american journal of archaelology

5/20/2018 American Journal of Archaelology

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AMERICAN JOURNALOF ARCHAEOLOGY

THE JOURNAL OF THE ARCHAEOLOGICAL INSTITUTE OF AMERICA

Volume 106 No. 1 January 2002


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ARCHAEOLOGICAL INSTITUTE OF AMERICA

2001

OFFICERS

Nancy C. Wilkie , PresidentJane C. Wald baum, First Vice President

Ricardo J. Elia, Vice President for Professional ResponsibilitiesNaomi J. Norman , Vice President for PublicationsCameron Jean Walker, Vice President for Societies

Jeffrey A. Lamia, TreasurerStephen L. Dyson , Past President

Hector Williams, President, AIA Canada

HONORARY PRESIDENTS

Frederick R. Matson, Robert H. Dyson, Jr.,Machteld J. Mellink, James R. Wiseman,

Martha Sharp Joukowsky, James Russell

GOVERNING BOARD

TRUSTEES EMERITI

Jacqueline Rosenthal, Executive DirectorLeonard V. Quigley, of Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison, General Counsel

Elie M. AbemayorKaren AlexanderPatricia Rieff AnawaltElizabeth BartmanMary Beth BuckEric H. ClineMichael CosmopoulosSusan DowneyAlfred EisenpreisNeathery Batsell Fuller

Kevin GlowackiEleanor GuralnickJames R. James, Jr.Charles S. La FolletteRichard Leventhal

Jodi MagnessCarol C. MattuschFrancis P. McManamonAndrew M.T. MooreDorinda J. OliverKathleen A. PavelkoAlice S. RiginosJohn J. RocheAnne H. SalisburyCatherine Sease

John H. StubbsBarbara TsakirgisPatty Jo WatsonMichael Wiseman

MEMBERSHIP IN THE ARCHAEOLOGICAL INSTITUTE OF AMERICAAND SUBSCRIPTION TO THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF ARCHAEOLOGY

The American Journal of Archaeologyis published by the Archaeological Institute of America in January,April, July, and October. Membership in the AIA, including a subscription to AJA, is $85 per year (C$123).Student membership is $40 (C$58); proof of full-time status required. A brochure outlining membershipbenefits is available upon request from the Institute. An annual subscription to AJAis $75 (international,$95); the institutional subscription rate is $250 (international, $290). Institutions are not eligible forindividual membership rates. All communications regarding membership, subscriptions, and back issuesshould be addressed to the Archaeological Institute of America, located at Boston University, 656 BeaconStreet, Boston, Massachusetts 02215-2006, tel. 617-353-9361, fax 617-353-6550, email [email protected].

Richard H. Howland Norma Kershaw


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AMERICAN JOURNAL

OF ARCHAEOLOGYTHE JOURNAL OF THE ARCHAEOLOGICAL INSTITUTE OF AMERICAEDITORS

R. Bruce Hitchner, University of DaytonEditor-in-Chief

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Co-editors, Book Reviews

ADVISORY BOARD

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EDITORIAL ASSISTANTS

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University of MichiganStephen L. Dyson

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THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF ARCHAEOLOGY, the journal of the Archaeological Institute of America,was found ed in 1885; the second ser ies was begun in 1897. Indexe s have been published forvol umes 111 (18851896), for the second series, volumes 110 (18971906) and volumes 1170(19071966). TheJournal is indexed in the Humanities Index, the ABS International Guide to ClassicalStudies, Current Contents, the Book Review Index, the Avery Index to Architectural Periodicals, AnthropologicalLiterature: An Index to Periodical Articles and Essays, and the Art Index.

MANUSCRIPTS and all communications for the editors should be addressed to Professor R. BruceHitchner, Editor-in-Chief, AJA, Archaeological Institute of America, located at Boston University, 656Beacon Street, Boston, Massachusetts 02215-2006, tel. 617-353-9364, fax 617-353-6550, [email protected]. The American Journal of Archaeologyis devoted to the art and archaeology of ancientEurope and the Mediterranean world, including the Near East and Egypt, f rom prehistor ic to lateantique times. The attention of contributors is directed to Editorial Policy, Instructions for Contributors,and Abbreviations, AJA104 (2000) 324. Guidelines for AJAauthors can also be found on the WorldWide Web at www.ajaonl ine.org. Contributors are requested to include abstracts summariz ing themain points and principal conclusions of their articles. Manuscripts, including photocopies ofillustrations, should be submitted in triplicate; original photographs, drawings, and plans should notbe sent unless requested by the editors. In order to facilitate the peer-review process, all submissionsshould be prepared in such a way as to maintain anonymity of the author. As the of ficial journal ofthe Archaeological Institute of America, AJA wi ll not ser ve for the annou nce ment or ini tialscholarly presentation of any object in a private or public collection acquired after 30 December1970, unless the object was part of a previously existing collection or has been legally exportedfrom the country of origin.

BOOKS FOR REVIEWshould be sent to Professors Paul Rehak and John G. Younger, Co-editors, AJABook Reviews, Classics Department, Wescoe Hall, 1445 Jayhawk Blvd., University of Kansas, Lawrence,Kansas 66045-2139, tel. 785-864-3153, fax 785-864-5566, email [email protected] [email protected] (please use both addresses for all correspondence). The following are excludedfrom review and should not be sent: offprints; reeditions, except those with great and significantchanges; journal volumes, except the first in a new series; monographs of very small size and scope;and books dealing with the archaeology of the New World.

THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF ARCHAEOLOGY(ISSN 0002-9114) is published four times a year inJanuary, April, July, and October by the Archaeolgocial Institute of America, located at Boston Uni-versity, 656 Beacon Street, Boston, Massachusetts 02215-2006, tel. 617-353-9361, fax 617-353-6550,email [email protected]. Subscriptions to the American Journal of Archaeologymay be addressed to theInstitute headquarters in Boston. An annual subscription is $75 (international, $95); the institutionalrate is $250 (international, $290). Membership in the AIA, including a subscription to AJA, is $85 per

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The opinions expressed in the articles and book reviews published in the American Journal of Archaeologyare those of the authors and not of the editors or of the Archaeological Institute of America.

Copyright 2002 by the Archaeological Institute of America

The American Journal of Archaeologyis composed in ITC New Baskervilleat theJournals editorial offices, located at Boston University.

The paper in this journal is acid-free and meets the guidelines for permanence and durability of theCommittee on Production Guidelines for Book Longevity of the Council on Library Resources.


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AMERICAN JOURNAL OF ARCHAEOLOGY

Volume 106 No. 1 January 2002

ARTICLES

Eileen Murphy, Ilia Gokhman, Yuri Chistov, and Ludmila Barkova:Prehistoric Old World Scalping: New Cases from the Cemetery ofAymyrlyg, South Siberia 1

Gloria Ferrari: The Ancient Temple on the Acropolis at Athens 11

Ezequiel M. Pinto-Guillaume:Mollusks from the Villa of Livia atPrima Porta, Rome: The Swedish Garden Archaeological Project,19961999 37

Rabun Taylor: Temples and Terracottas at Cosa 59

ESSAY

Christina Riggs: Facing the Dead: Recent Research on the Funerary

Art of Ptolemaic and Roman Egypt 85

NECROLOGY

Nancy C. Wilkie:William Donald Edward Coulson, 19422001 103

REVIEWS

Review ArticleBarbara Burrell: Out-Heroding Herod 107

Book ReviewsBlench and Spriggs, eds., Archaeology and Language. Vol. 1, Theoretical

and Methodological Orientations (J.S. Smith) 111Gove,From Hiroshima to the Iceman: The Development and Applications of

Accelerator Mass Spectrometry(R.A. Housley) 112Ramage and Craddock,King Croesus Gold: Excavations at Sardis and the

History of Gold Refining(D. Killick) 113Pye and Allen,Coastal and Estuarine Environments: Sedimentology,

Geomorphology and Geoarchaeology (P. Goldberg) 114Borbein, Hlscher, and Zanker, eds., Klassische Archologie:

Eine Einfhrung(W.M. Calder III) 115Hrke, ed.,Archaeology, Ideology and Society: The German Experience

(R. Bernbeck) 116

Chamay, Courtois, and Rebetez, Waldemar Deonna: Un archologuederrire lobjectif de 1903 1939(A. Szegedy-Maszak) 118

Donald and Hurcombe, eds.,Gender and Material Culture inArchaeological Perspective, and

Donald and Hurcombe, eds.,Gender and Material Culture in HistoricalPerspective( J. Gero) 118

Price, ed.,Europes First Farmers (K.J. Fewster) 120


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Barclay and Harding, eds.,Pathways and Ceremonies: The CursusMonuments of Britain and Ireland,

Ruggles, Astronomy in Prehistoric Britain and Ireland, andBurl, Great Stone Circles (K. Jones-Bley) 121Hitchcock, Minoan Architecture: A Contextual Analysis( J.C. Mcenroe) 123Hallager and Hallager, eds., The Greek-Swedish Excavations at the

Agia Aikaterini Square Kastelli, Khania 19701987. Vol. 2, The Late

Minoan IIIC Settlement(L.P. Day) 124Bowman and Rogan, eds., Agriculture in Egypt from Pharaonic to Modern

Times (C.E.P. Adams) 125Potts, The Archaeology of Elam: Formation and Transformation of an Ancient

Iranian State (P. Amiet) 126Burns, Monuments of Syria: An Historical Guide(A.H. Joffe) 127Coleman and Walz, eds., Greeks and Barbarians: Essays on the Interactions

between Greeks and Non-Greeks in Antiquity and the Consequences forEurocentrism(I. Malkin) 128

Fossey, ed., Boeotia Antiqua. Vol. 6, Proceedings of the 8th InternationalConference on Boiotian Antiquities (Loyola University of Chicago, 2426 May

1995) (D.W. Roller) 130Splitter, Die Kypseloslade in Olympia: Form, Funktion und Bildschmuck.

