Chronicle 7. INDO-IBERIAN ARC (Duende)

Chronicle 7. INDO-IBERIAN ARC (Duende)

/ΕΛΛΗΝΙΚΑ/ Χρονικό 7. ΙΝΔΟΪΒΗΡΙΚΟ ΤΟΞΟ (Duende)

● Lorca and Duende ● Pohren and Flamenco:
Dance and Guitar ● Cithara and Pandura

Michales Loukovikas

FEDERICO GARCÍA LORCA gave lectures not only on cante jondo, but also on the Theory and Play of Duende (1930) – a keyword in order to get to the bottom of the essence of flamenco, of music in general, and penetrate the core of all the arts, especially the so-called performing arts. According to the dictionaries, duende means “fairy, demon, ghost, devil, goblin, spirit – holy or evil.” Dictionaries rarely clarify concepts related to music and culture. And why should we let ourselves in the mercy of lexicographers when we have Lorca as a guide? Let’s listen to him with due attention as we are introduced to the magic and mystical duende:

“All that has dark sounds has duende.” (Manuel Torre)

“All through Andalusia… people constantly talk about duende and recognize it every time it appears with a fine instinct… The old Gypsy bailaora [dancer] La Malena once heard Brailowsky play a piece of Bach, and exclaimed: ‘Olé! That has duende!’, but was bored by Gluck, Brahms and Milhaud. And [the Gypsy singer] Manuel Torre, a great artist of the Andalusian people, a man who has more culture in his veins than anyone I’ve known, on hearing Falla play his own Nocturno del Generalife, spoke this splendid phrase: ‘All that has dark sounds has duende’… – agreeing with Goethe who hit on a definition of duende, in speaking of Paganini: ‘A mysterious force that everyone feels and no philosopher has explained.’⁽¹⁾

• ⁽¹⁾ Lorca’s English texts on Cante jondo and Duende are based on A. S. Kline’s translations.

“I heard an old maestro of the guitar say: ‘Duende is not in the throat: duende surges up, inside, from the soles of the feet.’ Meaning, it’s not a question of skill, but of a style that’s truly alive; meaning, it’s in the veins; meaning, it’s of the most ancient culture of immediate creation. It is, in sum, the spirit of the earth, the same duende that scorched Nietzche’s heart as he searched for its outer form on the Rialto Bridge and in Bizet’s music, without finding it, and without seeing that the duende he pursued had leapt from the Greek mysteries to the dancers of Cádiz and the headless Dionysiac scream of Silverio’s siguiriya.”

Alhambra with Generalife by night

The “Dionysiac” and “mystic” Hellenes are here again in full force. Their theatre of action is Cádiz, the ancient Gádeira (Gadir), or Roman Gades.⁽²⁾ To this port of Andalusia outside the Mediterranean, on the Atlantic Ocean, beyond the Strait of Gibraltar, or the Pillars of Heracles, we will shortly return. For the moment, we continue listening to García Lorca spellbound:

• ⁽²⁾ The ancient root is retained in the adjective gaditano: of/from Cádiz, its native/inhabitant.

Sea Melodies, by Herbert James Draper (1904)

“For every man, every artist called Nietzsche or Cézanne, every step that he climbs in the tower of his perfection is at the expense of the struggle that he undergoes with his duende, not with an angel, as is often said, nor with his Muse… Angel and Muse come from outside us: the angel brings light, the Muse form (Hesiod learnt from her)… While duende has to be roused from the furthest habitations of the blood. Reject the angel, and give the Muse a kick… The true struggle is with duende.

“The great artists of southern Spain, Gypsy or flamenco, singers, dancers, musicians, know that emotion is impossible without the arrival of duende. They might deceive people into thinking they can communicate the sense of duende without possessing it, as authors, painters, and literary fashion-makers deceive us every day, possessing no duende: but we only have to attend a little, and not be full of indifference, to discover the fraud, and chase off that clumsy artifice.

“Emotion is impossible without duende.” (García Lorca)

Pastora Pavón, la Niña de los Peines

“Once the Andalusian flamenco singer Pastora Pavon, La Niña de Los Peines [The Girl of the Combs], sombre Spanish genius, equal in power of fancy to Goya… was singing in a little tavern in Cádiz. She played with her voice of shadows, with her voice of beaten tin, with her mossy voice, she tangled it in her hair, or soaked it in manzanilla or abandoned it to dark distant briars. But, there was nothing there: it was useless. The audience remained silent… Pastora Pavón finished her song in silence. Only, a little man… sarcastically, in a very soft voice, said: ‘Viva, Paris!’ as if to say: ‘Here ability is not important, nor technique, nor skill. What matters here is something else.’

“Then La Niña de Los Peines got up like a madwoman, trembling like a medieval mourner, and drank, in one gulp, a huge glass of fiery spirits, and began to sing with a scorched throat, without voice, breath, colour, but… with duende. She managed to tear down the scaffolding of the song, but allow through a furious, burning duende, friend to those winds heavy with sand, that make listeners tear at their clothes with the same rhythm as the Negroes of the Antilles in their rite… La Niña de Los Peines had to tear apart her voice, because she knew experts were listening, who demanded not form but the marrow of form, pure music with a body lean enough to float on air. She had to rob herself of skill and safety: that is to say, banish her Muse, and be helpless, so her duende might come, and deign to struggle with her at close quarters. And how she sang! Her voice no longer at play, her voice a jet of blood, worthy of her pain and her sincerity”…

Donn Pohren and Baile Flamenco

WHAT AN EVENING, INDEED! I’D LOVE TO BE THERE! Well, here we are back to Cádiz with the captivating description of duende by Lorca. It’s where we meet again Donn Pohren, who will lead us to the ancient city of Gadir via… India!

Donn Pohren

“Today”, Pohren writes in his Biographical History, Lives and Legends of Flamenco, the second book of his flamenco trilogy, “nearly all theoreticians of the dance agree that the baile flamenco is directly descended from the ancient religious dances of the Indian Hindus… What in all likelihood has taken place is that the highly-civilized Brahmanic temple dances were adopted by a lesser-developed people, shorn of many subtleties, and returned to a more natural and primitive art form concerned only with the expression of oneself and one’s emotions.

“Let us attempt to construct a brief history of the development of these Indian dances within Spain. First of all, how did they reach Spain? Traditionally performed only in the temples during Brahmanic religious rites, these dances eventually began to be danced more popularly outside the shrines in India. It was then that they were first introduced into other lands by way of early Mediterranean trading vessels and overland caravans. The point of entrance into Spain was most certainly Gadir, later called Gades, today called Cádiz, the oldest city in Spain, founded by the Phoenicians around 1100 BC. Gadir was an extremely important city, and it is likely that professional Indian dancers were brought in to entertain the city’s royalty, probably during the time of the Greeks, c. 500–250 BC, less likely during the reign of the Romans, c. 250 BC – 475 AD. (Hindu musicians and singers surely accompanied the dancers, and thus also introduced their art forms into Spain during this same period. This would partly explain the strong similarities that still exist between certain types of Hindu singing and music, and flamenco).”

● Although we have just heard Lorca telling us that “duende had leapt from the Greek mysteries to the dancers of Cádiz”, there was probably no Hellenic period then in Gadir. From the Phoenicians and the Punics (whom Pohren seems to ignore), the city passed into the hands of the Romans in 206 BCE. Irrespective of the error, what’s important is not who the master of the city was at the time, but the fact that Gadir functioned as a gateway for the Indian dance and music influence into Andalusia. Whatever the case, we know that in their symposia, the Hellenes, both in mainland Greece and also in the colonies, used to enjoy the art of foreign singers and musicians, mostly women, who (according to the symposiasts’ “tastes”) appeared dressed or nude, as we are told by Athenaeus (“Deipnosophistae”, 3rd century CE) and Suda (“Lexicon”, 10th century).

Symposium scene with an aulos playing girl [modestly dressed up, not nude], by Nicias painter

“These civilizations,” Pohren goes on, “with their emphasis on culture, undoubtedly introduced this religious dancing into their own temples, so that by the arrival of the Visigoths in Andalusia (c. 450–700), this type of religious dancing had already become so traditional as to be carried over into the primitive Spanish Church, encouraged and even performed by early Christian priests. (El Baile Andaluz, by Caballero Bonald: ‘It is now known that the fathers of the primitive Church openly admitted, and even fomented with their examples, the adoption by the Christian cult of certain elements of the sacred oriental dances, frequently danced by the very priests themselves’). The Visigoths accepted Catholicism and merged with the Hispano-Roman population,⁽³⁾ and religious dancing continued throughout their reign.

• ⁽³⁾ Pohren, just like Mascarenhas Barreto in the Chronicle 5, put the cart before the horse, speaking about Catholicism before the Schism. Although this doubling of the error makes me wonder: may Catholicism be synonymous with Christianism, and Orthodoxy is a… heresy? Terra incognita: religious affairs have never been my forte!

“It is postulated that during the reign of the Moors (c. 711–1492) these sacred dances were danced more and more popularly outside the confines of the church, possibly even by Spain’s first gypsies, who were thought to have come as camp-followers of the Moorish armies (after having arrived in North Africa from their homeground, India, by way of Pakistan, Persia, and Arabia). As both the gypsies and the Moors already cultivated a type of dance largely derived from the Brahmanic religious dances, their arrival most certainly gave the existing Andalusian dances a shot in the arm…

“Another historical event in the development of the flamenco dance was the arrival of the second migration of gypsies to Spain around 1450, shortly before the Moors were expelled from their last footholds in Andalusia. The gypsies arrived from India by the northern route (Persia, Russia, etc.), bringing with them their interpretations of Indian dances and songs, and adding fresh fuel to the Andalusian folklore…

“After the Moors were forced out, all religious connotations in the dance ceased. The dances were not only banned from the Church because of their increasing sensuality and ‘sinful movements’, but at one time persecutions were carried out against interpreters of certain dances regardless of where they were danced. It was then that the dance, together with the cante, went underground, becoming an art of the ‘lawless elements’ of society. This happened more or less simultaneously with the 16th century edicts ordering the expulsion of the Moors, gypsies, and Jews, and can probably be cited as the beginning of the formation of flamenco as we know it today.”

Cithara/Kithara > Guitarra

This panorama on the evolution of dance from the Indian Brahmanic temples to the Andalusian gypsy camps, with all intermediate stages, has a negative side: it is one-dimensional, presenting India as the matrix of the art of dance – and even more – leading to wrong conclusions. But if, instead of the dance, we trace the evolution of the guitar, the entire mosaic of exchange becomes balanced and three-dimensional. Our guide, Pohren, as a guitarist, moves now into far more familiar waters:

Ancient Hellenic cithara/kithara

“The Spanish guitar”, he remarks in the chapter of the same book (Lives and Legends of Flamenco) dealing with his instrument, “is the direct offspring of, principally, the guitarra latina (Latin guitar) and, secondarily, the guitarra morisca (Moorish guitar), both of which are generally believed to have descended from the ancient kithara asiria (Oriental zither).⁽⁴⁾

• ⁽⁴⁾ Note how terminology differs in the phases of the guitar’s development: cithara or kithara > guitarra. It refers to the time when the ancient cithara ceased to have the form of a large ancient lyre and acquired a “neck” or “arm”.

“First let us attempt to trace the kithara asiria [Assyrian]. José de Azpiazu, in his book La Guitarra y Los Guitarristas, makes the observation that we must look to Egypt and Babylonia for the earliest string instruments, including the zither, from whence they passed on to Syria, Persia, India, and the Middle and Far East in general. He bases this assumption on diverse archaeological finds, principally in Egypt, singling out in particular a bas-relief, dated at 3500 BC, discovered in the tomb of one of the Kings of Thebes. This bas-relief, now in the museum of Leyden (Holland), includes an instrument somewhat resembling today’s Spanish guitar. Azpiazu also states that around the time 1000–800 BC the Egyptians possessed an instrument greatly resembling the modern guitar. This instrument could easily have been the previously mentioned guitarra morisca, or one of its predecessors in its development from the kithara asiria.

Egyptian 3500 years ago playing a guitar-like instrument

“However, in view of continued archaeological discoveries, no date or place can be irrevocably pinpointed concerning the origin of any of the ancient stringed instruments. The discovery by an English archaeologist, Kathleen Kenyon, determining that the city of Jericho was teeming with life as far back as 6800 BC, makes the first Egyptian dynasty (3400 BC) seem relatively modern. In truth, the family tree of string instruments, in all of its rich variety, is as vague as civilization’s early history. Perhaps the only data available to sustain the belief that the guitar is descended from the ancient kithara asiria is the similarity and progression of the zither-guitar terminology in various languages, and the corresponding similarity and development of the instruments represented by the terms, as follows: qitâra (Chaldea – an ancient region in Southeast Asia, on the Tigris and Euphrates rivers), quitar (Arabic), sitar (Hindi), kithara (Greek), cítara (Spanish) and guitarra (Spanish).

Vihuela: the bygone “aristocrat” cousin of the “folk” guitar, with six double strings, is the mother of the violas portuguesas, one of which accompanies the guitarra portuguesa, the lead instrument of fado.

“If we wish to follow the popular theory that the guitar was derived from the kithara (there is no good reason not to), the guitar’s development in Spain can be traced in rough outline. It is generally agreed that the kithara asiria (then called the kithara romana) was introduced into Spain during the time of the Romans, sometime before the birth of Christ.⁽⁵⁾ The kithara flourished in Spain until the fall of the Spanish Roman Empire (5th century), at which time it fell largely into disuse until the invading Visigoths were firmly established on the peninsula. The Visigoths set about reviving the old Roman culture, and the kithara again emerged. In the 7th century San Isidro wrote of wandering minstrels singing and accompanying themselves on the kithara… It was around this period that the guitarra latina, an instrument containing four sets of double strings and which resembled a small version of the present Spanish guitar, was developed in Spain, presumably, as we have stated, from the kithara romana.

• ⁽⁵⁾ “In my opinion”, footnotes Pohren, “it is more likely that visiting Hindu musicians introduced the kithara asiria, or similar instruments, into Cádiz before the coming of the Romans, probably during the reign of the Greeks”…

● Well, in my opinion, it is far more likely that the Greeks themselves introduced into Iberia their own version of this instrument: the cithara helénica!

A woman playing a lyre (an instrument that shows the
cithara to guitarra transition), by Cesare Saccaggi

“Meanwhile, in the Middle East the kithara asiria had long ago inspired the family of the guitarra morisca, an oval-shaped, three-stringed instrument introduced into Spain with the 8th century Moorish invasion. It is thought that the only significant characteristic that the Latin guitar borrowed from the Moorish guitar, in its development into Spanish guitar, was the idea of the single strings in place of the formerly-used sets of double strings.

