V 11 N 1

1
Electronic Antiquity 11.1 (Nov 2007)

The Mythology and Iconography of Colonization:
a Special Themed Issue of Electronic Antiquity

Guest Editors: Ann-Marie Knoblauch (Virginia Tech) & Terry Papillon (Virginia
Tech)

Introduction
Ann Marie Knoblauch and Terry Papillon
Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University
amk@vt.edu, Terry.Papillon@vt.edu

How Archaic Greek Colonization Developed and What Forms it Took
Alfonso Mele
Universit degli studi di Napoli Federico II, Naples, Italy
mele.alfonso@libero.it

Mythological Aspects in the Hittite Colonization of Anatolia
Itamar Singer
Tel Aviv University, Israel
singer_itamar@yahoo.com

Discussing Colonization in Archaeology: The Case of Hellenized Cyprus
(Once More)
Anastasia Leriou
University of Athens, Greece
nleriou@yahoo.gr

Cults of the Greek Cities En Aristera Tou Pontou: Interaction of Greek and
Thracian Traditions
Dobrinka Chiekova
Bryn Mawr College, USA
dchiekov@brynmawr.edu

Kadmos, Jason, and the Great Gods of Samothrace: Initiation as Mediation
in a Northern Aegean Context
Sandra Blakely
2
Emory University, USA
sblakel@emory.edu

Aphrodite and the Colonization of Locri Epizephyrii
Rebecca K. Schindler
DePauw University, USA
rschindler@depauw.edu

Colonizing Naples: Rhetoric of Allure and the 17
th
Century Spanish
Imaginary
Yolanda Gamboa and Noemi Marin
Florida Atlantic University, USA
ygamboa@fau.edu.com
nmarin@fau.edu

Debating the Origins of Colonial Women in Sicily and South Italy
Angela Ziskowski
Bryn Mawr College, USA
aziskows@brynmawr.edu

Myth and History in Oikist Traditions: Archias of Syracuse
Antonella Carfora
Universit degli studi di Napoli Federico II, Naples, Italy
antonella.carfora@katamail.com

The Myth of the Metropolis Colonization, Cosmopolitanism, and its
Consequences
Kristoffer Momrak
University of Bergen, Norway
kmomrak@gmail.com

Mythical Origins of Greek Toponimy in the Northwest Iberian Peninsula
Domingo Plcido
Universidad Complutense, Madrid, Spain
placido@ghis.ucm.es

Introduction: The Mythology and Iconography of Colonization: An
International Conference

Ann-Marie Knoblauch, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State
University
amk@vt.edu

Terry Papillon, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University
Terry.Papillon@vt.edu

The papers in this issue of Electronic Antiquity come from a
conference titled The Mythology and Iconography of Colonization: An
International Conference, held in October 2006 at the Villa Vergiliana in
Cuma, Italy. The conference was co-sponsored by Virginia Tech
(Blacksburg VA, USA) and the Universit degli Studi di Napoli
Frederico II (Naples, Italy). Ann-Marie Knoblauch (Art & Art History)
and Terry Papillon (Classical Studies) were the Virginia Tech organizing
faculty; Gioia Rispoli, Rossana Valenti and Raffaele Grisolia were from
Naples. Professor Alfonso Mele of Naples kindly joined us as sponsor
and key note speaker.
The project was a result of Virginia Techs first International Faculty
Development Program in 2005. Twelve faculty members (two each from
six colleges) traveled to Virginia Techs Center for European Studies and
Architecture in Riva san Vitale, Switzerland to develop and promote
individual international research projects, as well as consider ways to
ii Electronic Antiquity 11.1
enhance the Universitys mission on an international stage. We were
fortunate to be members of that 2005 class as a representative from the
College of Architecture and Urban Studies, School of Visual Arts, and
the College of Liberal Arts and Human Sciences, Department of Foreign
Languages and Literatures. Collaboration between us made sense since
we both do research on the classical world. As a result, we spent the
spring of 2005 exploring a project that would allow us to pursue mutual
research interests in an international setting. We developed the idea to
hold an international conference, the topic of which would treat the
rhetoric and iconography of colonization.
We created a connection with the three professors in Naples, and
during our time in Switzerland, we traveled to Naples to meet with them
and learn about the Centro Interdipartimentale di Studi per la Magna
Grecia and the work of Professor Mele. This visit resulted in our plans
for the conference, to be held in October 2006 at the Villa Vergiliana in
Cuma, Italy. Our choice of location was twofold: first, Cuma, near the
Bay of Naples, is in a part of the world in which ancient Greek
colonization had early and strong roots; and second, the intimate setting
of the Villa Vergiliana invited a level of collegiality that could extend
well past the formal paper sessions.
An excerpt from our call for papers expresses our goals for the
conference:

The process of colonization affects most world
cultures and by definition includes the colonizer, the
colonized, and the resulting hybrid community that
communicates what its new values are. But the
reasons for and impact of colonization differ
dramatically in different situations. This conference
encourages discussion of the rhetoric of the hybrid
community that colonization produces. Furthermore,
the concept of colonization appears in many
different contexts, including military occupation,
political posturing, economic planning, and modern
academic discourse, such as post-colonial studies.
This conference uses ancient Mediterranean
colonization as the starting point for broader
discussions of the impact of colonization.
Knoblauch & Papillon Introduction iii
We were excited and intrigued by the abstracts we received and the
conference that followed. We spent five days at the Villa Vergiliana,
where we welcomed speakers from Italy, Greece, Israel, Russia, Spain,
Portugal, Norway, and the United States. Our conference on the
hybridity of colonization became a metaphor for the conversation and
collegiality of an international group of scholars working on diverse
topics within diverse periods and parts of the world. The setting of the
Villa Vergiliana allowed for on-going conversations about the nuances of
colonial contact and impact, as well as site visits to Cuma, Pompeii,
Paestum, and the Naples Archaeological Museum.

Colonization

Colonization in one form or another has been a consistent theme
throughout much of human history, up to and including the present day.
Current political, military and commercial activities allow us to witness
at a rapid pace the ever-changing ways in which cultures compete and
coalesce on a global stage. Different actors are often able to manipulate
the assimilation process in ways that suit their interests, and the results
are often met with ambivalence by the world audience. Whether
discussing the spread of Coca-Cola or democracy, most of us recognize
that when something is gained, something else is lost. Can such trends be
observed and analyzed in other periods, and if so, how can they be
measured?
The theme of colonization interested us both and we recognized that
it could be fruitful for bringing together different disciplines to discuss
the topic from different methodological approaches. Ann-Marie works
with archaeology and iconography while Terry works with rhetoric and
oratory; thus we could already see many possible approaches to
colonization just from our own perspectives. Ann-Maries disciplines
(particularly archaeology) tend to identify colonization through the
material remains by pinpointing those elements that are an enduring and
transportable part of a groups cultural identity (burial practices, the
manifestation of religious beliefs, etc.) and document them in the
archaeological record, charting the local and non-local trends to separate
the colonized from the colonizers. Terrys research field of rhetoric often
looks at the way discourse meshes and distinguishes colonizers and
colonized. Through our project, we aimed to investigate ways that
multiple voices could lead to more robust commentary about the ways in
iv Electronic Antiquity 11.1
which cultures take an active or passive role in the evolution of a hybrid
culture.
The notion of colonization is a complicated one, both in antiquity as
today. What does it mean when a foreign group descends onto a place,
and how do we measure the impact on both the colonized and the
colonizer? Is assimilation of culture an automatic outcome of
colonization? If so, how can we (de)construct this process of assimilation
in order to determine the roles played by the two (or more) cultures
involved? While in some contexts (for example political, military and
economic power) the colonizer might be dominant by default, when it
comes to cultural assimilation in a non-local (and sometimes non-
familiar) region, does the colonized have a visible and/or lasting
advantage? Is it possible to move beyond biased official and/or historical
reports of successes or failures of colonies to understand the
consequences on every day people? Finally, is there an expiration date
on these questions? In other words, after the physical act of colonization
occurs, at what point (if ever) do two cease to talk of colonizer and
colonized, and instead address the assimilated culture?
We did not intend for our conference to provide explicit answers to
these questions. In fact, it goes without saying that every region, every
period and every culture creates its own algorithm that produces uniquely
local results when cultures come together through force or convenience.
The opportunities to advance the conversations provided by a conference
such as ours, however, enabled interdisciplinary engagement and a
broader view of history and humankind.

The Conference Papers

We intentionally wanted the conference to cover a broad range of
topics, starting with the classical world, of course, but allowing other
areas and time periods to inform and enlighten our inquiry. The papers
thus cover a wide array of times and places. This created an invigorating
environment for conversation.
For this issue, we give pride of place to the keynote paper by
Professor Mele, where he argues for a reconsideration of the inorganic
colonization through close attention to Homer, Hesiod, and Greek lyric
poetry focusing on the Rhodian example of Tlepolemus.
Knoblauch & Papillon Introduction v
We have set the rest of the papers out more or less geographically,
beginning in the East and traveling to the West. This was not meant to
prioritize the West, or imply a dominance of that West as a colonizer. It
came about more from the papers treating the East being chronologically
earlier.
Thus we begin in Anatolia, with Itamar Singers paper on Hittite
influences in Anatolia, focusing on the charter myth of the Queen of
Kanesh and the additional possibilities of a return myth. Anastasia
Leriou continues with a discussion of the rhetorical nature of
archaeological discussion, using the example of descriptions of the
Mycenean colonizastion of Cyprus. Dobrinka Chiekova then treats Greek
and Thracian interaction on the coast of the Black Sea. She clarifies how
religious cultic choices shows an interaction between Greek and original
Thracian thought. Sandra Blakely concludes the section dealing with
eastern Mediterranean topics with a discussion of Kadmos and Jason on
Samothrace, using the myth of initiation to highlight the interaction.
In the central Mediterranan region, Rebecca Schindler takes us to
Locri Epizephyrii in southern Italy to look at how the presentation of
Aphrodite represents connection. In a jointly authored paper, Yolanda
Gamboa and Noemi Marin take us up the west coast of Italy and upward
in time to look at Naples in the 17
th
century. They analyze the notions of
Naples as a rhetorical and colonial concept in Spain. Angela Ziskowski
looks at evidence for women in Sicily and southern Italy and their role in
informing us about colonial patterns; the Greek colonists took local
women as wives. Antonella Carfora analyzes a specific example of
colonial mythmaking with the example of Archias of Syracuse. Next,
Kristoffer Momrak contributes a more theoretical piece dealing with the
idea of colonization and metropolis, or mother city, using examples from
Sicily and North Africa. He argues that the narratives of the historians
hide the multiplicity of motives for colonization during the Archaic
period. Finally, we reach Spain and the west with Domingo Plcidos
paper on the colonization of the northwest Iberian peninsula by
Phoenicians and Greeks.
We are glad to offer this collection of papers that will show the
variety of perspectives and the variety of topics that come from some
deceptively simple questions.