Eine archologische Rekonstruktion. Mit einem Katalog der Sagenbilder in derkorinthischen Vasenmalerei und einem Anhang zur Forschungsgeschichte(M.D. Stansbury-ODonnell) 131

Radt,Pergamon: Geschichte und Bauten einer antiken Metropole, andWulf,Altertmer von Pergamon. Vol. 15, Die Stadtgrabung, pt. 3,Die

hellenistischen und rmischen Wohnhuser von Pergamon: Unter besondererBercksichtigung der Anlagen zwischen der Mittel- und der Ostgasse(B.A. Ault) 132

Vlizos, Der thronende Zeus: Eine Untersuchung zur statuarischen Ikonographiedes Gottes in der sptklassischen und hellenistischen Kunst (G. Waywell) 134

Neils and Walberg, Corpus Vasorum Antiquorum. USA 35: The ClevelandMuseum of Art 2 (J.M. Padgett) 135

Tomei, Scavi francesi sul Palatino: Le indagini di Pietro Rosa per NapoleoneIII (18611870) (L. Richardson, jr) 137

Steinby, ed., Lexicon topographicum urbis Romae. Vol. 5, TZ. Addenda etcorrigenda (L. Richardson, jr) 138

Bejor, Vie colonnate: Paesaggi urbani del mondo antico(A.B. Griffith) 139Bergmann, Chiragan, Aphrodismas, Konstantinopel: Zur mythologischen

Skulptur der Sptantike (N. Hannestad) 140Gilli, I materiali archeologici della raccolta Nyry del Museo Civico Correr di

Venezia (P. Biagi) 141Cabanes, ed., LIllyrie mridionale et lpire dans lantiquit. Vol. 3, Actes du

3e colloque international de Chantilly (1619 octobre 1996)(V.R. Anderson-Stojanovic) 142

Davidson, Roles of the Northern Goddess(N.L. Wicker) 144Sasse, Westgotische Grberfelder auf der iberischen Halbinsel am Beispiel der

Funde aus El Carpio de Tajo (Torrijos, Toledo) (S. Noack-Haley) 145

BOOKS RECEIVED 146


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American Journal of Archaeology106 (2002) 1101

Abstract

Evidence for three definitive cases of scalping havebeen identified among the corpus of human skeletalremains excavated from the Iron Age south Siberian cem-etery of Aymyrlyg in Tuva. The osteological evidence forscalping that is apparent in these individuals is presentedhere, as are the results of a recent reexamination of apreviously known south Siberian case from the royal burialin Kurgan 2 at Pazyryk.These four Iron Age Siberiancases of scalping are important in part because they sup-port the literary references pertaining to the practice

contained in Herodotuss Histories, written in the fifthcentury B.C. Osteological evidence for scalping in pre-historic Old World contexts, including cases previouslyreported only in German and Russian publications, is alsoreviewed.*

The term Scythian world is applied to a groupof archaeological cultures that date from approxi-

mately the seventh to the second centuries B.C. andare located in the zone of the steppes, forest-

steppes, foothills, and mountains of the Ukraine,Russia, Kazakhstan, Mongolia, and the northern

part of China.1The cultures comprising the Scyth-ian world are, therefore, wide ranging. The Greeks

referred to the nomads of Eurasia and Central Asiaas the Scythians, while the Persians designated allnomadic tribes of the Eurasian steppes (including

the Scythians) as the Saka.2 The Scythian periodculture in Tuva is called the Uyuk Culture, a name

that derived from the Uyuk river basin, where thefirst scientific excavations of monuments of thisculture occurred.3The Uyuk Culture was bordered

by two other Scythian period cultures, the PazyrykCulture to the west, and the Tagar Culture to the

north.4

The history of the Central Asian nomads is in-separable from that of the nomadic and semino-

madic tribes of the Eurasian steppes. Their materi-al culture and political and economic practices were

markedly similar.5 The common material cultureapparent among all the tribes of the Scythian worldis known as the Scythian Triad, and consists of weap-

ons, horse harnesses, and objects decorated in theAnimal style of artwork.6 Although the artifacts of

the Scythian Triad display marked similarities, oth-er components of the Scythian world (such as dwell-

ings, burial customs, ceramics, and adornments)differ considerably among the various cultures.

Consequently, it is not possible to envisage a singleScythian culture but rather a variety of cultures ofthe Scythian world,7and the Scythian empire was

not a centralized state, but rather a confederationof powerful nomadic clans.8

During the late third and early second centuryB.C. several significant social changes occurred

among the nomadic tribes of the steppes. In thewest the Sarmatians succeeded the Scythians, while

in the east the Xiongnu, who are often presumedto be the ancestors of the later Huns, had emergedas a strong nomadic power. This period in the his-

tory of the steppe nomads thus is referred to as theHunno-Sarmatian period.9As a result of their in-

creased prosperity from pastoralism, the develop-ment of an iron industry, and military prowess, the24 Xiongnu tribes dramatically rose in strength,

resulting in the emergence of the powerful Xiong-nu empire.10According to the historical sources

the Xiongnu initially engaged in a lengthy strug-

Prehistoric Old World Scalping:

New Cases from the Cemetery of Aymyrlyg,

South SiberiaEILEEN MURPHY, ILIA GOKHMAN, YURI CHISTOV, AND LUDMILA BARKOVA

*We would like to acknowledge Dr. Colm Donnelly, Schoolof Archaeology and Palaeoecology, Queens University Belfast,for his comments on the text. We are also grateful to ProfessorDon Brothwell, Department of Archaeology, University of York,for drawing our attention to the Alvastra case in Sweden. We

would also like to thank Dr. Rupert Breitwieser, Institute forAncient History, University of Salzburg, for informing us ofthe case of scalping from Regensburg-Harting in Bavaria.

1 Clenova 1994, 499.

2Abetekov and Yusupov 1994, 24.3 Mannai-Ool 1970, 8.4 Mandelshtam 1992, 179.5Abetekov and Yusupov 1994, 23.6 Moskova 1994, 231.7 Clenova 1994, 5001.8Vernadsky 1943, 51.9 Zadneprovskiy 1994, 457.10 Ishjamts 1994, 153.


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EIL EEN MURPHY ET AL .2 [AJA 106

gle against other nomadic tribes, particularly the

Wu-sun and the Yeh-chih, as well as with the Chi-nese,11 and for several centuries the Xiongnu em-

pire acted as a rival power to the Han empire ofChina. At its greatest extent the Xiongnu empireis thought to have stretched from Korea to the Al-

tai, and from the border of China to Transbaika-lia.12At the end of the third and the beginning of

the second century B.C. the populations of Tuva,the Transbaikalia area, the Minusinsk Basin, and

the Altai are all considered to have experiencedthe impact of Xiongnu military force.13

The Hunno-Sarmatian period culture in Tuva is

referred to as the Shurmak Culture. The olderScythian period Uyuk Culture in Tuva does not

appear to have totally disappeared from the archae-ological record, however, and a large proportion of

its characteristicsits funerary monuments, burialrituals, and grave goodsseem to have become as-

similated into the new Shurmak Culture.14Artifacts recovered from Scythian period funer-

ary monuments in Tuva indicate that the economy

of the highland-steppe peoples was based upon aseminomadic form of pastoralism, which was com-

bined with land cultivation and hunting and gath-ering. The Scythian period tribes of the mountain-steppe regions of Tuva would have made vertical

shifts seasonally, with the construction of perma-nent structures undertaken in the lowlands dur-

ing the winter months.15 This form of economywould have involved regular repeated seasonal

migrations within the borders of a relatively defined

territory.16The Shurmak Culture in Tuva is consid-ered to have had a similar seminomadic pastoralist

economy to that of the preceding Uyuk Culture butwith a greater degree of mobility.As was the case for

the Scythian period, the existence of tribal burialgrounds in Tuva of Hunno-Sarmatian period date

indicates that cyclic migration continued in thisera; tribes alternately moved through their land

along fixed routes and maintained set camp sitesduring winters.17 A large variety of weaponry wascontained in the burials of both the Uyuk and Shur-

mak Cultures, indicating the important role thatwarfare played in society.

the cemetery of aymyrlyg

The cemetery complex of Aymyrlyg is situated inthe Ulug-Khemski region of the Republic of Tuva

in south Siberia (fig. 1). The site was excavated

between 1968 and 1984 by archaeologists of theSayano-Tuvinskaya expedition team from the Insti-

tute for the History of Material Culture in St. Pe-tersburg. Dr. A.M. Mandelshtam directed the exca-vations from 1968 to 1978, and Dr. E.U. Stambulnik

continued the research until the mid 1980s. Themajority of burials excavated by Mandelshtam were

from the Uyuk Culture of the Scythian period (ca.seventhsecond centuries B.C.), with the greatest

proportion dating to the third and second centu-ries B.C. Most of the burials from the later years ofthe program, under the direction of Stambulnik,

originated from the Hunno-Sarmatian period (ca.first century B.C.A.D. second century).

