veda SEECK 1883, 221–2, CALLU 20032, 124 e da ultimo RUTA 2023, 99–106. Per il cursus honorum di Marcianus, destinatario di cinque epistole del libro VIII della corrispondenza simmachiana (cfr. Symm. epist. 8,9; 23; 54; 58; 73) si veda PLRE I, 555: fu vicarius nel 384 e praefectus Urbi nel 409.
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Maria Lubello Nullus in navibus canor, nulla in conviviis helluatio, nec frequentatio balnearum nec ulli iuvenum procaces natatus. Scias nullum esse in luxuria crimen locorum. (Symm. epist. 8,23,3) Un fiume di amici si riversa spesso su di me. Né temo che tu pensi che io mi dia a una vita licenziosa in tanta bellezza dei luoghi e abbondanza di beni. Dovunque conduciamo una vita degna di un console e sul Lucrino siamo seri. Non c’è nessun canto sulle barche, nessuna gozzoviglia durante i banchetti, nessuna frequentazione delle terme, nessun bagno di giovani lascivi. Sappi che i luoghi non hanno nessuna colpa per la dissolutezza.2
L’oratore, pur trovandosi in tanta locorum amoenitate et rerum copia, rassicura il proprio corrispondente di stare conducendo una vita consularis, a tal punto priva di sollazzi e morigerata da poter affermare in Lucrino serii sumus.3 L’obiettivo del contributo è cercare di dare un significato a quest’ultima pregnante espressione tramite la ricostruzione dello stile di vita condotto dall’aristocrazia senatoria romana nell’area dei campi flegrei nel IV secolo d.C. e in modo particolare lungo le sponde del lago Lucrino. 2. Il mollis Lucrinus Prima di procedere all’esegesi del testo simmachiano, ci soffermeremo sull’immagine del Lucrino tramandata dalla tradizione letteraria antica.4 Un utile punto di partenza per l’indagine è il testo di Strab. 5,4,6 in cui l’autore,5 all’interno della descrizione della Campania, dedica una sezione al Lucrino fornendoci una testimonianza sulla natura del lago e le attività che vi si svolgevano nel I secolo d.C. All’inizio del passo viene presentato il χῶμα costruito da Ercole6 per collegare i 2 3
4
5
6
La traduzione è nostra. Per l’intera epistola si rimanda a RUTA 2023, 99–6 con utili riferimenti linguistici e letterari. Da notare che l’aggettivo serius nelle epistole simmachiane si riferisce all’ambito della cura, dei munera (cfr. Symm. epist. 1,60) e del negotium in opposizione all’otium (cfr. Symm. epist. 1,53), allo iocus (cfr. Symm. epist. 3,88) e alla voluptas (cfr. Symm. epist. 8,25). Nell’epistola 8,23 l’oratore vuole, dunque, associare il proprio comportamento sul Lucrino ad una vita attiva in contrapposizione al piacere e agli scherzi oziosi. Per un’introduzione storico-geografica al lago Lucrino, attualmente situato nell’Oasi naturalistica del Monte Nuovo tra Baia e Pozzuoli, si veda in particolare PAGANO 1983, ma anche BORRIELLO/D’AMBROSIO 1979 e PAPA 1993, 159–62. I risultati delle ricerche di archeologia subacquea sono presentati e discussi da SCOGNAMIGLIO 2002, 52–5 e GIANFROTTA 2012. Strab. 5,4,6: Ὁ δὲ Λοκρῖνος κόλπος πλατύνεται μέχρι Βαιῶν, χώματι εἰργόμενος ἀπὸ τῆς ἔξω θαλάττης ὀκτασταδίῳ τὸ μῆκος, πλάτος δὲ ἁμαξιτοῦ πλατείας, ὅ φασιν Ἡρακλέα διαχῶσαι τὰς βοῦς ἐλαύνοντα τὰς Γηρυόνου·δεχόμενον δ’ ἐπιπολῆς τὸ κῦμα τοῖς χειμῶσιν ὥστε μὴ πεζεύεσθαι ῥᾳδίως Ἀγρίππας ἐπεσκεύασεν. εἴσπλουν δ’ ἔχει πλοίοις ἐλαφροῖς, ἐνορμίσασθαιμὲν ἄχρηστος, τῶν ὀστρέων δὲ τὴν Ἀχερουσίαν φασίν, Ἀρτεμίδωρος δὲ αὐτὸν τὸν Ἄορνον. Per la stessa versione del mito si veda Lycophron. 694–8 e Diod. 4,22,2 (cfr. MARIOTTA/MAGNELLI 2012, 89–90), i quali, tuttavia, non citano il lacus Lucrinus. In particolare, lo storico siceliota parla di una ὁδός Ἡρακλεία che avrebbe separato il mare non dal Lucrino ma dall’Averno. Strabone stesso nella conclusione di Strab. 5,4,6 attesta la presenza di alcune incertezze nelle fonti a sua disposizione: se Artemidoro (= fr. 43 ed. STIEHLE) identificava il Lucrino con l’Averno, facendo lo stesso errore di Diodoro, degli imprecisati ἔνιοι ritenevano,
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del lacus Lucrinus. In primo luogo, Agrippa era intervenuto nella manutenzione della via dell’istmo eretta dall’eroe, probabilmente nell’ambito della costruzione del cosiddetto portus Iulius.7 Il generale romano sopraelevò l’istmo lagunare, creando così un argine artificiale parallelo alla costa con funzione di diga e sufficientemente alto da proteggere lo specchio d’acqua. Successivamente Strabone ricorda che il lago Lucrino era particolarmente noto per la coltivazione e l’abbondanza di ostriche: τῶν ὀστρέων δὲ θήραν ἔχων ἀφθονωτάτην. La notorietà dei molluschi flegrei trova conferma nella frequenza del binomio Lucrinus – ostreae negli autori antichi.8 La bontà delle ostriche del Lucrino era, infatti, divenuta proverbiale fin dall’introduzione degli ostriaria sul lago ad opera di Sergius Orata nel I secolo a.C. Seppur il geografo non ne faccia menzione, 9 oltre all’ostricultura, sul Lucrino erano diffuse anche la piscicoltura e le cure idrotermali.10 Parallelamente allo sviluppo di queste redditizie attività economiche vi fu un massiccio incremento edilizio:11 per invece, si trattasse della Acherusia palus. Non è persuasiva l’ipotesi di LASSERRE 2003, 109 = 125 n. 2 che identifica gli ἔνιοι con Eforo sulla base di FGrHist 70 F 134a tradito da Strab. 5,4,5. Ci limiteremo ad osservare che Strabone e Diodoro citano fonti risalenti a un periodo in cui il Lucrino non aveva ancora una propria identità specifica, esistente invece nel momento in cui essi furono attivi. Per altri riferimenti letterari a questo tratto della via Herculea in età romana si rimanda a Cic. leg. agr. 2,36; Prop. 3,18,4; Sil. 12,116–9. 7 Seppur la questione della destinazione e delle fasi di costruzione del portus Iulius sia ancora discussa dagli studiosi, è possibile affermare con qualche sicurezza che i lavori, promossi da Ottaviano e diretti da Agrippa, si contestualizzano nel periodo della guerra navale contro Sesto Pompeo tra il 37 e il 36 a.C. Le testimonianze relative all’edificazione di un porto o comunque all’utilizzo del Lucrino come bacino di armamento nel contesto della guerra civile sono Vell. 2,79,2; Suet. Aug. 16,1; Flor. epit. 2,18,8,6 (ed. FORSTER); Cass. Dio 48, 49,2; Ps.-Acro scholia in Hor. ars 65–6. Per un più generale intervento sul Lucrino: Verg. georg. 2,161–4 commentato da Serv. georg. 2,162 e Hor. carm. 2,15,1–4. Per la questione del portus Iulius si veda più recentemente BRANDON/HOHLFELDER/OLESON 2008; SCOGNAMIGLIO 2009; GIANFROTTA 2011a; WELCH 2012, 261–76; CHIOFFI 2013. 8 Delle 86 occorrenze latine del termine Lucrinus almeno 19 si riferiscono alle ostriche e al loro allevamento: si veda Varro. Men. 501 (eds. BUECHELER/HERAEUS); Hor. epod. 2,49; sat. 2,4,32; Sen. epist. 78,23; Petron. 119,33–5; Plin. nat. 9,169; 32,61–2; Mart. epigr. 3,60,1–4; 5,37,1–3; 6,11,5; 12,48,3–4; 13,82,1; 13,90,1–2; Iuv. 4,141; Macrob. Sat. 3,15,3. Da considerare anche l’iscrizione funebre CIL XIV 914 (= EDR 152251) in cui il defunto afferma vixi Lucrinis. 9 Per la figura di Sergius Orata si veda MARZANO 2013, 173–97 e THÜRY 2019. 10 Per la varietà ittica del Lucrino si rimanda a Mart. epigr. 13,90 in riferimento alle orate: Non omnis laudes pretiumque aurata meretur/sed cui solus erit concha Lucrina cibus e a Serv. georg. 2,161. Ricordiamo, inoltre, la favola del delfino che, al tempo di Augusto, dal Lucrino trasportò sul suo dorso un bambino fino a Puteoli (cfr. Plin. nat. 9,25; Solin. 12,7; Aul. Gell. 6,8,5). Per gli impianti termali del Lucrino: Stat. silv. 1,2,264: nec sibi sulpureis Lucrinae Naides antris e Flor. epit. 1,11,16,4–5 ed. FORSTER). Per le terme di Baia si veda MEDRI 2018, 562–72 e la testimonianza di Sid. Apoll. ep. 5,14,1 che attesta che alla sua epoca Baia era diventato un termine generico per le terme. 11 È stata avanzata anche l’ipotesi che il nome Lucrinus derivasse proprio dai consistenti ricavi economici provenienti dal lago i cui sistemi di allevamento dovevano fornire una cospicua fonte di reddito se Festo riporta che nell’appalto dei beni dell’erario si cominciava dal Lucrino
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quanto in un’epistola ad Attico Cicerone accenni ad una villa ad Lucrinum,12 è in età augustea che la consistenza abitativa dell’area di Baia e del Lucrino aumentò con l’edificazione di lussuose dimore per l’aristocrazia romana e per la famiglia imperiale che si recava nella zona per villeggiarvi.13 A partire, dunque, dall’età ciceroniana le élites romane, alla ricerca dell’otium lontano dall’Urbs, indulgevano tra Baia e il Lucrino ad uno stile di vita galante – bagni termali, gite in barca e pranzi prelibati a base di ostriche – che divenne fin da subito bersaglio di feroci polemiche moralistiche.14 Nel 66 a.C. Cicerone, impegnato nella dimostrazione dell’immoralità di Clodia, presenta nella Pro Caelio un elenco di pratiche dissolute, tra cui anche la frequentazione di Baia: Accusatores quidem libidines, amores, adulteria, Baias, actas, convivia, comissationes, cantus, symphonias, navigia iactant.15 Successivamente intorno alla metà del I secolo d.C. Seneca nell’epistola 51 attribuiva all’area la nomea di deversorium vitiorum chiedendosi se Catone avrebbe mai voluto soggiornare tra le barche delle adultere, le rose galleggianti sparse su tutto il lago e gli schiamazzi notturni.16 Se escludiamo un breve accenno in una lettera ciceroniana, l’accusa di dissolutezza specificatamente diretta al solo Lucrino sembra diffondersi più tardivamente: è, infatti, Marziale il primo ad attestare la depravazione del lago, ricordato sprezzantemente come mollis
12 13
14 15 16
come auspicio di buon augurio (cfr. Paul. Fest. p. 108 ed. LINDSAY: Lacus Lucrinus in vectigalibus publicis primus locatur eruendus ominis boni gratia; si veda anche Cic. leg. agr. 2,36: via vendibilis Herculaena multarum deliciarum et magnae pecuniae; PAPA 1993, 160). Si veda Cic. Att. 14,16,1. Da notare che in Cic. ac. 3, fr. 13 ed. REID = Non. 91,28–30 ed. LINDSAY si fa riferimento ad un’altra dimora sul Lucrino che avrebbe fatto da sfondo al dialogo: Et ut nos nunc sedemus ad Lucrinum pisciculosque exultantes videmus (cfr. GRIFFIN 1997, 24). In età augustea Strab. 5,4,8 affermava che una serie ininterrotta di case e ville guarniva il Golfo di Napoli come un’unica città. In riferimento al lago Lucrino si veda Stat. silv. 1,3,84 (Lucrinaeque domus) il quale, descrivendo la dimora di età domizianea di Manilius Vopiscus a Tivoli, elenca una serie di luoghi in Italia rispetto ai quali la proprietà di Vopiscus era superiore (cfr. CUCCHIARELLI 2018). Si veda D’ARMS 1970 in generale per le attestazioni letterarie di ville marittime sul golfo di Napoli e per i ritrovamenti archeologici MINIERO/DI MARCO/GUARDASCIONE 2017. L’imperatore Claudio emanò da Baia l’editto De civitate Anaunorum (CIL V 5050 = EDR 137898 per quale si veda da ultimo FAORO 2018) il 15 marzo del 46 d.C. Ricordiamo, inoltre, sulla base di Tac. ann. 15,5,3, che nel Lucrino sarebbe avvenuto il primo tentativo di Nerone di eliminare la madre. Ancora nel III secolo il favore degli imperatori per Baia era rimasto immutato: Alessandro Severo vi fece costruire un palazzo con un laghetto artificiale ed altre sontuose dimore per i suoi congiunti (cfr. Hist. Aug. Alex. Sev. 26,9–10) per i cui raffronti archeologici si veda GRÜNER 2013, 272–4; Tacito fu nominato imperatore mentre si trovava a Baia (cfr. Hist. Aug. Tac. 7,5–6). Si rimanda più in generale a FIORINI RIPERT 2020, 620–4. Per le gite in barca sul Lucrino si veda: Prop. 1,11,9–14; Stat. silv. 4,3,112–3; Mart. epigr. 3,20,19–20. Si veda anche, tra i tanti esempi, Ov. ars 1,255–8 e Prop. 1,11,27–30. Sulla luxuria a Baia si rimanda a D’ARMS 1970, 40–3 e AßKAMP 2007. Si veda Cic. Cael. 35. Si tratta di Sen. epist. 51,3: deversorium vitiorum esse coeperunt e 12: Habitaturum tu putas umquam fuisse illic Catonem, ut praenavigantes adulteras dinumeraret et tot genera cumbarum variis coloribus picta et fluvitantem toto lacu rosam, ut audiret canentium nocturna convicia? Sull’epistola in questione si veda da ultimo BERNO 2014 e FIORINI RIPERT 2020.
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o lascivus Lucrinus le cui acque erano dei blanda stagna.17 In particolare, nell’epigramma 1,62 il poeta ricostruisce in pochi versi la vicenda della casta Levina: la matrona, simile per virtù alle Sabine, trascorrendo un soggiorno tra il Lucrino e l’Averno, si era lasciata influenzare dalla licenziosità della zona e, innamoratosi di un giovane, aveva lasciato il marito, trasformandosi, come recita l’arguta chiusa finale, da una Penelope in una Elena: ... relicto/coniuge, Penelope venit abit Helene.18 3. Simmaco e la vita dei senatori romani sul Lucrino Dopo aver rilevato la nomea di ricettacolo di vizi attribuita all’area di Baia sin da età ciceroniana e più in particolare al Lucrino dal I secolo d.C., saremmo tentati di dedurre che Simmaco nell’epistola 8,23 abbia meccanicamente ripreso un topos letterario cosicché, nell’affermare in Lucrino serii sumus, l’oratore avrebbe fatto semplicemente riferimento ad uno stigma moralistico. In tale ottica, la critica ha avuto la tendenza a sottolineare la letterarietà della caratterizzazione dei luoghi nelle descrizioni simmachiane della Campania,19 senza, tuttavia, mettere in evidenza come, oltre ad alludere in modo erudito a celebri episodi, l’oratore si riferisca ad esperienze concrete del vissuto dell’aristocrazia senatoria romana del IV secolo. Tramite la ricostruzione della vita condotta dai senatori sull’istmo flegreo del Lucrino in epoca tardoantica, vorremmo mostrare che Simmaco, pur sicuramente rifacendosi a modelli letterari illustri,20 nel descrivere gli ozi del lacus sta nel contempo facendo riferimento alla propria esperienza personale. In primo luogo, considereremo un 17 Si tratta rispettivamente di Mart. epigr. 6,43,5: Hoc mihi Baiani soles mollisque Lucrinus e 4,57,1: Dum nos blanda tenent lascivi stagna Lucrini. Il poeta, inoltre, in due componimenti associa al lago Lucrino il mito di Ermafrodito attribuendo al lago campano la proprietà di sottrarre la virilità (cfr. Mart. epigr. 6,68,1–2; 10,30,10). Una polemica contro il tipo di vita condotta sul Lucrino in un’epoca precedente a Marziale potrebbe essere rintracciata soltanto nel breve cenno di Cic. Att. 4,10,1. 18 Mart. epigr. 1,62: Casta nec antiquis cedens Laeuina Sabinis/et quamuis tetrico tristior ipsa viro,/dum modo Lucrino, modo se permittit Averno,/et dum Baianis saepe fovetur aquis,/incidit in flammas: iuvenemque secuta, relicto/coniuge, Penelope venit abit Helene. Per un commento a questo epigramma si veda da ultimo SALANITRO 2003 e SCHINDLER 2003. 19 Per i topoi letterari nella descrizione del paesaggio campano si veda POLARA 1995, 226 e FASCIONE 2020. 20 Un confronto è possibile tra la missiva simmachiana e Sen. epist. 51. Nell’epistola del filosofo, infatti, troviamo alcune esemplificazioni della vita condotta a Baia (51,4: Videre ebrios per litora errantes et comessationes navigantium et symphoniarum cantibus strepentes lacus; 51,6: Quid mihi cum istis calentibus stagnis? quid cum sudatoriis, in quae siccus vapor corpora exhausurus includitur?; 51,12: ut praenavigantes adulteras dinumeraret et tot genera cumbarum variis coloribus picta et fluvitantem toto lacu rosam, ut audiret canentium nocturna convicia.) che sembrano trovare un parallelo nella descrizione delle attività svolte sul Lucrino in Symm. epist. 8,23,3: Nullus in navibus canor, nulla in conviviis helluatio, nec frequentatio balnearum nec ulli iuvenum procaces natatus. Inoltre, la domanda che Seneca si pone in 51,2: Quid ergo? ulli loco indicendum est odium? potrebbe trovare una risposta nella conclusione dell’epistola simmachiana: Scias nullum esse in luxuria crimen locorum.
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gruppo di testimonianze attestanti una continuità insediativa ed economica nella regione dei Campi Flegrei, per poi soffermarci più in particolare su una serie di passi simmachiani che testimoniano lo stile di vita aristocratico nell’area del Lucrino e più estesamente della costa campana. Innanzitutto, le fonti archeologiche e letterarie sono concordi nel dimostrare che la zona del Lucrino ancora almeno nel V secolo si presentava come un luogo di cure idrotermali dove l’aristocrazia romana aveva la possibilità di soggiornare in lussuose ville e gustare le rinomate ostriche. Nelle vicinanze del lacus Lucrinus, presso la masseria Scalandrone, è stato rinvenuto un ambiente pavimentato con un grande mosaico policromo raffigurante una scena di caccia che, sulla base della similarità con i mosaici di Villa del Casale a Piazza Armerina, è stato datato intorno al IV secolo. Tale mosaico, che doveva appartenere ad una villa senatoria, conferma la continuità nella costruzione o nel restauro di edifici lussuosi nell’area del lago.21 A testimonianza, invece, della persistenza dell’ostricoltura nelle lagune costiere del Lucrino, in una lettera contenuta nelle Variae cassiodoree e databile intorno al 527, il re Atalarico concede ad un primiscrinius il permesso di recarsi a Baia per motivi di salute: tra le varie attrattive del luogo, oltre alle terme naturali, il sovrano ricorda anche il Lucrino, descritto come il mare stagnaeum inmissum Averno, dove erano presenti allevamenti di ostriche particolarmente redditizi.22 Allontanandoci dalla più ristretta area del lacus Lucrinus, le fonti attestano anche la vitalità di Baia in epoca tardoantica per l’allevamento dei pregiati molluschi e per le cure idrotermali. Sono state datate agli inizi del IV secolo tre fiaschette di vetro decorate con una raffigurazione degli edifici principali della città di Baia, tra cui gli ostriaria che dovevano essere ancora attivi a quell’epoca.23 Inoltre, Eunapio nelle Vitae Sophistorum classifica le terme di Gadara in Siria come seconde solo agli impianti di Baia.24 Parallelamente alle testimonianze relative alla persistenza di unità abitative e attività economiche nell’area del lacus Lucrinus ancora fino al VI secolo, dobbiamo considerare che Simmaco stesso era proprietario di una dimora sul Lucrino. Nell’epistola di apertura del libro I l’oratore, offrendo un resoconto del suo otium, riferisce di essersi da poco trasferito nella casa sul lago e di aver composto dei versi per celebrare il costruttore della villa dei Simmachi a Bauli, Septimius Acyndinus, e la storia della città,25 inoltre, in Symm. epist. 1,8,1 i tacita Lucrina sono enumerati
21 Al mosaico, oggi andato perduto, devono appartenere quattro frammenti conservati al Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Napoli. Si veda BORRIELLO/D’AMBROSIO 1979, 44 e PAGANO 1983, 179–87 e 187–226 per altre testimonianze archeologiche nell’area del Lucrino. 22 Cassiod. var. 9,6,3: deinde inmissum Averno stagneum mare, ubi ad voluptatem hominum vita regitur ostreorum. 23 Al gruppo delle tre fiaschette si aggiunge anche un frammento da Astorga. Si veda da ultimo FUJII 2003, GIANFROTTA 2011b, POPKIN 2018 e GIANFROTTA 2022. 24 Eunap. vitae soph. 459: ἐκείνοις δὲ οὐκ ἔστιν ἕτερα παραβάλλεσθαι. 25 Symm. epist. 1,1,2: Baulos Lucrina sede mutavimus; non quod eius deversorii nos ceperit satias, quod cum diutius visitur, plus amatur, sed quod metus fuit ne si Baulorum mihi inolevisset adfectio, cetera, quae visenda sunt, displicerent. Si veda SALZMAN 2011, 5–11.
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tra le possibili mete che attendevano il padre Avianio in Campania.26 D’altra parte, la dimora sul Lucrino non era l’unica proprietà simmachiana lungo il litorale: anche Cuma, Baia, Pozzuoli, Bauli e Napoli sono ricordate nella corrispondenza come luoghi di soggiorni in compagnia di parenti, amici ed altri esponenti dell’aristocrazia senatoria romana, come Vettio Agorio Pretestato, il futuro imperatore Prisco Attalo, Caecina Decio Albino e i Nicomachi.27 Simmaco ricorda le mutuae invitationes compiute dai senatori romani una volta raggiunto il golfo di Napoli e gli spostamenti da una dimora campana all’altra facendo visite ai propri pari, contemporaneamente come gesto di affetto e strumento per il mantenimento della rete di relazioni sociali.28 Seppur filtrata dall’esigenza di costruire un’immagine pubblica, la corrispondenza simmachiana documenta la vita condotta sul litorale campano dagli esponenti della nobilitas senatoria. Le lettere di Simmaco mostrano come una parte fondamentale dell’otium dei ricchi esponenti dell’aristocrazia di Roma, quando trascorrevano periodi sul litorale flegreo, consistesse nell’incontro con altri clarissimi con i quali si immergevano in una vita dedicata ad attività piacevoli come banchetti, gite in barca, bagni termali e il costoso abbellimento delle proprie dimore, affetti dal cosiddetto morbus fabricatoris.29 A differenza delle proprietà suburbane e laziali, le ville aristocratiche del litorale campano, infatti, dovevano essere principalmente destinate alla delectatio e non al fructus cosicché i senatori, scarsamente impegnati a sovrintendere i lavori agricoli, potessero dedicarsi ad attività più gradevoli.30 Nell’autorappresentazione elaborata da Simmaco per l’aristocrazia senatoria, tali deliciae potevano, tuttavia, avere delle ripercussioni
26 Symm. epist. 1,8,1: Iamdudum vestri cupiunt Lucrina tacita et liquida Baiana et Puteoli adhuc celebres et Bauli magnum silentes. Si veda SALZMAN 2011, 27–9. 27 Per le proprietà simmachiane in Campania si rimanda a CECCONI 2002, 225–7 e SFAMENI 2006, 147. Per la dimora di Baia di Vettio Agorio Pretestato cfr. Symm. epist. 1,47,1: Me inpedit pontificalis officii cura, te Baiani otii neglegentia; 1,48,1: Certe levandi animi causa Baias concesserati; mentre sono attestati i soggiorni di Attalo a Baia in Symm. epist. 7,16,2 e 7,24; Decio aveva un arx deliciarum sulla costa napoletana (cfr. Symm. epist. 7,35; 36); per i Nicomachi e il possedimento sul Monte Gauro cfr. Symm. epist. 7,23 e MARCONE 1983, 70. 28 Cfr. Symm. epist. 7,23: Nunc mutuis invitationibus aut in Baulos aut in Nicomachi Gaurana migramus. Amicorum subinde mihi adfluentium largiter est. Per altre attestazioni degli spostamenti lungo la costa campana come parte dell’otium aristocratico si veda Symm. epist. 1,3; 2,3; 26; 5,93; 6,6; 62; 7,18; 35; 8,2; 27; 55A; 9,29; 111. 29 Si tratta proprio di quelle attività che Simmaco in 8,23,3 sottolinea non essere parte del suo soggiorno. Per i banchetti: Symm. epist. 1,7; le terme: Symm. epist. 6,66; 7,18. Il morbus fabricatoris per le dimore campane emerge in Symm. epist. 1,10; 2,60; 6,9 per un Baianorum praetorium; 9,17. In generale la regione campana veniva apprezzata per il clima salubre e gradevole (cfr. Symm. epist. 1,5; 7; 47). Per il rapporto di Simmaco con la Campania si veda POLARA 1995. 30 Si rimanda a SAVINO 2005, 37–44. L’unica eccezione potrebbe essere il riferimento ai vigneti del mons Gaurus (cfr. Symm. epist. 1,8). Escludendo, tuttavia, le proprietà lungo la costa flegrea, le dimore aristocratiche campano-laziali erano funzionali sia all’otium che all’attività produttiva, seppur probabilmente destinata solo all’autoconsumo (cfr. VERA 1986, 250–1).
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negative, come la distrazione dal munus epistolare o una supposta sensazione di satietas e di rigetto verso l’abbondanza di lusso.31 Dalle descrizioni simmachiane comprendiamo, quindi, che l’oratore nell’epistola 8,23 non si sta servendo di una ripresa letteraria slegata dal contesto storico. Pur riprendendo, infatti, lo stigma che aveva colpito fin dal I secolo a.C. la zona di Baia e del Lucrino, Simmaco si riferisce ad un’esperienza realmente vissuta in prima persona. A conferma di ciò notiamo che le menzioni del Lucrino in altri luoghi dell’epistolario rimandano ad un reale soggiorno nei pressi del lago. Nell’epistola 7,16 con il rimprovero rivolto ad Attalo che si era lasciato corrompere dalle arguzie eccessive del Lucrino l’oratore allude ad un’effettiva permanenza del futuro imperatore a Baia.32 Allo stesso modo quando il padre Avianio viene invitato a lasciare la rustica Cora e la sterilis Formia per trascorrere un soggiorno tra il Lucrino, liquida Baia, celebres Puteoli e silentes Bauli, l’oratore menziona aree in cui realmente possedeva una dimora e dove padre e figlio avrebbero potuto effettivamente incontrarsi.33 Parallelamente, i riferimenti epistolari alla luxuria di Baia o i tentativi di Simmaco di giustificare la propria presenza inoperosa nella regione campana, per quanto sicuramente rimandassero alla tradizione letteraria precedente, dovevano legarsi al reale vissuto dell’oratore.34 L’unico caso in cui il riferimento al lusso del Lucrino è considerabile un topos letterario è nella laudatio rivolta a Valentiniano I in occasione della prima ambasceria di Simmaco a Treviri nel 367–368 per i quinquennalia dell’imperatore. Nell’elogio dell’inesauribile attività bellica del laudatus, l’oratore presenta per contrasto una serie di grandi personalità del passato che si erano concesse momenti di svago riprovevole: Scipione l’Africano si aggirava per la Sicilia palliatus, Lucullo era stato indebolito dal luxus Ponticus, Antonio si era lasciato sedurre da Cleopatra. Tra questi personaggi è ricordato anche Augusto il quale, pur non essendosi direttamente abbandonato all’ozio, aveva costruito delle dighe nell’area del Lucrino, contribuendo al miglioramento di una zona giudicata da Simmaco e dal suo pubblico come pervasa di vizi e sprechi oziosi.35 In questo caso la menzione del Lucrino può essere considerata una ripresa letteraria poiché sganciata dal contesto reale dell’orazione pronunciata a Treviri. Il genere epidittico prevedeva che l’oratore celebrasse l’imperatore tramite degli exempla del
31 Per le mancanze nella pratica epistolare si veda Symm. epist. 1,35: Diu in Campaniae secessibus otiatus occasione carui scriptionum; 47; 8,25; 61. L’idea che l’abbondanza possa creare rigetto si trova in Symm. epist., 7,31; 35–6. 32 Si tratta di Symm. epist. 7,16,2: Festivitas ista Baiana est; nimiis te salibus sinus Lucrinus infecit in cui l’oratore presenta lo scambio epistolare con Attalo come un rimedio per evitare la luxuria di Baia. 33 Si tratta di Symm. epist. 1,8 (cfr. supra). 34 Si veda Symm. epist. 2,17 dove Nicomaco Flaviano è invitato a respingere le Baianae cogitationes; 6,22; 67 in cui Simmaco sottolinea come le tentazioni di Baia non siano un pericolo per la figlia, perfetto esempio di matrona per le sue virtù domestiche; 7,16,2 (cfr. supra); 24 dove Baia è definita un luxuriae sinus. Per le giustificazioni: Symm. epist. 5,93; 8,25. 35 Symm. or. 1,16: Vis petam proximae aetatis exempla? Ecce Baias sibi Augustus a continuo mari vindicat et molibus Lucrinis sumptus laborat imperii. Si veda HALL 1977, 68–74; DEL CHICCA 1984, 169–72.
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passato, senza dover necessariamente far riferimento ad una situazione concreta, diversamente da quanto ci si aspetta da uno scambio epistolare. Contemporaneamente a Simmaco, tra la fine del IV e gli inizi del V secolo d.C., la fama della rilassatezza dei costumi della società che frequentava Baia è confermata anche da Ammiano Marcellino, Girolamo e Agostino. Il primo nella celebre digressione sui vizi della nobilitas tratteggia una vignetta delle barche pictae dei senatori che salpano dall’Averno verso Pozzuoli con baldacchini di seta e ventagli dorati.36 Dopo essere stato costretto a lasciare Roma nel 385, Girolamo scrive una lettera ad Asella in cui rivendica la giustizia dei propri insegnamenti e, lamentandosi della diffusa ostilità contro Paola e Melania, donne dell’aristocrazia romana che avevano abbandonato la vita mondana per quella monastica, ricorda tra i primi lussi a cui esse avevano rinunciato i soggiorni a Baia.37 Infine, anche per il vescovo di Ippona il solo nome di Baia è sinonimo di lussuria e di piaceri: se l’ignoto adversarius di Romanianus, il destinatario del dialogo agostiniano, si fosse avvicinato alla filosofia, avrebbe abbandonato qualsiasi delicia, tra i quali Agostino enumera la città di Baia, gli amoena pomaria, i convivia e gli histriones.38 A differenza delle epistole simmachiane, il contesto polemico in cui questi passi si inseriscono spinge a pensare che si tratti con maggiore probabilità di una ripresa letteraria.39 D’altra parte, la vitalità di questo topos potrebbe spiegarsi se consideriamo che effettivamente ancora alla fine del IV secolo, come testimoniato da Simmaco, l’area di Baia e del Lucrino era meta dei soggiorni dei senatori che amavano trascorrere periodi lontani da Roma tra cure idrotermali, banchetti e svaghi più o meno sconvenienti, davanti ai quali Simmaco, per proteggere la propria immagine di vita consularis, doveva affermare in Lucrino serii sumus.
Maria Lubello Via Aretina 300/B 50014 Fiesole, Italia [email protected]
36 Si tratta di Amm. 28,4,18: ... aut si a lacu Averni lembis invecti sunt pictis Puteolos, velleris certamen, maxime cum id vaporato audeant tempore. Ubi si inter aurata flabella laciniis sericis insederint muscae, uel per foramen umbraculi pensilis radiolus irruperit solis, queruntur quod non sunt apud Cimmerios nati. 37 Hier. epist. 45,4: Baias peterent, unguenta eligerent, divitias et viduitatem haberent, materias luxuriae et libertatis, domnae vocarentur et sancte. Si veda MARASCO 2004, 44. 38 Aug. c. acad. 2,2,6: nae ille et baias, et amoena pomaria, et delicata nitidaque convivia, et domesticos histriones, postremo quidquid eum acriter commovet in quascumque delicias, abiciens et relinquens, ad eius pulchritudinem blandus amator et sanctus, mirans, anhelans, aestuans advolaret. 39 Si veda da ultimo per le riprese letterarie nelle digressioni su Roma in Ammiano CREER 2020.
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Bibliografia R. AßKAMP: Luxus and Dekadenz. Römisches Leben am Golf von Neapel, Mainz 2007. F. R. BERNO: Seneca contro Baia ovvero il vizio in villeggiatura: lettura di Sen., Ep., 51, in O. Devillers (ed.), Neronia IX. La villégiature dans le monde romain de Tibère à Hadrien, Paris 2014, 123–32. M. BORRIELLO/A. D’AMBROSIO: Baiae-Misenum (Forma Italiae regio I, XIV), Firenze 1979. C. BRANDON/L. HOHLFELDER/J. P. OLESON: The concrete construction of the Roman harbours of Baiae and Portus Iulius, Italy. The ROMACONS 2006 field season, in International Journal of Nautical Archaeology 37, 2008, 374–9. J. P. CALLU: Symmaque. Lettres (livres VI-VIII), texte établi, traduit et commenté par, Paris 20032,19951. G. A. CECCONI: Commento storico al libro II dell’epistolario di Q. Aurelio Simmaco, Pisa 2002. L. CHIOFFI: Portius Iulius nelle fonti letterarie, Roma 2013. T. CREER: Ethnography and the Roman Digressions of Ammianus Marcellinus, in Histos 14, 2020, 255–74. A. CUCCHIARELLI: Come Orazio a Tivoli, ma senza pensieri (Stazio, silv. I 3), in Aevum antiquum 18, 2018, 159–203. J. H. D’ARMS: Romans on the bay of Naples and other essays on Roman Campania, Cambridge 1970. F. DEL CHICCA: Symmachus: Laudatio in Valentinianum Seniorem Augustum prior, Roma 1984. D. FAORO: Claudio e i suoi comites. Nota alla tabula Clesiana, in ZPE 207, 2018, 247–8. S. FASCIONE: La Campania incantatrice, in Invigilata Lucernis 42, 2020, 63–73. L. FIORINI RIPERT: Seneca, Baia e l’imperatore: per una rilettura dell’epistola 51, in Maia 72/3, 2020, 610–27. Y. FUJII: An iconographical study of Baiae group flasks: Are vaulted buildings fishponds or not?, in Annales du 15e Congrès de l'Association Internationale pour l'histoire du Verre (Corning, New York, 15th-20th October 2001), Nottingham 2003, 73–7. P. A. GIANFROTTA: ...mare Tyrrhenum a Lucrino molibus seclusum, in Atlante Tematico di Topografia Antica 21, 2011, 69–80. P. A. GIANFROTTA: La topografia sulle bottiglie di Baia, in Rivista di Archeologia 35, 2011, 13–40. P. A. GIANFROTTA: Da Baia agli horrea del Lucrino: aggiornamenti, in Archeologia classica 63, 2012, 277–96. P. A. GIANFROTTA: Sulle bottiglie di Puteoli, in Archeologia classica 73, 2022, 431–63. M. GRIFFIN: The composition of the Academica. Motives and versions, in B. INWOOD/J. MANSFELD (eds.), Assent and Argument. Studies in Cicero's Academic Books. Proceedings of the 7th Symposium Hellenisticum (Utrecht, August 21–5, 1995), Leiden 1997, 1–35. A. GRÜNER: Die kaiserlichen Villen in severischer Zeit: eine Bestandsaufnahme, in N. SOJC/A. WINTERLING/U. WULF-RHEIDT (eds.), Palast und Stadt im severischen Rom, Stuttgart 2013, 231–86. R. G. HALL: Two Panegyrics in honor of Valentinian I by Q. Aurelius Symmachus. A Translation and Commentary, PhD Thesis, The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, 1977. G. MARASCO: Aspetti sociali, economici e culturali del termalismo nel mondo romano, in Studi Classici e Orientali 47/3, 2004, 9–64. A. MARCONE: Commento storico al libro VI dell’epistolario di Q. Aurelio Simmaco, Pisa 1983. G. MARIOTTA/A. MAGNELLI: Diodoro Siculo. Biblioteca storica. Libro IV. Commento storico, Milano 2012. A. MARZANO: Harvesting the sea: the exploitation of marine resources in the Roman Mediterranean, Oxford 2013. J. MATTHEWS: Western aristocracy and the imperial court A.D. 364–425, Oxford 1975. M. MEDRI: La fama di Baia e le risorse naturali tipicamente baiane nelle fonti letterarie, in Archeologia classica 69, 2018, 549–78.
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P. MINIERO/M. DI MARCO/F. GUARDASCIONE: Ville romane in Baiano sinu: recenti rinvenimenti e riflessioni, in L. CICALA/B. FERRARA (eds.), Kithon Lydios. Studi di storia e archeologia con Giovanna Greco, Napoli 2017, 795–810. V. CARDONE/L. PAPA: Le attività lacustri, in (eds.) V. CARDONE, L. PAPA, L’identità dei Campi Flegrei, Napoli 1993, 157–166. M. L. POPKIN: Urban Images in Glass from the Late Roman Empire: The Souvenir Flasks of Puteoli and Baiae, in American Journal of Archaeology 122/3, 2018, 427–62. G. POLARA: Simmaco e la Campania, in F. E. CONSOLINO (ed.), Pagani e cristiani da Giuliano l’Apostata al sacco di Roma. Atti del Convegno Internazionale di Studi (Rende, 12/13 novembre 1993), Soveria Mannelli 1995, 225–39. A. RUTA: Quinto Aurelio Simmaco. Epistularum liber VIII. Introduzione, traduzione e commento retorico-filologico a cura di, Alessandria 2023. M. SALANITRo: L’amore incendiario in Marziale, in Maia 55, 2003, 307–12. M. R. SALZMAN: The Letters of Symmachus: Book 1, Atlanta 2011. E. SAVINO: Campania tardoantica (284–604 d.C.), Bari 2005. W. SCHINDLER: Aus einer Penelope wird eine Helena. Zu Martial I, 62, in Forum Classicum 46, 2003, 20–6. E. SCOGNAMIGLIO: Porto Giulio: nuovi dati, in Archeologia Marittima Mediterranea 6, 2009, 145– 53. O. SEECK: Q. Aurelii Symmachi opera quae supersunt. Monumenta Germaniae Historica. Auctores Antiquissimi VI 2, Berlin 1883. C. SFAMENI: Ville residenziali nell’Italia tardoantica, Bari 2006. G. E. THÜRY: Sergius Orata und die Erfindung des Austernparks, in M. FRASS/J. KLOPF/M. GABRIEL (eds.), Erfinder, Erforscher, Erneuerer, Salzburg 2019, 45–63. D. VERA: Simmaco e le sue proprietà: strutture e funzionamento di un patrimonio aristocratico del quarto secolo d.C., in F. PASCHOUD (ed.), Colloque Genevois sur Symmaque à l’occasion de mille six centième anniversaire du conflit de l’autel de la Victoire, Paris 1986, 231–70. K. WELCH: Magnus Pius: Sextus Pompeius and the Transformation of the Roman Republic, Swansea 2012.
LA COSTA ATLANTICA DELLA PENISOLA IBERICA IN UN FRAMMENTO DI ERODORO DI ERACLEA (FGRHIST 31 F 2A) Andrea Pierozzi Abstract: A fragment of the work On Heracles by Herodorus of Herakleia (FGrHist 31 F 2a) transmitted by Constantine Porphyrogenitus lists the peoples settled on the coast of the Iberian Peninsula. The description stretches from the south-western Atlantic regions to a boundary that is not clear due to a corruption of the text, but which is very likely to be the Rhone: thus, while contemporary authors (Vth/IVth centuries BC) consider Iberia to coincide with the Mediterranean side of the Peninsula, Herodorus considers it to include the Atlantic shores. He locates the Gletes, one of these peoples, “towards Boreas” from the Cynetians, who dwell the western end of the region, which is to be identified with the Sacred Promontory – Cape St. Vincent; therefore, these Gletes seem to have been located by Herodorus on the western coast of the Peninsula. The fragment can be compared with some passages of Herodotus’ Histories concerning the Atlantic regions; in particular, the Gletes mentioned by Herodorus seem to match with the Keltoi placed by Herodotus in the region from which the Istrus is believed to flow, in the far west, beyond the Pillars of Hercules and near the Cynetians (2,33; 4,49). While Herodotus, Ephorus and Aristotle show a curtailed knowledge of the regions beyond the Strait of Gibraltar, Herodorus’ representation seems to be outlining rather clearly the shape of the south-western Atlantic coast, inhabited by the Cynetians and the Gletes/Celts, together with the south-to-north navigation route beyond the Sacred Promontory; one could believe this to be due to a peculiar knowledge of the region or to an insertion of the intermediate author or the copyists. Keywords: Herodorus of Herakleia, Stephanus of Byzantium, Iberia, Gletes, Celts. 1. Introduzione Un passo del De administrando imperio di Costantino Porfirogenito è testimone di un frammento tratto dal decimo libro dell’opera Su Eracle di Erodoro di Eraclea
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Pontica1. Il mitografo, la cui akme si colloca probabilmente intorno al 400 a.C.2, riportava in questo passo i nomi delle popolazioni localizzate sulle coste della Penisola Iberica dall’estremità occidentale della regione verso oriente, per un’estensione resa incerta da un guasto della tradizione manoscritta. Può essere utile riportare il passo per intero3: FGrHist 31 F 2a = Const. De adm. imp. 23 Ταύτης δὲ πολλά φασιν ἔθνη διαιρεῖσθαι, καθάπερ Ἡρόδωρος ἐν τῇ ῑ τῶν Καθ' Ἡρακλέα γέγραφεν ἱστορῶν οὕτως: “τὸ δὲ Ἰβηρικὸν γένος τοῦτο, ὅπερ φημὶ οἰκέειν τὰ παράλια τοῦ διάπλου, διώρισται ὀνόμασιν ἓν γένος ἐὸν κατὰ φῦλα· πρῶτον μὲν οἱ ἐπὶ τοῖς ἐσχάτοις οἰκέοντες τὰ πρὸς δυσμέων Κύνητες ὀνομάζονται, ἀπ' ἐκείνων δὲ ἤδη πρὸς βορέαν ἰόντι Γλῆτες, μετὰ δὲ Ταρτήσιοι, μετὰ δὲ Ἐλβυσίνιοι, μετὰ δὲ Μαστιηνοί, μετὰ δὲ Κελκιανοί, ἔπειτα δὲ ἤδη ὁ Ῥοδανός”. Di questa Iberia4 dicono che si distinguano molti popoli, in base a come ha scritto Erodoro nel decimo libro dell’opera Su Eracle, raccontando così: ‘questa stirpe iberica, che io affermo abiti le zone costiere della traversata, si divide, nei nomi, per tribù, pur essendo una sola stirpe: in primo luogo, coloro che abitano le regioni verso il tramonto che si trovano presso gli estremi sono chiamati Cineti, mentre a partire da questi, per chi vada verso nord, ci sono i Gleti, poi dopo i Tartessii, poi gli Elbisini, poi i Mastieni, poi i Celchiani, e poi a questo punto il Rodano’.
2. Considerazioni sul pensiero geografico di Erodoro alla luce della tradizione manoscritta e delle caratteristiche del frammento Si impongono alcune considerazioni sul testimone. Il frammento, che il verbo φημί consente di identificare come una citazione letterale da Erodoro5, si inserisce in un passo del De administrando imperio che presenta forti affinità, con corrispondenze anche letterali, con una voce degli Ethnika di Stefano di Bisanzio (s.v. Ἰβηρία); nel lessico tuttavia, a noi giunto in forma epitomata per mano di un certo Ermolao6, non sono riportati né questo estratto dalle Storie su Eracle né i frammenti di altri autori
1 2 3
4 5 6
Sull’autore cfr. JACOBY 1912, DESIDERI 1991, 8–13, GALLOTTA 2009, 431–45, BLAKELY 2011 (Bibliographical essay) e FOWLER 2013, 696–8. Erodoro scrisse, oltreché Su Eracle in diciassette libri, anche Argonautiche. Così BLAKELY 2011 (Bibliographical essay); simile l’ipotesi cronologica di FOWLER 2013, 697, secondo il quale il figlio di Erodoro, Brisone (noto ad Aristotele, cfr. oltre), visse tra il 400 e il 340 a.C. ca.; secondo DESIDERI 1991, 8ss. visse nella prima metà del IV secolo a.C. Faccio riferimento all’edizione BILLERBECK 2011, 262ss; mi pare possa essere accolta l’emendazione οἰκέειν alla lezione οἰκεῖν dei codd., proposta da MEINEKE 1849, 323, in quanto non priva di paragoni con altri ionismi presenti nel frammento (ma cfr. oltre per il caso particolare di βορέαν). Per un’edizione che conserva le lezioni tràdite e segnala cruces sui guasti più significativi cfr. MORAVCSIK / JENKINS 1967, 98. Qui distinta dalla regione omonima nel Caucaso (quella “presso i Persiani”): cfr. St. B. s.v. Ἰβηρία. CANFORA 2008, 265–6 n. 42 e 278. Suda s.v. ‘Ερμόλαος.
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riportati invece da Costantino nello stesso contesto7. Il Bizantino è altresì testimone dello stesso passo erodoreo in due brevi voci dell’epitome degli Ethnika, rispettivamente s.v. Κυνητικόν e Γλῆτες8. Alla luce di questi elementi, i primi editori hanno ipotizzato che il passo di Costantino costituisca una ripresa verbatim della versione originale dell’opera del Bizantino precedente il processo di epitomazione9: il frammento di Erodoro sarebbe stato dunque originariamente trasmesso da Stefano, omesso dall’epitomatore e recuperato da Costantino. L’ipotesi che il passo del Porfirogenito riporti fedelmente un originario lemma degli Ethnika è stata messa in discussione da L. Canfora, secondo il quale durante il processo di redazione del più antico manoscritto a noi pervenuto del De administrando imperio, risalente all’XI sec. a.C. e quindi di circa un secolo posteriore alla stesura dell’opera10, sarebbero confluite nel testo, originariamente basato sui lemmi di Stefano di Bisanzio s.v. Ἰβηρία e Ἱσπανία, alcune note a margine tratte dall’epitome dei Geographoumena di Artemidoro di Efeso prodotta da Marciano di Eraclea11. Non sembra necessario tuttavia ricondurre il frammento di Erodoro a queste interpolazioni, e dunque al testo di Artemidoro anziché a quello di Stefano, giacché l’Efesino è menzionato nel De administrando imperio solo dopo la citazione dell’Eracleota, a sua volta preceduta da un riferimento ad Apollodoro di Atene12; se la tesi di Canfora è corretta, l’estratto dall’opera del mitografo appare comunque
Apollod. FGrHist 244 F 324; Artemid. fr. 21 STIEHLE; Phyl. FGrHist 81 F 13 (ma Stefano menziona Ateneo, che del frammento di Filarco è testimone secondo il Porfirogenito, cfr. Deipn. 2,21,44b). 8 FGrHist 31 F 2b ("Ἰβηρίας τόπος πλησίον ὠκεανοῦ. Ἡρόδωρος δεκάτῳ τῶν καθ' Ἡρακλέα. οἱ οἰκοῦντες Κύνητες καὶ Κυνήσιοι") e 2c ("ἔθνος Ἰβηρικὸν μετὰ τοὺς Κύνητας, Ἡρόδωρος δεκάτῳ"). Per una discussione cfr. oltre. Testimone dei F 2a e 2b è anche Erodiano secondo la ricostruzione del testo operata da A. Lentz per la sua edizione del De prosodia catholica (Gramm. Gr. 3,1 p. 401). Sono noti i problemi di questa opera, ritenuta dall’editore fonte di primo piano di Stefano di Bisanzio e pertanto spesso integrata proprio con i lemmi degli Ethnika (DE SANTIS 2013, 35–40); nella fattispecie parrebbe trattarsi dell’edizione di MEINEKE 1849, come risulta dalle lezioni οἰκέειν e βορέην (cfr. supra e infra). 9 Nell’edizione di Stefano di Bisanzio di MEINEKE 1849, 323 (“Totum hoc tmema a Constantino Porphyr. de admin. imp. 23 servatum epitomator ita compendifecit”) e nella raccolta dei frammenti di Artemidoro di STIEHLE 1856, 203 (“Das Fragment steht auch bei Constantin. Porphyrog. de admin. imp. c. 23 p. 107 ed. BONN.”) il lemma degli Ethnika appare direttamente integrato con il passo del De administrando imperio; più cauto l’approccio di BILLERBECK ibid. che riporta il testo di Costantino con caratteri diversi; per altri riferimenti cfr. CANFORA 2008, 250 n. 11. 10 L’opera è stata scritta dopo il 979 d.C., mentre il cod. Parisinus gr. 2009 è databile al periodo 1059–1081 sulla base della menzione di Giovanni Duca: cfr. MORAVCSIK / JENKINS 1967, 15– 33 e CANFORA 2008, 250, 258 e 265–6 n. 42. 11 CANFORA 2008, 243–75. 12 Non c’è ragione di dubitare che il passo originale di Stefano di Bisanzio riportasse anche il frammento erodoreo, in quanto l’Eracleota è menzionato negli Ethnika, oltreché nei sopracitati testimoni del F 2, anche in F 29, 35, 36 e 63.
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riconducibile alla parte del passo del Porfirogenito derivata probabilmente dal testo originale di Stefano di Bisanzio13. Il frammento di Erodoro riporta gli etnonimi dei popoli localizzati lungo le coste sud-occidentali della Penisola Iberica da Occidente a Oriente: si alternano nell’ordine, a partire dall’eschaton estremo-occidentale, i Cineti, i Tartessi, gli Elbisini (etnonimo risultato da emendazione di una forma probabilmente corrotta14), i Mastieni e i Celchiani, mentre il popolo dei Gleti risulta localizzato a nord dei Cineti e si pone pertanto al di fuori della sequenza principale e in contrasto con l’orientamento dell’elenco15. Dal ricorso alla formula μετὰ δέ appare evidente il richiamo del mitografo al modello descrittivo del genere periplografico, che si caratterizza per l’adozione di un principio “unidimensionale” e di una prospettiva “odologica” per la rappresentazione dello spazio costiero e dei suoi abitanti16. La menzione di un diaplous ragionevolmente da identificare con lo Stretto di Gibilterra, dei Cineti e di Tartesso consente di collocare almeno una parte della sequenza di popoli descritta nel frammento lungo le coste atlantiche meridionali della Penisola Iberica a partire dall’angolo sud-occidentale della regione. Nel lemma relativo al Κυνητικόν, indicato come “Ιβηρίας τόπος πλησίον Ὠκεανοῦ”, Stefano di Bisanzio menziona in effetti Erodoro come autore di riferimento per questa localizzazione e riporta due varianti dell’etnonimo dei Cineti, “Κύνητες καὶ Κυνήσιοι”, che rimandano con ogni probabilità all’occorrenza di entrambi questi termini nelle Storie di Erodoto; quest’ultimo infatti, come l’Eracleota, indicava i Cineti quali abitanti eschatoi d’Europa in direzione occidentale17. Una più precisa delineazione della regione abitata da questi popoli può ricavarsi da un passo di Avieno che indica come iugum Cyneticum un promontorio, “alte tumescens ditis Europae extimum”, vicino a Tartesso e posto a sud dei popoli dei Cempsi e dei Sefi i quali abitano la regione di Ophiussa identificabile con le coste lusitane e galiziane18. Pare lecito ricollegare questo settore estremo della Penisola 13 Per una distinzione tipografica di queste componenti del testo cfr. CANFORA 2008, 265ss. 14 Nei codd. si legge Ἐλευσίνιοι, emendato dai primi editori sulla base di Avien. Or. v. 422 (Selbyssina) e St. B. s.v. Ὀλβύσιοι: cfr. FOWLER 2013, 301. 15 MANGAS / PLÁCIDO 1998, 277. Per una più precisa identificazione e localizzazione di questi popoli cfr. oltre. 16 Sulle caratteristiche dei peripli cfr. JANNI 1984, 51–2, PRONTERA 1992, GONZÁLEZ PONCE 1995, 52–3, BIANCHETTI 2008 passim, FERRER ALBELDA 2008a, 54, KOWALSKI 2012, passim e BRILLANTE 2020, 45ss.; sul’espressione μετὰ δέ, che descrive in successione i popoli e gli elementi geografici che si susseguono sulle coste, e che prevale sul ricorso ai punti cardinali, cfr. PERETTI 1979, 36–7. 17 Hdt. 2,33 e 4,49: cfr. oltre. Per un’analisi generale di questi passi cfr. DION 1968 e FISCHER 1972. Per l’ipotesi che sia Erodoto che Erodoro traessero notizie sui Cineti da Ecateo cfr. FERRER ALBELDA / ALBURQUERQUE 2019, 142–3 e n. 18. 18 Avien. Or. 192–201: “Cempsi atque Sefes arduos collis habent Ophiussae in agro. Propter hos pernix Ligus Draganumque proles sub nivoso maxime septentrione conlocaverant larem. Poetanion autem est insula ad Sefum latus patulusque portus. Inde Cempsis adiacent populi Cynetum. Tum Cyneticum iugum, qua sideralis lucis inclinatio est, alte tumescens ditis Europae extimum in beluosi vergit Oceani salum;” 219–22: “hinc dictum ad amnem solis unius via est, genti et Cynetum hic terminus. Tartessius ager his adhaeret adluitque caespitem Tartessus amnis.” Sulla localizzazione di Ophiussa cfr. BIANCHETTI 2019, 88.
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a quel Promontorio Sacro che secondo Strabone costituisce il “δυσμικώτατον σημεῖον τῆς οἰκουμένης” e che parte della critica identifica con il Capo San Vincenzo nella punta sud-occidentale dell’Algarve19. Se da una parte non sembra ci sia motivo di dubitare che Erodoto ed Erodoro proponessero per i Cineti la stessa localizzazione, la critica ha osservato che i due autori presentano concezioni divergenti rispetto al limite occidentale dell’Iberia. Lo storico di Alicarnasso parrebbe distinguere nettamente il coronimo iberico dalla regione di Tartesso, stabilendo probabilmente sia una diversa connotazione etnica per gli abitanti di queste regioni, sia una delimitazione dell’Iberia al solo versante mediterraneo della Penisola, a est delle Colonne d’Ercole, caratteristica dell’età classica ma riscontrabile ancora in età ellenistica20. Il mitografo invece, ascrivendo i Cineti e i Tartessi al genos iberico, estende gli Iberi (e probabilmente l’Iberia) a ovest delle Colonne d’Ercole fino alle coste atlantiche sud-occidentali; l’affermazione in prima persona riportata da Stefano di Bisanzio indica chiaramente che non si tratta di un’interferenza di una concezione dell’Iberia più tarda e anzi segnala
19 Str. 2,5,14 C 119 (“ἀκρωτήριον ὃ καλοῦσιν ἱερόν”) e 3,2,11 C 148; cfr. anche id. 3,1,4 C 138 che indica il Promontorio col nome latino di Cuneus che potrebbe far pensare ad un riferimento ai Cineti, come osserva MAGNANI 2002, 98–9. Per l’identificazione con Capo San Vincenzo cfr. su tutti, oltreché MAGNANI ibid., PRONTERA 1990, 56–61 e 2006, 18–9, che mette in evidenza come questo promontorio imponga la prima e più significativa inversione di rotta nella navigazione atlantica lungo costa in direzione occidentale. È probabile che questa concezione risalga almeno ad Artemidoro (fr. 11 STIEHLE = Str. 3,2,11 C 148), ma non è chiaro se possa risalire a Eratostene (F II C 18 BERGER = Str. ibid., cfr. BIANCHETTI 1998, 119–21) e a Pitea (fr. 4 BIANCHETTI), come fa notare PRONTERA 1990, 61: per una discussione cfr. BIANCHETTI ibid., 2000, 133 e 2008, 33. Secondo MAGNANI 2002, 92–9, solo a partire da Artemidoro il Promontorio Sacro corrisponde a Capo San Vincenzo. Per l’identificazione del “Giogo Cinetico” avieneo con questo promontorio cfr. GONZÁLEZ PONCE 1995, 150 e MAGNANI 2002, 99. In generale sul Promontorio Sacro in Strabone cfr. SALINAS DE FRIAS 1988. Per altre considerazioni cfr. BERTHELOT 1934, 74–5. 20 Le due regioni paiono tra loro distinte in Hdt. 1,163: “οἱ δὲ Φωκαιέες οὗτοι ναυτιλίῃσι μακρῇσι πρῶτοι Ἑλλήνων ἐχρήσαντο, καὶ τὸν τε Ἀδρίην καὶ τὴν Τυρσηνίην καὶ τὴν Ἰβηρίην καὶ τὸν Ταρτησσὸν οὗτοι εἰσὶ οἱ καταδέξαντες”. È probabile, come osserva MORET 2017, 176–81, che ancora Eratostene indicasse come Iberia solo il versante mediterraneo della penisola; cfr. anche Plb. 3,37,11: “καλεῖται δὲ τὸ μὲν παρὰ τὴν καθ᾽ ἡμᾶς παρῆκον ἕως Ἡρακλείων στηλῶν Ἰβηρία”; su cui cfr. LASSERRE 1966, 79, CRUZ ANDREOTTI 2002, 167, MORET 2006, 68–70 e ALBALADEJO VIVERO 2019, 49–50 i quali evidenziano come Polibio deroghi talvolta a questa definizione (ad es. nel libro 34), chiamando Iberia l’intera penisola in accordo con un uso di epoca romana testimoniato da Str. 3,4,19 C 166. Dell’ipotesi che la concezione erodotea sia stata messa in discussione soltanto all’epoca di Polibio dubita PRONTERA 2006, 21–4, secondo il quale già Eratostene e Timostene di Rodi potrebbero aver indicato con questo coronimo l’intera Penisola (cfr. anche CRUZ ANDREOTTI / GARCÍA QUINTELA / GÓMEZ ESPELOSÍN 2007, 404); lo studioso osserva inoltre (ibid. p. 16) che questa plausibile riconfigurazione dei limiti della regione detta “Iberia” si collocherebbe in un contesto (dopo Pitea) in cui le fonti rendono conto della connotazione peninsulare della regione, fino ad allora non perspicua nelle testimonianze letterarie e probabilmente incerta per gli autori stessi. Sul rapporto tra delineazione dello spazio e identificazione delle identità etniche nella concezione degli autori antichi cfr. CRUZ ANDREOTTI 2002, 155ss.
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probabilmente, come è stato osservato, l’intento preciso di stabilire un confronto polemico con altre tradizioni21. In sostanza, Erodoro presenta una concezione peculiare degli Iberi e dell’Iberia che include le popolazioni atlantiche dei Cineti e dei Tartessi e il cui limite occidentale coincide non con le Colonne, bensì con l’eschaton di ponente dell’intero continente europeo. Ha posto invece qualche problema l’individuazione del limite orientale dell’Iberia nella concezione di Erodoro. Esattamente a conclusione del frammento, la sequenza periplografica è interrotta da un guasto della tradizione manoscritta22. La menzione del Rodano (“ἤδη ὁ Ῥοδανός”), accolta in questa sede, risulta infatti dall’emendazione della forma tràdita corrotta “ἔπειτα δὲ † ἡδιορόδανος †”, proposta da A. Berkel e accolta da buona parte della critica23. A. Schulten, seguito da una parte della dottrina anche recente, proponeva invece l’emendazione “ἥδη ὁ πορθμός24”. La scelta testuale appare dirimente per la determinazione del punto della costa spagnola nel quale si interrompe la sequenza dei popoli descritti dal mitografo e indicati come Iberi. In base all’emendazione di SCHULTEN, il limite orientale dei paralia iberici si collocherebbe all’altezza di uno “stretto” identificabile con le Colonne d’Ercole, mentre secondo il testo qui accolto gli Iberi sarebbero delimitati a Oriente dal basso corso del Rodano: nel primo caso le Colonne segnerebbero il confine dei territori dei Celchiani, mentre nel secondo si collocherebbero
21 La concezione erodorea potrebbe prestarsi peraltro a un confronto con una testimonianza di Teopompo, riportata dal Bizantino, che parrebbe indicare come “iberico” il popolo dei Tleti identificabili con i Gleti menzionati da Erodoro: cfr. FGrHist 115 F 201 = St. B. s.v. Τλῆτες. È difficile tuttavia stabilire se in questo caso la definizione di “ἔθνος Ἰβηρικόν” sia riconducibile a Teopompo o alla fonte tralatrice. Cfr. anche gli Igleti menzionati da Asclepiade di Mirlea ap. Str. 3,4,19 C 166. Dal confronto tra queste testimonianze parrebbe delinearsi un filone di tradizione alternativo a quello rappresentato in prima istanza da Erodoto e che anticipa la concezione ellenistica di un’Iberia coincidente con l’intera penisola: cfr. GARCÍA MORENO 1990, 163ss., CIPRÉS / CRUZ ANDREOTTI 1998, 121, MANGAS / PLÁCIDO 1998, 275, MORET 2006, 43 (con rappresentazione schematica), CANFORA 2008, 265–6 n. 42 e 278, BIANCHETTI 2008, 22 e FOWLER 2013, 303. 22 CANFORA 2008, 258 nota che i guasti si collocano in corrispondenza delle presunte interpolazioni di glosse tratte da Artemidoro; simile il parere di DE HOZ 2011, 31. 23 MEINEKE 1849, 323; BILLERBECK 2011, 264–5; DE HOZ 2011, 31; cfr. anche MÜLLENHOFF 1870, 187 e SIMS-WILLIAMS 2017, 425. 24 SCHULTEN 1914, accolto da Jacoby, in sede di commento, in FGrHist 31 F 2a Komm. 1, 502 (“daß Schultens ἥδη ὁ πορθμός viel für sich hat”). FOWLER 2013, 300-301 osserva che la sequenza erodorea si presta a un paragone con Avien. Or. 417–24 che tra le Colonne e Tartesso localizza, con orientamento EO, i Libopunici, i Massieni e i Selbisini; afferma pertanto che l’emendazione di Schulten “gives what is required, however adventurous”. Pur mantenendo una certa cautela rispetto alla proposta di Schulten, lo studioso predilige questa interpretazione anche nella trascrizione del testo, in FOWLER 2000, 264. BLAKELY 2011, in BNJ 31 F 2a, riporta la lezione corrotta nel testo ma accoglie l’emendazione di Schulten in sede di traduzione (“and then the straits”) e di commento. Per altre interpretazioni cfr. CIPRÉS / CRUZ ANDREOTTI 1998, 121 n. 27, con una proposta di traduzione della sezione guasta in “la dulce corriente”.
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grossomodo all’altezza dei Mastieni o degli Elbisini, vicini orientali dei Tartessi (Fig. 1). L’emendazione qui accolta risulta preferibile alla luce di altre testimonianze letterarie, di poco anteriori o posteriori a quella erodorea, che evidenziano la funzione liminare del Rodano e che attribuiscono a questo fiume, o almeno alla sua sponda occidentale, una connotazione iberica25. Afferma Strabone che “Ἰβηρίαν ὑπὸ μὲν τῶν προτέρων καλεῖσθαι πᾶσαν τὴν ἔξω τοῦ Ῥοδανοῦ καὶ τοῦ ἰσθμοῦ τοῦ ὑπὸ τῶν Γαλατικῶν κόλπων σφιγγομένου”, con probabile riferimento ad autori di V–IV sec. a.C. vicini alla cronologia di Erodoro26. Alle testimonianze a cui fa riferimento il geografo è riconducibile un frammento di Eschilo, trasmesso da Plinio e tratto probabilmente dalle perdute Eliadi, da cui risulta che secondo il tragediografo il fiume Eridano si trovava in Iberia ed era chiamato Rodano, mentre da un frammento del Prometeo liberato testimoniato da Strabone si deduce una localizzazione dei Liguri in corrispondenza di un terreno pietroso identificabile con la distesa arida della Crau, alla foce del fiume27. Secondo lo Ps. Scilace, “a partire dagli Iberi si trovano Liguri e Iberi mescolati fino al fiume Rodano”, dopo il quale inizia il territorio dei Liguri28. Non sembra distanziarsi da questa concezione lo Ps. Scimno, che la critica ritiene in larga parte dipendente da Eratostene ma per il quale non è da escludere un riferimento ad un autore più antico, come Teopompo29. Pare quindi lecito credere che questo fiume svolgesse una funzione liminare tra Iberia e Liguria anche nella concezione di autori che, pur non menzionando esplicitamente il corso d’acqua, indicavano Iberi e Liguri come popoli tra loro confinanti o vicini30. 25 BILLERBECK 2011, 265; SIMS-WILLIAMS 2017, 425. 26 Str. 3,4,19 C 166; per un inquadramento cronologico delle fonti indicate da Strabone come “antichi” (V–IV sec. a.C., dietro ai quali si scorge spesso un riferimento a Eforo) o come “contemporanei” (Posidonio e Artemidoro) cfr. LASSERRE 1975, 75 n. 1 (in relazione ai “παλαιοὶ τῶν Ἑλλήνων συγγραφεῖς” di Str. 11,6,2 C 507), POTHECARY 1997, CRUZ ANDREOTTI / GARCÍA QUINTELA / GÓMEZ ESPELOSÍN 2007, 403–4 e PARMEGGIANI 2011, 258–9. 27 Aesch. fr. 73a RADT = Plin. Nat. 37,12: Nam quod Aeschylus in Hiberia hoc est in Hispania Eridanum esse dixit eundemque appellari Rhodanum…; fr. 199 RADT = Str. 4,1,7 C 182–3: “ἥξεις δὲ Λιγύων εἰς ἀτάρβητον στρατόν… ἰδὼν δ' ἀμηχανοῦντά σε Ζεὺς οἰκτερεῖ, νεφέλην δ' ὑποσχὼν νιφάδι γογγύλων πέτρων ὑπόσκιον θήσει χθόν'…”: cfr. CULASSO GASTALDI 1979, 20–56. 28 Ps. Scyl. 3: “Ἀπὸ δὲ Ἰβήρων ἔχονται Λίγυες καὶ Ἴβηρες μιγάδες μέχρι ποταμοῦ Ῥοδανοῦ”; 4: “Ἀπὸ Ῥοδανοῦ ποταμοῦ ἔχονται Λίγυες μέχρι Ἀντίου”. Per un’analisi cfr. SHIPLEY 2019, 92ss., secondo il quale il Rodano non costituisce un limite rigido vista la presenza di un elemento ligure anche a ovest del fiume. La localizzazione dei Liguri in corrispondenza della valle del Rodano è nozione testimoniata anche da Ap. Rh. 4, 627–48. 29 Ps. Scymn. 206-209: “ἐλθόντες εἰς Ἰβηρίαν οἱ Μασσαλίαν κτίσαντες ἔσχον Φωκαεῖς Ἀγάθην Ῥοδανουσίαν τε, Ῥοδανὸς ἣν μέγας ποταμὸς παραρρεῖ”; sul rapporto tra la concezione espressa in questo passo e i proteroi indicati da Strabone cfr. MARCOTTE 2000, 113 n. 32. Lo Ps. Scimno indica le proprie fonti in una sezione dell’opera danneggiata (v. 109 s.), nella quale Eratostene è preso come autore di riferimento e doveva essere menzionato anche Teopompo, citato al v. 370 come fonte per l’Adriatico: cfr. BIANCHETTI 1990, 75–153 (con ampia trattazione del rapporto tra il Chiota, il Cirenaico e l’Anonimo) e MARCOTTE 2000, 109 n. 17. 30 Erodoto ad esempio non menziona il Rodano ma localizza i Liguri “ἄνω ὑπὲρ Μασσαλίης” (5,9,15), riferendosi forse alla risalita del fiume; un possibile riferimento dello storico alla
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Che la sequenza di popoli riportata da Erodoro non si concentri soltanto sulla costa atlantica della Penisola è deducibile anche da altre testimonianze relative agli Elbisini e ai Mastieni. Secondo Stefano di Bisanzio questi si trovavano “nei pressi delle Colonne d’Ercole” e i secondi prendevano il nome da Mastia, località menzionata nel secondo trattato romano-cartaginese (348 a.C.) riportato da Polibio e collocata, secondo parte della critica, lungo le coste iberiche sud-orientali31. Anche ammettendo una localizzazione di queste genti nelle immediate vicinanze delle Colonne, appare in ogni caso piuttosto probabile che si debbano collocare a est del porthmos i Celchiani menzionati dal mitografo pontico subito dopo i Mastieni32. Una localizzazione di questi popoli sia sulle coste atlantiche che su quelle mediterranee può forse dedursi infine dall’espressione “τὰ παράλια τοῦ διάπλου”, che parrebbe sottintendere un interesse per regioni poste sia al di qua che al di là dello Stretto di Gibilterra.
vicinanza reciproca di Iberi e Liguri è forse ravvisabile nella menzione ravvicinata di questi popoli nel catalogo delle truppe cartaginesi a Imera, in Hdt. 7,165. Anche la versione dell’origine iberica dei Sicani e della migrazione di questo popolo in Sicilia a causa della pressione dei Liguri, testimoniata da Thuc. 6,2,2 e in parte ravvisabile in Philist. FGrHist 556 F 45 = Diod. 5,6,1 ed Eph. FGrHist 70 F 136 = Str. 6,2,4 C 270, parrebbe sottintendere una simile concezione dello spazio occitano; per un’analisi di questa tradizione cfr. SAMMARTANO 2008, 115–20 e 132–8. 31 Cfr. St. B. s.v. Ἐλβέστιοι (“ἔθνος Λιβύης… Ἑκαταῖος Εὐρώπῃ” = FGrHist 1 F 40), Μαστιανοί (“ἔθνος πρὸς ταῖς Ἡρακλείαις στήλαις. Ἑκαταῖος Εὐρώπῃ. εἴρηται δὲ ἀπὸ Μαστίας πόλεως”, = FGrHist 1 F 40) e Ὀλβύσιοι, (“ἔθνος ἐπὶ Ἡρακλείων στηλῶν. καὶ Ὀλβυσίνιοι ἄλλο”; per l’identificazione con gli Elbisini/Elbesti cfr. SIMS-WILLIAMS 2017, 424). Plb. 3,24 riporta (traducendo probabilmente dal documento latino originale) che il trattato imponeva ai Romani “τοῦ Καλοῦ ἀκρωτηρίου, Μαστίας Ταρσηίου, μὴ λῄζεσθαι ἐπέκεινα… μηδ᾽ ἐμπορεύεσθαι μηδὲ πόλιν κτίζειν”. La critica è divisa sull’interpretazione di vari aspetti del passo: non è chiaro ad esempio se Mastia e Tarseio siano due località o una sola, né se il secondo toponimo derivi da un guasto di un originario riferimento a Tartesso. È ad oggi poco seguita la tesi, sostenuta su tutti da A. Schulten nel 1922, dell’identificazione di Mastia con Carthago Nova (SCHULTEN 2006, 122). Si distinguono negli studi le posizioni contrapposte di P. Moret (MORET 2002), secondo il quale Mastia e Tarseion indicherebbero due località rispettivamente sulle coste africane e sarde, e di E. Ferrer Albelda (FERRER ALBELDA / DE LA BANDERA 1997, FERRER ALBELDA 2006, 2008b e 2011–2012), secondo il quale si collocherebbero l’una al di qua e l’altra al di là delle Colonne (con probabile riferimento al toponimo di Tartesso) su coste iberiche; a una collocazione iberica sud-orientale al di qua dello Stretto pensa anche GARCÍA MORENO 1990, secondo il quale i Mastieni coinciderebbero coi Bastetani. A favore della localizzazione di Mastia proposta da Ferrer Albelda depongono altre testimonianze letterarie che rafforzano la correlazione con i Mastieni, come FGrHist 115 F 200 e Av. Or 419–23; non è tuttavia da escludere che, come affermato da Moret, Tarseion si riferisca ad un toponimo sardo o comunque legato ad altre rotte mediterranee che i Cartaginesi avrebbero avuto interesse a sottrarre ai Romani o ai loro alleati, in particolare ai Massalioti (veri destinatari, secondo FERRER ALBELDA 2006, delle clausole imposte dai Punici nel trattato). Per altre considerazioni cfr. WALBANK 1957, 347. 32 È probabile peraltro, come osservato da DE HOZ 2011, 31, che il guasto nel riferimento al Rodano sia dovuto alla perdita di una parte di testo immediatamente precedente; si spiegherebbe così la menzione di un solo popolo (i Celchiani) nell’ampio settore di costa compreso tra le Colonne e il Rodano e coincidente con l’Iberia delle altre fonti.