HOW ARCHAIC GREEK COLONIZATION DEVELOPED AND
WHAT FORMS IT TOOK

Alfonso Mele, Universit degli studi di Napoli Federico II, Italy
mele.alfonso@libero.it

Premises for colonisation.

A lively debate has developed in recent years around the nature and
development of archaic Greek colonisation. This debate tends to prove
that the model based on the oecistmetropolisdate of foundation
relation that has been passed on to us through the ancient tradition in fact
results from a later normalisation process, which did not occur earlier
than the mid-7
th
century. For the most ancient period, archaeological
evidence would suggest a different model, made up of heterogeneous
colonial contributions and settlements following each other gradually
1
. In
the light of this, the chapters of our books of history concerning Greek
colonisation ought to be deleted and re-written. Colonists of different
origin flow towards the earliest settlements, as is confirmed by the
different origins of pottery; a consequence of this were settlements
without a well-defined plan and expanding gradually, a fact which finds
evidence in field studies. In the same perspective, Greek metropolitan
poleis must be primitivistically conceived as communities similar to

1
Cf. Purcel, Osborne, and Braund.
2 Electronic Antiquity 11.1
either those of the Polynesian big men
2
or to the stateless communities of
Black Africa
3
.
It is a wave of primitivism that beats down on the way in which the
archaic Greek society is perceived. Such a perception neglects the
existence of Homers poems (and all the lost works that accompanied it),
Hesiods poems and the whole world of which they were part; it neglects
the existence of lyric poetry and what it tells us about its contemporary
world. This view also seems to ignore the nature of the ancient emporia,
which does not make for a mechanical identification between the origin
of products and their usersthink, for example of the ubiquitous
spreading of Corinth ceramics and the presence of the archaic colonies of
Kerkyra and Syracuse. And it also seems to forget the characteristics of
the archaic poleis, developed following the two clashing models of the
kat komas polis, Sparta
4
, and of the synoecistic polis, Athens
5
.
I am not going to examine the issue in a comprehensive way; I have
already discussed this topic elsewhere.
6
Here I will limit my analysis to a
criticism of the inorganic colonisation model.
It should be remembered that there are references to the colonisation
dating from the time of the most ancient settlements in the 8th-7th
centuries BCE These references are included in what E. Havelock
defines as the Greek tribal encyclopaedia, that is Homer and Hesiod.
Alongside these works are the specific evidence and the colonial models
found in archaic Greek lyrical production: Callinus, Archilocus,
Simonides, Mimnermus and Alcaeus. In particular, Callinus was able to
recall a colonial movement from the past of the Troad region
7
; some
poets, then, were directly involved in colonial enterprises: Archilocus,
for example, took part in the colonial endeavour of Paros in Thasos
8
, and
described the foundation of Syracuse
9
and how the Ionians were
fascinated by the site of Siris; Simonides of Samos, instead, founded
Minoas on the island of Amorgos
10
. Past colonial enterprises had their

2
Quiller. Contra: Carlier.
3
Berent. Contra: Hansen 162.
4
Thuc. I, 10.
5
Thuc. II, 15.
6
Mele 2007
7
F 7 West.
8
FF 102.21.22.116.
9
F 293 West.
10
Sud., s.v. Simonides.
Mele Archaic Greek Colonization 3
own bards: Samos had Simonides
11
; Colophon had Mimnermus, who,
from his homeland also sang the war against Gyges
12
. Alongside them
came Xenophanes, who sang the origin of Colophon and the recent
foundation of Elea
13
. All these accounts must be taken into consideration
when evaluating the complex phenomenon of the archaic Greek
colonisation.
This is what we are going to attempt, starting from the archaic Greek
encyclopaedia, the Homeric poems, to comment on what they say about
colonisation. Homeric poems present the whole picture of the
phenomenon of colonisation. First, they present the preconditions for the
establishment of a colony, through an excerpt of the Odyssey about Goat
Island, located in front of the Cyclops land (IX 116-141). It is a wooded,
uninhabited island, showing no sign of the presence of humansno
hunters, or shepherds, or ploughersbut grazing land for a multitude of
goats. The island shows a good potential: its land is suitable for grazing
and for growing vines and cereals. It has a safe harbour and water
resources. But it has remained uninhabited because the Cyclops are not
sailors and do not build ships to travel to other peoples cities nor carry
out the typical activities which men undertake when they cross the seas
and meet with other men.
The meaning of this is clear. Colonies are born if some preconditions
are met: a prior knowledge of the places (which only a community of
origin that owns ships and is used to travelling and trading can obtain);
an attractive destination with good resources for farming (for the
growing of cereals and vines and for breeding); the possibility to moor
and stop in a safe harbour; and feasibility of the enterprise, which in this
case means the lack of any inhabitants. An implicit precondition is the
presence, in the community interested in the colony, of people who do
not benefit from these resources in their homeland and are therefore
willing to move to the new settlement. All these preconditions should be
seen in the perspective of the world in which Homeric aedes work, in the
paradigmatic forms of the tribal encyclopaedia that express the typical
premises for the foundation of a colony.
The fact that the chronological level at which this paradigm is
formulated is that of the earliest colonial settlements finds further support
in a number of other sources. When Hesiod, the other component of the

11
ibid.
12
FF 9.10.13.14.
13
D.L. IX.20.
Greek encyclopaedia, tells of his fathers migration from the Aeolic
Cyme to Ascra, he points out that his father had been involved in
maritime trade and was urged to move to a place which turned out to be
less attractive than it had seemed. In Cyme he had not been able to
overcome his difficult economic conditions through his work
14
. We are in
the second half of the 8
th
century.
Archilocus further supports the model for the first half of the 7
th

century. The territory to colonise must be attractive. This is not the case
for Thasos, that is likened to a donkeys back covered with woods, while
it is true for the area through which flows the river Siris, which is
beautiful, desirable and pleasant
15
. It is misery that drives colonists from
all over towards the island of Thasos
16
, and it is poverty that urges him to
do the same, leaving the island of Paros and a diet of figs and fish
17
.
Towards the end of the same century, Mimnermus confirms Archilocus
auspice, recalling that his fellow citizens went to sea heading for the
desirable Asia and the pleasant Colophon
18
. Even Apollo elects as his
temple a pleasant place, which ensures crops and has nice meadows
19
.
The premises and developments of the earliest contemporary Greek
foundations in Italy correspond to this model. Sea journeys by
prospectors since the late 9
th
century left a trace in the spreading of
Cycladic cups and cups with chevrons in Apulia, Lucania, western
Sicily, Campania and Etruria, followed by the late-geometrical colonial
settlements
20
. The most relevant situation is that of Pithecusae, the island
facing the mainland, which offered water and harbours, eukarpia and
trading opportunities. Discovered by prospectors, it later became an
agricultural-commercial settlement
21
. Zancles has a similar story: it was
discovered as a harbour with an indigenous name
22
and exploited for the
opportunities of maritime control and tele it offered, something which
the victims of this exploitation viewed as piracy
23
; later it became a

14
Hesiod Op 618; 631-640.
15
FF 21.22 West.
16
F 102 West.
17
F 116.Cf.P.,Py. 2,54-57; Critias 88 F 44 DK.
18
F 9 West.
19
H.Ap.,529-30.
20
E.Greco, Archeologia della Magna Grecia, Rome-Bari,1992,pp. 3 ss.
21
Cf. Mele 2003.
22
Thuc.,VI.4,5; Strabo,VI.2,3,268; Paus.,IV.23,7.
23
Strabo, IX,3,4,418-9, talking of Krisa, helps understand the link between the
imposition of tele and the judgement given by those who were obliged to pay
colony owning a territory that was appreciated for its eukarpia, or
euoinia, and excellent wine production
24
.
The second of the Homeric data, that is the agricultural resources as
a reason for settlements across the sea, appears again in the colonial
settlements of southern Italy. The Delphian Oracle assigned a wealthy
territory between the Satyrion harbour and the river Taras to the
Parthenii
25
. Metaponto exhibits the ear of wheat on its coin and, thanks to
its abundant crops of cereals, it offers Delphian Apollo a gold harvest
26
.
We have seen what Archilocus thought of Siris. Sibari occupied a vast,
fertile land between two rivers and thus enjoyed great prosperity
27
.
Delphian Apollo assigned to Miscellus a great Kroton among the
beautiful lands to plough
28
. Cuma was founded thanks to a Demetrian
cereal rite, following the sound of cymbals that prepared Kores return
29

and built its prosperity thanks to the eukarpia of the Campanian-
Phlegraean plain
30
. Pithecusae owed its wealth to goldsmiths, but also,
again, to its eukarpia
31
. In conclusion, the written texts of the Homeric
encyclopaedia, other literary evidence and contemporary colonial
realities in the West correspond very closely to what is passed on by the
excerpt of the Odyssey mentioned above.

How and why the colonisation took place: the case of Rhodes.