“So by the 9th century there existed in Spain guitars not unlike those we play today, but until the troubadour period (the 11th through the 13th centuries) the guitar was not widely introduced to the general populace. Little structural change of any significance took place in this guitar until the 16th century, when Vicente Espinel began using a fifth string. (This was not Espinel’s invention, as guitars had existed previously with five strings. Espinel merely made the fifth string fashionable. Many musicologists express the belief that the famous Ziryab himself first innovated the use of the fifth string in the 9th century). With this development the Spaniards finally seemed to feel that the guitar was their instrument, and it was then that the guitarra latina was rechristened the ‘Spanish guitar’.⁽⁶⁾ Two centuries later the final radical development was made, which was the addition of the sixth string by fray Miguel García, a monk also known as Padre Basilio, an excellent classical guitarist and the guitar instructor of King Carlos IV, Queen María Luisa, and the famous concert guitarist, Dionisio Aguado. Thus, except for its growth in size and quality, by the latter third of the 18th century the Spanish guitar was as we know it today.

• ⁽⁶⁾ Except the guitarra española, there is also a guitarra portuguesa, which resembles more a lute than a guitar. It descends from a medieval “guitar”, the citole, and is now the solo instrument of fado. It is accompanied by a “normal” guitar, which is called viola to be distinguished from the guitarra portuguesa; the word viola probably comes from another old guitar, vihuela, or viola de mão. In the 15th century, some musicians played it with a bow, and that’s how the viol, or viola da gamba, was born; it was later replaced by the violin family, especially the cello.

Bayad plays the oud to the Lady (from the Arabic tale Bayad
and Riyad) – or Ziryab’s Garden (Andalusia, 13th century)

“Now that we know something of the development of the guitar, let us look into the development of the music. According to Lévi-Provençal (La Civilización Árabe en España), the great tradition of Andalusian music was molded together and developed in the Cordovan conservatory of music established and directed by the Mesopotamian musician, Ziryab, in the 9th century. (Ziryab arrived in Córdoba in 822, in his early thirties, and remained there the rest of his life). What he must have done was gather, and become proficient in, the Andalusian folklore of that period, which was, of course, highly Oriental in nature, and conserve and teach it to attending minstrels and nobility in his conservatory. As he had spent years in the courts of Baghdad, and was the supreme musician of his time, he undoubtedly added to, and purified, what he found. Ziryab, in fact, is credited with having played the major musical role in making Andalusia the outstanding cultural center of the world at that time.”

“Ziryab played the major role in making Andalusia the outstanding
cultural center of the world in the 9th century.” (Donn Pohren)

Chelys: lyre made with a tortoise shell

IN THIS MONUMENTAL MURAL, created mainly by Lorca and Pohren, with all the others contributing, we only need to apply some extra brushstrokes to… exonerate the Assyrians, who became notorious in history mainly for their cruelty, but also to show that in social processes, parthenogenesis is out of the question in all places and all times – even in the case of the ancient “Hellenic miracle” that has been feasible due to borrowing intellectual achievements and know-how from the Orient.

The cithara was an instrument of the professionals, while its little sister, the lyre, of the amateurs. According to the Encyclopedia of Ancient Hellenic Music by Solon Michaelides (the source of much valuable information throughout our Chronicles), the cithara was called Ἀσιάς (Asian). Plutarch (1st–2nd century CE) claimed that “it was called Asian because it was used by the Lesbian citharodes [or citharoedes, or citharedes (cithara + ode), i.e. cithara players who also sang] dwelling close to Asia”. This is, of course, a pretext – even if Lesbos is actually close to Asia Minor. The truth is found in the writings of Hesychius of Alexandria (5th century CE), who explained that the cithara was defined as such “for it was invented in Asia”. The adjectives Ἀσιάς and Ἀσιᾶτις (Asian, Asiatic) were used not only in relation to the cithara, but also to music in general; as Strabo points out: “… καὶ ἡ μουσικὴ πᾶσα Θρᾳκία καὶ Ἀσιᾶτις νενόμισται”; “… all music is thought to be Thracian and Asian” (see the Chronicle 11. “Music Is Thracian and Asian”). Ancient Thrace, mind you, was not a part of ancient Hellas.

A Konso girl playing a krar lyre (southern Ethiopia)

These instruments of the cithara and lyre family have been extinct for centuries now because they were left behind in the development of music, becoming inadequate and thus unable to satisfy the needs of the people – musicians and listeners. They are now rarely found still in use among primitive tribes, primarily in northeastern Africa – and this is indeed a pleasant surprise! Certain German ethnomusicologists recorded, among others, the sound of a lyre played by a cattleman, member of the Hamar tribe in Ethiopia, and put his photo on the cover of the album. Isn’t it impressive? The symbol of so many “serious” music institutions, the “musical instrument par excellence” of the ancient Greeks, the celebrated chelys of Hermes, who offered it to Apollo (to atone for stealing his oxen!), to be “degraded” in the hands of primitive Africans, and also been made with a tortoise shell? It can’t be, these Germans should have been related in some way to… Fallmerayer!⁽⁷⁾

• ⁽⁷⁾ Jakob Philipp Fallmerayer (1790 – 1861) was a German Tyrolean traveller, journalist, politician, and historian, best known for his controversial discontinuity theory concerning the racial origins of the Greeks.

In conclusion, if we assume that the guitar descended from the ancient cithara, the latter must have been combined with some kind of lute – that is, with an instrument having a “neck” – as the guitar belongs to this lute family. The only similar instrument in ancient Greece was the so-called tríchordon (three-string), or pandura, pandurís, pánduros, and phánduros. In the Hellenistic era there was already a whole family of such instruments that became later even larger with the additions of the erudite thambura (tambur of Constantinople), folk tanbur-saz or bağlama, and also bouzouki (see Chronicle 9. The Celebrated Tríchordon).

Bow harp (ennanga from Uganda): descendant of the musical bow and precursor of the string instruments

Pollux (2nd century CE), writing about the origin of the instrument, is very clear: “Tríchordon, which the Assyrians called pandura; it was also their own invention.” Therefore, etymologically and organologically, the pandura was Assyrian. We can assume, as a result, that the cithara asiria, which Pohren referred to, should have been related to the pandura. The term tríchordon that the Hellenes used for the pandura means that it was a three-string instrument. Let us not forget that the guitarra morisca, descending from the cithara asiria, was also a tríchordon.⁽⁸⁾

• ^(h) Cithara probably means tríchordon, three-string. The Indian sitar (of a common etymological origin), though it’s multi-stringed now (about 20 strings; 6-7 melodic and the rest sympathetic, “sympathizing”, i.e. vibrating, with the melodic ones) should have been three-string and Persian in origin (seh-tar in Farsi means “three-string”); besides, in Iran there is still in use a kind of three-string (already four-string) tanbur called setar.

It’s so thrilling to imagine that the starting point of all these instruments was the primitive hunter’s bow; that in time of rest could become a musical bow…

• >> Chronicle 8. A HYBRID’S HYBRIS…
• << Chronicle 6. INDO-IBERIAN ARC (Jondo)

Next Chronicle 8. A HYBRID’S HYBRIS… ● “Mosaic” of Andalusia ● Cultural “Crossroads” and “Purity” ● Natural and Artificial Hybrids ● “Creative” Commercialization ● Paco de Lucía

Musical bow

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Chronicle 2. IT ALL STARTED HERE…

Chronicle 2. IT ALL STARTED HERE…

/ΕΛΛΗΝΙΚΑ/ Χρονικό 2. ΟΛΑ ΑΡΧΙΣΑΝ ΕΔΩ…

Ploughing in Egypt

● Neolithic Revolution ● Cities, Exchange, Writing ● Aegean and Orient: Differences ● Irrigation and Trade Networks ● “Asiatic Mode of Production” and Centralization ● Nature, Gods and Democracy

Michales Loukovikas

IT ALL STARTED HERE: in the Mediterranean – in the Fertile Crescent.

The Fertile Crescent

ALTHOUGH BORN SUPPOSEDLY in Africa, man was civilized around the Mediterranean, in the Near East, more specifically in the arc formed by Mesopotamia, the Levant (Syria, Lebanon, Palestine) and the Nile valley in Egypt, also extending to Cyprus and Anatolia, as far as the Taurus Mountains: it was the so-called Fertile Crescent, where man made the first giant leap with the Neolithic agricultural revolution. It took millennia until something equal in scope happened again, with the industrial revolution that started in England in the 18th century.

Man made the first giant leap in the Fertile
Crescent with the Neolithic revolution

Neolithic baker

Despite the view that this second revolution signaled a return to barbarity, let us stick to generally accepted ideas for the time being. Even common sense says the key was the first step, when hunters and gatherers became pastoralists and farmers. This development was probably brought about by women: gathering fruit was their responsibility together with children, while men hunted.⁽¹⁾ Thus, we can reasonably assume that agriculture, especially farming, the main aspect of the emerging rural economy, has been an innovation brought forth by women.⁽²⁾

• ⁽¹⁾ That sexual division of labour explains numerous differences in mentality between the sexes that still characterize them, causing misunderstandings in their relationships.

• ⁽²⁾ I do not know if any researcher has ever made the above very logical guess. As I have pointed out, however, we should no further engage in such speculations for the time being, and better stick to generally accepted ideas – as long as they are not directly related to the issues under our consideration. Such are the assumptions related to the theories of man’s African origin, the origins of the inhabitants of Greece, the Indo-European languages and their speakers, or the Phoenician origin of the Greek alphabet, among various issues that are relevant, or sufficiently vague. As I have said, they are nothing but theories… (See our next Chronicle of the Humans).

As is well known, a farmer is more bound to the land than a hunter-gatherer or a pastoralist. Thus, the transition to farming led to the creation of permanent settlements that gradually grew: they became villages, some of them towns, or even cities. The latter – as the Hellenic and Latin words polis (πόλις) and civitas indicate – brought about both politics and civilization. Man began his gradual transformation into what Aristotle would much later call a “political animal” to identify a new distinctive feature of Homo sapiens vis-à-vis the other species.

The transition to farming led to the creation of settlements
that gradually grew: they became villages, towns, cities.
The latter brought forth both politics and civilization.

The ancient city of Mari on the Euphrates (reconstruction)

Cities require central authority and hierarchy, imposing monuments, division of labour, specialization. They necessitate the arts and crafts, architecture, pottery, commerce, metallurgy… The Mediterranean periplus began tentatively at that time, in parallel with the caravan routes along land roads that were inaccessible and dangerous. Consequently, so long as man familiarized himself with the sea, he’d rather sail than travel on land. It is an oxymoron that the liquid element is far more “solid” and safe, but that’s how it is. Besides, land roads were largely non-existent at that time.

No need to say, the exchange of commercial goods is accompanied with the exchange of ideas, aesthetic patterns, intellectual “goods”, innovations. That is how the new way of life spread rapidly inside and outside the Mediterranean basin, reaching eastwards as far as the Indian subcontinent and beyond: the Indo-Mediterranean contacts date back to at least the third millennium BCE, or even earlier.

The exchange of commercial goods is accompanied with
the exchange of ideas, aesthetic patterns, innovations.

Early Mesopotamian writing tablet recording
the allocation of beer (3100-3000 BCE)

The conditions were already ripe for the next titanic step: writing. Even though the reasons for this great innovation were initially… bureaucratic (administrative record keeping, transfer of orders and messages), the invention and subsequent simplification of writing with the alphabet was indispensable as a condition for the systematic transfer of knowledge between generations and, of course, for the cultivation of literature and the arts – fields where the Hellenes excelled.

Although the ancient Greeks constitute a universal point of reference, one needs to turn away from every temptation of nationalist simplifications. A “threat from the East” was present also then: it was the Persians. At the same time, knowledge from the East was present there, too: any Hellene philosopher aspiring to become a sage would go there for his “PhD”! The Orient was the source of innumerable ideas, and artifacts, along with their know-how. However, everything imported and adopted, had to be adapted according to the local needs and tastes; and some went by the wayside…

Alexander

Aegean vs. Orient: Differences

One of the several historical paradoxa of this period e.g. concerns the differences between the Aegean and the Orient in their political structures. The decentralized Grecian city-states that flourished in the Iron Age, i.e. in classical times, had few Oriental equivalents: the Sumerian and Phoenician cities. On the contrary, the prevailing state entities in the East were centralized empires of both the Bronze and Iron Ages. Be that as it may, the mighty Achaemenid Empire was repeatedly defeated and humiliated by the “Amphictyony” of Hellenes – except the Thebans and some other so-called medísantes (μηδίσαντες) “Quislings”: i.e. all those who surrendered to the Persians-Medes and fought on their side.

● “Except the Thebans”: it is a reference to the subsequent and far more well-known “except the Lacedaemonians”, from the famous victorious inscription on the Battle of the Granicus river in 334 BCE: “Alexander, son of Philip, and the Hellenes except the Lacedaemonians”! In the previous year, the Spartans, spoiled during the “Median” or Graeco-Persian Wars, as they had always been in command, refused to participate in Alexander’s campaign, because there would not be… a king of Sparta in command! Constantine Cavafy poetically commented:

In the Year 200 B.C.

“Alexander, son of Philip, and the Greeks except the Lacedaemonians…”

We can very well imagine
how completely indifferent the Spartans would have been
to this inscription. “Except the Lacedaemonians” –
naturally. The Spartans
weren’t to be led and ordered around
like precious servants. Besides,
a pan-Hellenic expedition without
a Spartan king in command
was not to be taken very seriously.
Of course, then, “except the Lacedaemonians.”

That’s certainly one point of view. Quite understandable.

So, “except the Lacedaemonians” at Granicus,
then at Issus, then in the decisive battle
where the terrible army
the Persians mustered at Arbela was wiped out:
it set out for victory from Arbela, and was wiped out.



Constantine Cavafy,
by Panaiotes Daphiotis

And from this marvelous pan-Hellenic expedition,
triumphant, brilliant in every way,
celebrated on all sides, glorified
as no other has ever been glorified,
incomparable, we emerged:
the great new Hellenic world.

We the Alexandrians, the Antiochians,
the Seleucians, and the countless
other Greeks of Egypt and Syria,
and those in Media, and Persia, and all the rest:
with our far-flung supremacy,
our flexible policy of judicious integration,
and our Common Greek Language
which we carried as far as Bactria, as far as the Indians.

Talk about Lacedaemonians after that!…

(Adapted into English by Edmund Keeley / Philip Sherrard)

Alexander’s empire

● So much for the phrase “except the…”, that’s always been very “trendy” in Hellas. As for the “medísantes” (derived from the Medes, Media, mentioned by Cavafy), they have flooded the land, indeed! Among others, they include even Themistocles, the man who triumphed supreme in the battle of Salamis! His successors have so much ballooned that a list of their names is almost impossible. They are well-known and visible, nevertheless: they mostly crowd the corridors and salons of the ruling elite…

But why In the Year 200 B.C.? Why Cavafy alludes in his title to such a later date? We ignore the poet’s intentions… At any rate, that year the 2nd Macedonian War broke out ending three years later with Rome’s victory over Macedon. It was the beginning of the end because since then Greece fell under full Roman control.

