The King and Kingship in Achaemenid Art: Essays in the Creation of an Iconography of Empire [1 ed.] 9042944889, 9789042944886

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Contents
INTRODUCTION
INDEX

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ACTA IRANICA THE KING AND KINGSHIP IN ACHAEMENID ART ESSAYS ON THE CREATION OF AN ICONOGRAPHY OF EMPIRE

by MARGARET COOL ROOT

PEETERS

ACTA IRANICA

ACTA IRANICA EDITED BY Ernie HAERINCK † (Ghent University) and Bruno OVERLAET (Musées Royaux d’Art et d’Histoire, Bruxelles)

IN AEDIBUS PEETERS LOVANII

ACTA IRANICA 19

THE KING AND KINGSHIP IN ACHAEMENID ART ESSAYS ON THE CREATION OF AN ICONOGRAPHY OF EMPIRE

by

Margaret Cool ROOT

PEETERS LEUVEN - PARIS - BRISTOL, CT

2021

This book was published in hardcover in 1979. A catalogue record for this book is available from the Library of Congress. ISBN 978-90-429-4488-6 eISBN 978-90-429-4489-3 © 2021 by Peeters, Bondgenotenlaan 153, 3000 Leuven, Belgium All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or translated in any form, by print, photoprint, microfilm, microfiche or any other means without written permission from the publisher PRINTED IN BELGIUM D/2021/0602/64

For M y Parents Robert and Louise Cool

Preface... . . . . . List of Abbreviations. . . . . . . . . I.Introduction ' . . II The Catalogue Palace R (the Gatehouse), Pasargadae .

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Palace P (the “Residential Palace”), Pasargadae The Behistun Relief of Darius I .

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The Canal Stelae of Darius I .

III. IV. V. VI. VII. VIII. 1X.

. . The Statue of Darius from Susa The Tombs of Darius and his Sucwssors:Naqsh-1Rus. . tam/Persepolis The Palace of Darius (the “Taéara”), Persepolis . The Apadana, Persepolis The Central Building (Tripylon) Persepolis . The Palaces of Darius' Successors. Statue Fragments from Susa . . . . The “Royal Head" from Hamadan . . . . Achaemenid Coins . . “Official” Achaemenid Seals . Religious Monuments in Egypt . . Addendum: Texts Referring to Royal Achaemenid . . . Sculpture . . . Hierarchlcal Order The King on H i g h . . . . The King before Ahuramazda and the Fire Altar . Behistun: The King Victorious . . . The Tribute Procession . The King Appearing 1n State . Mythical Visions of Kingship and Power . Pax Persiana: A11 Imperial Cosmos .

Cited Literature

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List of Plates .

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List of Figures . Index

58 61 68 72 76 95 100 110 114 116 118 123 129 131 162 182 285 300 309 312 335 340 341

PREFACE This monograph is an expanded and revised version of my doctoral dissertation, which was presented to the Department of Classical and Near Eastern Archaeology of Bryn Mawr College in 1976. Much of the research for this dissertation was carried out with the generous support of a fellowship from the Mrs. Giles Whiting Foundation. Travel grants from Bryn Mawr College enabled me to tour archaeological sites and museums in Turkey and Iran, to do extensive work

at Persepolis, and later to examine important related material in Berlin, Paris and London. This acknowledgment of Bryn Mawr’s

tangible assistance to my work cannot begin to suggest the depth of the College’s intangible support—which has really made this book possible. I am, furthermore, indebted to the American Council of Learned Societies for their award of a Grant-in-Aid for Recent Recipients of the Ph. D. which defrayed the costs of preparation of the final manuscript and its illustrations. Research conducted away from Bryn Mawr College was made possible through the kind auspices of Dr. Firouz Bagherzadeh (Director of the Iranian Center for Archaeological Research in Iran),

Ann Britt Tilia and Giuseppe Tilia (collaborator and Director, respectively, of the Persepolis restoration team of the Istituto Italiano per il Medio ed Estremo Oriente), Pierre Arniet (Conservateur-en-Chef des Antiquites Orientales au Louvre), Edmond Sollberger (Keeper of the Department of Western Asiatic Antiquities of the British Museum), and John A. Brinkman (Director of the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago). It is a pleasant task to thank the friends and colleagues who must

share the credit for anything that is decent or useful in this book— but who can take no blame at all for anything that is incorrect or ill-conceived. First, let me say that I feel awesomely indebted to all the many scholars whose publications are cited in the course of this

study. But more immediate and personal thanks must go to Mark Ciccarello, Charles Dempsey, Jacques Duchesne-Guillemin, Richard

Ellis, Richard Hallock, Machteld Mellink, Arnaldo Momigliano, Carl Nylander, Kyle Phillips, Edith Porada, Brunilde Ridgway and Lawrence Root—who have all read and commented upon my work at one stage or another. Their suggestions and insights have been invaluable.