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È probabile in sostanza che Erodoro, in parziale accordo con altre tradizioni coeve, fissasse al Rodano il confine dell’Iberia: pare quindi lecito ipotizzare che almeno i Mastieni e i Celchiani occupassero le regioni mediterranee comprese tra le Colonne e il fiume (Fig. 2). La peculiarità della concezione del mitografo non consisterebbe dunque in una localizzazione di questo coronimo limitata alle regioni oltre le Colonne d’Ercole, in forte contrasto con la tradizione, bensì in un suo ampliamento dal settore mediterraneo della Penisola in direzione delle coste atlantiche33. 3. Erodoro, Erodoto e i popoli “oltre” i Cineti In relazione al confronto tra le concezioni dell’Occidente di Erodoto ed Erodoro di Eraclea, merita attenzione il fatto che il mitografo non menzioni i Keltoi, che secondo lo storico di Alicarnasso si collocherebbero oltre le Colonne d’Ercole, nella regione da cui nasce il fiume Istro, e sarebbero gli ultimi abitanti d’Europa verso Occidente dopo i Cineti, con i quali confinerebbero34. In un articolo recente, P. Sims-Williams ha ipotizzato che la menzione dei Kelkianoi (di cui non si hanno altre attestazioni) nella tradizione manoscritta sia derivata dalla trascrizione erronea di un altro termine legato alla radice di Keltoi (*Keltianoi): si tratterebbe in sostanza di due varianti dello stesso etnonimo. Secondo lo studioso, l’identificazione sarebbe avvalorata dalle testimonianze di Erodoto e di Eforo relative alla diffusa localizzazione dei Keltoi nel settore occidentale e nord-occidentale dell’ecumene compreso tra l’Atlantico e il Rodano35; una connotazione “celtica” dello spazio iberico mediterraneo da parte dello storico cumano potrebbe dedursi in particolare da un passo di Strabone da cui risulta che Eforo riteneva la Celtica estesa a dismisura al punto da inglobare la maggior parte delle 33 Questo prolungamento dell’Iberia fino all’eschaton cinetico potrebbe forse prestarsi a un paragone con Ephor. FGrHist 70 F 130 = Str. 3,1,4 C 138, da cui risulta che il Cumano localizzava un tempio di Eracle presso il Promontorio Sacro; il dato pare da porre in relazione con l’individuazione di un limite occidentale delle peregrinazioni di Eracle (tema centrale dell’opera erodorea) nel quale una parte della critica ha ritenuto di cogliere l’intento, da parte di Eforo, di attribuire un retroterra mitico all’interesse dei Greci per un settore dell’Occidente storicamente frequentato dai Cartaginesi: cfr. BIANCHETTI 1990, 39–73 e infra. 34 Hdt. 2,33: “Ἴστρος τε γὰρ ποταμὸς ἀρξάμενος ἐκ Κελτῶν καὶ Πυρήνης πόλιος ῥέει μέσην σχίζων τὴν Εὐρώπην. οἱ δὲ Κελτοί εἰσι ἔξω Ἡρακλέων Στηλέων, ὁμουρέουσι δὲ Κυνησίοισι, οἳ ἔσχατοι πρὸς δυσμέων οἰκέουσι τῶν ἐν τῇ Εὐρώπῃ κατοικημένων”; 4,49: “Ῥέει γὰρ δὴ διὰ πάσης τῆς Εὐρώπης ὁ Ἴστρος, ἀρξάμενος ἐκ Κελτῶν, οἳ ἔσχατοι πρὸς ἡλίου δυσμέων μετὰ Κύνητας οἰκέουσι τῶν ἐν τῇ Εὐρώπῃ”. Anche nel corpo del testo utilizzo la trascrizione del greco Keltoi in luogo del termine “Celti” con preciso riferimento all’uso dell’etnonimo nelle fonti letterarie, dal momento che questo nome ha assunto diverse sfumature di significato nei vari settori scientifici impegnati negli studi celtici: sul problema cfr. SIMS-WILLIAMS 1998, 33. 35 SIMS-WILLIAMS 2017, 428: “it is not incredible that he (sc. Erodoro) should assign a long stretch of the Peninsula to the Celts… we can suppose that the Celts were imagined (sc. da parte di Eforo) to occupy the known (i.e. Mediterranean) part of the Iberian peninsula (which notionally started at the Rhône) from the Rhône to as far west as the Tartessian polity.”; p. 431, “…Herodotus and (if emended) Herodorus, both place the Keltoi/*Keltianoi on the Iberian side of the Pyrenees, or at least west of the Rhône”.
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regioni “di quella che oggi chiamiamo Iberia” fino a Gades36, e da un passo di Flavio Giuseppe stando al quale lo storico riteneva gli Iberi concentrati in un’unica città37. A favore di questa tesi depone la mancanza di altre attestazioni dell’etnonimo dei Kelkianoi; è quindi verosimile che il termine non corrisponda a quello del passo originale di Erodoro, il quale potrebbe aver riportato una variante del termine Keltoi caratterizzata da un suffisso diverso38. Questa ricostruzione suscita qualche perplessità per la localizzazione dei Keltoi che si deduce dalle testimonianze di Erodoto ed Eforo e che pare difficilmente compatibile con quella che, sulla base dell'individuazione del limite orientale dell’Iberia erodorea in corrispondenza del Rodano, il mitografo parrebbe aver attribuito ai Celchiani. La critica ha talvolta ipotizzato per i Keltoi menzionati da Erodoto una localizzazione centro-europea principalmente sulla base della presunta identificazione dell’Istro col Danubio e della classificazione delle culture materiali caratteristiche delle regioni da cui questo fiume trae origine come compagini “celtiche” o “protoceltiche39”. Tuttavia, è molto probabile che il fiume descritto da Erodoto nasca nell’estremo Occidente e sia da identificare non propriamente col Danubio, bensì con una sequenza di corsi d’acqua e percorsi terrestri connettiva tra il Ponto e le regioni occidentali e comprensiva del basso e medio corso del grande fiume europeo40. Inoltre, la connotazione “celtica” delle principali culture materiali alpine, transalpine e cisalpine dell’età del ferro, come Hallstatt, La Tène e Golasecca, è ad oggi ridimensionata alla luce del diffuso scetticismo della dottrina recente rispetto all’identificazione tra cultura materiale e identità etnica41. Appare di contro estremamente significativo che i Keltoi erodotei si localizzino “oltre le Colonne d’Ercole” e nelle vicinanze (ὁμουρέουσι) dei Cineti, plausibilmente non nel ristretto settore compreso tra questi e Tartesso bensì oltre il Promontorio Sacro / Giogo Cinetico42. La regione che viene a delinearsi alla luce di queste coordinate pare quindi inquadrabile grossomodo nell’ambito delle coste lusitane o galiziane e non sembra estendersi in direzione dell’entroterra europeo, ma anzi appare strettamente limitata
36 FGrHist 70 F 131a = Str. 4,4,6 C 198-199: “ὑπερβάλλουσάν τε τῶι μεγέθει λέγει τὴν Κελτικήν, ὥστε ἧσπερ νῦν ᾽Ιβηρίας καλοῦμεν ἐκείνοις τὰ πλεῖστα προσνέμειν μέχρι Γαδείρων”. 37 FGrHist 70 F 133 = Ioseph. Contr. Ap. 1,67. 38 SIMS-WILLIAMS 2017, 427 ipotizza una formazione dell’etnonimo dei Kelkianoi da una radice *Kelt- con l’aggiunta del suffisso -ianoi, paragonabile alla possibile origine del nome dei Mastieni in Ecateo ("Mastini" nella tradizione manoscritta del De administrando imperio). 39 Per una sintesi del problema e degli studi principali cfr. SIMS-WILLIAMS 2016, 15ss.; di recente, l’ipotesi di un riferimento di Erodoto alle effettive sorgenti del Danubio è stata ripresa da KOCH 2014. 40 DION 1968; BIANCHETTI 1990, 127; CORCELLA / MEDAGLIA / FRASCHETTI 1993, 272; LLOYD 19942, 145; SIMS-WILLIAMS 2016, 16. 41 Sul problema cfr. di recente FRANC 2018, 125–6; in generale per un approccio critico all’accostamento tra identità celtica e cultura materiale cfr. COLLIS 2003, passim; contro la connotazione “proto-celtica” della cultura di Hallstatt cfr. KOCH 2014, 24 e SIMS-WILLIAMS 2016, 8. 42 DION 1968, 8.
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al settore atlantico della Penisola43. In altre parole, i Keltoi menzionati da Erodoto si collocano, con ogni probabilità, lungo le sponde atlantiche della Penisola Iberica, mentre gli Iberi dovevano occupare, per lo storico, il versante mediterraneo corrispondente al settore assegnato da Erodoro ai Kelkianoi e forse ai Mastieni. A mio parere nessun elemento induce a credere che la concezione di Eforo si distanziasse significativamente da quella di Erodoto. Innanzitutto, è dubbio che l’affermazione straboniana secondo cui il Cumano avrebbe assegnato ai Keltoi “la maggior parte dell’Iberia” possa fare riferimento alla concezione che lo storico aveva di questa regione; l’espressione “ἧσπερ νῦν ᾽Ιβηρίας καλοῦμεν” parrebbe costituire al contrario un richiamo all’Iberia intesa nell’accezione vigente grossomodo all’epoca del geografo, il quale, a differenza degli antichi che indicavano con questo coronimo la sola costa mediterranea, si riferiva all’intera Penisola44. Il passo straboniano indicherebbe in sostanza che Eforo assegnava a quel popolo la maggior parte della Penisola Iberica, cosa che non implica necessariamente una connotazione “celtica” per il versante mediterraneo. Alla luce di queste considerazioni, risulta poco convincente anche l’ipotesi che il frammento eforeo trasmesso da Flavio Giuseppe sottintenda la concentrazione degli Iberi in un’unica località del versante mediterraneo della Penisola presuntamente dominato dai Keltoi. Depone a favore di un accostamento tra le concezioni di Erodoto ed Eforo un noto frammento del Cumano che delinea una rappresentazione schematica dell’ecumene nella quale i Keltoi occupano l’eschaton estremo-occidentale esteso tra il ponente equinoziale e il ponente estivo45. Dal momento che Eforo menzionava nella sua opera il Promontorio Sacro46, questa “estremità” della terra abitata non sembra da individuarsi in corrispondenza del versante mediterraneo dell’Iberia, bensì oltre 43 Una parte della critica ha posto in evidenza il fatto che non sia dato sapere il limite settentrionale delle popolazioni indicate come Keltoi e localizzate oltre il territorio cinetico, per cui non sarebbe da escludere un riferimento a regioni poste alla latitudine del Finisterre armoricano: cfr. su tutti JULLIAN 1905, DION 1968, JANNI 1984, 95 e CORDANO 1997, 22. La connotazione nordica dell’Occidente celtico sarebbe corroborata, secondo DION 1968, 35–6, 1976, 148ss. e 1977, 263, da una sovrapposizione tra lo spazio dei Keltoi e quello che Eschilo e Pindaro assegnano agli Iperborei; su Celti e Iperborei cfr. su tutti BRIDGMAN 2005 e di recente ZECCHINI 2020. 44 Str. 3,4,19 C 166: “οἱ δὲ νῦν ὅριον αὐτῆς τίθενται τὴν Πυρήνην, συνωνύμως τε τὴν αὐτὴν Ἰβηρίαν λέγουσι καὶ Ἱσπανίαν”. 45 FGrHist 70 F 30a–c; testimoni sono Str. 1,2,28 C 34, Cosm. Top. Chr. 2,79–80 e (in carattere minuscolo nell’edizione di Jacoby) Ps. Scymn. 167–82. La bibliografia su questo frammento è sterminata: cfr. su tutti AUJAC 1969a, 196, BALLABRIGA 1986, 148–50, CORDANO 1992, 78– 80, MARCOTTE 2000, 52–5 e 163, BIANCHETTI 2008, 20–1 e PARMEGGIANI 2011, 221–4. Ha prevalso nella dottrina un’interpretazione dello schema eforeo basata sulla testimonianza di Cosma, dalla quale si evince una rappresentazione dell’ecumene come un parallelogramma i cui spigoli corrisponderebbero ai punti solstiziali (di levata e tramonto, estivi e invernali, su cui cfr. BALLABRIGA 1986, 147ss.) e i cui lati sarebbero abitati, in senso orario a partire da Occidente, dai Celti, dagli Sciti, dagli Indi e dagli Etiopi; una parte della critica (PRONTERA 1990, 63 n. 23, MARCOTTE ibid.) mette in discussione questa concezione, ipotizzando che lo schema eforeo aggiorni le antiche carte ioniche attraverso la delineazione di una croce obliqua, formata dalle diagonali congiungenti i punti solstiziali, che dividerebbe l’ecumene in quattro settori. 46 FGrHist 70 F 130 = Str. 3,1,4 C 138: cfr. supra.
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le Colonne e la Tartesside, lungo le coste atlantiche della Penisola; appare confermata inoltre la collocazione di questo popolo oltre l’Algarve in direzione settentrionale fino ad una latitudine incerta, di cui Eforo non dava contezza ma che pare riferirsi a coste atlantiche orientate in senso SN. In sostanza, mi pare si possa escludere un’identificazione dei Kelkianoi di Erodoro, stanziati sulle coste mediterranee dell’Iberia, con i Keltoi di Erodoto ed Eforo, la cui localizzazione appare limitata alle coste atlantiche occidentali e nordoccidentali della Penisola47. Merita invece di essere approfondita una considerazione accennata da JACOBY in sede di commento del frammento erodoreo qui preso in esame e che ha ricevuto poca attenzione dalla critica48. Dal momento che i Keltoi erodotei ed eforei si collocano probabilmente in corrispondenza delle coste occidentali della Penisola Iberica, oltre l’eschaton di ponente rappresentato dal promontorio dei Cineti, pare lecito ipotizzare piuttosto una corrispondenza col popolo dei Gleti: stando al frammento di Erodoro citato nel De administrando imperio, questi si trovano a nord (“verso Borea”) rispetto ai Cineti, beninteso lungo la costa (“τὰ παράλια”). Inoltre, nel lemma di Stefano dedicato ai Gleti, testimone dello stesso frammento erodoreo, questa localizzazione reciproca è indicata con l’espressione “μετὰ τοὺς Κύνητας”, che ricorre, pur con una sfumatura di significato più incerta, anche in uno dei passi erodotei relativi ai Keltoi49. 47 In un articolo del 2017 (p. 11 n. 59) già menzionato, P. Sims-Williams riconsidera alcune affermazioni fatte in un suo precedente contributo (SIMS-WILLIAMS 2016, 15–6) nel quale indicava i F 54–6 di Ecateo (FGrHist 1) come elementi utili per ipotizzare una localizzazione occitana dei Keltoi già nel VI sec. a.C.; lo studioso ha in seguito espresso dubbi in proposito alla luce della trasmissione di questi frammenti da parte di Stefano di Bisanzio, al quale è probabilmente da ricondurre la connotazione “celtica” dei toponimi per i quali richiama la Periegesi: cfr. su questo cfr. GAYRAUD 1981, 77, seguito da COLLIS 2003, 127. Si tratta di considerazioni significative, in quanto, come osservato dallo stesso SIMS-WILLIAMS (2017, 430ss.), viene meno una testimonianza decisiva in favore di una localizzazione “mediterranea” dei Keltoi già negli autori più antichi; secondo lo studioso tuttavia, a differenza di quanto si intende qui dimostrare, questo non basta a escludere che per Erodoto ed Eforo questi popoli potessero estendersi fino al Rodano. Tale ipotesi si inquadra nel contesto della tesi, espressa in SIMS WILLIAMS 2020, che l’area di origine e poi di prima diffusione delle lingue celtiche sia da identificare con l’odierna Francia (“Celtic from the Center”, in contrapposizione con “Celtic from the East”, tesi tradizionale, e “Celtic from the West”, tesi di KOCH 2013 – difesa dallo studioso in numerosi altri contributi e relativa alla presunta origine atlantica delle lingue celtiche), e che le più antiche occorrenze del termine Keltoi, che designerebbe parlanti “celtici”, contribuiscano a documentare questo fenomeno; l’ipotesi che gli etnonimi “celtici” usati dai Greci (Keltoi/Celtae, Galatai/Galli) designino i locutori appartenenti ad una specifica famiglia linguistica, ad oggi designata convenzionalmente come “celtica” sulla base di criteri scientifici moderni e pertanto difficilmente proiettabili nel pensiero antico, appare tuttavia piuttosto dubbia: cfr. COLLIS 1996, 21. 48 FGrHist 31 F 2 Komm. 1, 503; MANGAS / PLÁCIDO 1998, 277. 49 Hdt. 4,49 esprime il rapporto di vicinanza tra Celti e Cineti in maniera diversa rispetto a 2,33, affermando che i Keltoi “ἔσχατοι πρὸς ἡλίου δυσμέων μετὰ Κύνητας οἰκέουσι τῶν ἐν τῇ Εὐρώπῃ”. In questo caso è probabile che Erodoto intenda indicare i Keltoi come il “secondo” popolo più occidentale d’Europa, come riportato nella maggior parte delle proposte di traduzione (LEGRAND 1945, 78; GODLEY 1966, 251) e come osservato da SIMS-WILLIAMS
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Per quanto le concezioni di Erodoto ed Erodoro differiscano rispetto all’identità etnica delle popolazioni atlantiche, che il secondo ritiene appartenenti alla stirpe degli Iberi, si può osservare che entrambi considerano le regioni oltre le Colonne articolate grossomodo negli stessi settori; sia lo storico di Alicarnasso che l’Eracleota individuano infatti, a partire dallo Stretto verso Occidente, i Tartessi, i Cineti – da entrambi designati come eschatoi – e infine un terzo popolo dalla localizzazione incerta, posto in qualche modo “oltre” i suoi vicini eppure non indicato come estremo, designato rispettivamente come Keltoi o come Gletes. Può essere utile uno schema sinottico50: Erodoto (Hdt.)
Erodoro (FGrHist 31 F 2a)
Liguri (7,165) RODANO Popoli iberici: •
Celchiani
•
Mastieni
COLONNE D’ERCOLE (2,33)
•
Elbisini
Tartesso (1,163)
•
Tartessii
Cineti (2,33; 4,49) - ἔσχατοι
•
Cineti - ἐπὶ τοῖς ἐσχάτοις
Iberi (1,163)
Keltoi:
o
Gleti:
2016, 13 n. 41; per una raccolta di usi simili nelle Storie cfr. POWELL 1938, 220. Sono tuttavia condivisibili le osservazioni di PRONTERA 1990, 65–6 n. 25, secondo il quale lo storico potrebbe aver indicato la localizzazione dei Keltoi “oltre i Cineti” in senso odologico, dunque non più a ovest (giacché i Cineti occupano già il punto ritenuto più occidentale dell’ecumene) bensì più a nord dei loro vicini; cfr. l’opportuna traduzione di CORCELLA / MEDAGLIA / FRASCHETTI 1993, 63, “L'Istro infatti percorre tutta l'Europa a partire dai Celti, che verso occidente, dopo i Cineti, ne sono gli ultimi abitanti”, che ammette entrambe le possibilità d’interpretazione. Cfr. anche FISCHER 1972, 112 n. 5. 50 Lo schema riporta, dall’alto verso il basso, la sequenza dei popoli della Penisola secondo i due autori, con orientamento E-O. Sono evidenziati in maiuscolo i due punti di riferimento geografici più significativi, ovvero il Rodano (assente in Erodoto, ma localizzato probabilmente tra Liguri e Iberi, cfr. supra) e le Colonne d’Ercole. Nella parte dello schema relativa a Erodoro è indicato in corsivo l’inizio dell’elenco puntato dei popoli iberici; il contrassegno dei Gleti è bianco in quanto non è certo che il mitografo li includesse in questo genos (SCHULTEN 1914). Keltoi e Gleti presentano una spaziatura iniziale per indicare la loro collocazione peculiare (nord) rispetto alla successione periplografica in senso est-ovest dei due elenchi. Per questi due popoli e per i Cineti sono riportate le espressioni utilizzate da Erodoto ed Erodoro per indicarne la localizzazione e la vicinanza reciproca. Per uno schema alternativo cfr. MORET 2006, 43.
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Andrea Pierozzi - ὁμουρέουσι (2,33); - μετὰ Κύνητας (4,49).
- ἀπ' ἐκείνων… πρὸς βορέαν ἰόντι (F 2a); - μετὰ τοὺς Κύνητας (F 2c).
I Gleti e i Keltoi occupano in sostanza lo stesso settore delle coste atlantiche e si caratterizzano per un simile rapporto di vicinanza con il popolo “estremo” dei Cineti. Si può osservare che i due etnonimi presentano due sequenze consonantiche molto simili. P. Sims-Williams non esclude che il nome dei Gleti possa essere ricondotto alla stessa radice del termine Galatai51. Conforterebbe questa interpretazione il fatto che Eratostene, secondo un passo di Strabone dai toni polemici, localizzasse questo popolo sulle coste atlantiche della Penisola Iberica fino a Gades52; si tratta tuttavia, come evidenziato dallo stesso geografo, di una notizia isolata nella quale può forse scorgersi un consolidamento di una tendenza all’accostamento sinonimico di Keltoi e Galatai già ravvisabile nell’Inno a Delo di Callimaco e definitivamente affermata all’epoca di Polibio, ma difficilmente retrodatabile all’epoca di Erodoro53. Non è da escludere, come affermato peraltro dallo stesso Sims-Williams, una radice comune a tutti questi etnonimi54. Tralasciando il discusso problema dell’origine dei due principali termini greci relativi a queste popolazioni, sembra del tutto ammissibile, alla luce dello schema proposto in precedenza, che Keltoi e Gletes costituiscano due varianti coeve di uno stesso etnonimo55. La circolazione di diverse designazioni per uno stesso popolo tra V e IV sec. a.C. risulta verosimile soprattutto alla luce del ricorso di Erodoto a due termini distinti, Κύνητες e Κυνήσιοι, per indicare gli abitanti dell’eschaton occidentale europeo56. 51 SIMS-WILLIAMS 2017, 425, riprendendo (con cautela) un’ipotesi formulata da MANGAS / PLÁCIDO 1998, 277 n. 557 sulla base di JACOBY (cfr. supra). 52 Erat. F III B 123 BERGER = Str. 2,4,4 C 107. 53 BERGER 1880, 369. Il riferimento di Eratostene a Galatai localizzati lungo la costa atlantica della Penisola fino a Gades richiama l’estensione che, secondo Strabone, Eforo avrebbe attribuito ai Keltoi (cfr. supra): cfr. AUJAC 1969b, 152. La più antica occorrenza di entrambi gli etnonimi in un solo passo si trova in Callim. Hymn. 4,173–84, che costituisce peraltro la prima testimonianza letteraria sicura del termine Galatai. Sull’uso sinonimico dei due termini in Polibio cfr. CARENA / MANFREDINI / PICCIRILLI 1983, 316, ma cfr. contra FOULON 2000. 54 Per l’ipotesi di una radice *glt-/*klt- cfr. SIMS-WILLIAMS 2011, 275–8 e, per un cauto accostamento con i Gleti, 2017, 425 n. 21 (“this is very uncertain”); cfr. anche MORET 2017, 40 per l’ipotesi che l’etnonimo Gletes sia costituito da un suffisso arcaico -tes, che farebbe pensare ad una possibile radice *gle- e che non sembra porre problemi rispetto all’accostamento col termine Keltoi, sulla cui formazione permangono molti dubbi. 55 Tra le possibili cause della diffusione di diverse forme di uno stesso etnonimo occorre considerare il ruolo di mediazione linguistica e culturale tra mondo iberico e mondo greco rappresentato dai Cartaginesi, su cui cfr. FERRER ALBELDA 2008b, 141. Per simili considerazioni di carattere linguistico, si veda il caso della possibile origine degli etnonimi dei Mastieni e dei Bastetani da una medesima radice indigena mediata da altri idiomi (punico, greco, latino), su cui cfr. GARCÍA MORENO 1990, 62-63. 56 Le differenze morfologiche che intercorrono tra le due forme non sembrano riconducibili alla tradizione manoscritta: per un quadro cfr. LEGRAND 1944, 88 e 1945, 78.
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In sostanza, è molto probabile che non i Celchiani, bensì i Gleti di Erodoro corrispondano ai Keltoi menzionati da Erodoto. 4. I Gleti “a nord” dei Cineti A favore dell’identificazione tra i Gleti erodorei e i Keltoi erodotei è parsa dirimente la comune localizzazione sulle coste atlantiche a nord dell’Algarve. Si può tuttavia osservare che nel frammento qui preso in esame la collocazione reciproca dei Gleti e dei Cineti è indicata attraverso un’espressione che pone esplicitamente i primi a nord dei secondi (“ἀπ' ἐκείνων δὲ ἤδη πρὸς βορέαν ἰόντι”) e che non trova riscontro in Erodoto, le cui coordinate geografiche appaiono invece piuttosto problematiche. Il ricorso dell’Eracleota ai punti cardinali risulta in effetti alquanto isolato nel quadro delle fonti di V e IV sec. a.C. relative al popolamento delle coste atlantiche della Penisola Iberica oltre il territorio dei Cineti, con ogni probabilità esplorato dai Greci in età arcaica ma delineato con grande cautela e scetticismo dagli scrittori in epoca classica57. I frammenti di Eforo relativi all’Estremo Occidente, alcuni dei quali già richiamati nelle pagine precedenti, non offrono elementi utili a tratteggiare la concezione che lo storico aveva dell’Oceano e del settore nord-occidentale dell’ecumene, plausibilmente conforme a quella di Erodoto58. Appare tuttavia indicativo di una probabile localizzazione “costiera” dei Keltoi, beninteso oceanica, il dato eforeo dell’estensione di questo popolo dal ponente equinoziale (“fino a Gades”) al ponente estivo59; la disposizione verticale del segmento congiungente queste due coordinate, coincidente nella concezione dello storico con l’eschaton estremo-occidentale dell’ecumene, può forse richiamare l’orientamento S-N delle coste della Penisola Iberica che si presentava ai naviganti una volta doppiato il Promontorio Sacro60. Una simile concezione parrebbe sottintesa inoltre in un passo dei Meteorologica nel quale Aristotele afferma che gli estremi dell’ecumene a Occidente e a Oriente non si toccano a causa dell’Oceano, che separa le terre abitate e delinea chiaramente l’orientamento S-N delle coste estremo-occidentali ed estremo-orientali61; 57 Sui peripli e sulle navigazioni oceaniche in età arcaica cfr. BIANCHETTI 1998, 47–52. Per un esempio delle difficoltà degli antichi nella rappresentazione dell’Estremo Occidente e del nordovest cfr. Hdt. 3,115, dove lo storico afferma di non credere alle notizie sull’Eridano e di non conoscere la localizzazione delle Isole dello Stagno, e 4,45, dove afferma che non sia dato sapere se l’Europa sia circondata dalle acque. Sui limiti delle conoscenze greche dell’Occidente tra V e IV sec. a.C. cfr. PERETTI 1979, 39 e FERRER ALBELDA 2008a. 58 Cfr. PARMEGGIANI 2011, 223, secondo il quale Eforo e Aristotele (Meteor. 2,5, 363b) accoglievano lo scetticismo di Hdt. 4,36,2 per le rappresentazioni circolari dell’ecumene e dell’Oceano, di matrice ionica; è pertanto probabile che entrambi condividessero le perplessità dello storico sulla delimitazione dei continenti (Hdt. 4,36, 42 e 45). Per un quadro cfr. AMIOTTI 1986. Per un’analisi dei frammenti eforei relativi all’Estremo Occidente cfr. MANGAS / PLÁCIDO 1999, 454–63. 59 FGrHist 70 F 30 e 131a: cfr. supra. 60 FGrHist 70 F 130 = Str. 3,1,4 C 138: cfr. supra. 61 Aristot. Meteor. 2,5, 362b.
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è probabile quindi che anche per il filosofo i Keltoi, menzionati in un altro passo della stessa opera, si collocassero lungo un tratto di costa oceanica limitato a nord dal ponente estivo e corrispondente grossomodo alle coste lusitane62. Anche in questo caso si registra tuttavia una certa cautela da parte di Aristotele, il quale non ritiene del tutto prive di argomentazioni le tesi di coloro che ipotizzano la tangenza degli estremi dell’ecumene63. Le incertezze che, pur tenendo conto del naufragio della produzione eforea e di una parte di quella aristotelica, si registrano in queste testimonianze sono dovute probabilmente al ricorso di questi autori ad un patrimonio di informazioni che non risulta aggiornato rispetto alle nozioni erodotee, e che, in assenza di documentazione accreditata, rimane legato a forme d’indagine di origine periplografica e di carattere speculativo nelle quali la nozione dell’orientamento S-N della costa oltre il Promontorio Sacro è sottintesa ma non del tutto perspicua64. Una descrizione dell’orientamento della costa atlantica della Penisola Iberica oltre l’Algarve, e plausibilmente anche delle regioni (o di una parte di esse) assegnate ai Keltoi, è invece deducibile da alcuni frammenti di Pitea. Particolarmente significativi sono due passi di Strabone: nel primo il geografo afferma che Eratostene, seguendo l’astronomo massaliota, avrebbe indicato come “προσάρκτια καὶ Κελτικά” l’isola di Uxisame e la regione degli Ostimni, inquadrabili nella parte settentrionale del Golfo di Biscaglia65; il secondo testimonia la critica di Artemidoro all’affermazione di Eratostene, basata sui dati di Pitea, secondo cui “τὰ προσαρκτικὰ μέρη τῆς Ἰβηρίας εὐπαροδώτερα εἶναι πρὸς τὴν Κελτικὴν ἢ κατὰ τὸν ὠκεανὸν πλέουσι66”. A riprova del carattere speculativo delle incerte rappresentazioni legate alla concezione erodotea, l’esplicita connotazione settentrionale della navigazione lungo le coste della Keltike si inquadra in questo caso in un’indagine geografica di carattere autoptico e scientifico, che integra le nozioni odologiche col calcolo delle latitudini (klimata), nella quale la direzione di navigazione “πρὸς ἄρκτον” per l’individuazione della Celtica costituisce un dato verificato scientificamente67. In altre parole, una esplicita localizzazione dei Keltoi o della Keltike in 62 Elementi per ipotizzare che Aristotele si richiamasse a Eforo ed Erodoto per l’Estremo Occidente sono dati da Meteor. 1,13, 350b, in particolare con i riferimenti a Pirene e alle sorgenti dell’Istro (dati erodotei), all’origine del fiume Tartesso dalla Celtica (dato probabilmente eforeo, cfr. FGrHist 70 F 129, su cui cfr. BIANCHETTI 1990, 66–7 e ANTONELLI 1998, 99–100, ma cfr. il parere scettico di PARKER 2011) e alla localizzazione della sua foce oltre le Colonne, che parrebbe indicativa di una collocazione atlantica della regione dei Keltoi. Sul rapporto di interdipendenza o comunque sulle connessioni tra Erodoto, Eforo e Aristotele rispetto alla rappresentazione dell’Estremo Occidente cfr. PRONTERA 1990, 66, 2006, 17 e 2021, 14, ANTONELLI 1998, 100 e 108 n. 77, BREGLIA 2005, 300–2 e DAN 2015, 136. 63 Aristot. De Cael. 2,14, 298a. 64 Sul carattere speculativo delle fonti geografiche consultate da Aristotele per l’Occidente cfr. PRONTERA ibid. 65 Pyth. fr. 6a BIANCHETTI (F 6a METTE) = Str. 1,4,5 C 64: per un’analisi e per la localizzazione di queste regioni cfr. BIANCHETTI 1998, 128ss. e 2019. 66 Pyth. fr. 4 BIANCHETTI (F 8 METTE), Erat. fr. III B 122 BERGER, Artem. fr. 11 STIEHLE = Str. 3,2,11 C 148: cfr. BIANCHETTI 1998, 115–33. 67 BIANCHETTI 2008, 26–34.
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relazione a una navigazione in direzione nord è ricollegabile in questo caso ad una fonte che arricchisce la descrizione periplografica di queste regioni con riferimenti ai punti cardinali basati su considerazioni di carattere astronomico. Se questi ragionamenti sono corretti, si può notare che mentre l’elenco dei popoli iberici nel frammento di Erodoro qui esaminato presenta caratteristiche periplografiche ben inquadrate nel contesto culturale del 400 a.C. ca., grossomodo lo stesso di Eforo e Aristotele, le coordinate relative ai Gleti si prestano invece a un confronto con forme di rappresentazione dell’Occidente più tarde (piteane o posteriori) e indicative di un’esplorazione diretta di queste regioni e di una valutazione scientifica delle caratteristiche della costa. Si osserva in sostanza, a mio parere, una peculiarità nella concezione erodorea dei Gleti rispetto alle conoscenze geografiche del suo tempo che merita di essere evidenziata specialmente alla luce del confronto qui proposto con Aristotele, il quale conosceva probabilmente l’opera del mitografo68. Si tratta di aspetti significativi che possono prestarsi a diverse interpretazioni. Non è da escludere che una puntuale e originale descrizione dell’orientamento S-N della costa da parte di Erodoro (come del resto anche la singolare concezione di un’Iberia sia mediterranea che atlantica) sia riconducibile al ricorso del mitografo a fonti ben informate, appartenenti a un filone diverso da quello erodoteo-aristotelico, in ragione della centralità che doveva avere nell’opera la delineazione dei percorsi seguiti da Eracle nelle sue peregrinazioni69. Si potrebbe ipotizzare in particolare una dipendenza dell’Eracleota da fonti puniche ben informate sulle caratteristiche delle coste ed esplicite in merito alla direzione settentrionale imposta ai naviganti dalla virata oltre il Promontorio Sacro70; nel contesto di un’opera centrata su Eracle, un ipotetico interesse di Erodoro per il punto di vista cartaginese si spiegherebbe alla luce della sovrapposizione tra le figure dell’eroe greco e di Melqart, divinità tiria associata dai Fenici all’esplorazione e alla colonizzazione in Occidente e oggetto di culto, secondo una parte della critica, anche nel sud-ovest della Penisola Iberica71. Si può avanzare un’ulteriore ipotesi centrata sull’analisi del testimone. Trattandosi di un frammento, occorre considerare una possibile interferenza delle fonti 68 Aristotele conosceva Erodoro quale padre del sofista eracleota Brisone: cfr. FGrHist 31 F 22a (T 3) = Aristot. Hist. an. 6,5 563: “καὶ διὰ τοῦτο καὶ ῾Ηρόδωρος ὁ Βρύσωνος τοῦ σοφιστοῦ πατήρ φησιν εἶναι τοὺς γῦπας…”. 69 In generale su Eracle e l’Occidente cfr. JOURDAIN-ANNEQUIN 1982. 70 Sulla presenza punica oltre le Colonne cfr. FERRER ALBELDA 2008a e MARTÍ AGUILAR 2014, 33ss. 71 SALINAS DE FRIAS 1988, 136–42 afferma che il tempio di Eracle menzionato da Eforo in FGrHist 70 F 130, del quale Artemidoro, secondo Strabone (testimone del frammento, cfr. supra), negava l’esistenza, rimandi a un culto locale del Melqart tirio legato alla colonizzazione fenicia delle coste atlantiche; lo studioso preferisce questa interpretazione all’ipotesi avanzata da alcuni circa un riferimento di Eforo a un culto locale di Baal, su cui cfr. ad es. LASSERRE 1966, 186. Per una sintesi delle altre ipotesi avanzate su questo passo cfr. CRUZ ANDREOTTI / GARCÍA QUINTELA / GÓMEZ ESPELOSÍN 2007, 456–9. In generale sulla sovrapposizione tra Eracle e Melqart in relazione al sud-ovest della Penisola, dalle Colonne al Promontorio Sacro (con particolare riferimento a Gades), cfr. BONNET 1988, 203–36.
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tralatrici rispetto al testo originario72; la frase relativa alla localizzazione reciproca dei Gleti e dei Cineti, che già A. Schulten indicava come un inserto parentetico73, potrebbe costituire in sostanza un innesto del testimone. Un’interferenza limitata soltanto a questa frase sarebbe giustificata dalla localizzazione dei Gleti al di fuori della linea di costa estesa dal punto più occidentale della regione a quello più orientale, che costituisce l’argomento centrale del passo estrapolato, e di conseguenza al di fuori della sequenza periplografica; è plausibile infatti che il testo originale riportasse, anziché l’esplicita posizione dei Gleti a nord dei Cineti, l’espressione generica (e di carattere marcatamente periplografico) “μετὰ τοὺς Κύνητας” attestata peraltro, si è visto, in un altro testimone dello stesso frammento. Pare lecito credere in sostanza che una delle due affermazioni corrisponda più puntualmente dell’altra a quanto affermato originariamente da Erodoro. L’ipotesi parrebbe indebolita dalla presenza del verbo φημί alla prima persona singolare, che consente di classificare il frammento come una citazione letterale. L’estratto si caratterizza inoltre per alcune forme riconducibili al dialetto ionico, come ἐόν, οἰκέοντες e δυσμέων, confermative di una ripresa verbatim74. Tuttavia, si può osservare che all’interno della parentesi relativa ai Gleti il termine βορέαν non presenta la peculiare mutazione ionica di α lungo puro in η75. Una simile considerazione potrebbe apparire di poco peso in ragione del fatto che la forma ionica οἰκέειν, riportata in alcune edizioni, risale a un’emendazione di A. Meineke alla forma οἰκεῖν (attica) attestata nella tradizione manoscritta76; tuttavia, nel dialetto ionico la presenza di η in luogo di α lungo puro ricorre sistematicamente e costituisce un elemento che, se non riconducibile con certezza ad una svista dei copisti (plausibile peraltro per la trascrizione di οἰκεῖν con un singolo ε anziché due77), pare opportuno mettere in evidenza. È possibile in sostanza che qualcuno tra Stefano di Bisanzio, Costantino Porfirogenito o uno dei copisti intendesse precisare che i Gleti si trovavano “oltre i Cineti” non nel senso che l’espressione μετὰ δέ assume nella sequenza descritta, che indica l’alternarsi di questi popoli lungo la costa meridionale della Penisola dai Cineti in direzione est, bensì nella direzione opposta, verso nord; in altre parole, dal momento che nel passo originario di Erodoro risultavano collocati “dopo i Cineti” sia i popoli posti a nord del Promontorio Sacro (i Gleti), sia quelli posti a est (i Tartessii etc.), il testimone, citando la sequenza di questi phyla in senso O-E a partire dall’eschaton cinetico, avrebbe ritenuto opportuno specificare che i Gleti si trovavano “dopo i Cineti” solo “per chi vada verso Borea” e non per chi, seguendo la sequenza periplografica principale, navigasse verso le Colonne78. 72 La critica recente sottolinea come negli studi di Quellenforschung sia opportuno valorizzare il contesto di trasmissione e il ruolo della fonte tralatrice: per un quadro cfr. VISCONTI 2016, 33ss. 73 SCHULTEN 1914, seguito da JACOBY in FGrHist 31 F 2a. 74 FOWLER 2013, 696 n. 2. 75 Su questo fenomeno del dialetto ionico cfr. BUCK 1955, 21. 76 MEINEKE 1849, 323 emendava inoltre βορέαν in βορέην. 77 Su analoghe forme non contratte cfr. BUCK 1955, 39–40. 78 Non c’è motivo di ipotizzare interferenze simili anche per il resto del testo in quanto non si riscontrano elementi dissonanti rispetto alle concezioni geografiche caratteristiche dell’epoca
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Questa ipotesi, per quanto verosimilmente destinata a rimanere tale, pare tuttavia compatibile col quadro della trasmissione del frammento esposto in precedenza. È infatti plausibile che la parentesi sull’orientamento S-N della navigazione dai Cineti ai Gleti fosse originariamente una glossa esplicativa del complesso problema della collocazione dei secondi rispetto ai primi, poco chiara nel testo originario in quanto sintetizzata dalla formula periplografica μετὰ δέ, successivamente confluita nel testo durante la trascrizione dell’opera nell’XI sec. a.C. L’interpolazione si inserirebbe pertanto, se è corretta la tesi di L. Canfora, nello stesso contesto in cui si collocano gli inserti di materiale riconducibile ad Artemidoro nei lemmi di Stefano di Bisanzio richiamati da Costantino Porfirogenito. È possibile peraltro che proprio dall’Efesino i compilatori abbiano tratto le informazioni utili a interpretare quanto riportato da Erodoro. Non è da escludere infatti che Strabone traesse da Artemidoro il dato della localizzazione del popolo degli Artabri in una regione (corrispondente grossomodo al Finisterre iberico) posta “πρὸς ἄρκτον” per chi provenisse dal Promontorio Sacro79; a favore di questa ipotesi depone il fatto che l’Amaseno tragga dall’Efesino il succitato riferimento di Eratostene ai “προσαρκτικὰ μέρη τῆς Ἰβηρίας”, che parrebbero da identificare proprio con le coste nordiche e nord-occidentali della Penisola. In sostanza, se Artemidoro riportava diffusamente simili coordinate nelle sezioni dei Geographoumena relative alla costa atlantica della Penisola Iberica, proprio da quest’opera i copisti potrebbero aver derivato le informazioni necessarie per interpretare l’espressione “dopo i Cineti” di Erodoro, riferita ai Gleti, come un riferimento a una navigazione “verso Borea” a partire dal Promontorio Sacro. 5. Conclusioni Attraverso Costantino Porfirogenito apprendiamo che l’opera non epitomata di Stefano di Bisanzio trasmetteva un frammento di Erodoro di Eraclea probabilmente corrispondente al passo originale e depositario di una concezione dell’Estremo Occidente che presenta caratteristiche piuttosto peculiari. La probabile localizzazione del popolo dei Gletes sulle coste a nord dell’Algarve consente di ipotizzare che questo termine costituisca una variante, circolante intorno al 400 a.C., dell’etnonimo dei Keltoi riportato da Erodoto, Eforo e Aristotele in relazione alle stesse regioni descritte nel frammento di Erodoro. Di notevole interesse è l’affermazione, riportata nel frammento, secondo cui i Gleti si localizzerebbero “verso Borea” per chi navighi dal promontorio cinetico. di Erodoro, fatta salva la già menzionata estensione del coronimo iberico alle regioni oltre le Colonne che pare tuttavia ammissibile soprattutto alla luce della già discussa testimonianza teopompea relativa ai Tleti (cfr. supra). 79 Str. 2,5,15 C 120: “εἰς δὲ τἀναντία πλέουσιν ἀπὸ τοῦ ἱεροῦ ἀκρωτηρίου μέχρι τῶν Ἀρτάβρων καλουμένων ὁ πλοῦς ἐστι πρὸς ἄρκτον ἐν δεξιᾷ ἔχουσι τὴν Λυσιτανίαν”; cfr. AUJAC 1969b, 163. Sul rapporto tra Strabone e Artemidoro, citato dal geografo soprattutto in merito a dettagli etnografici, cfr. CRUZ ANDREOTTI / GARCÍA QUINTELA / GÓMEZ ESPELOSÍN 2007, 151 e LOWE 2017, 73.
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Alla luce dell’evanescente localizzazione dei Keltoi tratteggiata da fonti anteriori, coeve o di poco posteriori all’attività del mitografo, questo aspetto della testimonianza erodorea potrebbe essere cautamente ricondotto, se non al ricorso dell’Eracleota ad una documentazione diversa da quella utilizzata dai suoi contemporanei e successori, ad un’interferenza delle fonti tralatrici: la presenza di un’indicazione di rotta di carattere “astronomico” all’interno di una descrizione costiera di tipo marcatamente periplografico e odologico deriverebbe in sostanza da una puntualizzazione di un aspetto poco chiaro del testo originale erodoreo, ovvero la posizione dei Gleti “dopo i Cineti”, plausibilmente confluita nel passo durante il processo di copiatura del De administrando imperio al quale sono riconducibili gli inserti provenienti da Artemidoro. Andrea Pierozzi Corso Gramsci 101 51100 Pistoia, Italia [email protected]
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E. FERRER ALBELDA / P. ALBURQUERQUE 2019: El conocimiento del extremo occidente en la Grecia arcaica: las Casitérides y la geografía de los recursos, in E. FERRER ALBELDA (ed.), La ruta de las Estrímnides Navegación y conocimiento del litoral atlántico de Iberia en la Antigüedad, Alcalá de Henares 2019, 135–84. E. FERRER ALBELDA / M. L. DE LA BANDERA 1997: La localización de Mastia: un aspecto problemático de los conocimientos geográficos griegos sobre Iberia, in F. J. PRESEDO et al. (eds.), Χαῖρε. Homenaje al Profesor F. Gascó, Sevilla 1997, 65–72. F. FISCHER 1972: Die Kelten bei Herodot: Bemerkungen zu einigen geographischen und ethnographischen Problemen, in MDAI(M) 13, 1972, 109–24. E. FOULON 2000: Polybe et les Celtes, in LEC 68, 4, 2000, 319–54. R. L. FOWLER 2000: Early Greek Mythography, I. Texts, Oxford 2000. R. L. FOWLER 2013: Early Greek Mythography, II. Commentary, Oxford 2013. FRANC 2018: Appunti sull’ipotesi di un valore identitario per l’alfabeto di Lugano, in Quaderni Friulani di Archeologia 28, 2018, 123–32. S. GALLOTTA 2009: Introduzione ai PONTIKA, in E. LANZILLOTTA / G. OTTONE / V. COSTA (eds.), Tradizione e trasmissione degli storici greci frammentari (Themata 2), Roma 2009, 431–45. L. A. GARCÍA MORENO 1990: Mastienos y bastetanos. Un problema de la etnología hispana prerromana, in Polis 2, 1990, 53–65. M. GAYRAUD 1981: Narbonne Antique des Origines à la Fin du IIIe Siècle, Paris 1981. A. D. GODLEY 1966: Herodotus, Histories vol. I: books I-II, Cambridge (Massachusetts) 1966. F. J. GONZÁLEZ PONCE 1995: Avieno y el periplo, Ecija 1995. F. JACOBY 1912: Herodoros [4], in RE VIII.1, 1912, coll. 980–7. P. JANNI 1984: La mappa e il periplo: cartografia antica e spazio odologico, Roma 1984. C. JOURDAIN-ANNEQUIN 1982: Héraclès en Occident. Mythe et histoire, in DHA 8, 1982, 227–82. C. JULLIAN 1905: Les Celtes chez Hérodote, in REA 7, 1905, 375–92. J. T. KOCH 2013: Tartessian. Celtic in the South-west at the dawn of history, Aberysthwyth 2013. J. T. KOCH 2014: Once again Herodotus, the Κελτοί, the source of the Danube and the Pillars of Hercules, in C. GOSDEN / S. CRAWFORD / K. ULMSCHNEIDER (eds.), Celtic art in Europe. Making connections, Oxford 2014, 6–18. J.-M. KOWALSKI 2012: Navigation et géographie dans l'Antiquité gréco-romaine. La terre vue de la mer, Paris 2012. F. LASSERRE 1966: Strabon, Géographie II. Livres III et IV, Paris 1966. F. LASSERRE 1975: Strabon, Géographie VIII. Livre XI, Paris 1975. PH. E. LEGRAND 1944: Hérodote, Histoires II. Euterpe, Paris 1944. PH. E. LEGRAND 1945: Hérodote, Histoires IV. Melpomène, Paris 1944. A. B. LLOYD 19942: Herodotus, Book II. Introduction, Commentary 1-98, Leiden / New York / Köln. B. J. LOWE 2017: Strabo and Iberia, in D. DUECK (ed.), The Routledge Companion to Strabo, London / New York 2017, 69–78. S. MAGNANI 2002: Il viaggio di Pitea sull’Oceano, Bologna 2002. J. MANGAS / D. PLÁCIDO 1998: La Península Ibérica en los autores griegos: de Homero a Platón (Testimonia Hispaniae Antiqua II A), Madrid 1998. J. MANGAS / D. PLÁCIDO 1999: La Península Ibérica prerromana: de Éforo a Eustacio (Testimonia Hispaniae Antiqua II B), Madrid 1999. D. MARCOTTE 2000: Géographes Grecs, I. Ps.-Scymnos: Circuit de la Terre, Paris 2000. M. A. MARTÍ-AGUILAR, Hijos de Melqart. Justino (44.5) y la koiné tiria entre los siglos IV y III a.C., in Archivo Español de Arqueología 87, 2014, 21–40. A. MEINEKE 1849: Stephani Byzantii Ethnicorum quae supersunt, Berlin 1849. G. MORAVCSIK / R. J. H. JENKINS 1967: Constantine Porphyrogenitus, De administrando imperio, Washington 1967. P. MORET 2002, Mastia Tarseion y el problema geográfico del segundo tratado entre Cartago y Roma, in Mainake 24, 2002, 257–76.
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P. MORET 2006: La formation d’une toponymie et d’une ethnonymie grecques de l’Ibérie: étapes et acteurs, in G. CRUZ ANDREOTTI / P. LE ROUX / P. MORET (eds.), La invención de una geografía de la Península Ibérica, I, La época republicana, Madrid 2006, 39–76. P. MORET 2017: Des noms à la carte. Figures antiques de l’Ibérie et de la Gaule, Alcalá de Henares 2017. K. MÜLLENHOFF 1870, Deutsche Altertumskunde I, Berlin 1870. V. PARKER 2011: Ephorus, in BNJ 70. G. PARMEGGIANI 2011: Eforo di Cuma. Studi di storiografia greca, Bologna 2011. A. PERETTI 1979: Il Periplo di Scilace. Studio sul primo portolano del Mediterraneo, Pisa 1979. S. POTHECARY 1997: The expression “our times” in Strabo’s geography, in CPh 92, 1997, 235–46. J. E. POWELL 1938: A Lexicon to Herodotus, Cambridge 1938. F. S. PRONTERA 1990: L’Estremo Occidente nella concezione geografica dei Greci, in La Magna Grecia e il lontano Occidente. Atti del ventinovesimo convegno di studi sulla Magna Grecia, Taranto 6-11 ottobre 1989, Taranto 1990, 55–82. F. S. PRONTERA 1992: Perìploi: sulla tradizione della geografia nautica presso i Greci, in J. LE GOFF / D. PUNCUH / F. PRONTERA (eds.), L'uomo e il mare nella civiltà occidentale: da Ulisse a Cristoforo Colombo. Atti del Convegno. Genova, 1-4 giugno 1992. Atti della Società Ligure di Storia Patria, Genova 1992, 25–44. F. S. PRONTERA 2006: La penisola iberica nella cartografia ellenistica, in G. CRUZ ANDREOTTI / P. LE ROUX / P. MORET (eds.), La invención de una geografía de la Península Ibérica, vol. 1, La época republicana, Madrid 2006, 15–29. F. S. PRONTERA 2021: Viaggi e mappae mundi alla scuola di Aristotele, in RaRe17, 2021, 13–26. M. SALINAS DE FRIAS 1988: El “hieron acroterion” y la Geografía religiosa del extremo occidente según Estrabón, in G. PEREIRA MENAUT (ed.), Actas 1er congreso peninsular de historia antigua, II, Santiago de Compostela 1988, 135–47. R. SAMMARTANO 2008: Filisto e le origini delle popolazioni anelleniche di Sicilia, in P. ANELLO / J. MARTÍNEZ-PINNA (eds.), Relaciones interculturales en el Mediterráneo antiguo: Sicilia e Iberia, Málaga / Palermo 2008, 115–46. A. SCHULTEN 1914: Eine Emendation zu Herodoros, in Hermes 49, 1914, 153–4. A. SCHULTEN 2006: Tartessos: contribución a la historia más antigua de Occidente, Sevilla 2006 (traduzione spagnola di Tartessos: ein Beitrag zur ältesten Geschichte des Westens, Berlin 1922, ed. M. GARCÍA MORENTE). G. SHIPLEY 2019: Pseudo-Skylax's Periplous: the circumnavigation of the inhabited world. Text, translation and commentary, Liverpool 2019. P. SIMS-WILLIAMS 1998: Celtomania and celtoscepticism, in Cambrian Medieval Celtic Studies 36, 1998, 1–35. P. SIMS-WILLIAMS 2011: Celto-Etruscan speculations, in E. R. LUJÁN / J. L. GARCÍA ALONSO (eds.), A Greek man in the Iberian street, Innsbruck 2011, 275–84. P. SIMS-WILLIAMS 2016: The location of the Celts according to Hecataeus, Herodotus, and other Greek writers, in EC 42, 2016, 7–32. P. SIMS-WILLIAMS 2017: The earliest Celtic ethnography, in Zeitschrift für celtische Philologie 64, 2017, 421–42. P. SIMS-WILLIAMS 2020: An alternative to ‘Celtic from the East’ and ‘Celtic from the West’, in CArchJ 30, 2020, 511–29. R. STIEHLE 1856: Der geograph Artemidoros von Ephesos, in Philologus 11, 1856, 193–244. A. VISCONTI 2016: Fragmenta Historica. Problemi aperti e indicazioni di metodo nella riflessione sui frammenti degli storici greci, Napoli 2016. F. W. WALBANK 1957: A Historical Commentary on Polybius, I. Commentary on books I-VI, Oxford 1957. G. ZECCHINI 2020: Dalla leggenda degli Iperborei alla realtà dei Galati, in C. BEARZOT / F. LANDUCCI GATTINONI / G. ZECCHINI (eds.), I Celti e il Mediterraneo. Impatto e trasformazioni (Contributi di Storia Antica 18), Milano 2020, 53–61.
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Immagini
Figure 1: La posizione delle Colonne d'Ercole a seconda dell'emendazione accolta: se si accoglie l’emendazione di Schulten, tutti i popoli menzionati da Erodoro risultano localizzati tra il Promontorio Sacro e le Colonne d’Ercole, mentre secondo la tesi più diffusa, che fissa il limite della descrizione erodorea al Rodano, le Colonne si troverebbero all’incirca all’altezza del territorio degli Elbisini e di parte di quello dei Mastieni.
Figure 2: Possibile localizzazione dei popoli menzionati da Erodoro: si può osservare la vasta estensione del territorio assegnato ai Celchiani, riconducibile forse ad un guasto della tradizione nella sezione del frammento compresa tra i riferimenti a questo popolo e al Rodano.
DIE SÜDTHRAKISCHE KÜSTE IN DER RÖMISCHEN KAISERZEIT* Thomas Schmidts Abstract: This article covers the section of the southern Thracian coast, stretching from the river Nestos to the river Melas. By taking archaeological finds into account, an attempt is made to reconstruct the settlement landscape and the economic conditions of the port cities in the Imperial Roman period and Late Antiquity. Within the coastal strip, Abdera, Maroneia and Ainos are three port cities that were already booming in the Classical period. The localisation of smaller cities is partly disputed. It is clear that the larger port cities were not in crisis, as is often assumed, and participated in the economic life of the Imperium Romanum, even if they were no longer as important as in the Classical era. Also smaller settlements along the coast were part of the trade networks. On the other hand, the area underwent a process of transformation which had already started during the Hellenistic era. In Late Antiquity, the settlement activity continued in general, although the settlements developed differently. The noteworthy boom of Ainos, for example, contrasts with the decline of Abdera. Keywords: Thrakien, Küste, Landschaftswandel, Hafenstädte, Handel, Netzwerke, Kaiserzeit, Spätantike, Abdera, Maroneia, Ainos. 1. Einleitung Im Jahr 132 n. Chr. besuchte Kaiser Hadrian Abdera und Maroneia, zwei traditionelle Hafenstädte an der südthrakischen Küste. Er kam mutmaßlich von der nahe gelegenen Insel Samothrake. Das Schlüsseldokument für seinen Aufenthalt ist eine in Maroneia gefundene Inschrift, die ein Edikt überliefert, das der Kaiser bezüglich der unberechtigten Nutzung von Transportmitteln auf der Straße von Philippi nach Maroneia sowie für die Passage nach Samothrake erlassen hatte1. Während seines Aufenthalts scheint er zudem die Grenzen des Territoriums von Abdera neu *
1
Der vorliegende Beitrag stellt die erweiterte schriftliche Fassung eines Vortrags dar, den ich im Rahmen der Tagung der Ernst-Kirsten-Gesellschaft „Küste(n) im Altertum“ in Eichstätt (29.9.–1.10.2021) gehalten habe. Danken möchte ich MARIA GABRIELLA PARISSAKI (Athen), die mich mit schwer zugänglicher Literatur versorgte sowie den anonymen Gutachtern für ihre Hinweise und Anregungen. IAegThr E185; ausführlich dazu JONES 2011; zum Verlauf der Reise Ebd. 319–21. HALFMANN 1986, 208–9 zur Reisetätigkeit des Kaisers in den Jahren 131–2 ohne Kenntnis dieser Inschrift.
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geregelt zu haben2. Mit dem Besuch wird auch die Aufstellung von Ehrenstatuen und die Errichtung des Propylons von Maroneia in unmittelbarer Nähe zum Hafen in Verbindung gebracht3. Dieses Ereignis war eines der wenigen, in denen die südthrakische Küste im Fokus der römischen Administration stand. Abdera und Maroneia lagen zwar nicht auf einer der zu dieser Zeit am häufigsten frequentierten Handelsrouten durch das Mittelmeer, waren aber aufgrund ihres Alters, bekannter Söhne der Stadt (Abdera) oder auch des Weins bekannt. Daneben zählte Ainos zu den traditionsreichen Hafenstädten an diesem Küstenstreifen. Diese drei Städte verbindet eine vergleichbare Entwicklung in vorrömischer Zeit. Gegründet im Zuge der Großen Griechischen Kolonisation lag der Höhepunkt ihrer politischen und ökonomischen Entwicklung in der Klassischen Zeit, was nicht zuletzt an den hohen Beiträgen für den Attischen Seebund und die typenreiche Münzprägung ablesbar ist. Allerdings verstärkte sich ab der Mitte des 4. Jahrhunderts der Druck auswärtiger Mächte, die Einfluss auf diesen strategisch wichtigen Abschnitt zwischen Europa und Kleinasien gewinnen wollten. Makedonen, Ptolemäer, Seleukiden und Attaliden versuchten Kontrolle über den Küstenabschnitt zu gewinnen. Zudem begannen auch thrakische Herrscher ihren Einflussbereich zu erweitern, ebenso hinterließen die keltischen Raubzüge ihre Spuren in der Region4. Als Rom ab dem frühen 2. Jahrhundert v. Chr. als Ordnungsmacht auftrat, profitierten die Städte zwar von den Freiheitserklärungen, und die überlieferten Verträge zwischen Rom und Maroneia bzw. Ainos, bei letzterem wohl auf einen Teil der Bürgerschaft bezogen, scheinen auf gute Verhältnisse hinzudeuten5. Allerdings war die Region aufgrund ihrer exponierten Lage zwischen Makedonien und Kleinasien, nicht zuletzt durch die Via Egnatia als maßgebliche Verbindung6, auch eine Konfliktzone, was zu massiven Zerstörungen führte. Die zu diesem Zeitpunkt unter makedonischer Kontrolle stehende Stadt Abdera war 170 v. Chr. von Praetor Hortensius mit seinen Truppen, unterstützt von einem Aufgebot Eumenes’ II, zerstört worden, was nachträglich vom Senat als bellum iniustum qualifiziert worden war7. Gerade am Beispiel von Ainos zeigt sich die Härte von Strafmaßnahmen bei einem aus Sicht der Schutzmacht illoyalen Verhalten: Nach der Schlacht von Pydna (168 v. Chr.) wurde die Stadt auf Befehl von Aemilus Paullus durch L. Postumius
2 3 4
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Grenzsteine mit der Identifizierung von Hadrian als Zeus Ephorios: IThrAeg E23. E78–9. Dazu HALFMANN 1986, 42 im Kontext von Kaiserreisen. s. u. S. 15. Zur Entwicklung in archaisch-klassischer Zeit z. B. ISAAC 1986; LOUKOPOULOU 2004. Die Beiträge des Sammelbandes SCHMIDTS / TRIANTAFILLIDIS 2022a zu aktuellen Forschungen. Zur ökonomischen Entwicklung der Region im weiteren Kontext der Nordägäis vgl. ARCHIBALD 2013; PARISSAKI 2022, 101–2 mit einem Überblick für den griechischen Anteil des Untersuchungsgebietes. IThrAeg E168; CLINTON 2003. TERZOPOULOU 2018 mit einem Überblick zu den Beziehungen von Abdera und Maroneia zu Rom. ADAMS 1997, 135–40 zum thrakischen Abschnitt der Via Egnatia, der ab dem späten 2. Jahrhundert v. Chr. noch vor der Provinzgründung unter römischer Kontrolle gestanden haben soll. Diod. 30,6; Liv. 43,4,8. KALLINTZI 2018, 2 sah hier ein einschneidendes Ereignis für den Niedergang der Stadt.
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Albinus geplündert8. In der Folgezeit verweist ein Bündnisvertrag zwischen Rom, Maroneia und Ainos auf gute Beziehungen, wobei allerdings nur ein Teil der Bürgerschaft von Ainos mitberücksichtigt wurde, was wiederum auf eine Spaltung hinweisen dürfte9. Zur Konfliktzone wurde das südliche Thrakien wiederum während des Angriffs Mithridates’ III im Jahre 88 v. Chr., als Maroneia wohl zerstört und Abdera belagert worden sein dürfte10. Nach der Schlacht von Philippi verstärkte sich zudem der Einfluss der thrakischen Klientelkönige auf die Küstenzone, was sich an Ehreninschriften und in der Münzprägung festmachen lässt, allerdings scheinen Autonomie und Territorien der Hafenstädte hierdurch nicht gefährdet worden zu sein11. Erst im Zuge der Gründung der Provinz Thracia im Jahr 46 n. Chr. wurde die südliche Küstenzone ins Reichsgebiet integriert, wobei die alten Hafenstädte sich bemühten, ihre Privilegien zu wahren. Die Entwicklung der südthrakischen Küste vom 1. bis 6. Jahrhundert n. Chr., die den Schwerpunkt dieses Beitrags bildet, zu beurteilen, erweist sich als schwierig. Der Fokus der historischen und archäologischen Forschung lag bislang eher auf den älteren Perioden sowie auf der byzantinischen Epoche. Zudem hat die moderne Grenzziehung dazu beigetragen, dass der Hebros eine Trennlinie für grundlegende Forschungen bildete12. Allerdings nahm in jüngerer Zeit das Interesse an der römischen Kaiserzeit in Nordostgriechenland zu; darüber hinaus erschienen Sammelbände, die Beiträge zur Geschichte und Archäologie sowohl des türkischen als auch des griechischen Abschnitts dieser Küste vereinen13. 2. Naturräumliche Voraussetzungen Die thrakische Südküste (Abb. 1–4) liegt im äußersten Norden der Ägäis. Sie bildet mit den angrenzenden ostmakedonischen Küsten sowie den Inseln Thasos, Samothrake, Imbros und Lemnos das Mare Thracium bzw. sie wurde zum Mare Macedonicum gezählt14.
8 9 10 11
12 13 14
Liv. 45,27,4. Zur Inschrift IAegThr E168 vgl. insb. CLINTON 2003. 2004. Zur Lesung und Deutung dieser Inschrift auch WÖRRLE 2004. Einen Überblick zu den Beziehungen der südthrakischen Küstenstädte mit Rom bietet TERZOPOULOU 2018 mit weiterer Literatur. TERZOPOULOU 2018, 115–6 zu den Diskussionen insbesondere um die maßgebliche Inschrift (IThr Aeg E180) mit weiterer Literatur. Die Belagerung von Abdera wird knapp bei Cranus Licianus XXV (ed. M. FLEMISCH 1904, p. 26) erwähnt „Regii, qui Abderae praesidebant, …“. PARISSAKI 2018b. TERZIEV 2017, bes. 135–7 zu den territorialen Folgen und dem Status der Städte sowie gegen eine mögliche Zugehörigkeit von Abdera zum Reich der Sapäer aufgrund epigraphischer Zeugnisse. Auffällig ist jedoch, dass die Stadt in dieser Zeit keine eigenen Münzen prägte und stattdessen Prägungen von Rhoimetalkes I umliefen, s. PARISSAKI 2022, 101. Dies gilt etwa für den relevanten Abschnitt der Tabula Imperii Romani (TIR K 35,I = AVRAMEA 1993), bei dem der türkischen Anteil Thrakiens unberücksichtigt bleibt. z. B. KARAMBINIS 2020; EVANGELIDIS 2021 sowie diverse Beiträge in den Sammelbänden VAGALINSKI ET AL. 2018; SCHMIDTS / TRIANTAFILLIDIS 2022a. SCHMIDTS / TRIANTAFILLIDIS 2022, 1.