The most common form of interior structure inScythian period funerary monuments was the rect-

angular log house tomb. Invariably, the numbers ofindividuals buried within an Aymyrlyg log house

tomb could be considerable, with as many as 15 skel-etons being recovered from individual examples.Stone cists of Scythian period date were also com-

monly encountered at Aymyrlyg.18Burial in a com-posite wooden coffin or, less frequently, in a hollowed

out log or wooden block was characteristic for theHunno-Sarmatian period. The majority of these buri-als contained a single individual, although several

double and triple burials were discovered.19

Some 1,000 human skeletons were recovered

from the Aymyrlyg cemetery, and the skeletal re-mains are now stored in the Department of Physi-

cal Anthropology of the Peter the Great Museum

of Anthropology and Ethnography (Kunstkammer)in St. Petersburg. A recent paleopathological ex-

amination of the skeletal remains identified threecases of scalping in this corpus.20The osteological

characteristics of these three cases and a furtherScythian period example from Kurgan 2 at Pazyryk,

also in south Siberia, are analyzed below.

siberian cases of scalping

Scalping may be defined as the forcible removalof all or part of the scalp from the head. The proce-

dure involves the incision of the skin overlying theskull with a sharp object in a circular pattern21 to

enable the easy removal of the soft tissues from thecranial vault.22The practice has been undertaken

throughout the past among different world cul-tures, usually in order to retrieve human trophies

11 Litvinsky and Guang-da 1996, 29.12 Phillips 1965, 112.13 Davidova 1996, 159.14 Mannai-Ool 1970, 108.15Vainshtein 1980, 51.16 Mandelshtam 1992, 193.

17Vainshtein 1980, 96.18 Mandelshtam 1983, 26.19 Stambulnik 1983, 347.20 Murphy 1998.21Axtell and Sturtevant 1980, 467.22 Hamperl 1967, 630.


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PREHISTORIC OLD WORLD SCALPING 32002]

as indicators of success and bravery in warfare. Ithas also been suggested that scalping may havebeen undertaken for therapeutic or magico-reli-

gious reasons.23

The first case from the Aymyrlyg cemetery with

clear evidence for scalping is a Scythian period malewith an age at death of 2535 years. Healed frac-

tured nasal bones were apparent. Unfortunately,the context for this case was uncertain, and onlythe skull was available for analysis. Numerous small

sharp cut marks, with an appearance that was indic-ative they had been made using a metal tool, were

apparent on the surface of the cranial vault. Thecut marks ranged in length from 4 mm to 62 mm,

and followed the circumference of the skull. The

characteristics of the cut marks suggest that theobjective of the scalper had been to carefully re-move a circular area of skin from the superior and

posterior aspects of the cranium. The cut marks onthe occipital and the posterior regions of the pari-

etals ran in a horizontal direction, parallel to oneanother. The superior margins of the cut marks

were generally beveled, which may indicate that theperson who had made the marks had been posi-tioned superior to the skull, and that the skin had

been peeled off in an anterior direction. No signsof healing were associated with the scalping cut

marks, and it is therefore probable that the proce-dure may have occurred either immediately prior

to death or during the perimortem period.

23 Owsley 1994, 3378.

CHINA

KAZAKHSTAN

MONGOLIA

RUSSIA

Aymyrlyg

Pazyryk

Ob

Yenisey

Km

0 100 200

Fig. 1. Map showing the location of Aymyrlyg and Pazyryk


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Two Hunno-Sarmatian period individuals exca-

vated from the Aymyrlyg cemetery also displayedclear evidence of scalping. Both individuals were

buried in the same tomb, and it is therefore proba-ble that they had been scalped concomitantly. Thecut marks apparent in Skeleton XXXI. 87. Sk. 1, a

1725 year old male individual, and in SkeletonXXXI. 87. Sk. 2, a 3545 year old male, were practi-

cally identical in morphology and location (figs. 23; hereafter termed Sk. 1 and Sk. 2). This may indi-

cate that a single individual had carried out bothprocedures. In both cases numerous small sharpcut marks were apparent on the surface of the cra-

nial vault. The cut marks again followed the cir-cumference of the skull, and their morphology sug-

gested that the objective of the scalpers had beento carefully remove a circular area of skin from the

superior and posterior aspects of the cranium. Thecut marks on the occipital and the posterior regions

of the parietals ran in a horizontal direction, paral-lel to one another. The superior margins of the cutmarks were generally beveled, which may indicate

that the individuals responsible for making themhad been positioned superior to the skull, and that

the skin had been peeled off in an anterior direc-tion. The cut marks on the frontal bone and the

anterior aspect of the right parietal also displayedbeveled superior margins, which may suggest theyhad been made in the opposite direction.

Evidence of sword injuries was also present inthe remains of both Hunno-Sarmatian period indi-

viduals. A sword cut was present on the neural arch-

es of the 11th and 12th thoracic vertebrae in Sk. 1,which indicates that the attacker had been posi-tioned behind the individual. A sword cut was alsoapparent on the right femur of Sk. 2. It is probable,

therefore, that both individuals had been em-broiled in a single episode of violence, which pos-

sibly involved armed combat and, perhaps follow-ing their defeat, they had been deliberately and

methodically scalped. Based on the clear evidencefor weapon injuries and lack of signs of healingassociated with the scalping cut marks of either in-

dividual, it is possible that the scalping proceduresoccurred immediately prior to death or during the

perimortem period; the victors of the attack maythen have taken the scalps as war trophies. A spear-

head and a variety of knives were recovered fromthe burial, possibly indicating the warrior status of

the two men. The circumstances of the formal buri-al accorded to the two individuals also suggest that

the bodies had been retrieved by their relatives and

friends and had then been buried as befitted theirstatus in life.

A high status male individual with battle-axe in-juries from Kurgan 2 at Pazyryk in the High Altai

also displayed evidence for scalping (fig. 4). Ser-

gei Rudenko, the excavator of the kurgan, provid-ed a detailed description of the mummified indi-

vidual. He concluded that the scalp had been re-moved from the cranium after death, and stated

that the skin above the forehead had been cutthrough from ear to ear and then torn backward to

expose the skull as far as the neck. Prior to burial ascalp from another individual had been attachedto the anterior aspect of the cranium with horse-

hair.24 Three perforations caused by blows from abattle-axe were visible on the parietals. Similar bat-

tle-axe injuries were apparent on numerous Scyth-ian period individuals from Aymyrlyg and, in prac-

tically all cases, these injuries would have resultedin death.25

The Pazyryk mummy is currently housed in the

Department of Archaeology in the State Hermit-age Museum of St. Petersburg. A recent reexami-

nation of the mummy by the current authors hasidentified the injuries and postmortem alterationsdescribed by Rudenko. In addition, however, a

number of small cut marks, clearly indicative ofscalping, were also discovered to be present on the

skull. As has been postulated for the two Hunno-Sarmatian period individuals from Aymyrlyg, it is

probable that the Pazyryk male had been scalped

in the aftermath of an incident of combat, with hisscalp removed as a war trophy. Again, it would seemthat his body had been retrieved and formally bur-ied by his kith and kin.

Within the New World, the remains of a numberof scalped individuals have been discovered asso-

ciated with grave goods. In contrast to the Siberianexamples, these individuals show no signs of hav-

ing met a violent end but were given mortuary treat-ment and deliberate burial. This finding may sug-gest that their scalps had been removed for other

cultural purposes apart from warfare. It is knownthat a number of Native American tribes regarded

a scalp to have a supernatural or religious signifi-cance.26Among the Pueblo tribes, scalps were re-

lated to sacrifices and ceremonies conducted tobring rain. Scalps were also used for therapeuticreasons among Native American tribes; the Nava-

ho, for example, believed that chewing on a scalp

24 Rudenko 1970, 221.25 Murphy 1998.

26 Owsley 1994, 337.


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would cure a toothache.27Conversely, however, theretention of the scalps of dead warriors as battle

trophies appears to have been widely practicedthroughout many geographic regions of the world

including Europe, America, and Africa.28 Numer-ous individuals from both the Scythian and Hun-no-Sarmatian periods formally buried in tombs at

Aymyrlyg displayed evidence of weapon trauma, afinding that further attests to the warfaring nature

of these tribes.29

osteological evidence for scalping inthe old world during prehistory

A number of scholars have provided overviews of

the historical references to scalping, which indi-cate that scalping was practiced throughout both

the Old and New Worlds.30 Historical references tothe activity in the Old World are contained in a

number of classical sources, perhaps the earliestand most quoted of which is Herodotuss descrip-

tion of scalping among the Scythians, written in thefifth century B.C.31The majority of the archaeologi-

cal evidence for scalping, however, has been ob-tained from New World contexts,32and a large cor-pus of material has been investigated.33 This evi-

dence indicates that scalping was practiced in theAmericas as early as the fifth or sixth centuries A.D.34

Osteological evidence for Old World scalping ismuch less frequent. In addition to the four cases

from Siberia reported here, a small but significantcorpus of cases has been discussed in English, Rus-sian, and German reportscases that indicate that

scalping has occurred during prehistory at a rangeof geographic locations across the Old World. Indi-

vidual case studies35 and reviews of scalping evi-dence in both northern Europe36and Russia37have

Fig. 2. Cut marks indicative of scalping on the frontal bone and right parietal of Sk. 1. (Photo by E. Murphy)

27Allen et al. 1985.28 Burton 1864.29 Murphy 1998.30 Reese 1940; Anger and Diek 1978.31 Reese 1940, 7.32 Roberts and Manchester 1995, 85.