X

PREFACE

To Carl Nylander, friend as well as mentor, I offer special thanks for introducing me to the Achaemenids in the first place, and then for allowing me to graze freelyr on the green pastures of his inspiration. And to Larry Root, my husband, I extend heartfelt thanks for his help, his wisdom and his humor in good times and bad. One final note: In revising my dissertation I have made an effort to incorporate scholarship which appeared between the spring of 1976 and the spring of 1977 (when the new manuscript was completed). But, inevitably, a few studies which had in fact been published by

that time did not become available to me until it was too late to include them here. My apologies to those whose contributions have thus gone unmentioned in the pages which follow. Margaret Cool Root.

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS Journals and Series AA AAA ADOG Afo AJA AJSL AMI AOAT AOS ASAE BagMitt BAIIAA BASOR BIFA 0

RM MA BSOAS CA H Cahiers de la DAFI

C RRAI EW FuF

HSCP IsMEO JA JA NES

JAOS JDAI JEA JEOL JESHO JHS JNES

Archa‘blogische Anzeiger Annals of Archaeology and Anthropology Abhandlungen der deutschen Orient-Gesellschaft Archiv fur Orient/orschung American Journal of Archaeology

American Journal of Semitic Languages and Literatures Archa'ologische Mitteilungen aus Iran

Alter Orient und alles Testament American Oriental Series Annales du service des antiquités de I’Egypte Baghdader M ittet‘lungen Bulletin of the Americm Institute for Iranian Art and Archaeology Bulletin of the American School of Oriental Research Bulletin de l'Institut francais d'archéologie orientale Bulletin of the Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies Cambridge Ancient History Cahiers de la delegation archéologique francaise en Iran

Compte rendu de la rencontre assyriologique utternationale East aid West Forsehungen and Fortschritte Harvard Studies in Classical Philology lstituto italiano peril Medic ed Estremo Oriente Journal asiatt‘que Journal of the Ancient Near Eastern Society of Columbia University Journal of the American Oriental Society Jahrbuch des deutschen archa'ologischen lnstituts Journal of Egyptian Archaeology Journal ex Oriente Lux Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient Journal of Hellenic Studies Journal of Near Eastern Studies Memoirs of The American Academy in Rome Mitteilungen des deutschen arehtiologischen Instituts Kairo Mitteilungen der deutschen Orient-Gesellrchafl Mémoires de la delegation en Perse Mémoires publie'es par les membres de l’institut fianpais d’archéologie orientale du Caire Monuments et mémoires publ. par l'académie des inscrip-

tions et belles lettres, Fondatian Piot

XII

MVAG NC NNM

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

Mitteifungen der mrderawiamchen-aegyptisohen Geeellschqfl Numismatic Chronicle Numismlic Notes and Monographs

Oriental Institute Publications OrSu PMMA RAssyr

REM! Srlr WVDOG

24 21's ZDMG

Orientalia Suecana Publications of the Metropolitan Museum of Art Revue d‘assyrl'ologz‘e Revue d’égyprologie Studia lrml'ca Witsenschty'llieke Verfifl‘entlidnmg der deutwhen OrientGesellschafl Zeilsdmfl filr Assyriologie Zeitschrift fiir dgyptische Sprache and Alt‘ertmtskmde Zeitschrifl der deutsdren morgenlfindischm Gesellsehafi

I INTRODUCTION 0» the Nature of Achaemenid Art. “Achaemenid art” is the art of kings. It is the official art of the

Achaemenid Dynasty, which arose from the Aehaemenid clan of the Persian people eventually to rule the Near East from 550 until the coming of Alexander in 331 EC.1 Just as the Achaemenid Empire was consciously created and its bureaucratic structures formalized by the early kings of the dynasty, so the art which speaks for that empire was, in every meaningful sense, a product of their creative effort—

brilliantly conceived and consciously evocative. It was commissioned in the service of kingship, designed by high-level officials who were in all probability directly responsible to the king himself; and it was planned as an imperial programme which was intended to project, in

a variety of representational contexts, a specific set of consistently imposed images of power and hierarchical order.

The official art of the Achaemenids thus reflects the ideals and attitudes of the king and his most tntsted advisors—and not least in representations involving the figure of the king himself. This is not to say that the attitudes so reflected necessarily mirror objective historical reality. But there is another realm of history which does find reflection here even if it diverges from objective fact: this is the realm of subjective historical self-perception. Lying somewhere on a continuum between verism and fantasy, the image of the patron and ' It is imperative to treat as a distinct phenomenon this “Acheemenid art“—as the Metal art'of the empire. Art which, on the other hand. was simply produced within

the sphere of the Persian political domain during the Achaemenid Period. but which was not official art, presents special problems of definition which overlap but do not totally coincide with those of Aehaernenid art per are. On the complexities of such terminological distinctions, as also on other problems to be discussed in this chapter.