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Die in diesem Beitrag behandelte Küstenzone beginnt im Westen mit dem Nestos, der gleichzeitig die Grenze zu Makedonien bildet, und endet im Osten mit dem Melas15. Sie ist geprägt durch zwei große Ebenen, zu deren Entstehung maßgeblich Nestos und Hebros beigetragen haben. Im Norden wird die westliche Ebene durch die Rhodopen begrenzt, die heute maximal 25 km von der Küste entfernt ansteigen. Mehrere kleine, aus dem Gebirgszug kommende Flüsse tragen zur Fruchtbarkeit der Ebene bei. Von beträchtlicher Größe (47 km2) ist der Bistonis-See (Vistonis), eine mit dem Mittelmeer verbundene Lagune. An seinem nördlichen Ende verengt sich die Ebene. Ausläufer der Rhodopen mit dem 700 m hohen Ismaros erreichen östlich von Maroneia die Küstenzone. Weiter östlich folgt ab dem Kap Serrheion die Ebene, die sich mit dem Mündungsgebiet des Hebros tief ins Binnenland ausdehnt. Der Küstenverlauf wendet sich nun in südliche Richtung und nach dem Kap Sarpedon wieder nach Osten. Auf der Höhe des Golfs von Melas ziehen Ausläufer des Kuru Dağı bis in die Küstenzone. Südlich der Mündung des Melas beginnt die Thrakische Chersones, die als schmale, von Höhenzügen geprägte Halbinsel nach Südwesten orientiert ist und den Golf begrenzt16. Die südthrakische Küstenlandschaft ist bedingt durch die aus dem Norden kommenden Flüsse äußerst dynamisch und ständigen Verlandungsprozessen unterworfen. Erkenntnisse zu diesen Landschaftsveränderungen in der Antike liegen insbesondere für die Mündungsgebiete des Nestos und Hebros mit Abdera und Ainos als betroffenen Siedlungen vor17. Im unmittelbaren Vorfeld der südthrakischen Küste liegen mit Thasos und Samothrake zwei bedeutende, vom Festland aus sichtbare Inseln, die – abgesehen von ihrer politischen, wirtschaftlichen und sakralen Bedeutung in der Antike – schon aufgrund ihrer Nähe zum Festland eine wichtige Rolle für die Schifffahrt in diesem Raum spielten. Die Voraussetzungen für die Befahrung der Küstengewässer sind allgemein, insbesondere aber in den Sommermonaten, als günstig einzuschätzen. Sie unterliegen aber durchaus Unwägbarkeiten. Hinzu kommen lokale Wind- und Strömungsbedingungen, die im Bereich der Küsten der Inseln anzutreffen sind18. Darüber hinaus ist das im südlichen Thrakien vorherrschende übergangsmediterrane Klima deutlich rauer als in den südlichen Teilen der Ägäis und durch Einflüsse aus dem Norden mit Kälteeinbrüchen ab dem Herbst charakterisiert.
15 Grundlegende Kartenwerke für das Arbeitsgebiet in römischer und byzantinischer Zeit: Tabula Imperii Romani K 35,1 (AVRAMEA 1993); Tabula Imperii Byzantini 6 (SOUSTAL 1991) bzw. 12 (KÜLZER 2008); Barrington Atlas (TALBERT 2000). 16 Zur Geographie SOUSTAL 1991, 53–8 sowie KÜLZER 2008, 64–7 jeweils mit weiterer Literatur. 17 Nestosdelta: SYRIDES / PSILOVIKOS 2004, 356–9 aufgrund der georachäologischen Forschungen im Umfeld von Abdera sowie zusammenfassend KALLINTZI 2022, 115–6 mit weiterer Literatur. Hebrosdelta: ALPAR 2001 sowie aufgrund der geoarchäologischen Forschungen in Ainos BRÜCKNER ET AL. 2015, 63–71; DAN ET AL. 2019, 138–41; DAN ET AL. 2020; SCHMIDTS ET AL. 2020, 325–36. 18 BOCKIUS / TRIANTAFILLIDIS 2022 mit einer ausführlichen Beschreibung der nautischen Bedingungen.
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3. Der Küstenabschnitt in geographischen Schriften, Itinerarien und Listen der Römischen Kaiserzeit Die im folgenden Abschnitt präsentierten Quellen stellen nur einen, wenn auch nicht unbedeutenden Ausschnitt der antiken Literatur zur südthrakischen Küste dar19. Sie sollen aber gemäß dem zeitlichen Fokus dieses Beitrags eine Übersicht zur Wahrnehmung des Untersuchungsgebiets in der Kaiserzeit geben, wobei die Angaben der Geographen hinsichtlich ihrer Korrektheit und Aktualität an dieser Stelle noch nicht hinterfragt werden. Relativ ausführlich fällt die Beschreibungen im siebten Buch bei Strabon aus. Sie zerfällt allerdings in drei separate Blöcke: vom Nestos bis zur Stadt Ismaros/Ismara (7, fr. 18a–c), von Maroneia, das bereits zuvor erwähnt wurde, bis zum Hebros (7, fr. 20a) und schließlich vom Hebros bis zum Golf von Melas (7, fr. 21):20 7, fr. 18a: μετὰ δὲ τὸν εἰς ** Ἄβδηρα καὶ τὰ περὶ Ἀβδήρου μυθευόμενα. ᾤκησαν δ᾽ αὐτὴν Βίστονες Θρᾷκες, ὧν Διομήδης ἦρχε. οὐ μένει δ᾽ ὁ Νέστος ἐπὶ ταὐτοῦ ῥείθρου διὰ παντός, ἀλλὰ κατακλύζει τὴν χώραν πολλάκις. εἶτα Δίκαια, πόλις ἐν κόλπῳ κειμένη, καὶ λιμήν, ὑπέρκειται δὲ τούτων ἡ Βιστονὶς λίμνη κύκλον ἔχουσα ὅσον διακοσίων σταδίων. […] μετὰ δὲ τὴν ἀνὰ μέσον λίμνην Ξάνθεια, Μαρώνεια καὶ Ἴσμαρος, αἱ τῶν Κικόνων πόλ[εις]. καλεῖται δὲ νῦν Ἰσμάρα πλησίον τῆς Μαρωνείας. πλησίον δὲ καὶ ἡ Ἰσμαρὶς ἐξίησι λίμνη. καλεῖται δὲ τὸ ῥεῖθρον Όδύ[σ]σειον ῥεῖθρον. αὐτοῦ δὲ καὶ αἱ Θασίων λεγόμεναι κεφαλαί. Nach dem ** Abdera und die Fabel von Abderos; es wurde von den thrakischen Bistonen besiedelt, über die Diomedes herrschte. Der Nestos bleibt nicht stets in demselben Flussbett, sondern überschwemmt das Land häufig. Dann Dikaia, eine Stadt, die an einer Bucht liegt, und ein Hafen. Oberhalb davon liegt der Bistonis-See mit einem Umkreis von etwa 200 Stadien. […] Nach dem dazwischen liegenden See kommen Xantheia, Maroneia und Ismaros, die Städte der Kikonen. Es heißt jetzt Ismara, nahe bei Maroneia. In der Nähe fließt auch der Ismaris-See aus; der Abfluss wird ‚Odysseischer Abfluss‘ genannt. Dort sind auch die sogenannten Köpfe der Thasier. […]. 7, fr. 20a: μετὰ δὲ τὴν Μαρώνειαν Ὀρθαγoρία πόλις καὶ τὰ περὶ Σέρριον, παράπλους τραχύς, καὶ τὸ τῶν Σαμοθρᾴκων πολίχνιον Τέμπυρα καὶ ἄλλο Χαράκωμα, οὗ πρόκειται ἡ Σαμοθρᾴκη νῆσος, καὶ Ἴμβρος οὐ πολὺ ἄπωθεν ταύτης: πλέον δ᾽ ἢ διπλάσιον ἡ Θάσος. ἀπὸ δὲ Χαρακώματος Δορίσκος, ὅπου ἐμέτρησε Ξέρξης τῆς στρατιᾶς τὸ πλῆθος. εἶθ᾽ Ἕβρος ἀνάπλουν ἔχων εἰς Κύψελα ρκ´. […] Nach Maroneia kommt die Stadt Orthagoria und die Gegend um Serrion, eine rauhe Küste, und das Städtchen der Samothraker Tempyra und ein weiteres, Charakoma, dem die Insel Samothrake vorgelagert ist, sowie Imbros, das nicht weit von ihr entfernt ist, mehr als doppelt so weit entfernt ist Thasos. Nach Charakoma kommt Doriskos, wo Xerxes die Menge seines
19 Eine ausführliche Auseinandersetzung unter Berücksichtigung insb. auch der älteren Quellen bieten z. B. ISSAC 1986; LOUKOPOULOU ET AL. 2005; PARISSAKI 2018a. 2022. 20 Text und Übersetzung nach ST. RADT (2003). Strab. 7, fr. 18b–c erhält keine zusätzlichen Informationen zur Geographie: „Dass nach dem Fluss Nestos gen Osten die Stadt Abdera kommt, genannt nach Abderos, den die Rosse des Diomedes gefressen haben. Dann in der Nähe die Stadt Dikaia; oberhalb liegt der große Bistonis-See. Dann die Stadt Maroneia. Das genannte Ismaros, später auch Ismara, ist, sagt man, eine Stadt der Kikonen nahe bei Maroneia. Da ist auch ein See, dessen Abfluss der Odysseische genannt wird. Dort ist auch ein Heroengrab des Maron, wie der Geograph berichtet.“
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Thomas Schmidts Heeres gemessen hat, dann der Hebros, den man 120 Stadien aufwärts nach Kypsela schiffen kann. […] 7, fr. 21a: πρὸς δὲ τῇ ἐκβολῇ τοῦ Ἕβρου διστόμου ὄντος πόλις Αἶνος ἐν τῷ Μέλανι κόλπῳ κεῖται, κτίσμα Μιτυληναίων καὶ Κυμαίων, ἔτι δὲ πρότερον Ἀλωπεκοννησίων. εἶτ᾽ ἄκρα Σαρπηδών: εἶθ᾽ ἡ Χερρόνησος ἡ Θρᾳκία καλουμένη, ποιοῦσα τήν τε Προποντίδα καὶ τὸν Μέλανα κόλπον καὶ τὸν Ἑλλήσποντον: ἄκρα γὰρ ἔκκειται πρὸς εὐρόνοτον συνάπτουσα τὴν Εὐρώπην πρὸς τὴν Ἀσίαν ἑπτασταδίῳ πορθμῷ τῷ κατὰ Ἄβυδον καὶ Σηστόν, ἐν ἀριστερᾷ μὲν τὴν Προποντίδα ἔχουσα, ἐν δεξιᾷ δὲ τὸν Μέλανα κόλπον, καλούμενον οὕτως ἀπὸ τοῦ ποταμοῦ τοῦ Μέλανος ἐκδίδoντος εἰς αὐτόν, καθάπερ Ἡρόδοτος καὶ Εὔδοξος. […] Bei dem Delta des Hebros, der zwei Mündungen hat, liegt an dem Schwarzen Golf die Stadt Ainos, eine Gründung der Mitylener und Kymäer, und noch früher der Alopekonnesier. Dann die Landspitze Sarpedon, dann der sogenannte Thrakische Cherrones, der die Propontis, den Schwarzen Golf und den Hellespont bildet: es ist nämlich eine nach Südsüdosten hinausragende Landspitze, die durch den sieben Stadien breiten Sund bei Abydos und Sestos Europa mit Asien verbindet und zur Linken die Propontis, zur Rechten den Schwarzen Golf, der so genannt wird nach dem Schwarzen Fluss, der sich in ihn ergießt, wie Herodot und Eudoxos sagen; […].
Die durchgängige Beschreibung der thrakischen Südküste beginnt bei Plinius (nat. 4,42–43), nachdem er von der Mündung des Nestos noch einmal seinen Blick nach Westen richtete, mit Abdera: […] Abdera libera civitas, stagnum Bistonum et gens; oppidum fuit Tirida, Diomedis equorum stabulis dirum; nunc sunt Dicaea, Ismaron, locus Parthenion, Phalesina, Maronea, prius Orthagurea dicta. mons Serrium, Zone, tum locus Doriscum, X hominum capax, ita Xerxes ibi dinumeravit exercitum, os Hebri, portus Stentoris, oppidum Aenos liberum cum Polydori tumulo, Ciconum quondam regio, a Dorisco incurvatur ora ad Macron Tichos CXII p., circa quem locum fluvius Melas, a quo sinus appellatur. oppida Cypsela, Bisanthe, Macron Tichos, dictum, quia a Propontide ad Melanem sinum inter duo maria porrectus murus procurrentem excludit Cherronesum. […] die freie Gemeinde Abdera, der Strandsee und der Stamm der Bistonen; lag die Stadt Tirida, berüchtigt durch die Ställe der Rosse des Dimomedes; jetzt liegen Dikaia, Ismaron, die Ortschaft Parthenion, Phalesina, Maroneia, früher Orthagorea genannt. Der Berg Serreion, Zone, dann die Ortschaft Doriskon, die 10.000 Menschen fasst, weshalb Xerxes hier sein Heer zählte, die Mündung des Hebros, der Hafen Stentoris, die freie Stadt Ainos mit dem Grabhügel des Polydoros, einst das Gebiet der Kikonen. Von Doriskon krümmt sich die Küste 112 Meilen zur “Langen Mauer”, in welcher Gegend sich der Fluss Melas befindet, nach dem die Bucht benannt wird. Die Städte Kypsela, Bisanthe und die “Lange Mauer”, benannt, weil eine zwischen den beiden Meeren von der Propontis zur Bucht von Melas gezogene Mauer die vorspringende Cherronesos absperrt. (Übersetzung G. WINKLER.)
Die dritte in unserem Kontext relevante Beschreibung der Küste stammt von Pomponius Mela (2,27–30), der – im Gegensatz zu den zuvor behandelten – von Ost nach West vorgeht. Ganz im Sinne einer Schiffsreise21 beginnt er, von der Propontis kommend, mit dem Kap Mastousia an der Südspitze der Thrakischen Chersones: […] eius tractum legentibus praevectisque Mastusiam sinus intrandus est qui alterum Chersonesi latus adluens iugo facie vallis includitur, et ex fluvio quem accipit Melas dictus duas urbes amplectitur, Alopeconnesum et in altero Isthmi litore sitam Cardiam. eximia est Aenos ab Aenea profugo condita. Circa Hebrum Cicones, trans eundem Doriscos, ubi Xerxen copias suas
21 BRODERSEN 1994, 4–5 zur Form der Beschreibungen, die an Periploi erinnern.
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quia numero non poterat spatio mensum ferunt. Dein promunturium Serrhion, et quo canentem Orphea secuta narrantur etiam nemora Zone. Tum Sthenos fluvius, et ripis eius adiacens Maronia. […] et urbs quam soror eius suo nomine nominavit Abdere; sed ea magis id memorandum habet, quod Democritum physicum tulit, quam quod ita condita est. ultra Nestos fluit […] […] Fährt man diese Strecke ab und an Mastusia vorbei, muß man in einen Golf einfahren, der die andere Seite der Chersonnes bespült und von einer Gebirgskette wie ein Tal eingeschlossen ist; nach dem hier mündenden Fluß heißt er Melas und umfaßt zwei Städte, Alopekonnesos und das auf der anderen Küste des Isthmos gelegene Kardia. Berühmt ist Änos, von Äneas auf der Flucht gegründet. Um den Hebros herum wohnen die Ciconen, jenseits davon liegt Doriskos, wo Xerxes seine Truppenmassen, da er sie nicht zählen konnte, durch den (von ihnen eingenommenen) Raum berechnet haben soll. Sodann folgt Kap Serrhion und die Stadt Zone, wo sogar die Haine dem singenden Orpheus gefolgt sein sollen, danach der Fluß Sthennos und das an seinen Ufern gelegene Maroneia. […] außerdem eine Stadt, die er seine (=Diomedes) Schwester nach sich selbst Abdera genannt hat. Doch die Stadt ist eher deshalb bemerkenswert, weil sie den Philosophen Demokritos hervorgebracht hat, als weil sie so gegründet wurde. Jenseits davon fließt der Nestos [...] (Übersetzung K. BRODERSEN)
In seinen Geographika nennt Ptolemaios Koordinaten für die Mündung des Nestos, Abdera, Maroneia, die Hebros-Mündung und im Golf von Melas sowohl für die Flussmündung als auch die Grenze zur Thrakischen Chersones22. In den kaiserzeitlichen Itinerarien ist die südthrakische Küste kaum präsent, da die Via Egnatia als südliche Reichsstraße, die diesen Raum durchquert, zumeist parallel, aber nur in einem Abschnitt entlang der Küste verläuft. Eher enttäuschend fällt der Blick auf die Tabula Peutingeriana (Abb. 5) aus. Die einzige Siedlung, die sich an der Küste identifizieren lässt, ist Ainos23. Zwar suggeriert das Kartenbild eine westlich von Ainos entlang der Küste führende Straße, jedoch erweist sich dies als trügerisch, da der nächste genannte Ort im Westen als Dymis bezeichnet wird, das im Landesinneren liegt, noch nördlich vom ebenfalls nicht im Kartenbild erscheinenden Traianoupolis. Die Position von Ainos ist also an der falschen Stelle eingetragen, da es eigentlich Ausgangspunkt einer Stichstraße auf den Streckenabschnitt zwischen Dymis und Micolto sein müsste, das mit dem im Folgenden genannten Milolitum/Melalico zu identifizieren ist. In den übrigen relevanten Itinerarien finden sich folgende Angaben zum Streckenverlauf: Itin. Ant. 322,2–4: Milolito mpm xii / Timpiro mpm xvi / Traianopoli mpm ix Itin. Burdig. 602,7–10: civitas Traianopoli milia XIII / mutatio ad Unimpara milia VIII / mutatio Aalei milia VII s / mutatio Melalico milia VIII
Zwischen den beiden im Landesinneren gelegenen Punkte, der Stadt Traianoupolis im Osten und der Straßenstation Milolitum bzw. Melalico im Westen verbleiben als Siedlungen an der Küste die bei Strabon erwähnten Siedlungen Timpirum bzw. Ad Unimpara (Tempyra) und Salei (Sale), hier verschrieben als Aalei.
22 Ptol. geogr. 3,11,2; ferner die Koordinaten des Bistonis-Sees Ptol. geogr. 3,11,5. 23 Vgl. https://tp-online.ku.de/trefferanzeige.php?id=1115 (29.09.2023).
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Einige wenige der südthrakischen Küstenstädte erscheinen auch noch in Listen der spätantik/frühbyzantinischen Epoche. Sie liegen sämtlich in der in tetrarchischer Zeit geschaffenen Provinz Rhodope, die den Südwesten der ehemaligen Provinz Thracia umfasst und die Küste von Ainos bis zum Nestos umfasst. Der im Osten anschließende Küstenabschnitt gehört zur Provinz Europe. Im Syekdemos des Hierokles, der in justinianischer Zeit verfasst wurde, finden sich lediglich Ainos und Maroneia, wobei Ainos an erster Stelle der Städte der Provinz Rhodope genannt wird24. Diese beiden erscheinen auch in der um 640 verfassten Notita Episcopatum als autokephale Bistümer sowie Anastasioupolis als dem Metropoliten von Traianoupolis unterstehend25. Die in den genannten Quellen behandelten Städte sind in Tabelle 1 erfasst. Zum Vergleich wurden auch die Angaben aus dem Periplous des Pseudo-Skylax aus dem 4. Jahrhundert v. Chr. hinzugefügt. Die Übersicht zeigt, dass die großen Hafenstädte regelmäßig genannt werden, was nicht überrascht. Zwar erwähnt Strabon zwischen Maroneia und Ainos mehr Ortsnamen als die anderen Autoren, jedoch wird Drys weder bei ihm noch bei Plinius oder Mela genannt26. Nur bei Plinius kommen die Toponyme Parthenion als locus sowie Phalesina27 vor. Beide sind ansonsten nicht belegt. Zudem müssen die in den angeführten Passagen genannten Orte nicht zwangsläufig an der Küste liegen, wie die Nennung von Doriskos bei Strabon, Plinius und Mela zeigt. Zu hinterfragen ist, ob die Ortsangaben in den geographischen Schriften der frühen Kaiserzeit auch einem älteren Siedlungsbild entsprechen könnten. Im folgenden Abschnitt werden deshalb die archäologischen Zeugnisse in die Betrachtung des Küstenabschnitts einbezogen. 4. Die Siedlungen entlang der südthrakischen Küste 4.1 Vom Nestos bis zum Berg Isamaros Östlich des Nestos beginnt die chora von Abdera, wobei die Siedlung heute ca. 15 km östlich der Mündung liegt. Das Bett des Flusses dürfte sich im Laufe der Zeit verlagert haben, zudem existieren mehrere Nebenarme, die östlich des Hauptstroms in die Nordägäis entwässern. Ebenso hat sich die Küstenlinie durch die Verlandung nach Süden verschoben28. Abdera war als Apoikie zweimal, zunächst 656 v. Chr. von Klazomenai und nach einer Zerstörung durch Thraker 545 v. Chr. von Teos aus, gegründet worden, Die bereits im 7. Jahrhundert v. Chr. entstandene, von der nördlichen Stadtmauer
24 Hierocles synec. 634,5. 8 (ed. E. HONIGMANN 1939). 25 Not. episc. 7,48. 71. 133 (ed. G. PARTHEY 1866). Der letztgenannte Abschnitt ist fälschlicherweise als Provinz Europe statt Rhodope überschrieben, zu der neben Anastasioupolis, noch Topeiros und Traianoupolis als Sitz des Metropoliten, gehören. 26 Zu einer vermeintlichen Nennung von Drys in einer severischen Inschrift (IThrAeg E433) s. u. 27 OBERHUMMER 1938. 28 KALLINTZI 2022, 115–6 mit weiterer Literatur.
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umgebene Siedlung (Abb. 6) lag an einer offenen Bucht im Westen der Stadt, wo auch Hafenanlagen nachgewiesen sind29. Diese Bucht war bereits im 4. Jahrhundert v. Chr. verlandet und zu einem Sumpf geworden, der die Lebensbedingungen der Stadt maßgeblich verschlechterten. Diverse Krankheitsbilder werden bei Hippokrates und später bei Lukian beschrieben; darüber hinaus wurde Stumpfsinn aufgrund ungesunden Klimas sprichwörtlich als „Abderitismus“ bezeichnet30. Um die Mitte des 4. Jahrhunderts v. Chr., vermutlich nach der Eroberung durch Philipp II, wurde eine neue Stadtbefestigung südlich der alten errichtet und ein neuer Hafen nun 300 m westlich der Stadt gebaut. Diese Siedlung hatte in den nächsten Jahrhunderten Bestand; einschneidend könnte jedoch die bereits erwähnte Eroberung durch Hortensius 170 v. Chr gewesen sein mit der Zerstörung der Stadt, der Ermordung der Eliten und der teilweisen Versklavung der Bevölkerung. Dieses Ereignis deutete C. KALLINTZI als maßgeblich für den Niedergang der Stadt in den folgenden Epochen, wozu auch wiederholte Überschwemmungen im 2. Jahrhundert n. Chr. beigetragen haben sollen31. Die Entwicklung der Siedlung in der Kaiserzeit lässt sich in groben Zügen anhand einiger epigraphischer Zeugnisse und den in knappen Ausführungen beschriebenen archäologischen Aufschlüssen nachvollziehen. Inschriften belegen die Existenz von Kulten, u. a. für Dea Roma sowie Bauarbeiten an einem Tempel für Dionysos im 3. Jahrhundert n. Chr.32. Aufgrund des Zeugnisses einer Inschrift aus dem 1. Jahrhundert n. Chr. dürften in Abdera auch Gladiatorenspiele stattgefunden haben33, was auf die Existenz einer Spielstätte und somit eines potentiellen Großbaus hinweist. Ob das Theater in der Kaiserzeit genutzt wurde, ist unklar34; verwiesen sei auf Maroneia, wo nach einem Umbau auch Gladiatorenspiele veranstaltet werden konnten (s. u.). Auch der Besuch Hadrians könnte zu baulichen Aktivitäten Anlass gegeben haben. Belegt sind eine Ehreninschrift sowie zwei Grenzsteine mit Weihungen an Hadrian als Zeus Ephorios, wobei sich die Stadt als Hadrianeon Abdereiton polis (Ἁδριανέων Ἀβδηρειτῶν πόλις) bezeichnet35.
29 KALLINTZI 2022, 116–7. LOUKOPOULOU 2004, 872–5, Nr. 640 zusammenfassend zur Entwicklung in archaisch-klassischer Zeit. 30 Hippokr. 3,3,17,6–9; Lukian 25,1–2 zu den Krankheitsbildern. Zum sprichwörtlichen Abderitismus z. B. Vitr. 7,5,6; Cic. Att. 4,17,3; 7,7,4; Mart. 10,25. Ausführlich dazu KALLINTZI 2011, 91; 2022, 117 mit Anm. 22–6. 31 KALLINTZI 2018, 22. 32 KALLINTZI 2018, 24. Weihung an Dionysos: IThrAeg E18. 33 IThrAeg E68. Aus einer ancyranischen Grabinschrift ist der summarudis (Schiedsrichter) Publius Aelius aus Pergamon bekannt, der über nicht weniger als neun Ehrenbürgerschaften verfügte, u. a. derjenigen von Abdera, was als Indiz für sein Wirken dort gedeutet wird: BENNETT 2009, 6. 34 KALLINTZI 2018, 23–4 verweist auf eine Inschrift des 2. Jhs. v. Chr. sowie Funde hellenistischer Zeitstellung. Der in einem kleinen Ausschnitt ausgegrabene Bau war großteils zerstört, s. TRIANTAPHYLLOS 2004, 266. 35 IThrAeg E23. E78–9. Bei MUNK HØJTE 2005, 171. 427, Nr. 167–8 erscheinen die Grenzsteine als Basen von Ehrenstatuen.
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Im Westen der Stadt konnten innerhalb der Stadtmauern Reparaturphasen des 2.-3. Jahrhunderts n. Chr., in einem Falle auch noch des 4. Jahrhunderts n. Chr. in älteren Wohnbauten nachgewiesen werden. Noch während des 1. Jahrhunderts n. Chr. wurde im Bereich des westlichen Tores (Abb. 6, 5) die Stadtmauer abgetragen und neue Bauten errichtet. Westlich der Stadt (Abb. 6, 6) entstand zwischen Tor und Hafen ein kaiserzeitliches Viertel mit Badeanlage und Purpurfärbereien36. Die Bewertung des kaiserzeitlichen Abdera wurde zuletzt kontrovers diskutiert. Pessimistisch beurteilten C. KALLINTZI sowie M. KARAMBINIS die Entwicklung, wobei Letztgenannter eine Reduktion der Siedlungsgröße auf ein Drittel der älteren Siedlung vorschlug37. Dieser Einschätzung wurde von V. EVANGELIDIS sowohl aufgrund der Bauten als auch hinsichtlich der Handelsbeziehungen (s. u.) widersprochen38. Überschwemmungen setzten im 4. Jahrhundert n. Chr. der zuvor beschriebenen Wohnbebauung und den Werkstätten beidseits der Stadtmauer ein Ende. Bemerkenswert ist allerdings, dass noch bis ins 4. Jahrhundert dort Bauaktivitäten stattgefunden haben39. Beim jetzigen Publikationsstand lässt sich dies allerdings nicht im Detail interpretieren. Die Aufgabe größerer Teile der Siedlung ist sicherlich ab einem unbestimmten Zeitpunkt im 4. Jahrhundert n. Chr., wahrscheinlich im Verbund mit einer Reduktion der Bevölkerung, anzunehmen. In den folgenden Jahrhunderten konzentrierte sich die Besiedlung auf den ehemaligen Akropolis-Hügel und innerhalb des aufgelassenen westlichen Stadtviertels wurden Gräber angelegt40. Die Stadt bestand weiterhin; für das späte 9. Jahrhundert ist der neue Name Polystylon für den Bischofssitz überliefert. Sie war noch im 14. Jahrhundert Stützpunkt einer Flotte41. Dikaia ist die nächste Hafenstadt nach Abdera, wenn wir den geographischen Schriften folgen (s. o.). Die Lage an einem Golf und die Existenz des Hafens wird von Strabon beschrieben42. In den Tributlisten des Attischen Seebundes wird Dikaia, das auch eigene Münzen prägte, mit Beiträgen von 3000 bzw. 2000 Drachmen 36 Zur kaiserzeitlichen Bebauung KALLINTZI 2018, 24–5; s. auch ATHANASIOU / KALLINTZI 2009, 456–7; KALLINTZI 2011, 1126–29. Von PAPAIOANNOU 2010, 53 mit Anm. 7 wird ein Peristylbau von 1000 m2 Größe mit gehobener Ausstattung erwähnt. Es ist unklar, ob dieser Bau mit einem der von KALLINTZI beschriebenen Befunde identisch ist. 37 KALLINTZI 2018, 22; KARAMBINIS 2020, 473. 38 EVANGELIDIS 2021, 510–11 mit Verweis auf PAPAIOANNOU 2010, 53 (s. Anm. 33). 39 KALLINTZI 2022, 24 beschreibt zwei Bauten des 3.-4. Jhs. n. Chr., die („random arrangement“) wohl nicht mehr der älteren Ausrichtung folgen. Anhand des relativ kleinen Plans (Ebd. 26, Abb. 4, Nr. 1 u. 5) lässt sich dies nicht nachvollziehen. Es dürfte sich um Einbauten in bestehende ältere Bausubstanz handeln. Diese beiden Befunde werden jedenfalls nicht bei den zuvor genannten Renovierungsphasen der Wohnbauten erwähnt. 40 KALLINTZI 2018, 24–7. BAKIRTZIS 1994, 158–62 sowie SOUSTAL 1991, 408 zu den byzantinischen Bauresten. Die Befestigungen, die auf einen Teil des ehemaligen Akropolishügels beschränkt waren, werden von BAKIRTZIS EBD. ins 7.-8. Jh. datiert, die dreischiffige Bischofskirche ins 9.-10. Jh., so dass lediglich die Gräber noch in die frühbyzantinische Zeit fallen. 41 SOUSTAL 1991, 408–10 ausführlich zur Geschichte. SAMIOU 1999, 365 zur byzantinischen Phase des Hafens. 42 Strab. 7, fr. 18a.
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erwähnt, was für die klassische Zeit eher auf eine kleinere Hafenstadt schließen lässt43. Die Siedlung wird mit einer Fundstelle am östlichen Ausgang des BistonisSees auf dem Hügel Katsamakia nordöstlich des heutigen Urlaubsortes Fanari identifiziert44. Ihre Größe wird mit 7 ha angegeben45. Die Entwicklung in nachklassischer Zeit lässt sich bislang kaum fassen. Auf eine mögliche Siedlungsunterbrechung vom 3. Jahrhundert v. Chr. bis zum 3. Jahrhundert n. Chr. hat jüngst KARAMBINIS hingewiesen46. Wie lange eine Siedlung an dieser Stelle bestand bzw. welchen Charakter diese ab dem 3. Jahrhundert n. Chr. hatte, ist unklar47. Westlich von Dikaia, auf der gegenüberliegenden Seite der Einfahrt in den Bistonis-See, befand sich die ab dem späten 9. Jahrhundert bezeugte byzantinische Stadt Poroi48. Nach vagen Hinweisen dürfte dort auch eine ältere Siedlung gelegen haben, deren Größe und Funktion allerdings unbekannt ist49. Der sich nördlich von Dikaia bis nahe an die Ausläufer der Rhodopen erstreckende Bistonis-See muss aufgrund seiner Schiffbarkeit in die Betrachtung der südthrakischen Küste einbezogen werden. Einen konkreten Hinweis auf die Nutzung eines Hafens liegt für das ehemals am mittlerweile verlandeten Nordende des Sees gelegene Anastasioupolis vor. Diese an der Via Egnatia gelegene kleine Stadt wurde, wie der Name schon vermuten lässt, von Kaiser Anastasius I um 500 n. Chr. gegründet50. Unter Justinian I wurde laut Prokop der Hafen mit einer Befestigung versehen, da sich mehrfach Hunnen dort Schiffe aneigneten, um die vorgelagerten Inseln zu plündern51. Folglich müssten die Schiffe zumindest für die Befahrung von Küstengewässern und den nahe gelegenen Inseln tauglich gewesen sein und über Kapazitäten für den Transport einer größeren Personengruppe verfügt haben. Prokop nennt explizit die „Meereslage“ von Anastasioupolis. Somit muss der BistonisSee bis mindestens in frühbyzantinischer Zeit schiffbar gewesen sein und die Verlandung im Bereich von Anastasioupolis folglich als jüngere Landschaftsveränderung eingestuft werden. Von der ca. 7,3 ha großen Stadt (Abb. 7) haben sich die Umfassungsmauern erhalten, deren sichtbare Teile überwiegend einer spätbyzantinischen Phase angehören dürften, aber mutmaßlich den Verlauf der älteren spätantiken Wehrmauer aufnehmen52. Bislang gilt die Stadt als Neugründung; es sollte aber die Möglichkeit einbezogen werden, dass es sich um die Nachfolgesiedlung von Tyrida bzw. Stabulum Diomedis handelt. Dieser in letztgenannter Variante in 43 ISAAC 1986, 109–11; LOUKOPOULOU 2004, 877–8, Nr. 643 auch zur Münzprägung (Ende 6.– 5. Jh. v. Chr.); IThrAeg S. 127. 44 LAZARIDIS 1971, 45–53. 45 LAZARIDIS 1971, 51. 46 KARAMBINIS 2020, 475 mit Verweis auf eine Mitteilung von M. TASAKLAKI, die eine Siedlungsunterbrechung mutmaßlich aufgrund von Münzfunden vorschlug. 47 Bei SOUSTAL 1991 finden sich keine Hinweise auf eine spätantike bzw. byzantinische Siedlung. 48 SOUSTAL 1991, 412 s. v. Poroi zu Quellen und Funden. 49 Nach EVANGELIDIS 2021, 507 soll in Porto Lagos eine Siedlung klassischer und römischer Zeit gelegen haben. 50 Zu Anastasioupolis SOUSTAL 1991, 394–5 s. v. Peritheorion insb. zu den Quellen. 51 Prok. de aed. 4,11,11–3 (ed. O. VEH 1977). 52 KYRIAKIDES 1931; BAKIRTZIS 1994, 162–4 zu den Befestigungen. SCHMIDTS 2018. 2020, 226– 8 bes. zur Befestigung des Hafens.
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den Itinerarien aufgeführte Ort53, wo auch der ostgotische rex Theoderich Strabo 481 verstarb, wurde etwas weiter westlich lokalisiert, wofür allerdings keine überzeugenden Argumente angeführt werden können54. Zukünftige archäologische Forschungen werden dies möglicherweise klären können. Eine weitere Hafenstadt wurde bei archäologischen Forschungen auf der Molyvoti-Halbinsel entdeckt55. Ihre Identifizierung mit dem aus der literarischen Überlieferung bekannten Stryme56 ist nicht gesichert, aber wahrscheinlich. Stryme war eine thasische Gründung und sollte den Einfluss der Mutterstadt auf dem Festland sichern57. Reiches Fundmaterial zeugt von Handelsverbindungen in klassischer Zeit. Die Stadt wurde im späten 4. oder frühen 3. Jahrhundert v. Chr. aufgegeben. Da im Münzspektrum der klassischen Zeit Prägungen aus Maroneia dominieren und vermeintlich gleichzeitige Spuren dieser Stadt an der Stelle der hellenistisch/römischen Polis fehlten, wurde die Siedlung auf der Molyvoti-Halbinsel als das frühe Maroneia identifiziert58. Diese Position fand, insbesondere hinsichtlich des frühen Maroneia, m. E. zurecht Widerspruch59. Allerdings steht eine eingehende Diskussion zu den Argumenten, die gegen die Verortung von Stryme sprechen, noch aus. In unserem Kontext ist die Wiederbesiedlung erwähnenswert, die entweder noch in der Hohen Kaiserzeit oder zu Beginn der Spätantike einsetzte. Möglicherweise handelt es sich auch um zwei Siedlungsphasen, die zwischen dem 2. und 6. Jahrhundert zu datieren sind, wobei die spätantiken Funde wesentlich häufiger als diejenigen des 2. bzw. der zweiten Hälfte des 3. Jahrhunderts vorkommen60. Im Barrington Atlas (Abb. 1) findet sich zwischen der Molyvoti-Halbinsel und Maroneia in direkter Küstenlage Xantheia. Dies dürfte auf Strabon zurückzuführen sein, der die Stadt nach dem Bistonis-See und noch vor Maroneia nennt, allerdings
53 Itin. Anton. 331,5; Itin. Burdig. 603,3. 54 PANTOS 1989 zusammenfassend zu den Quellen und der Lokalisierung; kritisch dazu SCHMIDTS 2018, 295. 55 ARRINGTON ET AL. 2016 zu den neueren archäologischen Forschungen. Zur Forschungsgeschichte s. EBD. 5 sowie PARISSAKI 2022, 110. 56 LOUKOPOULOU 2004, 880–1, Nr. 650; ARRINGTON ET AL. 2016, 4–5 zu den Schriftquellen zu Stryme sowie den Diskussionen um die Interpreation der Stadt auf der Molyvoti-Halbinsel. 57 ARRINGTON ET AL. 2016, 4 mit Anm. 6 mit den relevanten Quellen. 58 LOUKOPOULOU / PSOMA 2008; PSOMA ET AL. 2008; GATZOLIS / PSOMA 2021, 146–8. Dagegen SABA 2018 mit einer Relativierung der Fundmünzen als maßgebliches Argument und Betonung der traditionellen Sicht. Kaum thematisiert wird dabei bislang, dass Stryme wohl keine Münzen prägte. Somit kann ein starker Anteil von maronitischen Prägungen nicht verwundern. 59 Zur Diskussion um diese Position s. PARISSAKI 2022, 107–8, Anm. 51. 60 ARRINGTON ET AL. 2016, 24–8 zu den Befunden und Funden der römischen Wiederbesiedlung; EBD. 55 mit der Zusammenfassung der nicht miteinander zu parallelisierenden Münz- und Keramikfunde. Das späte Münzspektrum beginnt in der zweiten Hälfte des 3. Jhs. n. Chr. (vier Münzen), wesentlich mehr spätrömische Prägungen (ohne exakte Angabe), die mit Honorius enden. Das Keramikspektrum (Ebd. 27-29) enthält neben einigen Stücken des 2. Jhs. Belege für spätantike Waren (Ebd. 29). Die Datierung der Wiederbesiedlung ab der Mitte des 3. Jhs. n. Chr. bei KARAMBINIS 2020, 475 erscheint noch unsicher.
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lassen sich kaum weitere Argumente finden und jeder Versuch einer Lokalisierung erscheint zweifelhaft61. An den westlichen Ausläufern des Ismaros bei Hagios Charalambos lag Maroneia. Die Stadt wurde von Kolonisten aus Chios noch vor der Mitte des 7. Jahrhunderts v. Chr. gegründet. Wenn man die drei Talente, die laut Tributlisten des Ersten Attisch-Delischen Seebundes um die Mitte des 5. Jahrhunderts v. Chr. zu entrichten waren, als Maßstab nimmt, scheint die Hafenstadt, die berühmt war für ihren Wein, weniger wohlhabend gewesen zu sein als Abdera oder Ainos. Zudem wird – wie bereits zuvor gesagt – die Lokalisierung von Maroneia in archaisch-klassischer Zeit noch diskutiert62. Allerdings nahm spätestens in hellenistischer Zeit die Stadt (Abb. 8) beeindruckende Ausmaße an, wie sich nicht zuletzt an der Stadtmauer zeigt, die eine Fläche von 424 ha umfasste, wovon allerdings nur ein Teil bebaut gewesen sein dürfte63. In der Kaiserzeit scheint Maroneia die führende Hafenstadt des südlichen Thrakiens gewesen zu sein, wofür sich – nicht zuletzt – die im Vergleich zu Abdera und Ainos stärkere Münzprägung (s. u.) anführen lässt64. Die guten Beziehungen zu Rom entwickelten sich bereits ab dem 2. Jahrhundert v. Chr., und in den Mithridatischen Kriegen stand die Stadt zu Rom65. Mit dem Besuch Hadrians sind das bereits erwähnte Edikt aus Maroneia zur Stärkung der Rechte von Abdera und Maroneia gegenüber unberechtigten Leistungen zur Beförderung sowie mindestens eine Ehrenstatue für den Kaiser zu verbinden66. Diesem Kontext wird auch der Bau des in der Nähe des Hafens gelegenen Propylons zugeschrieben, das wohl den Zugang zur Agora bildete; darüber hinaus ist ein großer Speicherbau bemerkenswert, dessen Entstehung in das 3. Jahrhundert n. Chr. datiert wird67. Für die Nutzung des hellenistischen Theaters für Gladiatorenspiele sprechen Umbauten. Reparaturen belegen einen Betrieb bis in das 4. Jahrhundert n. Chr.68 Zusätzlich kann auch auf die Grabinschrift eines Gladiators verwiesen werden69. Von Karambinis wurde jüngst eine Schrumpfung der Siedlungsfläche von mehr als 100 ha auf etwa 20 ha
61 BORZA 2000, 779 verweist auf SOUSTAL 1991, 501–2, der sich lediglich gegen die Gleichsetzung der antiken Siedlung mit der späteren byzantinischen Stadt ausspricht. Nach AVRAMEA 1993, 60 sowie LOUKOPOULOU 2004, 872 ist die Lokalisierung unklar. 62 ISAAC 1986, 111–24; LOUKOPOULOU 2004, 878–80, Nr. 846 zum archaischen und klassischen Maroneia. Die Forschungsprobleme sind prägnant bei PARISSAKI 2022, 99 aufgeführt. 63 Für die Ausgrabungen stehen ausführliche Auswertungen noch aus. KARADIMA / PSOMA 2008 mit einem Überblick. 64 Die Münzprägung dank der grundlegenden Monographie SCHÖNERT-GEISS 1987 sowie PSOMA ET AL. 2008 gut bekannt. 65 Bündnisvertrag zwischen Maroneia und Rom: IThrAeg E168 mit Kommentar. Hierzu auch CLINTON 2003. 66 Edikt: JONES 2011; IThrAeg E185. Ehrenstatue: IAegThr E210 = MUNK HØJTE 2005, 427, Nr. 171. Bei der vermeintlichen Ehreninschrift MUNK HØJTE 2005, 427, Nr. 172 (= SEG 49, 886) handelt es sich um das Edikt. 67 KOKKOTAKI 2003. Als mutmaßlicher Eingang zur Agora bei EVANGELIDIS 2014, 338. 343. 68 KARADIMA 2008, lxii–lxiii auch zum Ende der Münzreihe mit Prägungen von Theodosius und Arcadius; KARADIMA ET AL. 2015, 261–2. 69 IAegThr E167.
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vorgeschlagen70. Inwiefern sich dies auf belastbare Daten stützen kann, ist unklar und beim aktuellen Publikationsstand nicht überprüfbar. Für die spätantik-frühbyzantinische Siedlungsphase lassen sich mehre Kirchenbauten anführen, außerdem ist der Status als Bischofssitz belegt. Allerdings sind darüber hinaus bislang kaum Aussagen zur Struktur und Dichte der Siedlung möglich. Sie dürfte sich eher im Süden der Stadt nahe dem Hafen befunden haben. Maroneia bestand bis in spätbyzantinische Zeit71. 4.2 Vom Berg Ismaros bis zum Hebros Im Küstenabschnitt östlich des Ismaros bis zum Hebros lagen einige kleinere Hafenstädte, wobei ihre Lokalisierung mitunter schwierig bzw. unmöglich ist. Große Teile dieses Gebiets zählten einst zur Samothrakischen Peraia, wobei sich dies noch in hellenistischer Zeit änderte. Spätestens seit dem späten 2. Jahrhundert v. Chr. dürften die Besitzungen von Samothrake nur noch östlich des Kap Makri gelegen haben72. Dass noch in der Kaiserzeit Landbesitz in diesem Abschnitt existierte, belegen Inschriften73. Für die Küstenzone werden folgende Plätze erwähnt, wenn man den Beschreibungen und den Itinerarien (s. o.) folgt: Orthagoreia, Drys, Zone, Sale, Tempyra und Charakoma (Abb. 2). Darüber hinaus ist noch das bei Herodot erwähnte Mesembria zu berücksichtigen, dessen Existenz jedoch M. ZAHRNT mit guten Gründen bezweifelt hat74. Der in Betracht kommende Küstenabschnitt ist auf maximal 60 km begrenzt. Auch eine Verortung von Stryme (s. o) östlich des Ismaros wurde zur Diskussion gestellt75. Die Siedlungsgeographie dieses Bereichs wurde zuletzt in mehreren Arbeiten behandelt76, wobei die Verteilung der Orte teilweise signifikant von den Standard-Kartenwerken, dem Barrington Atlas (Abb. 1) sowie der Tabula Imperii Romani (Abb. 2) abweicht. Orthagoreia ist durch Strabon und Plinius bezeugt, wobei Letztgenannter fälschlich Orthagoreia als älteren Namen von Maroneia angibt. Die Münzprägung Orthagoreias im 4. Jahrhundert v. Chr. lässt diese Abfolge wenig plausibel
70 KARAMBINIS 2020, 473–4 verweist auf mündliche Mitteilungen der Ausgräber. 71 SOUSTAL 1991, 350–1 zusammenfassend zur byzantinischen Geschichte und den Siedlungsresten. Ferner: ALIPRANTIS 1994 (nicht eingesehen). Einen Eindruck der Topographie des byzantinischen Maroneia vermittelt KARADIMA 2008, lxxi map 3 mit der mittelbyzantinischen Befestigung beim Hafen und der dreischiffigen spätantiken Kirche (D). 72 PARISSAKI 2018a, 15 zu den Auflösungserscheinungen der seit dem 6. Jh. v. Chr. bestehenden Samothrakischen Peraia durch die keltischen Wanderungen und den Druck der hellenistischen Mächte. 73 IAegThr E435. E448. 74 ZAHRNT 2008, bes. 114–5. LOUKOPOULOU 2004, 880, Nr. 647 mit einer Übersicht zu den diversen Lokalisierungsversuchen. 75 LOUKOPOULOU / PSOMA 2008, 65. 76 LOUKOPOULOU / PSOMA 2008, 76–9; ZAHRNT 2008, TSATSOPOULOU-KALOUDI 2015; PARISSAKI 2018a. 2022; AVRAMIDOU et al. 2022.
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erscheinen77. Einem in jüngerer Zeit entwickelten Szenario, das die Angaben von Plinius dennoch als realistisch ansehen wollte, wurde m. E. zurecht widersprochen78. Die Stadt zählte nicht zur Samothrakischen Peraia79. Mit Drys, Zone sowie Sale, die Teil der Samothrakischen Peraia waren, finden wir drei Städte, die ihren Status bis zur Römischen Kaiserzeit aber sicherlich eingebüßt hatten. Drys war in klassischer Zeit selbstständig, worauf auch die Münzprägung des 4. Jahrhunderts v. Chr. hinweist. Zone erscheint als Polis bis zum 3. Jahrhundert v. Chr., was auch die Münzprägung des 4. Jahrhunderts v. Chr. bestätigt80. Von Sale ist bekannt, dass es sich in klassischer Zeit um eine Polis handelte und später um eine Station an der Via Egnatia81. Aufgrund einer Erwähnung bei Livius ist belegt, dass die Stadt im 2. Jahrhundert v. Chr. bereits eine kome von Maroneia war82. Ein solcher Status wäre auch für die westlich von Sale liegenden Gemeinwesen Drys und Zone denkbar, falls in der Kaiserzeit überhaupt noch Siedlungen dieses Namens existierten. Inwieweit ab dem 2. Jahrhundert n. Chr. Traianoupolis sein Territorium nach Westen erstreckte, erscheint aufgrund einer Inschrift erwägenswert, die Lose für die Instandhaltung von Straßen jeweils einer Phyle bzw. einer kome von Traianoupolis zuweisen83. Im unteren, nur zum Teil erhaltenen Abschnitt erscheinen mutmaßlich die altbekannten Städte Drys und Stryme (Z. 27: Dρῦαι Στρυμ-)84. Dies wäre für Drys bei einer angenommenen Lage nicht allzu weit von der Via Egnatia entfernt vielleicht noch denkbar, für Stryme wäre dann aber eine Lokalisierung westlich von Maroneia auszuschließen85. Deshalb sind hier Zweifel angebracht, zumal auch die übrigen Namen ansonsten unbekannte Örtlichkeiten (komai?) nennen. Hier sei auf die Interpretation F. MOTTAS’ verwiesen, der darlegt, dass es sich um die Nennung von Siedlungen handelt, die auf der Strecke von Traianoupolis zum Hebros-Übergang, also auf dem Weg ins
77 Plin. nat. 4,42; Strab. 7, fr. 20a. Zum Forschungsstand PARISSAKI 2022, 101–2. 107–8, Anm. 49–51; zur Münzprägung CHRYSSANTHAKI-NAGLE 2004. 78 Nach LOUKOPOULOU / PSOMA 2008, 79–80 wäre Orthagoreia eine relativ kurzzeitig bestehende Stadt, die an der Stelle des späteren Maroneia gelegen hätte und von Maroneia nach der Verlagerung der Siedlung im 4. Jh. v. Chr. übernommen worden wäre. Dagegen SABA 2018. 79 ISAAC 1986, 123. 80 LOUKOPOULOU 2004, 881, Nr. 651; IThrAeg S. 505–11; PARISSAKI 2020. Münzprägung: GALANI-KRIKOU ET AL. 2015. 81 IThrAeg S. 547–9; AVRAMEA 1993, 51 zu den Quellen; KARAMBINIS 2020, 475–6. 82 Liv. 38,41,8 als vicus Maronitarum. 83 IThrAeg E433, gefunden in Traianoupolis, mit ausführlichem Kommentar. Mit nahezu gleichlautendem Text die in Alexandroupolis entdeckte Inschrift IThrAeg E433, bei der allerdings der untere Teil mit den Ortsnamen kaum erhalten ist. 84 KARAMBINIS 2020, 449 für eine Zugehörigkeit zu Traianoupolis. Dies wird nicht begründet, bezieht sich aber sicherlich auf die Inschrift. 85 So bei LOUKOPOULOU / PSOMA 2008, 63 als eines der Argumente für die von ihnen befürwortete Lokalisierung von Stryme östlich von Maroneia. Allerdings lässt sich hieraus diese Interpretation nicht unbedingt ableiten. Nach PARISSAKI 2018a, 18 könnte das Territorium von Traianoupolis etwa bis Makri gereicht haben, was (s. u.) Sale einbezogen haben könnte.
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Landesinnere lagen86. Somit wäre dieses wichtige Zeugnis für die Küstenregion, eingedenk der ehemaligen Städte Drys und Stryme, nicht relevant. Tempyra wird als samothrakische Gründung erst im späten 2. Jahrhundert v. Chr. erstmals erwähnt und von Strabon als kleine Ansiedlung (polichnion) charakterisiert87. Für eine Lage an der Küste gegenüber von Samothrake spricht die Angabe von Ovid, hier mit dem Schiff angekommen zu sein und seine Reise zu Fuß weitergeführt zu haben88. Zudem lag auch Tempyra an der Via Egnatia89. Charakoma wird schließlich bei Strabon ebenfalls als kleinere Siedlung genannt und erscheint darüber hinaus schon in einer Liste um 200 v. Chr. in Delphi90. Die Verortung der bekannten Ortsnamen respektive ihre Zuweisung zu bekannten Fundplätzen ist allerdings umstritten und wirft eine Reihe von Fragen auf. Es erscheint sinnvoll, zunächst einmal die in Betracht kommenden archäologischen Zeugnisse der Küstenregion (Abb. 9) aufzulisten91. Für den Abschnitt westlich von Kap Makri ist auf ein archäologisches Feldprojekt zur Erforschung der Samothrakischen Peraia zu verweisen, das zukünftig sicher zum besseren Verständnis der Siedlungsgeographie beitragen wird92. Etwa 5 km östlich von Maroneia entstand im 5. Jahrhundert in Küstennähe bei Synaxis (Abb. 9,2) ein größerer Sakralbau. Neben der dreischiffigen Basilika, die vollständig ausgegraben wurde, ist ein als Herberge bzw. Speicherbau gedeutetes Gebäude mit mehreren Räumen in Strandnähe bekannt, was auf einen Hafen schließen lässt93. In der Basilika waren als Spolien monumentale marmorne Architekturteile verbaut. Aufgrund dieses Fundes war Synaxis als Standort des Heroons des mythischen Königs Maron identifiziert worden94. Dies ist bislang zwar spekulativ, allerdings wäre aufgrund der Lage auch eine antike Siedlung mit Hafen an dieser 86 MOTTAS 1989, 102–4. Dieser Sicht folgend KUNNERT 2012, 62–3. 296. Zum Verlauf der Strecke und den Wartungsarbeiten s. auch ADAMS 1997, 140–4. 87 Strab. 7, fr. 20a. Liv. 38,41,8. ISAAC 1986, 132–3; PARISSAKI 2018a, 15–6. 88 Ov. trist. 1,10,1. 89 Itin. Anton. 322,3; Itin. Burdig. 602,8. 90 Strab. 7, fr. 20a. ISAAC 1986, 132–3; LOUKOPOULOU 2004, 871; PARISSAKI 2018a, 15. 91 Die Zusammenstellung basiert insbesondere auf den Lemmata in der Tabula Imperii Romani (AVRAMEA 1993) und in der Tabula Imperii Byzantini (SOUSTAL 1991) sowie Hinweisen in der neueren Literatur, u. a. ZAHRNT 2008; PARISSAKI 2022. Eine konsequente Durchsicht von aktuellen Fundberichten konnte im Rahmen dieses Beitrags nicht geleistet werden. Allerdings hätten wichtige Entdeckungen sicherlich ihren Niederschlag in jüngeren Aufsätzen wie z. B. PARISSAKI 2022 bzw. KARAMBINIS 2020 gefunden. 92 The Peraia of Samothrace project: AVRAMIDOU ET AL. 2022 mit ersten Ergebnissen. Die Surveygebiete sind Ebd. 282, Abb. 1 gekennzeichnet. 93 BAKIRTZIS 1994, 167–71 mit der Deutung als Herberge. SOUSTAL 1991, 469–70 erwähnt einen Speicherbau, wobei anzunehmen ist, dass es sich um dasselbe Gebäude handeln dürfte, sowie eine Wasserleitung. Wahrscheinlich sind auch die von von KAZAROW 1918, 34 beschriebenen Mauerreste mit Synaxis identifizieren, da sie 5 km westlich des Fundplatzes als Jalą-dere (s. Anm. 100) verortet werden, was der von KAZAROW angegebenen Distanz entspricht. 94 Nach BAKIRTZIS 1994, 167 könnte das Heroon von Ismara, das auf dem Gipfel des Agios Georgios (s. u.) gelegen haben soll, auf Befehl Hadrians überführt worden sein. Ebenso LOUKOPOULOU / PSOMA 2008, 79 mit Verweis auf IThrAeg E185 als Beleg für den Schiffsverkehr nach Samothrake.
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Stelle plausibel. Da Synaxis direkt gegenüber von Palaiopolis, dem Standort der antiken Stadt Samothrake auf der gleichnamigen Insel lag, wurde hier auch ein maßgeblicher Hafen für den Pilgerverkehr vermutet95, wobei allerdings die – aus Sicht der Straßenverbindungen – abseitige Lage der Siedlung für Reisende aus dem thrakischen oder makedonischen Hinterland in die Überlegungen einbezogen werden müsste. Auf der Ostseite des Ismaros konnten zwei Siedlungen nachgewiesen werden: eine auf dem Gipfelplateau des Hagios Georgios (Abb. 9,4) gelegen sowie eine etwas südlich davon bei Mikros Elaionas (Abb. 9,3) 96. Erstgenannte, die auch als thrakisch klassifiziert wurde, bestand seit vorgeschichtlicher Zeit und war mit einer massiven Polygonalmauer ausgestattet. Aufgrund der Nähe zum hellenistisch/römischen Maroneia war sie als Vorgängersiedlung interpretiert worden, aber auch das antike Stryme wurde hier lokalisiert97. Für unseren Zusammenhang sind die spätantiken Siedlungsaktivitäten nach einer mutmaßlich längeren Siedlungsunterbrechung relevant. Etwas südlich davon lag bei Mikros Elaionas (Abb. 9,3) eine Siedlung klassischer bis frührömischer Zeitstellung, vereinzelt als Orthagoreia identifiziert98. Dieses Areal ist zwar mehr als 1 km von der Küste entfernt, allerdings dürfte die Verkehrsanbindung auf die Küstenzone ausgelegt sein, so dass mit einem zugehörigen Hafen zu rechnen ist99. Falls die Küsten an dieser Stelle ungeeignet sein sollten, wäre die nächste mögliche Anlegestelle ca. 2 km östlich davon bei Paralia Petroton (Abb. 9,5) zu suchen. Dort wurde eine weitere kleine Siedung mit potentiellem Hafen entdeckt, wobei ein Tempel und weitere Bauten geophysikalisch nachgewiesen werden konnten. Das Fundmaterial datiert in hellenistisch-römische Zeit100. Hinweise auf spätantike und byzantinische Funde fehlen, allerdings ist östlich der Siedlung ein byzantinischer Turm (Abb. 9,6) bekannt101. Die am besten erforschte Siedlung an diesem Küstenabschnitt ist fraglos die heute als Archäologischer Park Mesembria/Zone (Abb. 9, 8) präsentierte großflächige Ausgrabung, die sich ca. 3 km west-südwestlich des modernen Mesimvria 95 s. Anm. 94. 96 Hierzu jüngst mit weiterer Literatur AVRAMIDOU ET AL. 2022, 282, Abb. 1 (Area 1). 289 (Topographie, ältere Grabungen, Surveys). 297–301 (Survey-Ergebnisse) 308. 310. 97 LOUKOPOULOU / PSOMA 2008, 65–9 zur Deutung der Siedlung als älteres Maroneia und EBD. 76 mit dem alternativen Vorschlag als Stryme. Die Topographie mit Maroneia und Hagios Georgios: KARADIMA 2008, lxxii map 4. Dort sind auch zwei südlich von Hagios Georgios zum Meer weisende Wälle eingetragen, die den Bezug der höher liegenden Siedlungen zum unteren Küstenabschnitt belegen; s. dazu LOUKOPOULOU / PSOMA 2008, 61. 98 PANTOS 1983, 171 zur Identifizierung als Orthagoreia. 99 Die zughörige Küstenzone war noch nicht Teil des Surveygebietes: vgl. AVRAMIDOU ET AL. 2022, 282, Abb. 1. Der Hafen dürfte im Bereich des in der Karte erkennbaren Bachlaufes zu vermuten sein, der von Area 1 zum Meer führt. 100 AVRAMIDOU ET AL. 2022, 282, Abb. 1 (Area 2). 289–91 (Topographie, ältere Grabungen, Fundmaterial). 297–308 (Ergebnisse Survey). 310 (Ergebnisse). Diese Siedlung dürfte mit dem von KAZAROW 1918, 33 als Jalą-dere bezeichneten Fundplatz identisch sein, zu der bemerkt, dass von dort keine griechischen Funde bekannt seien, es aber „Indizien aus späterer Zeit“ gäbe. 101 SOUSTAL 1991, 355.
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befindet und in der Literatur auch unter der Flurbezeichnung Shapli Dere geläufig ist. Die Umwehrung umfasste eine Fläche von gut 12 ha, wobei vor allem Siedlungsreste aus klassischer Zeit beschrieben werden. Das reiche Fundmaterial belegt die Bedeutung der Stadt bis mindestens in hellenistische Zeit. Ihr Charakter in römischer Zeit ist bislang kaum fassbar, auch wenn die Existenz nicht in Frage steht102. Fundmünzen aus dem Bereich des Apollo-Heiligtum lassen auf Aktivitäten bis ins 5. Jahrhundert n. Chr. schließen103. Es scheint sich um eine ausgedünnte Teilbesiedlung des Areals zu handeln, so dass ein städtischer Charakter wohl nicht mehr attestiert werden kann. Ein massiver Rückgang der Bevölkerungszahl fand im 3. Jahrhundert v. Chr. etwa zeitgleich mit den Kelteneinfällen statt, ohne dass sich allerdings Zerstörungen im archäologischen Befund belegen ließen104. Drei Fundstellen mit römischen und spätrömisch/frühbyzantinischen Funden liegen in einem Bereich 0,8-1 km wohl westlich des Archäologischen Parks (Abb. 9,7). Dabei handelt es sich um die mit folgenden topographischen Bezeichnungen im Kommentar der Tabula Imperii Romani genannten Plätze: a) Moussa Vryssi mit Gräbern und Einzelfunden, darunter Münzen und Keramik, b) Hamam-geri, ein Fundplatz mit Scherben, bei dem ein Badegebäude vermutet wird, wobei unklar ist, ob diese Interpretation mit dem Toponym zusammenhängt und c) Kaklıkı, von wo Baureste und frühbyzantinische Architekturteile bekannt sind105. Letztgenannter Platz ist auch in der Tabula Imperii Byzantini verzeichnet, allerdings mit einer abweichenden Richtungsangabe106. Es ist unklar, ob die genannten Befunde und Funde zu einer Siedlung gehören könnten. Aufgrund der Architekturteile scheint es sich aber zumindest in spätantik-frühbyzantinischer Zeit nicht nur um einen Gutshof zu handeln. Weitere Hinweise auf nicht näher beschriebene Siedlungsreste befinden sich im Umfeld der modernen Ortschaften Mesimvria (Abb. 9,9) und Dikella (Abb. 9,11) im Bereich von Demirkuyu sowie in Mesemvria selbst107. Spätrömische Grabfunde weisen zudem auf einen weiteren Siedlungsplatz südwestlich von Dikella hin (Abb. 9,10)108. Abgesehen davon, dass schon aufgrund der geringen 102 TSATSOPOULOU-KALOUDI 2001 zusammenfassend zu Ausgrabungen und Funden. TSATSOPOULOU-KALOUDI ET AL. 2015 zu den Ausgrabungen im Apolloheiligtum, die auch eine Vielzahl von Ostraka in thrakischer Sprache erbrachten. Zu den Münzen: GALANI-KRIKOU ET AL. 2015 (nicht eingesehen). 103 GATZOLIS / PSOMA 2021, 148 erklären die Funde mit dem Besuch des Heiligtums. 104 GATZOLIS / PSOMA 2021, 148–9 für ein freiwilliges Verlassen der Siedlung und den Fortbestand als Kleinfestung innerhalb des ehemaligen Stadtareals. Allerdings erscheint der Bezug auf die keltischen Invasionen ohne archäologischen Nachweis von Zerstörungen nicht überzeugend. Zur Festung s. TSATSOPOULOU-KALOUDI 2001, 21–4. 105 AVRAMEA 1993, 37 s. v. Mesembria mit der Angabe, dass sich der Fundplatz Moussa Vryssi von 800 m westlich von Zone liegt. 106 Nach SOUSTAL 1991, 355 befindet sich der Fundplatz Kaklıkı 1 km südöstlich des Grabungsgeländes und unmittelbar westlich des Badegebäudes. 107 AVRAMEA 1993, 26 s. v. Drys nennt nur Demirkuyu, während sowie SOUSTAL 1991, 354, zusätzlich auf Reste in Mesimvria selbst verweist. 108 KAZAROW 1918, 52–6 mit Abb. 58–60. Die Gräber wurden laut Kazarow südwestlich von Diklitasch (= Dikella) gefunden etwa 300 m vom Strand entfernt. Damit sollten sie nicht mit dem
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Entfernung zu Zone kaum eine weitere Stadt als realistische Option erscheint109, ist für die Kaiserzeit bzw. die Spätantike eher mit kleineren ländlichen Siedlungen zu rechnen. Durch neuere archäologische Untersuchungen konnte in Makri (Abb. 9,12) eine Besiedlung von vorgeschichtlicher bis in byzantinische Zeit nachgewiesen werden, zudem sind Reste mittel- bis spätbyzantinischer Befestigungen und Kirchen dokumentiert worden110. Aufgrund diverser Funde lässt sich die Existenz einer römischen Siedlung im Bereich des heutigen Alexandroupolis eindeutig nachweisen. Belegt sind für die Kaiserzeit Inschriften, mindestens zwei Gräberfelder und Münzen, ohne dass sich hier nähere Aussagen zur Größe der Siedlung treffen ließen111. In den neueren Kartenwerken und Abhandlungen, die sich mit diesem Küstenabschnitt in einem größeren Kontext auseinandersetzen, lässt sich kein übereinstimmendes Bild von der Besiedlung gewinnen. Dies drückt sich einerseits in unterschiedlichen Lokalisierungen der antiken Ortschaften aus und andererseits in dem Umfang der als unsicher charakterisierten Zuweisungen. Es ist sicherlich nicht möglich, an dieser Stelle die bekannten literarischen und archäologischen Quellen zu einem widerspruchsfreien Gesamtbild zusammenzufügen. Allerdings lassen sich einige Anmerkungen hinsichtlich der publizierten Zuweisungen treffen. Nimmt man das Zeugnis der Itinerarien ernst, so ergibt sich für den Straßenverlauf von Traianoupolis nach Westen folgendes Bild: Von Traianoupolis, das abseits der Küste bei Loutra lag, gelangt man in westlicher Richtung laut dem Itininerarium Antonini nach 9 Meilen nach Timpirum, das sicherlich mit Tempyra bei Strabon gleichzusetzen ist, und nach weiteren 16 Meilen nach Milolitum, einer bis heute nicht sicher identifizierten Station nördlich der Küste112. Diese Gesamtentfernung von 25 Meilen entspricht fast den 23,5 Meilen, die laut Itinerarium Burdigalense für dieselbe Strecke zu veranschlagen sind, wobei die dort genannte Wechselstation Melalico mit dem im Itininerarium Antonini erwähnten Milolitum sicherlich gleichzusetzen ist. Als Zwischenstationen finden wir hier bereits nach 8 Meilen Ad Umimpara, sicherlich Tempyra und nach weiteren 7,5 Meilen Salei, die Hafenstadt Sale113. Dies widerspricht, wenn man die Angaben ernst nimmt, einer Lokalisierung von Tempyra bei oder östlich von Traianoupolis, wie sie sich sowohl in der Tabula Imperii Romani (Abb. 2), der Tabula Imperii
109 110 111 112 113
zuvor genannten Fundplatz identisch sein, der näher an Mesimvria liegen müsste. Etwas westlich der Nekropole wurden noch Fundamente einer kleinen Kirche ohne nähere Angaben zur Datierung entdeckt. ZAHRNT 2008, 104 mit Anm. 41. EFSTRATIOU / KALLINTZI 1994 zu den Ausgrabungen sowie SOUSTAL 1991, 342 zu Quellen und baulichen Resten der byzantinischen Zeit. Amphore des 4. Jhs. v. Chr.: CARLSON / LAWALL 2005/2006, 35. AVRAMEA 1993, 51; PARISSAKI 2018a, 15 und KARAMBINIS 2021 (allgemeiner Verweis auf die Funde). Inschriften: IAegThr E446–448. Itin. Ant. 322,2. Itin. Burdig. 602,9.
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Byzantini bzw. dem Barrington Atlas findet114. Gleiches gilt für Sale, das im Bereich von Alexandroupolis vermutet wurde115. Vielmehr liegt nahe, Tempyra mit Alexandroupolis zu identifizieren. Die in den Itinerarien genannten Entfernungen, umgerechnet 13,3 bzw. 14,4 km, entsprechen mit ca. 14 km der Strecke zwischen Loutra und Alexandrouoplis (Stadtmitte) beim heutigen Straßenverlauf. Die 7,5 Meilen (11,1 km) von Tempyra (Unimpara) nach Sale (Salei) würden etwa der Entfernung zwischen Alexandroupolis und Makri auf der heutigen Küstenstraße entsprechen. Eine Identifikation von Tempyra mit Alexandroupolis und von Sale mit Makri wurde bereits in jüngeren Publikationen befürwortet116. Eindeutig scheint die Zuordnung von Zone zu der oben genannten großflächig erkundeten Siedlung Shapli Dere zu sein, die als archäologischer Park den Doppelnamen Mesembria-Zone führt. Sie beruht insbesondere auf den mehr als 2000 Fundmünzen, die als Prägungen von Zone identifiziert werden konnten117. Dies ist zwar nicht unproblematisch; erinnert sei an die oben skizzierte Diskussion zur Gleichsetzung der Stadt auf der Molyvoti-Halbinsel mit dem frühen Maroneia. Der Unterschied liegt allerdings in der fehlenden Alternative für eine Verortung von Zone, da keine weiteren markanten Konzentrationen von Münzen aus dieser Stadt bekannt sind. Als schwierig erweisen sich weiterhin die übrigen namentlich bekannten Orte: Drys, Mesembria, Orthagoreia und Charakoma. Mesembria hat, wie ZAHRNT nachvollziehbar dargelegt, wohl nicht existiert und kann im Folgenden vernachlässigt werden118. Er befürwortete eine „Unachtsamkeit“ von Herodot, der aus einer Richtungsangabe bei Hekataios einen Ortsnamen gemacht haben soll119. Orthagoreia wäre, wenn man der Reihenfolge der Ortsnamen bei den Geographen folgt, westlich von Zone (Shapli Dere) und der Samothrakischen Peraia zu suchen, was allerdings nicht unumstritten ist120. Auf die vermutete Lokalisierung im Bereich des hellenistisch-römischen Maroneia war bereits oben hingewiesen worden, ebenso auf die vermutete Lage an den östlichen Ausläufern des Ismaros. Die erstgenannte, allerdings sehr umstrittene Deutung fände eine Bestätigung bei 114 AVRAMEA 1993, 55 zu den Quellen ohne Wertung; im Kartenbild als Tempyra? nördlich von Traianoupolis; BORZA 2000 sowie SOUSTAL 1991, 474 für eine Lokalisierung in oder bei Gügercinlik östlich von Traianoupolis aufgrund der bei Livius erwähnten Schlucht. In den zugehörigen Kartenbildern wurde Tempyra nicht berücksichtigt. 115 So z. B. AVRAMEA 1993, 51; LOUKOPOULOU 2004, 880, Nr. 649; BORZA 2000; KARAMBINIS 2020, 475–6 („tentatively“). 116 PSOMA 2008, 125–6; TSATSOPOULOU-KALOUDI 2015, 48–9 mit Abb. 25; PARISSAKI 2022, 100 mit 107, Anm. 28. 117 TSATSOPOULOU-KALOUDI 2001. 2015. Zu den älteren Forschungen vgl. AVRAMEA 1993, 37 mit Verweisen auf die Arbeiten von J. und L. ROBERT, die die Identifikation mit Zone zuerst vorgeschlagen hatten. Zu den Fundmünzen GALANI-KRIKOU ET AL. 2015 (nicht eingesehen). 118 ZAHRNT 2008, 107–15. Hingewiesen sei noch auf TSATSOPOULOU-KALOUDI 2001, 10, die vorgeschlagen hatte, dass Mesembria in Orthagoreia umbenannt worden sein könnte. Für eine Namensänderung ließe sich auf Ainos verweisen, dessen älterer thrakischer Name als Poltymbria überliefert ist; vgl. Strab. 7,6. Allerdings ist m. E. die Lösung von Zahrnt überzeugender. 119 ZAHRNT 2008, 114 –5. 120 AVRAMEA 1993, 42 mit weiterer Literatur. Zur Diskussion s. PARISSAKI 2022, 101–2.