Rhodes provides a typical example of colonisation (Iliad 2.661-670).
Tlepolemos, being the son of Herakles, was a brave and gallant hero, a
famous spear-user, and head of the tripartite Rhodians in Troy. A grown-
up man, he once happened to kill old Licymnius, his fathers uncle on the
part of his mother. Herakles other children and grandchildren then

them. On this interpretation of organised piracy, see the reaction of Etruscans
and Campanians to the Phocean attempt to transform Alalia into a polis with its
own exclusive territorial and maritime space: Hdt. I.166,1.
24
Strabo,VI.2,3,268
25
Antioch.555 .F 13.
26
Strabo, VI.1,15,264.
27
Tim. 50; Diod-,XII.9,1; Varro,RR,I,44,2.
28
Diod., VIII,17.
29
V.P.,I,4,1.
30
D:H., VII.3,2; Strabo,V.4,2-3,242.
31
Strabo, V,4,9,247.
convinced him to flee. He immediately started building ships and
gathering great support. So he left, and not without suffering, he reached
Rhodes. Here his comrades settled in three different places, one for each
of the tribes and, being much loved by Zeus, obtained great wealth. This
division into three groups recalls the first lines of the excerpt, 652-656,
where the Rhodians are said to keep the island divided into three, between
Lindus, Ialysus and Camirus.
The foundation of the colony is conceived as a unitary act, in which
the role of the oecist appears essential. He is the military leader of the
colonists; he is the one who builds ships and gathers colonists, chooses
the place, organises the colony assigning different areas of the new
territory to different tribes. A fundamental aspect is he is backed by a
community in which he plays a leading role: he is a descendent of
Herakles and can therefore build ships and gather followers. As for the
reasons for leaving, for the oecist it is means accepting the consequences
of a fault that keeps him isolated from his relatives; for his followers the
colony will mean obtaining the land and the wealth they do not have in
their homeland. In the light of these considerations the function of the
colony becomes clear: is restoring the leaders lost prestige, and restoring
the colonists lost land and wealth.
The same tradition is found in Pindars Olympian VII, which he
composed in 464 BCE in honour of the pugilist Diagoras, an authoritative
member of the Rhodian aristocracy. The poem chronicles the entire
mythical history of Rhodes, the rising of the island from water, the
relationship with Helios and his children including Camirus, Ialysus and
Lindus, the worship of Athena and the arrival of Tlepolemosand the
Rhodians wanted to have it written in gold letters in the temple dedicated
to Athena Lindia
32
. It is thus a poem in which the islands ruling class
recognised itself. The tradition on Tlepolemos keeps the essential traits of
the Homeric tale intact.
33
Tlepolemos was a very strong Heraklides,
oikists and archagetas, hence founder as well as religious and military
leader: in the definition of the Rhetra, the archagetai were the Heraklides
kings of the Spartans
34
. The colonists find themselves divided between
the three cities on the island. The metropolis, implicit in Homer, is clearly
the Argolides and Tiryns. The reason for the departure is the killing of
Alcmenas brother Lycimnius. The colonists find an island rich in men

32
Gorgon di Rodi 515 F 18.
33
Ol.,VII.,19-33; 64;77-81.
34
Paus.,Lyc.,VI.8.
and animals, with a potential for great wealth. The function of the colony
is to provide him with redemption from misfortune (lines 77-81) and the
colonists with great prosperity (line 64).
There are some variations: the heros mother was the Thessalian and
Phtiotic Astydameia, the daughter of Ormenos
35
, eponym of Ormenion
near the gulf of Pagases
36
, instead of Astyocheia of Ephyra; the murder
was unintentional; Tlepolemos consulted Apollos Oracle. All this is
declared by the poet himself, who points out he has introduced a
correction compared to the uv, Xyo,, the universally widespread
tradition, that is the Homeric tale. When he writes this, it is not the mere
local tradition of Rhodes, but in Herodotuss words
37
, it is the
E Xyo,.
The paradigmatic version offered by the Greek encyclopaedia is thus
that of a colony that is born out of a crisis within the ruling class: a
Heracklides has done something wrong and must leave his land; a colony
that is born thanks to the initiative of its future oecist, who uses his
leading position to secure ships and partners, chooses the destination and
assigns each of the three tribes to a different place. As has long been
recognised, this tradition is backed by the memory of an early Achaean
presence in the area
38
on the one hand, and on the other the anticipation of
the future Doric presence on the island
39
. However, following the
approach we have taken so far, it is not this point we should insist on, but
rather the underlying model, which integrates the process with the data
produced by the model we have examined earlier. The colony is born
thanks to the action of the ruling class in the homeland, where the oecist,
the means, the men, the resources come from.

Tlepolemos and Archias.

The archaic nature and soundness of this model is clearly shown by
the comparison between Tlepolemos and Archias, the founder of
Syracuse. He is a Bacchiad, and thus member of the ruling class in his
homeland Corinth, and as such he is a Heraklides
40
. He, too, has to leave

35
Hes.,F 232 M.-W.= schol.P.O.VII 42. Simon., F 554 Page.
36
Strabo, IX.5,7,432; 5,15,436; 5,18,438; e,21,442 etc.
37
IV.2,3.
38
Marazzi, 1 ff.
39
Musti, pp. ,39 f,.48,56,58,66 n.11.
40
Thuc., VI,.3,2.
because he has killed someone unintentionally
41
. As the military leader of
the colonists, he drives the Sikels out of Ortygia
42
. He, too, makes a
dasms of lands, kleroi, among his fellow colonists, who therefore appear
to have followed him to this purpose
43
. He, too, is the object of an annual
worship as oecist: this is inferred from Callimacus, who started the list of
the colonies where the nominal worship of the oecist was the rule with
Syracuse
44
.
What is particularly important in this case is the account of
Archilocus, F 293 West, a poet who lived in the first half of the 7
th

century, around the time of the foundation of Syracuse. The poet told an
exemplary story about love for pleasures and incontinence that had led a
friend of Archias who was going to found Syracuse, a certain Aithiops,
to exchange the kleros he was going to receive in Syracuse for a honey
cake. Some important facts follow: the well-known exemplary story,
which involved Archias as the oecist, and the distribution of land among
colonists once they had reached their destination. The tradition linked to
Archias and the foundation of the colony was thus archaic when
Archilocus wrote of a well-known fact, a uv, E Xyo,, to
which he could refer for a fact that was somehow exemplary. The
mythical elements, which are present in the tradition about Archias as we
will see shortly, cannot thus lead to discredit his work on the historical
level, but are rather the counter evidence of the very ancient origin of this
figure.
For more elements to judge the value of these oecist traditions it is
possible to look at the way in which tradition has dealt with the problem
of Archias fault. Melissus Argivus, son of Habron, bound to Corinthian
Dexandros by ties of hospitality, and thus a friend of the Corinthians,
informs Dexandros of Phidons intention to kill a thousand young men
and, by doing so, actually saves their lives. For this reason he is exiled to
Corinth where, on his way back from a komos, he involuntarily tears his
son Actaeon, whom Archias loved, to shreds during an attempted
kidnapping. Melissus does not obtain to see Archias punished by the
Corinthians, so during the celebrations for Poseidon he kills himself,
cursing those who were responsible for this. A plague strikes Corinth, and
the oracle tells Archias that he is responsible for all this. So Archias

41
Alex.Etol. 3,7 Powell= Schol. AR IV,1212; Diod., VII,10; Plut.,Mor.,772 D-
773 B.
42
Thuc., VI.3,2.
43
Archiloch., F 293 W.
44
Callim., F 43 28-30 Pf. E scholl.ad loc.
organises the colony for Syracuse, where, after accomplishing the task
and generating two daughtersOrtygia and Syracusehe is killed by his
previous eromenos, Telephos, who had followed him commanding a
ship
45
. In the same period, another Bacchiad, Chersicrates, deprived of his
political rights, atimos, has to abandon Corinth to found Kerkyra, so that
the departure of two important members of the ruling aristocracy appears
as a moment of crisis in the history of Corinth under the Bacchiads
46
.
The story is well-known at the end of the 4
th
century, when Alexander
Aetolus on the one hand and Callimachus and Apollonius Rhodius on the
other refer to it, without feeling the need for a complete account. It may
be proved, however, that it is an ancient tradition inspired by the
Bacchiads. To start with, it confuses the departure of the two Bacchiads
around 733 with the final expulsion of the Bacchiads by Cypselus in the
mid-7
th
centurya typical example of the merging tendencies of oral
traditions. On the other hand, in history there is a trace of solidarity
between Phidon and the Bacchiads, which appears through a series of
parallel, yet not identical, accounts. Nicolaos Damascenus knows that
Phidons death occurred in Corinth, where the tyrant had come to the
rescue of the faction supporting him
47
. In the Bacchiad colony of
Syracuse an argive basileus named Pollis was active.
48
Among the
Bacchiads Phidons name was one of the most ancient legislators.
49
The
name of Actaeon, brought by the young son of Melissus, recalls
connections with Boeotia and the homonymous figure who, too, was torn
to shreds
50
: the relationship with Boeotia reappears at the time of the
Bacchiads with the Corinthian and Bacchiad Philolaus, who was an exile
in Thebes where he, too, was a legislator
51
. The same story, in the figures
of Philolaus and Diocles, respectively erasts and eromenos, confirms the
ordinariness of homoerotic practices among the Bacchiad aristocracy.
Finally, from the Bacchiad point of view, the story provides the
motivation for the departure of Archias and Chersicrates. The whole story
appears thus to draw inspiration from the Bacchiads and preserves the