0.]. Brendel's work provides an indispensible theoretical framework: Prologameno to a Book on Roman Art, MAAR, XXI (Rome: American Academy in Rome, 1953). Other works which have influenced my approach include G. Hermeren. Representation and Meaning in the Viwal Arts: A Study in the Methodology of [cartography and leanology (Stockholm: Uromedelsforlaget, 1969), E. Panovsky, Metering in the Virus!

Arts (Garden City: Doubleday, 1955). and P.G. Hamberg, Smite: in Roman Imperial Art with Special Reference to the Store Edie/s of the Second Century (Uppsala: Almqvist & Wiksell, l945).

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his empire which is presented in his commissio art must reflect the image of kingship which he himself wished to be surrounded by and to identify with, as well as the image with which he wished to be identified by others. In the case of the Achaemenids, the artistic reflection is of this subjective realm of historical reality”.

The Persian kings waged brutal wars, exacted heavy taxes from reluctant subjects, and harbored fears of palace revolutions spawned

by ambitious courtiers. But, for the imperial art with which they hoped to impress the world (and with which they themselves apparrently wished to identify), we shall see that the Achaemenids commissioned the creation of a consistently idealized vision of kingship and empire—a vision which stressed images of piety, control, and harmonious order.

Rulers before and after the Achaemenids have developed artistic programmes—setting distinctive trends in art as a response to their perceptions of the particular political/historical demands of their reigns, and reflective of their particular aspirations and visions of power covenants. Well documented examples (and examples which

for various reasons are of particular pertinence to our discussion) include the art produced under the patronage of Akhenaten, Augustus, Charlemagne, and the Mughal emperor Akbar’. Although each of these cases is unique and not strictly analogous to any other, nevertheless one may discern useful patterns of similarity by a comparative analysis of scholarly approaches to the study of these artistic programmes emerging from a variety of historical contexts.

Achaemenid art fits neatly into the broad conceptual framework suggested by studies of generally acknowledged imperial programmes. 3 In this sense the official representations of the king offer a similar type of source material as is oflered to the historian by autobiography. For theoretical analysis the discussions of historians of autobiography are particularly helpful. See. for instance.

G. Misch. A History of Autobiography in Antiquity. trans. E.W. Dicker: (London: Routledge and Paul. 1950); R. Pascal. Design and Truth in Autobiography (London: Routledge and Paul. 1960); K J . Weiotraub, “Autobiography and Historical Con-

sciousness". Critical Inquiry l . 1975. 821—843. The remarks of G. Weckman are particularly appropriate here. I think: “Believing myth as myth does not mean a return to a primal naivete. which I doubt ever existed anyway and is part of modern man‘s We need only broaden the world misguided apprehension of the ‘primitive‘ world. of our data. have a fuller notion of what makes up reality, and include the uniquely human and psychic elements of life in our notion of the factual. Then the old polarities of myth and fact. religion and science, relevation and rationality disappear". See “Believing Myth as Myth" in Myth and tire Crisis of Historical Continuous. ed. L.W. Gibbs and W.'l'. Stevenson (Missoula. Montana: Scholars Press. 1975), 106.

3 See below.

m‘raonucrton

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And in fact, within the ancient Near Eastern cultural sphere it has

the potential for being a particularly instructive case study in imperial programming. But the representational art of the Achaemenid Dynasty has never been analyzed as a programme, as an art with a coherent and intentional vision behind it which may possibly be read and

interpreted‘. The ultimate aim of this study is to show the validity of viewing Achaemenid art as such a programme. This involves an attempt to understand the nature of the process of creation of Achaemenid

imperial iconography, first on a theoretical level and then subsequently on a particular level. On the theoretical level I shall demonstrate the need to view the process of creation of this imperial art as a complex cultural system of influences—not simply as a mechanistic “event” of executiOn‘. This preliminary theoretical exploration is a necessary preamble to the second level of inquiry—the particular level—because it will show the richness of the cultural fabric we are dealing with in the Achaemenid Period and it will show the need to see the Achaemenids themselves as the central and commanding figures of

their own cultural history. On the particular level, I shall present a catalogue of the known official imperial monuments, coin types and seals which include in their sculptural programme or figural decoration a representation of

the king or kingship. This catalogue will be followed by a series of iconographical essays on those representational types portraying the king and kingship in official Achaemenid art. Finally, I shall draw together the information gleaned from the iconographical essays in order to suggest a plausible understanding of the total vision of kingship and empire which was intended consistently to be projected through Achaemenid iconography.