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Plinius. Aufgrund der Begrenztheit des Küstenraumes wäre eine Lokalisierung unter Berücksichtigung der bekannten Siedlungsreste schwierig121. Dies gilt natürlich auch für Drys, das meist in der Umgebung von Mesimvria, aber auch westlich von Zone lokalisiert wurde und wohl auch eher etwas abseits der Küste zu suchen ist122. Als markanter Punkt wird in den geographischen Schriften auch Serrheion als Berg und Cap genannt, das überwiegend mit dem Cap Makri123, allerdings auch mit dem Kap von Maroneia124 identifiziert wird. Für Charakoma existieren ebenfalls nur wenige Anhaltspunkte für eine Verortung. Aufgrund der Nennung bei Strabon an letzter Stelle nach Tempyra könnte die Siedlung relativ weit östlich gelegen haben: entweder im Hebrosdelta, möglicherweise etwas abseits der Via Egnatia125, oder es handelte sich, wie von ZAHRNT vorgeschlagen, um die Vorgängersiedlung von Traianoupolis126. Beim momentanen Forschungsstand zeichnet sich folgende Konstellation der Siedlungen entlang der Küste zwischen Maroneia und dem Hebros ab: Es beginnt östlich des Ismaros mit den bekannten spätantiken Bauten von Synaxis, wo auch eine ältere Siedlung als kleine Hafenstadt denkbar wäre. Dann folgt die hellenistisch-kaiserzeitliche Siedlung bei Paralia Petroton sowie Zone, das mit den Ausgrabungen bei Shapli Dere gleichzusetzen ist, mit kleineren Siedlungsresten in der Umgebung. Mit Sale (Makri) träfe die Küstenzone dann auf die Via Egnatia. Die Straße verlief weiter entlang der Küste bis nach Tempyra (Alexandroupolis), wo sie dann wieder ins Landesinnere nach Traianoupolis abzweigt. Östlich davon könnte Charakoma am Rand des Hebrosdeltas gelegen haben, falls es nicht mit dem späteren Traianoupolis identisch ist. Für die Römische Kaiserzeit ist allerdings kaum mit Siedlungen städtischen Charakters zu rechnen. Die partielle Nicht-Erwähnung der Städte westlich von Sale in der schriftlichen Überlieferung scheint im Verbund mit den bisherigen Ergebnissen der archäologischen Forschung nahezulegen, dass kleinere Städte wie Zone ihren urbanen Charakter verloren hatten und allenfalls noch eine reduzierte Restbesiedlung bestand bzw. auch eine Aufgabe nicht gänzlich auszuschließen ist127. Dieser Prozess dürfte allerdings schon in hellenistischer Zeit eingesetzt haben, wenn man den Verlust der Selbstständigkeit von ehemaligen Städten wie Sale einbezieht. Es dürfte sich bei den Küstensiedlungen eher um kleinere Agglomerationen gehandelt haben, die eine Infrastruktur für lokalen Handel und 121 Auf den Mangel an geeigneten Plätzen in diesem Abschnitt verweist auch ZAHRNT 2008, 107. 122 Abseits der Küste: IThrAeg S. 502; ZAHRNT 2008, 106. Mesimvria und Umgebung: AVRAMEA 1993, 25–6; BORZA 2000. Westlich von Zone: TSATSOPOULOU-KALOUDI 2015, 50, Abb. 26. Nahe Kap Serrheion: AVRAMIDOU ET AL. 2022, 285 mit Verweis Athener Tributlisten von 421/420 v. Chr. (IG I3 77. V 27–31). 123 SOUSTAL 1991, 53–4 mit Quellen und weiterer Literatur. 124 ZAHRNT 2008, 102. 125 So AVRAMEA 1993, 22. Möglicherweise lagen die antike Küstenlinie und somit auch die Siedlung weiter nördlich als dies das Kartenbild suggeriert. 126 ZAHRNT 2008, 115–6. 127 TSATSOPOULOU-KALOUDI 2015, 107 vermutete einen Zusammenhang mit der Besiedlung des hellenistischen Maroneia und eine Reduzierung auf die im Inneren der Stadt befindliche kleine Befestigung, die eine Funktion in der Sicherung des Seewegs nach Samothrake erfüllt haben soll.
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Verkehr sowie auch Heiligtümer umfasst haben könnten. Dies gilt insbesondere für die an der Via Egnatia gelegenen Ortschaften. Zusätzlich existierten in diesem Abschnitt noch Siedlungen etwas abseits der Küste, etwa an den östlichen Abhängen des Ismaros bzw. zwischen Zone und Sale. Ob einer dieser Siedlungsplätze mit den älteren Poleis Orthagoreia bzw. Drys identisch sein könnte, muss offenbleiben. Es ist aber überaus unwahrscheinlich, dass in vorrömischer Zeit im Bereich dieses Küstenabschnitts zwei weitere Städte lagen. In Kaiserzeit und Spätantike könnte die landwirtschaftliche Produktion ebenso wie die Nutzung mariner Ressourcen und die lokale Küstenschifffahrt eine Bedeutung für die Wirtschaft dieses Küstenabschnitts gespielt haben. Auch eine Gründung von neuen ländlichen Siedlungen sollte dabei nicht ausgeschlossen werden. Eine Verbesserung des Forschungsstandes ist nur durch zukünftige archäologische Forschungen möglich, wobei das bereits erwähnte, aktuell laufende Projekt zur Samothrakischen Peraia mehr Klarheit bringen sollte. 4.3 Vom Hebros bis zum Melas Im Hebrosdelta, einer äußerst dynamischen Landschaft, liegt Ainos, heute Enez (Abb. 10). Die Sedimente des Flusses verursachten einen Verlandungsprozess128, so dass die noch in Karten des 19. Jahrhunderts existente Bucht im Westen der Stadt mittlerweile verschwunden ist. Mit dem Zugang zum Hebros war es möglich über den Fluss Handelskontakte weit ins thrakische Hinterland zu schaffen129. Die Auswirkungen der Landschaftsveränderungen waren allerdings nicht so gravierend wie in Abdera. Nach den Ergebnissen aktueller geoarchäologischer Forschungen waren die potentiellen Häfen der Stadt bis mindestens in die Hohe Kaiserzeit problemlos nutzbar und die Einschränkungen der spätantik-frühbyzantinischen Zeit noch nicht gravierend130. Die Koloniegründung im späten 7. bzw. frühen 6. Jahrhundert v. Chr. scheint, wie auch an anderen Stellen entlang der thrakischen Küste, schwierig gewesen zu 128 Grundlegend zur Entwicklung des Hebrosdeltas ALPAR 2001 sowie aufgrund der geoarchäologischen Forschungen in Ainos BRÜCKNER ET AL. 2015, 63–71; DAN ET AL. 2019, 138–41; DAN ET AL. 2020 mit einer hypothetischen Visualisierung des Verlandungsprozesses EBD. 156, Abb. 2; SCHMIDTS ET AL. 2020, 325–36. 129 Schiffbarkeit des Hebros: DE BOER 2010, 177 zusammenfassend für den Zeitraum von Antike bis mindestens ins späte 19. Jh. mit Verweisen zur älteren Literatur; SOUSTAL 1991, 147 mit Anm. 104 speziell zur byzantinischen Epoche. 130 Neuere Untersuchungen fanden im Rahmen des interdisziplinären DFG-Projektes „Die thrakische Hafenstadt Ainos“ DFG-Geschäftszeichen: BR 877/31–1 u. -2 und SCHM 2831/2–1 u. – 2, das vom VERF. gemeinsam mit H. BRÜCKNER im Rahmen des DFG-SPP 1630 „Häfen von der Römischen Kaiserzeit bis zum Mittelalter“ geleitet wurde. Die abschließenden Publikationen befinden sich in Bearbeitung. Überblick zu den Ergebnissen: BRÜCKNER ET AL. 2015; SCHMIDTS ET AL. 2020. Speziell zu den geoarchäologischen Forschungen s. auch SEELIGER ET AL. 2018. 2021. Geoarchäologische Arbeiten wurden zudem von H. BRÜCKNER im Rahmen des LEGECARTAS-Projekt mit ANCA DAN (Paris CNRS) mit Feldarbeiten durchgeführt. Vgl. dazu DAN ET AL. 2019.
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sein. Die äolischen Siedler kamen wohl zunächst aus Alopekonnes und, möglicherweise später, aus Mytilene. Zudem lässt der ebenfalls überlieferte Ortsname Poltyobria bzw. Poltymbria auf eine thrakische Vorgängersiedlung schließen131. Die Blütezeit der Stadt lag zweifellos in der klassischen Zeit, was sich etwa an den relativ hohen Tributen bis zu 20 Talenten (425 v. Chr.) bzw. auch der umfänglichen Münzprägung und der weiten Verbreitung von ainetischen Münzen ablesen lässt132. Seit dem Abfall von Athen, der um 340 zu datieren ist, lag die Stadt in der Interessenssphäre der Makedonen sowie anderer hellenistischer Mächte, bis schließlich Rom als Ordnungsmacht nicht nur die Stadt seit 196 v. Chr. mehrmals für frei erklärte, sondern auch 189 v. Chr. das Ende der seleukidischen Besatzung und bald darauf (185/184 v. Chr.) auch die Räumung der makedonischen Garnisonen in diesem Küstenabschnitt durchsetzte133. Wie die Plünderung von Ainos im 3. Makedonischen Krieg (167 v. Chr.) oder auch die Spaltung der Bürgerschaft in zwei Parteien zeigen, war das Verhältnis zu Rom nicht ungetrübt134. Für die Entwicklung der Stadt in der Kaiserzeit ist die Quellenlage weniger ertragreich. Unter den Nennungen in den geographischen Schriften (s. o.), die eher Hinweise auf die mythische Vergangenheit bzw. die Kolonisierung geben, fällt eine Erwähnung des Weizens von Ainos bei Plinius auf, die auf eine bemerkenswerte landwirtschaftliche Produktion im Umfeld der Stadt (s. u.) verweist135. Immerhin erscheinen Abgesandte der Stadt fernab der Heimat bei einer Gerichtsverhandlung in Eburacum/York 208/209 n. Chr.136 Während eine Inschrift auf die Weihung eines Zeustempels im 2. Jahrhundert n. Chr. verweist137, sind die archäologischen Belege für antike Großbauten gering. Zwar konnte im Süden der Stadt ein Abschnitt der hellenistischen Stadtmauer gefunden werden, ansonsten sind trotz langjähriger Forschungen keine öffentlichen Gebäude nachgewiesen worden, was vor allem der modernen Überbauung der antiken Siedlung geschuldet sein dürfte138. Immerhin geben großformatige Kapitelle Hinweise auf mögliche Großbauten auch in der Hohen Kaiserzeit139 und zahlreiche in mittel- bis spätbyzantinischen Befestigungen wiederverwendete große Quader stammen sicherlich von antiken Bauten. Im Gegensatz zu den öffentlichen Bauten kann ein zumindest teilweise ausgegrabenes und mit Mosaiken ausgestattetes Haus 131 Strab. 7,6,1; 7, fr. 21a; Suda, al. 1389 (s. v. Alopekonnesos). ISAAC 1986, 147 sowie TIVERIOS 2008, 119–20 zur Vorgängersiedlung und Koloniegründung. LOUKOPOULOU 2004, 875–7, Nr. 641 zusammenfassend zur Geschichte in archaisch-klassischer Zeit. 132 ISAAC 1986, 150–51. 153; MARTÍNEZ FERNÁNDEZ 1999, 79, Nr. 1 zu den Tributzahlungen mit weiteren Angaben und Nachweisen. 133 Liv. 31,16,4; 37,60,7; 39,33,4. SCHMIDTS ET AL. 2020, 317–8 mit einem Überblick zur Geschichte des hellenistischen Ainos mit weiterer Literatur. 134 Liv. 45,27,4 (Plünderung); zur Zweiteilung der Bürgerschaft, die sich aufgrund der oben behandelten Inschrift aus Maroneia erschließen lässt, s. Anm. 5. 135 Plin. nat. 18,70. 136 KAYGUSUZ 1986, 66–7, Nr. 3. 137 KAYGUSUZ 1986, 67–8, Nr. 5 = SEG 36, 657. 138 Überblicke zu den langjährigen Feldforschungen der Universität Istanbul, die sich insbesondere auf die Gräberfelder konzentrierten: BAŞARAN 2001. 2007. 2022. 139 SCHMIDTS et al. 2020, 357–8.
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am Rand der heutigen Stadt als Beleg für eine relativ wohlhabende Schicht angesehen werden. Ein zentral gelegener gepflasterter Straßenabschnitt mit Abwasserleitung und randlicher Bebauung wird in die hellenistische bis römische Epoche datiert. Zu weiteren Siedlungsresten liegen bislang keine Publikationen vor140. Für die Spätantike ist staatliche Bautätigkeit belegt141. Laut einer Inschrift des 4. Jahrhunderts n. Chr. wurde ein Prätorium (pretorion) errichtet, wobei sowohl der vicarius der Diözese Thracia als auch der Statthalter der Provinz Rhodope beteiligt waren142. Größe und genaue Funktion des Baus lassen sich aus dem Begriff praetorium / pretorion nicht ableiten. Beherbergung und möglicherweise Verwaltungstätigkeit wären plausible Optionen143. In den „Bauten“ nennt Prokop auch eine justinianische Restaurierung von älteren Befestigungswerken. Dabei nimmt er unmittelbar Bezug auf eine seeseitige Stadtmauer, die erhöht wurde, um sie vor feindlichen Angriffen zu schützen. Zudem soll Justinian die Stadt erweitert und nach allen Seiten hin gesichert haben144. Auch diese Baumaßnahmen lassen sich derzeit weder mit den erhaltenen Fortifikationen byzantinischer Zeitstellung, noch mit in jüngerer Zeit geophysikalisch detektierten Stadtmauern südlich der heutigen Stadt Enez verbinden145. Bemerkenswerterweise wird Ainos als einzige der traditionellen Hafenstädte an der thrakischen Südküste bei Prokop erwähnt. Die Baumaßnahmen in Anastasioupolis, das ebenfalls an der Via Egnatia liegt, waren bereits weiter oben besprochen worden. Als Zeugnisse eines „Baubooms“ der spätantik-frühbyzantinischen Epoche lassen sich darüber hinaus Architekturteile anführen, von denen einige wahrscheinlich von Sakralbauten stammen, deren Grundrisse allerdings bislang nicht fassbar sind. Dabei sind diejenigen Architekturteile hervorzuheben, die einerseits in der großen Kirche (spätere Moschee Fatih Camii) auf der byzantinischen Burg (Abb. 10, 5) als Spolien verwendet wurden und andererseits diejenigen, die als Sammelfund in der sog. Königstocherkirche/Kral Kızı Kilisesi (Abb. 10, 17) gefunden wurden. Im erstgenannten Sakralbau waren Kapitelle des 4.–5. Jahrhunderts n. Chr. verbaut und in der sog. Kral Kızı Kilisesi wurden Teile, darunter sehr qualitätvolle Kapitelle eines
140 Eine größere Ausgrabung fand 2017 im Zentrum von Enez statt. Nach mündl. Mitteilungen der beteiligten Archäologen liegt hier eine kontinuierliche Wohnbebauung bis mindestens in die Spätantike vor. 141 Vgl. SCHMIDTS 2022. 142 Inschrift KAYGUSUZ 1986, 67, Nr. 4 = ASDRACHA 2003 / IV, 287–9, Nr. 117. Zur Datierung vgl. D. FEISSEL, Bull. Épigr. 2000, 810. 143 LAVAN 2001, 39–43 zu den unterschiedlichen Funktionen. 144 Prok. de aed. 4,11,2–5. 145 Hierzu zusammenfassend SCHMIDTS 2022, 154–9; dies gilt insbesondere auch für die seeseitigen byzantinischen Befestigungen, deren untere Teile aufgrund von verbauten Spolien noch in der jüngeren Literatur (BAŞARAN 1999, 345; DAN ET AL. 2019, 139–40) als potentielle antike bzw. frühbyzantinische Bauwerke angesehen wurden. Zu neu entdeckten Stadtmauerabschnitten, die mutmaßlich in hellenistischer Zeit errichtet wurden SEELIGER ET AL. 2018; SCHMIDTS ET AL. 2020, 335–6. 351.
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justinianischen Großbaus geborgen, die von einer frühen Phase dieses Gebäudes stammen dürften146. Betrachtet man die Küstenzone östlich von Ainos bis zum Melas, so fällt für die römische Kaiserzeit in Kartenwerken wie dem Barrington Atlas (Abb. 1) eine Siedlungsleere auf, die sicherlich einer Erklärung bedarf. Dank detaillierter Studien konnte für die byzantinische Zeit (Abb. 4) dieses Bild von A. KÜLZER revidiert werden147. Befestigungen und potentielle Ankerplätze säumen diese Strecke. Allerdings stammen die dokumentierten Siedlungsreste und literarischen Zeugnisse bislang ausschließlich aus der mittel- bis spätbyzantinischen Zeit und sind somit für den hier betrachteten Zeitraum nicht direkt relevant. Es wäre zwar bei der ansonsten in diesem Raum zu beobachtenden Siedlungskontinuität überraschend, wenn sich die Verhältnisse erst ab der zweiten Hälfte des 1. Jahrtausends grundlegend geändert hätten, aber letztlich auch nicht auszuschließen. Keine der antiken Küstenbeschreibungen (s. o.) enthält die Nennung einer Siedlung in diesem Abschnitt, wohl aber des für die Seefahrt als gefährlich geltenden Kaps Sarpedon beim heutigen Boztepe Burnu, wobei die Existenz einer antiken Stadt namens Sarpedon unklar bzw. unwahrscheinlich ist148. Für den vom Kap Sarpedon an in west-östlicher Richtung verlaufenden Küstenabschnitt (Abb. 4) konnte A. KÜLZER drei größere mittel- bis spätbyzantinische Befestigungen sowie geeignete Hafenstellen lokalisieren149. Zeugnisse für potentielle ältere Siedlungen liegen eher entlang einer Straße, die von Ainos etwa 10 km östlich des Kaps Sarpedon parallel zur Küste mit einem variierenden Abstand von wenigen Kilometern verlief150. Ab wann diese Verbindung existierte, ist allerdings noch unsicher. Erst mit Aphrodisias, nördlich des Golfes von Melas gelegen, erlauben die Quellen den Nachweis einer Stadt für die Römische Kaiserzeit und frühbyzantinischen Epoche151. Ob Aphrodisias identisch mit der ansonsten nicht lokalisierten Colonia Flaviopolis sein könnte, bleibt unsicher sowohl hinsichtlich der Existenz einer Kolonie als auch des Ortsnamens152. Somit erweist sich die 146 Die Architekturteile werden im Rahmen des oben genannten DFG-Projektes von M. DENNERT bearbeitet: SCHMIDTS U. A. 2020, 358–61 mit Abb. 40 sowie SCHMIDTS 2022, 162–3 zu ersten Ergebnissen. Zu den beiden großen mittelbyzantinischen Kirchenbauten: OUSTERHOUT 1985; OUSTERHOUT / BAKIRTZIS 2007, 23–31 sowie ebenda 42–4; KARWIESE 2021 jeweils mit weiterer Literatur. Zu den spätantik/frühbyzantinischen Bauelemente s. OUSTERHOUT 1985, 278, Nr. 1–5, Abb. 12 bzw. die Abbildungen in den Grabungsberichten: BAŞARAN / KURAP 2014, 230, Abb. 11; BAŞARAN ET AL. 2016, 433–4, Abb. 9, 12–3; BAŞARAN ET AL. 2017, 50–1, Abb. 12–3. 15. 147 KÜLZER 2007. 2008. 148 KÜLZER 2007, 354. 149 KÜLZER 2007, 354–7 mit Abb. 150 KÜLLZER 2008, 202 zum Verlauf der Straße. Spolien werden EBD. 301 (Büyükevren). 437–8 (Karaincirli). 694 (Yayla) erwähnt. 151 Ptol. 3,11,13; Itin. Ant. 333,7; Tab. Peut. VII 5. Befestigungsarbeiten überliefert Prok. de aed. 4,10,20, zudem die Erwähnung im Synekdemos (Hier. 634,1). Ausführlich KÜLZER 2008, 254 mit weiterer Literatur. 152 Eine Diskussion der Quellen bei KAHRSTEDT 1954, 69–74. Er lässt die Frage der Lokalisierung der colonia offen, hält aber eine Identifikation von Kallipolis mit Flaviopolis für möglich. Zur
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vermeintliche Leere des Küstenstreifens zwischen Hebros und Melas bis zur Spätantike als ein Forschungsdesiderat. Es wäre auch zu prüfen, ob ungünstige hydrologische Verhältnisse in der Antike eine Besiedlung verhindert haben könnten bzw. landschaftliche Veränderungen (z. B. Landsenkungen) zum Verschwinden älterer Siedlungsreste beigetragen haben könnten153. 4.4 Eine abgehängte Region? In einem kürzlich erschienenen Beitrag von M. KARAMBINIS wird ein düsteres Bild von der Situation der Hafenstädte im griechischen Teil Thrakiens in der Kaiserzeit gezeichnet. Resultierend auf einer Betrachtung von baulichen Aktivitäten, vor allem der besiedelten Fläche und der Existenz von öffentlichen Bauten sowie der städtischen Münzprägung finden sich Maroneia noch in der 3. und Abdera in der 4. Kategorie der von ihm entworfenen, fünf Kategorien umfassenden Hierarchie der Städte. Dabei ist ein deutliches Gefälle zu den makedonischen Städten zu erkennen, was auch für das thrakische Hinterland mit den „Neugründungen“ Topeiros, Traianoupolis und Plotinoupolis gilt, die ebenfalls in der 4. Kategorie aufgelistet werden154. Ebenso schlecht wurde die Situation im kaiserzeitlichen Ainos von M. L. STRACK schon im frühen 20. Jahrhundert bewertet, wobei er von der vereinzelten Prägetätigkeit ausging und die „Versumpfung der Hebrosmündung“ sowie die daraus folgende Änderung bei Handelswegen für den Abstieg der Stadt verantwortlich machte155. Negative Einschätzungen zur Entwicklung der Siedlungen herrschen allgemein vor, wie bereits oben dargelegt wurde. Es steht natürlich außer Frage, dass die politische und ökonomische Bedeutung der alten Hafenstädte an der südthrakischen Küste nicht mit derjenigen in Klassischer Zeit vergleichbar ist. Auch die Anzahl der Hafenstädte hat sich sicherlich reduziert, wie die archäologischen Zeugnisse zeigen. Die traditionellen Poleis Abdera, Maroneia und Ainos, auf denen hier der Fokus liegen soll, bestanden allerdings kontinuierlich bis in die byzantinische Zeit fort. Als problematisch für eine Beurteilung erweist sich der archäologische Forschungs- bzw. Publikationsstand für die drei Städte. Während für Abdera und Maroneia zumindest noch Grundrisse einzelner Gebäude vorliegen, ist aus Ainos kaum ein antiker Bau bekannt. Aber auch für Abdera und Maroneia erscheint fraglich, worauf sich die Berechnung der Siedlungsfläche von KARAMBINIS gründet. Ebenso ist die Frage nach der Anzahl möglichen Gleichsetzung von Aphrodisias mit der colonia Flaviopolis z. B. JONES 1971, 17. Auch im Barrington Atlas (Map 51) wurde dies übernommen, s. BORZA 2000, 773. 153 Hierzu liegen m. W. keine geoarchäologischen Daten vor. Die jüngste Studie zur Entwicklung des Meeresspiegels in der Region (SEELIGER ET AL. 2021) lässt sich nicht verallgemeinern, vielmehr müssten für eine Beurteilung der Verhältnisse östlich von Kap Sarpedon lokale Daten gewonnen werden. 154 KARAMBINIS 2020, 459–63 mit Tab. 14.5. Die Kategorie 1 mit einer Siedlung von 110 ha wurde nur von Thessalonike als Provinzhauptstadt eingenommen, für die folgenden Kategorien wurden Flächen von 40–65 ha (2), 20–40 ha (3), ca. 20 ha (4) sowie 1–20 ha (5) angesetzt. 155 Ainos: STRACK 1912, 143.
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der öffentlichen Gebäude kaum beantwortbar, wenn nur Ausschnitte von Siedlungen bekannt sind. Somit erscheint es ratsam, Schlussfolgerungen e silentio zu vermeiden. Resümiert man die bereits oben behandelten Zeugnisse für bauliche Aktivitäten auch unter Berücksichtigung von Inschriften und Architekturteilen, so ergeben sich für die drei großen Hafenstädte eindeutige Hinweise für Neubauten, insbesondere Tempel. Gerade für Ainos konnte gezeigt werden, dass es möglich ist, mit Architekturteilen die Existenz von Großbauten auch ohne Grundrisse zu erschließen. Verwiesen sei zudem auf die Indizien für Gladiatorenspiele in Abdera und Maroneia, die auf Gemeinwesen von einem gewissen Wohlstand sowie eine intakte Infrastruktur für die Durchführung dieser Spiele, im Falle von Maroneia direkt durch Umbauten im Theater belegt, schließen lassen. Für die Spätantike ist zudem auf die staatlichen Bauaktivitäten hinzuweisen, die sich insbesondere in Ainos nachweisen lassen. Bemerkenswerterweise ist Ainos die einzige der alten Hafenstädte die bei den von Prokop überlieferten Befestigungsmaßnahmen genannt wird. Ansonsten sind diese eher für die Hafenstädte an der thrakischen Ostküste156 bzw. im südlichen Thrakien entlang der Via Egnatia (Traianoupolis, Maximianoupolis) überliefert157. Sowohl an dieser Verkehrsverbindung gelegen, als auch mit einem Zugang zum Meer ausgestattet, geriet, wie geschildert, Anastasioupolis in den Fokus der Administration. Ainos nahm aber sicherlich von allen genannten Orten eine Sonderrolle ein, wenn man die anhand von Bauelementen zu erschließenden Kirchenbauten berücksichtigt. Abdera, Maroneia und Ainos haben in der Kaiserzeit eigene Münzen geprägt, wenn auch in unterschiedlichem Umfang. Herausgehoben ist die Münzprägung von Maroneia. Die Münzemissionen reichen mit Unterbrechungen von der Mitte des 1. Jahrhunderts unter Nero bis zur Regierungszeit von Trebonianus Gallus im Jahr 253 n. Chr.158. Im Vergleich dazu war die Prägetätigkeit der beiden anderen traditionellen Hafenstädte schwächer. Die kaiserzeitliche Münzprägung von Abdera reicht immerhin noch von Tiberius bis Antoninus Pius, wobei ein Schwerpunkt in die traianische Zeit fällt159. Für Ainos sind hingegen lediglich einige pseudo-autonome Prägungen des 1. bis 2. Jahrhunderts n. Chr. sowie eine Emission unter Caracalla bekannt160. Es fragt sich natürlich, inwieweit die Prägetätigkeit als Spiegel der Prosperität in der Hohen Kaiserzeit interpretiert werden darf. Im Falle von Maroneia lässt sich dies sicherlich positiv beantworten, allerdings bestehen für ein solches Vorgehen bezüglich Abdera und Ainos Zweifel, da auch andere Gemeinwesen in Thrakien nur in begrenztem Umfang in der Kaiserzeit Münzen prägten161. SCHMIDTS 2018, 299–300 bzw. SCHMIDTS 2021, 228–30 mit Nachweisen. Prok. de aed. 4,11,10–3. SCHÖNERT-GEISS 1987, 85–8. 214–20 (Periode XI). CHRYSSANTHAKI-NAGLE 2007, 326–81 (Periode XIV). Eine tabellarische Übersicht zur kaiserzeitlichen Emissionen EBD. 374, Tab. 8. 160 STRACK 1912, 199–200 (Periode VIII) mit dem Hinweis, dass auch ein Teil der Münzen der vorhergehenden Prägeperiode (VII) bereits in die Kaiserzeit datieren könnte. 161 Dies gilt etwa für die vorgelagerten Inseln Thasos, Samothrake und Imbros, die nur eine geringe bzw. keine (Samothrake) Prägetätigkeit für die Kaiserzeit aufwiesen. Auch für den thrakischen
156 157 158 159
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Hier ist noch der Vergleich zu den Neugründungen im südlichen Thrakien entlang der Via Egnatia interessant. Die relativ umfangreiche Münzprägung von Traianoupolis, die diejenige von Maroneia hinsichtlich Typen und Stempel übertrifft, erstreckt sich von der Regierungszeit Mark Aurels bis zu Gordian III162. Auch für Topeiros lässt sich von Antoninus Pius bis zu den Severern eine variantenreiche Prägetätigkeit nachweisen, deren Umfang allerdings bislang nicht abzuschätzen ist163. Der lokale Münzumlauf des 1. bis 3. Jahrhunderts n. Chr., der in zwei kürzlich erschienenen Beiträgen thematisiert wurde164, gibt wichtige Hinweise auf die Vernetzung der Hafenstädte. Für Abdera und Maroneia lässt sich ein recht einheitliches Bild gewinnen. Bei den Provinzialprägungen kommen neben den jeweiligen aus der Stadt selbst solche aus Thrakien am häufigsten vor (Abb. 11). Unter diesen kommen auffällig häufig solche der jeweils benachbarten Küstenstadt (Prägungen von Abdera in Maroneia und vice versa) sowie aus Topeiros vor, in Abdera auch noch diejenigen aus Thasos. Darüber hinaus spielen in den Münzspektren der beiden Gemeinwesen makedonische Prägungen eine bedeutende Rolle, wobei Münzen von Philippi dominieren. Prägungen aus Kleinasien und Moesien sind hingegen rar165. Aufgrund der stark unterschiedlichen Quantitäten verwundert es nicht, dass in Abdera mehr Prägestätten vertreten sind. Da, wie bereits gesagt, die Tendenzen auf die Regionen bezogen vergleichbar sind, dürfte das Fundbild auch für Maroneia repräsentativ sein. Es sei noch darauf hingewiesen, dass in Maroneia relativ häufig Reichsprägungen im Verhältnis zu den Stadtprägungen vorkommen166. Ainos zeigt allerdings ein anderes Bild. Dort stehen wenige Provinzialprägungen einer größeren Menge von Reichsprägungen gegenüber167. Bei den Provinzialprägungen dominieren diejenigen aus Kleinasien, während Thrakien lediglich mit Münzen aus Ainos präsent ist. Darüber hinaus ist noch jeweils eine einzelne Prägung aus Iudaea und dem nördlichen Syrien bekannt. Zwei Drittel der Münzen aus Kleinasien wurden in
162 163 164 165 166 167
Küstenabschnitt von Ainos bis Elaious sind auf der Karte der „Roman Provincial Coinage online“ Website keine Prägestätten verzeichnet: https://rpc.ashmus.ox.ac.uk/map (02.04.2023); ebenso die Karte für das 2. bis 3. Jh. bei KOMNICK 2021, 538, Abb. 2, die Imbros unberücksichtigt lässt, da die dortige Münzstätte nur im frühen 1. Jh. prägte. SCHÖNERT-GEIß 1991, 139–83. Ein Prägecorpus für Topeiros existiert bislang nicht. Der Verweis von TASAKLAKI 2018, 280 sowie KOMNICK 2021, 544 auf die relative Häufigkeit der Fundmünzen könnte einen Hinweis auf eine mit Maroneia vergleichbaren Umfang der Emissionen geben. TASAKLAKI 2018; KOMNICK 2021. TASAKLAKI 2018, 281, Tab. 1. Da in der Tabelle KOMNICK 2021, 549–50 wesentlich weniger Münzen erfasst wurden, beziehen sich die Ausführungen auf die Angaben bei TASAKLAKI. TASAKLAKI 2018, 282, Tab. 2 mit einer Übersicht zu den Reichsprägungen. Ohne spätantike und unbestimmte Prägungen ergeben sich für Abdera 69 sowie für Maroneia 17 Stücke. Das Verhältnis zu den Stadtprägungen entspricht etwa für Abdera 1:12,6 und für Maroneia 1:3,1. Die Funde wurden von TEKIN 2007 vorgelegt mit einer tabellarischen Aufschlüsselung der kaiserzeitlichen Prägungen EBD. 600: 162 Reichsprägungen (ohne Spätantike) stehen 19 Provinzialprägungen gegenüber, was ein Verhältnis 1:0,1 (bzw. Provinzialprägung zur Reichsprägung 1:8,5) entspricht. Auf der Arbeit von TEKIN beruhen auch die Angaben bei KOMNICK 2021, 539–40. 552, Tab. 3. 553, Abb. 5 allerdings mit leicht abweichenden Zahlenwerten.
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der Troas, bis auf eine Ausnahme in Alexandreia Troas geprägt. Diese in der Kaiserzeit prosperierende Hafenstadt war ein wichtiger Verkehrsknotenpunkt in der Nordägäis168. Auch wenn die geringe Anzahl der Münzen zur Vorsicht mahnt, zeichnet sich dennoch für Ainos eine stärkere Verbindung nach Kleinasien als zu den westlich gelegenen Hafenstädten bzw. zur Provinz Makedonien ab, die für die Fundspektren aus Maroneia und Abdera charakteristisch war. Die wirtschaftlichen Grundlagen der Hafenstädte in der Kaiserzeit lassen sich bislang nur in groben Zügen ermitteln, da archäologische Daten in geringem Umfang zur Verfügung stehen. Ihre Prosperität in den älteren Perioden beruhte in erster Linie auf dem Austausch mit dem thrakischen Binnenland, das Sklaven und Rohstoffe bereitstellte und im Gegenzug mit mediterranen Waren versorgt wurde, was sich auch in der Verbreitung ägäischer Amphoren zeigt169. Maroneia war berühmt für seinen Wein. Allerdings ist die Sitte der Amphorenstempelung, die eine eindeutige Zuweisung erlaubt, nur kurzfristig im 5. Jahrhundert v. Chr. nachweisbar, so dass darüber hinaus keine Aussagen zum Exportraum möglich sind170. Immerhin wird der Wein aus Maroneia noch bei Plinius in Berufung auf C. Licinius Crassus Mucianus (cos. 67, 70, 72 n. Chr.) erwähnt171. Auch für Ainos ist eine Weinproduktion anhand von Amphorenstempeln aus klassischer Zeit nachgewiesen172. Hinweise auf eine Kontinuität bis in die Kaiserzeit fehlen bzw. sind bezüglich einer literarischen Erwähnung des Endes des lokalen Weinbaus aufgrund einer Klimaverschlechterung nicht eindeutig173. Dafür war Ainos für seinen Weizen so bekannt, dass Plinius die dort angebaute Sorte in einem Abschnitt zu den Weizenarten anführt174. Dies spricht für ein ertragreiches Umland, was angesichts des fruchtbaren Schwemmlandes in der Hebrosebene nicht verwundert. Überdies trugen wohl maritime Ressourcen zum Wohlstand der Hafenstädte bei, da sowohl Ainos als auch Abdera und Maroneia für bestimmte Fischarten bzw. Meeresfrüchte berühmt 168 FEUSER 2009 zum Hafen und der maritimen Bedeutung von Alexandria Troas. Die Reise von Paulus von dort über Samothrake nach Neapolis (Apg. 16,11) belegt die Verbindungen in den südthrakischen und ostmakedonischen Küstenraum. 169 ARCHIBALD 2013 umfassend zur wirtschaftlichen Entwicklung der Region in vorrömischer Zeit. TZOCHEV 2010 zur Verbreitung der gestempelten Amphoren, die insbesondere den Hebros als Verkehrsachse hervorheben. 170 LAWALL 2010, 50 zur Gleichförmigkeit der Formen in der Nordägäis und der Stempelsitte. 171 Plin. nat. 14,53–4; OBERHUMMER 1930, 1912 mit weiteren Nachweisen. 172 KAYGUSUZ / ERZEN 1986; KARADIMA 2004. 173 Für Plin. nat. 17,30, existiert neben der in den meisten Ausgaben geläufigen Version (z. B. Übers. R. KÖNIG: „(Die Stadt) Ainos bekam, als der Hebros ihr näherrückte, einen Anstieg der Temperatur zu spüren“) noch eine weitere Vorlage, die ein Ende des Weinbaus aufgrund einer Klimaverschlechterung nennt; vgl. Pliny, Natural History, Volume II: Books 3–7 (ed. H. RACKHAM 1942), 22, Anm. 2. Diese Version findet sich in der Übersetzung von WITTSTEIN (1881; neu bearbeitet und hrsg. von L. MÜLLER / M. VOGEL 2007): „Ebenso erfroren um dieselbe Zeit die Weinstöcke der Stadt Aenos, als der Hebros näher geleitet war.“ Angesichts des bekannt kalten Klimas von Ainos (s. Athen. Deipn. 8,351) erscheint dieser Kontext durchaus nachvollziehbar, zumal kalte Winde von Norden her kommen und die Erwähnung eines verbesserten Mikroklimas der Stadt durch eine Änderung des Flusslaufes ohne weitere Folgen für die Landwirtschaft wenig sinnvoll erscheint. 174 Plin. nat. 18,70.
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waren175. Zudem ist für Abdera auch eine kaiserzeitliche Purpurfärberei in Hafennähe (s. o.) und eine reiche Meeresfauna durch Funde belegt176. Weitere Aufschlüsse zu den Fernhandelsverbindungen lassen sich anhand von Keramikfunden gewinnen. Allerdings liegen Erkenntnisse zu relevanten Keramikspektren nur punktuell vor. Zur Feinkeramik, insbesondere zu Terra Sigillata-Funden, sind Fundspektren aus Abdera und Ainos bekannt. In Abdera wurden die Funde eines vom 1. Jahrhundert v. Chr. bis zum frühen 4. Jahrhundert n. Chr. bewohnten Hauses vorgelegt. Der Schwerpunkt des Spektrums lag auf Waren aus dem 2. und 3. Jahrhundert n. Chr. (Eastern Sigillata B und C). Darüber hinaus konnte auch in geringerem Maße Feinkeramik aus Zypern, Italien und Nordafrika (African Red Slip Ware) und vom Schwarzen Meer nachgewiesen werden177. Auch in den Funden von Ainos, die von mehreren Ausgrabungsstellen in der Stadt stammen, dominieren die Waren aus Kleinasien (Eastern Sigiallata B und C), wobei hier die spätantike Phocaean Red Slip Ware ebenfalls sehr präsent ist. Aus dem Westen stammen vereinzelte kaiserzeitliche Vertreter der italischen Sigillata sowie eine beachtliche Menge nordafrikanischer Terra Sigillata, die hier fast ausschließlich in die Spätantike datiert178. Die nordafrikanischen und spätantiken kleinasiatischen Waren sind in Ainos bis zu deren Ende im späten 6. bis frühen 7. Jahrhundert n. Chr. nachweisbar. Deren starke Präsenz im Vergleich zu Abdera erklärt sich einerseits durch die Aufgabe von Siedlungsarealen in Abdera bereits im frühen 4. Jahrhundert n. Chr. und andererseits wohl auch durch den Boom, den Ainos in der Spätantike erlebte179. Bemerkenswert ist ebenfalls das Spektrum der spätantiken Amphoren von der Molyvoti-Halbinsel, dem mutmaßlichen Stryme180. Von dem nach einer längeren Siedlungsunterbrechung im 2. oder 3. Jahrhundert n. Chr. wieder besiedelten Areal wurden spätantike Amphorenfunde aus zwei Surveykampagnen untersucht. Die 175 Athen. Deipn. 3,92d (Ainos, Miesmuscheln); 3,118c (Abdera, Äschen); 7,285f (Ainos, Sardellen); 7,307b (Abdera, Meeräschen); 7,324b (Abdera und Maroneia, Tintenfisch); 7,326f (Ainos, Schollen). Die Bezeichnungen nach der Übersetzung von F. FRIEDRICH (1998, 1999), bei 7,285f wird als „ainatides“ ohne Bezug zur Stadt übersetzt, hingegen „from Ainos“ bei Ch. B. GULICK (1929, LOEB). ARCHIBALD 2013, 294 zur ökonomischen Bedeutung von Meerestieren in den Küstenzonen der Nordägäis. 176 KALLINTZI 2022, 130 zusammenfassend mit weiterer Literatur. Die faunistischen Reste stammen aus der westlichen Bucht der nördlichen Festung, datieren somit in die vorrömische Zeit. 177 Die Funde wurden vorgelegt von MALAMIDOU 2005. Zum Ausgrabungsbefund EBD. 22–4, zusammenfassend zum Keramikspektrum EBD. 81–2 sowie detaillierte Angaben zu den einzelnen Warenarten EBD. 77–81. Hinzu kommt noch die Vorlage eines gestempelten italischen Terra Sigillata-Gefäßes von PAPAIOANNOU 2010. Auf dieser Datengrundlage basieren die Tabellen zu den einzelnen Warenarten bei BES 2015, 186–7. 194, wobei allerdings die zypriotischen Produkte (LRD) zu fehlen scheinen. 178 Zu den Funden aus Ainos, die auf einer systematischen Erfassung von Funden aus dem Depot des Grabungshauses in den Jahren 2013/2014 beruhen, liegen erste zusammenfassende Beiträge vor: LÄTZER-LASAR 2016; SCHMIDTS ET AL. 2020, 361–4. Die Vorlage der Funde mit Katalog steht noch aus. 179 SCHMIDTS ET AL. 2020, 363–4 mit Abb. 43 anhand eines Vergleiches des Fundspektrums von Ainos mit demjenigen der Nordägäis nach BES 2015. 180 MOWAT 2016 anhand der Surveyfund der Feldkampagnen 2014 und 2015.
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Amphorentypen, die zwischen dem 2. und frühen 6. Jahrhundert n. Chr. datieren, lassen, wie die zuvor behandelte Feinkeramik, einen weitreichenden Belieferungsradius erkennen: Ägäis mit Kleinasien, Kilikien/Zypern, Nordafrika und der Schwarzmeerraum181. Dieses Spektrum belegt, dass sogar eine kleine Siedlung an der südthrakischen Küste in der Kaiserzeit noch an den überregionalen Fernhandel angebunden war, was für die alten Hafenstädte umso mehr gelten muss. Ausgehend von den dargelegten Hinweisen auf bauliche Aktivitäten und die ökonomische Vernetzung spricht wenig dafür, dieser Region in der Hohen Kaiserzeit oder in der Spätantike ökonomische Schwierigkeiten oder gar ein Niedergangszenario zu attestieren. Vielmehr profitierte sie wohl von der wirtschaftlichen Vernetzung mitunter weit entfernter Akteure in der Kaiserzeit182. Dies ist ein genereller Trend, der lokal unterschiedlich ausgeprägt sein konnte. Gerade für die Spätantike zeigt sich eine eigene lokale Dynamik mit einem auffälligen Bauboom in Ainos und einer maßgeblich durch naturräumliche Veränderungen bewirkten Siedlungsreduzierung in Abdera. Mit Blick auf die Funde aus Ainos und Molyvoti scheinen von dem in weiten Teilen der Ägäis feststellbaren späten wirtschaftlichen Boom zumindest auch Abschnitte der südthrakischen Küstenregion profitiert zu haben183. 5. Resümee Betrachtet man den Küstenabschnitt des südlichen Thrakiens in seiner Gesamtheit, zeichnen sich für den relevanten Zeitabschnitt folgende Tendenzen ab: Zunächst einmal ist die Resilienz der großen Hafenstädte Ainos, Maroneia und Abdera hervorzuheben. Obwohl sie sicherlich im Vergleich mit der klassischen Zeit in der Kaiserzeit eine geringere ökonomische und politische Bedeutung besaßen, bestanden sie – mit den auch andernorts bekannten Einschränkungen – bis in die spätbyzantinische Zeit. Neben Maroneia, das als führende Stadt in der Kaiserzeit gilt, dürfte insbesondere für Ainos, aber auch für Abdera gelten, dass ein postulierter Niedergang in dieser Phase zu relativieren ist. Vielmehr führte ein gewisser Wohlstand zur Bautätigkeit im öffentlichen und privaten Raum. Darüber hinaus belegen die keramischen Fundspektren eine Integration der südthrakischen Küste in die überregionalen Handelsnetze des Römischen Reiches. Während nach dem Zeugnis der Fundmünzen Abdera und Maroneia eher mit den thrakischen und makedonischen Städten verbunden waren, war Ainos vorrangig nach Kleinasien orientiert. Für Ainos lässt sich zudem eine spätantike Boomphase anhand der Bautätigkeit
181 Das Gesamtspektrum, nach den Grabungskampagnen aufgeschlüsselt: MOWAT 2016, 120, Tab. 16. Dominierend der Funde aus der Ägäis (299), die insbesondere auf Funden der Form „Late Roman 2“ beruht. Daneben sind die Funde aus dem ostmediterranen Raum, gemeint ist Kilikien/Zypern (160) mit der Form „Late Roman 1“, Nordafrika (49) insb. mit der Form „Keay 62“, der Schwarzmeerraum (36) mit der Form „Zeest 80“. 182 Es sei auf das Konzept der Interaktion von Mikroökonomien im Mittelmeerraum verwiesen, das von PURCELL / HORDEN 2000 vertreten wurde. 183 Hierzu z. B. BINTLIFF 2014, der auf die Diversität der regionalen Entwicklungen hinweist.
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erschließen, die ein kaiserliches Interesse an der Stadt, wohl aufgrund der günstigen Lage an der Hebrosmündung, belegt. Im Gegensatz dazu erlebten kleinere ältere Poleis bereits ab dem 4. Jahrhundert v. Chr. einschneidende Veränderungen, die, wenn man den Ergebnissen archäologischer Forschung für die Molyvoti-Halbinsel (wohl Stryme) und Zone folgt, mit einem Bevölkerungsschwund einherging. Andererseits belegen archäologische Hinterlassenschaften im Küstensaum zwischen Ismaros und Makri kleinere kaiserzeitliche Küstensiedlungen. Mit Makri beginnt dann der Küstenabschnitt, durch den die Via Egnatia führte. Sie bildete die Grundlage für die Existenz kleinerer Siedlungen, die sich in den Itinerarien finden. Zu diesen zählt auch Tempyra (Alexandroupolis), für das sich aufgrund der Inschriften und Funde eine prosperierende Phase in der Kaiserzeit abzeichnet. Zudem lässt sich für das nahe dem Hebros gelegene Gebiet noch in dieser Epoche eine Zugehörigkeit zur Samothrakischen Peraia belegen. Bemerkenswert ist die Entwicklung ab der fortgeschrittenen Hohen Kaiserzeit mit der Wiederbesiedlung älterer, mutmaßlich zwischenzeitlich verlassener Küstenstädte, die sich für Stryme (Molyvoti-Halbinsel) sowie für Zone abzeichnet. Auch in frühbyzantinischer Zeit scheint sich diese Tendenz fortzusetzen, wenn man die Befunde in Synaxis einbezieht. Östlich von Ainos bis zum Melas ist aufgrund des Forschungsstandes die Situation jedoch kaum zu beurteilen. Eine Siedlungsleere dürfte allerdings wenig wahrscheinlich sein, insbesondere auch hinsichtlich der Zeugnisse ab der mittelbyzantinischen Epoche.
Thomas Schmidts Leibniz-Zentrum für Archäologie Ludwig-Lindenschmit-Forum 1 55116 Mainz [email protected]
Die südthrakische Küste in der römischen Kaiserzeit Abbildungen
Abb. 1 Barrington Atlas: Südliches Thrakien mit vorgelagerten Inseln.
Abb. 2 Tabula Imperii Romani: Südthrakische Küste.
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Abb. 3 Tabula Imperii Byzantini: Westlicher Abschnitt der südthrakischen Küsten.
Abb. 4 Tabula Imperii Byzantini: Östlicher Abschnitt der südthrakischen Küsten.
Die südthrakische Küste in der römischen Kaiserzeit
Abb. 5 Ausschnitt aus der Tabula Peutingeriana mit der Hafenstadt Ainos in der Mitte.
Abb. 6 Abdera. Übersichtsplan.
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Abb. 7 Anastasioupolis. Übersichtsplan mit Hafentor (1) und mutmaßlicher Hafenmauer (2).
Abb. 8 Maroneia. Plan mit antiken und byzantinischen Bauten.
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Abb. 9 Zeugnisse kaiserzeitl. od. byzantin. Besiedlung zw. Maroneia und Makri: 1 Maroneia; 2 Synaxi; 3 Hagios Georgios; 4 Mikros Elaionas; 5 Paralia Petroton; 6 Byzantintinischer Turm; 7 Fundstellen (Moussa Vryssi, Hamam-geri, Kakliki), ungef. Lage; 8 Zone (Archäolog. Park); 9 Mesimvria; 10 Spätröm. Grabfunde (ungefähre Lage); 11 Dikella; 12 Makri.
Abb. 10 Ainos. Karte des Stadtgebiets mit archäol. Befunden (Auswahl): 4 byzant. Burg; 5 byzant. Kirche (später Fatih Camii); 6 byzant. Befestigungsmauer mit Türmen; 9 sog. röm. Villa; 12-13 antike Stadtmauer (Geophysik); 17 byzant. Kirche (Kral Kızı Kilisesi).
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Abb. 11 Spektren der in den Hafenstädte Abdera, Maroneia und Ainos gefundenen Provinzialprägungen im Vergleich. Nach Herkunftsregionen (links) bzw. nach thrakischen Prägestätten (rechts).
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Nestos Abdera Bistonis-See Anastasioupolis Dikaia Xantheia Parthenion Phalesina Maroneia Stehnos-Fluss Ismaros / Isamara Ismaron Ismaris See Orthagoreia Kap Serrheion Drys Zone Sale Tempyra Charakoma Doriskos Hebros Hafen des Stentor Ainos Kap Sarpedon Melas Golf von Melas
X X X
X X X
X X X
X X
Spätant. Listen
Itineraria
Ptolemaios
Mela
Plinius
Strabon
Ps.Skylax
Die südthrakische Küste in der römischen Kaiserzeit
X X X N
X
X
X X
X
X X X
X
X
X X X
X X
X
X
X
X X X X X X X X X
X
X X X X
X X
X
S, N
IB IA, IB X X X X X X
X
TP
S, N
X X
Tab. 1 Erwähnungen von Ortsnamen, Flüssen, Seen und speziellen Küstenverläufen entlang der südthrakischen Küste in ausgewählten Schriftquellen (IA=Itinerarium Antonini; IB=Itinerarium Burdigalense; TP=Tabula Peutingeriana; N=Notita Episcopatuum; S= Synekdemos des Hierokles).
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KALLINTZI, C. 2018. The Roman city of Abdera and its territory, in: VAGALINSKI ET AL. 2018, 21– 30. KALLINTZI, C. 2022: Abdera: The sea matters. Did the city make its harbours, or did the harbours make their city?, in: SCHMIDTS / TRIANTAFILLIDIS 2022a, 115–35. KARADIMA, Ch. 2004. Ainos, an unknown amphora production centre in the Evros delta, in: J. EIRING / J. LUND (eds), Transport amphorae and trade in the Eastern Mediterranean, Acts of the International Colloquium at the Danish Institute at Athens, 26–29 September 2002, Athens, 155–61. KARADIMA, Ch. 2008. The excavations at Maroneia, History of the archaeological research, in: PSOMA ET AL. 2008, lvii–lxxviii. KARADIMA, Ch. / PSOMA, S. 2008. The excavations coins of Maroneia. A preliminary report, in: Η Θρακε στoν ελληνo-ρωμαϊκo κoσμo. Πρακτικα τoυ 10oυ διεθνoυς συνεδριoυ Θρακoλoγιας. Koμoτηνι, Aλεξανδρoυπoλε, 18-23 oκτωβριoυ 2005. Thrace in the Graeco-Roman world. Proceedings of the 10th International Congress of Thracology. Komotini, Alexandroupolis 18–23 October 2005. Athina, 291–8. KARADIMA, Ch. / ZAMBAS, C. / CHATZIDAKIS, N. / THOMAS, G. / DOUDOUMI, E. 2015. The Ancient Theatre at Maroneia, in: R. FREDERIKSEN / E. R. GEBHARD / A. SOKOLICEK (eds.), The architecture of the ancient Greek theatre (Monographs of the Danish Institute at Athens 17), Aarhus, 253–66. KARAMBINIS, M. 2020. Urban networks in early Roman Macedonia and Aegean Thrace, in: L. DE LIGT / J. L. BINTLIFF (eds.), Regional urban systems in the Roman world, 150 BCE - 250 CE, Leiden / Boston, 440–81. KARWIESE, St. 2021. Bauliche Besonderheiten in der Pantokratorkirche von Ainos (Thakien), in: K. KOLLER / U. QUATEMBER / E. TRINKEL (eds.), Stein auf Stein. Festschrift für Hilke Thür zum 80. Geburtstag (Keryx 9), Graz, 44–53. KAYGUSUZ, I. 1986. Neue Inschriften aus Ainos (Enez), Epigraphica Anatolica 8, 65–70. KAZAROW, G. 1918. Zur Archäologie Thrakiens. Archäologischer Anzeiger 1918, 1–63. KOKKOTAKI, N. 2003. Ρωμαϊκή Μαρώνεια: έρευνα και ανάδειξη. To Archaiologiko Ergo sti Makedonia kai Thraki 17, 13–6. KAYGUSUZ, I. / ERZEN, A. 1986. Stempel auf Amphorenhenkeln aus Ainos (Enez), Epigraphica Anatolica 7, 1986, 7–16. KOMNICK, H. 2021. Lokales Geld - lokaler Umlauf - lokale Zielgruppen? Die thrakischen Städteprägungen der römischen Kaiserzeit im Spiegel des Münzumlaufs der Provinz Thracia, in U. PETER / V. F. STOLBA, Thrace. Local coinage and regional identity, Berlin, 535–86. KÜLZER, A. 2007. Die Küstengestade des Golfs von Saros und der thrakischen Chersones von der Antike bis zur frühen Neuzeit: einige Anmerkungen, in: K. BELKE (ed.), Byzantina Mediterranea. Festschrift für Johannes Koder zum 65. Geburtstag, Wien / Köln / Weimar, 353–63. KÜLZER, A. 2008. Ostthrakien (Eurōpē) (Tabula Imperii Byzantini 12 = Österreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften, Philosophisch-Historische Klasse, Denkschriften 369), Wien. KUNNERT, U. 2012. Bürger unter sich. Phylen in den Städten des kaiserzeitlichen Ostens (Schweizerische Beiträge zur Altertumswissenschaft 39), Basel. KYRIAKIDES, St. P. 1931. Θρακικά ταξείδια. Μπουρού-Καλέ - Αναστασιούπολις - Περιθεώριον, Imerologion Megalis Elladas 1931, 195–220. LÄTZER-LASAR, A. 2016. Das römische Handelsnetz von Ainos: Ausgewählte Keramik vom Späthellenismus bis zur Spätantike, Rei Cretariae Romanae Fautorum Acta 44, 707–14. LAVAN, L. 2001. The praetoria of civil governors in Late Antiquity, in: L. LAVAN (ed.), Recent research in Late Antique urbanism (Journal of Roman Archaeology Supplement Series 42), Portsmouth, Rhode Island, 39–56. LAWALL, M. L. 2010. Imitative amphoras in the Greek World. Marburger Beiträge zur antiken Handels-, Wirtschafts- und Sozialgeschichte 28, 2010, 45–88. LAZARIDIS, D. 1971. Άβδηρα και Δίκαια. Αρχαίες ελληνικές πόλεις 6, Athens.
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LOUKOPOULOU, L. 2004. Thrace from Nestos to Hebros, in: M. H. HANSEN / Th. H. NIELSEN (eds), An inventory of archaic and classical poleis, New York, 870–84. LOUKOPOULOU, L. D. / PSOMA, S. 2008, Maroneia and Stryme revisited. Some problems of historical topography, in: L. D. LOUKOPOULOU / S. PSOMA (eds.), Thrakika Zetemata I (Meletemata 58), Athens, 55–86. MALAMIDOU, V. 2005. Roman pottery in context: fine and coarse wares from five sites in northeastern Greece (BAR International Series 1386), Oxford. MARTÍNEZ FERNÁNDEZ, Á. 1999. Inscripciones de Eno, Tracia, Fortunatae 11, 55–91. Meyer, E. 1976. Zur Topographie der samothrakischen Peraia: Drys, Mesambria, Orthagoria, Rheinisches Museum Für Philologie, 119/1, 1–3. MOTTAS, F. 1989. Les voies de communication antiques de la Thrace Égéenne, in: H. E. HERZIG / R. FREI-STOLBA (eds.), Labor omnibus unum. Gerold Walser zum 70. Geburtstag dargebracht von Freunden, Kollegen und Schülern (Historia Einzelschriften 60), Stuttgart, 82–104. MOWAT, A. 2016. The Late Roman amphoras of Thrace: the perspective from the Molyvoti Peninsula, MA Thesis University of Manitoba. http://hdl.handle.net/1993/32117 (08.05. 2023). MUNK HØJTE, J. 2005. Roman Imperial statue bases. From Augustus to Commodus (ASMA 7), Aarhus. OBERHUMMER, E. 1930. Maroneia, in: RE XIV.2, 1912–3. OBERHUMMER, E. 1938. Phalesina, in: RE XIX.2, 1668. OUSTERHOUT, R. 1985. The Byzantine church at Enez. Problems in twelfth-century architecture, Jahrbuch der Österreichischen Byzantinistik 35, 261–80. OUSTERHOUT, R. / BAKIRTZIS, Ch. 2007. The Byzantine monuments of the Evros/Meriç river valley, Thessaloniki. PANTOS, P. A. 1983. The present situation of the studies in archaeological topography of western Thrace, Pulpudeva 4, 164–78. PANTOS, P. A. 1989. Ein "königliches" ostgotisches Grab bei Stabulum Diomedis in Thrakien. Erste historische und topographische Gedanken, in: Ch. BAKIRTZIS (ed.), Byzantine Thrace. Image and Character. First International Symposion for Thracian Studies, Komotini, May 28th-31st 1987 (= Byzantinische Forschungen. Internationale Zeitschrift für Byzantinistik 14), Amsterdam, 485–96. PAPAIOANNOU, M. 2010. East meets west: The pottery evidence from Abdera, Bollettino di Archeologia online, Volume Speciale C/C9/5, 53–65. PARISSAKI, M.-G. 2018a. In search of territories in southwestern Thrace: the peraia of Samothrace, the strategy of Korpilike and the civitas of Traianopolis, in: VAGALINSKI ET AL. 2018, 13–20. PARISSAKI, M.-G. 2018b. Rome, le royaume-client Thrace et les cités du littoral Égéen à l’est du Nestos: vers la formation d’une nouvelle réalité, in: J. FOURNIER / M.-G. PARISSAKI (eds.), Les communautés du Nord Égéen au temps de l’hégémonie romaine. Entre ruptures et continuités (Meletēmata 77), Athènes, 29–40. PARISSAKI, M. G. 2022. Aegean Thrace from Greek colonisation to the end of the Roman period, in: SCHMIDTS / TRIANTAFILLIDIS 2022a, 97–114. PSOMA, S. 2008: Psoma, An honorary decree from Thasos (IG XII 8, 267) and the Samothracian Peraia during the Hellenistic period, in: LOUKOPOULOU / PSOMA 2008, 121–38. PSOMA, S. / KARADIMA, Ch. / TERZOPOULOU, D. 2008. The coins from Maroneia and the Classical city at Molyvoti. A contribution to the history of Aegean Thrace (Meletemata 62), Athens. PURCELL, N. / HORDEN, P. 2000. The corrupting sea: a study of Mediterranean history, Oxford / Malden (Mass.). SABA, B. 2018. A problem of historical geography: Orthagoreia in Thrace reconsidered, Ancient Society 48, 103–13. SAMIOU, Ch. 1999. Ancient ports of Abdera in Aegean Τhrace, in: H. TZALAS (ed.), Tropis V, 5th International Symposium on Ship Construction in Antiquity, Nauplia 1993, Athens, 363–8.
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SCHMIDTS, Th. 2018. Die Befestigung des Hafens von Anastasioupolis. Eine justinianische Baumaßnahme in Südthrakien, in: J. FOUQUET / S. HERZOG / K. MEESE / T. WITTENBERG (eds.), Argonautica. Festschrift für Reinhard Stupperich (BOREAS 12), Marsberg / Padberg, 291–302. SCHMIDTS, Th. / BAŞARAN, S. / BOLTEN, A. / BRÜCKNER, H. / BÜCHERL, H. / CRAMER, A. / DAN, A. / DENNERT, M. / ERKUL, E. / HEINZ, G. / KOÇAK, M. / PINT, A. / SEELIGER, M. / TRIANTAFILLIDIS, I. / WILKEN, D. / WUNDERLICH, T. 2020. Die thrakische Hafenstadt Ainos. Ergebnisse eines interdisziplinären Forschungsprojektes. Archäologischer Anzeiger 2020/2, 317–74. SCHMIDTS, Th. 2021. Fortifying Harbour Cities at the Southern Thracian Coast in the Early Byzantine Era. Case Studies on Ainos and Anastasioupolis, in: J. PREISER-KAPELLER / F. DAIM / T. G. KOLIAS (eds.), Seasides of Byzantium (Byzanz zwischen Orient und Okzident 21), Mainz, 219–32. SCHMIDTS, Th. 2022. Neue Forschungsergebnisse zur Topographie des antiken bis frühbyzantinischen Ainos. Eine Bestandsaufnahme im Spiegel von Schriftquellen und Reiseberichten, in: SCHMIDTS / TRIANTAFILLIDIS 2022a, 153–68. SCHMIDTS, Th. / TRIANTAFILLIDIS, I. 2022: Mare Thracium: introduction and acknowlegments, in: SCHMIDTS / TRIANTAFILLIDIS 2022a, 1–9. SCHMIDTS, Th. / TRIANTAFILLIDIS, I. (eds.) 2022a: Mare Thracium. Archaeology and History of Coastal Landscapes and Islands of the Thracian Sea during Antiquity and the Byzantine Era (RGZM Tagungen 47 = Interdisziplinäre Forschungen zu den Häfen von der Römischen Kaiserzeit bis zum Mittelalter in Europa 12), Mainz. SCHÖNERT-GEISS, E. 1987. Die Münzprägung von Maroneia (Griechisches Münzwerk. Schriften zur Geschichte und Kultur der Antike 26), Berlin. SCHÖNERT-GEIß, E. 1991: Die Münzprägung von Augusta Traiana und Traianopolis (Griechisches Münzwerk. Schriften zur Geschichte und Kultur der Antike 31), Berlin. SYRIDES, G. E. / PSILOVIKOS, A. A. 2004. Geoarchaeological investigations in the area of ancient Abdera, in: A. MOUSTAKA / E. SKARLATIDOU / M.-C. TZANNES / Y. ERSOY (eds.), Klazomenai, Teos and Abdera: metropoleis and colony. Proceedings of the International Symposium held at the Archaeological Museum of Abdera, Abdera, 20-21 October 2001 (Thessaloniki 2004), 351–459. SEELIGER, M. / PINT, A. / FRENZEL, P. / WEISENSEEL, P.K. / ERKUL, E. / WILKEN, D. / WUNDERLICH, T. / BAŞARAN, S. / BÜCHERL, H. / HERBRECHT, M. / RABBEL, W. / SCHMIDTS, Th. / SZEMKUS, N. / BRÜCKNER, H. 2018. Using a multi-proxy approach to detect and date a buried part of the Hellenistic city wall of Ainos (NW Turkey), Geosciences 8, 357. https://doi.org/10.3390/geosciences8100357 (10.12.2021). SEELIGER, M. / PINT, A. / FRENZEL, P. / MARRINER, N. / SPADA, G. / VACCHI, M. / BAŞARAN, S. / DAN, A. / SEEGER F. / SEEGER, K. / SCHMIDTS, Th. / BRÜCKNER, H. 2021. Mid- to late-Holocene sea-level evolution of the Northeastern Aegean Sea, The Holocene 31/10, 2021, 1621–43. http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/09596836211025967 (18.05.2023). SOUSTAL, P. 1991. Thrakien (Thrake, Rodope und Haimimontos) (Tabula Imperii Byzantini 6 = Österreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften, Philosophisch-Historische Klasse, Denkschriften 221), Wien. STRACK, M. L. 1912. Die antiken Münzen Nordgriechenlands II.1: Die Münzen Thrakiens 1. Die Münzen der Thraker und der Städte Abdera, Ainos, Anchialos, Berlin. TALBERT, R. J. A. 2000 (ed.). Barrington Atlas of the Greek and Roman World. Atlas, Map-bymap directory I–II, Princeton / Oxford. TASAKLAKI, M. 2018: The presence of Roman and provincial coins in Aegean Thrace: Quantitative and Qualitative Analysis, in: VAGALINSKI ET AL. 2018, 279-288. TEKIN, O. 2007. Excavations coins from Ainos. A preliminary report, in: Thrace in the GraecoRoman world. Proceedings of the 10th International Congress of Thracology. Komotini, Alexandroupolis 18 - 23 October 2005, Athina, 596–601.