45
Al.Aet. 3,7 Powell;schol.AR., IV,1212; Diod.,VIII,10; Plut.,Mor.,772 D-773
B.
46
Callim.,F 12,1-6 Pfeiffer; AR,IV,1210-16; Tim.,F 80..
47
90 F 35.
48
Hippys F 4; Aristot.,F 585 R. = 602 Gigon.
49
Pol.,1265 B 8-16.
50
Diod.,VII,10; Max. Tyr., XVIII,1 Hoben.Cf. Hes.Cat.F 112 Colonna =
Apd.,III.4,4; Cat.,113,Colonna= P.Oxy. 2509 ed.Lobel 1964.,
51
Aristot.,Pol.,1274 A 21 B 6.
memory of an archaic reality of which only isolated, yet consistent,
fragments have reached us.
It is therefore interesting to analyse the texture of the whole story:
what emerges from it is the heroic stature attributed to Archias, whereas
the argive Dexandros, whose name exalts his role of host, appears as a
functional hero. Likewise, his Corinthian guest Habron recalls the
positive nature which the habrosyne had in archaic aristocracies and the
close connection between practices of luxury and hospitality
52
. Melissus
and Actaeon, instead, recall mythical heroes: Actaeon, homonym of the
Boeotian hero who was torn to pieces by his dogs
53
, and Melissus, the
male of the bee, who recalls Aristeus, the god of honey and father of
Actaeon
54
. Melissus suicide takes place during the festival of Poseidon
by kremnisms in the adyton of Melicertes
55
, another figure whose name
was connected to honey. Ortygia and Syracuse are eponymous heroines.
His murderers name, Telephos, also has a heroic-mythical origin: like
the Corinthian hero who joins Archias in commanding his ship, he leads
the Achaeans towards their destination, Troy
56
. Archias therefore enjoys
the status of hero.
But this is not all: Archias is involved in ritual practices of transition.
The story of the relations with Actaeon is clarified in the light of the
juvenile nomima typical of archaic aristocracies.
Through Ephorus
57
we learn that these existed in the Doric world, in
particular in Crete and, in the light of what he says, we can describe the
story of Archias and Actaeon. Actaeon is the pais who, because of his
handsomeness, his valour and composure, is chosen as eromenos by a
noble erasts like Archias. Archias wants to make him the object of
harpag, after a komos, aided by his synetheis. The young mans father,
following the logic of hostility towards the Bacchiads and Phidon,
considers him as anaxios and resists, thanks to the aid of his philoi. All
this causes the death of the pais-eromenos, following which Archias
founds Syracuse and is killed by his own eromenos, who is now an adult.
The logic of the tale seems clear. The foundation of a colony is
experienced as a rite of transition in which the colonists, paides (thanks to
the oecist, erastes), die like Actaeon, to be able, as eromenoi who are now

52
Diod.,XIII.83,1. Cf.Emped., B 112 DK.
53
Cf.n.39.
54
Diod.,IV.81,4; Apd.,III,4,4 ( 30)
55
Will 184.
56
Cypr. Arg. 42 B; F 22 B.
57
F 149.
adults and citizens, to embody Telephos, and get rid of the old oecist-
erastes and therefore alter their status of subordination. It is the view of
the colony as lutron tes sumphors, already experienced in Rhodes,
which comes back with the full extent of its implications.
The two stories of Tlepolemus and Archias develop the same model.
Is it a mere superstructure? Let us consider a few facts. Archias is a
Bacchiad, who lived at the time when the Greek encyclopaedia was put
down in writing. He is Eumelus syngens, he himself a Bacchiad and
associated to him by a chronographical tradition that constructed its
chronological associations starting from the work of the poets concerned:
Archilocus, Simonides, Callinus. Eumelus is an epic poet who works
under the influence of Hesiod
58
, competes with Arctinus
59
, draws on the
theme of the Nostoi
60
, develops the archaiologia of Corinth in the light of
the Aeolic
61
, Argonautic
62
, Boeotian and Theban
63
traditions. This is the
environment in which Archias is educated and works, the one which
provides him with models: the fact that his story repeats that of
Tlepolemus Heraklides of Argo, presented as exemplary in the Greek
encyclopaedia, is not a mere coincidence, but rather the very way in
which a colony at the time could become reality.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Berent, M. The Stateless Polis.Toward a Re.Evaluation of the Classical
Greek Political Community. Diss. Cambridge, 1994.
Braund, D., Writing and Re-inventing Colonial Origins: Problem from
Colchis and the Bosphorus, in The Greek Colonization of the Black
Sea: Historical Interpretation of Archaeology ed. G.R. Tsetskladze.
Historia Einzelschriften 121 (Stuttgart, 1998) 287 ff.
Carlier, P., Les Basileis Homeriques, Ktema, 21 (1996) 5 ff.
Hansen, M.H., Was the Polis a State or a Stateless society?, in CPC
Papers 6. = Historia Einzelschriften 162, 2002.
Marazzi, M., Riflessi di economie palaziali fra mondo Egeo e Anatolia
occidentale.

58
T 6 B.
59
T 9.10 B.
60
T 13 B.
61
FF 6.7 B.
62
F 5 B.
63
FF 11.12.13. B
Mele, A., Le anomalie di Pithecusa, in Incidenza dellantico 1 (Napoli
2003) 13 ff.
_______, Dalla comunit militare allo stato cittadino, in Unit e
disunione della Polis (Napoli, 2007) 67 ff.
Musti, D., Continuit e discontinuit tra Achei e Dori nelle tradizioni
storiche, in Le origini dei Greci,Dori e mondo miceneo. (Bari,
1985).
Osborne, R., Early Greek Colonization, in Archaic Greece: New
Approaches and New Evidence ed. N. Fisher and H. van Wees
(London, 1998) 251 ff.
Purcel, N., Mobility and the Polis, in The Greek City: from Homer to
Alexander ed. O. Murray and S. Price (Oxford 1990) 29 ff.
Quiller, B., The dynamics of the Homeric Society, SO 56 (1981) 109
ff.
Will,, E. Korinthiaka (Paris,1955).

MYTHOLOGICAL ASPECTS IN THE HITTITE
COLONIZATION OF ANATOLIA

Itamar Singer, Tel Aviv University
singer_itamar@yahoo.com

Because this is a Hittite paper in a predominantly classical context, I
should perhaps begin with a brief introduction on the Hittites before we
get to their mythology.
Hittite is the oldest recorded Indo-European language, attested in
cuneiform script in the second millennium BCE. When we first meet
them in texts, the Hittites already inhabit large parts of central Anatolia,
but we do not have clear evidence regarding how much earlier they
entered Asia Minor and from where. There is a long-standing debate
among linguists and archaeologists about the chronology and genealogy
of the IE Anatolian languages, and the current trend is to date the
migrations of the Hittites and their "cousins", the Luwians and the
Palaians, at least a thousand years, probably more, before the first written
documents, i.e. somewhere in the 3rd or possibly the 4th mill. BCE. This
situation, among other things, may account for the fact that the Hittites
did not leave behind any explicit traditions about their origins, unlike the
Romans, the Greeks, or the Israelites. Still, scholars have repeatedly
scrutinized the Hittite texts and the archaeological record for some
distant echoes and reflections about their origins and their migrations
into Asia Minor.
In north-central Anatolia the Hittites encountered the highly
advanced culture of the Hattians, an autochtonous people whose
language is perhaps distantly related to some western Caucasian dialects.
The encounter between the IE Hittites and the local Hattians resulted in a
remarkable fusion between two entirely different cultures. The dominant
Hittites adopted completely the cultural assets of their predecessors,
especially in the domains of religion and mythology. However, this
cultural fusion between Hittites and Hattians, not unlike the one between
Romans and Etruscans, must have been preceded by fierce encounters of
which we have very little information, most of it embedded in cryptic
mythological descriptions. This laconic characterization should supply in
a nutshell the background for the following myth and its decipherment.
Let me add a short note on ethno-geography. In the early 2nd
millennium BCE the Hattians controlled the Land of Hatti, comprising
the area within the large bend of the Halys River, Hittite Marassanta.
Their major kingdoms were Hattush, the future capital of the Hittites,
and Zalpa on the Black Sea. To the southeast lay the predominantly
Hittite kingdom of Kanish or Nesha. In the mid-18th century Anitta, king
of Nesha, conquered in a sweeping campaign the entire Land of Hatti, as
well as other parts of central Anatolia, thus founding the first Hittite
empire, which lasted, with ups and downs, for more than 500 years. It is
from the name of this city of Kanish/Nesha that the Hittites took the self-
designation of their own language, Neshili, which has erroneously come
to be known in modern scholarship as Hittite (Singer 1984).
One of the earliest myths in Hittite literature is the tale about "The
Queen of Kanesh, her thirty sons and thirty daughters" (Otten 1973). The
mythical time of this origin legend is set before Anitta's takeover of
central Anatolia, but the text was actually written down in Old Hittite
script in the mid-17th century. You may find several English translations
and numerous discussions of this intriguing text. The translation below
follows that of Watkins(2004):
The Queen of Kanesh bore thirty sons in a single year. She said,
'What a monster is this which I have borne?' She filled baskets with fat,
put her sons in them, and launched them in the river. The river carried
them to the sea to the land of Zalp(uw)a. But the gods took them up out
of the sea and reared them.
When the years had passed the Queen again gave birth, (this time) to
thirty daughters. And she herself reared them. The sons are making their
way back to Kanesh, driving a donkey. When they reached the city of
Tamarmara, they are saying: 'Here you have heated up the bedroom so
that the donkey tries to copulate.' The men of the city replied: 'As far as
we have seen, a donkey tries to copulate anyway.' The boys countered:
Singer Hittite Colonization 15
'As far as we have seen, a woman bears [only one] son [a year], but one
gave birth to us (all) at once.' The men of the city retorted: 'Once our
queen of Kanesh gave birth to thirty daughters at once, but the sons have
disappeared.' The boys said to themselves: 'Whom are we seeking? We
have found our mother there. Come, let us go to Kanesh.' When they
went to Kanesh the gods put another appearance on them so their mother
does not recognize them, and she gave her own daughters to her own
sons. The older sons did not recognize their own sisters. But the youngest
[said]: '... should we take our own sisters in marriage? Do not stain
yourselves [with] impiety. [It is not] right.' But they sle[pt] with them. [...
As it happens, at this dramatic point the tablet breaks off. On the
other side of the tablet the narrative continues after a brief gap. It
recounts the struggle that broke out between Zalpa, where the boys were
raised, and Hattusha, the future capital of the Hittites. Of course,
Hattusha has the upper hand after three generations of hostilities and the
city of Zalpa is destroyed. This part of the story is no longer in mythical
time, but rather it portrays the early history of the Hittite kingdom. For
the sake of precision I should add that the connection between the two
parts of the legend (on two sides of the tablet) is conjectural, and some
scholars would even doubt that they belong to the same text. For me,
however, the two sides represent "the sin and its punishment", an
aetiological justification for the domination of Hattusha and its ruling
dynasty (Singer 1984; 1995; for another interpretation see Gilan 2007).
You have probably recognized in this concise tale plenty of
mythologems familiar from other parts of the world, including Greek and
Vedic Indian mythology. The baby in the basket floating in the river
recalls of course Moses and Sargon of Akkad. More specifically, the
motif of exposing boy babies and keeping the girl babies recurs in the
legend of the Amazons, who according to Greek tradition lived in
Anatolia, more or less in the same region on the southern shore of the
Black Sea where Zalpa must be located.
The prodigious multiple birth has been compared by Cal Watkins to
the Asvamedha ritual in the Rigveda (RV 10.86.23) and to the Greek
legend of the Danaids, all three reflecting a common IE heritage. The
Greek tale of origins, as recounted by Aeschylus in "The Suppliants",
recounts the endogamic marriage of parallel cousins, the fifty sons of
Aigyptos with the fifty daughters of Danaos. As forcefully argued by
Emile Benveniste in his 1949 'La lgende des Danades", the central
issue of "The Suppliants" was the conflict of Greek exogamy (including
cross-cousin marriage) and Egyptian endogamy (including parallel-
cousin marriage). In his horror of the imminent incest, Danaus orders his
daughters to slay their husbands on the wedding night, but one of them,
Hypermestra, spares her husband, Lynceus, who becomes the founder of
the royal house of Argos and of the Danaoi. Following Benveniste,
Watkins also justifies the search for traces of hidden Indo-European
themes in Classical Greek authors, even if they were no longer valid in
fifth-century Athenian society.
Returning to the Hittite tale of the Queen of Kanesh, the incest of
brothers and sisters is probably the primeval cause for the downfall of
both Zalpa and Kanesh, though the latter is not explicitly mentioned in
the second part of the text. According to Hittite law and custom, brother-
sister incest was considered a severely punishable abomination. This was
apparently not the case among the indigenous populations of Anatolia, as
demonstrated by the treaty between Huqqana and the Hittite king
Shuppiluliuma.
Huqqana was the king or tribal chief of Hayasha, a small land in the
mountains east of Hatti. In order to guarantee his political cooperation
against the Hurrians, he was given in marriage a sister of the Hittite king,
thus joining the extended royal family of Hatti. But since his behavior
was expected to be "uncivilized", the treaty formulated for him included
several sexual prohibitions to be avoided at all price (Cohen 2002: 79
ff.). Let me quote a couple of the good "counsels" offered to Huqqana
(Beckman 1999: 31 f.):