33 Larsen 1997, 119.34 Owsley 1994, 337.35 Glob 1969, 93; Fischer 1988, 3940; During and Nilsson

1991; Ortner and Ribas 1997.36Anger and Diek 1978.37 Mednikova 2000.


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been published, and this information is synthesized

below. The following literature-based review pre-

sents summaries of possible cases of scalping inorder to raise awareness of these little-known pur-

ported cases of prehistoric Old World scalping. Thecurrent authors have not physically examined these

crania and, as such, it is difficult to be certain oftheir authenticity. This is particularly true for ex-

amples that are not accompanied by published il-lustrations or photographs.

The earliest cases are of Neolithic date and in-

clude a cranium that dated to approximately 4500B.C. and was recovered from Dyrholmen Bog, Rand-

ers in Denmark during excavations in the 1920s

and 1930s. The disarticulated remains of a varietyof animals and at least 20 individuals were retrieved,including the cranial vaults of at least nine people.

A series of shallow cut marks were visible on thefrontal bone and on one of the parietals of a childof approximately 10 years of age, and these marks

were interpreted as evidence for scalping.38A sec-

ond Neolithic cranium that displayed evidence of

scalping, dated to ca. 3000 B.C., was recovered fromthe Alvastra pile-dwelling in Sweden during exca-

vations in 1917. The individual was male, aged ap-proximately 20 years, and his head appeared to have

been decapitated since only the skull, atlas, andaxis were recovered. Cut marks were identified on

the cranium but were found to be restricted to thefrontal bone where they followed the curve of thebone. The cut marks may have been made using a

stone tool.39Finally, the disarticulated remains of atleast three individuals associated with Neolithic

pottery sherds, stone tools, and animal bones were

recovered from Atzenbrugg in Austria, and a num-ber of the human skull fragments displayed cutmarks that were interpreted as evidence for scalp-

ing.40

A greater range of case studies has been report-ed for the Bronze Age in Europe and the Middle

38Anger and Diek 1978, 1667.39Anger and Diek 1978, 16872; During and Nilsson 1991.

40Anger and Diek 1978, 173.

Fig. 3. Cut marks indicative of scalping on the occipital and left parietal of Sk. 1. (Photo by E. Murphy)


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East. The skull of an adult male, with an age at death

greater than 40 years, was recovered from a shafttomb at the Early Bronze Age (ca. 32003000 B.C.)

site of Bab-edh-Dhra in Jordan, and displayed evi-dence of scalping associated with healing. The le-sion extended from the mid-region of the frontal

through both parietals and onto the occipital. Ithad an irregular margin and was associated with a

groove that was indicative of healing. No deliberate

cut marks appear to have been associated with thelesion, and its irregular margin suggested that thescalp was torn, rather than cut, from the skull. It has

been suggested that this damage may have beencaused by an animal predator, and that no humanagent was involved.41 A number of German exam-

ples of scalping during this period have also been

reported. During the 1860s five bog bodies were

retrieved from the Tannenhausener Bog, nearHamburg, associated with jewelry that was consid-

ered to be of Early Bronze Age date. Hair was visibleon the back and sides of each individuals head,but in all cases it appeared to have been severed

from the anterior aspect of the skull where sharpcuts were evident.42 In addition, the remains of sev-

en scalped headsand in some cases their de-

tached scalpswere reported from among a cor-pus of skulls discovered within a Bronze Age sanc-tuary in Bentheim. A number of the heads displayed

cut marks that were considered to be definite evi-dence of scalping.43

Maria Mednikova has assembled a corpus of cas-

es of scalping from Bronze Age Russia. A cranium

41Ortner and Ribas 1997.42Anger and Diek 1978, 175.

Fig. 4. View of the right side of the head of the scalped male individual fromKurgan 2 at Pazyryk. The removal of the skin of the head and neck is clearlyevident, as are two perforations, which were made using a pointed battle axe.(Photo by Y. Chistov)

43Anger and Diek 1978, 1756.


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recovered from the Kalinovskaya Kurgan in the Al-

exandrovskova region of the Northern Caucasusdisplayed cut marks on its surface that included a

variety of overlapping lines, geometrical patterns,and triangular and rectangular shapes.44 Two fur-ther possible cases of Bronze Age Russian scalping

have been discovered in the Pepkino Kurgan, lo-cated in the upper basin of the Volga River. The

remains of 27 individuals were discovered in thekurgan, many of whom displayed injuries caused

by weapon trauma. Burials 12 and 26, both of whomwere adult males, displayed cut marks on their rightparietals.45

A number of possible cases of scalping that dateto the Iron Age have been recorded in northern

Europe. These include the remains of three par-tially preserved bodies recovered from Wennigst-

edt in Germany in 1866. None of the individualshad retained their hair, and cut marks were visible

on their skulls, which were interpreted as evidencefor scalping.46A female bog body from Borremosein Denmark is reported to have had her face crushed

and the back of her head scalped. Although no cutmarks were evident on the cranium, the scalp ap-

peared to display evidence of having been torn fromthe skull.47Another possible case of scalping origi-nated from Strandby in Denmark, where the crania

of an adult male and female were discovered. Cutmarks that ran vertical to the hairline were visible

on the female cranium, and were considered to beindicative that the individual had been scalped.48A

human skull recovered from Karlstein in Germany

in 1886 was reported to have displayed sharp cutmarks on its frontal bone. A copper coin that dis-

played the Roman Emperor Hadrian, who reignedfrom A.D. 117138, was retrieved from the mouth

region of the skull.49 Finally, the skulls of a Romanman and woman dating to the period between the

second and fourth centuries A.D. were recoveredfrom the well of a villa discovered at Regensburg-

Harting in Bavaria. Both skulls appeared to havebeen bludgeoned on their frontal bones. In addi-tion, the woman seems to have been killed by sever-

al sword blows. A series of cut marks were also evi-dent on her frontal bone, and these have been in-

terpreted as evidence of scalping.50

conclusion

The Greeks considered scalping to be so typical

an activity of the Scythians that they invented a spe-cial verbaposkythizeinto denote the process.51

Herodotuss description in his Histories, written in

the fifth century B.C., is generally accepted as the

earliest historical reference to the practice.52

Theheads of vanquished enemies were carefully pro-cessed with the skin being stripped from the head

by making a circular cut around the ears; the skullwould then have been shaken out. Herodotus alsorelated how the flesh was scraped from the skin

using an ox rib, cleaned and worked by the warrioruntil supple, then used as a form of handkerchief.

The handkerchiefs were hung on the bridle of thewarriors horse as symbols of battle prowess.53This

description corresponds perfectly to the evidencefor scalping obtained from the remains of the Scyth-ian and Hunno-Sarmatian period steppe nomads

from south Siberia discussed in this paper.An understanding of the Greek fascination with

scalping may be gleaned from an examination ofanother unusual practicecannibalismascribed

to the Scythians by Herodotus.54 This practice wasviewed as a toposby Herodotus and a practice thatwas to be associated with foreigners. In his discus-

sion of cannibalism, Arens has shown how the as-signment of bestial practices to ones enemies or

even neighbors, to contrast their lack of culture withones own, is a nearly universal cultural practice,

especially when it also employs the usual dispar-agement of the cannibal as sexually promiscuous.55

Indeed, Herodotus combines incest with cannibal-ism in his description of the Massagetae. It is there-fore possible that Herodotus provided such a de-

tailed description of scalping in his Histories sincehe was trying to dehumanize the Scythian tribes by

portraying them as violent and warfaring in nature.Whereas it is possible that Herodotuss description

of cannibalism arose from a misunderstanding of afunerary practice,56 the cases of scalping from Ay-myrlyg and Pazyryk are physical proof that the tribes

of the Scythian world did indeed practice scalping.The four cases of Siberian scalping presented

here may not appear to reflect the apparent wide-spread nature of this practice as described by Hero-

44 Mednikova 2000, 623.45 Mednikova 2000, 634.46Anger and Diek 1978, 177.47 Glob 1969, 93; Anger and Diek 1978, 1834.48Anger and Diek 1978, 1845.49Anger and Diek 1978, 185.50 Fischer 1988, 3940.