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TERZIEV, St. 2017. The cities in Southeastern Thrace and the central government under the last Thracian Kings (27 BC-AD 45), in: D: STOYАNOVA / G. BOYKOV / I. LOZANOV (eds.), Cities in southeastern Thrace: continuity and transformation, Sofia, 131–40. TERZOPOULOU, D. 2018. Roman Thrace: diplomacy and the Greek cities of the Aegean coast, in: VAGALINSKI ET AL. 2018, 111–20. TIVERIOS, M. 2008. Greek colonisation of the Northern Aegean, in: G. R. TSETSKHLADZE (ed.), Greek colonisation. An account of Greek colonies and other settlements overseas II, London / Boston, 1–154. TRIANTAPHYLLOS, D. 2004. Abdera, the Classical and Hellenistic cities, in: A. MOUSTAKA / E. SKARLATIDOU / M.-C. TZANNES / Y. ERSOY (eds.), Klazomenai, Teos and Abdera: metropoleis and colony. Proceedings of the International Symposium held at the Archaeological Museum of Abdera, Abdera, 20-21 October 2001, Thessaloniki, 261–9. TSATSOPOULOU-KALOUDI, P. 2001. Mesembria-Zone, Athens. TSATSOPOULOU-KALOUDI, P. 2015. Εισαγωγή, in: TSATSOPOULOU-KALOUDI ET AL. 2015 (Komotini 2015), 16–112. TSATSOPOULOU-KALOUDI, P. / BRIXHE, C. / PARDALIDOU, Ch. / ILIOPOULOU, S. / KALOUDIS, Κ. / GALANI-KRIKOU, Μ. / ZOURNATZI, Α. / TSELEKAS, P. / VEROPOULIDOU, R. / NIKOLAÏDOU, D. Αρχαία Ζώνη Ι: Το Ιερό του Απόλλωνα, Komotini. TZOCHEV, Ch. 2010. Between the Black Sea and the Aegean. The diffusion of Greek trade amphorae in Southern Thrace, in: D. KASSAB TEZGOR / N. INAISHVILI (eds.), Patabs I. Production and trade of Amphorae in the Black Sea (Istanbul 2010), 97–101. VAGALINSKI, L. / BOTEVA, D. / RAYCHEVA, M. / SHARANKOV, N. (eds), Proceedings of the first international Roman and late antique Thrace conference “Cities, Territories and Identities”, Plovdiv 3rd-7th October 2016. Bulletin of the National Archaeological Institute 44, Sofia. WÖRRLE, M. 2004. Maroneia im Umbruch. Von der hellenistischen zur kaiserzeitlichen Polis. Chiron 34, 149–67. ZAHRNT, M. 2008. Gab es in Thrakien zwei Städte namens Mesambria? Überlegungen zur Samothrakischen Peraia, in: LOUKOPOULOU / PSOMA 2008, 87–120. Bildnachweise Abb. 1 nach TALBERT 2000, Ausschnitt aus Map 51. Abb. 2 nach AVRAMEA 1993, Ausschnitt aus Kartenbeilage. Abb. 3 nach SOUSTAL1991, Ausschnitt aus Kartenbeilage. Abb. 4 nach KÜLZER 2008, Ausschnitt aus Kartenbeilage. Abb. 5 Tabula Peutingeriana. Online. https://tp-online.ku.de/. (29.9.2023) Abb. 6 nach KALLINTZI 2018. Abb. 7 nach BAKIRTZIS 1994, 164. Abb. 8 nach KARADIMA / PSOMA 2008. Abb. 9 TH. SCHMIDTS; Grafik K. HÖLZL; Satellitenbild Google Earth. Abb. 10 nach SCHMIDTS ET AL. 2020. Abb. 11 TH. SCHMIDTS aufgrund der Angaben von TASAKLAKI 2018 und TEKIN 200
SULLE ORME DI FELIX JACOBY TRA CONTINUITÀ E INNOVAZIONE Cronaca del convegno “The ‘Fragments’ of ‘Greek Historians’ – Jacoby and Beyond”, Leiden, 7–8 settembre 2023 Pietro Zaccaria In occasione della ricorrenza dei cent’anni dalla pubblicazione del primo volume della monumentale raccolta di Felix Jacoby (1876–1959) intitolata Die Fragmente der Griechischen Historiker (FGrHist), si è svolto a Leiden, nei giorni 7–8 settembre 2023, il convegno internazionale “The ‘Fragments’ of ‘Greek Historians’ – Jacoby and Beyond”. Come è noto, i 15 volumi dei FGrHist, pubblicati da Jacoby tra il 1923 e il 1958 prima a Berlino per i tipi di Weidmann e successivamente a Leiden per i tipi di Brill, rappresentano, nell’ambito degli studi classici, una delle imprese scientifiche più imponenti e imprescindibili realizzate da un singolo studioso. Superando e sostituendo i Fragmenta Historicorum Graecorum di Karl e Theodor Müller (in cinque volumi pubblicati a Parigi presso Didot tra il 1841 e il 1870),1 Jacoby raccolse, editò, e in gran parte2 commentò, catalogandoli per sottogeneri storiografici, più di 856 storici greci3 le cui opere sopravvivono soltanto in frammenti. Questi storici rappresentano in realtà solo tre delle sei sezioni che avrebbero dovuto far parte dell’opera secondo il piano originario. Mentre Jacoby riuscì a portare a termine l’edizione delle parti 1 (“Genealogie und Mythographie”), 2 (“Zeitgeschichte”)4 e 3 (“Geschichte von Städten und Völkern [Horographie und Ethnographie]”), egli non riuscì a realizzare le parti 4 (“Antiquarische Geschichte und Biographie”, la cui realizzazione aveva affidato a Herbert Bloch), 5 (“Geographie”, affidata a Friedrich Gisinger) e 6 (“Unbestimmbare Autoren. Theorie der Geschichtsschreibung. Autoren und Sachregister”).5 Nonostante la difficoltà oggettiva di portare a termine un’impresa editoriale così ampia e ambiziosa, il grande progetto di Jacoby non si è spento con lui, ma ha trovato vari continuatori, che, in tempi relativamente recenti, ne hanno raccolto 1 2 3 4 5
Oggi disponibili in una nuova edizione interamente digitale a opera di Monica Berti (“DFHG: Digital Fragmenta Historicorum Graecorum”: https://www.dfhg-project.org/). Il commento riguarda gli storici FGrHist 1–607. Commenti a FGrHist 608a e 608 furono pubblicati, sulla base delle note manoscritte di Jacoby, da FORNARA (1994). Un’edizione delle note inedite di Jacoby è in preparazione da parte di Stefan Schorn. FGrHist 1–856 (ma alcuni numeri consistono in a/b). Sul concetto di Jacoby di Zeitgeschichte, vd. recentemente SCHEPENS (2022). Sul dibattito concernente la struttura dei FGrHist, vd. SCHEPENS (2009b); SCHEPENS (2010).
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l’eredità scientifica continuando o sviluppando, in maniera aggiornata rispetto al progresso degli studi, la sua opera. “Continuatori” non sono tanto singoli studiosi (anche questo, un segno del cambiamento dei tempi – Bloch e Gisinger non realizzarono mai le parti IV e V), ma progetti collettivi di dimensione internazionale, diretti da editori in grado di garantirne continuità e uniformità di metodo e intenti. Si tratta, come è noto, dei seguenti progetti (tutti pubblicati digitalmente nella piattaforma Brill’s Jacoby Online).6 1) Die Fragmente der Griechischen Historiker Continued. Part IV: Biography and Antiquarian Literature (FGrHist IV), iniziato negli anni Novanta e diretto prima da Guido Schepens e poi (dal 2009) da Stefan Schorn, si propone di realizzare la sezione IV dei FGrHist, dedicata alla biografia e alla cosiddetta letteratura antiquaria. 2) Die Fragmente der Griechischen Historiker Continued. Part V: Geography (FGrHist V), iniziato anch’esso negli anni Novanta da Hans-Joachim Gehrke e portato avanti in collaborazione con Felix K. Maier, si occupa della realizzazione della parte V dei FGrHist, dedicata ai geografi. 3) Brill’s New Jacoby (BNJ), iniziato nei primi anni Duemila e diretto da Ian Worthington, offre traduzioni in inglese e nuovi commenti ai volumi I-III di Jacoby, nonché, in alcuni casi, edizioni di testi e autori assenti in FGrHist (2006–2021). Dal 2016, è in preparazione la seconda edizione del progetto, intitolata Brill’s New Jacoby, Second Edition (BNJ2), con contributi aggiornati e una rinnovata attenzione all’aspetto (con)testuale dei frammenti. La continuazione e l’aggiornamento dell’opera di Jacoby – FGrHist IV, FGrHist V e BNJ – costituiscono oggi, non meno degli originali FGrHist I–III, un punto di riferimento imprescindibile per gli studiosi di storiografia antica. Scopo della conferenza di Leiden è stato di riunire gli editori delle diverse sezioni dello Jacoby Online, studiosi di storiografia greca e responsabili editoriali della casa editrice Brill, per riflettere insieme sulla storia e sul futuro del progetto, in una realtà in cui l’acquisita centralità della componente digitale è un fatto incontrovertibile che pone nuove sfide e apre varie possibilità. “Storia” e “futuro” del progetto Jacoby hanno rappresentato infatti l’oggetto delle due parti in cui si è articolata la conferenza, intitolate rispettivamente “From Jacoby to Now” e “The Future of Jacoby”. Ian Worthington ha aperto la prima sezione con un intervento intitolato “19 Years Later and Still Going: from FGrHist to BNJ to BNJ 2 to …?”, nel quale ha ripercorso la storia del BNJ dalle origini all’inizio degli anni Duemila – quando nacque con lo scopo primario di rendere accessibili, con commento e traduzione inglese, le fonti primarie della storia greca – a oggi – con il BNJ completato e il BNJ2 già a buon punto. Nonostante il BNJ non sia nato (e non sia tuttora concepito) come una nuova raccolta di frammenti – ha sottolineato Worthington – il progetto 6
Vd. https://scholarlyeditions.brill.com/bnjo/. Le sezioni FGrHist IV e V sono (o saranno) pubblicate anche in forma cartacea.
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include alcuni autori e testi (per es. Herakleides Kritikos [369A] e Kritias of Athens [338A]) non presenti in FGrHist I–III; in questo senso, il BNJ presenta una messe di materiale maggiore rispetto agli originari volumi di Jacoby. Lungi dal voler rendere i FGrHist I–III obsoleti, dunque, il BNJ si pone piuttosto come uno strumento aggiornato alle esigenze dei tempi e al progresso degli studi. I successivi quattro interventi, da parte di Christopher A. Baron, Cinzia Bearzot, Veronica Bucciantini e Franco Montanari, si sono variamente soffermati sulla relazione tra la struttura dei FGrHist e la concezione di Jacoby dello sviluppo della storiografia greca, testimoniata non solo dal famoso articolo del 1909 pubblicato in Klio (Über die Entwicklung der griechischen Historiographie und den Plan einer neuen Sammlung der griechischen Historikerfragmente)7 e dalla struttura stessa dei FGrHist (parzialmente diversa rispetto a quella proposta nel 1909), ma anche da appunti privati e lettere, risalenti a varie fasi della sua vita.8 Tutto questo materiale dimostra come Jacoby abbia impostato la sua raccolta secondo una concezione lineare dello sviluppo della storiografia greca (che avrebbe conosciuto il suo apice con Tucidide), ma anche come lo studioso non abbia mai cessato di interrogarsi sulla collocazione (e quindi sull’interpretazione) di diversi gruppi di autori. La tendenza a concepire gli storici greci di Sicilia e Magna Grecia (tra cui spiccano Antioco e Filisto di Siracusa e Timeo di Tauromenio) come un gruppo di autori di storia locale o regionale – ha mostrato Christopher A. Baron – è forse dovuta alla scelta di Jacoby di inserirli nel volume III B (“Geschichte von Städten und Völkern [Horographie und Ethnographie]. B: Autoren über einzelne Städte [Länder]”); tuttavia, Jacoby stesso dubitò a più riprese se non fosse meglio comprenderli nella sezione dedicata alla Zeitgeschichte.9 I problemi di collocazione di tali autori nascevano dal fatto che le loro opere mal si adattavano alla concezione lineare dello sviluppo della storiografia greca teorizzato da Jacoby. Invece di assegnare agli autori antichi etichette generalizzanti che ne influenzano inevitabilmente l’interpretazione – conclude Baron – si potrebbe oggi caratterizzarli in termini più flessibili ed equilibrati prendendo in considerazione uno spettro di possibili parametri storiografici (definiti da Baron come “metrics for Greek historians”). “Flessibilità” ed “equilibrio” sono ritornati come concetti chiave anche nella relazione di Cinzia Bearzot, dal titolo “Atthidography from F. Jacoby to the BNJ – Political Nature, Historiographical Reception, and More”. In contrasto con l’interpretazione unitaria dell’attidografia proposta da Jacoby (secondo il quale gli attidografi sarebbero stati un gruppo di autori caratterizzato da un marcato interesse politico, che avrebbe influenzato Aristotele e utilizzato una struttura annalistica) la critica posteriore ha avanzato spesso conclusioni opposte, ma altrettanto dogmatiche: come argomentato da Bearzot, sarebbe metodologicamente più opportuno (1) non considerare gli attidografi come un insieme monolitico, (2) non opporre interessi politici e interessi eruditi, (3) ricordare che la probabile influenza dell’attidografo Androzione su Aristotele non implica per forza operazioni di “copia e incolla” 7 8 9
JACOBY (1909/1956/2015). Cf. SCHEPENS (2009b); SCHEPENS (2010). Sul concetto di Jacoby di Zeitgeschichte, cf. n. 4.
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di materiale attidografico da parte del filosofo, e (4) ritenere che aspetti formali come lo schema annalistico non debbano necessariamente essere stati adottati da tutti gli autori. Se oggi siamo ancora lontani da un’interpretazione condivisa degli attidografi, una rinnovata attenzione nei confronti dei frammenti può portare, con la giusta dose di buon senso, a una comprensione migliore di tali autori. La concezione jacobiana dei frammenti geografici ha rappresentato l’oggetto della relazione di Veronica Bucciantini, intitolata “‘Boundaries’ of Fragmentary Ancient Geography: from Felix Jacoby’s Idea in 1908 to Friedrich Gisinger’s Studies and Current Trends in Research”. Bucciantini ha messo in luce come Jacoby concepisse un’edizione di frammenti geografici in termini profondamente diversi da Friedrich Gisinger, al quale, come già detto, lo stesso Jacoby aveva affidato la realizzazione della parte V dei Fragmente. Materiale edito e inedito (in particolare diverse lettere provenienti dall’archivio privato di Gisinger) mostra come la discussione tra i due studiosi non riguardò soltanto questioni di organizzazione e presentazione del materiale, ma anche il problema, più profondo, di che tipo di testi includere. Mentre Gisinger prevedeva una raccolta di materiale geografico (in senso talmente ampio da includere anche passi di interesse geografico in Omero e nei tragici), Jacoby propendeva per una raccolta di frammenti di geografi. Jacoby sembra convinto dell’inevitabilità della via da lui percorsa in FGrHist I–III (distinguere cioè, in linea di massima, tra frammenti di opere e materiale storico)10 e nelle lettere a Gisinger non sembra ricorrere a giri di parole: “Se fossi in Lei, prenderei questa decisione”. Parole premonitrici: mentre Gisinger non realizzò mai la sua edizione (anche per via della sua attività di insegnamento scolastico), i continuatori della parte V dei Fragmente includono oggi solo i frammenti dei geografi. Spinosi problemi di inclusione ed esclusione di autori frammentari, come mostrato da Franco Montanari nella relazione intitolata “Scholars, Antiquarians, and Historians: an Ancient and Modern Problem”, si presentarono a Jacoby e si presentano tuttora ai continuatori11 anche per quanto riguarda autori che classifichiamo spesso come eruditi, antiquari, grammatici e storici. I problemi principali sono posti dal fatto (1) che tali etichette moderne spesso mal si adattano agli autori antichi, (2) che diversi autori antichi sembrano essere stati attivi in diversi campi, e (3) che lo stato frammentario della documentazione spesso impedisce di farci un’idea chiara degli autori e delle loro opere. Il problema dell’inclusione o esclusione di autori con interessi (anche) filologici o grammaticali può essere però affrontato oggi in maniera flessibile e pragmatica grazie alla collaborazione tra FGrHist IV e i progetti di ambito grammaticale Lexicon of Greek Grammarians of Antiquity (LGGA) e Supplementum Grammaticum Graecum (SGG), entrambi editi da Franco Montanari, Fausto Montana e Lara Pagani. La difficoltà di trovare efficaci criteri di inclusione ed esclusione di molti autori è superata grazie alla complementarità di tali progetti: 10 Note eccezioni in FGrHist sono gli Anhänge, contenenti tradizioni anonime. Jacoby stesso aveva preso in seria considerazione la possibilità di includere non solo frammenti, ma anche tradizioni storiche: vd. SCHEPENS (2010) e l’Addendum di Stefan Schorn in Jacoby Online, Anhänge and Appendices (https://scholarlyeditions.brill.com/bnjo/Anhaenge/). 11 Vd. soprattutto SCHEPENS (1997); SCHEPENS (2009a); SCHORN (2021).
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FGrHist IV non proporrà edizioni di autori e opere di interessi prevalentemente grammaticali inclusi in LGGA e SGG, ai quali rinvierà tramite appositi hyperlinks, una soluzione efficace resa possibile dal fatto che tutti i progetti in questione sono pubblicati (anche) online da Brill. Che l’aspetto digitale rappresenti infatti il futuro del progetto Jacoby è emerso con chiarezza nella seconda parte della conferenza, dedicata al “futuro di Jacoby” (“The Future of Jacoby”). In una relazione dal titolo eloquente “Quantifying FGrHist – Towards a Network of Authorial Quotes”, Stefan Schorn e Mark Depauw hanno presentato i risultati preliminari di un ambizioso progetto nato dalla collaborazione tra Jacoby Online e Trismegistos (https://www.trismegistos.org/): un relational database che mira a ricostruire i networks delle citazioni degli storici frammentari includendo tutte le citazioni raccolte in FGrHist I–III12 (dunque tutti i riferimenti agli autori citanti e citati), visualizzandoli tramite grafici e statistiche che tengano conto di diversi parametri, come la cronologia e il genere letterario degli autori. Le possibilità e, in particolare, la flessibilità offerte dall’ambiente digitale sono state evidenziate, ancora una volta, da Hans-Joachim Gehrke, in un intervento mirante a mettere in risalto alcuni punti salienti emersi nelle varie relazioni del primo giorno di lavori (“Short summary of day 1”), ovvero: (1) l’importanza di un approccio interdisciplinare, che coinvolga storia, filologia e archeologia in un dialogo efficace; (2) la relazione tra “vecchio” e “nuovo” (Jacoby – Jacoby Online), da intendere soprattutto in termini di continuità dialettica e progresso; (3) la necessità di affrontare in modo flessibile e aperto vecchi problemi di classificazione (Che cos’è la storiografia? Quali ne sono i sottogeneri?); (4) la differenza fondamentale che intercorre tra lo studio dei frammenti e la ricostruzione dello sviluppo dei generi storiografici (due prospettive che, come si è visto, convivono in modo problematico nell’opera di Jacoby). In conclusione, Gehrke ha richiamato tre aspetti che dovranno rimanere centrali nella continuazione dell’impresa di Jacoby: (1) la priorità dello studio dei singoli frammenti su ipotetiche ricostruzioni dello sviluppo della storiografia antica; (2) il commento come sede ideale per affrontare i problemi posti dai testi frammentari (come già intuito da Jacoby); (3) la necessità di trovare nuove soluzioni a vecchi problemi grazie alla flessibilità consentita dall’ambiente digitale. Il nuovo ambiente digitale del progetto Jacoby, ovvero la nuova piattaforma Brill’s Jacoby Online (2020), è stata quindi presentata da Felix Maier (“Presentation of the new online edition”). In tale piattaforma, che sostituisce quella creata nel 2006, le edizioni degli autori frammentari non riproducono più il formato delle edizioni cartacee, ma si presentano come vere e proprie edizioni digitali, che permettono maggiore flessibilità e nuove funzionalità (tra le quali la possibilità di visualizzare in due colonne parallele testo in lingua originale e traduzione o commento). Suggello alla conferenza – prima di una Tavola Rotonda conclusiva presieduta da Gehrke in cui i partecipanti hanno discusso diversi aspetti emersi nel corso dei lavori – è stata la relazione di John Marincola, significativamente intitolata “Jacoby and Beyond”. Marincola ha efficacemente individuato quattro modi diversi in cui 12 In futuro, il database includerà anche le altre continuazioni.
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le generazioni di studiosi successive a Jacoby si sono rapportate alla sua opera monumentale: (1) continuità rispetto a Jacoby, con la diretta prosecuzione (o traduzione) del suo lavoro (C.W. Fornara, C.A. Robinson); (2) prosecuzione critica e aggiornata dell’opera iniziata da Jacoby (P.A. Brunt, FGrHist IV, FGrHist V e BNJ); elaborazione di nuovi concetti e prospettive nello studio della storiografia (come il concetto di intentional history o l’approccio retorico alla storiografia); (4) l’abbandono della concezione lineare dello sviluppo della storiografia greca elaborato da Jacoby, oggi reso più facile dall’ambiente digitale, che permette di consultare l’edizione di uno storico frammentario senza essere – anche solo inconsciamente – condizionati dalla posizione che Jacoby gli assegnò all’interno della raccolta. Credo che Marincola abbia colto in modo perfetto l’essenza dello spirito che ha animato l’organizzazione di questa conferenza. Dopo cent’anni di studi, dobbiamo guardare a Jacoby non come a un feticcio accademico, ma come a un maestro indiscusso di disciplina e metodo, il quale, oltre ad averci consegnato (in aggiunta a numerosi altri fondamentali contributi)13 un imprescindibile strumento di lavoro quale i FGrHist, continua a interrogarci, nelle sue pagine edite e inedite, sul nostro lavoro. A cent’anni di distanza dalla pubblicazione del primo volume dei Fragmente, l’eredità scientifica del grande studioso guarda al futuro.
Pietro Zaccaria Faculty of Arts, KU Leuven 3000 Leuven, Belgium [email protected]
Riferimenti bibliografici: C. AMPOLO (ed.), Aspetti dell’opera di Felix Jacoby, Pisa 20092. H. BLOCH (ed.), Abhandlungen zur griechischen Geschichtsschreibung von Felix Jacoby. Zu seinem achtzigsten Geburtstag am 19. März 1956, Leiden 1956. C.W. FORNARA, F. Jacoby, Die Fragmente der Griechischen Historiker. Dritter Teil. Geschichte von Städten und Völkern (Horographie und Ethnographie). C. Fascicle 1. Commentary on Nos. 608a-608, Leiden / New York / Köln 1994. F. JACOBY, Über die Entwicklung der griechischen Historiographie und den Plan einer neuen Sammlung der griechischen Historikerfragmente, Klio, 9, 1909, pp. 80–123. Ripubblicato con aggiunte e modifiche in H. BLOCH (ed.), Abhandlungen zur griechischen Geschichtsschreibung von Felix Jacoby. Zu seinem achtzigsten Geburtstag am 19. März 1956, Leiden 1956, pp. 16– 63. Traduzione inglese della versione del 1956 in: F. JACOBY, On the Development of Greek Historiography and the Plan for a New Collection of the Fragments of the Greek Historians, translated by M. CHAMBERS / S. SCHORN, Newcastle Upon Tyne 2015. F. JACOBY, Die Fragmente der Griechischen Historiker, 15 voll., Berlin, poi Leiden 1923–1958. C. e Th. MÜLLER, Fragmenta Historicorum Graecorum, 5 voll., Paris 1841–1870.
13 Bibliografia di Jacoby in BLOCH (1956: 1–15); per una panoramica della produzione di Jacoby in vari ambiti, cf. AMPOLO (2009).
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G. SCHEPENS, Jacoby’s FGrHist: Problems, Methods, Prospects, in G.W. MOST (ed.), Collecting Fragments. Fragmente sammeln, Göttingen 1997, pp. 144–72. G. SCHEPENS, Storiografia e letteratura antiquaria. Le scelte di Felix Jacoby, in C. AMPOLO (ed.), Aspetti dell’opera di Felix Jacoby, Pisa 20092, pp. 149–71 (= 2009a). G. SCHEPENS, Il carteggio Jacoby-Meyer. Un piano inedito per la struttura dei FGrHist, in C. AMPOLO (ed.), Aspetti dell’opera di Felix Jacoby, Pisa 20092, pp. 357–95 (= 2009b). G. SCHEPENS, Die Debatte über die Struktur der „Fragmente der griechischen Historiker“, in Klio 92, 2010, pp. 427–61. G. SCHEPENS, The So-called Zeitgeschichte. A Reassessment, in V. Fromentin / P. Derron (eds.), Writing Contemporary History, from Thucydides to Ammianus Marcellinus, Genève 2022, pp. 9–69. S. SCHORN, Historians, Antiquarians, Grammarians: Methodological Problems in the Classification and Structuring of FGrHist IV, in ASNSP13/1, 2021, pp. 11–62.
BUCHBESPRECHUNGEN Der Orbis Terrarum informiert über Neuerscheinungen auf dem Gebiet der historischen Geographie der Alten Welt sowohl in der Form von Literaturberichten zu bestimmten Themen als auch von Rezensionen bzw. kurzen Notizen zu einzelnen Publikationen. Die geographischen und zeitlichen Grenzen der alten Welt sind, wie überhaupt in dieser Zeitschrift, nicht eng gefaßt. Die Rezensionen sind in vier Rubriken unterteilt: I. Sammelbände mit übergreifender Thematik II. Monographien mit übergreifender Thematik III. Publikationen zu antiken und mittelalterlichen Autoren und Schriften IV. Publikationen zu antiken Landschaften
I. Sammelbände mit übergreifender Thematik w HOLLIS, DAWN / KÖNIG, JASON (eds.), Mountain Dialogues from Antiquity to Modernity, Ancient Environments, London: Bloomsbury 2021. 272 p., 8 ill. ISBN: 978350162839. Angesichts eines allgemeinen und akuten Interesses an Mensch-Umwelt-Beziehungen sind Berge, ebenso wie Gewässer und weitere natürliche Gegebenheiten, verstärkt in den Blick auch der altertumswissenschaftlichen Forschung getreten. Durch die Literaturwissenschaftlerin MARJORIE HOPE NICOLSON ist 1959 ein kulturwissenschaftliches Paradigma für die Beschäftigung mit Bergen entwickelt worden. In ihrer wirkmächtigen Monographie Mountain Gloom and Mountain Glory: The Development of the Aesthetics of the Infinite hat sie dafür argumentiert, dass unser heutiger Zugang zu Bergen ein grundlegend anderer ist als jener der Antike.1 Während wir heute auf die Erhabenheit von Bergen mit einer ehrfürchtigen und romantisierenden Perspektive schauen („Mountain Glory“), habe man seit der Antike die Berge als Orte der Alterität und Menschenfeindlichkeit betrachtet („Mountain Gloom“). Erst gegen Ende des 17. Jahrhunderts habe sich der Blick auf die Berge gewandelt, Berge seien in ihrer Erhabenheit positiv konnotiert worden und erst von nun an konnten sich auch Bergwandern und Bergsteigen unter ästhetischen Gesichtspunkten entwickeln. Diese „Wasserscheide“ um 1700 wird bis heute von der Forschung im Wesentlichen akzeptiert, auch wenn es bereits Stimmen gegeben hat, die dieses Paradigma differenzierten und darauf hinwiesen, dass bereits in der Antike, sowohl der paganen wie der christ-
1
M. H. NICOLSON, Mountain Gloom and Mountain Glory: The Development of the Aesthetics of the Infinite, Ithaca 1959.
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lichen, auch die positiv bewertete Erhabenheit von Bergen zum Erfahrungsschatz gehörte.2 Der anzuzeigende Band, herausgegeben von DAWN HOLLIS und JASON KÖNIG, setzt sich zum Ziel, das Modell von NICOLSON kritisch zu betrachten und aus ganz unterschiedlichen Perspektiven, die vom 5. Jh. v. Chr. bis zur Gegenwart reichen, zu beleuchten. Dabei wird von allen beteiligten Autorinnen und Autoren nicht angestrebt, das Modell von NICOLSON zu falsifizieren, sondern es zu differenzieren. Im Anschluss an eine Einleitung von HOLLIS und KÖNIG, in der eine forschungsgeschichtliche Einordnung erfolgt und die Beiträge des Bandes vorgestellt werden, folgen insgesamt zwölf Aufsätze, die allesamt von Textzeugnissen ausgehen und in ihrer Abfolge nicht chronologisch und auch nach keinem weiteren erkennbaren Ordnungskriterium strukturiert sind. Die Herausgeber schreiben (S. 6–7), dass diese Aneinanderreihung bewusst gewählt sei, da sie nicht den Eindruck erwecken wollten, dass sie das Thema erschöpfend und systematisch behandeln könnten und durch die lockere Anordnung mehr Querbezüge entstünden. Und in der Tat ergibt sich nach dem Lesen der auf den ersten Blick doch sehr disparaten Fallstudien eine spannende Gemeinsamkeit. Es wird deutlich, dass bereits nicht nur vor 1700 in den Erfahrungen mit Bergen sehr viel mehr „Mountain Glory“ zu beobachten ist als zuvor angenommen, sondern – was ebenso wichtig oder vielleicht noch wichtiger ist – dass sich diese auch in der Folgezeit entwickelnde Erfahrung insbesondere vor der Folie der kenntnisreichen Verarbeitung antiker Literatur entwickelt, „Mountain Glory“ mithin bereits ein antikes Motiv ist. So erhält der Band nicht nur eine forschungsgeschichtliche Relevanz, sondern ist auch ein differenzierterer Blick auf die antike Literaturgeschichte.3 Der Beitrag des Klassischen Philologen DAN HOOLEY zeigt am Beispiel des Schweizer Humanisten Conrad Gessner (1516–65), wie sehr Gessner den Aufenthalt in den Bergen vor dem Hintergrund der antiken Literatur genoss (S. 21–36). Der englische Literaturwissenschaftler CIAN DUFFY zeichnet am Beispiel des Reisenden Patrick Brydone (1736–1818) und der Dichterin Anna Seward (1742– 1809) nach, wie sehr deren Wahrnehmung von Vulkanen, insbesondere des Ätna, durch antike Mythologie und Texte beeinflusst war (S. 37–54). Die Klassische Philologin DAWN HOLLIS untersucht in ihrem Beitrag am Beispiel des Theologen Thomas Burnet (1635–1715) die Integration antiker Literatur für die Entwicklung einer positiv geprägten Vorstellung von Bergen als Gottes Schöpfung (S. 55–71). Der Germanist SEAN IRETON beschäftigt sich in seinem Aufsatz mit Josias Simler (1530–76) und der französischen Übersetzung seines Werks über die Alpen zu Beginn des 20. Jahrhunderts. Auch er kann nachzeichnen, wie sehr Simler seine Faszination und sein Wissen aus dem Studium antiker Texte erwarb (S. 73–88). 2 3
Vgl. z.B. J. H. KOELB, “This Most Beautiful and Adorn’d World“: Nicolson’s Mountain Gloom and Mountain Glory Reconsidered, in: Interdisciplinary Studies in Literature and Environment 16.3, 2009, 443–68. Vgl. dazu jetzt systematisch J. KÖNIG, The Folds of Olympus: Mountains in Ancient Greek and Roman Culture, Princeton 2022.
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Der Sozialgeschichtler DOUGLAS WHALIN begibt sich in die Spätantike und zeichnet den Prozess nach, wie Berge zu Orten des Rückzugs und der Heiligkeit wurden und sie so in der christlichen Literatur der Spätantike durchaus positiv besetzt waren (S. 89–108). In eine ähnliche Richtung geht die Vergleichende Literaturwissenschaftlerin JANICE HEWLETT KOELB, die Hieronymus und Franz von Assisi und deren Rückzug in die Berge thematisiert und in diesem Zusammenhang Bilder von Giovanni Bellini (ca. 1430–1516) diskutiert, welche die beiden Heiligen in Bergwelten zeigen, welche diese als locus amoenus und paradiesgleich auffassen (S. 109–30). Die Klassische Philologin ALLEY MARIE JORDAN beschäftigt sich in ihrem Beitrag mit Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826) und seinem Landsitz Monticello in Virginia, der auf einem Berg gelegen war und in eine Berglandschaft ausblickte. Auch sie kann aufzeigen, wie Vorstellungen antiker Autoren den Blick Jeffersons auf die Landschaft prägten (S. 131–46). Der Klassische Philologe JASON KÖNIG folgt in seinem Beitrag dem Griechenlandreisenden Edward Dodwell (1767–1832) auf die Peloponnes und kann nachzeichnen, wie sehr für Dodwell Berge nicht nur im Fokus der Wahrnehmung stehen, sondern auch, dass die zeitgenössische Ästhetik, dass Berge erhaben und malerisch seien, zutiefst von der Kenntnis antiker Literatur geprägt ist (S. 147–64). Der Klassische Philologe GARETH D. WILLIAMS beschäftigt sich mit dem Versuch von Patrick Brydone (1736–1818), den Ätna zu besteigen, der wohl scheiterte, der aber trotzdem beschrieben wurde, und zwar nach dem Bericht von William Hamilton (1730–1803). Er fügt sich so in eine Tradition fiktiver Bergbesteigungen ein, deren berühmteste die von Petrarca (1304–74) auf dem Mont Ventoux ist (S. 165–84). Die Klassische Philologin CHLOE BRAY geht in ihrem Beitrag der Frage nach, wie die Tragödiendichter des 5. Jh.s v. Chr. bei den Zuschauern Vorstellungen von Bergen abriefen und evozierten und Berge auch zu dieser Zeit nicht nur Orte der Alterität waren (S. 185–96). Die englische Literaturwissenschaftlerin HARRIET ARCHER widmet sich in ihrem Beitrag John Higgins (1544–ca. 1620) und dessen Brennus-Legende, die einerseits auf antiken Vorlagen und Assoziationen beruht, andererseits eine Bergwelt beschreibt, welche für zeitgenössische Identitätskonstruktionen wichtig war (S. 197–214). Der letzte Beitrag stammt von dem Historiker PETER H. HANSEN, der sich mit dem Mont Ventoux befasst und ausgehend von Petrarca und seiner Rezeption den Umgang mit dem Berg in der Moderne diskutiert (S. 215–27). Abschließend kann festgehalten werden, dass der Sammelband ein großes Spektrum an Themen abdeckt, welche zunächst einmal für sich stehen, welche dann aber doch in eine Diskussion einmünden, die unterstreicht, dass die „Wasserscheide“ von „Mountain Gloom“ and „Mountain Glory“ zwar im Prinzip existiert, aber nicht zu strikt gesehen werden darf. Insbesondere der Rückgriff auf bereits antiken „Mountain Glory“ trug nämlich zu der Ausprägung von „Mountain Glory“ seit dem 18. Jahrhundert entscheidend bei. So kann das Paradigma von NICHOLSON aus heuristischen Gründen durchaus bestehen bleiben, und der anzuzeigende Band unterstreicht, wie lohnend und erkenntnisreich die Auseinandersetzung damit bleibt.
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Buchbesprechungen ACHIM LICHTENBERGER Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität Institut für Klassische Archäologie und Christliche Archäologie/Archäologisches Museum Domplatz 20–22 D – 48143 Münster [email protected]
w MANIA, ULRICH (ed.), Hafen, Stadt, Mikroregion. Beiträge der Arbeitsgruppe 5 “Hafenorte” des Forschungsclusters 6 “Connecting Cultures” und einer Tagung am 26. und 27. Mai 2017 an der Abteilung Istanbul des DAI, Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz 2022. XIV + 154 p., ill. ISBN: 9783447117449. (Menschen – Kulturen – Traditionen, 18.) Hafen, Stadt, Mikroregion is the result of a two-day workshop in the framework of the Research Cluster 6 “Connecting Cultures. Forms, Paths and Spaces of Cultural Interaction from 2015–2017” initiated in 2013 by the Deutsches Archäologisches Institut which gathered a working group on the subject of Port cities (group 5). This working group had a particular focus on harbours and on port cities as components of regional or supra-regional networks. More specifically, it aimed at addressing the effects of connectivity on cities and microregions, with a particular attention to the dynamic relationship between natural environment, connectivity, and port location. Three meetings have been organised between 2015 and 2017 in order to address questions such as what influenced the character of port cities and their micro-regions; the third meeting, held in Istanbul, had external speakers who presented archaeological research on port cities and harbour structures and environments. STEFAN FEUSER’s paper, on harbour site and micro-region, considered through the prism of connectivity, is the first contribution. He argues that perhaps the theory of connectivity and of network formation developed by HORDEN and PURCELL,1 might narrow the view too much to a unifying sea, when in fact the large number of shipwrecks suggests that the sea has a separating and fragmenting aspect that also needs to be investigated. In Western Mediterranean, MATTHEW HARPSTER models micro-regions from a corpus of material present on the sea floor: shipwrecks and their contents. He argues that the sea is not anarchic, but rather an inhabited place with a cognitive and cultural topography. Because of the limited time of a vessel at sea, the material assemblage – the cargo – becomes the primary dataset on which interpretations are based. Several models can be generated: vectors that represent generalized routes (last port visited and location of the assemblage), polygons with the location of the assemblages and the source of their items, and density
1
P. HORDEN / N. PURCELL, The Corrupting Sea. A Study of Mediterranean History, Oxford 2000.
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maps according to the date of assemblages, which enables visualisation of maritime areas that have been more actives through time. Perhaps coincidentally, the maritime toponyms that correspond to the modelled areas – the Sardinian and the Tyrrhenian Seas – are mentioned in the Geographies of Polybius and Strabo (and indirectly perhaps by Eratosthenes) and this makes us wonder then if those areas can be considered as micro-regions. In the next paper, JON ALBERS examines harbours and anchorages of western Greek cities, compiles the information for this area and examines the different types of connections between the harbour and the agora and between the harbour and the micro-region or the city’s hinterland. The article by JULIA DAUM and MARTINA SEIFERT examines the Adriatic Sea and the change from a separating to a connecting character after the establishment of the province of Dalmatia in 9 AD. It focuses primarily on two Italian sites of Dalmatia, Iader and Aenona, just North of the provincial capital Salona, and their relationship with Italy (Iader was a colony and had an emporion, whereas Aenona was a municipium) and to the family relationships that were developed in Aenona and inland trade in its microregion. NICOLAS CARAYON and SIMON KEAY (†) offer a definition of what a port is and what it comprises in order to define the notion of harbour system as a network of facilities that might serve the port or a city and a port and its wider environment. This is developed in the framework of the ERC Portus Limen Project, but similar systems can be described for more ports than Portus itself (i.e. further in this book, Delos). The cases that this contribution focuses on are Tarraco’s harbour system on the coast of the Iberian Peninsula and at the mouth of the Francoli river, the harbour system of the micro-region of Narbo Martius, on a lagoon and with access to the river Atax. In this case, 178 sites are attested in the area between the 2nd century BC and the 3d century AD; this shows how sites evolve around the port-city of Narbonne through time. This paper briefly illustrates only a small sample of the potential of the harbour-system theory, through which more micro-regions perhaps ought to be examined across the Mediterranean. It is well documented by several maps that plot a multitude of nodes of each network through time. ALFRED SCHÄFER presents the port of Cologne in the Roman period, Colonia Claudia Aria Agrippinensium, built on the Rhine, and how the harbour is integrated in the urban grid. During rescue excavations, the Roman city wall came to light, in Kurt-Hackenberg Platz in Köln, along with a harbour gate dated to the end of the 1st century AD. This, along with the timber remains of a flatboat dated in 43 AD, was evidence that the harbour was located on a 60–70 m wide secondary arm of the Rhine, which was rapidly silted; in the next phase, the harbour may have been located directly on the Rhine. The discovery of this gate allows to reconstruct circulation and transport links between the city and the hinterland, via the harbour on the Rhine for the Roman period and questions the role played by the Rhine in the town-planning and the effect of the development of Cologne on the Rhine environment itself.
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The next contribution by JESKO FILDHUTH explores the harbours, settlements and infrastructures of the Lower Meander Valley in Late Byzantine Time (13th century), for which exist written sources, preserved in the archives of the Monastery of Patmos. However, some sites remain yet to be located with certitude. The article questions the relation of these harbours to the regional settlements, their integration into the regional infrastructure and their role as distribution centres for local and long distance trade activities. The main sites that are examined here are Sampson, Spilia, Doganbey and the city of Palatia, ancient Miletus. In the next paper, BERNHARD LUDWIG presents Pergamon’s access to the sea and the connectivity between sites and resources of this micro-region. The configuration here, on the West coast of Asia Minor is different, because Pergamon was located 20 km inland already in Antiquity. Therefore, the city’s access to the sea played an important role in its development and success: Pergamon ensured control over harbours such as Elaia (at Zeytindağ), Kane (at Bademli) and Pitane (at Çandarlı) and other coastal sites of the micro-region. Moving back West and taking an insular example as a micro-region in itself, YANNIS KOURTZELLIS and THEOTOKIS THEODOULOU offer a brief topographical overview of Mytilene’s North harbour, which operated as the main commercial harbour. This paper also illustrates how this harbour may have been connected to other coastal sites of the South of Lesbos. Further West in the Aegean, MANTHA ZARMAKOUPI’s paper on the island and the harbour city of Delos analyses how the rapidly growing city plan integrated infrastructures according to its economic need for an emporion. The paper shows how the emporion did not rely solely on one harbour, but rather on a network of smaller harbour bays around the island on the one hand and on the commercial facilities that were accommodated within the already existing urban fabric on the other hand. She presents her point in a summary but very dense way and well supported by bibliography. Indeed, to support the main harbour of Delos, we should also consider the Bay of Skardhana and the Stadium District as part of a tight network that operates in several dimensions of activity: she refers to the micro-scale of the city and the macro-scale of the emporion. The main question that was asked at the beginning of the meeting was whether or not one can view the ports and their urban setting and their wider environment as a unit depending on individual activities and productions? Ten contributions in German or in English, followed by a twenty-page general bibliography, have been published in this volume to address this question. The proceedings of this meeting allow the reader to wander across sites and regions of the Mediterranean and through time. The contributions presented here are not of equal quality and they do not all develop their point with those questions in mind. However, these reflexions, based on archaeological evidence, are tributary to the available data and to the level of advancement of research projects and also of the methods used to analyse each subject. FEUSER and HARPSTER adopt a more theoretical approach to the material and reach opposing conclusions: FEUSER seems to think that the sea is a separating element, whereas HARPSTER actually
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defines the maritime areas as micro-regions themselves. Others, e.g. CARAYON and KEAY, FILDHUTH and LUDWIG, have a historical geography approach of the micro-region under scrutiny, plotting sites and defining their relationship within the region and within timeframes, taking also into account the possible mobility of landscapes. SCHÄFER and ZARMAKOUPI address the issue on the scale of the city, analysing the evolution of the urban fabric in relation to the development of the emporia, although in different contexts, fluvial in the case of Cologne and maritime in the case of Delos. Interestingly, there is only one contribution on the byzantine region of Miletus. In the absence of concluding remarks, it is up to the readers to reach their conclusions on whether the questions are answered. However, the heterogeneity of the landscapes and the diversity of geographical and topographical situations across this overview of sites and micro-regions is what stands out. CATHERINE BOURAS École française d’Athènes 6 od. Didotou GR – 10680 Athen [email protected]
w PAPADODIMA, EVI (ed.), Ancient Greek Literature and the Foreign. Athenian Dialogues II. Berlin: De Gruyter. 2022. 193 S. ISBN: 9783110767575. (Trends in Classics – Supplementary Volumes, 130.) Die Thematik dieses Buches, die Darstellung des Fremden in der antiken griechischen Literatur, ist gewiss keine neue: Vor allem seit FRANÇOIS HARTOGs einflussreicher Studie Le miroir d’Hérodote: essai sur la représentation de l’autre (1980) ist der „Andere“ (auch) in den Altertumswissenschaften regelmäßig diskutiert worden. Ein großer Impuls kam noch kurz vor HARTOGs Buch selbstredend von EDWARD SAÏDs Orientalism (1978). So vieldiskutiert die Thematik ist, so unterschiedlich sind die in den jeweiligen Arbeiten vorgelegten Argumentationen. Vor allem in den letzten Jahren ist ein Korrektiv zu bis vor kurzem noch weit verbreiteten, mitunter von HARTOG und SAÏD lancierten Interpretationen feststellbar. Ethnographische Darstellungen in der antiken Literatur werden weniger und nicht nur als Projektionen (oder Spiegelbilder) und autoritative Diskurse verstanden, sondern vermehrt als zumindest gelegentliche Versuche, den „Anderen“ durchaus korrekt darzustellen bzw. nicht nur zu stereotypisieren. Der hier anzuzeigende Band, der aus einem Seminar an der Athenischen Akademie 2018– 19 hervorging, schließt sich in mehreren Beiträgen dieser neueren Richtung an. Die Artikel von KOSTAS VLASSOPOULOS (Intercultural Relations and the Barbarian Repertoire in Greek Culture), MARY LEFKOWITZ (The Phrygian Slave in Euripides’ Orestes) und ROSALIND THOMAS (Greek Historians, Persika and the Persian Empire [late 5th.c. – 4th.c.]) weisen allesamt auf die Komplexität und Brüche in der griechischen Darstellung des Anderen hin. VLASSOPOULOS verwendet den in der Tat hilfreichen Begriff „Repertoire“ für die mannigfaltige Themati-
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sierung der barbaroi in der griechischen Literatur. Nicht-Griechen, so VLASSOPOULOS, wurden nicht nur als Fremde, Feinde und „Andere“ dargestellt, ihre Kulturen konnten vielmehr auch als Modelle und Anknüpfungspunkte für das Verständnis der eigenen Welt verstanden werden. Mit anderen Worten: Das „barbarische“ Repertoire war längst nicht nur ein von Polaritäten geprägtes. So können Perser auf Vasenbildern wie auch in der Literatur (Herodot) in Szenen dargestellt werden (z.B. jener des Abschied nehmenden Kriegers), die nicht die Alterität betonen, sondern im Gegenteil die „universality of warfare, military valour, death and family loss“ (p. 17). Und Kyros kann in Xenophons Kyrupädie als Exemplum eines idealen Herrschers dienen. Das Fremde konnte eben nicht nur für Alterität und Barbarismus stehen, sondern auch für Wissen und Weisheit. Der letzte Teil von VLASSOPOULOS’ Beitrag ist mit Alien wisdom überschrieben. Dass hier nicht auf das gleichnamige grundlegende Buch von ARNALDO MOMIGLIANO verwiesen wird (Alien Wisdom: The Limits of Hellenization, 1975), ist erstaunlich. Schon MOMIGLIANO hat eindringlich auf die Diversität im griechischen Austausch mit den Anderen verwiesen (MOMIGLIANOs Buch wird nur von MARY LEFKOWITZ erwähnt S. 117): MARY LEFKOWITZ nimmt sich in ihrem Beitrag der Rolle des Phrygers in Euripides’ Orestes an. Zwar werden die Phryger von Euripides als feiges Volk beschrieben (v. 1352–3), und der phrygische Sklave wird über seine Kleidung und Bräuche als Fremder markiert, aber in der Rezeption wurde diese Fremdheit überzeichnet (etwa, wenn das an sich korrekte Griechisch des Phrygers parodistisch übersetzt wird). Aus der Figur des Phrygers, der im Stück eine wichtige Botenrolle besetzt und vom Mord an Helena berichtet, werde vielmehr deutlich, so LEFKOWITZ, dass auch Fremde ein Verständnis von richtig und falsch haben (S. 116). LEFKOWITZ kommt zu einem bemerkenswert optimistischen Schluss: „For all their awareness of the differences in the customs of the different peoples the Greeks encountered in their forays around the Mediterranean, they always seem to have realized that they shared with foreigners a common humanity” (S. 116–7). Always? Ob dies nicht eine allzu humanistische Interpretation der durchaus auch von xenophoben Polemiken geprägten Darstellung des Fremden in der griechischen Literatur ist (cf. BENJAMIN ISAAC, The Invention of Racism in Classical Antiquity, 2013)? ROSALIND THOMAS konzentriert sich auf das griechische Perserbild im späten 5. und im 4. Jh. THOMAS zeigt, dass es neben Orientalism (SAÏD) auch den Versuch gab, Perser als exempla zu verstehen. Man zog hierbei freilich frühere Beispiele (Kyros!) zeitgenössischen Optionen vor. Besondere Aufmerksamkeit widmet THOMAS Ktesias von Knidos, in dessen Persika sie einen ernsthaften Versuch erkennt, den persischen Hof zu verstehen (S. 136). Ktesias steht, so THOMAS, für eine für das 4. Jh. typische Wendung im Perserbild, das neben den alten Stereotypen auch faktenorientierte Historiographie über die Perser ermöglichte. ROSALIND THOMAS kommt damit zu ähnlichen Schlussfolgerungen wie ALBRECHT DIHLE in seinem Die Griechen und die Fremden (1994, im Buch nicht zitiert), der – allerdings nicht für Ktesias – im 4. Jh. eine im Vergleich zu früherer Zeit differenzierte Ethnographie festmacht (S. 65, zu Ktesias S. 31).
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Einen höchst innovativen, gleichsam revolutionären Beitrag legt DAVID KONSTAN vor (Making Friends with Foreigners: Xenoi in the Homeric Epics). KONSTAN plädiert für ein neues Verständnis von xenos (bzw. xeinos) bei Homer. Das Wort bedeute nie Gastfreund, sondern bezeichne stets einen Fremden („an unknown or unrecognized foreigner“: S. 31). Ferner stünde xenia (bzw. xeinia) keineswegs für ein formales Bündnis oder gegenseitige Verpflichtungen, sondern bezeichne einfach die Art und Weise, wie man einen Fremden bei sich zu Hause aufnimmt. Das klassische Griechisch habe gar kein Wort, das unserem „Gast“ (bzw. englisch „guest“) entspreche – was freilich nicht bedeute, dass die Griechen Gastfreundschaft, gerade gegenüber Fremden, nicht hochgehalten hätte (S. 34, 54). Homer-Spezialisten sind besser befugt, KONSTANs Neudeutung zu bewerten. Mir scheint, dass KONSTAN eine zwar gewagte, aber argumentativ gut untermauerte These vorlegt. So sei in Il. 6,224–31, wo Diomedes den Trojaner Glaukos trifft, mit xeinos (auf Glaukos bezogen) eben nicht „Gast“, sondern „Fremder“ gemeint. Obwohl Glaukos ein Fremder ist, wird Diomedes ihn zukünftig als einen der ihm Nahestehenden empfangen. Das, so KONSTAN, sei die Bedeutung von xeinos philos in Vers 224 (S. 39). Ebenso ist an entsprechenden Stellen in der Odyssee jeweils „Fremder“ gemeint (8,159.408; 21,27). RICHARD SEAFORDs The xenos as a Focus for Civic Unity in History, Ritual, and Literature diskutiert, wie – in einer Zeitspanne vom 7.–3. Jh. v.Chr. – die Ankunft des Fremden die Einheit der Gesellschaft stärkt. Als Beispiel dient die Vergöttlichung von „fremden“ Männern (als erstes der Spartaner Lysander in Samos). PHIROZE VASUNIA (A God in Translation? Dionysus from Lucian to Gandhara) nimmt sich mit Dionysos des fremdesten Gottes im griechischen Pantheon an. Ausgehend von Lukians Geschichte von Dionysos und seinem indischen Feldzug diskutiert VASUNIA ungefähr zeitgenössische Dionysos-Darstellungen aus Gandhara. Aus letzteren ergibt sich weniger ein ideologisches Bild oder dasjenige eines Zivilisationsbringers: „Dionysus lived and moved in his own environment here, in Gandhara, whether drinking, or dancing, or looking after the dead in the afterlife, and he did not have to bring civilisation to anyone“ (S. 97). MICHAEL PASCHALIS schließt den Band mit einer diachronen Lesung des Mythos vom Raub der Europa (The Abduction of Europa from Moschus to Nonnus). Das ist eine gute Wahl, denn der Europa-Mythos thematisiert ja nicht zuletzt die Interdependenzen von Ost und West, von Asien und Europa: so schon im Traum der Europa im Epyllion des Moschos (S. 141–7). PASCHALIS zeigt die Wendungen in der jeweiligen Mythos-Interpretation auf: Bei Lukian wird die Entführung und Vergewaltigung Europas als Liebes-Verhältnis inszeniert, bei Achilles Tatius steht nicht mehr die Dichotomie zwischen Ost und West im Zentrum, sondern das Handeln der einzelnen Individuen unter römischer Herrschaft (S. 153). Dieses schmale Buch ist ein äußerst reichhaltiger Beitrag zu einem wesentlichen Aspekt der antiken griechischen Welt: dem Umgang der Griechen mit dem Fremden. Der Band ist sorgfältig herausgegeben und eingeführt von EFI PAPADODIMA, der Autorin von Foreignness Negotiated: Conceptual and Ethical
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Aspects of the Greek-Barbarian Distinction in Fifth-Century Literature (2013) und wissenschaftlichen Koordinatorin des Seminars, der dem Buch zugrunde liegt. Die Reise des Fremden im antiken Griechenland wird in der Forschungsliteratur weitergehen, aber Ancient Greek Literature and the Foreign ist ein wichtiger Zwischenhalt. RENE BLOCH Universität Bern [email protected]
w REITZ-JOOSSE, BETTINA / MAKINS, MARIAN W. / MACKIE, C. J. (eds.), Landscapes of War in Greek and Roman Literature, London / New York: Bloomsbury Academic, 2021. X + 281 p., 11 ill. ISBN: 9781350157903. El rol del paisaje tuvo caminos divergentes en la literatura y en las artes visuales en el mundo clásico. Si bien a partir de Homero el paisaje y sus elementos juegan un rol preponderante no solo en el desenlace de confrontaciones bélicas, sino que también proveen un detallado mapa visual de locaciones específicas para la audiencia. En este sentido, resulta a lo menos peculiar que en las artes visuales el paisaje no haya tenido la misma incidencia sino hasta su aparición en la pintura romana, donde por vez primera el paisaje es un elemento activo en la composición pictórica.1 Landscapes of War in Greek and Roman Literature intenta explorar la compleja relación entre paisaje y conflicto armado en la antigua Grecia y Roma, con foco en el paisaje de guerra descrito en las fuentes literarias grecolatinas. No obstante, su mayor contribución es que intenta esbozar paralelismos con recuentos y experiencias del paisaje de guerra en la historia contemporánea reciente que, lejos de propender ser una aproximación anacrónica, muy por el contrario, resulta ser una comparación relevante y que tanto exalta como enfatiza la ‘experiencia’ del paisaje en la literatura clásica. Este libro tiene su origen en los debates originados durante la Conferencia Céltica de Estudios Clásicos en Montreal, 2017. En la ‘Introducción’, los editores definen el ‘paisaje de guerra’ (Kriegslandschaft) desde el punto de vista fenomenológico; esto es, un paisaje que se experimenta distinto en tiempos de paz que en tiempos de guerra (p. 2). La experiencia del paisaje es, por consiguiente, un 1
Sobre este tema, véase el excelente estudio de B. SCIARAMENTI, Paesaggi del Dramma nelle “Metamorphosi” di Ovidio en nella pittura romana coeva, Roma 2019, reseñado por la autora del presente artículo en BMCR (2022.10.42). No obstante, debe tenerse en cuenta la posible influencia de la pintura Etrusca en el arte romano (L. PIERACCINI, Etruscan Wall Paintings: Insights, Innovations and Legacy, en: S. BELL / A. CARPINO (eds.), A Companion to the Etruscans, Oxford 2016, 247–60, esp. 250–3). Por ejemplo, la Tumba de la Caza y Pesca en Tarquinia (c. 530–20 a.C.) muestra un particular interés por el paisaje y la figura humana integrada en éste en contraste, por ejemplo, con el ‘paisaje’ griego de la Tumba del Buzo de Paestum (Tomba del Tuffatore, c. 480 a.C.) reducido a unos pocos elementos y concentrado en la figura humana.
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fenómeno dinámico y cambiante, constituyendo “el mundo externo mediado por la subjetividad de la experiencia humana… no es solo el mundo que vemos, … sino una construcción de ese mundo”.2 El paisaje es, por consiguiente, parte de la interacción humana donde se construye y destruye (o deconstruye). Esto ocurre principalmente en la intervención bélica y sus memorias donde su propiedad es puesta en juego y reestablecida. Dividido en cuatro secciones con tres ensayos cada una, la intención de los autores no es proveer al lector de información militar histórica o topográfica, sino más bien, desde un punto de vista fenomenológico, hacer un recuento de cómo las zonas bélicas son percibidas y vividas, y qué significado tenían en la antigüedad examinando aspectos como, por ejemplo, los efectos de la guerra en el paisaje, las distinciones entre espacios de guerra y otros paisajes, las diferentes experiencias de guerra en las fuentes literarias sobre el paisaje, y cómo la memoria generacional genera lazos con el paisaje durante periodos de guerra o después de ella a través de las ‘marcas’ dejadas por ésta, su conmemoración u olvido. Más que hacer un análisis crítico de cada uno de los ensayos incluidos en el libro, intento hacer una sinopsis de cada sección para que el lector tenga conocimiento de los principales debates en cada una de ellas.3 En la primera parte (Perception and Experience of War Landscapes) los autores indagan en las técnicas o recursos literarios usados por algunos autores grecolatinos y el propósito literario o metaliterario de sus descripciones. ELIZABETH MINCHIN, por ejemplo, examina la ‘información locativa’ o marcas topográficas que ayudan a crear un mapa mental en la audiencia, y la ‘información no locativa’, relacionada con la experiencia visual y auditiva del paisaje, recursos usados también por Homero para crear una experiencia inmersiva en la audiencia (por ejemplo, la topografía del paisaje entre las murallas de Troya y las embarcaciones griegas), similar a la usada en Australia para conmemorar la Primera Guerra Mundial donde el espectador es introducido en campos de batalla lejanos a través de dioramas.4 Es interesante el punto que hace MINCHIN en relación a lo que la autora denomina el soundtrack de la Ilíada (p. 33), donde la descripción de los ruidos del campo de batalla son también ‘escuchados’ por la audiencia. A contiunación, VIRGINIA FABRIZZI y ANDREW FELDHERR analizan fenómenos atmosféricos que aparecen en un determinado paisaje y cómo estos pueden definir una batalla, a la vez que son usados como recurso literario para generar tensión en el lector. En su análisis de Ab Urbe Condita, FABRIZZI estudia la relación dinámica entre batallas, topografía y condiciones climáticas en batallas como Nola (215 a.C.) donde romanos y cartagineses se vieron obligados a parar debido a una lluvia torrencial, Satricum (378 a.C. y en 341 a.C.), sin omitir el 2 3 4
D. COSGROVE, Social Formation and Symbolic Landscape, Londres 1984, 13 (traducción propia). Para una reseña critica de temáticas transversales en el libro, véase J. MCINERNEY, War, Landscape and Literature, CR 72(1), 2021, 32–5. Il. 4.15 describe una ‘lucha terrible’ entre estas locaciones (πόλεμόν τε κακὸν καὶ φύλοπιν αίνήν). Los dioramas mencionados pueden verse en el Australian War Memorial (AWM): http://www.www.awm.gov.au/.
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memorable episodio del fallido intento de Aníbal por atacar Roma en 211 a.C. debido a la lluvia y granizo (26.11.1–3) o la caracterización enérgica de la niebla que hace Livio en la batalla contra Felipe V de Macedonia y contra Antíoco III de Siria en la batalla de Magnesia, donde los soldados solo logran orientarse mediante gritos, creando una tensión que va in crescendo en el lector. En la misma línea, pero haciendo una comparación entre Livio y Polibio, ANDREW FELDHERR analiza la experiencia del soldado romano en la niebla del Lago Trasimene y las distintas versiones de estos autores sobre un mismo evento. En particular, FELDHERR explora el concepto de enargeia (o evidentia) y los desafíos que implica a los lectores en cuanto la capacidad de un autor de hacer a la audiencia ‘ver’ aquello que está siendo descrito (p. 62). No obstante, la paradoja del concepto se encuentra precisamente en que, si estos fuesen completamente inmersos en la visión interna del paisaje, estarían igual de cegados y desorientados por la niebla como los protagonistas. La segunda parte (Landscape of ruin and recovery) se enfoca en una descripción ecocrítica del paisaje; esto es, el estudio de la relación entre literatura y el entorno físico.5 Comúnmente, la guerra suele dejar huellas que alteran el paisaje (incendios, deforestación, divergencia del cauce de ríos, contaminación de las aguas, destrucción de cultivos, etc.). Estas alteraciones físicas del paisaje, que pueden extenderse por un tiempo prolongado incluso después de la batalla, también se extrapolan a lo simbólico. LAURA ZIENTEK estudia las formas en que conflictos armados afectan la agricultura de un territorio en referencia a Lucano, que en contraste con predecesores como Esquilo y Plutarco quienes hablan del ciclo recuperatorio de la postguerra, pone énfasis en la desolación y la toxicidad del paisaje después de una intervención bélica. A continuación, WILLIAM BROCKLISS adopta un método innovador al considerar cómo la poesía de la Primera Guerra Mundial (Wilfred Owen, Ivor Gurney, entre otros) puede, de hecho, estimular valiosas lecturas del tratamiento del paisaje en obras como Edipo en Colono donde Sófocles describe el paisaje rural del Ática de forma idealizada, y cómo una audiencia contemporánea pudo haber reaccionado a esta concepción del paisaje después de la Guerra Deceliana durante el conflicto con el Peloponeso (413–04 a.C.). Por otra parte, MARIAN MALKINS describe la naturaleza fantástica del paisaje de acuerdo a las Elegías de Propercio y sus descripciones de paisajes asociados con la Guerra Perusina, la conquista romana de Veii (Veio) y la batalla de Actium. En particular, MALKINS examina cómo ciertas personificaciones del paisaje permiten expresar posiciones que cuestionan la narrativa dominante de la paz augusta y la voz autoritativa del poeta. La tercera parte (Controlling Landscapes and the Symbolism of Power) examina cómo textos literarios abarcan el tema del control físico y simbólico del territorio y sus habitantes, y las consecuencias de la pérdida de control por falta de conocimiento geográfico o por falta de moral de los combatientes o sus líderes. En 5
C. GLOTFELTY, Introduction: Literary Studies in an Age of Environmental Crisis, en: C. GLOTFELTY / H. FROMM (eds.), The Ecocriticism Reader: Landmarks in Literary Ecology. Athens/GA 1996, xv–xxxvii; xix.
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literatura, estos atributos son narrados a través de recursos como la metáfora y personificación de elementos geográficos (como, pero ejemplo, el caso del Escamandro), mientras que el control simbólico del paisaje es manifestado mediante la edificación de puentes o la erección de monumentos conmemorativos.6 Esta sección comienza con el ensayo de ESTHER MEIJER, quien estudia el episodio de César cruzando el Rubicón contado por Lucano en Bellum Civile, donde pese a la ‘protesta’ del río, no puede evitar su cruce ilegal (1.182–5). Para MEIJER, el Rubicón de Lucano, más que un límite territorial donde Cesar abandona tratados previos y declara la guerra (1.225: “hic pacem temerataque iura relinquo”), es un emblema de la desorganización geográfica y política de la Patria (1.191: “quo fertis mea signa, viri?”) narrada en su obra. Por otra parte, BETTINA REITZ-JOOSSE analiza representaciones literarias en la literatura romana del tiempo del principado donde Partia es descrita como un “paisaje de derrota” por autores como Ovidio y Propercio al señalar la ineptitud romana para comprender, conquistar y controlar este lejano territorio y su gente (pp. 179–86).7 Otra perspectiva es ofrecida por KARINE LAPORTE en su análisis de la Historia del Imperio Romano de Herodiano, donde la descripción del paisaje bélico se realiza con la intención de simbolizar el carácter individual de los protagonistas. La autora analiza, específicamente, los enfrentamientos entre Pescennius Niger y Septimio Severo en 193–4 d.C. donde lugares como la ciudad de Bizancio (3.1.5– 6), Monte Tauro (3.3.1–2) y una explanada cerca de Isos (3.4.2–3) son utilizadas para articular las características de los contendores y la naturaleza del poder imperial. LAPORTE argumenta que las omisiones, invenciones y ‘errores’ en la historia de Herodiano no son tales, sino que corresponden, en realidad, a recursos literarios que ayudan a organizar la narrativa en torno a una temática común (p. 193). La sección final del libro (Memory in War Landscapes) se concentra en narrativas iliterarias que enfatizan el rol del paisaje en procesos de memoria y olvido de conflictos armados. Basados en los ya asentados conceptos establecidos en el campo de memory studies, los autores se enfocan en procesos de memoria colectiva y transgeneracional que generan identidad y las formas en que muchas de estas memorias, en efecto, se cristalizan en función de lugares específicos.8 6 7 8
Sobre este tema en el arte romano, véase T. HÖLSCHER, The Transformation of Victory into Power: From Event to Structure, en: S. DILLON / K. WELCH (eds.), Representations of War in Ancient Rome, Cambridge 2006, 27–48. Ovidio, Fast. 5.581–2: gens fuit et campis et equis et tuta sagittis / et circumfusis invia fluminibus. Para la creación de memoria en la antigua Roma, véase K. GALINSKY (ed.), Memory in Ancient Rome and Early Christianity. Oxford 2016, en especial las contribuciones de A. GOWING (Memory as Motive in Tacitus) y K.-J. HÖLKESKAMP (In the Web of (Hi)stories: memoria: Monuments and Their Myth-historical ‘Interconnectednessʼ) en el mismo volumen. Para menotécnicas y su uso por prisioneros políticos durante la dictadura en Chile, véase S. ACCATINO, No olvidaremos. Lugar y memoria en los proyectos, dibujos y planos en isla Dawson, en: R. GREENE (ed.), Lawner, Talca 2021, 232–47, con dibujos y planos de Miguel Lawner durante su presidio político en la Isla Dawson (1973–74).
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Tomando como ejemplo el caso de un paisaje marítimo, JANRIC VAN ROOKHUIJZEN explora la relación entre paisaje y memoria de guerra en la batalla de Salamina donde el autor discute el proceso de creación de lugares de memoria o ‘mnemotopos’ de la batalla, que se construyen por medio del litoral, prácticas colectivas de conmemoración y narrativas literarias creadas a partir de la topografía costera narrada por Heródoto como lo son la isla de Psitalea entre Salamina y la costa (8.76–97),9 la península de Kynosoura en Salamina (8.76–7) y el monte Aigaleos frente a la isla, desde donde Jerjes observó la batalla (8.90). Más que identificar el lugar exacto de las confrontaciones navales entre griegos y persas, estos ‘mnemotopos’ marcan puntos clave de la batalla constituyéndose en puntos geográficos de interés desde la antigüedad. El segundo ensayo de esta sección nos introduce en significados pasados y presentes del paisaje de los Dardanelos, descrito por el autor, CHRISTOPHER MACKIE, como un paisaje “definido por la guerra más que cualquier otra área del mundo mediterráneo” (p. 229). Expandiendo su estudio más allá de la topografía homérica, MACKIE enfatiza la importancia de este lugar en la antigüedad donde conflictos míticos y reales tuvieron lugar: desde los precursores de la guerra de Troya, las Guerras Médicas y del Peloponeso hasta las campañas de Alejandro y, más recientemente, la campaña de Galípoli durante la I Guerra Mundial. Finalmente, JESSE WEINER examina paisajes bélicos civiles tomando como referencia los monumentos descritos por Lucano en su obra ya mencionada, los que WEINER contrasta y compara con los monumentos bélicos de la guerra de Yugoslavia y su recepción. El autor concluye que tanto los conflictos bélicos como sus monumentos generan paisajes de memoria colectiva que son dinámicos e inestables o, en otras palabras, versiones selectivas del pasado que pueden ser expresión de una ‘represión cultural’ o censura de una ‘memoria cultural’ (p. 241). WEINER incluye varias fotografías de este tipo de monumentos en Macedonia, Croacia, Bosnia y Herzegovina, incluyendo algunos ejemplos donde han sido destruidos, vandalizados con grafitis o derrumbados como ejemplos de lo que Lucano denominó como un crimen de la guerra civil (7.398: “crimen civile videmus”), cuyas ruinas no pueden funcionar ya como mnemotopos (p. 249).10 En síntesis, los temas explorados en las cuatro secciones de este volumen no se encuentran necesariamente confinados a sus respectivos capítulos. Por ejemplo, aunque el tópico de la memoria es abarcado por el último capítulo, es también abordado por otros autores como MAKINS, MEIJER y REITZ-JOOSSE. A su vez, VAN ROOKHUIJZEN y WEINER estudian el concepto de ‘mnemotopo’ introducido por ASSMANN para describir un paisaje que sirve como mediador de memoria cultural,11 mientras que la relación entre paisaje y el carácter de personajes que forman parte de éste es examinado en detalle por FELDHERR, FABRIZI, y LAPORTE. La isla también es mencionada por Esquilo (Pers. 447–71), Plutarco (Arist. 9.2) y Pausanias (4.36.6) como un lugar de muerte para los persas. 10 En otras palabras, monumentos des-monumentalizados por la guerra civil, algo común, por ejemplo, durante las dictaduras latinoamericanas o tras periodos totalitarios. 11 S. J. ASSMANN, Das kulturelle Gedächtnis, München 1992, 60.