( 25) The sister whom I, My Majesty, have given to you
as your wife has many sisters from her own family as well as
from her extended family. They belong to your extended
family because you have taken their sister. But for Hatti it is
an important custom that a brother does not take (sexually)
his sister or female cousin. It is not permitted.
In Hatti whoever commits such an act does not remain
alive but is put to death. Because your land is ignorant
("barbarian") it is in conflict (with Hittite custom). (There,)
one quite regularly takes his sister or female cousin. But in
Hatti it is not permitted.

( 26) And if on occasion a sister of your wife, or the
wife of a brother, or a female cousin comes to you, give her
to eat and to drink and make merry! But you shall not desire
to take her (sexually). It is not permitted, and people are put
to death as a result of that act. ...

We have no further information whether Huqqana abided by these
strict Hittite mores or whether he carried on his frivolous ways.
The hidden message of the Queen of Kanesh tale could be a similar
clash between the social customs of the Hattian and the Neshite
(=Hittite) population groups, which resulted in the downfall of those who
engaged in abominable sexual practices. It may perhaps seem strange
that the ultimate beneficiary from the downfall of Zalpa and Kanesh is
the originally Hattian city of Hattush, but then, the myth had to take into
account the political realities as well. Hattush, modern-day Boghazky,
became the new Hittite capital in the 17th c. BCE. In his volume of
translated "Hittite Myths" (1998), Hoffner has nicknamed the Queen of
Kanesh story as "A Tale of Two Cities", borrowing from Dickens.
Actually, a more appropriate nickname would be "A Tale of Three
Cities" (Kanesh, Zalpa, and Hattusha), or perhaps "The Kanesh
Outrage", which I borrowed from the story of "The Gibeah Outrage" in
Judges 19-21. This story, which recounts a horrendous sexual aggression
committed by the men of Gibeah, explicates how Gibeah, the seat of
Saul, the first king of Israel, lost its political supremacy, leaving the stage
open for the ascent of Jerusalem as the new capital of Israel.
And what about the role of the Donkey in the Queen of Kanesh
myth? You remember the conversation between the thirty sons who are
heading back home and the people of a little town where they spend a
night. According to Watkins's translation the donkey 'tries to copulate' in
the heated room, but in fact, the rendering of the verbal form ark- is less
obvious.
It may refer to "climbing", or "mounting" in a general sense, but also
to sexually "mounting" an animal (Melchert 2001). In Hoffner's
translation the donkey "climbs up (the staircase)" to the second floor
where people are supposed to sleep but not donkeys. Watkins takes his
sexual interpretation of the passage quite far, comparing it to the
ceremonial sacrifice of an aroused horse in the Indian Asvamedha ritual
and to the implied sacrifice of an aroused donkey in Pindar's
'Hyperborean digression' of Perseus. Other commentators, including
myself, would stop short with a less pregnant interpretation of the
'donkey episode'. It may simply serve as a literary device to trigger the
mutual recounting of strange episodes: a donkey that sleeps with his
owners and a queen who gives birth to thirty babies in a single year.
To sum up, it would seem that from the various interpretations given
to the Queen of Kanesh myth, the one explicating it as a charter myth
establishing a taboo against inadmissible sexual practices is the most
plausible. One may perhaps also find in it a distant echo for a Hittite
immigration into central Anatolia, or actually, a re-immigration or
"return narrative", if we take into account the brothers' to-and-fro
wanderings from Zalpa to Kanesh and back (Oettinger 2004: 363).
"Return narratives", as best exemplified by the Greek Nostoi, are often
used to justify a conquest or a colonization. For example, the return of
the Heraclids to the Peloponnessus, which may reflect a Dorian
migration. From a much later period, one may compare the Ostrogoths,
who justified their invasion of Italy through a myth according to which
their king Theodoric merely "returned" to Italy after being expulsed from
there by King Otoaker ("Hildebrandlied"). Obviously, some of these
"return narratives" may have had some factual background, for instance,
if one assumes that the 8
th
century BCE Greek colonization of
Pithekoussai and Kyme is related in any way to the Mycenaean presence
in Ischia itself and in the nearby island of Vivara. And with this happy
landing in the Bay of Naples, I conclude my concise presentation.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Beckman, G. Hittite Diplomatic Texts. Second Edition (Atlanta 2002).
Benveniste, . "La lgende des Danades", Revue de l'histoire des
religions 136 (1949), 129-138.
Cohen, Y. Taboos and Prohibitions in Hittite Society (Heidelberg 2002).
Gilan, A. "How many princes can the land bear? Some thoughts on the
Zalpa text (CTH 3)", Acts of the 6
th
International Conference of
Hittitology, Rome 2005-2009. (Rome 2007)
Hoffner, H.A., Jr. Hittite Myths, 2
nd
edn. (Atlanta 1998).
Melchert, H.C. "A Hittite Fertility Rite?" in G. Wilhelm, ed. Akten des
IV. Internationalen Kongresses fr Hethitologie, Wrzburg, 4.-8.
Oktober 1999 (Wiesbaden 2001), 404-409.
Oettinger, N. "Zur Einwanderung und ersten Entfaltung der
Indogermanen in Anatolien", in 2000 v. Chr. Politische,
Wirtschaftliche und Kulturelle Entwicklung im Zeichen einer
Jahrtausendwende (Saarbrcken 2004), 357-369.
Otten, H. Eine althethitisches Erzhlung um die Stadt Zalpa (Wiesbaden
1973).
Singer, I. "Hittites and Hattians in Anatolia at the Beginning of the
Second Millennium B.C.", Journal of Indo-European Studies 9
(1984), 119-134.
Singer, I. "Some Thoughts on Translated and Original Hittite Literature",
Israel Oriental Studies 15 (1995), 123-128.
Watkins, C. "The Third Donkey: Origin Legends and Some Hidden
Indo-European Themes", in J.H.W. Penney, ed. Indo-European
Perspectives. Studies in Honour of Anna Morpurgo Davies (Oxford
2004), 65-79.

