BMCR 2009.07.18: Roller on Draycott, Kerkenes Special Studies 1: Sculpture and Inscriptions from the Monumental Entrance to the Palatial Complex at Kerkenes Dag, Turkey. With a contribution by Claude Brixhe and Turkish summary by G. Bike Yazicioglu. Oriental Institute Publications 135

Catherine M. Draycott, Geoffrey D. Summers, Kerkenes Special Studies 1:
Sculpture and Inscriptions from the Monumental Entrance to the Palatial
Complex at Kerkenes Dag, Turkey. With a contribution by Claude Brixhe
and Turkish summary by G. Bike Yazicioglu. Oriental Institute
Publications 135.  Chicago:  The Oriental Institute of the University
of Chicago, 2008.  Pp. xxiv, 89; 98 p. of plates.  ISBN
978-1-885923-57-8.  $90.00.

Reviewed by Lynn E. Roller, University of California, Davis
([email protected])
Word count:  1739 words
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The excavations conducted at Kerkenes Dag, located in Yozgat Province
in central Turkey, have substantially enlarged our knowledge of
settlement patterns and cultural development on the Anatolian plateau
during the middle of the first millennium BCE.  The impressive ruins of
Kerkenes have long attracted scholarly notice, and the site was briefly
explored by Erich Schmidt and a team from the Oriental Institute of the
University of Chicago in 1928, who determined that the site was
post-Bronze Age and pre-Classical.  Given his strong orientation
towards Hittite studies, Schmidt had no further interest in the site
and so it was left untouched until 1993.  Since then the investigations
at Kerkenes have been sponsored by Middle Eastern Technical University
in Ankara under the direction of Geoffrey Summers, ably assisted by
Franc,oise Summers and an international team.  Early years were devoted
primarily to survey work, including a thorough aerial survey by balloon
and a resistivity survey of the central portion of the settlement.
This was an effective means of reconnaissance, given the large size of
the Kerkenes settlement, whose wall circuit is over seven kilometers in
length.  The survey enabled the creation of an accurate map of the site
and its fortification walls, and further identified an area where
several large architectural structures were concentrated as the most
profitable place for excavation.  The investigations also determined
that the site's period of habitation was fairly brief, approximately
seventy years, and that it had been thoroughly destroyed by a military
action that had deliberately pulled down the defensive walls and fired
the entire settled area within the walls.  The material found at
Kerkenes suggests a date in the seventh and sixth centuries BCE.  Based
on these circumstances, together with the site's location, Summers
supported the identification of the site as ancient Pteria (first
proposed in 1929 by Przeworski), a strongly fortified city east of the
Halys River that, according to Herodotos 1.76, was captured and
destroyed by the Lydian king Croesus as part of his campaign against
the Persian ruler Cyrus in the 540's BCE.  This remains the most
plausible identification for the ancient site.

The chronology of the Kerkenes settlement and its location east of the
Halys River placed it within the boundaries of the Median Empire, as
described by Herodotos.  When the METU team first started its work at
Kerkenes, the expectation was that this was a Median site.  The
excavations, however, revealed a settlement that showed strong
affinities with Phrygian culture.  Excavation at the site has been
concentrated in the area near the southeastern gate, termed the
Cappadocia Gate by the excavators, and among the material found there
was an architectural complex with a large building in the typical plan
of a Phrygian megaron, inscriptions in the Phrygian language, and an
aniconic cult idol within the Cappadocia Gate that has a rectangular
body and disc-shaped head, a close match for the many cult idols found
in the Phrygian Highlands and elsewhere in Phrygia.  While the portion
of the ancient city that has been uncovered remains small, further
excavations have confirmed the Phrygian character of the site,
revealing a monumental entrance complex and courtyard adjacent to the
megaron and extensive examples of bronzes and stone sculpture that
display strong affinities with Phrygian style and subject matter.  Thus
it appears that Kerkenes was an outpost of Phrygian settlement within
Median controlled territory, and that it retained its cultural
identity, and perhaps also its political independence, after the rest
of Phrygia west of the Halys River had come under Lydian control.
Given that most of our information about Phrygian architecture and
urbanism before this time had come from Gordion, the discovery of a new
monumental Phrygian city is very exciting.  Indeed, the excavations at
Kerkenes have forced scholars to rethink the cultural landscape of
central Anatolia during the mid-first millennium BCE, the critical
period of the formation of the Achaemenian Empire.  Throughout, the
excavations have been conducted with great care and annual reports have
been promptly published in the Kerkenes News, in several publications
on Anatolian archaeology, and on the Kerkenes web site
(http://www.kerkenes.metu.edu.tr) .  Many of these reports, however,
have not received as wide circulation as they deserve, and so the
present volume, published under the auspices of the Oriental Institute
of the University of Chicago, draws welcome attention to this important
project.