It was not so much that the Hellenes did not want, but rather did not
need an imperial government, as a result of objective conditions…

“THE NECK OF A GREEK the yoke will not abide”, one could say. OK, but this was a result of objective conditions. It was not so much that the Hellenes did not want, but rather that they did not need an imperial government. What for them was an extraordinary situation requiring collective and comprehensive effort, for the Easterners was an everyday struggle with an opponent much more powerful than the mightiest empire: Nature itself…

Babylonian map (canals and irrigation systems) West of the Euphrates (1684-1647 BCE)

Expanding his presence in an environment of rather great contrasts, a land that would be barren without the Nile, Tigris and Euphrates, with abundant waters but also with floods and cataclysms lurking, the Easterner realized the need for coordination of the efforts of all communities. Next to deserts, symbolizing the constantly present, absolute evil, these rivers were a blessing from heaven but had unpredictable behaviour: thus, they should be tamed. Major public works, especially for irrigation and drainage, were a prerequisite for human survival; commerce, as well, for the supply of the communities with absolutely necessary raw materials, but also luxury goods.

Well, these basic networks of irrigation, and also of state-run trade, necessitated centralized power that should inspire fear. Obviously, all those in power needed law-enforcement agencies: the army and clergy; they needed imposing, majestic palaces, monuments, temples. It’s what Karl Marx has called the “Asiatic mode of production”, and is a key to understand Oriental despotism. A by-product is the relative – or ostensible, as others say – stagnation, or even immobility, that has characterized these societies for millennia until now.

Irrigation and trade necessitated centralized power inspiring fear.
Law-enforcement agencies, the army and clergy, were necessary.
It was impossible for democracy to grow on Babylonian soil.

Babylon

Let us not forget, however, that these societies cultivated astronomy, geometry, mathematics – for the same reasons they invented writing; societies that created wonders, like the Hanging Gardens of Babylon – though hanging from a thread: the infrastructure that had made them great was also their Achilles’ heel. You realize that with just a look at the ruins of Babylon conquered and pillaged by time.⁽³⁾ It was absolutely impossible for democracy to grow on Babylonian soil.

• ⁽³⁾ When this text was written, Babylon had not been conquered by the USA. Yet the conquerors were conquered in turn, as well. But the price was heavy: disregarding the consequences, the US forces built a military base on Babylonian ruins. Dr. John Curtis of the British Museum described how the archaeological site was in some parts leveled to create a landing area for helicopters and parking lots for heavy vehicles. The occupation forces, he wrote,

One of the dragons from the Ishtar gate

“caused substantial damage to the Ishtar Gate, one of the most famous monuments from antiquity… American military vehicles crushed 2,600-year-old brick pavements, archaeological fragments were scattered across the site, more than 12 trenches were driven into ancient deposits and military earth-moving projects contaminated the site for future generations of scientists… Add to all that the damage caused to nine of the moulded brick figures of dragons in the Ishtar Gate by soldiers trying to remove the bricks from the wall.”

● It is well known that American soldiers, and other personnel from the “Coalition of the willing” (invaders of Iraq, e.g. Poles, also stationed in Babylon), looted many antiquities that found their way to private collections.

The Oriental despots, satraps and tyrants were “necessary evils”. And, because there is always a match between worldly and heavenly powers (the concept of monarchies held “by the Grace of God” is in fact quite ancient), equally almighty and omnipotent, terrible and frightful, have been the Oriental gods; especially since they’ve been left alone with no competition at all, after their antagonists had been “dealt with” by the clergy of the new monotheistic religions.⁽⁴⁾

• ⁽⁴⁾ I am still wondering: How is it possible for the transition from polytheism to monotheism to be regarded as progress when, in fact, it has been regression? The Judaization of the Hellenistic and Roman worlds (in the Orient and Occident respectively) through Christianization was a sine qua non precondition of obscurantism during the Dark Ages.

The Oriental despots, satraps and tyrants were “necessary evils”. Equally almighty, terrible and frightful were the Oriental gods. No comparison
with the Olympians, who were full of shortcomings: they were human.

Leda and the Swan (i.e. Zeus), by Correggio (1531–32), with children musicians on the left.

No comparison whatsoever with the Olympians, who were full of shortcomings, as they were human, made in the image of the mortals that had created them, the Hellenes, their way of life, their society – or, rather: societies, for Greece, its topography, generated decentralization. The land was most beautiful, indeed, but not a paradise on earth. Living standards could improve through expansion, conquest, but also colonization. Either way, each option contributed to an even greater decentralization.

Life, therefore, was not a “test for some happy afterlife” – an idea the common people of the “Asiatic mode of production” should necessarily entertain. The Greeks were shaped and inspired by Hellenic Nature. They philosophized and discussed public issues under her beneficial influence. She “dictated” the forms of their state and political organizations – regardless if they both fomented discord. Their model was the city-state, polis; democracy was their ideal; and freedom their highest virtue – regardless if they lived in a slave and “male” society. It seems contradictory… Moreover, their democracy was pure, direct; today’s so-called “democracy” is the so-called “representative”, where power is not exercised by the people anymore, but by their so-called “representatives”, contrary to the very definition of democracy. (See the additional Chronicle 4 on Democracy). More and more oxymora and paradoxa…

Living in this ambience, the Greeks have not only summarized, but humanized, as well, the ancient world. They have shown what measure, proportion, harmony is. They have turned knowledge and culture into every free citizen’s right, and not that of a privileged closed caste. They have also left their invaluable heritage systematized and documented for future generations. However, just like their gods, they have been full of shortcomings, born out of the same environment that has fostered their virtues, with individualism underlying all. They are called les enfants terribles de l’antiquité. Rather, of human history, I would say…

• >> Chronicle 3. A CHRONICLE OF THE HUMANS
• << Chronicle 1. UNIVERSAL MEDITERRANEAN

Next Chronicle 3. A CHRONICLE OF THE HUMANS ● Academic Scholasticism ● Ares Poulianós: Archanthropus and Homo Erectus ● Homo’s Cradle: North Aegean and Macedonia ● DNA Analyses: Minoans, Mycenaeans, Cretans and Hellenes ● Paleolithic Odyssey ● Aegean Stonehenge ● Balkan Writing

The Temple of Poseidon

Chronicle 27. AN ARCHAEOLOGIST’S WATERLOO

Chronicle 27. AN ARCHAEOLOGIST’S WATERLOO

/ΕΛΛΗΝΙΚΑ/ Χρονικό 27. ΤΟ ΒΑΤΕΡΛΩ ΕΝΟΣ ΑΡΧΑΙΟΛΟΓΟΥ

● Emporia in Egypt and the Levant ● Leonard Woolley’s Waterloo ● Itinerant Minoan Artists ● Creto-Egyptian Ties ● Differences Between Minoan and Pharaonic Society and Art

Michales Loukovikas

.

… Hope the voyage is a long one…
May there be many a summer morning when,
with what pleasure, what joy,
you come into harbours seen for the first time!
May you stop at Phoenician emporia
to buy fine things…
And may you visit many Egyptian cities
to gather stores of knowledge from their scholars…

(Constantine P. Cavafy, Ithaca)

A Minoan woman

UNDER NORMAL CIRCUMSTANCES, in the process of a research, in order to present a topic, you know beforehand in general terms what you’re looking for, while searching for documentation. Sometimes, however, the thread you have in hand to find your way in the “labyrinth of history” leads you to unanticipated landscapes, “into harbours seen for the first time”! Then a strong desire is born to “stop at Phoenician emporia… | and visit many Egyptian cities | to gather stores of knowledge from their scholars”, as Cavafy advises in his Ithaca. These are, indeed, the happiest moments of a research!

It happened exactly that when from the Aegean emporia in the historical space of the Mediterranean, I ended up following itinerant Minoan artists to distant lands! I felt I was obliged to give more information about these emporia, after referring to Naucratis in the previous Chronicle, when I realized I have already used this term several times in connection with colonies or trading posts; but the emporia were not exactly colonies or trading posts, though related to both. Writing in the Encyclopaedia of the Hellenic World about Commercial posts and harbours, Elias Petropoulos tried to clear things out:

“The term emporium denoting a type of settlement or colony first appears in ancient literature rather late, in the 5th century BC. According to some scholars, an emporium should be understood as the locale of the emporos (or merchant), i.e. the traveller carrying commodities. The word emporos etymologically originates from the preposition en and the word poros, meaning sea route. The word appears in Homer’s Odyssey twice. In both cases the epic poet obviously meant a private individual who travelled for professional reasons. Hence we could suppose that the word emporium originated from the word emporos. Unfortunately, this word does not appear on [Mycenaean] Linear B tablets, and this is rather surprising, but it also leads to the obvious conclusion that the word was coined at a later time. Scholarship on the subject argues that the word or term emporium (in the sense of a colony or settlement and not that of a simple commercial transaction or exchange of products) appears first in writing in the work of Herodotus in the mid-5th century BC. By the 4th century BC the word is found written on an inscription (known as ‘the inscription of Pistiros’) which has been unearthed quite recently in a settlement of the modern Bulgarian (ancient Thracian) hinterland, close to Philippopolis…

Emporium < Emporos (< en + poros) = a voyager on a sea route

The Babylonian Marriage Market (1875), by Edwin Long,
inspired by a passage in the Herodotan Histories

“According to information we can extract from Melpomene, Herodotus’ fourth book [of Histories], the Black Sea was home to several emporia, as the ancient historian described them… There are also more scattered references in the other eight books of Herodotus. These emporia were located outside the Black Sea, and situated in the Mediterranean. The case of Naucratis among them really puzzles us: the ancient historian mentions it as both a polis and an emporium. Many studies have dealt with this issue, but nevertheless we still cannot determine the early nature of this settlement with certainty. The term usually understood as the opposite of emporium is colony, which is considered as a complete form of settlement in the model of the ancient Greek polis, featuring a distinct form of political and social organization. A colony was obviously established in the context of a predetermined plan of action, and under the auspices of a god (or gods) through an oracle, with every formality on the part of the metropolis, possessing an agricultural hinterland and its own coinage… However, in some cases, an emporium may be characterized as a proto-polis or proto-settlement, in the sense that it could act as an early stage in the foundation of a colony or polis.”

Frieze of a landscape with river; Acroteri, Thera – when there were still rivers on Santorini…

Egypt with Alexandria, Naucratis, Avaris, Sais, Pelusium, Memphis and Thebes mentioned in this Chronicle.

Emporia, according to Wikipedia, were places that the traders of one people had reserved to their business interests within the territory of another people. Except Naucratis, famous emporia in Egypt included Avaris and Sais, where Solon, the Athenian legislator, went “to gather stores of knowledge from its scholars”, in 590 BCE. Similar emporia were founded in the Levant, such as Al-Mina and Posideion in Syria. Sais (or Zau in ancient Egyptian) was located in the western Nile Delta. The city’s patron goddess was Neith. The Greeks, such as Herodotus, Plato and Diodorus Siculus, identified her with Athena and hence postulated a primordial link to Athens. Diodorus recounts that Athena built Sais before the deluge that supposedly destroyed Athens and Atlantis; all Hellenic cities were wiped out in that cataclysm, but the Egyptian cities survived. In Plato’s Timaeus and Critias (around 360 BCE), a priest in Sais entrusted to Solon the story of Atlantis, with its aggression against Greece and Egypt, and its eventual defeat and destruction by a natural catastrophe.⁽¹⁾

• ⁽¹⁾ The story of Atlantis may be connected with either ice melting after the last Ice Age (but Hellas was non-existent then), or the Sea Peoples’ raids and the consequent Bronze Age collapse. This could have been the “cataclysm” that destroyed Greece, while Egypt barely survived… (See the Chronicles 18, 19, 20, especially the last one).

Taureador: Fresco fragment from Avaris, 16th BCE

Avaris (today’s Tell el-Dab’a), the capital of Egypt under the Canaanite Hyksos, was also located in the Nile Delta, in the northeastern region. Its position at the hub of Egypt’s emporia made it a major administrative and commercial centre. Excavations have shown there was a busy harbour catering to over 300 ships in a trading season. Artifacts inside the precinct of the palace, possibly a temple, have produced goods from all over the Aegean. Most impressively, there were even Minoan-like wall paintings similar to those found in Crete at the Palace of Knossos. It is speculated that there was close contact with the rulers of Avaris, whoever they were, and the large building with the frescoes allowed the Cretans to have a ritual life in Egypt. French archaeologist Yves Duhoux also proposed the existence of a Minoan colony on an island in the Nile Delta.

Minoan Ladies in Blue fresco, ca 1525-1450 BCE

Outside of the Aegean, only three sites have an indisputable record of Minoan civilization, one being Avaris in Lower Egypt, the others Kabri and Alalakh in the Levant. Kabri, in Palestine, near the Lebanese border, is notable for its Minoan-style wall paintings. In the summer of 2009, more Aegean-style frescoes were found at the site. Apparently, the Canaanite rulers of the city wished to associate it with the Mediterranean culture and avoid Syrian and Mesopotamian styles of art that other cities in Canaan adopted. Alalakh was a late Bronze Age city-state in the area where Seleucid Antioch would rise by the end of the 4th century BCE. It was occupied from before 2000, when the first palace was built, and destroyed probably in the 12th century by the Sea Peoples (as were many other towns of coastal Anatolia and the Levant). Alalakh was never reoccupied and its place was taken by the nearby port of Al-Mina during the Iron Age.

Mantiklos Apollo, from geometric to orientalizing period, bronze, (c 700-675 BCE, Thebes, Hellas)

Al-Mina (“The Port” in Arabic) is the name that archaeologist Leonard Woolley gave to this ancient trading post in the Orontes estuary. According to Woolley, it was an early Hellenic trading colony, founded a little before 800 BCE in direct competition with the Phoenicians to the south. Large amounts of Greek pottery established its early Euboean connections, while the Syrian and Phoenician ware reflected a cultural mix typical of an emporium. The controversy whether it is to be regarded as a native Syrian site, with local architecture and pots, and a Greek presence, or as a Hellenic trading post, has not been resolved. Al-Mina served as an outpost for cultural influences that accompanied commerce with Urartu and Assyria through the shortest caravan route. Pottery recovered from later levels after 700 BCE shows that a Hellenic presence endured through the 4th century BCE, with pottery imported from Miletus and deftly imitated locally, apparently by Greek potters. Al-Mina is a key to understanding the role of early Hellenes in the East at the outset of the Orientalizing period of Greek cultural history. Robin Lane Fox has made a case for the Greek name of the site to have been Potamoi Karon mentioned by Diodorus Siculus; he suggestively linked it to karu (“trading post”) in an Assyrian inscription, which would result to Rivers of Emporia.