DISCUSSING COLONIZATION IN ARCHAEOLOGY: THE
CASE OF HELLENISED CYPRUS (ONCE MORE)

Anastasia Leriou, University of Athens
nleriou@yahoo.gr

Introduction: colonisation, archaeological theory and terminology

Regardless of their theoretical background, archaeologists have
always considered colonisations to be cultural developments of immense
importance; this is also the case for migrations and invasions.
1
On the
other hand, the ways in which archaeological material may be employed,
in order to substantiate such movements, frequently already known
through written sources, have been the subject of great debate that has
followed the development of archaeological thought throughout the
course of the 20
th
century. This debate is closely connected to the on-
going epistemological argument regarding the complicated relationship
between the archaeological record and past cultural groups.
2

Although the archaeological interest in ethnic studies might seem
relatively fresh, the earliest attempts to employ ancient remains in the
identification of past peoples date from as early as the Renaissance
period. This phenomenon was generalised during the 19
th
century as a

1
Chapman and Hamerow 1997; Van Domellen 1997; Burmeister et al 2000;
Lyons and Papadopoulos 2002 and Gosden 2004.
2
Shennan 1994; Hall 1995; Banks 1996; Jones 1997; Hall 1997: 111-42; Malkin
1998; Malkin 2001 and Orser 2001.
result of the growing nationalism and emphasis on ethnic identity
promoted by the developing European nation-states and lead to the
development of culture-historical archaeology or, more simply, the direct
equation between artefactsusually potsand peoples. Culture-
historical archaeologists regarded archaeological cultures as the material
manifestations of ancient groups of people with a distinctive ethnic
identity. Thus, the determination of the geographic distribution of a
particular archaeological culture would equal the identification of the
area that was occupied by the corresponding population. Furthermore,
the presence of foreign cultural elements within the specified area is
generally viewed as the result of colonisation, invasion or migration.
3

Culture-historical archaeology determined European and North
American archaeological thought during the 19
th
and the first half of the
20
th
century. It was dismissed during the 1950s-60s partly as a result of
its systematic exploitation by Nazi ideology
4
and most importantly due to
the development of processual archaeology, commonly known as New
Archaeology, which shifted the disciplines focus from the description
(when and where) of ancient cultures and their movements to the
explanation (how and why) of cultural change.
5

Since the descriptive identification of archaeological cultures and
their distribution through time and space was considered a totally
inadequate means of explaining the archaeological record, the
reconstruction of past peoples and, consequently, ancient migrations,
invasions and colonisation was somehow marginalised. Cultures and
ethnic groups were identified with the empirical/ descriptive level, while
other aspects of society were thought to contribute to the constitution of a
dynamic cultural system. Prehistoric archaeologists avoided alluding to
past peoples, while their colleagues researching historical archaeology
could not follow accordingly due to references to specific ethnic groups
and their movements in ancient written sources. The association between
archaeological cultures and specific populations, although severely
criticised, was not altogether abandoned. Some processual archaeologists

3
Trigger 1989: 148-50; 161-86; 1995: 266-70; Sherratt 1992: 316-17; Shennan
1994: 5-11; Diaz-Andreu 1996; Diaz-Andreu and Champion 1996; Hides 1996;
Jones 1997: 15-26; Jones and Graves-Brown 1996 and Hall 1997: 1, 128-31.
4
Trigger 1989: 163-67; Jones and Graves-Brown 1996: 2-4; Jones 1997: 2-5
and Hall 1997: 1-2, 129.
5
Rowlands 1982; Trigger 1989: 294-312; Renfrew and Bahn 1991: 411-13 and
Bahn 1996: 67-70.
Leriou Hellenized Cyprus 23
believed that, although ethnic/cultural groups should not be included in
the functional aspects of material culture, style, that is to say the non-
functional aspects, was thought to include important information
regarding the ethnic identity of past peoples. Thus, it could be somehow
be employed in the reconstruction of past peoples movements.
Moreover, many researchers regarded the normative concept of
archaeological culture (description, typology) as an indispensable tool
for the necessary preliminary stage of classifying the events (simple
narration) prior to the process of explaining them.
6

The principles, methods and goals of New Archaeology have been
challenged during the last thirty years by post-processual archaeologists,
who rejected the potential of developing explanatory models on the basis
of the uniqueness and diversity that characterises each and every society.
Moreover they declared that objective explanation is totally impossible
as there is no single way of interpreting material culture.
7
Furthermore,
while criticising the processual distinction between empirical description
(style) and social explanation (function), the great majority of post-
processualists focused on symbolic and ideological systems and
neglected a reconsideration of the interpretation of ethnicity in
archaeology.
8

The complicated relationship between past material cultures and
ethnic identities would have remained poorly theorised if it were not for
a small group of social anthropology-inspired archaeologists, who
maintained that the ethnic identities should not be viewed as a passive
reflection of cultural norms but as an active social process involving the
development and maintenance of cultural boundaries as a result of
interaction between groups of people. This approach towards ethnicity in
the past instigated research focusing either on its role in the construction
of economic and political relationships or the association between
material culture and ethnic symbolism.
9

In the following discussion, I do not intend to further explore the
above issues, since the main point of the present paper is how
archaeologists speak about colonisation, migration and invasion, in other
words the terminology they employ to describe the cultural phenomena
they identify within the theoretical frameworks discussed above. In

6
Binford 1965; Renfrew 1972; 1979 and Jones 1997: 26-28, 110-112.
7
Hodder 1986; Shanks and Tilley 1992; Renfrew and Bahn 1991: 426-434 and
Bahn 1996: 70.
8
Jones 1997: 27-28.
9
Hodder 1982; Shennan 1994; Hall 1995; 1997 and Jones 1997: 28-29.
contrast to science, the vocabulary employed in humanistic disciplines
such as archaeology, history and sociology has a highly subjective
character and a dynamic, ever-evolving nature. Thus, it can create fixed
images, cause inconsistency and misconception and provoke theoretical
discussions and reassessments. This is due to the rhetorical nature of
humanities.
Adorno maintains: in philosophy, rhetoric represents that which
cannot be thought except in language.
10
Archaeology depends largely on
texts. After having uncovered, recorded, classified and studied their
material, archaeologists are expected to produce texts about it.
Publishing excavated material is an essential task that facilitates its
communication to an audience, as well as data recording and storage. As
such, it is quite technical in nature.
11
Consequently, the terminology
employed in it has resulted from a consensus reached among researchers
and may be described as more or less objective. Indeed, plenty of
archaeological discussion has been devoted to terminological issues in
association with certain classes of material, mostly ceramics. Besides
publication, this type of standardised terminology is generally utilised in
classificatory studies and stylistic analyses.
In contrast to archaeological publications and other classificatory-
stylistic discussions, the choice of vocabulary that one employs in texts
aiming at the archaeological records interpretation and the
reconstruction of the past is much more complex. This is so since putting
together an archaeological narrative constitutes the object of a procedure
incorporating social, political, ideological, cultural and emotional
parameters reflecting the context in which it took place.
12
As such, it may
be approached by means of narrative analysis drawn from literary theory,
philosophy and sociology.
13
In their editorial to the proceeding of the
conference entitled Narrative Pasts/Past Narratives, which took place at
Stanford during February of 2001, Jackman and Witmore refer to the
philosophical perceptions of Ricoer and White
14
and maintain that
archaeological narrative may be viewed as a:

10
Adorno 1973: 55 cited in Shanks and Tilley 1992: 17.
11
Shanks and Tilley 1992: 16.
12
Shanks and Tilley 1992: 16-22; Shanks 1996: 93-97; see also Shanks 1992
and Hodder et al 1995.
13
Burmeister et al 2000.
14
Ricoeur 1984-1986; Ricoeur 1991 and White 1987.
disursive index through which, and by which, historical events
are mediated. Beyond simply delineating events, narrative
actually simulates that which it refers to, because it is an
outcome of the same type of occurrences as those that lie behind
the events and experiences that are accorded a place in history.
The way in which archaeologists go about writing up the objects
and events of archaeology is caught up within this same process.
In dealing with a past that is absent, archaeologists constitute the
material worthy of representation.

Moreover, they claim that the narrative act, which we take as the
process of discursive mediation, is that of interpretation, manipulation,
and construction.
15

In the light of these observations, the construction of narratives of
past colonisations, migrations and invasions seems a highly complicated
process due to their radical, rather dramatic character. The endeavour
becomes much more intricate if the archaeologists engaged in the
narratives production originate from a geographical region that has
received migration waves or been invaded or colonised in the past, recent
or more distant; this is particularly so when the narrative under
construction concerns that very same region. An analogous, though not
identical, situation may be observed with regard to researchers
originating from areas that have acted as initiators of processes such as
those mentioned above.
16

I propose to illuminate the decisive role ascribed to the terminology
employed in the narration of extreme processes such as colonisations,
migrations and invasions within the framework of the widely established
archaeological narrative of the Mycenaean colonisation of Cyprus. I
chose this narrative as a case study, as its earliest appearance goes back
to the middle of the 19
th
century. Consequently, its development through
the last sixteen decades reflects all major stages in the development of
theoretical archaeological thought.
17
Moreover, the turbulent political
situation of Cyprus during the second half of the 19
th
and throughout the
20
th
century has allowed plenty of space for manipulation, subjectivism

15
Available at http://archaeology.stanford.edu/journal/newdraft/editorial.html.
16
Trigger 1984; Trigger 1995; Kohl and Fawcett 1995; Meskell 1998; Lyons
and Papadopoulos 2002; Given 2004.
17
Leriou 2002.
and, consequently, misunderstanding and inconsistency.
18
Besides
proposing an alternative set of terms for the archaeological narrative in
question, the ultimate purpose of this paper is to contribute to the
development of a certain level of attentiveness regarding the choice of
words describing cultural phenomena of diachronic value.