51 Rolle 1989, 82.52 Reese 1940, 7.53Slincourt and Burn 1972, 291.54 Murphy and Mallory 2000; 2001, 16.55Arens 1979.56Murphy and Mallory 2000; 2001.


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dotus. This situation, however, may simply reflect

the approach of physical anthropologists workingon Russian material. With the exception of the cas-

es highlighted by Mednikova, the majority of Rus-sian physical anthropologists have concentrated onobtaining craniometrical and osteometrical infor-

mation from archaeological human remains, andpaleopathological analysis has only been undertak-

en by a small number of scientists. Indeed, the pa-leopathological analysis on the human remains from

Aymyrlyg represents one of the few full studies ofthis nature on a large cemetery population of Scyth-ian period date.57 It is quite probable that many

more cases of scalping will become apparent in theremains of individuals from the Scythian period

when more of their skulls are carefully examinedfor the characteristic pattern of cut marks.

The four cases of scalping evident among theseseminomadic pastoralists from south Siberia are

currently among the earliest definitive osteologi-cal examples for this practice in the ancient world.While confirming the accuracy of Herodotuss his-

torical account of scalping among the Eurasiansteppe nomads of the Scythian period, the osteoar-

chaeological information from Aymyrlyg has alsoindicated that scalping continued into the suc-ceeding Hunno-Sarmatian period of the Xiongnu.

Eileen Murphy

school of archaeology and palaeoecology

the queens university of belfast

belfast bt7 1nn

northern [email protected]

Ilia Gokhman

department of physical anthropology

museum of anthropology and ethnography

(kunstkammer) russian academy of science

3 university embankment

st. petersburg 199034

russia

[email protected]

Yuri Chistov

department of physical anthropology

museum of anthropology and ethnography

(kunstkammer) russian academy of science

3 university embankment


russia

[email protected]

Ludmila Barkova

department of archaeology

the state hermitage

34 dvortsovaya embankment


russia

[email protected]

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Allen, W.H., C.F. Merbs, and W.H. Birkby. 1985. Evi-dence for Prehistoric Scalping at Nuvakwewtaqa(Chavez Pass) and Grasshopper Ruin, Arizona. InHealth and Disease in the Prehistoric Southwest, edited byC.F. Merbs and R.J. Miller, 2342. Arizona State Uni-versity Anthropological Research Papers 34. Arizo-na: Arizona State University Press.

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Arens, W. 1979. The Man-Eating Myth: Anthropology andAnthropophagy. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Axtell, J., and W.C. Sturtevant. 1980. The UnkindestCut, or Who Invented Scalping? William and MaryQuarterly37:45172.

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American Journal of Archaeology106 (2002) 113511

The Ancient Temple on the Acropolis at AthensGLORIA FERRARI

Abstract

This article concerns the Archaic temple of Athenathat was set on fire in the Persian sack of Athens and itsfunction in the monumental reconstruction of theAcropolis under Pericles. A new analysis of archaeologi-cal, epigraphical, and historical sources leads to the con-clusion that the temple was neither destroyed in theassault nor taken down at a later date, but that, as Drpfeldargued, it remained standing until well into the Romanperiod. Further, it is argued that the old temple was thecore of an extensive choreography of ruins that is thebackground against which the new Periclean buildingsacquire their meaning.*

It is in that golden stain of time, that we are to lookfor the real light, and colour, and preciousness of

architecture; and it is not until a building has assumedthis character, till it has been entrusted with the fame,and hallowed by the deeds of men, till its walls havebeen witnesses of suffering, and its pillars rise out ofthe shadows of death, that its existence, more lastingas it is than that of the natural objects of the worldaround it, can be gifted with even so much as thesepossess of language and of life.1

The discovery of the archaic temple of Athenaon the vast empty terrace at the center of the Acrop-olis came as a surprise.2 In 1885 Wilhelm Drpfeldrecognized in the structure at the northeastern endof the terrace, whose massive retaining wall runsunder the Porch of the Maidens of the Erechtheum,a large poros temple. What remained after the work

of clearing the area, which had begun in earnest

with Ross in 1834,was completed by Kavvadias in1886,3were its foundations, preserved, in onepoint,to the level of the stylobate (fig. 1). Apparently, nobuilding ever had encroached on the place of thetemple in antiquity, except for the Porch of theMaidens, perched on the north foundation of itsperistyle (fig. 2). Drpfeld immediately recognizedin the great Doric building the temple of AthenaPolias, which had stood on the Acropolis at the timeof the Persian invasion and sack of Athens in 480B.C.E., and identified it with the arkhaios naosmen-tioned in literary and epigraphical sources.4Therefinally was an answer to the question of the origin of

pieces of entablature built into the north wall ofthe citadel, in correspondence to the foundations:this was the temple to which they had once be-longed.5But the discovery also played havoc withthe understanding of the sacred topography of theAcropolis that was current, as enshrined in Jahnand Michaelis, Arx Athenarum.6On the basis of Stra-bo (9.16), who mentions only two temples on theAcropolis, it had long been assumed that those twowere the Parthenon and the Erechtheum and thatthe latter was the reconstruction of the archaic tem-ple of Athena Polias, which the Persians had de-stroyed.7One had to reckon now with the fact that

the archaic temple was not rebuiltnot on the same

* I thank T. Jenkins for calling my attention to the Ruskinpassage and for much assistance besides in both technical andscholarly matters. A. Cohen, P.E. Easterling, M. Flower, A.Hollman, M. Jameson, N. Luraghi, G. Nagy, and J.C. Wrightcontributed valuable suggestions and corrected mistakes. I amespecially grateful to my colleagues at the University of Chica-go, T. Cummins, L.M. Slatkin, and Wu Hung, for insights intothe relationship of monuments to social memory. My greatestdebt is to D.H. Sanders, who brought to the project exactingstandards, immense patience, and commitment.

1 Ruskin 1849, 172.2That the area occupied by the temple was the site of a struc-

ture, however, had been seen before. In Michaelis (1871, pl.1) its perimeter is drawn in outline and tentatively identifiedas that of the Cecropium; see Korres 1996, 78. Burnouf (1877,1634, pl. XII) describes the structure as a terrace in blocks ofAcropolis limestone: Lautre moiti est remblaye jusq labase de lrechthum au moyen dun pav (18) compos deplusieurs assises de blocs polygonaux superposs. [. . .] Lesblocs dont se compose le pav proviennent du rocher mmede lAcropole et ont d tre obtenues quand on a form les

diverses esplanades consacres Minerve ou Diane. A ouestde lrechthum, ce pav se termine par un mur de vingt-qua-tre mtres de longueur, dont langle sest croul et qui secontinue en retour dans la direction de langle occidental duParthnon. According to Harrison (Harrison and Verrall 1980,496) Btticher discovered this pavement in 1862. I thank M.Jameson for this reference.

3On the work of clearing the Acropolis of post-ancient struc-tures, see Mallouchou-Tufano 1994. For earlier records of Athe-nian monuments, see Korres 1998.

4Drpfeld 1885, 275;1886a; 1886c; Kavvadias and Kawerau1906, col. 32.

5 On the discoveries and the debate over the assignment ofarchitectural members in poros found on the Acropolis to theOld Temple of Athena and the archaic predecessor of theParthenon, see Korres 1997, 21825.

6Jahn and Michaelis 1880.7 Seethe comments in Dinsmoor 1942, 185. As Jeppesen

(1987, 1112) observes, the communis opinio,which prevails tothis day, was founded as early as 1676 by Jacob Spon.


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GLORIA FERRARI12 [AJA 106

site, which, moreover, was left untouched by thecomprehensive reconstruction undertaken by Per-icles. This was clearly a case such as the one Dins-moor envisioned, where archaeology turns up apiece of the past that does not fit neatly within the

given current historical reconstruction:8

The archaeologist, engaged primarily in the study andinterpretation of the material products rather thanthe verbal records of mans past, that is, the illustra-tions of the written text rather than the text itself, themonuments rather than the documents, often findsthat he is in the enviable position of dealing with theunbiased evidence of contemporary witnessespro-vided that he can interpret itas contrasted with thetextual tradition which is so often retrospective andsometimes mistaken or willfully prejudiced. Yet illus-trations and text form an inseparable whole; the onemust fit the other; and the arbitration of differencesis often delicate.