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Por último, la agencia del paisaje bélico es un punto transversal a todas las secciones, pero explorada desde distintos puntos de vista. En general, el libro está bien editado y presenta una organización relevante y clara de los temas en relación al ‘paisaje de guerra’. Los autores constantemente refieren al lector a consultar otros capítulos del libro, generando un dialogo dinámico intertextual y permanente entre las distintas secciones de este volumen. Aunque la inclusión de imágenes de monumentos bélicos en el repertorio arqueológico clásico que complementaran lo discutido por algunos autores (en especial para la tercera parte) hubiese sido tremendamente interesante, los mapas en los ensayos de VAN ROOKHUIJZEN (Salamina) y MACKIE (Galípoli, con sitios antiguos y modernos) son de gran ayuda para el lector, así como las fotografías de monumentos bélico-civiles incluidas por MINCHIN y WEINER. Todos los textos clásicos citados en el libro aparecen en su versión original con sus respectivas traducciones al inglés de manera que el lector puede fácilmente consultar los conceptos e ideas estudiados por los autores. Si bien este libro constituye un estudio altamente especializado, la presentación de los temas es original y ágil, en especial aquellas contribuciones que establecen un puente entre la antigüedad y la historia reciente. Landscapes of War in Greek and Roman Literature es un libro recomendado no sólo para historiadores y especialistas en literatura clásica, sino que también para estudiantes y académicos en arte y arqueología grecorromana interesados en el estudio de monumentos bélicos y las marcas físicas y simbólicas de la guerra en el paisaje. VALERIA RIEDEMANN LORCA Department of Classics University of Washington [email protected]
w SCHULZ, RAIMUND (ed.), Maritime Entdeckung und Expansion. Kontinuitäten, Parallelen und Brüche von der Antike bis in die Neuzeit, Berlin / Boston: De Gruyter 2019. 404 p. ISBN 9783110666809. (Historische Zeitschrift, Beihefte, N.F. 77.) Der hier zu besprechende Band geht zurück auf die Konferenz „Maritime Exploration und Expansion“, die im Juni 2018 an der Universität Bielefeld stattfand und vom dortigen Zentrum für Interdisziplinäre Forschung (ZiF) finanziert wurde. Das Ziel der Konferenz war es, das Thema „komparativ und über die Epochengrenzen hinweg aus der Perspektive verschiedener Wissenschaftsdisziplinen zu erörtern“ (7) und „Voraussetzungen, Funktionen und Folgen maritimer Exploration komparativ zu analysieren“ (18), indem neben der Betrachtung dieser Aktivitäten in den östlichen Meeresräumen aus westlicher Richtung auch die indische und chinesische Seefahrt Berücksichtigung findet. Den Beiträgen vorgeschaltet ist eine ausführliche Einführung des Herausgebers in das Phänomen „Maritime Mobilität“, die wichtige Facetten der politisch und wirtschaftlich motivierten maritimen Aktivitäten von der Antike bis in die Frühe Neuzeit aufzeigt, die Beiträge resümiert und zugleich einen gelungenen Überblick über die neuere Forschung zu
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maritimen Explorationsaktivitäten bietet. Anders als in den ausschließlich auf die antiken maritimen Aktivitäten fokussierenden Publikationen kommen in diesem Band sehr viel mehr die atlantische Welt und auch andere maritime Großräume wie das Chinesische Meer in den Blick. Die Präsentation der Beiträge ist untergliedert in drei große thematische Blöcke. Der erste Block deckt den Bereich Erkundung und Eroberung der Meere ab, der die Faktoren für maritime Explorations- und Expansionsbewegungen thematisiert. Dazu zählen z. B. die Schiffbautechnik, deren Innovationsdynamik und Entwicklungsschübe mit ihren Rückgriffen auf ältere (etwa ägyptische, vorderasiatische und indische) marinetechnische Traditionen und der Transfer dieses technischen Know-how im Hinblick auf ihre Auswirkungen auf die Handelsaktivitäten mit dem Fokus auf die Verwendung der Nut-Feder-Technik im nördlichen Vietnam untersucht (RONALD BOCKIUS, Rezeption oder Innovation? Archäologische Spuren hellenistischen Schiffbaus in Indochina). Die Voraussetzungen für die Erschließung des Indischen Ozeans und seiner Zufahrtswege vom Westen aus analysiert RAIMUND SCHULZ (Ozeanische Seewege nach Indien. Der große Traum des Westens in der Antike) mit der Fokussierung auf politisch-wirtschaftliche Voraussetzungen wie die Inkorporierung Ägyptens ins Römische Reich mit dem Zugang zum Roten Meer als Verkehrsader und Bindeglied zwischen ostmediterranem Raum und Indischem Ozean; dass die Erkundung der Südroute um Afrika offenbar keine Option war, erklärt Schulz mit der Einschätzung, dass angesichts der immensen Gewinnspannen im Indienhandel kein Interesse an der risikoreichen Nutzung von Alternativrouten bestand. Nicht aus einer mediterranen Perspektive, sondern aus der entgegengesetzten Blickrichtung, der Sicht indischer Akteure, betrachtet EIVIND HELDAAS SELAND (Als Indien das Römische Reich entdeckte. Exploration und Handel im Indischen Ozean vom Osten aus gesehen) die Intensivierung maritimer Verbindungen, indem er die Präsenz von Händlern indischer Provenienz im Roten Meer und im südarabischen Raum seit dem 3. Jahrhundert v. Chr. bis in die erste Hälfte des 1. Jahrtausends n. Chr. untersucht. Die Etappen der Exploration des Atlantiks südlich und nördlich der Säulen des Herakles ab dem 7. Jahrhundert v. Chr. durch Phönikier, Griechen, Karthager (Hanno, Himilko), Massilier (Euthymenes, Pytheas) und Römer verfolgt DUANE ROLLER in seinem Beitrag Der Atlantische Ozean und die griechisch-römische Welt, wobei er das römische Interesse am Atlantik – abgesehen von den Britischen Inseln und der Küstenregion um die Rheinmündung – als gering einstuft. Die zunehmende Einbindung Chinas in maritime Handelsnetzwerke, die seit dem 3. Jahrhundert v. Chr. existierten und deren Aktionsradius sich bis in den Indischen Ozean erstreckte, erläutert ANGELA SCHOTTENHAMMER (Die Integration Chinas in die Welt des Indischen Ozeans von der Antike bis zum Beginn der Song-Dynastie. Seewege, Verbindungen und Handel), wobei in diesem Bereich bis ins späte 11. Jahrhundert die Dominanz iranischer, arabischer und südasiatischer Akteure auffalle. Überzeugend argumentiert Schottenhammer, dass die „Persian Gulf Traders“ ein unverzichtbarer Faktor seien für die Etablierung der transmaritimen Handelskonatke Chinas bis in den Indischen Ozean. Der Integration neuer Wissensbestände über den nördlichen Ozean und seine Inseln“
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(173) ist die Untersuchung über Imaginationen des Ozeans und atlantische Erkundungen im frühen Mittelalter von SEBASTIAN KOLDITZ gewidmet. Dabei steht der literarische Niederschlag der spätantiken und frühmittelalterlichen Erkundungen dieses maritimen Raumes im Vordergrund, die aber, so KOLDITZ’ Schlussfolgerung, mehr durch eine „‚Regionalisierung‘ innovativer geographischer Wissensbestände“ (204) gekennzeichnet sind als durch eine systematische Erweiterung des Bildes des atlantischen Meeres. Mit der Fokussierung auf ganz unterschiedliche Facetten maritimer Expansion (Schiffbau, Urbanisierung, explorative Aktivitäten im atlantischen Raum und handelspolitische Verflechtungen) in der Zeitspanne vom 12. bis zum 18. Jahrhundert zeichnet JÜRGEN ELVERT (Die Formierung der neuzeitlichen atlantischen Welt) die Folgen der Atlantiküberquerung und der Etablierung eines atlantischen Handelsnetzwerkes nach. Zugleich verweist er auf die Relevanz der Verbindung des westlichen Seeweges nach Indien mit der Umseglung des Kaps der Guten Hoffnung für die Entstehung eines den gesamten Globus umspannenden maritimen Aktionsfeldes der europäischen Seefahrer. Der zweite Block umfasst den Themenkomplex Die räumliche Verortung des Neuen: Maritime Exploration und die Geographie. KLAUS GEUS und IRINA TUPIKOVA (Entdeckungsfahrten und Kartographie. Anmerkungen zu einer problembefrachteten Beziehung im Altertum) versuchen, auf der Grundlage der Geographie des Klaudios Ptolemaios das komplexe Beziehungsgeflecht von Entdeckungsfahrten und Kartographie zu entschlüsseln. Festzuhalten sei, dass „die antiken Karten auch im Kontext von Seereisen ad hoc-Umsetzungen der vorliegenden geographischen Karten“ (240) zu sein scheinen und je nach Auftraggeber, Anlass, Größe, Form der Karte, Aufstellungsort und Funktion sehr unterschiedlich gestaltet werden konnten. INGRID BAUMGÄRTNER (Neue Karten für die Neue Welt? Kartographische Praktiken der Exploration) untersucht die antiken Erfahrungen, Vorstellungen und Denkmuster, die die Anpassung der Kartenproduktion an die zeitgenössischen Erfordernisse vorantrieben und die Kartierung frühneuzeitlicher Expansion forcierten. Auch wenn die Antike in vielen Karten aus der Zeit zwischen 1450 und 1550 präsent geblieben sei, hätten sich „Legitimationsdiskurse beim Kartieren der navigatorischen Leistungen in der Neuen Welt von den antiken Autoritäten hin zur Relevanz der Empirie“ (268) verlagert. Zwei von Matteo Ricci in den Jahren 1595–8 erstellte chinesische Weltkarten, Yudi-shan-hai-quan-tu (YDSHQT) und Yu-di-tu (YDT) stehen im Mittelpunkt der Untersuchung von YINGYAN GONG (Die ersten Weltkarten Matteo Riccis in China): Ein Teil der Ortsnamen stamme aus chinesischen Karten und Dokumenten. Die mit Abstand größere Anzahl von Toponymen auf den beiden Weltkarten basiere jedoch auf Ortelius’ Theatrum Orbis Terrarum und anderen (nicht immer identifizierbaren) geographischen und kartographischen Quellen europäischer Herkunft. Die beiden Weltkarten seien vielen chinesischen Gelehrten bekannt gewesen, die Erstellung derartiger Karten habe eine wichtige Rolle gespielt beim Wissenstransfer von Europa nach China. Der dritte Block konzentriert sich auf Fremde Völker an fernen Küsten – Konjunkturen und Methoden ethnographischer Welterfassung. MARIE LEMSER
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(Neue Ethnien am Südmeer. Die Sicht des Agatharchides von Knidos) fragt nach den Vorbildern, Motiven und Modellen, die der Darstellung der Ichthyophagen („Fischessser“) in der von Agatharchides verfassten Abhandlung Über das Rote Meer zu Grunde liegen. Sie arbeitet unter Einbeziehung des ethnographischen Denkens seit Homer heraus, dass Agatharchides mit der Idealisierung der genügsamen Lebensweise der Fischesser im Kontrast zu den eigenen (städtisch geprägten) Gewohnheiten die Begrifflichkeiten und Argumentationsstrukturen der Kyniker, Stoiker, Epikureer und Peripatetiker und bereits aus der ionischen Periplusliteratur und aus Herodots Historien geläufige Topoi aufgreift. Mit den ethnographischen Interessen des Poseidonios von Apamea setzt sich JULIAN GIESEKE (Poseidonios von Apamea und die Ethnographie der Kelten im Westen der Oikumene) auseinander. Im Vordergrund dieses Beitrags steht daher weniger die maritime Erkundung, sondern die von derartigen Unternehmungen ausgehenden Impulse für die Abfassung ethnographischer Beschreibungen, wobei sich Poseidoniosʼ Keltenexkurs als komplexes Konglomerat aus Realempirie, literarischen Topoi und gelehrten literarischen Reminiszenzen vor allem aus den homerischen Epen erweise. Besondere Bedeutung für die Entstehung von Poseidoniosʼ Keltenethnographie wird der machtpolitischen Entwicklung im westlichen Mittelmeerraum (der römischen Expansion nach Westen) zugeschrieben. BENJAMIN SCHELLER (Kaufleute als Ethnographen. Die Berichte über die Expeditionen zu den Kanarischen Inseln und an die Küste Westafrikas des 14. und 15. Jahrhunderts) analysiert zwei Berichte, „De Canaria“ (Mitte des 14. Jahrhunderts) und „Navigazioni Atlantiche“ (1455 / 6), über italienisch-iberische Atlantik-Expeditionen entlang der westafrikanischen Küste. Diese Texte zeichnen sich aus durch besonders qualitätvolle, auf eigener Beobachtung beruhende ethnographische Beschreibungen („Kaufmannsethnographie“) – ein Befund, den SCHELLER als Produktion zweckgebundenen Wissens im Kontext des atlantischen Sklavenhandels wertet, um auf den Kanaren und dem westafrikanischen Festland als Ausgangsbasis für die Anbahnung von Geschäftsbeziehungen das Vertrauen der Einheimischen und die Freundschaft der lokalen Machthaber zu gewinnen. Die ethnographischen Beschreibungen lieferten den Sklavenhändlern also das in diesem Kontaktsystem benötigte „instrumentelle Wissen des Kaufmanns“ und das ebenso unverzichtbare „kategoriale Wissen des Diplomaten“. ANTJE FLÜCHTER (Frühneuzeitliche Indienwahrnehmung zwischen Empirie, Antike und Antiquarismus. Die Briefe des Pietro della Valle 1586–1652) geht der Bedeutung des antiken Indienbildes für die frühneuzeitliche Wahrnehmung des südasiatischen Subkontinents nach: In erster Linie vom Reisebericht des Italieners Pietro della Valle ausgehend, veranschaulicht sie, in welcher Weise, je nach Bereich und entsprechend den Interessen und Erwartungen der Zielgruppe das Indien-Bild antiker Autoren tradiert, relativiert und modifiziert und mit der frühneuzeitlichen Realität abgeglichen und konfrontiert wurde. Die kritischen Anmerkungen können kurz ausfallen. So wäre es wünschenswert gewesen, angesichts der Vielfalt der abgehandelten maritimen Großräume und des epochen- und disziplinübergreifenden Ansatzes der Konferenz epochenübergreifende Kontinuitäten, Gemeinsamkeiten und Konvergenzen, aber auch
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Unterschiede, Spezifika und Brüche maritimer Explorations- und Expansionsbewegungen in einer Schlussbetrachtung zu resümieren. In einem nächsten Schritt hätten dann Forschungsperspektiven und -desiderata aufgezeigt werden können. Auf diese Weise könnte dem Lesepublikum der Ertrag der Konferenz noch anschaulicher vor Augen geführt werden. Festzuhalten bleibt, dass der sorgfältig edierte Band durchweg lesenswerte Beiträge präsentiert, die in ihrer Summe weiterführende Einblicke in die maritime Exploration und Expansion eines großen geographischen Raumes über einen langen Zeitraum hinweg bieten. MONIKA SCHUOL Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel Institut für Klassische Altertumskunde Abt. Alte Geschichte D – 24098 Kiel [email protected]
II. Monographien mit übergreifender Thematik w CATAUDELLA, MICHELE R., Ritorno alla Flat Tax. Un itinerario di Atene antica fra VII e IV secolo?, Turnhout: Brepols, 2021. 300 p. ISBN: 9782503592770. Esta obra es la sistematización del pensamiento sobre la fiscalidad ateniense de larga distancia (del s.VII al IV a.C.) de toda una vida por parte del autor que comenzó a reflexionar ya sobre estas cuestiones en su obra de 1966 acerca de las reformas de Solón (Atene fra il VII e il VI Secolo, Catania 1966) y ha continuado poniendo de manifiesto sus análisis en los años sucesivos en varios trabajos posteriores (de 1980, 1984, 1997). CATAUDELLA se adentra, por tanto, en esta obra en el examen del sistema impositivo ateniense de eisphora en un amplio marco temporal. Parte en primer lugar (parte I) de la lectura del siempre complejo texto de Pólux (8.129–31) (abordado en el Capítulo I de la Parte I) referido, sin duda, a la eisphora y que sitúa acertadamente a finales del s.V o inicios del s.IV. Aún así, concede al testimonio de Pólux un valor también para pensar el sistema de tributación en tiempos de Solón, reconociendo en el texto, por tanto, una ley de “matriz soloniana”. La teoría principal del autor presenta un recorrido temporal del paso de una flat tax inicial en el s.VII a un impuesto de carácter progresivo con Solón, que siguió vigente hasta el 378/7 a.C. fecha de la reforma de Nausinico de la fiscalidad ateniense, momento en que se retornaría a una flat tax, como desarrolla en el Capítulo II. El estudio de la fiscalidad conllevará, por otra parte, adentrarse en el tema de la demografía ateniense de los s.V y IV, abordado en el Capítulo III, con atención específica a los recortes de Antípatro y de Demetrio de Falero a finales del s.IV. Asimismo, se hace un recorrido, en la segunda parte de la obra (Parte II), por la crisis del s.VII y las reformas de Solón, tratado en el
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Capítulo I de la Parte II, poniendo el foco en los cambios metrológicos y monetarios, asociados a la hipótesis de la Seisachtheia como abolición de intereses y no de deudas, algo ya controvertido desde Androción. Finalmente, el autor termina el recorrido realizando una reflexión sobre el impacto de los cambios fiscales del 378 en la sociedad ateniense del s.IV en la que se descubre una tendencia a la inflación y la relación de esta realidad con los postulados e inquietudes económicas que descubre en los Poroi de Jenofonte (Capítulo II de la Parte II), a partir de los presupuestos teóricos que conciernen el viejo debate “modernistas” vs “primitivistas”. El punto de partida esencial de toda la interpretación del autor es, por tanto, el texto de Pólux (8.129–31) sobre la exacción de eisphora relacionada con las clases censitarias de matriz soloniana. En esta parte se detiene de manera minuciosa en un valioso estudio filológico del término ἀναλίσκω, cuyo sentido habitual es “gastar” (generalmente de manera voluntaria), aunque se ha traducido generalmente, en este pasaje, por “pagar” (obligatoriamente). Su análisis deja claro el sentido de “gastar” para obtener un rendimiento, un beneficio, tanto privado como público. De este modo para CATAUDELLA las cifras señaladas por Pólux con este verbo en el pasaje (del que se echa en falta una traducción) no se referirían tanto al pago a las arcas públicas por parte de estas clases censitarias (en la eisphora) (que se ha interpretado de distintos modos según los diferentes autores que han abordado el tema), sino al capital que es destinado a las contribuciones al estado por el que están censadas cada una de las clases para la eisphora. El contribuyente, en relación con la clase a la que pertenece, emplea un capital x en favor del estado. De este modo, las cifras que aparecen en Pólux no son las contribuciones de cada clase (o de cada uno de sus miembros), sino el valor del capital sobre cuya base se calcula la cuota del contribuyente que deriva de la resta de ingresos brutos (20% del capital) e ingresos netos que se especifica en todos los casos (500, 300) salvo en los zeugitai, donde se indicarían los ingresos brutos, siendo los netos 150 (recogido en otra noticia de Demóstenes, 43.54). De este modo la primera clase pagarían en concepto de eisphora 700 (1200–500), la segunda 300 (600–300) y la tercera 50 (200–150), es decir la diferencia entre sus ingresos brutos y netos, según un capital establecido para cada una de ellas. Estos cálculos, sin embargo, tienen varios inconvenientes. En primer lugar, se utiliza la equivalencia, recogida en Plutarco (Sol. 23.3) y teóricamente de época de Solón, entre dracmas y medimno pero se aplica a un pasaje (el de Pólux), de matriz soloniana pero operante en la Atenas de finales del s.V e inicios del s. IV, momento en el que esta equivalencia, si alguna vez fue válida, ya no lo era en absoluto, pues el precio del medimno de trigo, aunque fluctuante, posiblemente estaba entre 4 y 6 dracmas, tema que apenas trata (salvo en una nota en el epílogo). Por otra parte, según esta hipótesis, la primera clase sería censada para la eisphora en solo 6000 dracmas de timema, es decir un talento que está muy por debajo de la capacidad patrimonial de los 300 más ricos de Atenas (con patrimonio superior posiblemente a 3-4 talentos), lo que lleva a la teoría (postulada por CATAUDELLA en 1997 y tomada de A. BÖCKH en 1886) por la que el timema o capital que se toma de base para la eisphora es la quinta parte del
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patrimonio real de los contribuyentes, lo que se utiliza para explicar los complejos pasajes de Demóstenes Contra Afobo que aluden a “5 de cada 25 minas” (Dem. C. Afobo I, 7.28.4; 29.59) y “3 de 15 talentos” (C. Afobo I, 27.9), pero deja cierta oscuridad sobre el patrimonio (real) de la tercera clase (zeugitai), que cree, según el modelo tradicional, conformada por pequeños y medianos labriegos. Por otra parte, si el objetivo del texto de Pólux era mostrar el montante de la eisphora en relación con las aportaciones de las clases, la manera de hacerlo no deja de ser rebuscada y compleja. Lo que sí parece coherente es la posibilidad derivada del propio texto de Pólux, de una eisphora progresiva con la aplicación de un porcentaje distinto según las clases, teoría que retoma de BÖCKH, así como la utilización de las clases censitarias para la eisphora antes del 378 a.C. También parece plausible y coherente su propuesta del paso a una flat tax tras la reforma de Nausinico en 378, con un único porcentaje (que él cree del 5%) para todos los contribuyentes de eisphora (aunque sería interesante considerar si no se mantuvo la progresión, según determinadas franjas de patrimonio, en el pago de la proeisphora). Otro inconveniente en las ecuaciones presentadas por CATAUDELLA es el elevado porcentaje que supone la tasa impositiva de los contribuyentes según su clase censitaria: 5% (la tercera: zeugitai), 10% (la segunda: hippeis) y 11,6% (la primera: pentakosiomedimnoi); y luego, tras 378, 5% para todos, lo que parece que entra en contradicción con las noticias de contribuciones del s.IV con tasas de 1% y 2%, siendo ya muy elevada y pesada, la tasa del 2,5%. En la teoría de CATAUDELLA se pasa en el 378 a una tasa única (5%) y se amplía la base de contribuyentes, algo que parece tener cierto peso. Sin embargo, no convence la explicación del porqué de ese aumento que relaciona, por un lado, con el comienzo del pago de los metecos y, por otro, con el inicio de la tasación sobre el patrimonio mueble (siendo la carga, antes, solo sobre la propiedad inmueble: tierras y casas). Es dudoso, sin embargo, que el pago de los metecos no sea anterior al 378 (Lys. 12.20; Isocr. 17, 41, 49). Por otra parte, es más que probable que en el s.V hubiera hippeis y zeugitai sin (o con poca) propiedad fundiaria, como parece sugerir un pasaje de Lisias (Lys. 34.4) y se desprende también del elevado número de hoplitas en la víspera de la Guerra del Peloponeso, lo que implica que no todos podrían vivir de la tierra en el Ática. Lo más lógico es suponer, por tanto, una ampliación en el 378 de la base de los contribuyentes derivada de la disminución del patrimonio susceptible de ser tasado para la eisphora. Los cálculos para el tema demográfico del s.IV, especialmente en relación con los censos de Antípatro y Demetrio y los testimonios de Plutarco y Diodoro, como testimonios no contradictorios sino complementarios y expresión de conceptos distintos (patrimonial y social), son acertados e interesantes. Sin embargo, las cifras de población del s.V (431 a.C.) no terminan de convencer y se echan en falta, en esa parte específica, los importantes trabajos de M. H. HANSEN (1988) cuyos cálculos derivan del cómputo de la mortalidad durante la Guerra del Peloponeso y que proporcionan una cantidad de población mucho mayor que la estimada para inicios del s.V o finales del s.IV, lógica, por otra parte, en el contexto de la prosperidad del Imperio en esos momentos.
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En cuanto a la segunda parte, sobre las reflexiones de época de Solón, no termina de verse claro la existencia de una tasa de eisphora anterior al legislador y mucho menos el porcentaje (hekte); en mi opinión, el argumento está débilmente fundado y no se adentra, por otra parte, en la contextualización económica y social de ese siglo (s.VII) en cuyo conocimiento se ha ido avanzando más recientemente, sobre todo desde la arqueología. CATAUDELLA retoma, por otro lado, la teoría que veía en los hectémoros a los deudores, pero es una hipótesis que deja fuera a una masa importante de población, quizás no endeudada, pero pobre, sin tierras o con pocas tierras, los thetes que las fuentes identifican con los hectémoros, y muchos de los cuales pudieron contratarse como aparceros. El estudio del tema metrológico y monetario es interesante, pero hay que mostrar una cierta precaución pues no hay evidencias de moneda en Atenas antes de los tiranos (DAVIS 2012), aunque no puede descartarse un origen anterior, pues como acertadamente argumenta el autor, uno de los principales objetivos de Solón pudo ser el de la exacción fiscal, como se ve en los testimonios sobre las naucrarías y en la definición económica de las clases. No se sabe a ciencia cierta nada más y, en mi opinión, no hay evidencias suficientes como para plantear un porcentaje tan preciso de exacción según la clase. Por otro lado, el autor pasa por alto un extenso periodo que se alarga desde Pisístrato hasta el 428 y que prácticamente no se aborda. Sea como fuere, las reflexiones y los cálculos del autor, cimentados en una lectura inteligente de las fuentes, suscitan, sin duda, múltiples cuestiones y debates. En el último capítulo de la segunda parte CATAUDELLA hace una interesante reflexión, a partir de la lectura de los Poroi, sobre la probable relación de la reforma de 378 de Nausinico con la ley de la moneda y la tendencia inflacionista, adentrándose, además, en algunas ideas propias de la larga, y en algunos aspectos ya superada, discusión dicotómica entre “primitivistas” y “modernistas”. En definitiva, estamos ante un estudio valioso, lleno de hipótesis y de cálculos a tener en cuenta. El autor se atreve con preguntas pertinentes a las que da respuestas, a veces arriesgadas pero coherentes, que surgen del análisis solvente y minucioso de una documentación abundante pero también incompleta y de difícil comprensión. No hay duda de que la reflexión sobre la tributación, por un lado, y la demografía, por otro, es completamente pertinente y necesaria. Sin duda la idea central del autor del paso de una tasación progresiva según las clases censitarias a una flat tax en el 378, momento en el que las clases censitarias dejaron de usarse para la eisphora, permanece vigente y coherente, aunque los números y las hipótesis no siempre convenzan, dadas las tan alejadas circunstancias y condiciones económicas existentes entre, por un lado, los siglos VII-VI y, por otro, el final del s.V y hasta los momentos conclusivos de la centuria siguiente (con los importantes cambios que se producen también en ella). MIRIAM A. VALDÉS GUÍA Universidad Complutense de Madrid [email protected]
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w DUECK, DANIELA, Illiterate geography in classical Athens and Rome, Abingdon: Routledge, 2021. 278 p. ISBN: 9780367439705. DANIELA D(UECK) ist die Autorin einiger bedeutsamer Studien zur antiken Geographie mit Schwerpunkt auf Strabons Geographika.1 War bislang die Erforschung des geographischen Diskurses der gesellschaftlichen Eliten der griechischrömischen Antike ihr Hauptforschungsfeld, so bewegt sie sich mit ihrer rezenten Monographie auf neuem Terrain. Damit beabsichtigt sie, den geographischen Wissensstand der lese- und schriftunkundigen Gesellschaftsschichten Athens und Roms zu ermitteln. So will sie nicht antikes geographisches Wissen von „oben“ erörtern, das in den Bahnen gelehrter Fachdiskurse entstand, sondern die Frage aufwerfen, wie es sich mit der Geographie von „unten“ verhielt. Daher beschäftigt sich die Autorin weniger mit den konkreten Ausformungen geographischer Vorstellungen der lese- und schreibunkundigen Bevölkerung als vielmehr mit der Verbreitung geographischen Wissens in antiken Gesellschaften und dessen Zugänglichkeit für illiterate Personengruppen. Als zeitliche Untersuchungsräume wählt sie für Athen die Klassik und für Rom den Zeitraum von der Mittleren Republik bis zum Ende des Prinzipats Hadrians. Bevor D. ihre Methode näher vorstellt, definiert sie mit sorgfältiger Genauigkeit die für ihre Studie zentralen Begriffe und Konzepte. So versteht sie unter „illiterate geography“ das geographische Informationsniveau der Gesellschaftsschichten Athens und Roms, die weder lesen noch schreiben konnten. Dazu zählt sie auch jene Personen, die aufgrund der Erfordernisse ihres Alltags in eingeschränktem Ausmaß lese- und schriftkundig waren, weshalb sie von der Existenz mehrerer sogenannter „literacies“ ausgeht (S. 111). Zweifelsfrei war sowohl das Wissen als auch die Strukturen von Räumen jener Personengruppen ein anderes als das der Eliten und (Fach-)Geographen. Daher überzeugt D.s Annahme, dass das Informationsniveau der lese- und schreibunkundigen Bevölkerung Athens und Roms über Räume zum einen aus praktischer Erfahrung und zum anderen aus allgemein zugänglichen Informationen sowie Wissen über Geographie zusammengesetzt war (S. 4–8; 192). Und diesen Kenntnisstand will sie zunächst durch die Selektion von sowohl schriftlichen als auch materiellen Quellen bezüglich ihrer Öffentlichkeitswirkung und in weiterer Folge durch deren Kontextualisierung vor sozio-kulturellen Hintergründen erreichen. Obwohl das Vorhaben D.s innovationsträchtig ist, vermisst man gerade in diesem Abschnitt des Werks eine klare Stellungnahme zu den Unterschieden der „illiterate geography“ zum bereits wohletablierten Konzept der „common sense geography“.2 Jenes ist auf die Erforschung der in unseren Quellen stillschweigend 1 2
DANIELA DUECK (ed.), The Routledge Companion to Strabo, Abbingdon 2017; Dies., Geography in Classical Antiquity (Key Themes in Ancient History), Cambridge 2012; Dies., Strabo of Amasia. A Greek Man of Letters in Augustan Rome, London 2000. Siehe das vage Statement D.s auf S. 2: „…studies related to common sense geography have tended to concentrate on perceptions and mental models rather than on specific items of knowledge. This is the focus of the present study: to concentrate attention on the uneducated
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vorausgesetzten Raumkenntnisse antiker Akteure gerichtet, die sich von der elitären (Fach-)Geographie dadurch unterscheiden, dass sie auf praktischer Raumerfahrung basieren. Mehrere Studien haben dieses Konzept bereits fruchtreich zur Anwendung gebracht.3 So ergeben sich Überschneidungen zwischen beiden Konzepten hinsichtlich der Bedeutung der praktischen Alltagserfahrung für die Ausformung geographischen Wissens. Hierfür betrachtet D. die Mobilität und soziale Interaktion nicht-elitärer Akteure im Rahmen von Krieg, Kult, Handel und Tourismus als die maßgeblichen Kanäle für die Akquirierung geographischer Informationen (S. 8–12). So basiert die Hypothese ihrer Studie darauf, dass die lese- und schreibunkundige Bevölkerung Athens und Roms Kenntnisse über Räume durch Erfahrung, Austausch und allgemein zirkulierende Informationen erlangen konnte (S. 3; 18–21). Dabei stehen die konkreten Ausformungen des geographischen Wissens von „unten“ in D.s Monographie im Gegensatz zur „common sense geography“ im Hintergrund. Schließlich ist es das Hauptziel ihrer Studie, die Zugänglichkeit und Verbreitung geographischen Wissens unter der nicht-elitären Bevölkerung zu bewerten und ihr Informationsniveau abzuschätzen. Um ihr ambitioniertes Vorhaben zu einem erfolgreichen Abschluss zu bringen, entscheidet sich D. dazu, ein heterogenes Quellencorpus zu analysieren, das sich sowohl aus schriftlichen als auch materiellen Zeugnissen zusammensetzt. Im ersten thematischen Abschnitt (Kapitel 2–4) untersucht sie literarische Texte, die ihrer Meinung nach repräsentativ für das zirkulierende geographische Wissen in Athen und Rom seien. Damit sind vor allem Reden, Dramen und Sprichwörter gemeint, die aufgrund ihrer hohen Öffentlichkeitswirksamkeit vermutlich auch die illiteraten Gesellschaftsschichten erreichten. Dabei bearbeitet D. nur diejenigen Reden, von denen bekannt ist, dass sie öffentlich in Athen gehalten wurden. So kommt sie zum Ergebnis, dass die klassischen Reden nur den geographischen Raum abdecken würden, den die breite Bevölkerung womöglich aufgrund ihrer unmittelbaren Lebenserfahrung bereits gekannt hätte. Anders verhielte es sich laut D. in Rom, wo besonders die vor einer großen Öffentlichkeit gehaltenen Reden Ciceros das geographische Weltbild der Zuhörer zu erweitern vermochten. Hinblickend auf die räumliche Dimension der griechischen Dramen konstatiert D., dass diese ganz der unmittelbaren Lebenswelt der Griechen entspreche. Ebenso hätten ihrer Ansicht nach römische Dramen den geographischen Horizont der griechischen Stücke nur geringfügig erweitert. In den beiden Kapiteln listet D. meist nur die in den einzelnen Werken erwähnten Toponyme auf und erstellt zum Zweck des Vergleichs Tabellen und Abbildungen. So führt sie ihre Analyse zum Ergebnis, dass nicht nur in Athen,
3
lay members if society, but also on anyone who might potentially have absorbded unwritten information.” KLAUS GEUS / MARTIN THIERING (eds.), Features of Common Sense Geography: Implicit Knowledge Structures in Ancient Geographical Texts (Antike Kultur und Geschichte 16), Berlin et al. 2014; ANCA DAN / KLAUS GEUS / KURT GUCKELSBERGER, What is common sense geography? Some preliminary thoughts from a historical perspective, in: K. GEUS (ed.), Common Sense Geography, Berlin 2014, 17–38, bes. 33.
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sondern auch in Rom die Möglichkeit für die Bevölkerung bestand, über die Existenz von weit entfernten Orte zu erfahren. Doch dabei handele es sich ihrer Meinung nach meist um „places in the news“ (S. 34) im Sinne von intentionalem „name-dropping“. Das soll heißen, dass ihre Nennung politisch-ideologischen Absichten geschuldet war. So hätten ihres Erachtens nach Dramen und Reden zu keiner Erweiterung des geographischen Erfahrungshorizonts der nicht-elitären Bevölkerung geführt. In diesem Zusammenhang bleibe laut D. auch fraglich, ob das antike Publikum zwischen fiktiv-mythischen und realexistierenden Orten in den Reden und Dramen unterscheiden konnte. Im nächsten Kapitel schwenkt der Fokus der Diskussion auf Redewendungen mit sprichwörtlichem Charakter. In überzeugender Weise zeigt D., dass diese Quellengruppe nicht nur geographisches, sondern auch ökonomisches Wissen konserviert. Aber aufgrund der langen Zirkulation von Sprichwörtern sind Unterschiede zwischen ihren ursprünglichen Entstehungskontexten und ihrer Rezeption bei antiken Autoren und einschlägigen Sammlungen festzustellen, welche die Autorin bei der Interpretation beachtet. Nach der Meinung D.s würde die Existenz zahlreicher Sprichwörter und deren mnemotechnischen-didaktischen Eigenschaften verdeutlichen, dass geographisches Wissen vor allem in nicht-elitären Gesellschaftsschichten verbreitet war. Im zweiten thematischen Abschnitt (Kapitel 5–6) geht D. auf visuelle Medien und Veranstaltungen ein, die ihrer Meinung nach Vehikel geographischer Informationen gewesen wären. Zunächst bespricht sie Spektakel mit hoher Öffentlichkeitswirksamkeit, die als Medien ideologisch aufgeladene Informationen transportieren, die das Publikum zwangsläufig aufsaugte und daher dessen Weltsicht prägte. Daraufhin behandelt sie Monumente und Artefakte, die ihrer Meinung nach geographisches Wissen in ähnlicher Weise wie Spektakel einer breiten Öffentlichkeit zugänglich gemacht hätten. In diesem Abschnitt behandelt D. auch Inschriften und Münzen, wobei sie ihr besonderes Augenmerk der möglichen Wirkung der epigraphischen Inszenierung von Toponymlisten auf illiterate Betrachter schenkt. Generell attestiert sie den visuellen Medien und Veranstaltungen die Funktion bedeutsame Vehikel der staatlich gelenkten Kommunikation geographischer Informationen an die lese- und schreibunkundige Gesellschaft zu sein, da ihr Adressatenkreis nicht auf eine bestimmte Personengruppe beschränkt gewesen war. Das Schlusskapitel stellt eine konzise Präsentation der Ergebnisse dar. Darüber hinaus kommt D. an dieser Stelle auf die unterschiedlichen Rahmenbedingungen für die Vergrößerung geographischen Wissens in Athen und Rom zu sprechen. Während hierfür in Athen das mediterrane Netzwerk der Griechen der entscheidende Faktor gewesen wäre, so hätte ihrer Meinung nach in Rom Geographie in einem untrennbaren Zusammenhang mit Eroberungen und imperialer Außenpolitik gestanden (S. 195). Mit ihrer neuen Monographie legt D. einen wichtigen Grundstein für zukünftige Forschungen im Bereich der nicht-elitären Geographie und sogenannten Alltagsgeographie. Die Erstellung einer Methode zur Analyse des geographischen Wissenstands der lese- und schreibunkundigen Bevölkerung Athens und
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Roms ist das vorrangige Ziel der Studie (S. 4), das D. vollumfänglich erreicht. Besondere Bedeutung verdient ihre innovative Methode, das Ausmaß der in der Bevölkerung Athens und Roms zirkulierenden und allgemein zugänglichen geographischen Kenntnisse abzuschätzen. Würde man das von ihr erstellte Konzept der „illiterate geography“ mit der „common sense geography“ ergänzen, so öffneten sich neue Wege zur Erforschung nicht-elitären Wissensstrukturen über Räume in der breiten Masse antiker Gesellschaften. Besonders ertragreich dürfte die Anwendung der Konzepte zur Analyse dokumentarischer Quellen wie Inschriften, Papyri und Ostraka sein, die Rückschlüsse über die geographischen Kenntnisse der Bewohner der Regionen der antiken Welt geben können, die fern ab von Athen und Rom liegen. So stellen diese beiden Zugänge einen Schlüssel dar, um den Einfluss von sozio-ökonomischen Netzwerken in der römischen Welt und das damit verbundene Management von geographischem Wissen in bestimmten Gruppen zu erforschen. Es bleibt daher zu erwarten, dass zukünftige Studien von D.s wegweisender Studie profitieren werden. JULIAN DEGEN FB III – Alte Geschichte Universität Trier D – 54286 Trier [email protected]
w FROEHLICH, SUSANNE, Reisen im Römischen Reich, Berlin / Boston: De Gruyter 2023. 246 p., ill. ISBN 9783110763232. (Seminar Geschichte.) Reisen in der Antike – in einer Welt ohne Flugzeug, Auto oder Fahrrad – fasziniert bis heute und bietet durch seinen Lebensweltbezug zahlreiche Anknüpfungspunkte für das Interesse an der Alten Welt. Damit wird es zu einem beliebten Thema auch für althistorische Proseminare. Hierfür möchte SUSANNE FROEHLICH mit ihrem Buch ein Hilfsmittel vorlegen, das nicht nur einen Überblick über das Basiswissen geben soll, sondern auch Anregungen, Aufgaben und Lektüreempfehlungen zur selbstständigen Weiterarbeit. Es versteht sich damit als ein Studienbuch für die universitäre Lehre, das gleichzeitig aus ihr hervorgeht (vgl. Vorwort VII). Die Reihe Seminar Geschichte, in der das Werk erschienen ist, möchte den Bedürfnissen der neuen, modularisierten und kompetenzorientierten Studiengänge entgegenkommen und besteht daher aus quellenbasierten Themenbänden, die nach fachdidaktischen Gesichtspunkten strukturiert sind. Mit jeweils 14 Kapiteln bieten sich ihre Bände als Kompletthilfestellung oder ausgewählte Material- und Aufgabensammlung für Proseminare an. Die einzelnen Abschnitte sind jeweils nach dem gleichen Muster aufgebaut: Nach einem kurzen Überblick über das Schwerpunktthema folgt eine einschlägige Quelle, die durch Fragen und Anregungen erschlossen werden soll. Dabei handelt es sich beispielsweise um Auszüge aus Horazʼ Iter Brundisinum, um die Inschriften der Memnonkolosse oder um den
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Reisebericht der Egeria. Aber auch archäologische Zeugnisse wie Grabreliefs, Meilensteine oder antike Reisesouvenirs werden vorgestellt. Ergänzende Karten aus dem Historischen Atlas zur Antiken Welt oder dem Barrington Atlas sollen das geographische Orientierungswissen aufbessern und helfen, sich „den Raum der antiken Welt näher zu erschließen“ (S. 15). Den Abschluss eines jeden Unterkapitels bilden weiterführende, kommentierte Literaturempfehlungen. Inhaltlich bietet der Band zu Beginn zwar einen kurzen historischen Überblick über das Reisen von Archaik über Hellenismus bis in die Spätantike, beschränkt sich jedoch eindeutig auf das Reisen im Imperium Romanum vom ersten Jahrhundert v. Chr. bis zum vierten Jahrhundert n. Chr. Das thematische Hauptaugenmerk legt FROEHLICH auf „unterschiedliche Formen selbst gewählter Reisetätigkeit, etwa Geschäftsreisen, Studienreisen oder Pilgerreisen, nicht aber die Mobilität von Gefangenen, von Verbannten, von Geiseln oder von militärischen Abteilungen und auch nicht dauerhafte Migration von Einzelpersonen oder Personenverbänden“ (S. 30). Ausgehend von den antiken Quellen über das Reisen (1.) skizziert FROEHLICH anschließend die Forschungsgeschichte (2.) und zeigt auf, mit welch unterschiedlichen Perspektiven einzelne Forscher des 19. und. 20. Jahrhunderts auf das Thema blicken. Dieses sei lange randständig gewesen und habe erst mit Ludwig Friedländers wegweisender Sittengeschichte Roms (1864, 10. Aufl. 1921/2) eine Bearbeitung gefunden. Der Wirkmächtigkeit dieses Werks ist deshalb das dreizehnte Kapitel von FROEHLICHS Buch gewidmet. Nach der theoretischen Einordnung werden die Akteure, Anlässe und Motive (3.) des Reisens vorgestellt. Anschließend behandelt die Autorin die Voraussetzungen, nämlich die Sicherheit und Infrastruktur (4.) im Römischen Reich sowie Planung (5.) und Vorbereitung. Das Thema Infrastruktur wird daraufhin noch einmal vertieft, indem das Reisen zu Land (6.) und zu Schiff (7.) jeweils näher vorgestellt wird. Die Abschnitte 8 bis 12 beleuchten dagegen einzelne Reisearten, nämlich die Erholungs-, Bildungsund Kulturreisen, Tourismus sowie Missions- und Pilgerreisen. Abschließend (14.) reist FROEHLICH zusammen mit Asterix und Obelix durch die popkulturelle Antikenrezeption. Als Studienbuch beinhaltet das vorliegende Werk verschiedene Elemente, die die Erarbeitung des Themas erleichtern sollen, nämlich die kommentierten Literaturhinweise, Fragen und Anregungen zur Quellenarbeit sowie ein Glossar mit den zentralen Termini zum Thema Reisen.4 Die Lektüreempfehlungen am Ende eines jeden Kapitels fassen kurz und prägnant den Gehalt des jeweiligen Werkes für das Thema zusammen. LIONEL CASSONs Buch wird etwa als das „nach wie vor umfassende Standardwerk“ charakterisiert, das „einen breiten und quellennahen Überblick vom Alten Orient bis in die Spätantike“ (S. 16) bietet, MARION GIEBELs Reisen in der Antike wird als „einführende Darstellung, die vor allem literarische Quellen zu Wort kommen lässt“ (S. 16) beschrieben. Bei
4
Zum Beispiel: Itinerar, Leeseite, Mutatio, Via Publica, Villegiatur, usw. (vgl. Glossar, S. 233–8).
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gleichzeitig breiter Themenvarianz und begrenztem Umfang des Bandes kann FROEHLICH pro Kapitel nur einen kurzen Überblick über die Forschungsliteratur geben. Dies wird beispielsweise in Abschnitt 6 Reisewege zu Land bei der Besprechung von Horazʼ Satire 1,5 Iter Brundisinum deutlich. Hier wäre etwa neben der zeithistorischen Deutung von DENNIS PAUSCH vor allem die topographische Betrachtung der Satire von GERHARD RADKE5 sinnvoll gewesen, gerade wenn FROEHLICHs Arbeitsauftrag lautet: „Stellen Sie Informationen zusammen, die der Text über das Reisen auf der Landstraße bietet, etwa über die genutzten Transportmittel, Reisegeschwindigkeiten, Verpflegung und Unterkunft“ (S. 94). In 5.1 Information und Planung einer Reise wird ebenfalls deutlich, dass ein Studienbuch aufgrund seiner Konzeption eben nur die groben Linien eines Themas aufzeigen und keine Auseinandersetzung mit Spezialfragen leisten kann. Beispielhaft sei hierfür die Einordnung der Tabula Peutingeriana in den Kontext der Reiseplanung erwähnt. Diese aus der Antike überlieferte Weltkarte kommentiert FROEHLICH mit folgenden Worten: „Eine Darstellung wie die der Tabula Peutingeriana, die über 4000 Orte namentlich verzeichnete und die Entfernung der Wegstrecken zwischen ihnen angab, konnte bei der Planung von großem Nutzen sein.“ (S. 66–7). Nun sind es lediglich knapp 2800 Ortsnamen, die die Tabula aufführt, und weitere ca. 800 Flüsse, Berge, Ethnien, Inseln usw.6 Auch weiß die Forschung schon seit einigen Jahren (WEBER, TALBERT, RATHMANN), dass diese Weltkarte keinen praktischen Nutzen für Reisen durch das Römische Reich hatte.7 Mit den Fragen zum Textverständnis und Anregungen zur Weiterarbeit bietet FROEHLICH in jedem Abschnitt Arbeitsaufträge für die Quellenarbeit. Dabei versucht sie auch, wie es für den propädeutischen Teil eines Proseminars sinnvoll und notwendig ist, die Hilfs- bzw. Grundwissenschaften einzubauen. Mit einer Securitas-Augusti-Prägung Neros soll man sich etwa die Numismatik (4.), mit der Einkaufsliste des Theophanes die Papyrologie (5.) und mit einem Meilenstein aus Carnuntum die Epigraphik (6.) erschließen.8 Die dazugehörigen Fragen und Anregungen sind zwar nach dem Prinzip des selbstentdeckenden Lernens gestaltet, wirken jedoch oberflächlich, wenn es lediglich heißt: „Informieren Sie sich über die Numismatik/Papyrologie/Epigraphik“, ohne dass aufgeführt wird, wo man sich darüber informieren und was genau recherchiert werden soll. Hier ist davon auszugehen, dass der jeweilige Leser nur ziellos das Internet konsultieren wird. Alternativ könnte man etwa auf die Einführungswerke von ROSEMARIE GÜNTHER,
5 6 7 8
RADKE, GERHARD, Topographische Betrachtungen zum „Iter Brundisinum“ des Horaz, RhM 132.1 (1989), S, 54–72. Exakte Informationen sind über die Datenbank https://tp-online.ku.de/ abzurufen. Vgl. KÖHNER, PHILIPP, Nordafrika auf der Tabula Peutingeriana, AKAN XXXII (2022), S. 213. Die Prosopographie wird leider komplett ausgeklammert, obwohl man sie bei der Behandlung des Iter Brundisinum in Kapitel 6 gut hätte unterbringen können, gerade wenn es um die Frage nach den Mitreisenden des Horaz und deren Verhältnis untereinander (Stichwort: Maecenas-Kreis) sowie den Zweck der Reise geht.
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HARTMUT BLUM / REINHARD WOLTERS und PATRICK REINARD verweisen9 oder auf die einschlägigen Artikel im Neuen Pauly, um gleichzeitig selbstständige Literaturrecherche und die Arbeit mit Lexika einzuüben. Weiterhin wären ein Erwartungshorizont zu den Arbeitsaufträgen sowie vorformulierte Lernziele zu den Unterkapiteln wünschenswert, um die Arbeit mit dem Buch zu erleichtern. Zusammenfassend sei festgehalten, dass FROEHLICH mit dem vorliegenden Band eine Überblicksdarstellung zum Thema Reisen im Römischen Reich vorlegt, die eben kein Fachbuch für das Gesamtthema sein will, sondern ein Studienbuch für die Lehre mit exemplarischer Herangehensweise. Positiv hervorzuheben ist ferner die Fokussierung auf die Arbeit mit verschiedenen Quellenarten sowie die kompetenzorientierten Arbeitsaufträge. Gerade die Beschäftigung mit Friedländers Sittengeschichte soll der Schärfung der eigenen Methodenkompetenz im Umgang mit der jeweiligen „Schreibgegenwart des Autors“ (S. 205) dienen und hilft dabei, die eigene Perspektive auf das Thema kritisch zu hinterfragen. Beachten sollte man bei der Benutzung des vorliegenden Bandes jedoch, dass die ausgewählte weiterführende Literatur oft nicht den Stand der Forschung abbildet sowie manche Interpretation der Quellen (z.B. zur Tabula Peutingeriana) überholt ist. Dennoch eignet sich das Werk durch seine quellenbasierte und kompetenzorientierte Gestaltung sowohl für Wissenschaftliche Mitarbeiter am Beginn ihrer Laufbahn mit bisher wenig Erfahrung in der Erstellung und Durchführung eines Proseminars als auch für fortgeschrittene Lehrende als Materialsammlung für Seminare wie auch Lektürekurse. PHILIPP KÖHNER KU Eichstätt-Ingolstadt Universitätsallee 1 D – 85072 Eichstätt [email protected]
w HETTINGER, JASMIN, Hochwasservorsorge im Römischen Reich. Praktiken und Paradigmen, Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Verlag 2022, 493 S., 21 Abb., 9 Karten. ISBN: 9783515132664. (Geographica Historica, 44.) JASMIN HETTINGER (H.) hat mit ihrer Dissertation, die an der Universität Duisburg-Essen im DFG-Graduiertenkolleg „Vorsorge, Voraussicht, Vorhersage, Kontingenzbewältigung durch Zukunftshandeln“ entstanden ist und 2021 angenommen wurde, eine äußerst detailreiche und akribische Studie zur Hochwasservorsorge im Römischen Reich mit Fokus auf die Zeit zwischen Augustus und Caracalla vorgelegt.
9
GÜNTHER, ROSMARIE, Einführung in das Studium der Alten Geschichte, 3. überarbeitete und aktualisierte Auflage, Paderborn / München [u.a.] 2009; BLUM, HARTMUT / WOLTERS, REINHARD, Alte Geschichte studieren, 2. überarbeitete Auflage, Konstanz 2011; REINARD, PATRICK (Hrsg.), Werkzeuge der Historiker:innen, Bd 1 Antike, Stuttgart 2023.
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Ihre Forschungsfrage, die H. bereits in ihrer Einleitung formuliert und dann im Fazit erneut aufgreift, lautet: Wie wurde im Römischen Reich auf alltäglicher Basis mit Flusshochwassern und Flutrisiken umgegangen? Ihr Anlass, sich mit dieser Thematik zu beschäftigen, war die Tatsache, dass zumindest nach Ansicht H.ʼs präventive Praktiken angesichts latent drohender Naturkatastrophen bisher in der Forschung eher vernachlässigt wurden bzw. sogar – hier bezieht sich H. auf die Forschungsergebnisse von HOLGER SONNABEND (Naturkatastrophen in der Antike. Wahrnehmung, Deutung, Management, Stuttgart 1999) – argumentiert wurde, dass Vorsorgemaßnahmen, da vom Princeps nicht als politisch erstrebenswert angesehen, kaum ausgebebildet wurden. Dieser Ansicht versucht nun H. durch die Vorstellung und genaue Betrachtung etlicher konkreter Beispiele, die das gesamte Römische Reich in den Blick nehmen und sich an großen Flusssystemen (z.B. Tiber, Nil, Mäander) orientieren, zu widerlegen und damit eine Gegenposition zu dem Narrativ aufzubauen, aktive Risikobewältigung sei ein Charakteristikum der Moderne, was H. etwas polemisch als „Meistererzählung der Moderne“ qualifiziert. In ihrer ausführlichen und grundlegenden Einleitung stellt H. die bisherige Forschung zur Thematik „Naturkatastrophen in der Antike“ und die dabei in den letzten drei Jahrzehnten herausgearbeiteten Ergebnisse sehr luzide und prägnant dar und versucht bereits hier vorzuführen, was und wie sie diese Forschungsgeschichte für ihre Arbeit produktiv nützen kann und wo sie Defizite und Desiderate sieht. Gespiegelt jeweils vor der Folie ihrer eigenen Arbeit und Fragestellung erstellt H. einen gut lesbaren Literaturbericht zur antiken Katastrophenforschung seit den 90er Jahren des vergangenen Jahrhunderts, der nicht nur Literaturtitel an Literaturtitel reiht, sondern stets den größeren Kontext im Blick hat. Deutlich werden hier bereits die profunde Literatur- und Forschungskenntnisse der Autorin, die den Wandel der Perspektiven in der Forschungschronologie nicht nur erkennt, sondern für die Leserschaft klar formuliert. Darüber hinaus arbeitet sie in die Einleitung auch organisch etliche notwendige allgemeine Begriffsdefinitionen, etwa Risiko, Prävention, Management oder Vorsorge ein, mit denen sie in ihrer Studie umgeht. Sehr interessant, weil für H.ʼs Ansatz grundlegend, sind ihre Ausführungen zum analytischen Konzept „Environmental Coherence, das von MATTHIAS HEYMANN im Laufe der beiden vergangenen Jahrzehnte zur historisch vergleichenden Erforschung der Kultur-Umwelt-Beziehung ausgearbeitet wurde (HEYMANN, in: V. JANCOVIC / C. H. BARBOZA (ed.), Weather, Local Knowledge and Everyday Life: Issues in Integrated Climate Studies, Rio de Janeiro 2009, 99–106 u.ö.) Dieses Prinzip geht von der Grundüberlegung aus, dass historische Gesellschaften einerseits von den Gegebenheiten ihrer naturräumlichen Umgebung geprägt sind, sie aber den Naturraum durch kulturelle Praktiken ihren Bedürfnissen entsprechend umgestalten, wodurch eine ständige beiderseitige Dynamik entsteht. Als dritten Punkt geht das Einleitungskapitel noch ausführlich und mit großer Kenntnis auf die recht heterogene Quellensituation ein. Das erweiterte Quellenrepertoire: literarische Quellen, Fachschriften, epigraphische Quellen, archäologisches Material und Geoarchäologie, wird sauber aufgedröselt und mit seinen
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jeweiligen Stärken und Schwächen vorgeführt, gleichzeitig werden aber auch die Notwendigkeit und Unterschiedlichkeit der Berücksichtigung der verschiedenen Quellen je nach Fragestellung, Untersuchungsthematik und geographischer Lage herausgearbeitet, wie sie später in den Einzelstudien zur Anwendung kommen. Bevor dann der ausführliche Hauptteil (S. 151–365) der Arbeit mit seinen Einzelfallstudien beginnt, erläutert H. gestützt auf eigene Vorstudien noch römische Diskurse um Flusshochwasser. Sie arbeitet dabei eine Veränderung der Begrifflichkeit von aqua magna hin zu inundatio und schließlich – spätantik – diluvium heraus, die sie in einen interessanten historischen wie auch mentalitätsgeschichtlichen Kontext einbettet und somit – wie sich später herausstellt – für ihre Hypothese fruchtbar machen kann. Nach H. spiegelt der Wechsel der Wortfelder wohl den Wechsel der kulturellen Lebenswelt und die dadurch mitverursachte Veränderung im Umgang mit Hochwassern wider. In den vorgestellten Diskursen werden auch sehr kenntnisreich die Frage nach dem religiösen Umgang mit Flusshochwassern sowie deren Deutung thematisiert und die damit verbundenen Forschungsdiskussionen abgearbeitet (prodigium oder nicht, Divinisierung und Personifizierung von Flüssen). Gleichwohl betont H. selbst, dass im Mittelpunkt ihrer Studie weniger die Deutung als vielmehr die technisch-administrativen, alltagspraktischen Aspekte des römischen Umgangs mit Flusshochwassern stehen (S. 411). Im Hauptteil versucht H. nun, orientiert an geographisch den gesamten Mittelmeerraum abdeckenden Einzelfallbeispielen nacheinander unterschiedliche Facetten des Umgangs mit Hochwassern vorzustellen und dabei aufzuzeigen, dass diese Auseinandersetzung mit dem Naturphänomen, die – worauf H. mehrfach hinweist – sehr wohl anthropogene Ursachen haben können, durch ein komplexes Beziehungsgeflecht zwischen Kultur, Technologie und Topographie der Flusslandschaft geprägt ist. Besonders hervorzuheben ist dabei die Erkenntnis, dass Hochwasser nicht nur als Bedrohung gesehen werden, sondern auch als chancenreicher Teil eines regionalen Wirtschaftssystems, eine Einschätzung, die – wie H. zeigen kann – nicht nur für den ägyptischen Nillauf gilt. Daher verwundert es auch nicht, dass gegen manche von uns heute als Hochwassergefahr eingeschätzte Flusssituation nicht oder nur eingeschränkt vorgegangen wurde. Die einzelnen Fallbeispiele setzen ihren Fokus jeweils unterschiedlich. Zum einen geht es um technische Maßnahmen im alltäglichen Umgang mit Hochwasserrisiko (Brückenbau, Dammbauten, Kanalbauten, Talsperren, Drainagen, Ausbaggern von Fahrrinnen und Hafenbecken uvm.), zum anderen werden administrative Maßnahmen dargestellt sowie deren alltägliche Umsetzung und Anwendung, die in epigraphischen und vor allem juristischen Quellen evident wird. H. spannt dabei einen weiten Bogen von bekannten Beispielen, wie etwa dem Tibermanagement in Rom, der Trockenlegung des Lacus Fucinus, den Mäanderregulierungen, bis hin zum Straßen- und Brückenbaumanagement in Nordafrika und dem Kataster von Lacimurga. Bei jedem dieser Fallbeispiele wird zunächst der Sachverhalt vorgestellt, es wird die Quellenfrage diskutiert und die bisherige Forschung referiert, dann zieht H. daraus ihre Schlussfolgerungen und passt das Beispiel in ihre Argumentationsstruktur ein. In dieser Art und Weise arbeitet die Autorin akribisch und
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für die Leserschaft sehr gewinnbringend alle in der Einleitung formulierten Themen und Sachfragen auf. Zuletzt finden sich eingehende Ausführungen zum antiken Wissen um die Hochwasser. H. kann hier zeigen, dass dieses Wissen geographisch spezifiziert ist und – ein interessanter Ansatz – von der politischen Zentralgewalt, die augenfällig italisch orientiert ist, nicht immer raumgerecht ein- und umgesetzt wird, was zu teilweise falschen Entscheidungen und Verwerfungen führt. Das Kapitel schließt mit einem Diskurs zum Thema „Siedlungen am Fluss“. An einzelnen Beispielen wird die Bandbreite des Umgehens mit Hochwasserrisiken vorgeführt, die sich von technischen Maßnahmen zur Verringerung der Hochwasserwahrscheinlichkeit über Anpassung der Siedlungen an die Gefahren und einer gewissen Toleranz gegenüber den Überflutungen bis zur Aufgabe von Siedlungen nach mehrmaligen Hochwasserkatastrophen spannt. Im 4. Kapitel, überschrieben mit Synthese: Betrachtungen zur Environmental Coherence (S. 365–415) arbeitet die Autorin zusammenfassend drei übergeordnete Perspektiven ihrer Untersuchung heraus: 1. die Äußerungen des Risikobewusstseins, 2. die Einbindung der Flussdynamik in den Alltag und 3. von H. als Rivalitäten bezeichnete, unterschiedliche Interessen und deren Ausgleich in der vielgestaltigen Nutzung von Flüssen und Uferzonen, das sich im sich permanent adaptierenden rechtlich-administrativen Vorgehen sowie dessen Niederschlag in einer detaillierten Rechtsliteratur abbildet. Hier rekurriert H. dann auch nochmal auf die bereits angesprochene scheinbare Dichotomie von transzendenter Deutung der Fluthochwasser und der aktiven Vorsorge im alltäglichen Umgang. Die Studie schließt dann mit einem Fazit (S. 417–425) und einem umfänglichen, die verarbeitete Literaturmenge wiedergebenden Literaturverzeichnis, das mit seinem fast 50seitigen Umfang für sich alleine für jeden/jede, der/die sich mit antiken Naturkatastrophen beschäftigt, schon ein Schatz ist, da es einen tiefgründigen Überblick über die antike Katastrophenforschung zumindest der letzten 30 Jahre beinhaltet. Das Fazit greift nochmals beinahe alle bereits in der Einleitung angesprochenen Themen und Fragestellungen auf, um nun nach der breiten Vorstellung der Einzelstudien ihre Tragfähigkeit bzw. Richtigkeit zu bejahen oder zu verneinen. Hier schleicht sich bei der Leser*in an der einen oder anderen Stelle ein leicht redundanter Eindruck ein, wenngleich diese Zusammenfassung die Klarheit der Thesen H.ʼs durchaus verstärkt. Insgesamt konstatiert H. ein umfassendes vorsorgendes Handeln gegenüber den latenten Flutrisiken, wobei unter Risiko – wie bereits gesagt – eine Bedrohung verstanden wird, die man aktiv bewältigen zu können glaubt. Daher stütz sich das Vorsorgeprogramm auf 1) Prävention als Kontingenzvermeidung und 2) auf Management als Kontingenzbewirtschaftung. H. geht dabei von der aktiven Auseinandersetzung der antiken Akteure mit den natürlich indizierten Risiken aus, wobei ihrer Meinung nach die Management-Praktiken überwiegen. Gerade im Falle von Flusshochwassern konnten aufgrund ihres meist saisonalen Auftretens und ihrer Berechenbarkeit – zumindest in einem gewissen Rahmen – die antiken Gesellschaften präventive Maßnahmen entwickeln und ein
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Katastrophenmanagementsystem etablieren, das auch Erfolge zeitigte. Flusshochwasser gehörten damit zum „außergewöhnlich Normalen“, um einen Begriff aufzugreifen, den der Rezensent vor fast dreißig Jahren mit Blick auf Erdbebenereignisse prägte und der von H. dezidiert in diesem Sinne wieder aufgegriffen wird. In der Gesamtbetrachtung ist festzuhalten, dass es H. gelungen ist, eine profunde, luzide argumentierende und klar strukturierte Studie vorzulegen, die aufzeigt, dass der Umgang mit Naturrisiken in der Antike mehr war als religiöse Deutung und die Entwicklung sakraler Bewältigungspraktiken. Vielmehr versuchte der antike Mensch, sich aktiv präventiv mit seiner Umwelt auseinanderzusetzen und entsprechende Risiken einzuschätzen und sein Verhalten dementsprechend zu adaptieren. Daraus entstand sowohl technisches Know-how und Fortschritt wie auch praktisch-administratives Handeln, das rechtlich fixiert und im Laufe der Zeit auch entwickelt und nachjustiert wurde. Darüber hinaus zeigt H. geradezu vorbildlich auf, wie historisch-kritische Forschung funktioniert, in dem sie präzise und punktgenau mit den Quellen in all ihrer Breite arbeitet und daraus sowie auf der Basis von mehr als dreißigjähriger Forschungstradition neue theoretisch-abstrakte Ansätze ableitet. An diese muss wiederum die Messlatte der Quellen angelegt und sozusagen immer wieder der Lackmustest gemacht werden, um zum nächsten „Step“ in der Erkenntnis zu kommen. Jedem, der sich mit Naturkatastrophen in der Antike, nicht nur mit Hochwassern, beschäftigt, kann die Lektüre dieser Arbeit ohne Einschränkung ans Herz gelegt werden. GERHARD WALDHERR [email protected]
w IRBY, GEORGIA L., Conceptions of the Watery World in Greco-Roman Antiquity, London: Bloomsbury 2021. XVIII + 275 p. ISBN: 9781784538293. Im Folgenden wird nur der erste Band eines zweibändigen umfassenden Werkes rezensiert. Dieser Band behandelt die antiken (natur-) wissenschaftlichen, philosophischen, religiösen, mythischen und magischen Konzeptionen über Wasser in der griechisch-römischen Antike. Interessierte Leser seien unbedingt auch auf den zweiten Band GEORGIA IRBYs mit dem Titel Using and Conquering the Watery World in Greco-Roman Antiquity, London 2021, hingewiesen, der antike Gedanken über nutzbringende Verwendung sowie Kontrolle bzw. Beherrschung von Wasser und hierfür geeignete Techniken behandelt. Dieser Band ist daher für die antike Wirtschafts- und Sozialgeschichte oder die Siedlungsgeographie als Ergänzung zum hier besprochenen Band grundlegend. Wasser ist eine unverzichtbare Ressource allen pflanzlichen, tierischen und menschlichen Lebens auf der Erde. Dies wird uns derzeit angesichts der in vielen Regionen der Erde schon bestehenden Wasserknappheit infolge der übermäßigen Nutzung von natürlichen Wasserressourcen immer deutlicher bewußt. IRBYs zweibändige Studie leistet auch einen grundlegenden Beitrag zur derzeit aufblühenden
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Umweltgeschichte der griechisch-römischen Antike. IRBY integriert stärker als ältere Studien in ihre Überlegungen neuartige Parameter und Perspektiven aus der Diskussion über die Welt des Wassers oder über den Menschen und seine natürliche Umwelt im ‚Anthropozän‘ des beginnenden 21. Jh. Die thematische, räumliche und zeitliche Spannweite der Behandlung aller möglichen Aspekte, die mit Wasser in der griechisch-römischen Welt in Verbindung stehen, ist eindrucksvoll. Ihre Quellen- und Literaturhinweise sind zuverlässig und generell weiterführend, wenngleich bei einem solchen Thema natürlich annähernde Vollständigkeit von Quellenbelegen oder Sekundärliteratur nicht angestrebt werden kann. IRBY räumt selbst ein, daß sie sich primär auf literarische Quellen stützt, aber vereinzelt auch archäologische oder kunsthistorische Quellen einbezieht. Eine annähernd vollständige Berücksichtigung des sehr reichen archäologischen, siedlungsgeographischen, epigraphischen und numismatischen Quellenmaterials zu ihrem Thema hätte das Projekt ihrer Monographie überfordert. Die Verteilung von Wasserressourcen und der Zugang zu Seen, Flüssen oder Meeresküsten stellen ein ganz wichtiges Organisationsprinzip der Siedlungsgeographie und der Geschichte der Staatenbildung in der antiken Mittelmeeroikumene dar (vgl. Introduction 1–10). Enge Zusammenhänge einer systematischen Wasserwirtschaft mit früher antiker Staatsbildung sind oft beschrieben worden. In der antiken griechisch-römischen Staatenwelt bis hin zum spätantiken römischen Weltreich sind wohl die Bedeutung der Ressource Wasser und die Rolle von Wasserwegen in Handel und Verkehr stetig gewachsen. Im Unterschied zu anderen grundlegenden Bodenschätzen galt Wasser als eine ‚self-renewing ressource‘. Das antike Interesse an hydrologischen Phänomenen war groß. Es entstanden bereits früh antike geographische Fachschriften über einzelne Meeresgebiete (z.B. Pontos Euxeinos, Erythra Thalatta) oder den äußeren Weltozean (u.a. von Pytheas, Theophrast, Poseidonios). Philosophen spekulierten über die Rolle des Wassers von der prote hyle-Theorie des Thales über Aristoteles und die peripatetische Schule bis in die römischen Kaiserzeit (Seneca) und zu der folgenreichen Lehre der vier Grundelemente des Kosmos (Wasser, Feuer, Erde, Luft). Einschlägige Passagen antiker Autoren über Wasser, die bei IRBY vorgestellt und erörtert werden, stammen aus einem Zeitraum von ca. 1000 Jahren von Homer bis in die Spätantike aus (natur-) philosophischen, poetischen, geographisch-historischen, religiös-mythischen oder fachtechnischen Schriften. IRBYs Buch gliedert sich in 3 Hauptteile mit 9 Kapiteln sowie eine kurze Conclusion (191–4); es folgen ein nützlicher tabellarischer Appendix zu zitierten wissenschaftlichen, technischen, historischen und medizinischen antiken Autoren, dann Endnoten, eine Bibliographie und mehrere nützliche Indices. Part 1: Interpreting the Watery Framework: Philosophy, Cosmogony, and Physics, 11–82: Kapitel 1 (13–33) handelt über die Rolle von Wasser in der Kosmogonie. IRBY verweist auf enge Motivparallelen der griechischen (z. B. Hesiod) zu den mesopotamisch-vorderasiatischen Kosmogonie-Mythen und die Spekulationen über Wasser als wichtigstes der vier Elemente bei den ionischen Naturphilosophen (insb. Thales). Wasser bleibt auch in späteren antiken kosmologischen Mythen ein
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elementares Element, z.B. bei Platon oder Plutarch. Kenntnisse über besonders tiefe Meeresgebiete oder umgekehrt gefährliche Untiefen und Riffe oder andere schwierige nautische Verhältnisse, z. B. in Meerengen, waren jenseits eines rein wissenschaftlichen Interesses natürlich von eminent praktischer Relevanz (Kapitel 2: Meeresgebiete und Binnenseen 35–62). Kapitel 3 (63–82) widmet sich den Formen der wechselseitigen Einwirkung von Wasser und Land aufeinander. Bereits antike Geographen (nachdrücklich z. B. Strabon in den Geographika) betonten die gewaltigen Wasserkräfte von Meeren und Flüssen, die Küstenverläufe oder Mündungsgebiete von Flüssen im Laufe längerer Zeit (oder sogar innerhalb einer einzigen Generation) drastisch verändern konnten. Sie beschrieben im Detail Küsten oder Deltagebiete mit ihren Hafenorten, berichteten über neu aufgetauchte oder durch Überflutung verschwundene Inseln, oder über Bildungen von Isthmoi. Prominente Beispiele in der Literatur waren das ganze Deltagebiet des Nils von Alexandria bis hin nach Pelusion oder das Delta des PyramosFlusses in Kilikien mit einer besonders drastisch erkennbaren Landanschwemmung. IRBY thematisiert auch streckenweise unterirdisch fließende Flüsse sowie Quellen und Flüsse mit paradoxen Eigenschaften und Kräften. Hier wird die große Nähe antiker geographisch-hydrologischer Texte zur damaligen Paradoxographie deutlich. Part 2: Explaining Watery Phenomena (83–124) diskutiert zunächst in Kapitel 4 (85–109) antike Meinungen über klimatologische und hydrologische Phänomene, z. B. die Entstehung und die Arten von Regenfällen, Winden, Arten der Bewölkung, von Regenbogen, Donner und Blitz, Frost, Schnee oder Hagel. Hierzu gab es in der Antike schon früh sehr unterschiedliche Theorien. Fast allen aber fehlte eine hinreichende naturwissenschaftlich-experimentelle Fundierung. Daher wurde über die Jahrhunderte nur ein relativ geringer Fortschritt zur korrekten Erklärung solcher Phänomene erzielt. Das Kapitel ist aus meiner Sicht eines der besten im Buch. Kapitel 5 (111–24) widmet sich den überlebenswichtigen Zusammenhängen zwischen der Qualität des Wassers und der Aufrechterhaltung der Gesundheit der Lebewesen einer Region bzw. der Entstehung von individuellen Krankheiten oder Seuchen sowie andererseits den hochgeschätzten Heilkräften von Wasser in der Medizin und in Diätlehren. Hinreichend gutes Wasser spielte auch eine Schlüsselrolle bei der Aufrechterhaltung von Sanitäts- und Hygienestandards in Krisen- und Kriegszeiten (z. B. bei Belagerungen, in großen Heerlagern). Part 3: Imagining the Watery World (125–90) präsentiert in Kapitel 6 (127– 44) zunächst durch Beobachtungen gewonnene Erkenntnisse über das Aussehen und die Lebensweise von Meerestieren. Diese verbanden sich lange mit Spekulationen über angebliche Metamorphosen und einen hybriden Charakter solcher Tiere. Aelian referiert (phasin, man sagt) an einer sachkritisch schwierigen Stelle, daß in der Antike schon Meerestiefen bis zu 300 orguiai von Menschen erforscht worden seien (katopta einai). Alle Fauna und Flora in tieferen Meeresgebieten bleibe völlig unbekannt (Aelian, NA 9,35 und IRBY 127; 1 Orguia = 6 Fuß, umgerechnet ca. 550 m, aber das ist kaum glaubhaft). Unter den mit Interesse beobachteten Meerestieren fanden in der Antike Delphine und Robben große
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Sympathie (131–6). Delphine wurden oft abgebildet auf Gräbern, Vasenbildern oder als Statuetten, und in Mythen und Gedichten behandelt. Furchtgebietende Beschreibungen findet man von riesigen oder gefährlichen Meerestieren, z.B. Walen, Haien, Seeschlangen. Bisweilen, so z.B. hier in Kapitel 6, erhält IRBYs Buch den Charakter einer zwar sehr gelehrten Stellensammlung oder eines enzyklopädischen Thesaurus, es geraten aber übergreifende Fragestellungen über die Freude an der Präsentation des Materials in den Hintergrund. Bei den mythischen Meereswesen und Meeresungeheuern sowie Meeresgottheiten (Kapitel 7, 145–55) betonen antike Quellen ihren wechselhaften Charakter, der dem veränderlichen Element des Wassers angemessenen sei. Dies gilt für wohlwollend-gutartige Wesen wie die Tritone und Seepferdchen wie für gefährliche, bösartige wie Typhoeus, Skylla oder die Ketoi. Ebenfalls auffällig ist oft ein hybrider Charakter von Meeresmischwesen aus verschiedenen Gattungen. Wasser galt als Träger von Göttlichem und magischen Kräften der Geisterwelt (Kapitel 8, 157–69). Wasser als liminale Zone verband die menschliche Welt und die der Götter und Geisterwesen. Daher resultierte die unverzichtbare Rolle von Wasser aus dem Meer, aus Flüssen, Seen oder Quellen in antiken Kulten, aber auch die große Sorge um rituell-kultische Reinheit und die Angst vor Miasmata durch unreines Wasser. Seefahrerkulte und Kulte für Meergötter waren an allen Meeresküsten der antiken Welt verbreitet (Kapitel 9, 171–90). Zahlreiche Quellen bezeugen Opfer und Gelübde von Fischern, professionellen Seefahrern und Reisenden mit der Bitte um sichere Fahrt und glückliche Ankunft oder Heimkehr. IRBY stellt überregional verehrte Gottheiten wie Poseidon, Aphrodite, Isis oder die Dioskuren vor, aber auch interessante regionale und lokale Kulte. IRBY betont in ihren zusammenfassenden Bemerkungen (191–4) nochmals die instabile und wechselhafte („nebulous“) Qualität der watery world. Sie nennt seine Natur „polymorphic and metamorphic“ (191). Diese macht bereits eine Aufzählung abschließender Ergebnisse und prägnante Zusammenfassungen fast unmöglich. Wasser war zugleich nach IRBY „material foundation“ und „an agent of change“ in der Antike (191). Die schiere Vielfalt der im Buch referierten unterschiedlichen philosophischen, (natur-)wissenschaftlichen, historisch-geographischen oder poetischen Auffassungen aus der griechisch-römischen Antike ist der bleibende Haupteindruck der Lektüre des Buches, das für alle Richtungen der Altertumskunde empfehlenswert ist. Mit den griechisch-römischen Vorstellungen wären zur besseren Bestimmung ihrer Eigenstellungsmerkmale ähnliche Vorstellungen benachbarter Kulturen in Zukunft noch gründlicher zu vergleichen (der Kelten, Germanen, Skythen, Ägypter, Perser, Araber, oder Inder). Fast alle antiken griechisch-römischen Vorstellungen stimmen jedoch darin überein, daß Wasser wie die gesamte Natur und Umwelt zur Ausbeutung und Nutzung durch den Menschen dienen dürfe oder gar solle. Die meisten Autoren hielten deshalb auch alle Techniken für legitim, die die Antike hierfür entwickelte. Jedoch gab es seltene Ausnahmen z. B. bei Kritik an der Wasserverschwendung im Bergbau oder im Villen- und Badeluxus (oder aus religiösen Gründen). IRBY nennt die vorherrschenden antiken Konzepte über die watery world abschließend mit einem derzeit modernen Begriff treffend „earnestly anthropocene“ (194).