Setting the stage: the archaeological narrative of the Mycenaean
colonisation of Cyprus

It has already been mentioned that the earliest version of the
narrative generally known as the Mycenaean colonisation of Cyprus goes
back to the first half of the 19
th
century. Since then, it has been gradually
developed, modified and refined in the light of new archaeological
discoveries and as a result of novel research methods and theoretical
approaches.
19
The currently available version, a brief overview of which
follows, was consolidated during the 1990s. Despite the objections and
criticism expressed by many scholars lately,
20
this narrative remains
widely accepted, while only a limited number of researchers have
produced differentiated versions.
21
As these have not made it to the
handbooks, popular or academic, on Cypriot
22
and Greek ancient
history,
23
they will not be included in the present discussion. Before
continuing with the narratives brief overview,
24
it should be stressed
that, when referring to it, the term colonisation does not reflect my actual
opinion regarding the character of the Aegean movement to Cyprus. It is
used in a purely conventional manner, as it constitutes the earliest and
most widely used term employed by historians and archaeologists in
order to define the cultural phenomenon in question.
The current, official version of the archaeological narrative
of the Mycenaean colonisation of Cyprus advocates two successive

18
Hunt 1990a; Hunt 1990b; Hunt 1990c and Knapp and Antoniadou 1998: 29-
32.
19
Leriou 2002: 8-18.
20
Leriou 2002: 6-7 and Leriou 2005: 563-64.
21
Rupp 1985; Rupp 1987; Rupp 1988; Rupp 1998 and Leriou 2002: 5-7.
22
Karageorghis 1990a: 35-46; Karageorghis 1990b; Coldstream 1990: 47-51;
Kyrris 1996: 44-71; Karageorghis 1997: 255-85; Mantzourani 2001: 152-55 and
Karageorghis 2002b: 71-141.
23
Osborne 1996: 22 and Bournia-Simantoni 1997: 16-17, 18-19.
24
For a more detailed summary see Leriou 2002: 3-6.
influxes of Aegeans in Cyprus. The first one occurred immediately after
the fall of the Mycenaean palaces during the 12
th
century and is
substantiated by considerably large quantities of locally produced
MycIIIc:1b style pots. The second, definitely more extensive Aegean
wave took place during the first half of the 11
th
century and is thought to
be attested by:
a. The introduction of a new tomb-type bearing close affinities to
Mycenaean graves.
b. Many Mycenaean elements in the shape- and decoration-
repertory of the of the Proto-White Painted ceramic style, that appeared
at the beginning of 11
th
century (Late Cypriot IIIb).
c. Various artefacts/architectural features of Aegean origin or
inspiration (figurines of the goddess with uplifted arms, D-shaped fibulae
etc).
d. The introduction of the Greek language.

The first wave of newcomers has been associated with the activity of
the Sea Peoples, which is thought to be substantiated by a series of
destructions in almost all Late Bronze Age centres. Furthermore the
newcomers are held responsible for the subsequent establishment of new
sites during the 11
th
century. These coincide more or less with the
capitals of the ancient kingdoms of Cyprus, which according to a set of
foundation myths were founded by Greek heroes that came to Cyprus
after the Trojan War. Consequently, the 11
th
century has been regarded as
the beginning of a long and extremely significant procedure: the
hellenisation of Cyprus.
25

Colonisation versus migration

The archaeological narrative in question is characterised by
remarkable terminological inconsistency, which has caused much
confusion concerning the character of the alleged movement of Aegean
peoples to Cyprus around the end of the Late Bronze Age. Some scholars

25
This summary is based on Karageorghis 1990a; Karageorghis 1990b;
Karageorghis 1992; 1997: 255-85; Karageorghis 2000b; Karageorghis 2002a;
2002b: 71-141; Iacovou 1989; Iacovou 1994; Iacovou 1995; Iacovou 1998;
Iacovou 1999a; Iacovou 1999b; Iacovou 2001 and Iacovou 2003.
refer to it as colonisation
26
while Greek-speaking archaeologists use
ootto.
27
Migration and immigration (French: migration, German:
Einwanderung) appear quite frequently
28
although the Modern Greek
equivalent covooc:oj is not at all used. The Mycenaeans are usually
called immigrants
29
but never covooc. On the other hand, the term
colonists is not very popular,
30
while its Greek equivalent ootot is
widely used.
31

The establishment of the term colonisation goes back to the 19
th

century when historical writing, lacking support from the
underdeveloped discipline of archaeology, was almost exclusively based
on ancient literary sources. The earliest reference to the Mycenaean
colonisation of the island dates as early as Herodotus Historiae: in book
V it is mentioned that the kingdom of Kourion was founded by people
from the Argolid (5.113). Some seven centuries later Pausanias reported
that Paphos was established by Agapenor, the legendary king of Tegea,
who was driven to the western coast of Cyprus by a storm while on his
way home after the sack of Troy (8.5.2-3). Several similar references
describing the foundation of the Cypriot kingdoms by Greek heroes after
the Trojan War may be found in the texts of various Greek and Roman
authors the latest being Stephanos Byzantios.
32
Both the ancient authors
as well as their ancient and medieval commentators regarded the
movement of Aegean peoples to Cyprus as analogous to the organised
Greek colonisation of the Archaic period and consequently employed the
same terminology in the narration of both historical phenomena. Thus
the Greek heroes, who established (oktoov, oolktoov
33
or k+toov
34
)

26
Dikaios 1967: 19; Cadogan 1993: 94-95; Karageorghis 1968: 63;
Karageorghis 1990: 39 and Karageorghis 1998a: 39.
27
Dikaios 1962; Marinatos 1961; Karageorghis 1971a: 352; Karageorghis
1971b: 29 and Iacovides 1992.
28
Nicolaou 1973: 59; Coldstream 1985: 47; Coldstream 1990: 48; Coldstream
1998: 6-7; Yon 1973: 301; Pouilloux 1992; Deger-Jalkotzy 1994: 17, 20, 23 and
Iacovou 1999a: 1.
29
Iacovou 1995: 335, 340 and Karageorghis 2001: 271.
30
Karageorghis 1999: 62.
31
Karageorghis 1976b: 153 and Karageorghis 1985: 433.
32
Gjerstad 1944a; Hadjiioannou 1971: 46-67 and Leriou 2002: 8.
33
Casevitz 1985: 90-100, 130-33 and Hadjiioannou 1971: 46 no.20, 20.2, 54
nos.20.13, 20.14, 58-60 nos.21.2, 22, 62 nos.23.1, 23.3,
34
Casevitz 1985: 21-44 and Hadjiioannou 1971: 54 nos.20.10, 20.11, 60
no.21.4.
the Cypriot city-kingdoms are called olkto+ol or otkot
35
and their
establishments .
36
Moreover the colonists place of origin is
usually referred to as their metropolis.
37
Mythological information was
corroborated by linguistics, as soon as the existence of Greek dialect in
Classical Cyprus was detected by means of epigraphic evidence. Thus,
19
th
century historians described the Aegean movement as a colonising
one and the cities established by the newcomers as colonies.
38
These
scholars had been born and educated during a period characterised by the
strong and ever-growing European fascination by Greek antiquity. Thus,
they viewed ancient Greeks as superior, highly civilised humans, who
would be more than able to visit less sophisticated peoples in remote
places like Cyprus and establish colonies.
39

These terms became popular among early researchers of Cypriot
Archaeology, e.g. sir John L. Myres and Max Ohnefalsch-Richter,
undertaking excavations on the island during the final decades of the 19
th

century.
40
As they located plenty of material bearing strong Aegean
stylistic influences, they established that the mythological information
outlined above reflected actual historical events.
41
The terms in question
were established more firmly through the publications of the members of
the Swedish Cyprus Expedition, who thoroughly investigated Cyprus by
means of excavation during the late 1920s.
42
One cannot avoid
considering that the colonising activity of Great Britain, which had
reached its peak during the course of the 19
th
century, must have
provided plenty of inspiration and possibly motive for the use and
establishment of such terminology. It is the very same activity that had

35
Casevitz 1985: 101-107, 116-19 and Hadjiioannou 1971: 48 no.20.5, 58
no.21.1, 66 no.25.
36
Casevitz 1985: 58 and Hadjiioannou 1971: 60 no.21.3, 62 no.23.2, 64 no.24.1,
66 no.25.1.
37
Hadjiioannou 1971: 48 no. 20.4, 20.5.
38
Engel 1841: 210-29; Hoffmann 1841: 1271-300; Enmann 1886; Enmann
1887; Meister 1889: 125-31; Busolt 1893: 320-22 and Beloch 1893: 50-52.
39
Shanks 1996; 53-74 and Leriou 2002: 8-9.
40
Goring 1988: 7-35.
41
Cesnola 1878: 199, 219-220, 234, 298-99; Myres and Ohnefalsch-Richter
1899: 40; Myres 1914: xxx; Casson 1937: 41-71 and Hill 1949: 82-94 and
Leriou 2002: 9-14.
42
Gjerstad 1933: 267-68; 1944a; 1944b: 87; 1948: 428-29; Furumark 1944: 265;
Sjqvist 1940: 209; Rysted 1994; strm 1994; Edbury 2001; Steel 2001; Fitton
and Leriou 2002: 14-16.
seriously affected both the political conditions and the development of
the archaeological discipline in Cyprus during the final decades of the
19
th
and the first half of the 20
th
century. After all, most of the excavators
of Cyprus during the last quarter of the 19
th
century were of British
nationality.
43
Moreover, the Germans, the British and the Swedes had
been receivers of analogous hellenocentric education, which constituted
one of the most fundamental characteristics of the Western world, during
the second half of the 19
th
and the first decades of the 20
th
century. As a
result, these researchers believed deeply in the superiority of the Greeks,
which would have made the colonisation of Cyprus a simple venture.
Consequently, they paid special emphasis on the Aegeanising material,
the presence of which was attributed to the Mycenaean colonisation of
the island, by that time a widely established historical fact. Einar
Gjerstad, the head of the Swedish Cyprus Expedition has outlined the
basic characteristic of the post-colonisation society as follows:

The Mycenaean colonists and conquerors were the lords of
the country, but the descendants of the Late Bronze Age
inhabitants, whom we may call the Eteocyprians, formed the
majority of the population, and for some time parts of the island
still remained entirely Eteocyprian. No foundation legends refer
to cities in the interior of the island or to places on the south
coast between Kourion in the West and Salamis in the East. In
the interior of the island there were barbarian, i.e. Eteocyprian
cities at least down to the Classical period.
44

Further discoveries in Cyprus, as well as Greek finds associated with
the fall of the Mycenaean palaces at about 1200 BC and the subsequent
Dark Age in the Aegean during the 1950s and 1960s challenged
considerably the concept of the domination of the newcomers over the
native population that the Swedes had proposed.
45
Nevertheless, the large
amounts of Aegeanising material could not be ignored: the Aegeans had