In the figure of the unbiased contemporary wit-ness, Dinsmoor evoked the old hope of the anti-

quarian that the truth about the past lies preciselyin its tangible, unprocessed remains. In the event,the case of the Drpfeld temple, as some call it still,demonstrated instead the tenacity of establishedconstructs and their ability to resist intrusions that

would threaten their very foundation. Drpfeld tookhis discovery to show that the archaic temple wasrepaired in the years immediately following thePersian sack and that it remained standing, al-though without its peristyle, to the end of antiquityand beyond.9 His proposal found few, if distin-guished, supporters.10 Frazer and Michaelis stoodby the old explanation, arguing that the Drpfeldtemple was not the ancient temple of Athena Po-lias but a new temple with respect to the arkhaiosnaos, which lay still under the Erechtheum.11Theseattempts to reestablish the orthodox view of thematter were soon dismissed but, already in 1901,Bates had offered an interpretation that accommo-dated the new discovery and required only minor

Fig. 1. Plan of the arkhaios naosby W. Drpfeld. (After Wiegand 1904, fig. 117)

8 Dinsmoor 1942, 185.9 Drpfeld 1887a; 1887b; 1890; 1897. Drpfelds final for-

mulation of the hypothesis of the survival of the temple isbriefly stated at the end of his 1919 article, p. 39: the Peri-clean plan for a total reconstruction of the archaic temple andadjacent buildings and shrines only got as far as the Erech-

theum; in actuality the temple was retained and repaired afterthe fire in 406 (for which see infra, n. 26).

10 Harrison and Verrall 1890, 5029; Cooley 1899; F. Dm-mler, REII s.v.Athena, col. 1952; Schrader 1939, 3956.

11 Frazer 18921893, 16774;Michaelis 1902, 111.


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THE ANCIENT TEMPLE ON THE ACROPOLIS AT ATHENS 132002]

adjustments to the traditional account.12The Drp-feld temple was the temple of Athena Polias burnedby the Persians. This burned temple, he argued,was never rebuilt, in keeping with the oath the al-

lied Greek forces took on the eve of the decisivebattle at Plataea, when they pledged never to re-build the shrines of the gods destroyed by the bar-barians.13Bates connected the provisions of the oathto the fact that, after 479, some of the destroyedtemples were left in ruins for a generation and re-built after 450. He found the explanation for thisstate of affairs in the so-called Congress Decree,mentioned in Plutarchs Life of Pericles (17.13). Asthe Spartans grew wary of the growing power of Ath-ens, Pericles introduced a bill to convene the Hel-lenic states that had fought the Persians to a con-gress in Athens. Its agenda would be to discuss what

to do about the sanctuaries that had been burnedby the barbarians, the sacrifices that had been vowedto the gods in the course of the struggle, and thepeace among the Greek states and safe navigation.It was his intention, according to Bates, to persuadethe allies to revoke the oath because the Acropolis

with its burnt ruins had come to be an eye-sore tothe Athenians, and Pericles desired to clear theground and build a new temple. When the initia-tive failed, Pericles unilaterally took the decision

to rescind the part of the Oath of Plataea that con-cerned the temples: at Athens the Acropolis wascleared of its ruins and the Parthenon begun.14

Batess reconstruction of events left substantiallyintact the understanding of the history of the Acrop-olis that existed before the discovery of the Drp-feld temple. As before, the Erechtheum could beseen to be the successor of the ancient temple ofthe Polias, in name as well as in fact, and the placewhere the ancient temple had stood continued tobe viewed as an empty terrace of no particular in-terest. Thus by 1942the date of Dinsmoors sweep-ing reconstruction of the historical topography of

the Acropolisthe waters had closed over Drp-felds discovery. The questions it had raised remainunanswered. Why, given the spirit of grandeur thatinformed the Periclean rebuilding of the Acropo-lis, was the principal cult of the city served by sucha small edifice, less than half the size of the archaic

12 Bates 1901.13 Lycurg. Leoc.81; Diodorus 11.29.3; cf. Isoc. Paneg.4.156.

14 Bates 1901, 322, 326.

Fig. 2. Early 20th-century aerial view of the foundations from the south. (Courtesy of the Fine Arts Library, HarvardCollege Library)


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temple and lacking a peristyle, as well as pedimen-tal sculptures? Why was the temple not rebuilt onits original location, as customary? And why was theterrace on which it had stood left unencumberedby new construction? I wish to return here to themost vital part of Batess argument, one that he sup-

pressed in the end, namely, that the ancient tem-ple of Athena Polias was never rebuilt indicatescompliance with the Oath of Plataea. If the fact thatthe site of the ruin was left untouched is givenappropriate emphasis, instead of being swept aside,a different explanation of the Periclean architec-tural plan and of the events surrounding it becomespossible. The thesis of this article is that after thePersian sack the temple was left standing and madeinto a monument to barbarian sacrilege and Athe-nian righteousness. Far from being unsightly rub-ble, the ruin at the heart of the Acropolis func-tioned as the point of relay to which the other build-

ings responded. The argument moves from a dis-cussion of the Oath of Plataea to consider literaryand archaeological evidence for the existence ofthe war memorial.

The debate over the authenticity of the Oathbegan in antiquity. In the fourth century B.C.E.Theopompus of Chios, who was no friend of theAthenians, denounced it as a sham, of a piece withother Athenian claims, such as the Peace with theMede, the decisive role of Athens at Marathon, andother impostures the city of the Athenians perpe-trates and fools the Hellenes.15 Indeed, a recita-tion of ancestral glories, with a pronounced anti-

Peloponnesian flavor, is the context in which weencounter the Oath of Plataea for the first time, inLycurguss prosecution of Leocrates for treason(81).16 The relevant section of the speech openswith a reference to the attempt to withdraw thenight before the battle of Salamis by the Spartan,Corinthian, and Aeginetan commanders (70).Alone among the Hellenes, the Athenians forcedthem to stay and fight, and prevail upon the barbar-ians. The heroic sacrifice of Codrus for the city, inthe face of the first Peloponnesian invasion of Atti-

ca ever, is later recounted at length (8487). Asmuch as these stories, the Oath of Plataea lent it-self to a self-aggrandizing, boastful discourse aboutthe Athenian past, and that is all that may be saidwith confidence about it. But, in order to be effec-tive, the Oath had to appear to be true. Its power to

bear witness to the piety and courage of those menof old is stressed in the phrase, which in Lycurgussspeech follows its recitation (82): They stood bythis oath so firmly, fellow men, that they had thefavor of the gods on their side to help them; and,though all the Hellenes proved courageous in theface of danger, your city won the most renown. Therhetorical force of this statement depends upon itsbeing common knowledge that, in the event, theAthenians did what they said they would do: fol-lowed leaders, buried dead comrades, punishedcollaborators, and made war memorials of theburned shrines. For this reason Lycurguss state-

ment is hard to reconcile with the current view thatthe Acropolis was cleared of the debris of the Per-sian destruction and the Oath of Plataea essential-ly discarded. How could he say so boldly that theancestors had stood firmly by the oath, when itwould be so very apparent to anyone looking in thedirection of the Acropolis, the Parthenon toweringover it, that it was not so. How could the Oath ofPlataea play a role in the fourth century construc-tion of the gesteof Athens, unless the scarred wallsof the ancient temple of the Polias were there tobear out the truth of the claim?

Most scholars of the Acropolis now would agree

that the ruin was part of the Acropolis landscapefor some time, if only as part of a temporary, make-shift arrangement. Fifth- and fourth-century sourc-es mention a structure called tout court Opisthodomos,which housed the treasuries of Athena and of theOther Gods.17The word normally signifies the rearchamber of a temple, but this structure is called anoikos, an oikema, and part of the Acropolis, as thoughit were detached.18A decree dated around 420B.C.E., which contains the provision that a columnbe erected behind (or south of) the Opisthodomos,

15FGrH115 F 153. Connor (1968, 7881) pointed out thatthe wording of the fragment does not justify the widespreadnotion that Theopompus made an outright denial of the oathand the peace. He further notes (88) that the Oath, the peacewith Persia, and Marathon each plays an important role inAthenian panegyric and propaganda in the fourth century.The debate continues in modern time, with scholars firmlypositioned on one side or the other, but those who believe inthe oaths historicity seem now to have the upper hand, afterSiewerts monograph on the subject. Siewert (1972, 1028),however, argues that the promise to make memorials of theburnt shrines was not part of the original oath, because that

clause is omitted in the Acharnae inscription and some tem-ples were rebuilt immediately after the battle of Plataea.

16 Michael Flower points out to me that Diod. Sic. 11.29indirectly may preserve the earliest surviving version of theoath, which he drew from Ephorus of Cyme, although Styl-ianou (1998, 4950, 11012)concludes that the publicationof Ephoruss history is contemporary or slightly later than Ly-curguss speech, falling in the late 330s and the 320s.

17 Harris 1995, pt. II.18: Harpocration s.v. ; scholia to Demos-

thenes 13.14. : Demosthenes 24.136, with scholia. : Suidas, s.v. .


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seems to confirm that this Opisthodomoswas a free-standing building.19The solution to the puzzle ofhow an independent structure might be called rearchamber was proposed first by Ernst Curtius and isstill in favor: this was the western part of the archaictemple of Athena, the one discovered by Kavvadias

and Drpfeld. After the Persian sack, only theopisthodomosof the temple was repaired and con-tinued to serve as treasury, retaining its old name.20

Scholiasts and lexicographers tell us that theopisthodomos was located precisely where onewould expect it to be if, indeed, it was once the rearchamber of the temple of Athena Polias: behindthe temple of the Athena called Polias.21On theunwarranted assumption that the cella of the ar-chaic temple had been razed by the Persians ortorn down soon after the sack, the temple of Athe-na mentioned in reference to the Opisthodomoswas identified in the Erechtheum. From no signif-

icant viewpoint on the Acropolis, however, thisOpisthodomos would appear to be behind the Ere-chtheum and, in effect, anyone looking for it therewould find himself in the Pandroseum.22If the Cur-tius hypothesis is correct, the temple in questionshould be the eastern half of the Drpfeld temple,the cella that housed the ancient image.