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Bibliographische Notiz: Zur weiteren Lektüre bieten sich u.a. an: J. BONNIN, L’eau dans l’antiquité, Paris 1984; P. HORDEN / N. PURCELL, The Corrupting Sea. A Study of Mediterranean History, Malden M.A. 2000; G. L. IRBY / P. T. KEYSER (eds.), Encyclopedia of Ancient Natural Scientists: The Greek Tradition and Its Many Heirs, London 2008; T. TVEDT / T. OESTIRGAARD (eds.), A History of Water, Vol 4: The Idea of Water from Antiquity to Modern Times, London 2010; D. HUGHES, Environmental Problems of the Greeks and Romans: Ecology in the Ancient Mediterranean, Baltimore 2014; G. L. IRBY (ed.), A Companion to Science, Technology and Medicine in Ancient Greece and Rome, Malden M.A. 2016; M.-C. BEAULIEU, The Sea in the Greek Imagination, Philadelphia 2016; sowie jüngst insbesondere M.-C. BEAULIEU (ed.), A Cultural History of the Sea in Antiquity (= A Cultural History of the Sea, 1), London 2021. JOHANNES ENGELS Universität zu Köln Historisches Institut [email protected]
w KERSCHBAUM, SASKIA, Fernwasserleitungen im kaiserzeitlichen Kleinasien. Ein Innovationsprozess und sein urbanistischer und soziokultureller Kontext, Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz 2021. XII + 512 p. ISBN: 9783447115988. (Philippika, 148.) Die Etablierung einer geregelten Wasserversorgung stellt ein wesentliches Element für die Urbanisierung antiker Städte dar. Fernwasserleitungen sind in diesem Kontext von eminenter Bedeutung. Sie verlangen nicht nur einen hohen Grad an technischem Wissen, sondern auch politische Organisationsformen, die Bau, Betrieb, Wartung und Distribution gewährleisten. In der 2021 erschienen Monographie von SASKIA KERSCHBAUM versucht die Autorin Fernwasserleitungen weniger als eine singuläre Bauform zu betrachten, sondern als Beispiel für Innovation und Transformation römischer Kultur mit all ihren damit verbundenen Implikationen auf das städtische Leben. Bei der Monographie handelt es sich um eine überarbeitete Fassung ihrer 2018 an der Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München verteidigten Dissertation, die erfreulicherweise zeitnah im Harrassowitz-Verlag publiziert wurde. Der Umfang des Werkes ist beachtlich: Auf 511 dicht bedruckten Seiten (darunter 61 Seiten Anhänge, Indices und Konkordanzen) werden in einer großräumig angelegten Analyse die Innovationsprozesse, die der Entwicklung der Fernwasserleitungen zugrunde liegen, sowie einhergehende gesellschaftliche, wirtschaftliche und kulturelle Veränderungen, ausgeführt. Wenn der zeitliche und geographische Rahmen auch mit dem kaiserzeitlichen Kleinasien eingegrenzt wurde, so sind viele der Ergebnisse auf das gesamte Imperium Romanum umlegbar. KERSCHBAUM versteht ihre Arbeit aus methodischer Sicht „als Synthese“, Fernwasserleitungen in diesem Kontext nur als einen – wenn auch bedeutenden – Teil des Gesamtkonzeptes der städtischen Wasserversorgung. Die Druckqualität des Bandes ist prinzipiell gut, das Erscheinungsbild ist mit Ausnahme des Fußnotenapparats, der grenzwertig klein gedruckt ist, ansprechend. Das völlige Fehlen von Abbildungen, Plänen und Karten ist bedauerlich, im Rahmen dieser Analyse, die weniger auf einzelne Orte, sondern auf übergreifende
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Fragen fokussiert, aber vertretbar. Inwieweit der Band einem Lektorat unterzogen wurde, ist dem Impressum leider nicht zu entnehmen. Zur annähernden Fehlerfreiheit ist der unbekannten Lektorin/dem unbekannten Lektor sowie der Autorin zu gratulieren. Nach einleitenden theoretischen Überlegungen zum mitunter inflationär und wenig präzise verwendeten Begriff „Innovation“, formuliert KERSCHBAUM ihre zentralen Fragestellungen (S. 1–19): Es sind dies Fragen nach den Gründen für den Erfolg von Aquädukten als Wasserinfrastruktureinrichtungen, den involvierten Akteursgruppen, dem Einfluss des Vorhandenseins hoher Wasserkapazitäten auf Urbanisierungsprozesse und nach ihrem innovativen Charakter. KERSCHBAUM möchte aber auch klären, inwieweit die Verbreitung von Fernwasserleitungen zentral gesteuerten Prozessen unterlag und inwiefern der „kulturelle Code“ der Aquädukte Rückschlüsse auf römischen Imperialismus und städtische Kultur erlauben würde. Zunächst bietet KERSCHBAUM einen Überblick zu den Primärquellen (Inschriften, literarische Quellen, Rechtstexte, Münzen, archäologische Befunde) und den Forschungsstand (S. 20–56). Während sich die Quellenlage zu den römischen Wasserleitungen als überaus vielfältig erweist, betont KERSCHBAUM zurecht die zahlreichen Forschungsdesiderata in Bezug auf Kleinasien, wobei sie Städte wie Pergamon, Ephesos und Milet sowie teilweise auch Sardes, Antiochia in Pisidien und Sagalassos ausnimmt. Dem stringenten Aufbau des Buches folgend, liefert KERSCHBAUM die technische Definition einer „idealtypischen Fernwasserleitung“ (S. 57–106), wobei sie in diesem Kontext eine sehr scharfe terminologische Abgrenzung vornimmt. Durch eine präzise Analyse der einzelnen technischen Elemente der Leitungen versucht sie, Unterschiede zwischen griechischen und römischen Leitungssystemen herauszuarbeiten. Im Mittelpunkt der Analyse steht dabei immer die Frage nach einem möglichen Wissens- oder Techniktransfer, aber auch nach technischem Fortschritt. KERSCHBAUM betont darüber hinaus weitere Faktoren, die unmittelbaren Einfluss auf die Planung von Wasserleitungen hatten: Es sind dies einerseits die Endabnehmer und damit stark verbunden die Baukosten von Leitungen; andererseits die heterogenen hydrologischen und klimatischen Bedingungen in Kleinasien, die lokal-spezifische Lösungen verlangten. Eine knappe Auswertung der archaischen, klassischen und hellenistischen Leitungen in Kleinasien, bevor es in die römische Einflusssphäre gelangte, zeitigt Probleme und überraschende Ergebnisse (S. 107–30): Generell scheint eine Datierung der Wasserleitungen aufgrund der sporadischen Quellenlage schwierig; ebenso unklar gestalten sich Aussagen zur Verbreitung von Wasserleitungen. Für die hellenistischen Leitungen zeigt sich, dass sich die hellenistischen Könige aufgrund der scheinbar geringen repräsentativen Bedeutung der Wasserleitungen nur in geringem Maße als Akteure ausmachen lassen. Dies frappiert umso mehr, wie die Autorin betont, als in dieser Phase bereits wesentliche Fortschritte im Bereich des Wasserbaus geschehen. Die ersten Austauschprozesse zwischen Rom und Kleinasien bezeichnet KERSCHBAUM als „Transitionsphase“, also als Übergangsphase, in der rechtliche
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Konventionen in Bezug auf Wasserrecht und wasserbauspezifische Verwaltung ausgelotet werden mussten (S. 131–96). Als Grundvoraussetzung für die Verbreitung von Fernwasserleitungen in Kleinasien bezeichnet sie richtigerweise die relativ stabilen politischen Verhältnisse ab der augusteischen Epoche, sprich Friedenszeiten, in denen auch fernab der Städte Wasserinfrastrukturmaßnahmen sicher bestehen konnten. Auf rechtlicher Ebene attestiert die Autorin Tendenzen zu einer provinzübergreifenden Vereinheitlichung. Ein anderes Bild zeigt sich ihrer Meinung nach in Bezug auf die Verwaltung der Wasserversorgung, die in Kleinasien in den Händen der regulären Magistrate verblieb, während in Rom die curatores aquarum diese Aufgabe übernahmen. Warum Städte überhaupt die cura übernommen haben, beantwortet KERSCHBAUM mit Vorsicht so (S. 194): „Denkbar ist an dieser Stelle durchaus die Erklärung, dass die Curatores der Entlastung der Magistrate dienten und deshalb im Bedarfsfall berufen wurden.“ Das zentrale und zugleich umfangreichste Kapitel der vorliegenden Arbeit ist den wesentlichen Akteuren bei der Verbreitung von Fernwasserleitungen gewidmet: Es sind dies die Kaiser, die Euergeten und die Poleis (S. 197–329). Dabei tangiert KERSCHBAUM Fragen nach einer „Provinzialisierungspolitik“ der Kaiser und Statthalter ebenso wie die Stiftungspräferenzen von Euergeten und die Verantwortung der Städte für die öffentliche Infrastruktur. Die Rolle der Kaiser skizziert sie differenziert: Sie betrieben weniger eine zielgerichtete Baupolitik im Wasserinfrastrukturbereich; sie griffen vielmehr im Notfall ein, etwa nach Naturereignissen wie Erdbeben, wenn direkte oder indirekte finanzielle Unterstützung vonnöten war, oder bei Streitfällen in organisatorischen und juristischen Belangen. Eine besondere Rolle sei aber den Statthaltern zugekommen, die KERSCHBAUM als „das entscheidende Moment für den Bau einer Fernwasserleitung“ bezeichnet, da sie „als Scharnier in der Kommunikation zwischen dem Kaiser und den Städten“ fungierten. KERSCHBAUMs Analyse zeigt deutlich, dass auch – bis auf wenige Ausnahmen – private Euergeten die Finanzierung scheuten. Diese mieden ihrer Meinung nach den mit dem Bau von Aquädukten hohen juristischen und verwaltungstechnischen Aufwand und fokussierten auf Stiftungen, die ein höheres Prestige für den Stifter erwarten ließen und oftmals mit öffentlicher Unterhaltung in Verbindung standen. Als die entscheidenden Akteure für den Bau und die Instandhaltung von Fernwasserleitungen identifiziert sie als ein wesentliches Ergebnis ihrer Arbeit die Städte (S. 328): „Sie konnten den Bau genehmigen, den Verlauf der Leitung festlegen und planen, die nötigen organisatorischen Anforderungen wie etwa den Kauf von Grundstücken erfüllen, Epimeleten und sonstiges Fachpersonal ernennen und private Anschlüsse vergeben.“ Nicht weniger entscheidend sei der Umstand, dass einzig die Städte in der Lage waren, den Überblick über die gesamte Wasserinfrastruktur zu behalten. Mit den großen Wassermengen, die über Fernwasserleitungen sicher in die Städte transportiert werden konnten, gehen weitere Baumaßnahmen einher, wie etwa die Errichtung von Thermen oder Nymphäen. „Diese Bauten dienten nicht der Versorgung, sondern sorgten für eine völlig neue Art von urbanem Lebensstil … Die römische Einflusssphäre hatte den kleinasiatischen Poleis die technischen Mittel und die Rahmenbedingungen geliefert, um die Fernwasserleitungen gleichsam
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zum Symbol für die neue städtische Prosperität und einen neuen zivilisatorischen Standard avancieren zu lassen.“ (S. 329) Die Übernahme von technischen Innovationen wie etwa im Bereich der Wasserinfrastruktur zeige laut KERSCHBAUM ein hohes Maß an Integrationsbereitschaft in Kleinasien (S. 331–45). Es ist ein Leitmotiv dieser Arbeit, die Verbreitung von Fernwasserleitungen mit stabilen politischen Verhältnissen in Verbindung zu bringen (S. 347–71). Erst die kaiserzeitlichen Aquädukte konnten ungehindert bis vor die Stadt geführt werden. Der oberirdischen Führung von Leitungen konnte somit nicht nur inner-, sondern auch außerstädtisch eine repräsentative Funktion zukommen. Folgt man KERSCHBAUM, dann dringt dieser Repräsentationscharakter bis in die Ausschmückung privater Wohnräume mit Wasserbauten durch. Fernwasserleitungen sieht die Autorin allerdings nicht „als Medium imperialistischer, holistischer römischer Raumwahrnehmung“; sie seien vielmehr zur „Definition von städtischem Territorium“ genutzt worden. Sie sind daher vielerorts zu finden. Dort, wo sie fehlen, lokalisiert Kerschbaum Gesellschaften mit eigener, spezifisch angepasster Wasserbautechnologie (S. 373–81). Die wesentlichen Elemente des im Titel angeführten Innovationsprozesses sind der Prinzipat, die römische Administration und Rechtsprechung sowie die Polis als wichtigster Akteur in diesem Gefüge (S. 383–94). Es kann KERSCHBAUM daher gefolgt werden, wenn sie resümiert (S. 393): „Fernwasserleitungen waren zu einer elementaren Komponente der Identität kleinasiatischer Poleis und damit zu zentraler Bedeutung für die kulturelle Identität Kleinasiens avanciert.“ Die Monographie von SASKIA KERSCHBAUM stellt einen wertvollen Beitrag für all diejenigen dar, die sich für die Geschichte und Archäologie Kleinasiens im Allgemeinen, und die Bewirtschaftung von Wasser im Speziellen interessieren. Der Band ist gut lesbar, stringent aufgebaut, konzise in der Argumentation, reich an Verweisen und voller wichtiger Beobachtungen. Es ist das Verdienst von KERSCHBAUM, all die Quellen dieses doch beträchtlichen geographischen Raumes zusammengetragen und das Phänomen der Verbreitung von Fernwasserleitungen im kaiserzeitlichen Kleinasien in besonderer Klarheit diskutiert zu haben. MARTIN STESKAL Österreichisches Archäologisches Institut Österreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften Franz-Klein-Gasse 1 A – 1190 Wien [email protected]
w KÖNIG, JASON, The Folds of Olympus. Mountains in Ancient Greek and Roman Culture, Princeton: Princeton University Press 2022. XXX + 444 p., 27 ill. ISBN: 9780691238494. In recent years, ‘mountains’ as a theme of scholarly research has attracted a great deal of attention across the academy and the siren song of the summit has called
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to classicists, too. Representations of mountains in literature, epigraphy, numismatics, art works of all varieties, and archaeological sites on mountain tops have been considered in a number of more or less extensive, or scholarly, investigations in the humanities. Yet, as KÖNIG correctly states, there has yet to emerge a comprehensive survey of mountains within the diverse ancient source material, not to mention any overarching interpretation of what mountains might have represented in their original context. At a time when there is an intense focus on modern relationships with the physical world, the absence of a transhistorical view of mountains would seem especially egregious. This books takes up the challenge to right that wrong, and it is a challenge with many barriers to overcome, not least in the sheer scale of the (often friable and fragmentary) sources available to us. To navigate through this rocky terrain, KÖNIG has created an intricately structured work composed of four inter-related parts. The first part, on mountains and the divine, is largely concerned with ancient Greek literature and covers an introductory section on archaeological remains on summits, representations of mountains in archaic Greek poetry, and Pausanias’ writings on landscapes. In a final departure from Greek and classical antiquity, KÖNIG considers mountain pilgrimmage in early Christian and late antique culture, through the reportage of Egeria. KÖNIG sets out early on a compelling theoretical overlay, suggesting the utility of the concept of bodily immersion and eco-critical theory both to illuminate ancient relationships with mountains and to demonstrate how these relationships might compare to our own. The second part, Mountain Vision, covers aesthetics, science and the sublime, visual representations of mountains in art, and mountain symbolism in Latin literature. Here, we’re first introduced properly to an idea central to KÖNIG’s investigation: the enigmatic mountain. A section on Horace’s Soracte (Odes 1.9) sets out persuasively how both then and now there is often great difficulty in deciphering the meaning of mountains in literature. The enigmatic aspect is viewed in the multiplicity of potential meanings in textual sources, particularly given the expansive constellation of intertextual references woven into works on mountains by Seneca or Ovid, for example. To misquote Protagoras, mountains are the measure of all things. The third part covers mountain conquest, including the knowhow and technology used to allow travel through high altitude landscapes (though erroneously omitting the legacy of some indigenous mountain cultures that used items such as a proto-crampon to traverse Alpine areas.), a somewhat cursory survey of Greek and Roman historiography, an important section on Strabo’s extensive surveys of mountains and ranges, and reflections on the natural force imagery in work of the late antique Ammianus Marcellinus. The fourth and final substantive section is on living in the mountains. KÖNIG first brings us back to the present, considering how contemporary anthropological and environment theories might apply just as well to antique sources. We’re soon returned to KÖNIG’s favoured Arkadia, the region first explored in the book, for reflection on how mountain identities are formed, before travelling to Crete to
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hear about Plato’s Laws, and the Mountains of Euboia to discover how Dio Chrysostom’s language framed rural/urban optics. We end on the peaks of early Christian thoughts, marking the boundary stone between classical antiquity and the post-classical world, and containing a section on the truly disturbing Simeon the Mountaineer. KÖNIG successfully foregrounds eco-critical views such as sustained analyses of natural force imagery, along with reflections on the impacts of bodily immersion in experiencing and writing about mountains. These help to bind together the varied sources material, creating from the somewhat pointillistic sources a cohesive whole. The overall argument is persuasive – that there are correspondences, as well as divergences, between ancient and modern receptions of mountains and that works such as the highly influential Mountain Gloom and Mountain Glory written by MARJORY HOPE NICOLSON in 1959 have served only to distort these echoes between past and present receptions. The book contains a number of standout readings – KÖNIG is strongest on textual criticism – all of which allow a rarified oroskopia of the literary landscapes at to which KÖNIG seems best adapted. The chapter on the embodied experience in the Homeric Hymn to Pan, an eco-critical reading of a section of the Iliad, and bodily immersion in the mountains in Apuleius’ Metamorphosis are all outstanding and deserve wide attention. Chapter 12 on Strabo also usefully maps out the potentialities for future research on that author. There are occasional untaken opportunities. KÖNIG quite rightly argues that the colonial mindset that textures much of the nineteenth and early twentieth century mountaineering literature obscures the diversity of mountain representations in classical antiquity. Yet Roman political and literary culture, in particular, could equally be said to obscure the view of some mountain cultures before the Augustan period. The line: ‘mountain populations of Italy were absorbed and assimilated as valued constituents of the Roman Empire and Roman identity after a period of initial conflict.’ (p.197) is good evidence for the ease in which the colonial focalizations of Latin texts can dilute otherwise clear perspectives (likewise, contemporarily, when KÖNIG compares antiquity against ‘modern Western culture’ without qualification). All those communities listed on the Tropaeum Alpium at the foot of the Maritime Alps in La Turbie, some of whom such as the Salassi who faced near extinction, deserve better. There are occasional surprising omissions too, yet for every absence of a famous mountain description, such as the eruption of Etna in the Aeneid, there are gems, such as Plutarch’s account of mountain rescue. The result is luminous. It is true, more could be made of Greek theatre, both the texts of the plays and the location of theatres themselves, often on mountain sides or with mountain backdrops such as at Taormina before Etna or Aptera below the Lefka Ori. It also seems probable that Lyric poetry, of Simonides and Stesichorus especially, could be especially fertile ground for further work. Similarly, so could the texts and fragments of Arrian and Xenophon, who both receive fairly cursory treatment here, as does Livy. But the rare omission or underuse of source, or glossing over of ancient colonizing tendencies, points more to the ambition of the project than a
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failure by KÖNIG to meet the challenge. Indeed, the sheer length of the endnotes, running to 70 pages, demonstrates the huge endeavour involved in collecting and marshalling the original material and secondary literature. Any lacunae point to the vast potential for further work, both on individual summits, regions or sources, and on new readings from the perspectives of post-colonial theory or that focused on embodied experience or bodily immersion. Ecocritical interpretations of classical sources, such as signposted in the recent seminal work of CHRISTOPHER SCHLIEPHAKE, and in EDITH HALL’s forthcoming work on the Iliad, show the great potential for new approaches that will shed further light on mountains in ancient Greek and Roman culture. Mountain terrain can be treacherous, more so that of enigmatic mountains, and the many paths laid out in this work do not all make easy upwards progress. As metaphorically foreshadowed by Lucian in A Professor of Public Speaking, which is nicely deployed by KÖNIG in a section on meta-poetic mountain imagery, we can at times find ourselves ‘still at the foot of the ascent, creeping up with difficulty over crags that are slippery and hard to climb, sometimes rolling off onto their heads, and getting many wounds from the rough rocks.” But with the challenge of the climb comes the reward. In KÖNIG’s ascent the final view from the summit is rarified, one less of gloom than the glory of this landmark work. MATTHEW SHIPTON Kingʼs College London [email protected]
w LUTZ, JAN, Digital History als ‘experimental space’: Handels- und Transportnetzwerke in Gallien und Germanien sowie die Transportverbindung zwischen Mosel und Saône. Rahden: Marie Leidorf, 2022. 415 p., ill. ISBN 9783867572767. (Pharos: Studien zur griechisch-römischen Antike, 48.) ‘History’, according to the philosopher R.G. COLLINGWOOD, ‘is the re-enactment of past events in the historian’s mind’.1 Today, history is increasingly becoming a re-enactment of past events on the historian’s computer. This important volume, originally presented as a doctoral dissertation at the University of Luxembourg, attempts to grapple with some of the issues, challenges and opportunities which the ‘digital turn’ has brought to the historical sciences generally and more specifically to the historical geography of the ancient world. Undreamt of in the time of COLLINGWOOD, computers made their appearance on university campuses during the ’sixties of the last century. Contemporary historians, inspired by their colleagues in the social sciences, were in the vanguard of what was then known as the ‘quantitative revolution’. By the ’seventies, prehistoric archaeology and economic history had jumped on the bandwagon, later to
1
R. G. COLLINGWOOD, The Idea of History. Oxford 1946, 215.
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be followed by classical archaeology, epigraphy and numismatics. Since the turn of the millennium, computers – no longer bulky, slow and cumbersome mainframe leviathans, but inexpensive, portable and user-friendly laptops – have opened new avenues in historical geography through the application of GIS (Geographic Information Systems), ‘big data’ and network studies. The crucial advantage of the computer is its ability to store, retrieve and process amounts of data vastly larger than the historian’s own mind could ever hope to handle. Some of the ways in which historical geography can exploit this potential is through the creation of searchable databases, network analysis, and spatial analysis, which form the three core themes of the book: a critique of the ORBIS project at Stanford University (p. 63–82), a study of trade and transport networks in Roman Gaul and Germany (p. 83–131) and an attempt to identify Roman transport corridors across the Saône-Moselle watershed by means of Least Cost Path (LCP) analysis (p. 132–78). The main results are summarized on p. 179–86. Let it be said straight away: the text does not make for easy reading. Its structure betrays its origin as a doctoral dissertation thesis and the first four chapters (p. 1–62), devoted to introductory material, are burdened by marginal details and digressions (e.g., p. 47 on the reconstruction of a Roman river craft by the University of Trier). One searches in vain for traces of the guiding hand of a series editor or a publisher – or for that matter, of a graphic designer. The typography of the Latin block quotations on p. 21–2 is particularly unfortunate; worse, the text selections (from Ausonius’ Mosella) are given only in the original. Given the author’s declared intent to establish a ‘common ground’ and ‘build bridges’ between humanities and information sciences (p. 9), the decision to omit translations of Latin texts is difficult to understand and adds to the ‘Kommunikations- und Verständnisprobleme zwischen den Geistes- und Computerwissenschaften’ (ibid.) which this book was intended to reduce. With chapter 5, we move to the first of the three case studies, concerned with ORBIS, the Stanford Geospatial Dabatase with which most researchers within ancient historical geography will be familiar.2 This is one of several such open access databases; other examples – not cited here – being Pleiades, ToposText and, of course, Google Maps. The discussion engages closely with a 2012 paper describing the aims and scope of ORBIS at the time but takes no account of a more recent paper published by ELIJAH MEEKS following the upgrade to ORBIS version 2 in 20143 which addresses some of the issues raised by LUTZ. The points of criticism addressed in the chapter are, however, both relevant and well argued. Sections of road attested in textual sources are absent from the ORBIS database: as an example, LUTZ points to the south to north highway which according to Strabo (4.6.11) was laid out by Agrippa. (The name ‘Via Agrippa’ (p. 73–4) finds 2 3
https://orbis.stanford.edu. E. MEEKS, The design and implementation of ORBIS: The Stanford geospatial network model of the Roman world, in: Bulletin of the American Society for Information Science and Technology 41:2,2015, 17–21.
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no support in ancient sources; if the road were in fact named after its builder, it would have been a Via Vipsania). Other problems arise from treating roads spanning a period of more than six centuries as a single network (p. 82) and not taking account of variations in weather and daylight hours over the year (p. 69; 75–8). Furthermore, gradient – a significant constraint on mountain roads – does not always enter the equation or, if it does, in an unsystematic manner (p. 68–72). The author concludes that at present, ORBIS does not live up to the expectations voiced by its originators in 2012 (p. 80–2). Chapter 6 on network analysis should be read in tandem with chapter 4 (p. 54–7) on the history of network theory. ‘Der Einsatz der Netwerkanalyse in den heutigen Altertumswissenschaften ist vor allem im anglo-amerikanischen Raum verbreitet’, writes LUTZ (p. 55). Examples of ‘Arbeiten aus dem deutschsprachigen Raum, die sich der Netwerkanalyse bedienen’ (ibid.) include CHRISTIAN ROLLINGER, DANIEL BAUERFELD and LUKAS CLEMENS as well as EVA JULLIEN’s studies of late medieval trading guilds, but not the groundbreaking work of JOHANNES PREISER-KAPELLER at the University of Vienna. LUTZ’ own study of trading networks, which bases itself almost exclusively on inscriptions, reveals how connections between traders in the different ports and market towns along the main transport routes form networks with Lyon and Arles as their primary nodes (fig. 51–6). The function of the utricularii, who appear in no less than thirty inscriptions, is not clear: were they concerned with land transport of oil (p. 104) or wine (p. 117), were they makers of wineskins (the prevalent view) or skippers of rafts supported by inflated skins (Oxford Latin Dictionary)? The last of the three thematic chapters sets out to identify an ancient route connecting the Mediterranean and Atlantic watersheds across the plateaux of eastern Gaul by means of LCP analysis. The most direct road ran almost directly north from Chalon-sur-Saône through Langres to reach the banks of the Moselle at Toul. While this was the shortest route, it may not have been the most economical, given that ancient road transport was significantly more expensive than transport by riverboat. Since the nineteenth century, several topographers have proposed the existence of one or more roads linking the Saône upstream of Châlon to a point on the Moselle upstream from Toul (p. 139–41). A systematic comparison of all possible Saône-Moselle routes by means of LCP would be an interesting project for the future, but the scope of the present study is more limited. Nine possible alignments have been singled out for study. These link Port-sur-Saône (hypothetically identified with the portus Abucini of the Notitia Galliarum), Corre, Selles or Bains-les-Bains in the drainage basin of the Saône with Arches, Portieux or Charmes on the Moselle (p. 163). The results of the analysis (p. 165–73) reveal that in many cases, the course of known or presumed Roman roads do not diverge far from the LCP (p. 177); a tribute to the skill of the Roman road surveyor, who without a computer or a Digital Elevation Model (DEM) at his disposal managed to identify cost-effective routes across the landscape. The balance of other evidence combined with the results of the LCP analysis appears to favour the hypothesis of a route from Corre through Escles to Portieux (p. 181). As LUTZ takes care to emphasize, however, the computer does
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not provide definitive answers: ‘Die Ergebnisse sollten allerdings nicht als eigenständige Antworten, sondern vielmehr als Hinweise auf einen möglicherweise für weitere Untersuchungen interessanten Raum (z.B. Ausgrabungen) gesehen werden. Es sind Annährungen an eine mögliche Vergangenheit’ (p. 181–2). For the section between Corre and Escles, Lutz has also compared results of LCP analyses using different software (QGIS and SAGA) and different DEM resolutions. From a methodological viewpoint, his results are highly interesting but also somewhat disturbing (p. 177–8). While the alignment generated by SAGA comes close to the actual course of the Roman road as identified in the landscape, the QGIS route diverges eastwards (fig, 101, p. 286). The resolution of the DEM also plays a role; the route was generated by SAGA with a DEM resolution of 20m x 20m, but if the resolution is reduced marginally to 25m x 25m, the SAGA route now diverges from the Roman route (fig. 102, p. 287). The text is complemented by numerous illustrations (p. 187–287), tables (p. 288– 308), a corpus of inscriptions (p. 309–57) and a bibliography (p. 358–94). The volume is well provided with indices of places, persons, sources and subjects. Unfortunately, many of the index references are off by one or two pages. For instance, CIL XIII, 6851 appears on p. 111 but the index gives p. 109. TØNNES BEKKER-NIELSEN Classical studies, Department of Language, Culture, History and Communication University of Southern Denmark DK – 5230 Odense M [email protected]
III. Publikationen zu antiken und mittelalterlichen Autoren und Schriften w GUILLAUMIN, JEAN-YVES, Les arpenteurs romains. Vol. IV: Agennius Urbicus – Marcus Junius Nypsius. Texte établi et traduit, Paris: Les Belles Lettres, 2021. 281 S. ISBN: 9782251014913. (Collection des Universités de France.) Obwohl die Schriften der römischen Landvermesser (agrimensores) von hoher Signifikanz für ein vertieftes Verständnis der antiken Gesellschaft, Technik, Wissenschaft, Wirtschaft und Politik sind, zählen sie nicht nur zu den am wenigsten gelesenen antiken Texten, sondern auch zu den schwierigsten, voraussetzungsreichsten und diversesten.1 Dies beginnt bereits mit der Textkonstitution, die 1 Einen guten Überblick über den Stand der Forschung vermittelt unter den Publikationen der letzten Jahre beispielsweise der Sammelband von EBERHARD KNOBLOCH / COSIMA MÖLLER (eds.), In den Gefilden der römischen Feldmesser. Juristische, wissenschaftsgeschichtliche, historische und sprachliche Aspekte, Berlin / New York 2014. Zur inhaltlichen und formalen Vielfalt des Corpus der römischen Agrimensoren siehe beispielsweise die Bemerkung von
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moderne Editoren vor beachtliche Herausforderungen stellt. Unter denjenigen Forschern, die zu diesem Gebiet gearbeitet haben, ist der Philologe und Wissenschaftshistoriker JEAN-YVES GUILLAUMIN, inzwischen Emeritus an der Université de Franche-Comté in Besançon, zweifelsohne einer der Doyens. Neben zahlreichen Einzelstudien hat er sich vor allem im Bereich der Textedition hervorgetan. Von ihm sind bereits mehrere Editionen und Übersetzungen mit Kommentar zu den römischen Feldmessern erschienen. In der Reihe des Corpus agrimensorum Romanorum wurde sein Band zu Balbus publiziert (Napoli 1996). Drei weitere Ausgaben gehören zur renommierten Collection des Universités de France (veröffentlicht bei „Les Belles Lettres“): Der erste Band enthält die Schriften des Hyginus Gromaticus und des Frontin (2005), der zweite Band die des Hygin und des Siculus Flaccus (2010) und der dritte Band den anonymen Kommentar zu Frontin (2014). Das hier anzuzeigende Buch setzt diese Reihe fort und bietet die Schriften des Agennius Urbicus (De controversiis agrorum) und des Marcus Junius Nypsius (mit den Abschnitten Fluminis varatio, Limitis repositio, Varationis repositio und Lapides).2 Diese beiden Autoren waren zuletzt in den neueren Editionen, Übersetzungen und Kommentaren von JELLE BOUMA (Marcus Iunius Nypsus – Fluminis varatio, Limitis repositio. Introduction, Text, Translation and Commentary, Frankfurt am Main 1993) und BRIAN CAMPBELL (The Writings of the Roman Land Surveyors. Introduction, Text, Translation and Commentary, London 2000, S. 16–49 und 333–52 zu Agennius Urbicus) verfügbar. GUILLAUMINs Ausgabe ist streng zweigeteilt (S. 7–176 für Agennius Urbicus und S. 177–277 für Marcus Junius Nypsius): Für jeden der beiden Autoren gibt es separate Einführungen, Bemerkungen zur Textkonstitution, Bibliographien, Conspectus siglorum, die Texte mit kritischen Apparaten und französischen Übersetzungen sowie detaillierte Anmerkungen, gefolgt von Indices. Man hält also gewissermaßen zwei gesonderte Editionen in der Hand. Agennius Urbicus sieht GUILLAUMIN als einen spätantiken Autor und datiert dessen Schrift in ihrer endgültigen Fassung um das Jahr 420 n. Chr., vor allem aufgrund von einigermaßen plausiblen Bezügen zu Augustinus (S. 43). Der Name „Agennius“ ist möglicherweise keltischen Ursprungs und könnte „von erhabener SERAFINA CUOMO in ihrer Rezension von BRIAN CAMPBELLs Writings of the Roman Land Surveyors (in: Journal of Roman Studies 92 [2002] 200–1; Zitat von S. 200): „Indeed, the texts are very diverse, and some of them might even be characterized as incoherent, but it is arguably the very heterogeneity of the material that renders it more useful and informative.“ 2 Daneben stammen von ihm auch Editionen und Übersetzungen von Boethius (1995 und 2002), Martianus Capella (2003), Isidor von Sevilla (2004, 2005, 2009, 2010 und 2012) und Servius (2019) sowie von Gregor von Nyssa (1979 und 1982) und Heron von Alexandria (1997 und 2022), die nahezu durchweg in derselben Reihe publiziert wurden. Darüber hinaus sind die Aufsatzsammlung Sur quelques notices des arpenteurs romains (Besançon 2007) und das Dictionnaire de la terminologie latine ancienne de l’arithmétique et de la géométrie (Paris 2020) zu nennen, ferner der Sammelband Les vocabulaires techniques des arpenteurs romains: Actes du Colloque International (Besançon, 19–21 septembre 2002), den GUILLAUMIN gemeinsam mit DANIELE CONSO und ANTONIO GONZALES ediert hat (Besançon 2005).
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Abstammung“ bedeuten. Seiner Schrift nach zu urteilen, war er ein gebildeter Mann, der sich auch im Bereich der Philosophie, der Mathematik und des Rechtswesens auskannte; er war überdies rhetorisch geschult. Der erhaltene Text von De controversiis agrorum ist beschädigt und weist zahlreiche Lücken auf, deren genauer Umfang schwer einzuschätzen ist; eine Herausforderung ist auch die Frage danach, welche Partien auf den spätantiken Redaktor zurückgehen und welche zu den ältesten Bestandteilen der Schrift gehören (S. 30–8). Gleichwohl läßt sich die Stoßrichtung dieses Traktats ebenso wie seine Originalität hinreichend klar definieren, die sich nicht nur konzeptuell, sondern auch sprachlich niederschlage (bes. S. 13–24): Jeder Streit über Gebietsgrenzen wird nach status, effectus und transcendentiae unterschieden. GUILLAUMIN widmet vor allem terminologischen Details große Aufmerksamkeit und erschließt dadurch den spezifischen Wortgebrauch des Autors für den heutigen Leser; dazu gehört auch die Diskussion der hapax legomena (S. 24–6), die in den jeweiligen Anmerkungen weiter vertieft wird. Verschwiegen wird im übrigen nicht, daß der Stil des Agennius Urbicus bisweilen schwer verständlich sei (bes. S. 27). Über welche Eigenschaften ein römischer Feldmesser verfügen sollte, wird in seinem Traktat ebenfalls eruiert (dazu S. 27–30). Zum Vergleich macht GUILLAUMIN mit Recht auf ähnliche Erwägungen bezüglich fachlicher Kompetenz in Vitruvs De architectura aufmerksam; doch hätte er hier durchaus auch auf weitere antike Fachschriftsteller jenseits der Agrimensoren eingehen können, um die Perspektive ein wenig auszuweiten. Dies gilt auch für die ethischen Qualitäten, die mit dem Sachwissen zu verbinden sind: Eine solche Forderung wurde vielfach in antiken Fachtexten artikuliert, besonders in Columellas De re rustica, der Naturalis historia des Älteren Plinius und Frontins De aquaeductu urbis Romae.3 Wie GUILLAUMIN zeigt (S. 29), hebt Agennius Urbicus seinerseits wiederholt hervor, wie schädlich Unwissenheit (imperitia) und unbedachtes Handeln (imprudentia) für einen Feldmesser seien.4 Die Einführung geht schließlich auch auf die Bedeutung von Africa ein, das insgesamt fünfmal explizit in De controversiis agrorum erwähnt wird (S. 39–42). Auch wenn diese Passagen möglicherweise nicht von Agennius Urbicus selbst stammen, sondern aus einer früheren Textschicht, so scheint der Autor gleichwohl ein Interesse an dieser Region oder vielleicht sogar einen speziellen Bezug zu ihr gehabt zu haben. Kürzer und andersgeartet ist demgegenüber das unvollständig überlieferte Werk des Marcus Junius Nypsius, dessen Identität im Dunkeln liegt. GUILLAUMIN identifiziert „Nypsios“ (Νύψιος) als einen griechischen Namen, der vermutlich einem Sklaven gehörte; als dieser dann freigelassen wurde, habe er die beiden 3 Siehe dazu THORSTEN FÖGEN, Wissen, Kommunikation und Selbstdarstellung. Zur Struktur und Charakteristik römischer Fachtexte der frühen Kaiserzeit, München 2009 (mit weiterer Literatur). 4 Neben imprudentia findet sich für diese Passage in einigen Handschriften auch der Begriff impudentia, wie aus Guillaumins kritischem Apparat hervorgeht (S. 89). Weshalb sich der Herausgeber für imprudentia entschieden hat, begründet er im Kommentarteil (S. 166–7).
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lateinischen Namen seines Herrn Marcus Iunius vorangestellt, der vielleicht im dritten nachchristlichen Jahrhundert gelebt hat. Den Text des Marcus Junius Nypsius datiert Guillaumin auf das Ende des 3. Jh. n. Chr., wenngleich er einräumt, daß die Beweislage recht begrenzt ist (S. 179–180; siehe auch S. 191). Die Schrift befaßt sich zunächst mit der varatio, also der Vermessung der Breite eines Flusses, des Weiteren mit der erneuten Identifizierung von Grenzlinien, mit der Korrektur von bemessenen Entfernungen sowie mit Grenzsteinen im Allgemeinen und der Aufteilung in centuriae. Das Substantiv varatio ist von dem Verb varare („übermessen“) abgeleitet, das seinerseits mit dem Adjektiv varus („von der geraden Linie abweichend“, „auseinandergebogen“, „krummbeinig“) verbunden ist. Unter Rückgriff auf frühere Forschung ordnet GUILLAUMIN diese Termini in ihrer genauen Bedeutung ein und erklärt die Einzelheiten des damit bezeichneten Meßverfahrens (S. 180–9). Ein Vergleich mit einigen anderen antiken Traktaten über das Messen schließt sich an (S. 189–91), ferner eine nützliche Zusammenstellung weiterer gromatischer Fachbegriffe, die zum Teil sehr selten sind (S. 191–5). Auch auf die verschiedenen Abbildungen, die Bestandteil der Schrift waren, geht der Herausgeber angemessen ein (S. 195–8); an dieser Stelle wären freilich ein paar allgemeinere Bemerkungen über die Rolle von Illustrationen in antiken Fachtexten am Platze gewesen, um die hier vorgeführten Beispiele in einem breiteren Kontext zu situieren.5 Inwieweit die Übersetzungen der beiden lateinischen Autoren adäquat ist, mag ein französischer Muttersprachler letztlich besser beurteilen. Gleichwohl fällt positiv auf, daß GUILLAUMIN um eine möglichst textnahe, aber zugleich verständliche und nachvollziehbare Wiedergabe des jeweiligen Originals bemüht ist. Man wird jedenfalls seine Übersetzungen künftig gemeinsam mit denen von CAMPBELL und BOUMA heranziehen müssen – auch deshalb, weil GUILLAUMIN die Texte durch knappe Überschriften sinnvoll gliedert und damit deren Verständlichkeit insgesamt erleichtert. Auch die ausführlichen Anmerkungen im jeweiligen Kommentarteil (S. 91– 167 bzw. 239–71) bieten dem Leser ein buntes Panorama an Informationen. Neben Erläuterungen zur Textkritik sind dabei die zahlreichen Querverweise auf weitere Gromatiker sowie die Behandlung linguistischer Eigenarten besonders wertvoll. Doch auch Bezüge zu anderen Autoren jenseits des Corpus agrimensorum werden immer wieder hergestellt. Abgedeckt werden sowohl die philologischen als auch die althistorischen, juristischen, wissenschafts- und technikgeschichtlichen Dimensionen der beiden Texte. Insgesamt ist GUILLAUMIN eine weitere wertvolle Edition der römischen Landvermesser gelungen, die als eine unverzichtbare Basis für die künftige For5 Siehe dazu vor allem ALFRED STÜCKELBERGER, Bild und Wort. Das illustrierte Fachbuch in der antiken Naturwissenschaft, Medizin und Technik, Mainz 1994. Von demselben Autor stammt auch der folgende Aufsatz: Vom anatomischen Atlas des Aristoteles zum geographischen Atlas des Ptolemaios. Beobachtungen zu wissenschaftlichen Bilddokumentationen, in: WOLFGANG KULLMANN / JOCHEN ALTHOFF / MARKUS ASPER (eds.), Gattungen wissenschaftlicher Literatur in der Antike, Tübingen 1998, 287–307.
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schung auf diesem Gebiet anzusehen ist. Im Übrigen bleibt zu hoffen, daß die römischen Agrimensoren durch Veröffentlichungen wie diese weiter an Aufmerksamkeit in altertumswissenschaftlichen Kreisen gewinnen – vor allem unter Fachvertretern, die ein verstärktes Interesse an Raumvorstellungen in der Antike haben, aber auch unter Kollegen, die für gewöhnlich zu ganz anderen Themen arbeiten. THORSTEN FÖGEN Durham University Department of Classics & Ancient History 38 North Bailey GB – Durham DH1 3EU [email protected]
w MEYER, ANNE-SOPHIE, Naturphänomene in Lucans Bellum civile, Basel: Schwabe 2023. 274 p. ISBN: 9783796546099. (Schweizerische Beiträge zur Altertumswissenschaft, 55.) In den ideologisch geprägten Debatten der letzten Jahrzehnte um die politische Botschaft des Bellum civile war die seit dem Mittelalter bestehende Reputation Lucans als eines auch naturwissenschaftlich bewanderten Dichters etwas in den Hintergrund gerückt. In der hier vorliegenden Druckfassung ihrer im Juni 2020 an der Universität Basel angenommenen Dissertation setzt sich MEYER zum Ziel, „Passagen, in denen die natürliche Welt beschrieben und diskutiert wird“ und die angeblich „bei einer Lucan-Lektüre fast systematisch übersprungen oder unkommentiert beiseitegelassen werden“ (S. 11f.), in den Blick zu nehmen.1 Dabei konzentriert sich MEYER auf längere narrative Episoden, in denen aktiv in das Geschehen eingreifende Naturphänomene und deren Wahrnehmung und Deutung durch die Handlungsfiguren eine entscheidende Rolle spielen (vgl. Kap. I.4, S. 19–21), ohne auf die zahlreichen kürzeren Erwähnungen in Gleichnissen oder Katalogen einzugehen oder umfassende „allegorisch-symbolische Deutungen“ der Natur als Akteurin im Bürgerkrieg vorlegen zu wollen (vgl. S. 12).
1
Zu dieser Behauptung steht allerdings die von MEYER selbst referierte extensive Forschungsdiskussion in einem gewissen Widerspruch. Sie bezieht sich dabei aus der neueren LucanForschung u.a. auf: L. LANDOLFI / P. MONELLA (eds.), Doctus Lucanus. Aspetti dell’erudizione nella Pharsalia di Lucano, Bologna 2007; P. DOMENICUCCI, Il cielo di Lucano, Pisa 2013; E. MANOLARAKI, Noscendi Nilum Cupido. Imagining Egypt from Lucan to Philostratus, Berlin 2013; J. TRACY, Lucan’s Egyptian Civil War, Cambridge 2014. Besonders stark rezipiert sie die thematisch verwandte Monographie von MARKUS KERSTEN (Blut auf Pharsalischen Feldern. Lucans Bellum Ciuile und Vergils Georgica, Göttingen 2018, bes. Kap. 2 Caesar und die Umwelt), mit dem sie auch in persönlichem Austausch stand (S. 9, 62 Anm. 32 und 88 Anm. 132; vgl. Kap. III passim; nicht jedoch in Kap. II [bes. S. 33–6], obwohl KERSTEN auf S. 100–4 ebenfalls Ovids Sintflut als Prätext der Überschwemmung bei Ilerda bespricht).
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Nach diesen Kriterien werden behandelt: Die Flut bei Ilerda im vierten Buch (Kap. II, S. 25–49); Caesar, seine Soldaten und das Meer im fünften Buch (Kap. III, S. 51–99); Pompeius und die Sterne im achten Buch (Kap. IV, S. 101–14); Cato und die libysche Wüste im neunten Buch (Kap. V, S. 115–82); Caesar und der Nil im zehnten Buch (Kap. VI, S. 183–223). Da es sich dabei jedoch zugleich um einige der „meistuntersuchten“ (S. 51) Partien von Lucans Epos handelt, lesen sich (nicht nur) die einleitenden Partien der einzelnen Kapitel streckenweise wie ein Forschungsbericht. MEYER basiert ihre Interpretationen oft auf den Ergebnissen einschlägiger Studien bzw. Kommentare, die sie ausführlich rekapituliert und in den close readings der untersuchten Passagen in unterschiedlichem Ausmaß um ihre eigenen Beobachtungen ergänzt. In der „Einführung“ (Kap. I, S. 11–24) definiert MEYER, was sie unter „einem breiten Begriff der Naturwissenschaft“ versteht (S. 16): „… alle Traditionen, die sich um die Beschreibung und Erklärung der natürlichen Welt bemühen.“ In den folgenden Interpretationen unterscheidet sie „das historische, das mythische und das naturwissenschaftliche Paradigma“ (S. 26). Beim letzteren stehen Meteorologie, Geographie, Astronomie und Astrologie, Kosmologie sowie in Bezug auf den Schlangenkatalog im neunten Buch (Kap. V.6, S. 143–74) am Rande auch Biologie und Medizin im Fokus. Insbesondere auf dem Gebiet der geographischastronomischen Angaben gelangt MEYER zu eigenständigen Interpretationen. So argumentiert sie in Kap. IV, dass Pompeius’ Steuermann anhand des südlichen Sterns Canopus ein wissenschaftlich nicht ganz korrektes, aber in Pompeius’ auswegloser Lage pädagogisch plausibles Weltbild entwerfe, das die Grenzen des Römischen Reiches symbolisch ins Mittelmeer verlege (vgl. S. 230). Auch zum Problem der ora Nili (10.213f.) schlägt sie eine neue Lösung vor, die diese nicht mit den Nilquellen identifiziert, sondern mit dem „Ort, an dem die Flut merkbar wird und das Flutwasser austritt“ (S. 212f.). Das Konzept der Kugelgestalt der Erde und das Fünf-Zonen-Modell spielen zudem in weiteren Kontexten eine Rolle, die zusammen ein Netzwerk konstituieren (u.a. S. 35, 125, 141, 169; vgl. S. 230, 242f.). Besonders interessant ist die metaliterarische Deutung, dass Lucan seinen fiktionalen Caesar sich anachronistisch auf die Kalenderreform und die (nur fragmentarisch bzw. gar nicht erhaltenen) astronomischen Schriften des historischen Caesar berufen lasse (S. 186–94). Überhaupt bezieht MEYER durchgehend auch die intertextuelle Dimension von Lucans Epos mit ein, indem sie anhand römischer und teils auch griechischer Prätexte die Interaktionen zwischen epischen, didaktischen, historiographischen2 und philosophischen Diskursen und generell zwischen mythologischen und fachwissenschaftlichen Erklärungsmodellen untersucht (vgl. auch das einleitende Kap. I.2 Intertextuelle Ansätze und Naturwissenschaft, S. 15–7). Positiv hervorzuheben
2
Obwohl MEYER in Anm. 24 auf S. 31 zu Recht feststellt, dass JAN RADICKEs Aussagen zu Lucans Abhängigkeit von den verlorenen Büchern des Livius hypothetisch bleiben müssen (Lucans poetische Technik. Studien zum historischen Epos, Leiden 2004), beruft sie sich dennoch öfters auf dessen Quellenforschung (u.a. S. 56, S. 74 Anm. 70).
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ist, dass sie sich nicht auf die oft einseitig betonte technische Seite des stoischen Weltmodells beschränkt (vgl. Kap. I.1 Ein stoisches Naturbild?, S. 12–5), sondern vor dem Hintergrund von Senecas Naturales quaestiones auch die psychologische Wirkung der Beschäftigung mit Naturphänomenen zur Bewältigung von „Endzeitängsten“ durch die Einnahme einer kosmischen Perspektive ergründet (S. 241f.; vgl. den im Ausblick auf S. 246–8 angekündigten, allerdings nicht weiter ausgeführten Vergleich mit den Trostschriften). Der ergiebigste Aspekt von MEYERs Untersuchung liegt denn auch in der Verbindung von naturwissenschaftlichen Erläuterungen und narratologischen Analysen.3 Durch die konsequente Unterscheidung zwischen Erzählertext und aus der Perspektive von Handlungsfiguren fokalisierten Passagen, in denen unterschiedliche Auseinandersetzungen mit Naturphänomenen zum Ausdruck kommen, arbeitet sie die „Mehrstimmigkeit“ von Lucans Epos heraus (Kap. I.3, S. 17f.; vgl. S. 22f.). Diese zeigt sich darin, dass nicht nur die Feldherren zu Wort kommen, sondern auch die Soldaten und weitere Gestalten mit ihrem Fach- oder Erfahrungswissen einbezogen werden (der Fischer Amyclas, der ägyptische Priester Acoreus, Pompeius’ anonymer Steuermann sowie das nordafrikanische Volk der Psyller). Dabei weist sie den jeweiligen Protagonisten ein sie charakterisierendes Naturverständnis zu: Während Pompeius sich nur nebenbei mit astronomischen Fragen beschäftigt und dabei sein Unwissen verrät (vgl. Kap. IV und S. 235), werden Caesar und Cato durch ihren spezifischen, in MEYERs Augen diametral entgegengesetzten Umgang mit Naturelementen kontrastiert. Caesar erhebe im Kontext des Seesturms auf der Adria (Kap. III) und in seiner Unterhaltung mit Acoreus über die Nilquellen und die Nilflut (Kap. VI) den Anspruch, naturwissenschaftliches Fachwissen und Fachsprache zu beherrschen, setze seine manipulative Rhetorik aber im Dienst seiner Hybris und Egozentrik ein (vgl. Kap. II, S. 47). Cato hingegen ordne bei seinem Marsch durch die libysche Wüste (Kap. V) seine durchaus vorhandenen naturwissenschaftlichen Kenntnisse seinen moralischen Zielen unter und erweise sich dadurch als ehrlicherer Anführer (vgl. aber den „irritierenden Gedanken, dass Catos virtus nur durch das Ignorieren von Fachwissen – und dadurch auf Kosten von soldatischen Leben – wirksam inszeniert werden konnte“: S. 180). Im abschließenden Kap. VII (Ergebnisse: Vergleich und Auswertung, S. 225– 48) wird diese etwas schematisch anmutende Kontrastierung der beiden Anführer nochmals aufgegriffen (S. 235–7); die damit korrespondierenden Bemerkungen zum Bildungsgrad der jeweiligen Soldaten wirken ähnlich willkürlich (S. 234f.; vgl. S. 62 mit Anm. 32, 170, 182). Origineller erscheint die oben bereits erwähnte metapoetische Lektüre, wonach Caesar sich durch seine historisch verbürgte Beschäftigung mit naturwissenschaftlichen Fragen zur Konkurrenzfigur des Erzählers stilisiere und durch den Ruhm auch seiner wissenschaftlichen Schriften 3
Als Ausgangspunkt (vgl. S. 18) dienen insbesondere die narratologischen Studien von KATHRIN LUDWIG (Charakterfokalisation bei Lucan. Eine narratologische Analyse, Berlin 2014) und von NADJA KIMMERLE (Lucan und der Prinzipat. Inkonsistenz und unzuverlässiges Erzählen im Bellum Civile, Berlin 2015).
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dem Dichter Lucan sogar überlegen sei (S. 237f.; vgl. S. 192–4). In jedem Fall ist es MEYER gelungen, die ständig wechselnden und teils auch widersprüchlichen Perspektiven aufzuzeigen, welche Laien und Experten, die Figuren und der Erzähler auf die im Epos inszenierten Naturphänomene einnehmen und durch welche auch die Leserschaft mit in den Deutungsprozess einbezogen wird. Trotz der intensiven Bezugnahme auf den Forschungsstand vermisst man in dem bis 2018/2019 geführten Literaturverzeichnis (S. 249–62), in das noch zwei Aufsätze von 2021 aufgenommen wurden, einige relevante Titel.4 Der Umgang mit den lateinischen Originalzitaten ist etwas uneinheitlich, da sie bald im Fließtext, bald als Blockzitate erscheinen und bisweilen ganz fehlen (z.B. die Verse 5.336–9, die der Diskussion auf S. 57–63 zugrunde liegen). Die deutschen Übersetzungen stammen nur ausnahmsweise von der Verfasserin selbst (so auf S. 200); meist wurden sie aus unterschiedlichen Lucan-Ausgaben übernommen oder leicht adaptiert. Formal ist das Buch sorgfältig redigiert. Es schließt mit einem umfangreichen Index locorum (S. 263-74), in dem auch alle reinen Stellenangaben aus den Fußnoten aufgenommen sind. Insgesamt handelt es sich um einen lesenswerten Beitrag zu einer bedeutsamen und facettenreichen Dimension von Lucans Epos, der sich durch seine minutiösen Auseinandersetzungen mit der Forschungsgeschichte und seine oft voraussetzungsreichen Argumentationen primär an ein mit den antiken Texten bereits vertrautes Publikum richten dürfte. ANNEMARIE AMBÜHL Johannes-Gutenberg-Universität Mainz Institut für Altertumswissenschaften / Klassische Philologie Jakob-Welder-Weg 18 D – 55128 Mainz [email protected]
w Polemone di Ilio, I frammenti degli scritti periegetici. Introduzione, testo greco, traduzione e commento, a cura di MARIACHIARA ANGELUCCI. Stuttgart: Franz Steiner 2022. 301 p. ISBN: 9783515117890. (Geographica Historica, 37.)
4
So hat LAURA ZIENTEK in ihrer online zugänglichen Dissertation (Lucan’s Natural Questions: Landscape and Geography in the Bellum Civile, University of Washington 2014) ebenfalls Ilerda und die libysche Wüste behandelt. Zu den Syrten (S. 118–28) vgl. auch A. ESTÈVES, Brouillage référentiel et rupture des délimitations esthétiques de l’epos au livre IX de la Pharsale: une exploration fantastique, in: F. GALTIER / R. POIGNAULT (eds.), Présence de Lucain, Clermont-Ferrand 2016, 139–58; J. C. TAYLOR, Even Natura Nods: Lucan’s Alternative Explanations of the Syrtes (9.303-18), in: L. ZIENTEK / M. THORNE (eds.), Lucan’s Imperial World. The Bellum Civile in its Contemporary Contexts, London 2020, 91–110.
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Il volume sui frammenti degli scritti periegetici di Polemone di Ilio, curato da MARIACHIARA ANGELUCCI per la collana Geographica Historica (vol. 37), si inserisce in un recente rinnovato interesse per la figura di Polemone1. Esso si compone di due parti: una prima (pp. 15–70), introduttiva, presenta l’autore (pp. 15–31) e i suoi scritti periegetici (pp. 31–56) e fornisce gli elementi necessari per conoscere la costruzione dell’edizione critica (pp. 56–70); una seconda (pp. 71– 199) comprende i testimonia relativi a Polemone e alla sua attività (pp. 71–5), nonché i frammenti periegetici della sua opera, di cui sono forniti testo, apparato critico, traduzione e commento (pp. 77–214). Il volume è corredato da una bibliografia ragionata (pp. 215–64), in cui si distinguono diverse sezioni: una prima dedicata alle edizioni di Polemone (complessive o parziali, queste ultime accompagnate dall’indicazione dei frammenti trattati al loro interno), una seconda alle abbreviazioni dei principali corpora dei testi antichi (letterari o epigrafici), una terza alle abbreviazioni utilizzate per gli autori antichi meno noti, una quarta e ultima agli autori moderni. Seguono, infine, gli indici (pp. 265–301): quello delle concordanze (con PRELLER e MÜLLER); quello delle fonti (che hanno restituito i diversi frammenti); quello dei testimonia e dei fragmenta; quello dei passi citati (suddivisi in fonti epigrafiche, papiracee e letterarie); quello dei nomi e dei luoghi. Uno degli aspetti maggiormente pregevoli del lavoro è senz’altro quello formale: la semplicità e la chiarezza del dettato rendono la lettura piacevole e scorrevole, riuscendo a restituire pienamente l’immagine di Polemone come di un erudito che a cavallo tra III e II secolo a.C. – in una fase in cui il mondo greco si stava progressivamente marginalizzando rispetto all’affermazione di Roma – si è dedicato alla periegesi antiquaria o storica, relativamente alla Grecia classica, alla Sicilia, alla Magna Grecia e all’Asia Minore, fondandosi su fonti letterarie ed epigrafiche, nonché sulla diretta autopsia, e caratterizzandosi per uno spiccato gusto del dettaglio. L’impressione è, però, che questa semplicità derivi in alcuni casi da una mancata problematizzazione, anche di questioni ampiamente presenti nella storia degli studi. Un esempio può ritenersi la discussione sul soprannome 1
Dopo la pregevolissima edizione di PRELLER (L. PRELLER, Polemonis Periegetae Fragmenta, Leipzig 1838) e quella che di fatto è stata la sua riedizione da parte di MÜLLER nei FHG (C. MÜLLER, Fragmenta Historicorum Graecorum, Paris 1883, III, 108–148), nessuno ha dedicato a Polemone uno studio sistematico. Di recente, invece, non sono mancati gli studi dedicati all’autore (D. ENGELS, Polemon von Ilion. Antiquarische Periegese und hellenistische Identitätssuche, in K. FREITAG / CH. MICHELS (eds.), Athen und/oder Alexandreia. Aspekte von Identität und Ethnizität im hellenistischen Griechenland, Köln 2014, 65–97) e ai suoi frammenti: TRACHSEL ha studiato quelli tratti dallo scritto Περιήγησις Ἰλίου (A. TRACHSEL, La Troade: un paysage et son héritage littéraire. Les commentaires antiques sur la Troade, leur genèse et leur influence, Basel 2007); la stessa ANGELUCCI si è occupata dei frammenti del Περὶ τῶν ἐν Σικελίᾳ θαυμανζομένων ποταμῶν (M. ANGELUCCI, Water and Paradoxography: Polemon’s Work Περὶ τῶν ἐν Σικελίᾳ θαυμανζομένων ποταμῶν, Orbis Terrarum 12 [2014] 15–31); CAPEL BADINO ha pubblicato un’edizione dei frammenti periegetici relativi alla Grecia (R. CAPEL BADINO, Polemone di Ilio e la Grecia. Testimonianze e frammenti di periegesi antiquaria, Milano 2018); VERHASSELT si è concentrato sui frammenti dell’opera Πρὸς Ἀδαῖον καὶ Ἀντίγονον (G. VERHASSELT, The Fragments of Polemon’s Work Against Adaeus and Antigonus, ASNSP 13.2 [2021] 41–113).
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στηλοκόπας, attribuito a Polemone da Erodico di Babilonia (Herod. F 3 p. 126 During): essa è da ANGELUCCI relegata a una sintetica nota di natura bibliografica (p. 126), senza che vengano problematizzate le conseguenze che deriverebbero dalle diverse possibili interpretazioni del termine, che hanno invece ricadute sul giudizio circa l’operato di Polemone (cf. CAPEL BADINO 2018, 16–20). O ancora l’identificazione della fonte intermedia tra Polemone e il § 28 della Vita Thucydidis di Marcellino, nostro testimone per il F 5: se ANGELUCCI nell’introduzione (n. 79 p. 27) menziona il F 5 come uno dei molti frammenti di Polemone che testimoniano lo sfruttamento dell’erudito da parte di Didimo, nel commento al F 5 ella individua come fonte del testimone di Polemone Demetrio di Magnesia (p. 99), senza discutere minimamente la questione (sulla quale cf. CAPEL BADINO 2018, 115–8); la sensazione è che a questo proposito, come accade anche per diverse altre questioni, l’autrice si limiti a recepire e accogliere le posizioni di PRELLER. In generale anche il tema delle possibili fonti usate da Polemone avrebbe potuto essere maggiormente discusso: ANGELUCCI tende a ricordare che le notizie riferite dal periegeta possono derivargli da una molteplicità di fonti letterarie (pp. 52–4; 135); e raramente esplicita nel commento ai singoli frammenti la possibilità che egli si servisse dell’indagine autoptica e/o di fonti epigrafiche (elementi comunque menzionati nell’introduzione, cf. p. 139). Sono presenti nel testo alcuni refusi, che nulla tolgono alla cura complessiva del testo; mentre si incontra qualche “confusione” più rilevante: nel commento al F 5, ad esempio, ANGELUCCI riferisce di una citazione in P. Oxy XIII 1611 F 1 col. V – presentato come testimone alternativo alla Vita Thucydidis di Marcellino per il frammento di Polemone oggetto di discussione – anche di una commedia di Ermippo (p. 102), ma le linee del papiro di cui è riportato il testo non comprendono la citazione di Ermippo, le osservazioni rispetto alla quale risultano dunque incomprensibili al lettore. La bibliografia è senz’altro ampia, ma se in alcuni casi non è particolarmente aggiornata (ad esempio non mostra di conoscere il recente e foriero di conseguenze RUGGERI 20022 sulla questione dell’omonimia tra Tucidide di Farsalo e Tucidide del demo di Gargetto, inerente al F 5), a tratti sembra essere sproporzionata e non necessaria. Mi riferisco, in particolare, alle lunghe note bibliografiche: quelle dedicate a Pergamo e ad Alessandria e alle loro biblioteche (rispettivamente n. 47 p. 23 e n. 78 p. 27); oppure quelle su autori citati nel testo solo cursoriamente, senza che abbiano un peso in relazione allo sviluppo logico del discorso principale (cf. n. 96 p. 32, su Ecateo, e n. 363 p. 101, per Androzione). Di grande interesse certamente la riflessione circa il legame tra antiquaria e storia: ANGELUCCI presenta la ricerca antiquaria di Polemone come testimonianza su aspetti di civiltà, anche in assenza di «rigorosi e metodici riferimenti politici», 2
C. RUGGERI, Menone, figlio di Menecleide, ateniese del demo di Gargetto, ZPE 138 (2002) 73–86.
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e nella sua analisi dei singoli frammenti cerca sempre di valorizzarla anche in questo senso, inserendola – laddove possibile – all’interno dei maggiori dibattiti della sua epoca3. Così fa, per esempio, in relazione agli interessi italici e per Roma di Polemone, a proposito dei quali le osservazioni di ANGELUCCI si caratterizzano per una certa originalità (cf. Introduzione, pp. 28–31 e commento al F 37 = F 38 Preller): dal momento che il periegeta registra che i sacerdoti Salii erano così chiamati perché Enea aveva condotto con sé in Italia, da Mantinea, un uomo di nome Salio che aveva insegnato ai giovani salii la danza armata, da ciò si desume che egli «accettasse l’emigrazione dei Troiani e di Enea nel Lazio e la conseguente origine troiana dei Romani» (p. 208). Questo porrebbe Polemone – in una fase in cui i Romani sostenevano la propria origine troiana per dare un fondamento culturale alla propria politica estera – tra gli intellettuali greci favorevoli a Roma. Tale posizione, assunta dal periegeta – ipotizza ANGELUCCI – in virtù delle sue relazioni con Pergamo e con la corte degli Attalidi, assumerebbe un forte valore politico. Con rammarico si segnala la mancanza di un reale dialogo con l’edizione che CAPEL BADINO ha dedicato nel 2018 ai frammenti periegetici di Polemone sulla Grecia: uscita quando l’opera di ANGELUCCI era già stata consegnata alla casa editrice (p. 11), essa è solo citata – senza alcuna discussione relativa – nelle note. Si auspica che possano esserci altre occasioni e che da un dialogo tra le due edizioni si possa pervenire a una più profonda comprensione dell’opera di Polemone.4 LIVIA DE MARTINIS Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore [email protected]
IV. Publikationen zu antiken Landschaften w REMPE, MARIO, Antike Siedlungstopographie und nachhaltiger Umgang mit Ressourcen im griechischen Sizilien, Rahden: Marie Leidorf 2021. 304 p., 62 ill, 1 folded plan. ISBN: 9783867575119. (Göttinger Studien zur Mediterranen Archäologie, 12.) The book under review began its life as a doctoral dissertation undertaken between 2016 and 2020 at the Universität Göttingen and was written in the context of the larger interdisciplinary project Nachhaltigkeit als Argument. Suffizienz, Effizienz und Resilienz als Parameter anthropogenen Handelns in der Geschichte, 3 4
Cf. anche M. ANGELUCCI, Spunti di storia locale negli scritti periegetici di Polemone: l’attitudine alla storia dell’antiquario erudita di Ilio, Quaderni Borromaici 1 (2014) 15–31. Laddove, come per il F 6, questo dialogo è stato possibile – almeno con l’indagine specifica di Capel Badino sulle lampadedromie (R. CAPEL BADINO, Una fiaccola per Pan. Un riesame delle testimonianze sulle lampadedromie nell’Atene classica, Erga-Logoi 5.1 [2017] 63–85) – esso è stato proficuo.