Sumerian silver lyre of Ur (2600-2400 ΠΚΧ)

Woolley identified Al-Mina with Posideion mentioned by Herodotus and Strabo, but recent scholarship places the latter at Ras al-Bassit, located 53 kilometres north of Latakia (Hellenistic Laodicea) by the Mediterranean. Excavations there revealed a small settlement of the late Bronze Age, when it may have functioned as an outpost of Ugarit to the south. Unlike Ugarit, Bassit survived the passage of the Sea Peoples and into the Iron Age. It had strong links with Phoenicia and Cyprus, and a Greek presence was attested from the 7th century BCE. Posideion expanded and its acropolis was fortified in the Hellenistic period.

Ram in a Thicket: one of a pair of figures found at Ur. The excavation was a joint venture of the British Museum and the Pennsylvania University. Then they decided to share the booty!

Woolley began work at Al-Mina in 1936, after the excavation in Mesopotamia, at Ur, where he discovered Sumerian royal tombs of great wealth. He made up his mind to work by the Mediterranean coast because he was interested in finding ties between the Aegean and the Mesopotamian civilizations, and also wished to throw light, as he wrote, “upon the development of Cretan civilization and its connections with the great civilizations of Nearer Asia”. Disappointed at Al-Mina, as he did not find a Bronze Age port there, he soon moved his interests to the earlier, more urbane site of Alalakh, where he worked before and after World War II (1937-39 and 1946-49). It seems, however, that his “view” was anything but “impartial”, for he, too, was “spectacled”, wearing “Asiatic myopic glasses”. All those clues on the “connections” he was interested in were there, of course; but, having already in mind an elaborate scenario, and most probably the secret ambition to turn Arthur Evans’ work in Crete upside down, he led himself to erroneous conclusions. If Ur had been his Austerlitz, Alalakh turned out to be his Waterloo! His failure to interpret his findings correctly should be taught in every School of Archaeology, helping each equally short-sighted scholar learn his/her lesson…⁽²⁾

Wishing to turn Arthur Evans’ work in Crete upside down, Leonard Woolley drew wrong conclusions. If Ur had been his Austerlitz, Alalakh turned out to be his Waterloo!

Lawrence (left) and Woolley at Carchemish

• ⁽²⁾ “Sir” Charles Leonard Woolley (1880-1960) was knighted in 1935 for his contribution to his discipline, since he was considered as one of the first “modern” archaeologists. Volunteered by Arthur Evans to run the excavation on a Roman site in northern England, Woolley started his career in 1906, later admitting: “I had never studied archaeological methods even from books… and I had not any idea how to make a survey or a ground-plan”. He worked with T. E. Lawrence, the later famous “Lawrence of Arabia”, on the excavation of the Hittite city of Carchemish in 1912-14. His work at Ur, starting in 1922, led to the discovery of the royal tombs and inspired Agatha Christie in writing the novel Murder in Mesopotamia. The writer later married Woolley’s assistant, Max Mallowan. Woolley was one of the first archaeologists to propose that the “great deluge” of the Bible was a local flood, after identifying a flood-stratum at Ur of “…400 miles long and 100 miles wide; but for the occupants of the valley, that was the whole world”…

The Knossos palace reconstructed

Wolf-Dietrich Niemeier vs. Leonard Woolley

REFERRING TO MINOAN ARTISANS TRAVELLING OVERSEAS: The Alalakh Frescoes and the Painted Plaster Floor at Tel Kabri (Western Galilee), the German archaeologist Wolf-Dietrich Niemeier, who excavated at Kabri, explained how Woolley’s ambition to upturn Evans boomeranged back on him:

“The uniqueness and seeming suddenness of the emergence of the Cretan palace system in the Aegean has often been explained by connections with and influences from the older advanced civilizations of the ancient Near East. In Alalakh… Woolley thought to have found what he had looked for: in Yarim-Lim’s palace he recognized ‘unmistakable connections’ with Minoan Crete. Similar building techniques… as well as frescoes ‘identical in colouring, technique and style’ at Alalakh and Knossos led him to the conclusion that ‘there can be no doubt but that Crete owes the best of its architecture, and its frescoes, to the Asiatic mainland’, and that ‘we are bound to believe that trained experts, members of the Architects’ and Painters’ Guilds, were invited to travel overseas from Asia (possibly from Alalakh) to build and decorate the palaces of the Cretan rulers’.

“Crete owes the best of its architecture, and its frescoes, to Asia.”
(Leonard Woolley)

Yamhad, with Halab (Aleppo) as capital, and several toponyms mentioned in this Chronicle:
Carchemish, Alalakh, Ugarit, Qatna, Hazor in Canaan, Mari, Babylon, Ur.

“Woolley’s main argument for this theory, which has been accepted by eminent scholars,⁽³⁾ [!] was that ‘Yarim-Lim’s palace antedates by more than a century the Cretan examples in the same style’… However, after a long debate on ‘Alalakh and Chronology’, Woolley’s date (‘between c. 1780 and 1730 BC’) proved to be too high. Yarim-Lim of Alalakh was not – as Woolley had thought – Yarim-Lim I of Yamhad, the contemporary of the great Hammurabi of Babylon, but a younger brother of King Abban [Abba-El?] of Yamhad who gave Alalakh to him as an appanage principality…⁽⁴⁾ The dates recently proposed by different scholars lie between c. 1650 and 1575 BC. In regard to architecture… the evidence is far from substantiating Woolley’s theory of Near Eastern architects working in Crete… The orthostates of Alalakh are c. 300 years later than the orthostates of the first phase of the Old Palace at Phaistos… Fragments of wall paintings from Yarim-Lim’s palace show characteristic Minoan motifs which appear contemporary or even earlier in Crete. Moreover, the sense of movement detectable in the wall-painting fragments from Yarim-Lim’s palace is characteristically Minoan and in opposition to Near Eastern tradition.

• ⁽³⁾ You see, the… spectacled parrotlet (forpus conspicillatus) is not an endangered species!

• ⁽⁴⁾ There were three kings of Yamhad under the name of Yarim-Lim and, of course, far more local rulers with the same name, such as the one in Alalakh. Woolley (more than anyone else) should have known better before he wrote that “Crete owes the best of its architecture, and its frescoes, to the Asiatic mainland”…

Papyrus fresco on Thera

“Woolley’s strongest argument for a direct connection between the Alalakh paintings and those in Crete was that they both were executed in true fresco painting on wet lime plaster. But it is exactly this fact which definitely disproves Woolley’s theory of the Near Eastern ancestry of Cretan fresco painting. Until most recently the Alalakh frescos formed the only known example of true fresco painting on the ancient Near East. In Crete, true fresco painting is known at least from c. 1900 BC on. Thus true fresco painting apparently has been first invented on Crete, probably because it was suitable to the temperament of the Minoan artists.⁽⁵⁾ Technique, style and iconography of the fresco fragments from the Yarim-Lim palace at Alalakh indicate that their resemblances to the Cretan wall-paintings worked in the reverse direction as that originally thought by Woolley.

• ⁽⁵⁾ While the Egyptian artists of this period painted their wall paintings in the “dry-fresco” (secco) technique, the Minoans used a “true” or “wet” painting method, allowing the pigments of metal and mineral oxides to bind well to the wall, which required quick execution. The nature of this technique encouraged improvisation, spontaneity, and the element of chance. Since they had to work within the time constrains of the drying plaster, they had to be very skilful, and their fluid brush strokes translated into the graceful outlines that characterize Minoan art. For this reason, this method of painting was most appropriate for the fluid moments of life and nature scenes that the Minoans favoured, which contrasted sharply with the strict stylization and stereotyping typical of frescoes from other Mediterranean cultures of the same time. The figures of Minoan frescoes are depicted in natural poses of free movement that reflect the rigours of the activity they engage in, an attitude characteristic of a seafaring civilization accustomed to freedom of movement, liquidity, and vigour.

Ritual sprinkler in rock crystal
from Kato Zakros, Crete

“There is much evidence that Cretan objects of art were highly valued in the ancient Near East. In the Mari tablets Cretan imports are mentioned… The prestige character of the Cretan objects in the Mari texts is indicated by the fact that two of them were presented by King Zimri-Lim of Mari to other Mesopotamian Kings. As finds of Kamares pottery at Ugarit, Qatna, Byblos and Hazor demonstrate, this outstanding pottery was highly esteemed in the Levant. Thus, at least from the 19th century BC on, Crete within its relations to the Levant was not only the receiver but developed into an equal partner producing works of art for which there was a great demand in the Near East.⁽⁶⁾ These Cretan works of art arrived by some kind of exchange or trade in the Levant. But, as Woolley has stated, ’one cannot export a palace on board of a ship, nor is the «art and Mystery» of fresco-working a form of merchandise’.⁽⁷⁾ Do we therefore have to reconstruct just the reverse scenario as that suggested by Woolley, i.e. Cretan artisans travelling to Alalakh for painting the frescoes there?

• ⁽⁶⁾ I ignore the Levantine contribution to the Minoan culture and, unfortunately, Niemeier gives no information on the subject. What I do know is how much the Cretans were indebted to, and how much they were benefited by learning from, the Egyptians (see Chronicle 17, Minoan Trade and Influence). I can imagine, in addition, how much the Egyptians would have benefited if they were not so stuck-up to let themselves learn from the Cretans…

• ⁽⁷⁾ I used a similar argument in Chronicle 22, Conclusion, to show the necessity of Hellenic presence in Iberia: “What the Phoenician ships could not transport and, thus, made the Greek presence absolutely necessary in Iberia, was Hellenic culture, art, ideas, models, architecture, burial habits, etc.”

“The sense of movement is characteristically Minoan, in opposition to Near Eastern tradition. Kabri and Alalakh show a purely Minoan iconography and technique. This can only mean they were made by itinerant Minoan artists.”
(Wolf-Dietrich Niemeier)

Knossos: the Throne Room with the griffins reconstructed

“In ‘Greater Canaan’…⁽⁸⁾ there are two other sites which can contribute to the problem: Qatna and Tel Kabri. Fragments of wall-paintings from the palace at Qatna show [techniques] in the characteristic Aegean manner. Tel Kabri lay on one of the most important trade routes of the ancient Near East, [Way of the Philistines,] the later so-called Via Maris…⁽⁹⁾ In the palace of the local ruler… a threshold was plastered and painted with… similar floor-techniques and designs of the Minoan palaces but not from the Ancient Near East… There is evidence that the walls of this room were also covered with painted plaster of which unfortunately only tiny fragments have been preserved. The plaster floor has been painted in true fresco technique… found also in Cretan and Theran fresco painting but not in tempera and fresco secco. The colours in the floor’s painting are… very similar to those of Cretan and of Theran wall-painting… Originally the floor… imitated the slabs of a stone pavement… In Crete painted plaster floors imitating slab-paved floors are known from [c. 2000 BCE]. Other parts of the Kabri floor were decorated with floral motifs. Among them are chains of stylized linear iris blossoms of a characteristic Minoan type which occurs first in frescoes and vase-painting [in 1700-1500 BCE]. Such kind of decorative mixture is a characteristic feature of Minoan fresco painting… The Kabri floor and also the fresco fragments from Yarim-Lim’s palace at Alalakh do not have only single Minoan motifs foreign to ‘Greater Canaan’ which could be explained as intrusive or incorporated elements arriving by motif transfer, but they show a purely Minoan iconography as well as technique. This can only mean that they were executed by travelling Minoan artisans…

Asherah, Canaanite fertility goddess

• ⁽⁸⁾ Greater Canaan: “the area between the Amuq plain [where Antioch was later built] to the north and the deserts to the south and to the east for the middle and late Bronze Age… appears to form a largely uniform civilization with regional variations.” (Ruth Amiran)

• ⁽⁹⁾ The historical name of the road, sadly for the Israeli Jews, was Way of the Philistines, since it crossed through the Philistine plain, where the Gaza Strip is located. Via Maris was “fished up” out of the Vulgate – “via maris”, meaning “by the way of the sea” – without specifying any road (there was no such Roman name denoting any road anywhere). The modern name was adopted so as to… expel the Palestinians from their homeland, Palestine, even on archaeological terms!

La Petite Parisienne de Crète…

“We have evidence for exchange of information on the equipment of the palaces within the ancient Near East (to which Minoan Crete belonged in a certain sense as a westernmost member). That Cretans actually travelled to the Levantine coast is proved by a tablet from the Mari archives mentioning a Cretan who purchases tin at Ugarit from agents of the Mari palace. A tale in the mythological poetry of Ugarit is of highest interest in our context. In it the goddess Anat is sending the divine messenger over the sea to the god of handicrafts, Kothar wa-Khasis, who is brought from his throne in Kptr (almost unanimously identified as Caphtor = Crete) to build a splendid palace for god Baal and to furnish it with precious works of art.⁽¹⁰⁾ As Arvid Schou Kapelrud has stated, Kothar is ‘the master-builder and the master-smith as he is found in the Near Eastern courts of this time, a highly skilled specialist’. In Canaanite mythology the god of handicrafts was called from Crete to furnish the palaces of the deities with precious works of art; in reality the rulers of Tel Kabri (Rehov) and Alalakh (and other cities, possibly Qatna) asked the rulers of Crete for sending artisans to decorate their palaces with fresco painting. As has been demonstrated by Carlo Zaccagnini, the sending of specialized workers is well-attested in the framework of the diplomatic relations between the rulers in the ancient Near East, their transfers are inserted into the dynamics and formal apparatus of the practice of gift-exchange.”

• ⁽¹⁰⁾ “KPTR” may be identified with “Caphtor”; but the latter’s identification with Crete is anything but certain. Biblical Caphtor may refer to: a) Pelusium in the Nile Delta; b) Cilicia; c) Cappadocia; d) Cyprus; e) Crete (see Chronicle 20, Pelasgians and Philistines-Peleset). Egypt fits far better here because in all references to Kothar, except the poetic tale mentioned above, his abode is identified as “HKPT”, which is possibly read as “Hikaptah”, or “House of the ka (soul) of (god) Ptah”, i.e. Memphis. The Hellenes pronounced this Hikaptah as Aegyptos, hence the name of the country in many languages.

Minoan fresco frieze at Avaris reconstructed

AFTER THE DISCOVERIES in Alalakh and Kabri, the absolutely impressive Minoan wall paintings in Avaris with a long frieze of taurocathapsia (bull-leaping) against a labyrinth pattern, griffins or rosettes, recovered during Manfred Bietak’s excavations there,

“instantly created much sensation, since among the scenes depicted on them are spectacular representations of bull leaping so closely identified with Minoan cult and culture”, as Wolf-Dietrich and Barbara Niemeier commented in another paper on Minoan Frescoes in the Eastern Mediterranean.