While there is no evidence that the archaic tem-ple was ever taken down, there is some to the con-trary. The temple of Athena Polias is last men-tioned by Pausanias (1.27.1) in the second centuryafter Christ. Before him, Strabo had stated that therewere on the Acropolis the ancient temple of the

Polias, in which is the lamp that is never extin-guished, and the Parthenon made by Ictinus, inwhich is the Athena, the work of Pheidias in ivo-

ry.23 Strabo may be using the expression ancienttemple, arkhaios naos, in a purely descriptive andgeneric sense. In that case he draws a distinctionbetween an old and venerable structure (which,therefore, cannot be the Erechtheum) and the Clas-sical Parthenon. Or arkhaios naos has here a con-

ventional, nondescriptive meaning and functionsas the name of a particular building (which, in thiscase, may be the Erechtheum). But the labelarkhaios naos to designate the temple of AthenaPolias occurs in sources concerning events thatrange from the late sixth century to Hellenistictimes.24 The earliest mention occurs in referenceto Cleomenes attempt to seize the Acropolis in507/6 B.C.E. The penalties inflicted upon his Athe-nian supporters were inscribed on a bronze steleset up next to the arkhaios naos (Schol. Ar. Lys.273). The most important testimony is given by thedecree of the Praxiergidae, containing the provi-

sion that a stele be set up behind the ancient tem-ple.25This inscription dates to the years 460450,that is, to the time intervening between the Persiansack and the Periclean reconstruction, 30 years ormore before construction of the Erechtheum be-gan. What might be called arkhaios naos on theAcropolis at this time, except the temple of AthenaPolias in which the last defenders of the city hadtaken refuge? And the old temple of Athena, thepalaios neos, which was set on fire in 406 B.C.E., canhardly be any other.26

The literary and epigraphical testimonia coher-ently support Drpfelds contention that the archaic

temple continued to exist into late antiquity. If theOpisthodomos continued to stand as a separatestructure, it is not only possible but likely that the

19 The earliest mention of the Opisthodomosoccurs in adecree dated 440420 B.C.E.,IG13.207.1415: ] [ |] . InAristophanesPlutus(119193) there is talk of restoring Plutusto his old residence, always standing guard over theopisthodomosof the goddess. The latest reference to the build-ing is in a speech of Demosthenes of 353/2 (24, 136). Most ofthe literary and epigraphical testimonia are collected and dis-

cussed by White 1895.See also Harris 1995, 401.20 Curtius 1890, 163. The hypothesis of Frazer (18921893,

1626) and Michaelis (1902, 246) that the Opisthodomos isto be sought in the Parthenon,was endorsed by Paton (1927,4734) and most recently by Hurwit (1999, 1434).

21Scholion to Aristophanes Plutus 1193: . Harpocration, s.v., scholia to Demosthenes 13.14: . Scholion to Aristophanes Plutus1193, Suidas,s.v. . Photius,s.v. .

22 Cooley 1899, 399400.23 Strabo 9.1.16: ,

, , , , .

24 Most are discussed in Dinsmoor 1932,passim(esp. 31113). For the fourth-century B.C.E. records of the treasuries inthe arkhaios naos, see Harris 1995, pt. VI and appendix V. Ifollow Michael Jameson in believing that a damaged passagein a decree of ca. 34325 B.C.E. (IG22.334.910) is most easily

restored to refer to the old temple, as it is in the corpus, butruns into the difficulty that animal sacrifice in the Classicalperiod was not performed indoors. It may be that the build-ings ruined state, with part of the temple open to the skies,allowed it to be the site of sacrifice (pers. comm.). The latestepigraphical mention of the ancient temple of the AthenaPolias occurs in an Athenian decree of the second centuryB.C.E., IG22.983.56.

25 IG13.7.6: ] [.26Xen.Hell.1.6.1:

, , [ , ].


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cella of the archaic temple also survived, torn fromits rear chamber, charred and battered but suchthat it could be repaired and continue to house theancient wooden statue.27In the wake of the Persiansack, the two parts of the temple were repaired,under the supervision of a board of overseers in

charge of works on the Acropolis. The Pericleanreconstruction of the Acropolis made the scarredbuilding its core and framed it with splendid re-constructions of buildings damaged in the sack. Tothe south, the Parthenon is the grandiose reincar-nation of its predecessors on the same site. TheErechtheum is likewise the successor of the shrinementioned by Herodotus (8.55), whose orientationit follows, rebuilt on a larger scale and lavishly orna-mented.28 But the temple of Athena Polias re-mained the templeon the Acropolis, standing whereit always had, adjoining the shrine of Pandrosos, ofwhich the shrine of Erechtheus was part.

Such a reconstruction is in agreement with an-cient descriptions of the place, which leave no doubtthat the temple of Erechtheus, although close tothe temple of the Polias, was not identical with it.29

Herodotus (8.55) speaks of a temple, , of Erech-theus, which was within the sacred precinct of theAcropolis, , and also housed the tokens of thecontest between Athena and Poseidonthe oliveand the salt sea.30 In Euripides Erechtheus, Athenainstructs Erechtheuss widow to build his precinct,, a stone enclosure.31 Cicero (Nat. D. 3.49)claims to have seen both the shrine, delubrum, andthe priest of Erechtheus. Pausanias (1.26.56) de-

scribes first a building called the Erechtheum,

then another, which he calls the temple of Athe-na Polias; the Erechtheum is mentioned as wellin the Plutarchian (Life of Lycurgus, 843E) (). The serpent, which guarded the Acrop-olis, was housed in the sanctuary of Erechtheus,according to one source, in the temple of the Po-

lias according to Eustathius, who is obviously ex-trapolating.32The testimony of Philochorus locatesthe olive tree, which, according to Herodotus, waspart of the precinct of Erechtheus, next to and be-low the temple of Athena Polias.33 From this onemay conclude that the one was adjacent to the oth-er. The testimonia, such as they are, are easily rec-onciled with the archaeological remainsprovid-ed that we recognize in the little Ionic temple theErechtheum and acknowledge the presence of theancient temple of the Polias on its terrace. Far frombeing vague and confused, Pausaniass descriptionof the site (1.26.627.1) follows the logic of the ter-

rain, moving from the Erechtheum to the temple ofthe Polias, then offering some observations aboutthe Pandroseum before describing the sculpturesplaced on the terrace of the temple. There are tworeasons why an explanation of the surviving evi-dence along these lines has been tenaciously op-posed, one having to do with a matter of fact, theother with the misguided perception that the ruinwas an eyesore.

The linchpin in the argument that the Erech-theum effectively replaced the archaic temple evenin name, and became the temple of Athena Poliasthat was called arkhaios naos, is provided by a ste-

le dating to 409/08, which gives an account of con-

27 Korres (1994, 42, 467) allows for the survival of the cellauntil the completion of the Erechtheum.

28Casanaki and Mallouchou (1983, 92, cited by Hurwit 1999,1445) mention remains of a temple, which preceded theErechtheum on the same site. See also Korres 1997, 229, 242.

29 The argument that Athena and Erechtheus shared thesame temple on the Acropolis has long relied on the descrip-tion of the Athenian contingent in the Catalogue of Ships,Iliad 2.54651: | , | , | |

| . at line 549 is taken to mean that Ath-ena established the cult of Erechtheus in her own temple. Theadjective , however, may refer not to the grammatical sub-ject but to a person who is at the moment specially prominent(Leaf 1900, 561), as it does at Iliad 24.422 ( ), for example, andIliad 6.500 ( ). For the nonreflexive useof and in Homer, see Chantraine 1953, 155. In linewith all other testimonia concerning the cult of Erechtheus, Iunderstand Iliad2.549 to say that Athena installed Erechtheusin his own temple.

30 Herodotus (8.55) uses the term metonimically torefer to various parts of the precinct: the temple, the salt sea,and the olive tree, which surely stood in the open. Dionysiusof Halicarnassus (Ant. Rom.14.2), who echoes his description,appropriately correctsinto , sacred enclosure orprecinct. Jeppesen (1987, 3844) subjects Herodotuss de-scription of the Acropolis to close scrutiny and correctly pointsout that the word is used inappropriately in the passagein question. The testimony of Philochorus (FGrH328 F 67)makes it impossible, however, to detach the Erechtheum froma location adjacent to the temple of Athena Polias, as Jeppes-en and Robertson (1996, 3744) propose. The latter identi-

fies the temple of Erechtheus in what now is called BuildingIV.

31Austin 1968, fr. 65, 901.32Hesychius, s.v.

. , . Eustathius at Odyssey1.357, p. 1423, 8: , , , , .

