The Archaeology of Midas and the Phrygians : Recent Work at Gordion

273 Pages·2005·15.49 MB·English

by  Lisa Kealhofer

T A M
HE RCHAEOLOGY OF IDAS
P
AND THE HRYGIANS

T A M
HE RCHAEOLOGY OF IDAS
P
AND THE HRYGIANS
R W G
ECENT ORK AT ORDION
Edited by
Lisa Kealhofer

University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology
Philadelphia
Copyright © 2005
University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology
3260 South Street • Philadelphia, PA 19104-6324
First Edition
All Rights Reserved
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
The archaeology of Midas and the Phrygians : recent work at Gordion / edited by Lisa
Kealhofer.-- 1st ed.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 1-931707-76-6 (alk. paper)
1. Gordion (Extinct city) 2. Phrygia. 3. Turkey--Antiquities. I. Kealhofer, Lisa.
DS156.G6A73 2005
939’.26--dc22
2005004394
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The Editor would like to thank both Santa Clara University for subsidizing the inclusion
of the color illustrations and an anonymous donor for production support.
Chapter 8: The research from which this chapter is drawn has been carried out with
financial support of Bucknell University, the National Endowment for the Humanities, the
American Philosophical Society, the Council of American Overseas Research Centers, the Loeb
Library Foundation, the Margo Tytus Visiting Scholars Program of the Classics Department
at the University of Cincinnati, and the Parker Visiting Scholars Program at Brown University.
Phoebe Schweitzer produced illustrations based on drawings done in the field by the author.
Chapter 11: The Gordion Regional Survey was funded by the National Science Foundation
(Award Number 9903149) (1999–2002), the American Research Institute in Turkey (1996), the
College of William and Mary, and the University Museum. Ben Marsh patiently compiled the
GIS maps for this chapter, and Peter Grave commented on several versions.
Chapter 12: B. Burke, J. Chang, E. Denel, and M. Dixon processed the Dümrek survey
ceramics, and PIXE-PIGE analysis was funded by grant #99/115 from the Australian
Institute of Nuclear Science and Engineering.
Chapter 14: The research from which this chapter is drawn has been carried out with
funds from the National Endowment for Humanities (1995), American Research Institute
in Turkey (1996, 1997), and American Philosophical Society (1998). Partial funding was
provided by research funds from the University Museum (2000–2004). Jason D. Block
assisted the author in landuse and sheepfold surveys in 1998–2000.
Chapter 15: Thanks to G. Kenneth Sams for his vision and long-term support of
conservation at Gordion and to the directors and staff of the Museum of Anatolian
Civilizations in Ankara for their unending interest, cooperation, and help. The team
members of the Gordion Objects Conservation program are always willing to provide help
and advice. Special thanks go to Ibrahim Bolat and the rest of the staff of the Gordion
Museum, who have steadfastly tended to the monthly environmental and structural monitors
in the tomb. Sometimes it does take a village.
C
ONTENTS
1 Recent Work at Gordion
Lisa Kealhofer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
I EXCAVATIONS, HISTORY, AND DATING AT GORDION
2 Gordion: Exploration over a Century
G. Kenneth Sams . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
3 Old Problems and New Solutions: Recent Excavations at Gordion
Mary Voigt . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
4 Greek Pottery and Gordion Chronology
Keith DeVries . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36
5 Reconstructing the Roman-period Town at Gordion
Andrew Goldman . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56
II INTERPRETING THE FINDS FROM GORDION
6 Textile Production at Gordion and the Phrygian Economy
Brendan Burke . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
7 A Decorated Roof at Gordion: What Tiles Are Revealing about the
Phrygian Past
Matt Glendinning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82
8 Glass Vessels from Gordion: Trade and Influence Along the Royal Road
Janet Duncan Jones . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101
9 A Preliminary Report on the Human Skeletal Material from Gordion’s
Lower Town Area
Page Selinsky . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117
10 The Local Potter’s Craft at Phrygian Gordion
Robert C. Henrickson . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 124
III GORDION IN ITS REGIONAL CONTEXT
11 Settlement and Land Use: The Gordion Regional Survey
Lisa Kealhofer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 137
12 Ceramic Compositional Analysis and the Phrygian Sanctuary at Dümrek
Peter Grave, Lisa Kealhofer, and Ben Marsh . . . . . . . . . . . . . 149
13 Physical Geography, Land Use, and Human Impact at Gordion
Ben Marsh . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 161
14 Ethnographic Lessons for Past Agro-Pastoral Systems in the
Sakarya-Porsuk Valleys
Ayşe Gürsan-Salzmann . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 172
vi CONTENTS
IV CONSERVING GORDION AND ITS ARTIFACTS
15 Support and Conserve: Conservation and Environmental Monitoring
of the Tomb Chamber of Tumulus MM
Richard F. Liebhart and Jessica S. Johnson . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 191
16 Recent Conservation Research: Soluble Salts in Gordion Ceramics
Julie Unruh and Jessica S. Johnson . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 204
17 Architectural Conservation at Gordion
Mark Goodman . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 215
Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 230
Contributors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 250
Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 254
1
R W G
ECENT ORK AT ORDION
LISA KEALHOFER
Gordion is one of the few sites in the Middle East, outside of the Levant and
Egypt, with ongoing archaeological excavations and research since 1950 (Fig. 1-1).
Research at Gordion has always been highly innovative: for example, in the 1950s
Gordion provided some of the first radiocarbon samples to the new radiocarbon
lab at the University of Pennsylvania Museum, and early magnetometer studies
were conducted by Elizabeth Ralph, the director of the Museum Applied Science
Center, on the Citadel Mound. More recently, multidisciplinary environmental,
analytic, and chronometric projects have advanced new methods.
With a long history of research and excavation, Gordion provides an
exceptional opportunity to study specific historical and archaeological questions.
For example, studies of both new and previously excavated material are providing
insights into the exchange systems of the 1st millennium BC and early centuries
AD. Despite its inland location (Chapter 4 this volume), Gordion was closely linked
to Eastern Mediterranean trade networks. New evidence also reveals shifting trade
alliances and exchange with groups to the east (Chapter 8 this volume).
Gordion is also one of the key sites in central Anatolia that offer a long
occupation sequence from the Early Bronze Age to the early 1st millennium AD
(Voigt 1997). With a selection of widely dispersed sites like Gordion, Boğazköy,
Alişar, and Sardis, we are beginning to understand the nature of early civilizations
during the Late Bronze and Iron Ages. How did Gordion interact with the Hittite
Empire? How did the Phrygians and Midas create and consolidate a new state in
central Anatolia? What was its economic basis? How did it fit into the regional
economic and political structures of the day? These are questions that the research
presented here is beginning to answer.
From a methodological point of view, Gordion also has brought together
researchers who bridge several archaeological and material science disciplines.
Interest in the site was originally stimulated by historical accounts, such as those
of Herodotus and later Greek and Roman authors, but since about 1985 a
broader set of questions about the Phrygians and their landscape has developed.
Alongside archaeological research, Gordion has also become an important
center for innovations in site and monument conservation (Chapters 15–17 this
volume).
For all of these reasons, and others, research at Gordion is significant not
only to those with specific interests in ancient Anatolia, but also to a wider range
of people interested in more general processes of cultural interaction, state
Figure 1-1 Turkey, showing the location of Gordion and other major sites mentioned.
RECENT WORK AT GORDION 3
development and collapse, as well as the practicalities of how people protect sites
and artifacts for future generations.
This book aims to present an accessible summary of much of the recent
research on Gordion and the Phrygians. While the University of Pennsylvania
Museum Monographs on Gordion provide a scholarly venue for individual,
detailed studies, no summaries of the current research at the site are available. This
book seeks to fill that void. Compiling all current research at Gordion is beyond
the scope of this project, but the chapters provide a substantial sample of the
range of ongoing research projects for the University of Pennsylvania Museum’s
Gordion Project.
The wide range of research at Gordion is grouped here into four sections:
site history and excavations, artifact analyses, regional survey, and site and artifact
conservation.
PART I EXCAVATIONS, HISTORY,
AND DATING AT GORDION
The current Director of the Gordion Project, G. Kenneth Sams, discusses
the history of excavations at Gordion from work by the Körte brothers at the turn
of the 20th century to the beginning of the current excavations in 1988. The vast
quantity of material excavated by Rodney Young, from 1950 to 1974, continues
to stimulate research on a variety of fronts, from architectural conservation (see
Chapters 16 and 17 this volume) to re-assessments of excavation contexts and
dating (e.g., Chapter 4 this volume).
Mary Voigt, the current Director of Excavations and Survey, presents the
goals and some of the achievements of excavations since 1988 (Chapter 3).
Recent excavations have explored a very different set of goals, as non-elite areas
of the site have been investigated to provide a more representative view of life at
ancient Gordion. Evidence related to craft activities (including metal production),
mortuary patterns, and cultural/demographic changes are part of the more detailed
and textured understanding contributed by recent work. Recent excavations have
also refined the stratigraphic sequence at the site, which has resulted in significant
changes in its chronology.
Keith DeVries, the Project Director from 1974 to 1988, has most recently
been working on understanding the context and sequence of Greek ceramic
imports to Gordion. Because these ceramics are extremely well dated (often to
within a decade), they provide an excellent way to date archaeological deposits
that have few other artifacts that can provide an absolute date. DeVries’ critical
reassessment of several key deposits (Chapter 4) has contributed to the recent
re-dating of the Destruction Level at Gordion (the boundary between the Early
and Middle Phrygian periods). Incorporating both new radiocarbon dates and
dendrochronology, this re-dating has wide implications for the timing of the
development of the Phrygian state (earlier than previously thought) as well as
the dating of the monumental mortuary tumuli surrounding the site of Gordion
(DeVries et al. 2003).