“From 1990 on, we suggested that the Kabri and Alalakh frescoes were painted by travelling Aegean specialists, and [some time later] Bietak and Nanno Marinatos did the same for the Avaris frescoes”.

A Minoan heterotopia at Avaris. Taureador (detail)

There was a minor problem among archaeologists on the date of these frescoes. Wishing perhaps to please everyone,

“Bietak and Marinatos came to the conclusion that ‘Minoan wall painting existed in Avaris both during the late Hyksos period and the early 18th Dynasty’. Bietak had regarded as possible that ‘trade… links between Avaris and Crete… might have survived a dynastic change and might have carried on into the 18th Dynasty, even after the fall of the Hyksos.’ There is indeed enough evidence from history that the kind of diplomatic and economic relations which apparently are behind these fresco paintings can survive the changes of regimes.

“According to Bietak, ‘king Ahmose, the founder of the 18th Dynasty, fits particularly well into the picture of Minoan connections.’ He imagines the possibility of a political deal between Ahmose and the ‘Minoan Thalassocracy’ in which the Minoan fleet helped Ahmose – who had no fleet – against the danger still threatening from the Hyksos harbour bases in southern Palestine. There is no archaeological or textual evidence for the latter hypothesis, and it recalls rather imaginative and today forgotten scenarios connected with the expulsion of the Hyksos, like those according to which Mycenaean mercenaries helped Ahmose in evicting the Hyksos, or according to which fugitive Hyksos princes conquered the Argolid and subsequently were buried in the Shaft Graves at Mycenae. Moreover, Ahmose already had a fleet: he captured Avaris after a series of assaults by both land and water [and then] proceeded to southern Palestine.”

Ahmose fighting back the Hyksos

Even a pharaoh with a fleet of his own would surely prefer to have the far more experienced Cretan navy on his side, than against him, allied with the Hyksos! The Avaris paintings indicate an involvement of Egypt in international relations and cultural exchanges with the eastern Mediterranean either through exchange of gifts or even marriage. They additionally point to Minoan authority as being involved in Egyptian affairs, possibly because Crete had a strong naval force to offer the pharaoh, and also to Avaris as a place where these cultural exchanges took place, meaning the city was incredibly important to Egypt.

Girl from Acroteri, Thera: detail
from the fresco of the lilies

The marriage of a Minoan princess to an Egyptian pharaoh may be one possible scenario. Bietak has suggested that the Avaris frescoes were painted by Minoan artists who were members of the entourage of a Knossian princess married to a pharaoh, whom he first identified as a Hyksos ruler, then as Ahmose, and later as Thutmose III. At last, who was the Cretan girl’s groom? The Minoan eruption on Thera (c. 1640 – c. 1540) coincides with the Hyksos period in Egypt (1650–1550 BCE). But because the exact moment of the eruption escapes us, we can not speculate if the marriage took pace then and when. There follows Ahmose with his New Kingdom, when the Egyptians considered the Aegean to be part of their “empire”. The term must not be understood literally, because in Egypt, they misinterpreted even the gifts given to the pharaohs: “The Egyptians, with their characteristic egocentric sense of superiority, would have presented such gifts as tribute”, remarks A. R. Schulman. At any rate, “Ahmose fits particularly well into the picture of Minoan connections”. Thutmose could very well be the groom, too. Besides, we know that he had three foreign wives: Menwi, Merti, and Menhet. However, a problem arose: another dynastic change that happened during his reign, in the middle of the 15th century BCE – not in Egypt but in Crete, when the Minoans were put under the yoke of their own “Hyksos” (foreign rulers), the Mycenaeans. Therefore, if there was a wedding, it should have happened in the beginning of Thutmose’s reign, when the actual pharaoh was his stepmother, Hatshepsut, or immediately after her death, in 1458 BCE.

Theran rosettes

Whatever the case, these unique wall paintings are of Minoan style, technique, and content. There is a long frieze of bull-leaping and grappling against a maze pattern. Marinatos has made a case that the rosette motif, a prominent feature of the “Taureador” paintings, reproduces the Knossian rosettes, and that it is a distinct Minoan symbol. The frescoes also depict griffins, hunting scenes, felines chasing ungulates, several life-sized figures, and a white female wearing a skirt. Especially important are the Minoan palace emblems, such as the half rosette frieze, and the presence of big griffins that are the same size as the ones in the Knossian Throne room. The technique of painting is typically Aegean, while the style is of very high quality and compares with some of the best paintings from Crete. The use of Minoan royal motifs in a palace of Avaris, says Bietak, indicates that “an encounter on the highest level must have taken place between the courts of Knossos and Egypt,” while the large representation of the female in the skirt may suggest a political marriage of a Minoan princess to the pharaoh.

Minoan female acrobat
(ivory, 2800-1100 BCE)

“Dynastic intermarriage was a favoured diplomatic tactic in the Bronze Age Near East,” the Niemeiers point out. The entourage of a foreign princess, some scholars suppose, “would comprise several hundred people, who until the end of their lives remained in the harem of the pharaoh, and that one can well imagine that at Avaris the rooms of the foreign princess and her entourage were decorated according to her desires. [However], at Alalakh and Tel Kabri, the frescoes probably had been attached to the walls of major ceremonial (and possible ritual) halls of the palace, not of the private rooms of queens or princesses.”

The technique of using lime plaster in two layers with a highly polished surface, fresco in combination with stucco, are all techniques that are not Egyptian but first seen in Cretan paintings. The colours used by the artists are clearly Minoan. Using blue instead of grey is Minoan, with that colour convention being seen in Egypt later, due to Aegean influence. Besides, there are no Egyptian hieroglyphs or emblems among the fragments. The composition of the paintings and motifs also fit in perfectly with all those of the Aegean world. Thus the overwhelming evidence seems to point into the direction of Minoan artists working in Avaris.

Differences Between Minoan and Pharaonic Society and Art

Wild duck on Thera

“The differences between the styles of Egyptian and Minoan arts have been analyzed by Henriette Antonia Groenewegen-Frankfort and, most recently, by Bietak,” the Niemeiers comment. “According to Groenwegen-Frankfort, Minoan art differs from Egyptian (and ancient Near Eastern) art in its ‘absolute mobility in organic forms’. Bietak aptly explains this with the different cultural patterns of both civilizations. The Minoan society was not – as the Egyptian one – dominated by writing, listing, and absolute order, and therefore Minoan art was not subjected to hieroglyphic clichés and a rigid canonical order. As to a comparison of Canaanite and Minoan arts, we do not have, unfortunately, many objects of art from the middle Bronze Age Levant. But those which are extant show a style distinctly different from the Minoan one. For instance, the bird representations on bone inlays from Megiddo and Lachish seem motionless in comparison to the crane on an ivory plaque from Palaikastro. Canaanite female and male metal figurines appear stiff in comparison to the Minoan female and male metal figurines displaying strong inner tension and dynamics.”

“Minoan art differs from Egyptian art in its ‘absolute mobility in organic forms’.” “The Minoan society was not dominated by absolute order; so
Minoan art was not subjected to hieroglyphic clichés and rigid order.”
(Henriette Antonia Groenewegen-Frankfort and Manfred Bietak)

Another map of the area, with arrows pinpointing the places mentioned in this Chronicle): Alalah, Carchemish, Ugarit, Qatna, Byblos, Megiddo, Mari, Babylon, Ur.

As it turned out the wall paintings at Avaris, Alalakh, Kabri, possibly Qatna (17th – 16th centuries BCE), were not the older ones.

“Earlier are the painted stone imitations in Zimri-Lim’s palace at Mari [18th century BCE]. The excavator of Mari, André Parrot, compared the stone imitations to those at Knossos. He also asked for possible connections between the Mari and the Knossos murals, and, pointing to the evidence for their connections provided by the Minoan precious objects mentioned in the Mari archives, he apparently tended to see some Cretan influence in the murals there.”

● Located in Mesopotamia, far from the Mediterranean, Mari (today’s Tell Hariri) was a Sumerian and Amorite city on the Euphrates. It flourished from 2900 to 1759 BCE, when it was sacked by Hammurabi, despite the gifts king Zimri-Lim had given him. More important was Mari’s strategic position as a relay point between northern Syria and lower Mesopotamia. The city came to control the trade lanes between different regions such as Iran, Mesopotamia, and Anatolia. The royal palace contained over 300 rooms and was possibly the largest of its time (over 1,000 rooms, they say, had the palace of Knossos)! More than 25,000 tablets were recovered while excavating Mari, as Parrot noted, “bringing about a complete revision of the historical dating of the ancient Near East, and providing more than 500 new place names, enough to redraw the geographical map of the ancient world.”

● Qatna (modern Tell el-Mishrife), 18 km NE of Homs, was one of the largest Bronze Age Syrian towns. Trade routes in the 2nd Millennium connected Mesopotamia with Cyprus, Crete, Egypt. Qatna is mentioned in the tin trade, linking Mari, via Qatna, to the Mediterranean; Cypriote copper was also transported on this route; their alloy, bronze, was most valuable during both the Bronze and Iron Ages.

Theran boy-boxers

Regarding the ethnic composition of the “Minoan” workshops, there are various possibilities: the frescoes were painted a) by travelling Aegean artisans; b) under the supervision of Aegean artists, assisted by Levantine painters, after they were trained by them; c) by Levantine students of Aegean masters. The idea of mixed workshops seems more appealing, probable, realistic. Decorating huge palaces was a great undertaking. However, it would seem unthinkable to imagine Cretan ships full of artists travelling around the Mediterranean for this task. The artistic teams should have been rather small, working necessarily with local apprentices.

“It is difficult to decide in each case which of these solutions is the correct one,” point out the Niemeiers. “We would agree with Philip P. Betancourt that only a very small percentage of the fresco paintings is known and that ‘we are touching the tip of the iceberg of a whole series of interrelated workshops, working in Knossos, the Aegean islands, on the coast of Western Asia and in Egypt, perhaps travelling back and forth, perhaps occasionally exchanging personnel, or going back to Knossos to learn the most recent things’… The Alalakh, Kabri, and Avaris frescoes are to be seen ‘in terms of the forging of an élite koiné – artistic, iconographical, ideological, technological – in the circumstances of the intense maritime interaction between the coastal areas of the Eastern Mediterranean’,” as Susan Sherratt proposed. Marinatos has argued that these paintings are evidence of a koiné, a visual language of common symbols, which testifies to interactions among the rulers of neighbouring powers. This idea is adopted by the Niemeiers, as well: “The Minoan artists involved in the painting of all these frescoes apparently formed an important element in the growth of the so-called ‘International Style’ of the Late Bronze Age eastern Mediterranean.”⁽¹¹⁾

• ⁽¹¹⁾ Not only of the eastern part of the Mediterranean: according to some fresco experts, similar wall paintings have also been found in “faraway” Morocco. However, it is not clear if they are painted with the true (wet) fresco or secco technique.

“Interrelated workshops worked in Knossos, the Aegean islands, the Western Asia coast and Egypt, travelling back and forth, exchanging personnel, or going back to Knossos to learn the most recent things.” “An élite koiné – artistic, iconographical, ideological, technological – was forged in the circumstances of intense maritime interaction between the coastal areas
of the Eastern Mediterranean.” (Philip P. Betancourt and Susan Sherratt)

Cretans in Egypt, bringing gifts of metal, jewelry etc, facsimile of a painting in Thebes, Egypt, 18th dynasty
(early 15th century BCE)

Whatever happened to the Avaris wall paintings? One group of them had fallen off the wall of a doorway, and another group of fragments was found in dumps deposited by the north-east palace. The frescoes seem to have been removed during the later Thutmosid period – when there was no Minoan Crete anymore, after it was taken over by the Mycenaeans.

“Minoan fresco painting apparently was a rather short-lived phenomenon in the Levant and Egypt – in Egyptian terms, covering the Hyksos period and the very beginning of the early 18th Dynasty,” the Niemeiers sum up. “Later, we find again paintings of nature scenes which appear to breathe a Minoan spirit. They were, however, executed in secco technique and certainly were not painted by Aegean artists. Minoan wall painting was a thing of the past at that time.”

Without Minoan Crete there was no room for Minoan art. Minoan workshops were still busy, of course; but the artistic masters worked for the new political masters, the Mycenaeans; there were no Greek artists at that time to compete with them. But their new works of art are not typified as “Minoan” anymore; they are called “Mycenaean”, sometimes with a footnote that they were made by Cretan artistic workshops. Would anyone ever think to describe as “Cretan” the masterpieces of another great Cretan master, who lived more than three millennia later, namely Doménicos Theotocópoulos, the famous El Greco?

Mycenaean women procession fresco

Before Tin, it was the Obsidian…

HERE WE ARE AGAIN AT OUR STARTING POINT, my dearest fellow voyagers, having come full circle back: we began with Periplus and Minoan Cretan Thalassocracy, and we concluded with Emporia and Minoan Cretan fresco.⁽¹²⁾ Now we can start anew, picking up the thread again, going back even before our starting point – before man learned how to work metals, when he voyaged in search of an equally valuable material: the obsidian. So, let’s attempt to go back to the Neolithic era. Let’s schedule it, at least: our vivid imagination is our strong point!

• ⁽¹²⁾ See also Chronicles 3, 5, and 17, 18, 19, about Crete, Cretans, Minoan civilization, navigation and trade, thalassocracy, fresco, taurocathapsia, etc.

• >> 28. THE MAKING OF THE MEDITERRANEAN PERIPLUS
• << Chronicle 26. IBERIAN CROSS-CHECK

Grandstand Minoan procession fresco

Chronicle 16. MEDITERRANEAN PERIPLUS-PARAPLUS

II. CASSITERIDES ARCHIPELAGO

Sailing to Tartessos

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Chronicle 16. MEDITERRANEAN PERIPLUS-PARAPLUS

/ΕΛΛΗΝΙΚΑ/ Χρονικό 16. ΜΕΣΟΓΕΙΟΥ ΠΑΡΑΠΛΟΥΣ-ΠΕΡΙΠΛΟΥΣ

● Periplus: Circumnavigation or Log ● Navigators and Intellectuals
● The Peloponnesian War and Euripides ● Nomos (Law Song)

Michales Loukovikas

WHAT WAS THE MOTIVE BEHIND MAN’S decision to take his chances and go out to sea? As always, he had needs to satisfy: he initially was in search of a better place to live. After settling down, his needs changed: there was much food in the sea and he could certainly fish far better with a canoe or a boat. The more he familiarized himself with the sea, the further he went out there, and thus the vessel also became a means of transport. Men started exchanging goods and, as long as production increased, all these boatmen were divided into fishermen and traders – and sea warriors, as well. Commerce developed in parallel with navigation. As a rule, a sea trader was obliged to take notes and map out his routes. This notebook gradually developed into

P E R I P L U S

Ancient Greek pottery (cylix) depicting
merchant ships and warships

“PERIPLUS” is the Latin form of the Hellenic word περίπλους, a “sailing-around”. The word also developed specialized meanings; one of them became a term in the navigation of Greeks and other peoples. Such a periplus was a manuscript listing – in order and with approximate intervening distances – the ports and coastal landmarks that the captain of a vessel would see along a shore.⁽¹⁾ It served the same purpose as the Roman itinerarium, i.e. a map of road stops. If the navigators were skilled geographers (as many were), they added various notes, contributing to the geographical knowledge of the time. In that sense the periplus was a type of log. We can have an idea about such ancient logs from the earliest Hellene historian, Hecataeus of Miletus. The Histories by Herodotus and Thucydides contain passages that appear to have been based on such peripli, as well.