The volume publishes a particularly noteworthy group of finds from
Kerkenes, a series of sculptures, architectural members, and an
inscription found in the monumental entrance complex to the large
megaron.  Excavated between 2003 and 2005, this complex comprised a
broad paved street that passed through two flanking stone platforms and
led to the large megaron, plausibly identified as a palace.  In the
vicinity of the street and platforms were found the remains of a
life-size sculpture depicting a human figure, a rectangular stone block
that was decorated with sculptural relief and bore a Phrygian
inscription along its edges, and other sculptural fragments including
part of a lion and the legs and talons of a bird of prey.  All of the
pieces were badly damaged: all had been broken, probably deliberately
smashed and scattered at the time of the site's destruction, and all
showed significant traces of the fire that destroyed the settlement.
The recovery and reconstruction of the sculptural fragments were
clearly tasks that demanded great care and thoughtful analysis, and the
authors of the volume, Catherine Draycott and Geoffrey Summers, are to
be commended for the attention to detail that they brought to this
undertaking.

The volume begins with a discussion of the location and geography of
the site and an overview of the history of the Iron Age city, including
a description of the megaron complex, termed the palatial complex by
the authors, where the sculptural fragments were found, and the
circumstances of its destruction.  This is followed by the catalogue
entries for the sculptural fragments, ten pieces in all, written by
Catherine Draycott, and the catalogue entries for two architectural
elements, written by Geoffrey Summers.  Both sections use the same
order of presentation, giving a catalogue entry with a careful
description of each piece, including detailed discussions of the
potential reconstruction of the work, its meaning, and relevant
comparanda.  Next is a general discussion of the meaning of the
sculpture and architectural elements, their function and chronology,
their place in Phrygian art and architecture, and their relationship to
neighboring cultures.  A comprehensive discussion by Claude Brixhe of
the Phrygian inscription concludes the text.  The plates provide a
black and white photograph of every piece, along with drawings of
suggested reconstructions and visual comparanda.  At the end is a
series of color photographs of several of the sculptural pieces and of
one part of the stone inscription.

The major interest of the material presented here lies in the
publication of the sculptures found in the area of the monumental
entrance.  The principal piece of sculpture is a near life-size statue
of a standing male figure wearing a long gown and holding a rod or
staff in the right hand.  This is an important and unique find; very
little life-size sculpture of any kind is known from Phrygia, and
almost all extant examples of anthropomorphic sculpture depict a female
figure, usually the Phrygian Mother goddess, the Greek and Roman
Kybele.  The precise identity of this male figure remains uncertain,
but the piece is likely to have been a representation of a ruler or
cult figure, perhaps a deified heroic ancestor.  Another key find is a
series of pieces belonging to a rectangular stone block that contained
relief sculpture on its principal face.  The relief sculpture is
preserved in many small fragments and so its reconstruction is
tentative, but a likely restoration presents two antithetical composite
figures with human bodies and griffin heads, which stand and face each
other beneath a winged sun.  Both the sculpted male and the relief have
numerous parallels with sculptures and reliefs from urban centers in
southeastern Anatolia and northern Syria and Iraq, the so-called
Neo-Hittite kingdoms, and these parallels are thoroughly explored by
Draycott.  Additionally, two architectural fragments, a stepped base
and a series of stone bolsters discussed by Geoffrey Summers, probably
also belonged to the same installation.  The whole is presented in a
suggested restoration comprising a stepped base, on which stood the
inscribed stone block with the sculpted panel in the center, surmounted
by the statue of the standing male figure.  Draycott's discussion
places the Kerkenes pieces in the context of Phrygian art and its
relationship to the Neo-Hittite iconographic tradition, where the
practice of representing dominant male figures and relief sculptures
near the gates or entrances to a city was well established.

The final section, by Claude Brixhe, discusses the Phrygian inscription
that was incised onto the raised edges of the large rectangular stone
block.  This is a summary of an earlier publication by Brixhe and
Geoffrey Summers that appeared in Kadmos in 2006.  Brixhe plausibly
restores the inscription as a dedication by several individuals named
within the text, presumably those who were responsible for erecting the
monument.  The inscription adds another example to the limited corpus
of datable Phrygian inscriptions.

I noted a few minor points that I would disagree with.  In discussing
parallels for the costume of the statue of the male figure, Draycott
states that the ribbed skirt of Kybele is usually shown with the hem
drawn up and tucked into the belt.  It is the veil of the goddess,
however, that is drawn up and tucked into her belt, not her skirt,
which always hangs straight down.  In fact, the lack of a veil on the
Kerkenes figure is a point that strengthens the figure's identity as a
male.  In the discussion of sculptural parallels, I would prefer to
call the principal Phrygian goddess by her Phrygian name, Matar, or
Mother.  The term Kybele is a Greek name, one that was derived from one
of the epithets of the Phrygian Mother but was never used as her name
in Phrygia.  But these are comparatively minor quibbles that do not
detract from the overall quality of the publication.  In general, the
text is well written and free of errors, and the photographs are
superb, especially the color photographs, which must be somewhat of a
luxury in these times.  The careful discussion and prompt publication
of this important group of finds sets a high standard for the Kerkenes
Project.  We look forward to future presentations of material from this
fascinating site.