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directed by Professor JOHANNES BERGEMANN. REMPE outlines the origins and aims of his project in the book’s foreword (pp. pp. 9–10) and introduction (pp. 13–27, labelled as chapter one). The dissertation takes its cues from the Kamarina Survey also directed by BERGEMANN and seeks to deploy the results of this and other surface surveys in Sicily and elswhere to questions of sustainability in Greek Sicily. The introduction begins by making the case for archaeological approaches to ancient sustainability and for Kamarina as an ideal case study to illustrate this. Attention then turns to discussing ancient environmental problems, as well as to outlining the book’s aims and methods, including dated geoarchaeological samples. The limitations of the methods adopted are also addressed, such as the absence of faunal remains at Kamarina (p. 24). The limitations of the methods of others are also noted; in particular, REMPE is rightly critical of the widespread application of CLAUDIO VITA-FINZI’s model of erosion in the ancient Mediterranean and Near East, stresssing instead local perspectives grounded in local evidence (p. 19). The argument is developed in eight subsequent chapters. In chapter two (pp. 29–48), REMPE provides an overview of archaeological and historical research at Kamarina, highlighting the long-standing attention paid to studying city and countryside. Discussion of the most relevant literary and epigraphic sources is also included, always with an eye to questions of sustainability (like Pindar’s Olympian Ode V for Psaumis, where the Oanis river, the local lake, and sacred canals of the Hipparis river receive praise). REMPE devotes most of his attention to the archaeological evidence, emphasizing such things as the size of agricultural plots, canals and drainage, cisterns, and terracing. Chapters 3–6 analyse the data discussed in the previous chapter. Chapter 3 (pp. 49–81) focuses on reconstructing Kamarina’s landscape and enviroment. Soil and pollen samples were taken via augering in order to gauge episodes of increased sedimentation, erosion events, and changes in vegetation (their locations are helpfully illustrated on sixteen maps). Some of the recovered samples could be dated by Carbon-14 and optically stimulated luminescence (OSL). The results, which could change – it is admitted – with further data and their refinement, reveals an accumulation of 34 cm of sediment over the 300-year life of Greek Kamarina, and in general no unusual geomorphological developments emerge (p. 78). Microcharcoals indicate increased fire activity in the region during the life of the city, as is only to be expected. Chapter 4 (pp. 83–106) expands on the interpretation of the geoarchaeological and palynological findings and tackles whether climate-induced change played any part on the environment and society of Kamarina. No evidence in favour of this is discernible in the available evidence (p. 92). The data also allow REMPE to sketch out the vegetational history of the region in terms of both wild and cultivated plant types. The identification of various grasses and aquatic plants, for example, provides crucial glimpses of what parts of Kamarina’s landscape looked like. A spike in cultivated olive pollen occurred after Kamarina was founded, taking its place alongside what seems to have previously been wild olive pollen (p. 94). Interestingly, olive pollen reached its highest levels in the early Roman period. Throughout this chapter, he also attempts to tie in all these environmental conclusions with the archaeological and
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historical data from Kamarina, in order to relate them to human activities known to have happened from literary sources (already discussed in Chapter 2). In Chapter 5, the focus is on the evidence for land use in Kamarina’s territory (pp. 107–52). The discussion starts by rounding-up the survey and excavation data for farmsteads, with close attention paid to the nature of the finds and their associated activities and products. Here the good decision to choose Kamarina becomes evident in the rich discussion that follows. REMPE next addresses the possible sustainable strategies that might have been employed to maintain the successful land use observed (such as water storage and risk-minimizing polyculture on pp. 124–6). Population, moreover, never exceeded carrying capacity (pp. 140–3). Chapter 6 (pp. 153–8) considers any possible signs of discontinuity in the settlement record and changes in the natural environment, to probe whether the lack of sustainability is at all attested at Kamarina. Factors like warfare and the arrival of the Romans are taken into account, and some signs are found, as with a stretch of land previously used for agriculture becoming swampland. Chapter 7 (pp. 159–70) sets Kamarina in the comparative context of other Sicilian Greek poleis (Gela, Agrigento, Himera, and, oddly, Monte Polizzo is included under this chapter title, even though it was an indigenous village, as REMPE goes on to say), to show how sustainability similar to Kamarina’s was practised in Sicily. These parallels allow him to extrapolate his results to Greek Sicily as a whole and to justify his choice of words in the book’s title. Chapter 8 (pp. 171–4) summarizes the book’s conclusions. REMPE again emphasizes, among other things, the need to re-evaluate the theories of VITA-FINZI, and how climate change had no effect on Kamarina’s environmental and settlement history. We are also rightly reminded of the importance of the methods adopted, especially the scientific ones, to provide new insights. The ancient Greek contributions to sustainability are also considered in light of the research results, and how the inhabitants of Greek Kamarina struck a balance in carving out a livelihood and preserving the environment on which it was based. Chapter 9, the final one, contains a lengthy and detailed catalogue of the soil and pollen samples, as well as any artefacts recovered in them (pp. 175–244). Thorough summaries in English and Italian follow (pp. 245–50), after which come a brief index, photo credits, and forty of the sixty-two illustrations (with the others interspersed throughout the text in their appropriate places, most of all in Chapter 3). The folded plan sits in the book’s inside back cover. The book is well produced, as we have come to expect from this series. Some overall comments on the contents are in order. Readers seeking fuller treatment of Greek Sicily as a whole will be disappointed by the broad description contained in the book’s title. While REMPE makes every effort to provide parallels with sites and research elsewhere in Sicily and, indeed, further afield in the wider ancient Greek world, the book is essentially about Kamarina. The desire to get broader appeal for this study is understandable. Such broader appeal, however, resides not just in his generous title, but also, and especially, in his approach. RUBEN POST, in his recent article reviewing studies on ancient Greek environment and sustainability, observes as follows:
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A related but more traditional strand of scholarship on ancient sustainability has examined how individuals and communities in the Graeco-Roman world conceived of ecological sustainability and acted to conserve natural resources. This approach has been especially popular in recent German scholarship, reflecting a long-standing interest in the history of sustainability (Nachhaltigkeit) in German environmental studies. This scholarship has been heavily influenced by economic history, which is reflected in its focus on the tensions between the exploitation of natural resources for profit and their long-term conservation.1
POST mentions REMPE’s book in one of the footnotes associated with this passage, lumping it in as part of this larger German tradition of ancient sustainability studies which he characterizes as focusing primarily on literary sources. While REMPE’s book does indeed belong to this larger German tradition, it does not neatly fit POST’s mould. As POST himself goes on to say, “One promising avenue for future research on sustainability in the ancient Greek world is thus working to marry the perspective or descriptive discussions of the organization of humanenvironment relations in literary sources on the one hand and archaeological and scientific evidence for those relations on the other.”2 This is precisely what REMPE has attempted in his book, and in that it succeeds in providing an approach that has been uncommonly applied until now, irrespective of the scholarly tradition. This book, therefore, forms a welcome addition to the literature. FRANCO DE ANGELIS Department of Ancient Mediterranean and Near Eastern Studies University of British Columbia 1866 Main Mall, BUCH C227 Vancouver, B.C. V6T 1Z1 Canada [email protected]
w LIPPERT, ANDREAS / MATZINGER, JOACHIM, Die Illyrer. Geschichte, Archäologie und Sprache, Stuttgart: Kohlhammer 2022. 213 p., ill., maps, supplementary ill. online: https://dl.kohlhammer.de/978-3-17-037709-7. ISBN: 9783170377097.
1 2
R. POST, Environment, sustainability, and Hellenic studies, JHS 142 (2022) 322 with nn. 47– 8. POST 2022, 323; cf. also p. 328.
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Die Erforschung des antiken Balkan hat in den letzten Jahrzehnten bedeutende methodische und inhaltliche Fortschritte gemacht, nicht nur durch den enormen Zuwachs an archäologischem und epigraphischem Material, sondern auch durch die weitgehende Abkehr von politisch motivierten Überinterpretationen und eine verstärkte internationale Zusammenarbeit in den Altertumswissenschaften. Dies gilt besonders auch für Illyrien, das seit der postkommunistischen Öffnung von Albanien, dem ein Gutteil dieser antiken Region zuzurechnen ist, intensiver und nuancierter untersucht wird als je zuvor, allerdings aufgrund der komplexen kulturellen und politischen Landschaft, der lückenhaften Quellenlage und archäologischen Erforschung und nicht zuletzt der vielen verstreut und fremdsprachig publizierten Einzeluntersuchungen schwer zu überblicken ist.1 Man nimmt also, nachdem die in den anderen größeren Wissenschaftssprachen verfassten Standardwerke zu Illyrien schon über dreißig Jahre alt sind,2 mit einiger Spannung ein neues deutschsprachiges Überblickswerk zum Thema zur Hand. Die beiden Autoren können als ausgewiesene Experten auf ihren jeweiligen Gebieten gelten: L., Professor emeritus für Ur- und Frühgeschichte an der Universität Wien, trat u.a. als Kurator einer Illyrerausstellung sowie jüngst durch seine Mitarbeit an einem monumentalen und sehr nützlichen Albanien-Reiseführer hervor.3 M. wiederum, Linguist an der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften mit Schwerpunkt Balkanlinguistik, hat eine Fülle von Publikationen zum Albanischen, aber auch eine Grammatik des im vorchristlichen Südostitalien gesprochenen Messapischen und Beiträge über die Beziehungen beider Sprachen zum Illyrischen vorgelegt. Diesem fachlichen Hintergrund entsprechend bietet das Buch in zwei je einem der Autoren zuweisbaren Teilen (B: Archäologie der Illyrer, S. 23–110, und C: Sprache der Illyrer, S. 111–83) eine detaillierte Darstellung von archäologischem und sprachwissenschaftlichem Material, wie der Untertitel auch erwarten lässt. Dagegen ist die auf dem Cover erstgenannte „Geschichte“ zu einer nur zwölf-
1
2
3
Gradmesser des illyrischen Forschungsbooms und unerlässliche Orientierungshilfe darin sind die Kolloquiumsbände der von PIERRE CABANES initiierten Konferenzreihe L’Illyrie méridionale et l’Épire dans l’Antiqué, die vom ersten (1987) zum sechsten (2018) von 274 auf 1200 Seiten angewachsen sind. Einen Überblick über die jüngere Forschung in Kroatien gibt die Festschrift für John Wilkes: D. GAVISON / V. GAFFNEY / E. MARIN (eds.), Dalmatia. Research in the Roman province 1970—2001, Oxford 2006. A. STIPČEVIĆ, The Illyrians. History and Culture, Park Ridge, NJ 1977 (1. ital. Aufl. als Gli Illiri, Mailand 1966, 2., überarbeitete serbokroat. Aufl. als Iliri, Zagreb 1974); P. CABANES, Les Illyriens de Bardylis à Genthios. IVe—IIe siècles avant J.-C., Paris 1988; J. WILKES, The Illyrians, Oxford 1992. Als bedeutende deutschsprachige Beiträge zur breiteren Illyrienforschung sind zuletzt H. Parzinger, Archäologisches zur Frage der Illyrier, BRGK 72, 1991, 205–61 sowie die Beiträge im Asparner Ausstellungskatalog von 2004 zu nennen (s. folgende Anm.). Museum für Urgeschichte Asparn/Zaya, Die Illyrer. Katalog zu einer Ausstellung von Archäologischen Funden der Albanischen Eisenzeit (12. - 4. Jh. v. Chr.), Asparn/Zaya 2004; CHR. ZINDEL / A. LIPPERT / B. LAHI / M. KIEL, Albanien. Ein Archäologie- und Kunstführer von der Steinzeit bis ins 19. Jahrhundert, Wien 2018.
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seitigen Einführung in die Geschichte der Illyrer verknappt (Teil A, S. 11–22), worin sich schon andeutet, dass die Behandlung eigentlich historischer Fragestellungen und die Einbeziehung der literarischen Quellen oft nicht zufriedenstellend gelungen sind. Vor allem zeigt sich dies in der historischen Einführung, die zahlreiche Fehler und Ungenauigkeiten enthält, auch in den Quellenbelegen.4 Die häufigen Verweise auf spätere Diskussion(en) einzelner Punkte im archäologischen und/oder sprachwissenschaftlichen Teil können Redundanzen nicht vermeiden, mitunter stehen die verschiedenen Perspektiven auf dasselbe Thema eher nebeneinander.5 Von besonderem Interesse für die Leserschaft dieser Zeitschrift dürfte die Karte von illyrischen Stämmen und Flüssen „seit dem 4. Jh. v. Chr.“ (S. 13) sein, die griechische „Kolonien“, aber keine der vielen illyrischen Städte zeigt; die immer wieder als nördliche ‚Begrenzung‘ der illyrischen Kultur erwähnte Neretva und der Skodra-See sind nicht verzeichnet. Neben den meisten wichtigen Stämmen (von denen allerdings einige unkonventionell lokalisiert sind) sind manche dem Rez. völlig unbekannte eingezeichnet, die im Buch auch nicht thematisiert werden. Die Kartographierung der vielfältigen und historischem Wandel unterworfenen illyrischen Stammeslandschaft bleibt eine wichtige (wenngleich in weiten Teilen wohl unlösbare) Aufgabe, hätte aber jedenfalls größere Sorgfalt erfordert. Hierzu und zur Geschichte Illyriens bleibt somit ältere Literatur unverzichtbar. Es folgt der von L. verfasste Teil B zur Archäologie der Illyrer (S. 23–110), der zunächst eine Seite zu Geographie und Klima und eine kurze Forschungsgeschichte aus archäologischer Perspektive (S. 24ff.) enthält, dann ein langes und detailliertes Kapitel über materielle Zeugnisse aus Illyrien von der Kupferzeit bis ins 4. Jh. v. Chr. (S. 26–71). In 13 Unterkapiteln behandelt L. vor allem Grabsitten und -inventare, wobei er eine beeindruckende Materialfülle ausbreitet, deren Verständnis von zahlreichen guten Abbildungen und Verbreitungskarten unterstützt wird. Auf die chronologische Darstellung der Befunde aus Kupfer- und Bronzezeit folgen drei thematische Kapitel zum Fehlen der Urnenfelderkultur am Balkan (S. 35ff.), zu Siedlungsformen (S. 37–40) sowie zu Bestattungsformen (S. 41–4), wobei in den beiden letzteren Bronze- und frühe Eisenzeit zusammen behandelt werden; diese sind ausgesprochen lehrreich und hätten vielleicht noch ausgebaut werden können.
4
5
Z. B. (S. 17) war Hannibal kein König, der romtreue Illyrerkönig Pleuratos aus dem Frieden von Phoinike nicht ausgeschlossen (Liv. 29.12.14), und Genthios, der letzte unabhängige König Illyriens, wurde nach seiner Vorführung im Triumphzug nicht hingerichtet, sondern in Iguvium interniert (Liv. 45.43.9). Der Mythos von Kadmos und Harmonia bei den Illyrern etwa wird S. 11, 107f., 119f. behandelt, wobei die Quellen häufig irreführend wiedergegeben werden und ein illyrischer Schlangenkult unklar bleibt; ein guter Einstieg ins Thema bleibt M. ŠAŠEL KOS, Mythological stories concerning Illyria and its name, in: P. CABANES / J.-L. LAMBOLEY (eds.), L’Illyrie méridionale et l’Épire dans l’antiquité 4, Paris 2004, 493–504.
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Die folgenden fünf Kapitel zur Eisenzeit listen wieder hauptsächlich Grabbeigaben auf; hier wie vorher wird immer wieder auf Gemeinsamkeiten und Unterschiede zwischen verschiedenen Gebieten von L.s Untersuchungsraum hingewiesen. Die vielen termini technici, fremden Namen und nicht zuletzt der schiere Detailreichtum könnten Neulinge abschrecken, Fortgeschrittene dagegen werden viel Interessantes darin finden. Die Behandlung der griechischen Städte in Illyrien sowie der Kulturkontakte zwischen Griechen und Illyrern ist allerdings knapp und wenig nuanciert (S. 55f.). Die wichtigsten Entwicklungen werden in Kap. B.3.12 zum „archäologischen Bild des illyrischen Ethnos“ (S. 67–71) nochmals zusammengefasst; und „natürlich taucht hier in Verbindung mit dem Grundthema die Frage auf, ob, ab wann und wo man von Illyrern sprechen kann.“ Als Antwort wird das Gebiet der Glasinac-Kultur in der mittleren und späten Eisenzeit genannt (S. 68). Doch ist dieses Gebiet, das sich nicht nur von der Save bis zum Mat, sondern auch vom kroatischen Lika-Hochland bis Zentralserbien zu erstrecken scheint (S. 68, 71), entgegen generalisierenden Aussagen über das Zusammenfallen archäologischer und onomastischer Evidenz (S. 8, 71, 184) größer als das Verbreitungsgebiet der süddalmatischen = illyrischen Personennamen, aber auch als die in klassischhellenistischer Literatur vorgenommenen Abgrenzungen der Illyrer. Während letztere eine eigene historische Untersuchung erforderten,6 liegt die aufgrund ihres Fundreichtums namensgebende Glasinac-Hochebene jedenfalls nördlich jener Linie, die M. in seiner Karte um das süddalmatische Personennamengebiet gezogen hat (S. 137). In der Legende liest man zur betreffenden Linie folgende Worte: „“Begrenzung“ des Gebiets, innerhalb dessen südostdalmatinische-illyrische Anthroponymie typischerweise belegt ist (Kerngebiet)“. Oben auf derselben Seite steht dagegen, dass „eine ‚Abgrenzung‘“ dieses Personennamengebiets im Nordwesten gegen das mitteldalmatische bzw. mitteldalmatisch-pannonische Personennamengebiet klar hervortrete. Ist die Linie nach Norden nun eine modalisierte “Begrenzung“ oder eine klar hervortretende Grenze? Zudem zitiert M. auf derselben Seite den Entdecker dieser Personennamengebiete, RADOSLAV KATICIC, laut dem Lychnidos, Pelagonien, Paionien und der Westen von Dardanien ebenfalls zum südostdalmatischen Personennamengebiet zu rechnen seien, doch verläuft die Begrenzungslinie des illyrischen Personennamengebiets in besagter Karte zwar hier gestrichelt, aber westlich der von KATICIC genannten Regionen. Dies scheint um so seltsamer, als diese mit dem Gebiet zwischen dem Glasinac und Mittelalbanien in der Eisenzeit auch eine gemeinsame materielle Kultur teilen (S. 68), womit sie nach den im Vorwort gegebenen Maßstäben der Autoren (S. 8f.) eigentlich als illyrisch anzusprechen wären. Wenn sie weder in der genannten Karte des illyrischen Personennamengebietes noch in der Karte der illyrischen Stämme auf S. 13 oder in L.s Diskussion der archäologischen Zeugnisse aus Illyrien berücksichtigt werden, 6
Ansätze dazu S. 12f., 118–22, und s. D. DZINO, ‘Illyrians’ in ancient ethnographic discourse, DHA 40,2, 2014, 45–65.
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scheinen die Autoren hier doch den Illyrerbegriff der klassisch-hellenistischen griechischen Literatur zugrunde zu legen, in der die genannten Regionen meist nicht als illyrisch gelten und fast nie von als illyrisch bezeichneten Königen beherrscht werden. Derartige Inkongruenzen zwischen den Befunden verschiedener Quellengattungen hätten ausführlichere Diskussion verdient. Das nächste, sehr nützliche Kapitel zu Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft (S. 72–98) behandelt im ersten Unterkapitel Land- und Viehwirtschaft in Illyrien vor allem auf archäobotanischer Grundlage (S. 72ff.), wonach bemerkenswerterweise Ackerbau und Sesshaftigkeit deutlich wichtiger waren, als die literarischen Quellen und die ihnen folgende moderne Literatur vermuten ließen. Die Überblicke über Rohstoffe und Metallhandwerk (S. 74–8) und Handel (S. 78–81) sind gut, hätten allerdings von einer stärkeren Einbeziehung literarischer Quellen profitiert; beides gilt auch für die ausführlichere Darstellung der sozialen Strukturen in Illyrien (S. 81–94). Die Behandlung von Glaube und Kult bei den Illyrern (S. 94–8) folgt offenbar älterer Literatur, die sich auf Vogelwagen und Amulette konzentrierte, während Tempel und Weihegaben recht kurz und der andernorts öfters besprochene Schlangenkult gar nicht erwähnt werden. Zuletzt behandelt L. die „späten“, d. h. in den literarischen Quellen erscheinenden, Illyrer (S. 99–110). Das erste Unterkapitel (S. 99–105) diskutiert die südillyrischen Städte etwas knapp, aber meist solide,7 doch leider werden die hochspannenden Städte Nordillyriens nur kurz erwähnt (S. 105).8 Das Kapitel über spätillyrische Grabsitten (S. 105ff.) handelt tatsächlich vor allem vom griechischen Einfluss auf diese und ist aufschlussreich, auch in Zusammenschau mit Kap. B.4.4 zu den illyrischen Sozialstrukturen. Hier schließt nun Teil C an, M.s Abhandlung über die Sprache der Illyrer (S. 111–83). Die Einleitung zur Sprachgeschichte des antiken Balkan (S. 111–6) ist gut, überschneidet sich allerdings teilweise mit Kap. A.6 zum Verschwinden der illyrischen Sprache und der folgenden Diskussion verschiedener Illyrerbegriffe (S. 117–24). Kap. C.3 (S. 124–42) behandelt die Quellen des Illyrischen und, nach einer sehr interessanten Analyse einiger Orts- und Flussnamen (S. 127–33), vor allem die illyrischen Personennamen (S. 134–42). M. gibt einen thematischen Forschungsüberblick (S. 134f.), bevor er die drei großen Personennamengebiete des ostadriatischen Raumes erörtert (S. 135f.), das norddalmatisch-liburnische, das mitteldalmatisch-pannonische und das süddalmatische, das er allein als illyrisch anspricht. 7
8
Unerklärlich scheint allerdings die Behauptung (S. 101), Byllis sei von Rom wegen Verrats im dritten römisch-makedonischen Krieg zerstört worden, da die anscheinend einzige vorchristliche Brandschicht in Byllis durch Münzfunde und literarische Quellen dem Bürgerkrieg zwischen Caesar und Pompeius zuzuweisen ist (vgl. S. MUCAJ, L’évolution urbaine de Byllis de sa fondation jusqu’à l’abandon de la ville, in: J.-L. LAMBOLEY / L. PËRZHITA / A. SKENDERAJ (eds.), L’Illyrie méridionale et l’Épire dans l’antiquité 6.2, Paris 2019, 449–66). S. bes. Z. MARIĆ, Die hellenistische Stadt oberhalb Ošanići bei Stolac (Ostherzegowina), BRGK 76, 1996, 31–72 zu Daorson, und etwa P. STICOTTI, Die römische Stadt Doclea in Montenegro, Wien 1913 (allerdings wenig Hellenistisches).
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Die definitorische Frage, „was eigentlich illyrische Personennamen sind“, wird auf S. 138f. geklärt: Es sind die nur im letzteren Raum belegten und nicht aus anderen Sprachen herleitbaren Namen. M. listet die in der von ihm als zuverlässig eingeschätzten Literatur für illyrisch gehaltenen Personennamen auf (S. 139–42), doch „eine Gesamterforschung der Personennamen des illyrischen Raums nach modernen sprachwissenschaftlich-onomastischen Kriterien“ stehe „im Wesentlichen noch an ihren Anfängen“ (S. 139). Hier, ebenso wie in den folgenden Kapiteln zu den Merkmalen der illyrischen Sprache (S. 142–52) und der Stellung des Illyrischen unter den indogermanischen Sprachen (S. 152–61), findet sich einiges Interessante, doch wäre zur inhaltlichen Beurteilung der dichten und oft technischen Ausführungen letztlich eine höhere sprachwissenschaftliche Kompetenz nötig, als sie der Rez. beanspruchen kann. Die Schlussfolgerung (S. 160) lautet, dass das Illyrische am nächsten mit den benachbarten pannonischen und ostalpinen indogermanischen Sprachen verwandt sei, nicht aber mit dem Griechischen oder Thrakischen und auch nicht mit dem Albanischen. Messapisch dagegen, dass im der illyrischen Küste gegenüberliegenden Apulien gesprochen wurde und mit den restlichen italischen Sprachen nicht verwandt ist, wird als eine zwar in Italien ausgebildete, aber aus dem Balkan stammende und mit dem Illyrischen verwandte Sprache eingeordnet (S. 160f.). Im folgenden Kapitel (S. 161–7) lehnt M. aufgrund lautgeschichtlicher Entwicklungen die populäre These, nach der das Albanische eine direkte Fortsetzung der antiken illyrischen Sprache sei, entschieden ab, wobei dann ein kurzer Exkurs zur albanischen Immigration willkommen gewesen wäre. Kap. C.7 bietet eine „kurze Zusammenfassung“ der bisherigen Ausführungen (S. 167f.), der M.s eingehende Analyse der illyrischen Personennamen folgt (S. 168–83). Dabei könnten nur die Zweifel an der illyrischen Herkunft der Namen Epikados, Genthios und Teuta übervorsichtig wirken. Ersterer wird als möglicherweise griechisch, die letzteren als möglicherweise keltisch angesprochen (S. 171f., 177f.), doch wären sie in allen Fällen anhand der viel dichter bezeugten Onomastik ihrer vermuteten Herkunftssprachen nicht als keltisch bzw. griechisch erkennbar und ausschließlich in Illyrien als fremdsprachige Modenamen verbreitet gewesen. Teil C schließt mit der Diskussion des modernen Vorkommens illyrischer Namen in Albanien, das nicht auf ungebrochene Tradition, sondern eine nationalistische Mode des 19. Jh. zurückgeht (S. 182f.). Die Zusammenfassung des Buches (Teil D, S. 184ff.) rekapituliert wichtige Punkte zuerst des archäologischen und historischen, dann des sprachwissenschaftlichen Teils. Es folgen eine umfangreiche Bibliographie (S. 187–205), ein Verzeichnis der gedruckten und online publizierten Abbildungen sowie ein nach Flüssen, Orten, Personen und Sachen gegliederter Index. Der Text ist grundsätzlich gut verständlich, allerdings wird Fachvokabular bisweilen nicht erläutert und die Aussagekraft einzelner Schmuckstücke oder Lautveränderungen der des jeweiligen Faches unkundigen Leserschaft nicht immer klar. Den stellenweise gehäuften Querverweisen liegt in Teil C vereinzelt eine ältere Kapiteleinteilung zugrunde, welche die Hauptkapitel A.1 bis C.8 ohne Beachtung der Unterkapitel durchzählt. Das Griechische wird nur in Teil C in
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lateinische Schrift transliteriert, in den Teilen A und B dagegen häufig durch unpassende diakritische Zeichen entstellt. Anstelle von Fuß- oder zumindest Endnoten wird Sekundärliteratur in der Harvard-Zitation angegeben, die der wissenschaftlichen Auseinandersetzung Raum zur Nuance nimmt. Das Gesamturteil fällt ambivalent aus: Während der historische Teil die bisherigen Standardwerke nicht ergänzen kann und auch als Einführung für Anfänger nicht geeignet ist, werden Fortgeschrittene von der Materialfülle der archäologischen wie auch sprachwissenschaftlichen Untersuchungen und den wertvollen Erkenntnissen, die dort geboten werden, sehr profitieren. Der Versuch einer Synthese zu Illyrien bleibt, auch wenn er nicht in allen Punkten als geglückt bezeichnet werden kann, ein höchst dankenswertes Unterfangen, weswegen das Buch besonders für die kleine, aber wachsende deutschsprachige und auch die internationale Illyrienforschung als Anregung und Hilfsmittel gleichermaßen bedeutend sein wird. FLORIAN FEIL FB III – Alte Geschichte Universität Trier D – 54286 Trier [email protected]
w GRAINGER, JOHN D., The Straits from Troy to Constantinople. The Ancient History of the Dardanelles, Sea of Marmara & Bosporos, Barnsley: Pen & Sword 2021. 272 p. ISBN: 9781399013246. Die Monographie behandelt die Region zwischen den Meerengen der heutigen Dardanellen und des Bosporos und deckt dabei in zwölf chronologisch gegliederten Kapiteln die umfassende Zeitspanne von den frühesten Zeugnissen menschlicher Präsenz vor 3000 v. Chr. bis zur Gründung Konstantinopels als Hauptstadt unter Konstantin dem Großen 330 n. Chr. ab. So betrachten die ersten zwei Kapitel Geologie und früheste Siedlungsspuren (The Early Settlers [before c.3000 BC]) sowie die Entwicklung Troias in der Bronzezeit jeweils gestützt auf archäologische Untersuchungen (Troy and its War [c.3000–c.1000 BC]); das dritte Kapitel beleuchtet die Kolonisationsbewegungen – hauptsächlich der Griechen – an den Küsten von Hellespont, Propontis bis hin zum Bosporos (Thracians and Greeks [c.1000–546 BC]) vor den in Kapitel vier behandelten Auseinandersetzungen zwischen Persern und Griechen (Persians and Greeks [546–478 BC]), zu deren symbolisch bedeutsamen Schauplätzen bekanntermaßen Bosporos und Hellespont zählten. Die folgenden fünf Kapitel sind der Region um die Meerengen unter der teils sehr kurzlebigen Herrschaft verschiedener überregionaler, regionaler und lokaler Mächte gewidmet (Kapitel 5: Under another Empire – Athens [478–405 BC] mit Bezug auf den Delisch-Attischen Seebund; Kapitel 7: After Alexander [336–301 BC] zu den Kämpfen der Diadochen; schließlich Kapitel 8: In the Seleukid Empire [301–223 BC] und Kapitel 9: Seleukids, Romans, Attalids [228–133 BC] zu wechselnden Einflussnahmen verschiedener
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hellenistischer Herrscher), nur unterbrochen durch eine kurze Phase fragiler Unabhängigkeit nach dem Peloponnesischen Krieg und vor dem Aufstieg der Makedonen (Kapitel 6: Precarious Independence [405–336 BC]). Die Schlusskapitel endlich teilen die Auswirkungen römischer Herrschaft in eine Phase der Austerität der kleinasiatischen Städte aufgrund von Belastungen durch Abgaben und Kriegszüge (Kapitel 10: Into the Roman Empire [146–30 BC]) sowie eine Phase von relativer Stabilität und Erholung durch gelegentlich wohlwollende Förderung einzelner römischer Kaiser (Kapitel 11: In the Roman Empire [30 BC–AD 180]) bis zum unter dem zunehmenden Druck auf die Außengrenzen des Römischen Reiches erfolgten Aufstieg der Region um die Meerengen zum (geo-)politischen Zentrum und der Gründung Konstantinopels als neuer Hauptstadt unter Konstantin dem Großen (Kapitel 12: The New City [AD 180–330]). Die Entwicklung dieser etwa mit den Heroen des Troianischen Krieges oder so bekannten Persönlichkeiten wie Alexander dem Großen verbundenen Region nachzuzeichnen (so der Klappentext des Buches), ist ein verdienstvolles Unterfangen. Dies gilt um so mehr angesichts der in dieser Gegend charakteristischen Siedlungsstruktur, die sowohl auf der europäischen als auch auf der asiatischen Seite der Meerengen geprägt war durch kleine Ortschaften und Poleis, deren Ausdehnung sich zumeist in sehr überschaubaren Grenzen hielt. Die Verflechtungen dieser Ansiedlungen untereinander sowie im Spiel mit den jeweils vorherrschenden regionalen und überregionalen Mächten sind vor diesem Hintergrund kleinteilig und mühevoll zusammenzutragen. Ebenso und daraus resultierend ist es keine geringe Herausforderung, die gewonnenen Informationen und Erkenntnisse der Leserschaft kohärent zu vermitteln. Tatsächlich gelingt es der vorliegenden Studie nur zum Teil, diesem selbstgesteckten Ziel gerecht zu werden. Dies liegt zunächst an der Überlieferung und Ausrichtung der zur Verfügung stehenden Quellen, auf deren Basis sich die Geschichte der verschiedenen Poleis häufig nur punktuell und unregelmäßig rekonstruieren lässt, zumal der jeweilige thematische Schwerpunkt der auf uns gekommenen antiken Werke für den oben genannten Untersuchungszeitraum zumeist außerhalb der hier behandelten Region liegt – dies ist unabänderlich und liegt nicht in der Macht des Autors. Allerdings ist es auch die Gliederung der vorliegenden Studie selbst, die diesem Umstand Vorschub leistet, indem sie sich bei der Aufteilung der Kapitel an der etablierten (Binnen-)Differenzierung der Epochen und damit den Großereignissen antiker Geschichte orientiert: Diese Problematik wird deutlich bspw. beim Zuschnitt der Kapitel 5 und 6: Das Jahr 336 v. Chr. markiert zwar den Herrschaftsantritt Alexanders III von Makedonien (unserer Einteilung gemäß den Beginn des Hellenismus), aber in der vorliegenden Studie ist dies allenfalls von untergeordneter Bedeutung (insb. S. 105–6), ja, man könnte fragen, ob nicht ein anderes Datum wie der Tod Alexanders 323 v. Chr., in dessen Folge die Region um die Meerengen in den Fokus der Nachfolger rückte, der Darstellung nicht eher dienlich gewesen wäre. Auffällig ist auch der Übergang von Kapitel 9 zu Kapitel 10, deren Überschriften als einzige sich überschneidende Zeiträume aufweisen, erneut ohne dass die genannten Jahreszahlen im jeweils zugehörigen Text eine große Rolle spielen würden. (So endet die Darstellung in
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Kapitel 9, das eigentlich den Zeitraum bis 133 v. Chr. umfassen sollte, mit den Jahren 149–8 v. Chr. [S. 161-2], wohingegen Kapitel 10, das gemäß Überschrift 146 v. Chr. einsetzen sollte, mit der pergamenischen Erbschaft 133 v. Chr. beginnt [S. 163].) Wie schwierig es ist, eine Geschichte dieser Meerengen-Region zu schreiben, zeigt sich darüber hinaus auch in der Ausführung der einzelnen Kapitel selbst; so variiert etwa der Umfang, der den jeweiligen historischen Rahmenereignissen zugemessen wird, erheblich, und nicht immer aus nachvollziehbaren Gründen. Zum Beispiel findet der Peloponnesische Krieg nur peripher und punktuell Erwähnung ebenso wie die Herrschaftszeit Alexanders III von Makedonien (des Großen) mit Ausnahme des äußerst knapp erwähnten Übergangs über den Hellespont und der frühen Feldzüge. Während letzteres grundsätzlich stringent mit dem Themenzuschnitt der Untersuchung ist, wenngleich nicht unbedingt vereinbar mit der Prominenz, die dem makedonischen König durch die Wahl des Titelbildes zugemessen wird (Alexanders Landung in Asien), finden sich etwa in Kapitel 12 in Ermangelung entsprechender Quellen etliche überraschend ausführliche Überblicke über geschichtliche Hintergründe, deren Verknüpfung mit der Region um die Meerengen am Hellespont und Bosporos sich als eher lose herausstellt (etwa zu den Kämpfen verschiedener Prätendenten um die Kaiserwürde im Römischen Reich 192–3 n. Chr., S. 196–8; allgemein zu den Kaiserresidenzen der Tetrarchen, S. 202–3, oder zum Christentum, S. 207–11). Die Konzeption der vorliegenden Studie bringt darüber hinaus noch zwei weitere Schwierigkeiten mit sich. So zwingt der großangelegte Untersuchungszeitraum von ca. 3000 v. Chr. bis 330 n. Chr. zu einer raschen, grob skizzierenden Darstellungsweise, wohingegen etwaige Detailfragen bewusst ausgeklammert werden (müssen). Offensiv wird dies nur selten thematisiert – pointiert etwa im Fall der Ilias, der der Autor, wohl Widerspruch erwartend, dezidiert jegliche Aussagekraft für das bronzezeitliche Troia zugunsten eines Primats der Archäologie abspricht – ja, für die er überhaupt einen geringen Quellenwert postuliert (S. 23– 4). Eine solch flammende Argumentation bleibt jedoch eine Seltenheit; im Gegensatz dazu werden im Weiteren die zur Verfügung stehenden Quellen zumeist ohne Kommentierung eingearbeitet. Ähnlich steht es um die Einbeziehung wissenschaftlicher Literatur. Zwar schließt erneut der Umfang des gewählten Themas eine intensive und umfassende Auseinandersetzung mit Detailstudien quasi aus, lässt sie eventuell auch überflüssig erscheinen, und doch ist dies zuweilen unbefriedigend, etwa im Fall des vierten Kapitels, das – wie den Endnoten zu entnehmen ist – für die Geschichte der Perserkriege fast ausschließlich auf die Historien Herodots verweist, die entsprechende Literatur jedoch weitgehend außen vor lässt (insb. S. 222–3). Schließlich ließe sich noch eine letzte konzeptionelle Frage anbringen, die den geographischen Rahmen der Studie als solchen betrifft und letztlich in ihrer Fokussierung auf die Besiedlung dieser Region begründet liegt: Denn anders als es der Titel des Buches suggerieren könnte, sind die Meerengen am Hellespont und Bosporos sowohl in ihrer wirtschaftlichen Bedeutung als Seepassage zwischen der Ägäis und dem Schwarzem Meer als auch in ihrer geographischen Lage
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als Kontaktraum zwischen zwei Landmassen tatsächlich eher von untergeordneter Bedeutung (so auch eingangs in der Einleitung vermerkt, S. viii–ix). Gerade vor diesem Hintergrund wäre eine Erörterung interessant gewesen, worin sich denn der hier behandelte Raum vom Hellespont bis zum Bosporos von anderen strategisch bedeutsamen Räumen abhebt, ja sich überhaupt als „straits region“ (etwa S. 95, 156) oder „straits area“ (bspw. S. 167, 177) konstituieren lässt. So liegt der große Gewinn der vorliegenden Studie in ihrer synthetischen Zusammenschau, die einzelne lokale bzw. regionale Zentren um Hellespont, Propontis und Bosporos in den Vordergrund rückt wie Kyzikos, Byzantion oder Ilion, ohne allerdings die immanenten konzeptionellen Schwierigkeiten des gesteckten Themas auflösen zu können. Die ansprechende Darstellungsweise ermöglicht aller Kleinteiligkeit zum Trotz eine flüssige Lektüre, wenngleich eine gute Kenntnis der antiken Geschichte dem Verständnis der einzelnen Kapitel durchweg zuträglich erscheint und einige Fehler unglücklich im Gedächtnis bleiben (exemplarisch zeigt sich dies etwa an der abweichenden Schreibweise des Buchtitels auf dem Titelblatt [„Bosphorus“] im Vergleich zum Schutzumschlag, Buchrücken und übrigen Werk [„Bosporos“]). Darüber hinaus wäre eine Einbindung der im Buch enthaltenen, durchaus qualitativ sehr guten Abbildungen in die Darstellung wünschenswert gewesen. JOHANNA LEITHOFF Universität Erfurt Antike Kultur Nordhäuser Straße 63 D – 99089 Erfurt [email protected]
w THONEMANN, PETER, The Lives of Ancient Villages. Rural Society in Roman Anatolia. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 2022. 382 p.¸ 68 ill. ISBN: 9781009123211. (Greek Culture in the Roman World.) Dies ist ein bemerkenswertes und ein wichtiges Buch. Man könnte es als ethnologisches Experiment bezeichnen. Notgedrungen beschäftigen sich die Altertumswissenschaften meist mit mehr oder weniger zufällig überlieferten Fragmenten einer Elitekultur und sind kaum in der Lage, „unten, wo das Leben konkret ist“ (Hegel) zu recherchieren und sich zu den Lebensbedingungen derjenigen 95% der antiken Bevölkerung zu äußern, die selbst in der Blütezeit der Stadtkultur im 2. nachchristlichen Jahrhundert nicht in einer Stadt lebten. In seiner Bedeutung für die Erforschung einer ländlichen Regionalkultur ist das Buch vergleichbar mit HAMISH FORBESʼ epochalem Meaning and Identity in a Greek Landscape. An Archaeological Ethnograph (Cambridge 2007), das sich mit der Bevölkerung der Halbinsel Methana im 20. Jh. beschäftigt. THONEMANN richtet in seinem neuesten Buch den Blick auf die Landschaft Hieradoumia in der römischen Kaiserzeit. Der Landschaftsname ist nicht antik; den Namen hat THONEMANN erfunden. Er bezeichnet damit eine Region um das
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mittlere Hermostal, die im Norden des Flusses das abbaitische Mysien, im Süden die Katakekaumene umfaßt. Die Einheit der Region – der Hermos bildet keine eigentliche Grenze, man kann im Grunde überall hindurchwaten – ist seit den Pionieren ihrer Erforschung Buresch, Keil und Premerstein, Herrmann, die nicht ohne Grund Epigraphiker waren, ganz klar und augenfällig. Zur Bezeichnung werden wenig treffende Hilfskonstruktionen genutzt, etwa Nordostlydien oder lydisch-phrygisch-mysischer Grenzraum. THONEMANNs Entscheidung, einen Namen zu erfinden, löst das Problem elegant; der Name ist unbedingt passend (S. 2 Anm. 5). Innerhalb der Bevölkerung sind keine „ethnischen“ Unterschiede mehr zu erkennen; nichts läßt darauf schließen, ob man es mit einem Lyder, Myser, Phryger oder Griechen zu tun habe. Einführend werden die geographischen Gegebenheiten geschildert, die das Land und seine Menschen prägten: die kontinuierlich zum Temnos-Gebirge (Simav Dağları) hin ansteigende fruchtbare Landschaft im Norden, das junge und spektakuläre Lavaland der Katakekaumene im Süden. Historisch und humangeographisch können wir die Region erst seit der Herrschaft der Attaliden fassen, die hier keine Städte gründeten, jedoch mysische und gräko-makedonische „Söldner“ ansiedelten. In attalidischer Zeit bestand im Norden das Koinon der abbaitischen Myser, das auch Münzen prägte, und im Süden das Koinon der Maionier. Erste Poleis tauchen mit Augustus (Maionia und das vielleicht schon ältere Tabala) und Tiberius (Iulia Gordos) auf. Zwar ist bisher keine dieser Siedlungen und Städte ausgegraben, wie die Region insgesamt archäologisch fast völlig unberührt und vage ist, jedoch darf man sie sich nicht allzu monumental vorstellen. Eine Trennung zwischen Stadt und Land wurde hier nie vollzogen; es gibt kaum Inschriften, die von städtischen Institutionen errichtet wurden – Inschriften stammen von Individuen oder von Vereinen. Die Gegend blieb „a homogenous, face-to-face rural society, decentralized and autarkic, structured around the family, neighbourhood, and village rather than around the city, tribe, or social class“ (S. 20). Der Grund, warum THONEMANN diese Region für seine Untersuchung gewählt hat, liegt darin, daß es die einzige Region der antiken Welt sei (womöglich mit Ausnahme Ägyptens), für die sich eine solche ethnologische Untersuchung überhaupt durchführen lasse. Hier hat die Landbevölkerung eine Stimme, die sich in tausenden Grabinschriften äußert und in hunderten sogenannter Beichtinschriften, eine idiosynkratische Gattung, die nur hier vorkommt und um deren Erforschung sich Georg Petzl verdient gemacht hat. Die Grabinschriften sind sehr oft (781 Fälle) Familienepitaphe, in denen bisweilen mehr als 30 Personen genannt werden. Diese beiden epigraphischen Eigentümlichkeiten unterscheiden die untersuchten Gegenden im mittleren Hermostal von allen anderen Teilen des binnenländischen Kleinasiens und erlauben es, sie als Einheit, als Hieradoumia, zu betrachten. Die Grabinschriften zeichnen sich zudem durch mehrere Besonderheiten aus, die sie zu brauchbarem Material für sozialgeschichtliche Untersuchungen machen (S. 26–9): Sie geben ein präzises Datum, meist mit Monat, oft mit dem Tag, und sie bieten meist mehr oder weniger ausführliche Listen von präzise bezeichneten Verwandten, die sich der Erinnerung an den Verstorbenen oder die Verstorbene anschlossen. Bisweilen schließen sich auch weitere Freunde oder
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Bekannte von außerhalb der unmittelbaren Verwandtschaftsgruppe und Korporationen wie Vereine an. Die „Beichtinschriften“ hingegen folgen dem Muster, daß ein Familienmitglied eine religiöse Vorschrift übertreten hat, er oder jemand anderes daraufhin ein Unheil erlitt und der Übertreter oder seine Verwandten den zürnenden Gott versöhnten. Aus diesen Quellen, die er immer wieder mittels der Traumdeutungsschrift des Halb-Hieradoumiers Artemidoros von Daldis ergänzt und abgleicht, zieht THONEMANN nun Informationen über den Kalender, über jahreszeitliche Kultaktivitäten, über die saisonale Sterblichkeit (die im September am höchsten war, vor allem unter Mittzwanzigern: Kinder bis zu einem Alter von fünf Jahren bekamen für gewöhnlich keine Grabinschrift), zur verbreiteten Institution der Pflegekindschaft (Kap. 6). Ausführlich wird die komplexe und in ihrer Komplexität einmalige Verwandtschaftsterminologie vorgestellt, die auch proto-anatolische Bezeichnungen enthält; im Gegensatz zu allen anderen Griechen wurde hier auch die hekyros-pentheros-Unterscheidung konsistent beibehalten. Die Vereine in Hieradoumia (Kap. 7) gliedern sich in Familienvereine, Nachbarschaftsvereine, Kultvereine und Berufsvereine. Letztere zeigen, daß die Textilproduktion eine bedeutende Rolle spielte; die naturräumlichen Bedingungen begünstigen die Schafhaltung. (In osmanischer Zeit war die Region auf Teppichproduktion spezialisiert. Ein in der Antike nicht unbedeutender Weinanbau ist aus der Literatur bekannt.) Das achte Kapitel beschäftigt sich mit den ländlichen Heiligtümern, deren Götter Dörfer oder Gruppen von Dörfern „beherrschten“, wie es die Inschriften ausdrücken und wie es wohl auch fast wörtlich zu nehmen ist. THONEMANN untersucht, wie die Heiligtümer an Landbesitz kamen, und schließt: „The gods of rural Hieradoumia were ruthless and successful agricultural predators“. Das läßt sich besonders dann erkennen, wenn sich jemand weigerte, die Forderung des Gottes nach Land zu erfüllen und die Götter ihren Anspruch, die Dörfer und Menschen zu beherrschen, durchsetzten. Das neunte Kapitel über Konfliktlösungen zeigt, wie hier wieder die Götter eine wichtige Rolle spielten. Die Konflikte drehten sich hauptsächlich um Viehdiebstahl, Darlehen und familiären Unfrieden, wie es in ländlichen Gemeinschaften auch zu erwarten ist. Abschließend betrachtet THONEMANN, was über die Poleis ausgesagt werden kann, von denen es in der Mitte des 2. Jh. n. Chr. etwa zehn gab. Sie waren dominiert von einheimischen Landbesitzern, oft mit römischem Bürgerrecht. Wahrscheinlich haben die Städte keinen großen Einfluß auf die ihnen nun beigeordneten Dörfer gehabt; lediglich in Maionia und in Julia Gordos ist ein gewisses Maß an institutioneller Aktivität zu erkennen. In den einzelnen Dörfern sieht man mehr davon, nicht zuletzt in Form von ausdifferenzierten Jahresbeamten. Dieser kurze Überblick über die behandelten Themen kann nur einen vagen Eindruck davon geben, wie hier mustergültig die sozialen Bedingungen und Strukturen einer landwirtschaftlich und dörflich geprägten Region untersucht werden, indem THONEMANN die Inschriften zum Sprechen bringt. Wir haben hier einen der ganz seltenen Fälle vor uns, in denen es tatsächlich möglich ist, eine Landschaft mit „normalen“ Menschen zu bevölkern (was womöglich in Südsyrien in ähnlicher Weise möglich wäre). Auch wenn sich der Rezensent gewünscht
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hätte, daß THONEMANN näher auf den Zusammenhang zwischen naturräumlichen Bedingungen, Wirtschaftsform und Sozialstruktur eingegangen wäre, ist sein (etwas zu unauffällig betiteltes) Buch ein Glücksfall für die Altertumswissenschaften und eine echte Erweiterung ihres Horizonts. FRANK DAUBNER FB III – Alte Geschichte Universität Trier D – 54286 Trier [email protected]
w WIESEHÖFER, JOSEF, Iran – Zentralasien – Mittelmeer. Gesammelte Schriften Teil I: Studien zur Geschichte der Achaimeniden, hg. R. ROLLINGER / K. RUFFING Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz 2022. VIII + 246 S., 5 Abb. ISBN: 9783447118255. (Philippika, 159.) Few living historians have contributed as much as JOSEF WIESEHÖFER to the study of Ancient Iran, its interactions with other civilizations and role in world history, and the modern reception of Iranian antiquity. The very fact that the editors, ROBERT ROLLINGER and KAI RUFFING, must envision as many as four separate collections to highlight samples of his major works in different areas of study – the Achaemenid empire, the Arsacids and the Hellenistic world, the Sasanian empire, and historiography and reception – speaks to the breadth of his impact on the last two generations of scholarship. The first of these volumes assembles fourteen of his numerous papers on aspects of Achaemenid Studies, distilling thematic areas of particular importance within his larger body of work, and of influence in the wider field. As with the recent publications of collected papers by his fellow Achaemenid luminary PIERRE BRIANT (Kings, Countries, Peoples. Selected Studies on the Achaemenid Empire, Stuttgart 2017; From Cyrus to Seleukos: Studies in Achaemenid and Hellenistic History, Leiden 2021), this volume serves a valuable purpose in gathering seminal writings which initially appeared in a wide variety of edited volumes and journals, and thereby increasing their accessibility for collective study and historiographic reflection. Rather than focusing on the initial stages of WIESEHÖFER’s scholarship, marked by his prominent participation in the Achaemenid History Workshops of the 1980s, the editors have chosen to highlight a subsequent phase of study that synthesized and refined the implications of new approaches to the literary testimonies for the first Persian empire. The assembled chapters were originally published between 1980 and 2013 (with all except two appearing between 2003 and 2013). They model critical approaches to the Greek and Biblical evidence for Achaemenid imperial dynamics, balancing the value and limitations of these longfamiliar sources in the face of expanding internal evidence from the Iranian and Mesopotamian core regions, and challenging faulty assumptions and misinterpretations in the earlier modern literature. While a decade has passed since the publiccation of the most recent chapter, the book represents WIESEHÖFER’s
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contributions at a key transitional moment in the maturation and expansion of the field. By approaching particular themes from multiple angles, the chapters offer useful insight into his evolving ideas and methodology, sometimes highlighted further in endnotes on how his approach has changed since the original publication (i.e., greater skepticism towards Xenophon’s Cyropaedia, p. 111). The editors have also provided helpful addenda pointing readers to examples of his more recent studies on the topics in question, as well as to other scholars’ recent works that engage with and complement WIESEHÖFER’s scholarship. The chapters are not presented in a strict chronological or topical order, and readers may profit from reading out of order to fully appreciate his approaches and arguments on topics of particular interest. One notable theme is Achaemenid interaction with local legal standards and religious practice in the imperial provinces. WIESEHÖFER’s essay on Reichsgesetz oder Einzelfallgerechtigkeit? (pp. 217–27) is a classic reflection on this topic, notable for its decisive impact on an early methodological debate sparked by PETER FREI’s theory of imperial authorization (in Zentralgewalt und Lokalautonomie im Achämenidenreich, in P. FREI / H. KOCH, Reichsidee und Reichsorganisation im Perserreich, Fribourg 1984, 7–43). FREI had proposed an empire-wide imposition of a Persian royal law code and intrusive central approval of local religious practice, but the paper included here skillfully defuses the underlying evidentiary assumptions. It shows that the law code model is founded on misunderstandings of royal claims about dāta, the justice upheld by the king, which do not imply the dissemination of written regulations among different regions and cultures; and involvement in cultic practice occurred in specific political or military contexts, approving Passover observance for Judaean soldiers at Elephantine because of its impact on their service obligations, or burning Athenian temples in response to resistance and disloyalty. The implications of this crucial premises animate many of WIESEHÖFER’s subsequent discussions, including this collection’s chapters on Achaemenid rule and its impact on Yehud (pp. 1–14) and Law and religion in Achaemenid Iran (pp. 185–97). Another major topic explored in several chapters involves the structural dynamics of Achaemenid court society. Several of WIESEHÖFER’s papers, expanding beyond a focus on the imagery and agency of the great king, seek to systematize and categorize a typology of the court functionaries described in Greek historiography, exploring their respective places within the inner and outer social circles surrounding the crown. Die ‘Freunde’ und ‘Wohltäter’ des Großkönigs (pp. 95–111) parses the nuances of friendship terminology in court circles, focusing on “benefactors” (euergetai), “friends” (philoi), and “guest-friends” (xenoi), and their respective places in hierarchies of royal proximity and obligation. Günstlinge und Privilegien am Achaimenidenhof (pp. 143–61) covers related ground but highlights accounts of the bestowal and removal of royal favor, and the tenuous nature of individual status in court politics. Ctesias, the Achaemenid court, and the history of the Greek novel (pp. 29–44) focuses more closely on the ways in which one notorious author presented court life, and their
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limitations as reliable historical evidence, despite their vast literary impact and contribution to Orientalist stereotypes of Achaemenid despotism. A subject of critical importance in the study of Achaemenid imperialism is the relationship between the Persians and their Greek subjects and neighbors, which included not only conflict but cultural and economic exchange, and has suffered from extensive simplification and distortion in modern thought. WIESEHÖFER has been a leading voice in reframing how we should study these interactions and their significance in the Achaemenid worldview. In Ein König erschließt und imaginiert sein Imperium (pp. 77–94), he studies how the inscriptions and reliefs of Darius I lay out an internal understanding of the Achaemenid universe and its outer reaches at the empire’s formative stage, engaging with the important work of Amelie Kuhrt on how Persian characterizations of the Greeks among the empire’s peoples emerged from Mesopotamian cosmographic conceptions (‘Greeks’ and ‘Greece’ in Mesopotamian and Persian Perspectives, Oxford, 2002). He then develops a vital argument (pp. 88–9), articulated further (pp. 126– 9) in the chapter on Greeks and Persians (pp. 113–41), that reassesses the intentions behind Xerxes’ Greek expedition as aiming not towards regional (or continental) conquest and incorporation into the satrapal system, but rather at establishment of a vassal system incorporating some of the major Greek cities beyond the Aegean. The chapter on Die Ermordung des Xerxes (pp. 61–76), in turn, frames the aftermath of the Greek expedition not as a period of decline but rather a time of consolidation and stabilizing of the imperial system. WIESEHÖFER carefully establishes that Xerxes’ violent removal in 465 does not need to be connected with the events of 480–79. Rather, the accomplishments of Xerxes’ later reign, including continuing construction at Persepolis, laid the foundations for further internal development by his ambitious and unintended successor, Artaxerxes I, whom WIESEHÖFER blames for Xerxes’ assassination (drawing on a Babylonian chronicle text to read between the lines of a dubious Greek source tradition that tries too hard to proclaim Artaxerxes’ innocence). A final chapter touching on Greco-Persian relations is the treatment of Cyprus in Herodotus (pp. 163–83), which focuses on a Mediterranean frontier region marked by particular hybridity in the formation of political and cultural identities. Here WIESEHÖFER shows that modern studies based on Panhellenic sources such as Isocrates have oversimplified dichotomies between Greek and Phoenician populations, whereas Herodotus’ treatment shows greater complexity; moments of conflict such as Cyprus’ participation in the Ionian revolt or the wars of Evagoras stemmed not from an emergent Greek Cypriot consciousness or Phoenician or Persian hostility towards Greeks, but from the ambitions of local rulers and cities with conflicting views on the prospects for local autonomy within the larger Achaemenid imperial system. These conclusions have been amply confirmed and reinforced in recent years by the expansion of study on the Phoenician-language archive from Idalion, and the new insights that it provides on the administration of Classical Cypriot kingdoms (see most recently B. PESTARINO, Kypriōn Politeia: the Political and Administrative Systems of the Classical Cypriot City-Kingdoms, Leiden 2022).
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Other topics covered in the collection include the implications of the false Herodotean construction of a Median empire preceding the Achaemenids (pp. 229–37; see also pp. 16–20 and 90–1); the realities of imperial interaction with local identities in Media and the greater Zagros region (pp. 15–28); the ideological associations between kingship, the cultivation of natural environments, and the vital resource of water (45–59); and the evidentiary limits of modern hypotheses envisioning Persepolis as a primarily ritual center and connecting its ceremonial practices with the later festival of Nowruz (199–215). A brief review cannot do full justice to the wealth of ideas and questions that the assembled chapters contain. In sum, they provide an invaluable sampling of WIESEHÖFER’s contributions to Achaemenid Studies and the relevant historiography. Given the passage of time since their original publication, it is inevitable that the treatment of certain topics has been supplanted by new evidence and approaches, for instance in the study of the Babylonian economy and the ways in which the cuneiform evidence has moved discussions beyond the Herodotean tribute model (pp. 81, 124; see M. JURSA, Taxation and Service Obligations in Babylonia from Nebuchadnezzar to Darius and the Evidence for Darius’ Tax Reform, in Herodot und das Persische Weltreich, ed. R. ROLLINGER / B. TRUSCHNEGG / R. BICHLER, Wiesbaden, 2011, 431–8; K. KLEBER (ed.), Taxation in the Achaemenid Empire, Wiesbaden 2021); but the author would hardly pretend to offer a static final word on the topics in question. Instead, WIESEHÖFER’s collected works demonstrate an admirable commitment to the continuous questioning of old models and inspiration of new discussion, a goal in which he has achieved conspicuous success, while helping to establish the intellectual foundations of the Achaemenid field. JOHN HYLAND Christopher Newport University [email protected]
w HATKE, GEORG / RUZICKA, RONALD (eds.), South Arabian Long-Distance Trade in Antiquity “Out of Arabia”, Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2021. 485 p., ill. ISBN: 9781527564565. Yet another book on ancient Arabian trade – the most treated topic in Arabian studies. At the time of writing, googling for ‘ancient Arabian trade’ elicits 14.100.000 hits. The two editors of the compendium under discussion have assembled a suite of 20 studies of the 32 talks held at the 23rd Rencontre Sabéenne in Vienna, which took place from 13‒15 June 2019. While not all of the articles are thematically connected with the person, interests and work of EDUARD GLASER, on an organisational level, they well may be by means of the Austrian Academy of Sciences, Digital Humanities and the Project ArcheoMuse. Austrian ancient South Arabian (ASA) studies are much alive, if not leading. The editors
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are to be congratulated for taking on this work and assembling these many works, the conference launched by the keynote talk of Mohammed Maraqten. The topics range geographically from E Africa, SW Arabia to SE Arabia as well as Mesopotamia. The majority are archaeological in nature, but epigraphic and philological studies are tradition at the RS. Owing to the ongoing war in the Yemen, it is exceedingly difficult for Yemenites to leave and re-enter their land. But westerners still offer a wealth of material and thought tangential to ASA, its languages, historiography, archaeology and art history. It is impossible to fairly and evenly to do justice to the thought and effort of this colourful bouquet of contributions in the space of a short review. There is no central vantage point to address the different topics, which themselves are multi-facetted, aside from their being centred in Arabia. The reviewer’s own interests also effect his reaction to the different papers. G. HATKE’s, multi-facetted ‘South Arabia, the Arabs, and the East Africa trade in pre-Islamic times’ initiates the contributions (pp. 1–62). He re-exams the 1st century CE Periplus of the Erythraean Sea, but exceeds this supplementing it with Old South Arabian textual evidence for trade. Main points include that the Qatabanians developed a maritime link with eastern coastal Africa. He also suggests that the Himyarites recruited Arabs for commercial ventures in order to integrate them into their socio-economic framework. J.-F. FAÜ presents a striking account of the Kaleb Ǝlla AṣbƏḥa as one of the most popular figures of Catholic devotion in South America at the beginning of the 17th century (63‒5). He owed his popularity to his vanquishing in 525 of the Ḥimyarite Jewish king of Ḥimyar Yūsuf Asʾar Yathʾar, also known as Dhū Nuwās. R. LORETO illuminates the caravan trade routes of 1st millennium BCE which is still in an early stage of development to plausibly determine the locations of roads, stopovers and wells between north-western Arabia, the south-east and Mesopotamia. This author structures ‘The role of Adummatu among the early Arabian trade routes at the dawn of the southern Arabian cultures’ (66‒110). The French team in Wakarida submits new evidence to illuminate this preAksumite (Ethio-Sabaean) and Aksumite site (111‒53). Several sites of the kingdom of Daʿmat or Daʿmat and Saba are characterised by urban architecture, inscriptions, iconography and religious practices inspired by South Arabians. J.-F. BRETON’s treatment of the ancient salt trade (154–73) is original, considering his sources for this archaeologically and economically essential, but little discussed topic. G. BUONO presents four sealings with the name Ḏrʾkr on pottery vessels from the Ḥaḍramī port of Sumhuram recovered during the course of IMTO excavations (174‒84). Since these sealings are stamped on the vessel body, it is unclear who is being referred to: the potter, the owner of the vessels, or of what is stored in the vessels, if in fact this is not one in the same person. The vessel stamp is dated to the 1st cent. BCE/CE. This same PN occurred stamped on a contemporary vessel at Timna.
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C. CARBONARA compiles several artefacts imported from the Gulf to Sumhuram from the 3rd century BCE to the 3rd century CE (185‒210). Import pottery includes southern Mesopotamian glazed ware and Iranian Orange Fine Painted Ware. Imports include horse-shaped vessels spouts, Abiʾel coins, SE Arabian soft stone vessels, decorated shell discs, some of which are of the Mleiha period, Early Iron Age or are Bronze Age strays. E. FLORIDDIA poetically sounds EDUARD GLASER’s intellectual and psychological world by means of what he calls a “Bildungsroman” (211‒20). Surrealistically, in word and image, he recounts GLASER as a disoriented person searching for meaning in life. Amusing reading. E. MONAMY (221‒7) contributes a clearly written account regarding the unsung hero, Ḥayyim Ḥabšūš, resourceful guide of the important European researchers in the Yemen, JOSEPH HALÉVY and EDUARD GLASER. S. LISCHI (228‒44) offers a find note for the archaeological site of HAS1 located on coastal Inqitat, which flanks the khawr of Wadi Darbat entrance, which leads 1 km north to Sumhuram. The occupation ranges from the 4th cent. BCE to the 1st /2nd cent. CE. She argues that the Sumhuram population caused that at Inqitat to abandon their settlement. W. DAUM’s new iteration regarding the Abraha’s cathedral in Ṣanʿāʾ updates various studies and reconstructs it with a long nave and atrium at the western end, rather than as possibly a square building or one with a transept (245‒59). A. MULTOFF’s prosopographic study of mostly Sabaic and Qatanbanic PNs offers the advantage of being grounded a large textual corpus (267‒309). She argues that what have been taken to be incomplete names show a peculiar pattern of filiation. P. STEIN and S. RIJZIGER (310‒51) present evidence for a former archive of 200 extant zabūr wooden texts from Maqwala, SE of Ṣanʿāʾ. This complements those from al-Sawdā (ancient Naššān) in the Wadi al-Ǧawf. S. JAPP’s contribution on trade connections between South Arabia and Ethiopia (359‒91) can be supplemented by the two omitted largest sources of ʿAqaba/Ayla pottery: in Ẓafār (519 sherds and vessels) and ʿAqaba/Ayla itself: See respectively, M. RAITH et al., The view from Ẓafār – an archaeometric study of the ʿAqaba late Roman period pottery complex and distribution in the 1st millennium CE, Zeitschrift für Orient-Archäologie 6, 2013, 320–50; K. DAMGAARD, Modelling mercantilism an archaeological analysis of Red Sea trade in the early Islamic period (650–1100 CE), PhD dissertation, Copenhagen University, 2011, not to omit DAMGAARD’s more recent articles regarding the archaeology of ʿAqaba. By means of mineralogical comparison, the amphora trade between ʿAqaba and Ẓafār is proven beyond doubt. M. KÖSTER contributes a study of the interregional influences which come to bear in the emergence of the Ethio-Sabaean culture in the early first millennium BCE in the Horn of Africa (392‒412). Although pre-Aksumite South Arabian forms occur, an acculturation leads to the emergence of a new ceramic repertory. The late 2nd millennium pottery is readily distinguishable from that this period.
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In his last essay, C. DARLES † takes the reader on an excursion of different mostly Gothic sculptural renderings the Queen of Sheba, first known in the Hebrew Bible (413‒29). Not only does each religion depict her differently, but she falls in and out of favour in the art of different periods. M. MARAQTEN, of the Austrian Academy of Sciences, outlines ‘The pilgrimage to the Awām temple/Maḥrām Bilqīs Maʾrib, Yemen’ in light of recently edited Sabaic texts (430‒62). He presents an outline of communal practices and rites for the different deities. A welcome update of this key topic. The contributions deal with topics outside of long-distance trade, and reflect the multi-facetted subject of Arabia, the individual authors and the available sources. Several of the contributions are bound to be interesting and/or new for both epigraphers and archaeologists. PAUL A. YULE SKVO, Semitistik Ur- und Frühgeschichte/Vorderasiatische Archäologie Universität Heidelberg Schulgasse 2 D – 69117 Heidelberg [email protected]
Julian Gieseke
Vom äußersten Westen der Welt Die Griechische Ethnographie und die Völker Iberiens und der Keltiké im Schatten der römischen Expansion (2. Jahrhundert v. Chr. – 1. Jahrhundert n. Chr.) GeoG Geo Graphica historica – Band 45 2023. 486 Seiten mit 9 s/w-Abbildungen und 2 Tabellen 978-3-515-13462-0 GeBunden 978-3-515-13465-1 e-Book
Wie nahmen die Griechen die keltischen und iberischen Völker in der Zeit der römischen Eroberung des Westens (2.–1. Jahrhundert v. Chr.) wahr? Wichtig waren dabei Vergleichspraktiken: Nur durch Vergleiche mit bekannten Phänomenen konnten die Autoren ethnographischer Texte ihrem Publikum das Fremde verständlich machen. Die ,Barbaren‘ des äußersten Westens wurden dabei zunächst als grausame, primitive Krieger dargestellt, deren Naturell dem rauen Klima ihrer unzugänglichen und kalten Heimat entsprach. Nachdem Caesar und Augustus ganz Gallien und Hispanien unterworfen hatten, mussten die Griechen jedoch akzeptieren, dass
die Barbaren genauso Teil des Imperiums geworden waren wie sie selbst. Die Römer waren für die Griechen einzigartig, denn sie hatten die Geschichte für immer verändert: Nun konnten die Barbaren den Umweltdeterminismus überwinden und selbst Römer werden. der autor Julian Gieseke ist Althistoriker und hat 2021 an der Universität Bielefeld zur Hellenistischen Ethnographie promoviert. Inzwischen beschäftigt er sich mit der römischen Herrschaftsorganisation im 1. Jahrhundert n. Chr. und der Rolle der so genannten Klientelkönige.
Hier bestellen: [email protected]
Die Erforschung der Geographie der Alten Welt ist eine interdisziplinäre Wissenschaft. Der Orbis Terrarum bietet Raum für Publikationen von Historikern, Philologen, Geographen, Geomorphologen und Archäologen. Dabei ist das inhaltliche Spektrum, das mit dem Orbis Terrarum abgedeckt werden soll, bewusst breit angelegt. Geographischtopographische Studien haben hier ebenso ihren Platz wie Untersuchungen zur Wechselwirkung zwischen Mensch und Landschaft sowie wissenschaftsgeschichtliche oder methodologische Arbeiten.
Die Beiträge dieser Ausgabe erstrecken sich chronologisch von der griechischen Klassik bis in die Spätantike. Inhaltliche Schwerpunkte liegen auf der Untersuchung von antiken Texten und Inschriften, archäologischen Fragestellungen, römischen Feldmessern, der Weinproduktion, Küsten und Halbinseln als geopolitischen Faktoren oder der Regionalgeschichte. Der Band bietet zudem Studien, die räumlich von Iberien bis ins Schwarzmeergebiet reichen. Zudem enthält der Orbis Terrarum einen umfangreichen Rezensionsteil zu Neuerscheinungen aus dem Bereich der historischen Geographie der Alten Welt.
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