• ⁽¹⁾ Before the nautical charts, the primary store of geographic information for maritime navigation (a mariner’s handbook of written sailing directions) was known in antiquity as a periplus; later, in medieval Italy and the Mediterranean, it was substituted by a portolano. Portuguese navigators in 16th century called it roteiro, the Spaniards derroterro, the French routier, the English rutter, the Dutch leeskarte, and the Germans Seebuch. Portulano in Italian means “related to harbours”.

● A paraplus is similar to a periplus, meaning “sailing by (the coast)”.

● A periplus was also an ancient naval manoeuvre in which attacking triremes would outflank or encircle the defenders in order to strike them in the rear.

The map of Hecataeus

● The Milesian Hecataeus (Ἑκαταῖος, c. 550 – c. 476 BCE) lived in the time of the Persian invasion. Having travelled extensively, he settled in his native city devoting his time to the composition of geographical and historical works. He is the first Greek historian to mention the Celts. He is credited with a work written in two books and entitled Γῆς περίοδος (World Survey, or Travels Round the Earth). Each book is organized like a periplus, a point-to-point coastal survey. One, on Europe, was like a Mediterranean periplus, describing each region in turn, and reaching as far north as Scythia. The other, on Asia, was similar to the Periplus of the Erythraean Sea, giving information on the countries and inhabitants of this area, the account of Egypt being particularly comprehensive. It was accompanied by a corrected and enlarged version of Anaximander’s map of the Earth.⁽²⁾ This work survives only in fragments, mainly in Ethnica, the geographical lexicon compiled by Stephanus of Byzantium (6th century CE). Another work of Hecataeus was the Genealogiae, a systematized account of the Hellenic legends and myths, where he breaks with the epic myth-making tradition. The extant fragments are just enough to show what we are missing.

The map of Anaximander

• ⁽²⁾ Anaximander (Ἀναξίμανδρος, c. 610 – c. 546 BCE), a pre-Socratic philosopher, succeeded his master, Thales, one of the Seven Sages of Greece, as head of the Milesian school, where among his pupils he counted Anaximenes and, arguably, Pythagoras. He is the first philosopher known to have written down his studies, although only one fragment of his work remains. He was an early proponent of science trying to observe and explain different aspects of the universe, with a particular interest in its origins. In astronomy, he tried to describe the mechanics of the celestial bodies in relation to the Earth. In physics, his idea that the ἄπειρον (infinite) was the source of all things led Hellenic philosophy to a new level of conceptual abstraction. He created a map of the world and contributed greatly to the advancement of geography. According to Carl Sagan, he conducted the earliest recorded scientific experiment.

The world according to Herodotus

● Herodotus (Ἡρόδοτος, c. 484 – c. 425 BCE), born in Halicarnassus, is regarded as the “Father of History”. He was the first historian known to systematically collect his material, test its accuracy to a certain extent and arrange it in a well-constructed and vivid narrative. His celebrated Histories were a record of his Inquiries into the origins of the Greco-Persian Wars that culminated in 490–479 BCE. He describes in detail that period, which would otherwise be poorly documented – adding numerous long digressions about the various places and people he encountered during his wide-and-long-ranging travels around the Mediterranean, the Black Sea, and beyond.

Fragment from the Histories (VIII, Urania) on Papyrus Oxyrhynchus (early 2nd century CE)

Ἡροδότου Ἁλικαρνησσέος Ἱστορίης ἀπόδεξις ἥδε, ὡς μήτε τὰ γενόμενα ἐξ ἀνθρώπων τῷ χρόνῳ ἐξίτηλα γένηται, μήτε ἔργα μεγάλα τε καὶ θωμαστά, τὰ μὲν Ἕλλησι, τὰ δὲ βαρβάροισι ἀποδεχθέντα, ἀκλεᾶ γένηται. (Herodotus of Halicarnassus’ Inquiries are here set down to preserve the memory of the past by putting on record the astonishing achievements both of our own and of other peoples).

It was rather conventional at that time for authors to have their works “published” by reciting them at popular festivals. Herodotus took his Histories to Olympia, in the Olympian Games, and presented his entire work (9 books) to the assembled people in one sitting, receiving rapturous applause at the end. Others, nevertheless, said he refused to start reading until some clouds offered him a bit of shade, by which time, however, the assembly had dispersed – hence the proverbial expression “Herodotus and his shade” to describe anyone who misses his opportunity through delay.

● The Athenian Thucydides (Θουκυδίδης, c. 460 – c. 395 BCE) is the notable author of the History of the Peloponnesian War between Sparta and Athens (431–404 BCE) to the year 411. Its finale is recounted by Xenophon in his Hellenica. Thucydides is regarded as the father of “scientific history” due to his strict standards of evidence-gathering and analysis in terms of cause and effect without reference to intervention by the gods. He has also been called as the father of the school of political realism, which views the relations between nations as based on might rather than right. His Melian dialogue still remains a seminal work of international relations theory.⁽³⁾

• ⁽³⁾ The Melian dialogue is the account of a confrontation between Athens and Melos, a neutral island in the southern Aegean, east of the Peloponnese, in 416-415 BCΕ, during the Peloponnesian War. Athens wanted to conquer Melos to intimidate Sparta. The confrontation ended in tragedy: the Athenians executed all captive men and enslaved women and children…

● Melos was an important source of obsidian, a valuable volcanic material in the Neolithic era, to make cutting and piercing tools.

Venus de Milo, or Aphrodite of Melos (130-100 BCE)

● However, the island is famous all over the world because of a work of art that was found there: it is the celebrated statue of Aphrodite of Melos, better known as Venus de Milo. It was abducted by the French, supported by the Ottomans still occupying Hellas (1820), during clashes, at Melos and Piraeus harbours, that left more than 200 Greeks dead!

The Peloponnesian War, after the glorious end of the Persian Wars, marked the dramatic finale to the Golden Age of Hellenic civilization.

● In the first phase of the war Sparta launched invasions of Attica, and Athens raided the Peloponnesian coast, taking advantage of its naval supremacy. The Athenians sent later a huge expeditionary force to attack Syracuse in Sicily failing disastrously. This ushered in the final phase of the war, when Sparta, already receiving support from Persia, incited rebellions in the Athenians’ subject states in the Aegean and Asia Minor, undermining their hegemony. The destruction of their fleet put an end to the war and Athens surrendered in the next year. This Greek “civil war”,⁽⁴⁾ a few years after the glorious end of the Median (Persian) Wars (499–449 BCΕ), reshaped the ancient Hellenic world. Athens, the strongest polis in Greece prior to the war’s beginning, was reduced to almost complete subjection, while Sparta became established as the leading power. However, the economic costs of the war were felt all across Hellas; poverty became widespread in the Peloponnese, while Athens, totally devastated, would never recover its pre-war prosperity. The war also wrought subtler changes to Grecian society; the antagonism between democratic Athens and oligarchic Sparta, each of which supported friendly political factions within other poleis, made civil war a common occurrence in Hellas. Greek warfare, originally on a limited scale, was transformed into an all-out struggle between city-states, complete with large-scale atrocities. Shattering religious and cultural taboos, devastating whole cities and the countryside, this civil war marked the dramatic finale to the 5th century BCΕ and the Golden Age of Hellenic civilization.

• ⁽⁴⁾ The Peloponnesian War was ἐμφύλιος in the Greek sense of the word: not just a civil war, but a war within the “phylum” of the Hellenes.

During celebrations for victory, someone sang a song of Euripides.
The Spartans were so moved they changed their minds: “They felt it
would be barbarous to annihilate Athens that produced such men.”

Euripides, by Sebastià Giralt

● The Peloponnesian War is the background of a didactic story on music and politics centered on Euripides (c. 480–406 BCE) – perhaps the best of the Greek tragedians. He was also musically avant-garde, working with the most experimental musicians – a fact exploited by conservatives, such as Aristophanes, in order to ridicule him. Yet, it was Euripides’ music (and not that by Aristophanes, neither by Aeschylus, nor by Sophocles) that saved many Athenians, and Athens itself, during the war. Since then, and for many centuries to come, people used to sing the best odes of tragedies (we can say “arias” in operatic terminology). Hence, the modern Greek word for “song” (“τραγούδι”) originates from the word of “tragedy” (τραγῳδία). After the disastrous Athenian expedition to Sicily, many Athenians held captives there saved their lives as they were able to sing songs of Euripides. And at the end of the war, the victorious Spartan generals had a meeting to decide the fate of Athens. They concluded that the city should be demolished and its citizens enslaved. Then, during a banquet to celebrate victory, someone sang an ode from Euripides’ Electra. The generals were so much moved that they changed their minds: “They felt it would be a barbarous act to annihilate a city that produced such men”! These generals, needless to say, could appreciate the music of Euripides thanks to their culture.⁽⁵⁾ A most celebrated song in the ears of today’s generals or politicians would have no effect whatsoever… (These episodes are from Plutarch’s Parallel Lives – those of Nicias and Lysander).

• ⁽⁵⁾ Indeed, it’s very impressive that at that time, the most popular songs were avant-garde! It goes without saying that the citizens’ cultural level was very high…

Pytheas of Massalia: the greatest navigating explorer of the era with his periplus of Europe

A “Periplus” made of stone and the first one around Africa

JUST LIKE EVERYTHING ELSE, merchant shipping started in… “our own Orient” (it’s time for me to be sarcastic with this cliché! See Chronicle 6, footnote 1). The available data lead us to Egypt. Very soon the initiative passed to some sea peoples (Carians, Cretans, Greeks, Phoenicians, etc.), for the Egyptians, as a land people, were prone to agriculture. The Mediterranean, a closed sea with many islands, was in fact ideal for… sailing courses – the Aegean even more! Periplus as a log appeared with long-distance navigation, which is unthinkable without such a log. A captain kept his notes in any script, even… stenographic scribble, he could manage. It was impossible to memorize everything, and he could not impart his expertise to others.

● Hannu (Hennu, or Henenu), serving under Mentuhotep III (late 21st century BCE) re-opened the old trade routes to the land of Punt (in the Horn of Africa) and “Libya” – i.e. Africa beyond the Nile (the Maghreb). Hannu set out as head of 3000 soldiers, crossed the mountainous desert via Wadi Hammamat (“Valley of Many Baths”) and went on to the coast of the Red Sea. He wrote of his expedition on stone, on a rock-inscription in the same valley (therefore, his “Periplus” was made of stone):

Boat of Khonsu, the Egyptian god of the Moon

“I was sent to conduct ships to the land of Punt, to fetch for Pharaoh sweet-smelling spices… I reached the Great Green [i.e. the sea]. Then I made the ships and dispatched them with all manner of things and made for them a great oblation of cattle, oxen and gazelles. When I returned from the Great Green… I brought for His Majesty every product that I found on the shores of God’s Land; [… and also] splendid blocks of stone for the temple statues.”

Hannu’s road was the one used in the time of the Ptolemies and Romans; it led from Coptos to Leucos Limen (White Harbour, now Qoseir) on the Red Sea. It’s the same commercial thoroughfare of merchants of all countries, who traded in the wonderful products of Arabia and India, and thus turned into a bridge of all nations, which of old united Asia and Europe. Hannu is the first eponymous explorer. Coming back to Egypt, he brought precious treasures, e.g. myrrh, metal, wood. As for the Kingdom of Punt, it was probably situated in the area of today’s Somalia; others point towards neighbouring eastern Ethiopia and Eritrea. This lucrative trade network continued all the way into the classical era connecting local merchants with Phoenicia, Ptolemaic Egypt, Greece, Parthian Persia, Sheba, Nabataea, and the Roman Empire.

Penteconter

● In Hannu’s time, or perhaps a little later, the Cretans started their voyages during the Minoan thalassocracy in the Mediterranean, and maybe beyond. There followed the Argonautic expedition, and the Odyssey (meaning Odysseus’ wanderings) in the late Bronze Age.⁽⁶⁾ Everything we know about those voyages, and many others in that period, comes not from the navigators’ logbooks but from other sources. This does not mean they did not keep notes: long-distance voyages were inconceivable with no such peripli-logs of some sort, as we have said.

• ⁽⁶⁾ The Trojan War, according to Eratosthenes, took place in 1194-1184 BCE. So, Odysseus returned to Ithaca in 1174. But some researchers, using NASA data, compared the solar eclipses recorded in the Odyssey and specified he got back on his island on October 25, 1207 BCE. Hence the war took place in the decade 1227-1217. (On the Argonauts, see Chronicle 15, footnote 7, and Chronicle 22, Massaliote Periplus revival).

● According to Herodotus, the Phoenicians carried out a great feat: the first periplus of “Libya” (i.e. Africa), on behalf of the Egyptians, in the years of Necho II (610–595 BCE). It started from the Red Sea and lasted almost three years. A Persian awaiting execution attempted to repeat the feat, following the reverse course, in an effort to save his life, but eventually abandoned – though death was waiting for him… Even now, a voyage from the Red Sea to the Nile around Africa is not an easy thing. Epic voyages of such calibre have nothing to envy from today’s manned flights in space! Like the astronauts, in case of a long stay “out there”, the Phoenicians, too, were obliged to sow and harvest every year, since it was impossible to carry supplies for an indefinite period of time.

Herodotus and Thucydides

Herodotus’ Histories, Melpomene: “Libya is washed on all sides by the sea except where it joins Asia, as was first demonstrated, so far as our knowledge goes, by the Egyptian king Necho, who, after calling off the construction of the canal between the Nile and the Arabian Gulf, sent out a fleet manned by a Phoenician crew with orders to sail west about and return to the Mediterranean and Egypt by way of the Pillars of Heracles. The Phoenicians sailed from the Erythraean Sea into the southern ocean, and every autumn put in at some convenient spot on the Libyan coast, sowed a patch of ground, and waited for next year’s harvest. Then, having got in their grain, they put to sea again, and after two full years rounded the Pillars of Heracles in the course of the third, and returned to Egypt”…

The Phoenicians’ voyage to the unknown (on a “boat” called… hope) was additionally unknown how long it will last, as we have said. Consequently, the crew had to create temporary settlements, cultivate the land and maintain themselves. Herodotus’ brief reference to this incredible venture ends with a truly fantastic assertion:

“These men made a statement which I do not myself believe, though others may, to the effect that as they sailed on a westerly course round the southern end of Libya, they had the sun on their right – to northward of them. This is how Libya was first discovered by sea.”