33Philochorus (FGrH328 F 67) reports an ominous event of306, in which a dog entered the temple of the Polias, plungedinto the Pandroseum, and lay down on the altar of Zeus Herkeios,under the olive tree.


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struction work on the Acropolis. In the heading ofthe inscription, which contains extensive, unmis-takable references to the Erechtheum, the boardof supervisors, which drew the report, has the titleof epistatai of the temple on the Acropolis in which(is) the ancient statue.34This, at first sight, ap-

pears to be unshakable proof that the Erechtheumhoused the venerable image of the Polias. Becauseit contained the arkhaion agalma, the reasoninggoes, the building then came to be known as thearkhaios naos, although in itself it was brand new,indeed under construction.35 This explanation isproblematic in several respects. The ancient im-age should not be in the Erechtheum in 409/08,because the little temple was then being built andwas stil l roofless.36The difficulty is overcome bythe hypothesis that a temporary shelter was con-structed for the allegedly homeless statue on ornear the site of the Erechtheum, which would lat-

er arise, as it were, all around the image. And itwould be this temporary shelter that documentssuch as the decree of the Praxiergidae call thearkhaios naoslong before the foundations of thepresent Erechtheum were laidbecause it con-tained the ancient image.37

The fact that it enjoys wide endorsement is notenough to make this series of inferences credibleagainst the weight of the archaeological, epigraph-

ical, and literary evidence examined above. Andthe single fact on which the whole edifice rests isnot as unquestionable as it seems. Strictly speak-ing, what the building accounts from 409/08 allowus to say is that the epistatai of the temple thathoused the ancient image were in charge of the

construction of the Erechtheum. That the Erech-theum and that temple are one and the same is areasonable inference, which, however, contradictsall other available evidence. One may then consid-er an alternate interpretation: that the charge ofthe overseers of the archaic temple, with its statue,extended to other shrines on the Acropolis, or atleast shrines that might be considered part of itstemenos,38 namely, the Pandroseum, Cecropium,and Erechtheum. Accordingly, the reconstructionof the Erechtheum should be seen as part of a larg-er and more important project: the restoration ofthe ancient temple and of the Acropolis as a whole.

The board named in the building accounts of theErechtheum bears an uncanny similarity to an earli-er Athenian board of overseers. An Eleusinian de-cree dated around 450 B.C.E. contains the amend-ment of one Thespieus, who proposed the estab-lishment of epistatai in charge of the property of thegoddesses on the model of those in charge of workson the Acropolis who supervised the temple andthe image.39 The imperfect tense, , im-

34 IG13.474.1: [] h .

35 Paton 1927, 4656. For a recent summary restatement ofthis widely accepted explanation, see Hurwit 1999, 2002.

36The possibility that the wording of the inscription may beunderstood in a proleptic sensethe temple in which theancient image (will be)was raised by Caskey (1927, 2989)and quickly dismissed. The presence of the archaic statue inthe temple under construction has been inferred from thefollowing passages in the building accounts: IG13.474.75,mentioning unsmoothed areas in an area in front of thestatue, ; IG13.275.26970, regardingthe painting of ceiling coffers above the beams which are overthe statue, . As Drpfeld (1919, 1516)and Paton (1927, 4567) observed, neither passage impliesthat the statueany statuewas physically in place as workwas going on, only that its placement had been determined inthe plan and served as a convenient point of reference.

37Dinsmoor 1932, 318: the poros temple being uninhabit-able and likely to remain so, it is probable that the AncientImage would have been moved to a point outside the temple,probably sheltered under a baldachino in the open precinctjust to the north. See also Dinsmoor 1947, 109 n. 4. For arestatement of this argument, see Harris 1995, 2014. Thishypothesisis akin to an earlier one, put forward by Weilbach(1917, 11112), according to which the ancient statue wasmoved from the ancient temple, which was undergoing re-pairs, to the Erechtheum, still under construction. The paral-lel adduced in support of this scenario is the shelter built overthe omphalosat Delphi, while the new fourth century temple

was under construction (Bourguet 1932, no. 32, 811). Notethat, in that case, the temporary structure was the means ofdealing with an object that could not be detached from itslocation. This situation is precisely the opposite of that envi-sioned for the ancient image of Athena, which would have beenremoved from its ancient seat to the construction site. Theprobability of the argument may be shaken further by inscrip-tions, whose date precedes the completion of the Erechtheum,that speak of the removal of objects from the arkhaios naosand thus require us to believe that the temporary shelter forthe statue functioned also as treasury. These are IG13.341.l2,dated to 406/5 or 407/6, and IG13.403.18, 21 of 416/5. Thelatter would be given greater weight in this context, were itnot for the fact that the arkhaios naos and Parthenon to whichit refers may be those in the sanctuary of Artemis at Brauron.

38On the division of the Acropolis into temene marked off byavenues of circulation and terraces, see Korres 1994, 3940.The possibility that Herodotus viewed the entire area of the

northern sanctuary, including the Pandroseum, as one sanc-tuary is broached by Dinsmoor 1947, 110, n. 4, but in an effortto identify the temple of Erechtheus with that of the Polias.

39 IG13.32.1013: |[] [] [] |[] h [] [|][][] []. The Athenian boardmay be mentioned as well in a decree which probably refers tothe temple of Athena Nike, IG13.64.1921: ]|h [ h ] | [][] . See D. Lewis, IG13.463 (commentary on IG13.474);Mark 1993, 10810.


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plies that this Athenian board had accomplished itstask or had done so in the past and continued toaccomplish it; in any case, it was already in existence.The decree thus attests the existence of a board di-recting building projects on the Acropolis and, morespecifically, charged with the oversight of what could

be called the temple and the statue, without fur-ther qualifications, in the years preceding the be-ginning of construction on the Parthenon.40The un-warranted assumption that the archaic temple of thePolias had been dismantled, or was reduced to auseless ruin, coupled with a desire to identify in thetemple and the statue mentioned there Parthenonand Parthenos, has driven some to special plead-ing.41No other candidate, however, is as likely as thattemple, with its ancient statue, here, as in the Hek-atompedon inscription, given as simply the temple.42

If the Eleusinian body reflects its model in any mea-sure, the charge of this Athenian board was broad,

extending to financial matters and building projectsother than the temple itself.43The second decreeof Callias (IG13.52 B) offers a case in point, in that itconcerns completion of several different works wellunder way. The decree contains provisions for thecompletion of marble statues, gold figures of Victo-ry, and the Propylaea (35), as well as works involv-ing the Acropolis as a whole (512), to be con-ducted under the supervision of the treasurers ofAthena,44the architect, and a board of epistatai (10: [ ]), who may or may not be iden-tical with the treasurers.45The Thespieus amend-ment and the second Callias decree demonstrate

that there existed in Athens in the fifth century

boards with broad powers of oversight over buildingactivities on the Acropolis, in addition to boards thathad charge of a single project.46The epistatai whosupervised the construction of the Erechtheum are,I suggest, successors of those earlier boards withbroader capacities, and supervised construction af-

fecting not only the Erechtheum but the archaic tem-ple as well. The records reveal traces of activity con-cerning the temple of the Polias: Xenophon tells usthat the old temple suffered a fire in the archon-ship of Callias, in 406 B.C.E. and, indeed, the Ere-chtheum building accounts register parts of thetemple that had been burned.47

More support for the hypothesis presented abovemay be gleaned from the fragmentary inscriptionsthemselves, which record stages of construction andexpenditures. Among them, the one most exten-sively preserved is the opisthographic stele IG13.474(fig. 3) mentioned above.48 The text is laid out in

two columns, under the following heading (17):

] h [-

] , , (), [

] , ,

] h -

5 ] h , h, -

] , ,

h] .

40 Sinceits publication by Kourouniotis (1932) the identifi-cation of the temple mentioned in the Thespieus Decree hasbeen intensely debated in connection with the date of thedecree. The criteria for dating that are routinely applied toepigraphical texts of the fifth century yield a date around 450,which is retained in IG13.32. Accordingly, Picard (1933, 13)and Vallois (1933, 195200) identified the temple as the ar-chaic temple of the Polias and the statue as the Promachos.

41 On those grounds, Mattingly (1961, 171; 1984, 347)ar-gued for a date in the 430s; see also Meritt and Wade-Gery1963, 11114.Cavanaugh (1996, ch. 2), who herself favors thelater date, gives a useful critical survey of the controversy. To

argue, as Mattingly does, that the Eleusinian decree does notrefer to the temple of the Polias because there is no evidenceof the restoration of that temple before 450 is an instance ofcircular reasoning. One may note, in addition, that the Par-thenon and the chryselephantine statue most probably wereunder the supervision of not one but two distinct boards ofepistatai; see Boersma 1970, 56; Hurwit 1999, 310. This diffi-culty is addressed in Shear 1966, 11113, 2267; Miles 1998,42 n. 20.

42 On the sense of in the inscription, see Dinsmoor1947, 119, 121; the expression may be used in the same way inAntiph. 6.39 and Xen. Hell.2.3.20.

43The Eleusinian epistatai had control of all the property ofthe goddesses and supervised all building projects in the

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