‘ This is not to say that others have not seen the potential for such analysis. Note. for instance, the suggestive comments threaded through the work of E. Parade in The Art of Ancient Iran (New York: Crown Publishers, Inc.. I965), and C. Nylander in Ionian in Pasargadae, Uppsala Studies in Ancient Mediterranean and Near Eastern Civilization. l (Uppsala : Almqvist & Wiksell. 1970).

5 What Goran Hermeren calls the “artistic field" in his important theoretical study. Influence in Art and Literature (Princeton: Princeton University Press. 1975). I am in effect proposing what might be called a “Marxist“ approach to Achaemenid art— following the discussion of M. Schapiro. “Sty “. in Anthropology Today. ed. S. Tax (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1962), esp. 301 f.

4

INTRODUCI‘ION

Reflections on a Process of Creation.

The imperial iconography of Achaemenid art is closely related to the arts of the civilizations indigenous to the Near East. To be sure,

certain technical and stylistic characteristics of Achaemenid sculpture have been traced ultimately to Greek origins. And in the course of this work this aspect of Achaemenid art will be discussed and evaluated whenever style becomes a crucial factor in the analysis of iconography. But the iconographical studies presented here will focus on Iran in the Near Eastern context simply because this is the sphere to which the material itself leads us. Our attempt to understand the process of creation of Achaemenid art forces us to examine the nature of the Achaemenid relationship to the cultures which find reflection in Achaemenid art. We must

ask, for instance, in what ways, and to what depth of understanding, were the Persians exposed to the art and culture of Babylon, Assyria, Egypt, Elam, and Urartu? When we see reflections of these civilizations in the iconography of the Achaemenid kings, to what extent are they the result of a gradual assimilation of ideas and

forms by the Persians before their empire was ever formed? To what extent are they the result of random eclecticism or the whim of

foreign artisans? And to what extent do they suggest a deliberate and informed search for images drawn out of the traditions of ancient Near Eastern civilizations? When, furthermore, we see such foreign and antique models transformed in Achaemenid art, to what extent do these transformations simply reflect ignorance of the originally intended meaning of their models? To what extent are they the reflection of an elusive Persian cultural tradition and aesthetic allowed (perhaps quite unconsciously) to shine through the superposition of borrowed forms? And to what extent might these transformations rather reflect the very deliberate adaptation of models for specific reasons?

Within the total aspect of what I have chosen to call a process of creation, it will be seen that the impact of foreign artisans in formulating Achaemenid iconography was limited. On the other hand, the impact of the king and his court was of great significance. But even the ultimate dictates of the king and his image-makers in programmatic planning must he understood to have issued from a

complex synthesis of tangible and intangible influences and considerations. With respect to the art of the Achaemenids, reflections of

INTRODUCTION

5

deep-seated Indo-Iranian traditions may be difficult or impossible to isolate or to identify; but the possibility of their existence and influence must always be borne in mind when discussing Achaemenid art.

Furthermore, cultural heritage and cultural predispositions must certainly have had an impact in determining the Achaemenids’ response to the contemporary and antique foreign ideas and forms which they clearly drew upon in the creation of their imperial programme. And historical circumstances played a major role in determining the Persians' exposure to and interest in those ideas and forms which served as sources for Achaemenid imperial art.

In Fig. l I have attempted to suggest visually the nature of the system of influences involved in the process of creation of Achaemenid an.

Let us now take a closer look at the three factors shown in Fig. 1

whose relative importance in the process of creation we are attempting to evaluate on a theoretical level: the impact of artisans, the impact

of the patron and his selected planners, and the impact of long-term cultural/historical influences.

The Role of the Artisan: A Reassessment. Scholarly discussions which have formed the core of literature dealing with the creation of Achaemenid art have emphasized the national origin of the artisans who executed the art as the primary factor determining its nature and essence. Viewed within the context of the history of Achaemenid studies, this emphasis upon the supreme importance of foreign (and especially Greek) artisans is understandable. Speculation about how Achaemenid art originated began in the nineteenth century, when the reports of travelers to Persepolis, followed by excavations at the great Assyrian cities and finally also at Susa, had created lively interest in the Near East. Though certafn

similarities between Achaemenid sculpture and Assyrian sculpture were obvious, several prominent investigators (among them Marcel Dieulafoy) saw Greek influence as the primary factor determining the nature of Achaemenid art“. In particular, the way the ubiquitous Persian robe is rendered in Achaemenid sculpture was recognized as ° M. Dieulafoy, L'an antique de In Peru: Achéménides. Farther, Sassam‘der (Paris: ubrairie mntrale d'architecture, etc. 1884-1885). See Nylander, Ionims, l3-16. for a more detailed account of the history of scholarship on Achaemenid sculpture.

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