As they sailed round the southern tip of Africa, the sailors told him, they had the sun on their right – something that he wrote down, although he was doubtful, as it went beyond the knowledge of his time. This is exactly what makes his story reliable. For sure, the Greeks could understand the movement of the sun, but found it incredible that Africa reached so far south; they thought it was a lot smaller with the southern part connected to Asia. Thus we believe Herodotus, because he did not believe an account handed down to him by oral tradition, which is why he recorded it: this is where he differed from Thucydides; the latter would not bother to mention it – so we would never get to know the story… And it was not only Thucydides: Polybius, Strabo and Ptolemy had also many doubts, unlike Pliny. The Egyptologist A. B. Lloyd observes: “It is extremely unlikely that an Egyptian king would, or could, have acted as Necho is depicted as doing.” This rumour, he adds, might have been triggered by the failure of Sataspes (the death-row Persian) to circumnavigate Africa under Xerxes I.

The Canal of the Pharaohs

So, what could the pharaoh’s motives be? When Necho took over, the situation was anything but rosy in Egypt’s northeastern border. The Babylonians had captured the Assyrian capital, Nineveh, and then defeated the Egyptians in Carchemish to punish them for their support to the Assyrians. According to the Nebuchadnezzar Chronicle, Necho was campaigning in Syria (609–605 BCE), when the Babylonian king defeated him. The pharaoh perhaps considered the possibility to attack southern Babylonia by sea, and ordered a canal to be constructed between the Nile and the Red Sea. Then he realized he was giving free access to his enemies, as well. Consequently, the canal remained uncompleted until the Persians took over Egypt, in late 6th century, and Darius commissioned its completion. But it was Necho who started the construction (or restoration) of a canal some 85 kilometers long, foreshadowing the Suez Canal.

The periplus of Africa was related to Necho’s defense plans. He asked for Phoenician assistance because they were excellent sailors and had several colonies in the West, such as Gadir (Cádiz), next to the Pillars of Heracles. The Phoenicians must have also been happy to help, as they shared the Babylonian enemy. So, technically, a voyage around Africa would have been possible. The currents and winds favour a clockwise, East-West, periplus, according to plan, as long as it is a paraplus, sailing by the coast, keeping it in sight. The periplus’ purpose was to determine the exact size of Africa. If it was as small as they thought, the canal might not be such a great idea, taking into consideration the economic cost. Other Egyptologists dispute that a pharaoh would authorize such an expedition – except for the reason of trade, opening new maritime routes. Indeed, such voyages were made for economic gain. Despite Hannu’s accomplishments, the Egyptians lagged behind in the control of the seas; and they were not after sea adventures of any kind. There was already a status quo in place in the Mediterranean, with the Greeks exerting control over the northern shores, and the Phoenicians over the southern coast. The only region where Egypt, with its inferior fleet, might acquire influence and wealth was eastern Africa, where they had already established trade ties – that could thus be further expanded.

Re-enactment of the first periplus of Africa

According to the Livius site: “The Phoenicians must have started their expedition in July, and must have reached the Horn of Africa after an uneventful trip, relying on the northern wind. The Red Sea (which Herodotus calls ‘Arabian Gulf’) was well known to their Egyptian pilots, because the Egyptians traded incense with the Arabs of modern Yemen… After they had passed Africa’s most eastern shores, the northeast monsoon – which started in October – sped up their journey, and in March they must have reached the Equator. The Agulhas Current must have brought them through the Mozambique Channel and along the coast of modern South Africa. Sailing on their westerly course, they must have observed that they had the sun on their right… When they reached Cape Agulhas, they left the current that had helped them to the south. At the same time, they encountered the contrary South East trade winds. And they must have been surprised to discover that here, on the southern hemisphere, the winter was already approaching. However, they must happily have noticed that they had started to go north. The plain behind Saint Helena Bay, 150 kilometers north of modern Cape Τown, offered a fine opportunity to land. They must have sowed their wheat in June, started to repair their ships, and harvested in November.

“The Benguela Current and the now favorable South East trade winds brought the Phoenician sailors back to the hot equatorial regions; they will have experienced its effects in a most unpleasant way, when they sailed along the Namibian coast, which is a waterless desert. It took several weeks to reach a more fertile coast. In March, a new and equally unpleasant surprise awaited them: they had been traveling on a northerly course, but now, the coast curved to the west again. They may have benefited from the westward Guinea Current, but not for long, because it changes its direction during the spring. For weeks, they were struggling against the wind and the current, only to reach – in July – the African west coast, where they encountered the contrary Canary Current and the North Eastern trade winds. But they must have been relieved to find themselves rowing in a northerly direction again. Somehow they managed to beat against the wind and the current, and in November they must have landed somewhere on the coast of modern Mauritania… The voyagers sowed their wheat, repaired their ships, and waited for the next harvest…

“In May, they brought their ships to the sea, and started to beat their way up to along the Moroccan coast, where they discovered that they had returned to the world they knew: the town on Mogador island was occupied by Phoenicians. Having told the incredible story of their trip to the southern hemisphere, and no doubt with new equipment, they continued their voyage; soon they reached Phoenician towns like Lixus, modern Cádiz and Málaga, and Carthage. They must have reached Egypt at the end of the summer. Their expedition had lasted three full years. This story, told by Herodotus, was generally questioned after the famous geographer Ptolemy had said that it was impossible to circumnavigate Africa”… Thus this “top secret” epic periplus left no trace in the geographical knowledge of the time.

Peripli of the Classical and Hellenistic eras

Trireme

SEVERAL PERIPLI have survived, in whole or in fragments, and in quotations cited by other writers. The impression one gets, even with a first look at the list below, is that for a long time, from the 6th to the 4th centuries BCE, it was a Graeco-Phoenician “bras de fer” between Massalia and Carthage aimed at dominating the sea routes leading to regions rich mainly in gold, silver, tin and amber:

● The Massaliote Periplus (6th century BCE), preserved in Avienus’ Ora Maritima (Sea Coast, 4th century CE), followed Tartessian trade routes along the Atlantic shores of Europe, and recorded a voyage from Marseille to the British Isles, circumnavigating Iberia. It described the coasts of Spain and Portugal, and made a brief mention of a visit to the “sacred isle” Ierne (Ireland), located across from Albion (Britain). It is the earliest work about the trade links between northern and southern Europe; the fact that such a manual existed indicates the importance of these trade links. Especially the trade in tin to be used for making bronze is attested by archaeological evidence from even earlier periods. The riches to be won attracted numerous adventurers to the North Atlantic coast.

● The Periplus of Hanno the Navigator (6th or 5th century BCE) described the South Atlantic, along the African coast from Morocco down to the Gulf of Guinea – at best; in the worst case, the Punics probably did not sail beyond Morocco. If we trust their trumped-up information, Hanno was in charge of 60 ships and 30,000 colonists and soldiers! In fact, they should not exceed 5,000. This fleet was designed to explore and colonize Northwest Africa. The Punics founded or repopulated seven colonies on the Moroccan coast beyond the Pillars of Heracles (as a rule, the Phoenician settlements were not populous). Then, according to the official version, they proceeded further south, meeting several native tribes. The members of a hirsute and savage tribe were called “Gorillae”. In the 19th century, Hanno’s description was used as a name for the well-known primates.

Hanno’s periplus according to his “official” report

The primary source for this expedition is a Hellenic periplus, supposedly a translation of a tablet Hanno had reportedly hung up on his return to Carthage in the temple of Ba’al Hammon, whom the Greeks identified with Cronus. Its full title was The Periplus of Hanno, commander of the Carthaginians, round the parts of Libya [Africa] beyond the Pillars of Heracles, which he deposited in the Temple of Cronus.⁽⁷⁾ Obviously, the tablet contained falsified information, so that Carthage’s competitors, especially the Hellenes, could not profit. The sole purpose of the tablet was to gratify the pride of the Punics in their achievements. The very purpose of the voyage – the consolidation of the route to the African gold market – is not even mentioned…

• ⁽⁷⁾ This translation, into rather mediocre Greek, was not a complete rendering. The abridged text was copied repeatedly by Hellenes, as well as Byzantines. Two copies are still extant: one is the Palatinus Graecus 398 (9th century CE) in the University Library of Heidelberg. The other is the Codex Vatopedinus 655 (14th century) found in the Vatopedi monastery on Mount Athos, and divided between the British Library and the French Bibliothèque Nationale (it was probably sold: the monks in this monastery have an age-old strain of business acumen in their DNA)…

● Herodotus gives a story based perhaps upon Hanno’s original report:

“The Punics tell us that they trade with a race of men who live in a part of Libya beyond the Pillars of Heracles. On reaching this country, they unload their goods, arrange them tidily along the beach, and then, returning to their boats, raise a smoke. Seeing the smoke, the natives come down to the beach, place on the ground a certain quantity of gold in exchange for the goods, and go off again to a distance. The Punics then come ashore and take a look at the gold; and if they think it presents a fair price for their wares, they collect it and go away; if, on the other hand, it seems too little, they go back aboard and wait, and the natives come and add to the gold until they are satisfied. There is perfect honesty on both sides; the Punics never touch the gold until it equals in value what they have offered for sale, and the natives never touch the goods until the gold has been taken away.”

Herodotus, I’m afraid, lacks the business acumen that characterizes the monks at Vatopedi…

Himilco’s “report”: sea monsters!

● Along with the Massaliote Periplus, sailing to the North Atlantic, the explorations extended south also with the voyage of Euthymenes of Massalia (early 6th century or, according to other writers, second half of the 5th century BCE). Unfortunately, the original text of his Periplus in the Outer Sea was lost; only some quotations survived, such as those by Plutarch, or Seneca the Younger, who was very skeptical. During his exploration, Euthymenes arrived at a large river with hippopotami and crocodiles, whose outflow made the sea at its mouth fresh or brackish. It seems that it was the Senegal River. The Massaliotes should have known that the Punics, led by Hanno, had undertaken a great expedition in the same area and perhaps in the same period. There is no information, however, that the two fleets met. The results of Euthymenes’ venture were probably considered poor. So, the Massaliotes abandoned their effort in the South Atlantic.

● It was the Punics’ turn to expand into the North Atlantic, in the area described by the Massaliote Periplus. The expedition was headed by Himilco the Navigator (late 6th century BCE), with a periplus sailing by the coasts of Iberia and France. Following Tartessian routes, he reached Ophiussa (Portugal-Galicia) to trade for tin and other precious metals. Himilco gave a new dimension to the propaganda of Carthage: his voyage was presented as particularly painful; he painted a grim picture while referring to sea monsters and giant seaweed, so that the competitors, especially the Greeks, would not dare sail out into the Atlantic. It seems that this tactic was particularly effective: the Punic stories about sinister “signs and wonders” became the source of the myths discouraging voyages beyond the Pillars of Heracles.

● The Periplus of Scylax of Caryanda (late 6th – early 5th century BCE), on behalf of the Persians, explored the mouth of the Indus River, the Indian Ocean and Red Sea coasts as far as Suez. Scylax was born in Caria; he was a renowned Hellenized Carian explorer and writer in the years of Darius I. His expedition’s aim, circa 515, was to find the Indus River estuary. Sailing out into the Indian Ocean, he turned west until he arrived at the Red Sea, which he also explored. His voyage took 30 months. His report, perhaps entitled Periplus, and dedicated to king Darius, was lost, except for the quotations by later writers – such as Strabo in his Geography, Herodotus in his Histories, and Aristotle in his Politics, when he refers to the Indian kings. There are seven quotations in all, indicating his Periplus was not merely a log, but contained accounts of people, landscape, the natural conditions and political affairs. Hence it contained information intended for the expansion of the Persian Empire. Written in Greek, it was among the first works to be written in Hellenic prose. Moreover, it was the first account of the peoples of the Orient reaching the Mediterranean world and served as a model for later Greek writers. More lastingly, it registered the name of India and the Indians in geography.

● Periplus Outside the Pillars of Heracles, a work of the historian, chronographer, and logographer Charon of Lampsacus (1st half of the 5th century BCE), who lived before Herodotus; Periplus of the Inner Sea (the Mediterranean), a work of the astronomer, meteorologist and geographer Euctemon of Athens (mid-5th century), who was a student and partner of his compatriot, Meton; and also Ocean Periplus, of the great Abderitan “atomic” philosopher Democritus (c. 460 – c. 370 BCE): none of them has survived; especially in the case of Democritus, there are other reasons beyond fate (see Chronicle 22, intermediate reference to Abdera and Democritus).

● The epic exploration of the top Massaliote navigator, Pytheas (c. 380 – c. 310, or c. 350 – c. 285 BCE), took place around 325, and led him to Britain, Scandinavia, the Baltic Sea and, via river routes, to the Black and Mediterranean Seas, completing a periplus of Europe! His work, Τὰ περὶ τοῦ Ὠκεανοῦ (Things about [or Description of] the Ocean, or even Περίοδος γῆς (Travel around the Earth), survives only in excerpts quoted by other writers, some of whom treat him with skepticism, e.g. the constantly doubtful Strabo, and also Polybius. Pytheas said he “travelled over the whole of Britain that was accessible”, and explored the entire North. He saw the inhabitants of Cornwall to be involved in the manufacture of tin. Some of his observations may be the earliest report of Stonehenge; he also introduced the idea of ultimate Thule to the geographic imagination.⁽⁸⁾ He is the first person to describe the Midnight Sun and polar ice, and to state that the tides are caused by the moon. He measured latitude by the gnomon, and observed Germanic and possibly Finnic tribes.

• ⁽⁸⁾ Thule was believed in the past to be Iceland that was uninhabited until the second half of the 9th century CE. Yet, Pytheas had seen people on the island. By the late 19th century, Thule was identified with Norway. Others linked Thule to Greenland, where human presence dates back to 2500 BCE. Still, the likelihood of Pytheas sailing that far north is considered completely unreal.

Excerpts from his work are quoted or paraphrased by many others, such as Diodorus Siculus, Pliny, Geminus of Rhodes. Late writers gave titles to his book. Other simpler titles are Periplus, On the Ocean, or Ocean. After Britain and Norway, there followed the discovery of the Baltic and the voyage to the Don. And there, Polybius, willingly or not, created uncertainty, claiming that Pytheas turned back at the mouth of the Vistula, at the border of Scythia: “… on his return hence, he traversed the whole of the coast of Europe from Gades to the Tanais”… Was it a second leg in his exploration? And he didn’t pass by Massalia to refit and refresh the crew? Others claimed that the “Tanais” was not the Don, but the Elbe. Some writers raised questions on the first leg of the voyage, implying it had never happened! Since the Punics had blockaded the Pillars of Heracles – is the “incontestable” argument of the “armchair intellectuals” – how could Pytheas pass? Thus we need to examine the relations among Punics, Massaliotes and Romans at the time of his exploration.

Massaliotes, Punics and Romans as… “bitter friends”

Thule (or “Tile” on Olaus Magnus sea map, 1539), located NW of Scotland with monsters, was identified by some other “monsters”,
the Nazis, with Hyperborea (see Chronicle 15) as the cradle of the “Aryan race”: the Nazi party was hatched within the Thule Society.

The Punics had imposed a blockade of the Pillars of Heracles to all ships from other nations. However, by the 4th century BCE, the western Hellenes, especially the Massaliotes, were more or less on “amicable” terms with them. First of all, Massalia was militarily superior to Carthage: they had defeated the empire in the late 6th and early 5th centuries. Not wishing to test the issue any further, the Punics had made an independent treaty with the Massaliotes; and the latter had no trouble to place and maintain colonies on the Mediterranean Iberian coast. Archaeologically the sites of the western Mediterranean show no diminishment of Grecian wares at any time; on the contrary, there was an increase due to their better quality – which is a good indication of trade. Second, Massalia was an old ally of Rome. The Massaliotes had helped the Romans in their conflicts with the Etruscans and the Gauls. In the mid-4th century, Carthage and Rome came to terms over the Sicilian Wars, defining with a treaty their mutual interests. Rome could use Sicilian markets and Carthage could buy and sell in Rome. If Carthage had enslaved allies of Rome, they were to be set free. Rome was to stay out of the western Mediterranean – excepting Massalia. During the last half of the 4th century – the time of Pytheas’ voyage – relations between Rome and its allies on the one hand, and Carthage on the other, were totally amicable. The Massaliotes were free to operate as they pleased. Neither is there any evidence in any of the sources about some kind of problem emerging “in the last moment” in relation to Pytheas’ exploration. On the contrary, mentions of Gades, Tartessos, and the “sacred promontory” (Sagres), at the southern tip of Portugal – all testify to his passing through the Pillars “in broad daylight” and heading north…

Nearchus Paraplus

Nearchus Paraplus

● While Pytheas was circumnavigating Europe, Nearchus, as Alexander’s admiral, was carrying out his Paraplus, under the instructions to steer the fleet from India to the Persian Gulf, sailing by the coast, and meet the Macedonian king at Susa. Nearchus Paraplus is preserved in Arrian’s Indica.⁽⁹⁾ Nearchus was appointed as satrap of Lycia and Pamphylia in 334-333. In 328 he rejoined Alexander in Bactria, bringing with him reinforcements. Two years later, he was made admiral of the fleet that had been built at the Hydaspes (Jhelum) river, and steered it from the Indus to the Persian Gulf – a voyage that he recorded in every detail. Then he became the first Greek to visit Tylos (Bahrain), marking the area’s inclusion in the Hellenic world with the worship of Zeus (as the Arab sun goddess, Shams), and Greek being spoken as the language of upper classes. Nearchus Paraplus was intended by Alexander as a way to learn about the mouth of the Indus and the sea between India and Babylon. After many adventures, Nearchus arrived in Carmania (Kermā, in SE Iran, where one of the Alexandrias was founded), meeting with Alexander after the latter’s crossing of the Gedrosian desert. The king sent him off to complete his voyage – he went as far as the Euphrates river before turning back to rejoin Alexander at Susa, in early 324. He then took the fleet up to Babylon. Nearchus had a place in Alexander’s final plans, as he was to be the admiral of the Arabian invasion fleet – perhaps also in his other plans against Rome, Carthage and Iberia. But these plans were cut short by Alexander’s death in 323 BCE.

Pataliputra, where Megasthenes was sent: one of the largest cities in the world. Mathura: controlled by the Graeco-Indians (180-70 BCE). Sagala:
capital of Menander’s Graeco-Indian kingdom.

• ⁽⁹⁾ Arrian (late 1st – 2nd centuries CE) was one of the main historians of Alexander the Great, born in Nicomedia, the capital of Bithynia, in NW Asia Minor. His Indica tells the story of Nearchus’ voyage to the Persian Gulf after the Macedonians conquered the Indus Valley. But much of the importance of the work comes from his in depth writing about the history, geography, and also culture, of the Indian subcontinent. Arrian, who had Herodotus as a model, relates the stories of Heracles and Dionysus in India, as well.

Indica is also the title of a similar book by Megasthenes describing the history of India; this was a major source from which Arrian drew. Megasthenes (c. 350–290 BCE), also born in Anatolia in the Hellenistic period, was a Greek ethnographer, who became an ambassador of Seleucus I to Chandragupta at Pataliputra, in Bihar of NE India, some time before 298, the year this Indian chief died. Megasthenes had lived before in Arachosia, southern Afghanistan. At the beginning of his book, he referred to the old Indians who knew about the arrival of Dionysus and Heracles in India, and mentioned the devotees of Heracles (Krishna) and Dionysus (Shiva or Indra). Indica served as an important source to many later writers such as Strabo, Diodorus and Pliny; it also introduced India to the Mediterranean world. Its scope is wide-ranging, from the Himalayas in the North to Taprobana (Sri Lanka) in the South.

Hellenistic culture in the Indian subcontinent: Graeco-Indian banquet, with Hellenic clothes, amphoras, wine, music (1st–2nd centuries CE)

● Androsthenes of Thasos was another admiral of Alexander’s, and also a trierarch (commander of a trireme) of Nearchus’. The account of his voyage is a Paraplus of Indica. Alexander sent him down the Euphrates in an exploration, skirting the coast of Arabia and sailing farther than Archias of Pella. The latter was a geographer and officer who also served as trierarch under Nearchus. Archias was dispatched with a galley and reached Tylos; as he reported, the island was “about a day and a night’s sail” from the mouth of the Euphrates. Onesicritus was also an officer serving under Nearchus as a helmsman. Some quotations of his own Periplus referring to ancient India and its inhabitants have survived. Nevertheless, he was regarded as unreliable and conceited.

● The Periplus of Pseudo-Scylax (330s BCE) was written by an unknown Athenian. He entitled it as Periplus of the Sea of Universal Europe and Asia and Libya, and signed it as “Scylax” for reasons of prestige. He presented the Mediterranean and Black Seas clockwise, starting from Iberia and concluding in western Africa beyond the Pillars of Heracles.

● The Stadiasmus, i.e. Periplus of the Great Sea, is a work of an unknown geographer-helmsman (late 4th – early 3rd century BCE). Extant is only the part about distances, sailing directions, and descriptions of the Mediterranean harbours.

● The ten-volume Periplus of Timosthenes (early 3rd century BCE) was intended to describe more precisely countries already known, specifying the location of harbours and stations in the Mediterranean. Timosthenes of Rhodes was a major navigator, geographer, cartographer, and admiral of the Ptolemaic fleet. He additionally wrote On Harbours, On Islands, and Stadiasmi, drawing up several nautical maps. He was an expert on winds in antiquity, and the first Hellene geographer to use the winds for geographic orientation, rather than merely as meteorological phenomena. There are only quotations surviving in the works of other writers, who referred to him with admiration, such as Erathosthenes, or Strabo. The latter revealed another talent of this versatile man: he composed a Pythic nomos (law), a Pythian “canon”, if you like, for aulos and cithara to be played at Delphi in the Pythian Games in celebration of the victory of Apollo over Python.⁽¹⁰⁾

Apollo slaying Python, by Eugène Delacroix (1850)

Musical Nomos (Law)

• ⁽¹⁰⁾ “Nomos [law, canon] in music was the most important form of composition and interpretation in ancient Greek music. It seems that it evolved from a very old tradition, according to which the laws were sung by the people to be easily memorized and followed [unlike what happens now that the legislators do their best for the laws to be incomprehensible, although – or precisely because – ignorance of the law is not forgiven]… The composition and interpretation of nomoi were very demanding and set high professional standards in the four Hellenic games (Olympian, Pythian, Isthmian, Nemean), where the most distinguished musicians (composers-performers) of their time took part. The Pythian nomos, the most important nomos for aulos, invented by Sakadas, was the first known type of program music and was meant to describe the contest between Apollo and the dragon Python, in five parts…” (Solon Michaelides, Encyclopedia of Ancient Greek Music).

● Timosthenes either innovated, combining the aulos with the cithara in his Pythian nomos, or such a combination was already established in his time. These instruments were mostly played by professional musicians: aulos, a wind instrument, connected with Dionysus; cithara, a string instrument, identified with Apollo. The lyre, instead, was played only by amateurs. (On laws in verse see also Chronicle 11, footnote 1, and Chronicle 21, footnote 5 and the relevant text).

The duel between the citharoedus Apollo and the aulete Marsyas

● Note that no celebration was established, nor was any nomos composed, for another victory of Apollo in a musical contest against the satyr aulete Marsyas from Phrygia. The god, in order to win, was obliged to sing, as well, something that the Muses, who were the judges, permitted, of course. It was a “win on points”, infuriating Apollo, who over-reacted: he flayed Marsyas alive and nailed his skin to a pine tree for his “hubris” to challenge a god! That is how the Hellenic music prevailed over the Phrygian, and the Apollonian spirit subdued the Dionysian… However, in the Hellenistic years, according to Diodorus Siculus, Marsyas was admired for his intelligence (σύνεσις) and self-control (σωφροσύνη), while the Romans praised him for his free speech and boldness (παρρησία), and also “speaking truth to power”. His statue near the Roman forum was regarded as an indicium libertatis, a symbol of liberty, and associated with demonstrations of the plebs, the common people.

● Two great Greek navigators, who might have worked together in the Indian Ocean, were Eudoxus of Cyzicus (c. 150–100), and Hippalos (late 2nd – 1st centuries BCE). Eudoxus explored the Arabian Sea on behalf of the Ptolemies in Egypt. According to Poseidonius and Strabo, he was the first to sail on the monsoon wind system on the Indian Ocean in 118–116. They said that a shipwrecked sailor from India had been rescued in the Red Sea and taken to Alexandria. This Indian offered to guide Greek navigators to India. Eudoxus was appointed for the first voyage, in 118 BCE, guided by the Indian sailor. After he returned with a cargo of aromatics and precious stones, a second voyage was undertaken, in 116, sailing without a guide. Until then, Greek and Indian sailors met to trade at Arabian ports such as Aden, called by the Hellenes Εὐδαίμων (Felix: Fertile and Happy; while Yemen was named Eudaemon Arabia). Attempts to sail beyond Aden were rare and discouraged, involving a long, laborious sailing by the coast to India. On the contrary, Indian ships used the monsoon winds to sail to Arabia. If the Greeks acquired the know-how, they would have no need of the Arabian ports, trading directly with India. Having this accomplished, very soon, by mid-1st century BCE, there was a marked increase in the number of Hellenic and Roman ships sailing this way to India.

Greek ships and a sea monster near the Pillars
of Heracles, sketch by Walter Plitt Quintin

When Eudoxus was returning from his second voyage to India, the wind forced him south and down the coast of Africa for some distance, where he found the remains of a ship. Due to its appearance and the story told by the natives, he concluded that the ship was from Gades (Cádiz) in Andalusia, sailing south around Africa. Therefore, he was inspired to attempt a periplus of Africa. Organizing the expedition on his own, he set sail from Gades, but the difficulties were too great, so he was obliged to go back. He didn’t give up though. He again set out to circumnavigate Africa, but his eventual fate is unknown. Although some, such as Pliny, claimed that Eudoxus did achieve his goal, the most probable conclusion is that he perished on the journey…

● Concerning Hippalus, he is sometimes referred to as Eudoxus’ captain. The writer of the Periplus of the Erythraean Sea credited him with discovering the direct route from the Red Sea to India, correcting the map of the area. Greek geographers before him thought that the Indian coast stretched from west to east. Hippalus recognized the north-to-south direction of India’s coastline. Only someone who had this insight would foresee crossing the Indian Ocean might be a faster way to South India than sailing by the coast. Since the 1st century BCE onwards, we witness the prosperity of trade between Egypt and India. Sometimes Hippalus is credited with introducing to Europe the idea of sailing to India aided by the monsoon winds.

● The Periplus of the Erythraean Sea (40–70 CE),⁽¹¹⁾ written by an unknown Alexandrian, gives the shoreline itinerary of the Red Sea and the Indian Ocean, starting each time at the port of Berenice Troglodytica (also known as Baranis). Beyond the Red Sea, the manuscript describes the coast of India as far as the Ganges River and the east coast of Africa (called Azania).

• ⁽¹¹⁾ Although “Erythraean Sea” literally means “Red Sea”, the term for the ancient Greeks included the Indian Ocean and the Persian Gulf, as well.

● The Periplus Ponti Euxini (130–131 CE) described the trade routes along the Euxine (Black Sea). It was written by Arrian in a letter to the emperor Hadrian, and contains an accurate topographical survey of the coastline. It is possibly connected with his instructions, as a legate of Cappadocia, for a march of the Roman army against the Alani. Its purpose was to inform the emperor of the “lay of the land” – the distances between cities and locations that would provide safe harbour, in case of a military expedition to the region.

● The Anaplous Bosporou (Voyage through the Bosporus, or De Bospori navigatione), written by the geographer Dionysius of Byzantium (2nd century CE), describes the Bosporus coastline and ancient Byzantium, before becoming Constantinople in the 4th century. The text has been described as “one of the most remarkable and detailed of ancient geographic texts.”

Periplus, by Adolf Erik Nordenskiöld.

● The Periplus of the Outer Sea is an original work of the Greek geographer Marcian of Heraclea Pontica (4th century CE). He also prepared some epitomes: The Periplus Inside the Sea, an epitome of Menippus of Pergamon, and Geography, an epitome of Artemidorus Ephesius.

● Finally, a Periplus by Adolf Erik Nordenskiöld (1832-1901), a Finn arctic explorer, geologist and mineralogist, most remembered for the expedition along the northern coast of Eurasia in 1878-79. This was the first complete crossing of the Northern Sea Route, or Northeast Passage. It was a great feat as it opened the way to a periplus of Eurasia. Except his monumental Periplus (5 volumes, 1897), and a popular summary (2 volumes), he published the monograph Early History of Cartography (1889), for he was interested in the history of Arctic exploration as evidenced in old maps.

The Periplus of Eurasia through the North Sea and the Suez Canal Routes

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