43
Goring 1988: 7-35; Given 1998; Leriou 2002: 10-14 and Seretis 2005.
44
Gjerstad 1948: 429, italics mine. For the Eteocypriots see Leriou 2002: 15-16
and Given 1998; moreover, see the various comments and responses to Given
1998 by Y. Hamilakis, P. Van Dommelen, N.A. Silberman and P. Saint-Cassia
in Journal of Mediterranean Archaeology 11(1): 107-24.
45
Desborough 1964: 199-200; Furumark 1965; Dikaios 1971: 509-31;
Karageorghis 1990b: 29; Karageorghis 1990a: 39; Karageorghis 2000a: 12;
Catling 1994 and Leriou 2002: 16-17.
definitely arrived. As they could not have possibly been mighty
conquerors, they must had come as refugees fleeing the disasters in the
Aegean. Thus, the term immigration was introduced.
46
Subsequently,
archaeologists started developing a strong interest in the interaction
between the newcomers and the native population. This was evident in
the appearance of many studies investigating classes of material
characterised by a fusion of Aegean and LBA Cypriot stylistic
elements.
47

Nevertheless both colonisation and immigration carry plenty of
ancient as well as modern political connotation and thus attribute very
specific meanings to the Aegean movement. Many researchers, therefore,
tend to use more neutral terms like occupation, settlement/
c,oooooj
48
or the even more general arrival.
49
Consequently the
newcomers are called settlers
50
and lately refugees fleeing the disasters
in Mainland Greece
51
although very rarely po:,c.
52

It has already been argued that no term can be neutral enough. This
is particularly so, as almost none of the researchers discussing the
Aegean presence in Cyprus has so far explained the reasons for choosing
any term over the others and subsequently defined this particular term in
an exact and clear way before dealing with the actual narrative.
53

Meanings are taken for granted and sometimes overlooked as two
different terms may appear in the works of a single researcher, even in
the very same text.
54
Associations between scholars social, political and
academic preconceptions with their preference for a particular term are
called for. Greek-speaking archaeologists, for example, favour terms like
ootto and ootot. On the other hand, they seem to avoid the
somehow demeaning covooc:oj, covooc and po:,c.

46
Vanschoonwinkel 1994: 124-26.
47
Some typical examples are: Karageorghis 1977-78; Pieridou 1973; Iacovou
1988; Kling 1989 and Pilides 1994.
48
Catling 1964: 301; Catling 1973; Catling 1980; Catling 1994: 133;
Desborough 1964: 198; 1973; Hood 1973; Karageorghis 1976b: 144; 1978: 59
and Hooker 1985.
49
Desborough 1964: 198, 199 and Snodgrass 1988: 109, 112.
50
Karageorghis 1984: 22 and Nicolaou 1973: 60
51
Catling 1980: 24; Deger-Jalkotzy 1998: 117; Karageorghis 1992: 83; 1998b:
127.
52
53
Catling 1973: 34-35; Iacovou 1999a: 1.
54
The strongly political hellenisation/ Hellenisirung/ cc//jvto is used
by most Western European as well as Greek and Cypriot researchers
when referring to the whole procedure of the settlement of the Aegean
peoples on the island.
55
Similarly, the newcomers are often called
Greeks/1//jvc. The use of this characterisation has been more
systematic since the early 1980s, when an 11
th
century inscription in
Greek was discovered at Palaepaphos;
56
it constitutes the earliest
example of the Greek language on the island.
57
The introduction of
hellenisation goes back to 19
th
century historical writing and the age of
classicism and idealisation of ancient Greece.
58
It was re-introduced
during the 1970s by Vassos Karageorghis, a Greek Cypriot with a strong
hellenocentric identity and the most vehement supporter of the
Mycenaean colonisation hypothesis.
59

Other terminological inconsistencies

The colonisation of Cyprus is usually described as Mycenaean/
M:jvo,
60
although the characterisations Achaean/_o are
also very common.
61
Researchers seem to treat these characterisations as
completely synonymous and use them in order to describe anything

55
Karageorghis 1971b: 29; Karageorghis 1994; Karageorghis 2001;
Karageorghis 2002a; Iacovou 1988: 84; 1989: 57; Baurain 1989; Deger-Jalkotzy
1994: 24; 1998: 117; Vanschwoonwinkel 1994: 109.
56
Gjerstad 1948: 433; Hill 1949: 82; Marinatos 1961; Fortin 1980; 1984;
Karageorghis 1985; Demetriou 1987; Vanschwoonwinkel 1994; Maier 1996;
Iacovou 1999a; Reyes 1994: 11-13. Demetriou (2001) has gone as far as
stretching this term to describe the cultural assimilation of the Phoenicians by
the supposedly fully hellenised population of EIA Cyprus!
57
Karageorghis 1980: 135-36; Masson and Masson 1983; Maier and
Karageorghis 1984: 134 and Sakellariou 1988.
58
Engel 1841: 203.
59
Leriou 2002: 17-18.
60
Evans 1900; Gjerstad 1948: 429, 432; Dikaios 1962; Spyridakis 1963;
Desborough 1964: 196-205; Desborough 1973; Hood 1973; Nicolaou 1973;
Maier 1973; Karageorghis 1971b; Karageorghis 1973; Karageorghis 1976a;
Hooker 1985; Kilian 1990; Pouilloux 1992 and Deger-Jalkotzy 1998.
61
Daniel 1940; Gjerstad 1948: 428; Catling 1973; Sakellariou 1988;
Karageorghis 1978: 59, 61-62; Karageorghis 1990a: 39; Pavlides 1991: 67-72
and Iacovides 1992.
associated with the Late Bronze Age peoples of eastern and southern
Greece and related areas, who shared the same culture and language.
62

This is a more or less standard definition for the archaeologically
constructed cultural group of the Mycenaeans.
63
The term Achaeans, on
the other hand, has not been invented by archaeologists. It is the name
that Homer gave to the Greeks in his epics and is thus considered to be
the name, by which the Greeks of heroic times (i.e. the inhabitants of
Mainland Greece during LBA) spoke of themselves.
64

Some Aegean prehistorians consider the Achaeans as a Greek-
speaking population who established themselves in Mainland Greece at
the beginning of the Middle Bronze Age. Their interaction with the
native population resulted in the development of the Mycenaean
civilisation.
65
Consequently, the mythological term Achaean should not
be confused with the purely technical Mycenaean. Moreover, the
formers Homeric origin has ascribed it with strong ethnic connotations,
on the basis of which Catling has described it as emotive.
66

Furthermore it should be emphasised that the term Achaeans does not
appear anywhere in the ancient sources that report the foundation of the
Cypriot kingdoms by Greek heroes and their people, who are generally
mentioned there by their toponyms, i.e. Salaminians, Arcadians,
Argives.
67
Thus, other researchers have adopted the geographic people
from the Aegean, which is more neutral and allows the inclusion of
people from the island of Crete.
68

The main reason, however, for the terminological inconsistency
outlined above is the insufficiency of the archaeological material.
Excavated remains from the 12
th
-10
th
centuries are fragmentary and
rather limited, thus allowing ample space for assumptions and
hypotheses.
69
Furthermore, the invalidation of the direct association
between material evidence and peoples undermines the establishment of

62
Bray and Trump 1982: 166; italics mine.
63
Mylonas 1966; Vasilikou 1995; Wardle and Wardle 1997; Sherratt 1992: 317-
18; and Sherratt 2005: .
64
Bray and Trump 1982: 10, parenthesis mine; see also Mylonas 1966: 212;
Hood 1974: 118, 128; Taylour 1983: 9, 158; Finlay 1999: 17-18.
65
Mylonas 1966: 4; Chadwick 1976: 2-3 and Ramou-Hapsiadi 1982: 23-24.
66
Catling 1973: 34.
67
Hadjiioannou 1971: 48-49 no 20.5, 58-59 no 21.1, 60-61 no 21.7, 66-67 nos
25-25.1.
68
Coldstream 1990: 47, 48 and Coldstream 1994.
69
Leriou 2002: 6-7.
archaeological labels such as colonists and immigrants. This is
particularly true for the terms ethnicity, ethnic identity and ethnic group/
element, which have entered the discussion about the Mycenaean
colonisation of Cyprus during the last decades of the 20
th
century.
70

Sherratt has recently summarised the difficulties that lie in both the
general and the archaeological usage of these terms. She maintains that
ethnicity is employed by most researchers to describe a certain level of
group identity, which is usually vaguely defined and therefore unclear.
Furthermore when archaeologists or anthropologists do attempt to define
these terms, their definitions slide into the essentially political concepts
and preoccupations of relatively recent history. Sherratts arguments are
supported by a brief outline of the semantic history of the terms 0vo
and c0vt from the age of Homer until the present day that

reveals the kinds of earlier contexts in which successive Greek
and later Europaean notions of ethnic definition and distinction
were formed, and brings out the gradual crystallisation of the
essentially political principle of otherness which still informs
much of their modern usage.
71

Epilogue: an alternative set of terms and other suggestions

The above discussion has illustrated how the terminology employed
in archaeological narratives of colonisations, migrations and invasions
constitutes the result of the very same theoretical considerations and
socio-political conditions that generated them. At the same time,
however, terminology seems to actively contribute to the narratives
modification and development through the creation of preconceptions
and ideas. As a result, I would like to conclude this paper by stressing the
need to take some time and clarify our terminology, before starting to use
it, and most importantly, before putting any of it in print. Moreover, a
combined and systematic effort to establish a widely-accepted set of
terms in regard to the discussion of peoples movements such as
colonisations and migrations would by all means benefit research,
despite the fact that it would remain essentially fruitless. As objectivity is

70
Iacovou 1989: 53; Iacovou 2005; Catling 1994: 136-37; Karageorghis 1994;
Karageorghis 1998a: 276; Karageorghis 2000a: 13 and Karageorghis 2001: 265.
71
Sherratt 2005: 30-31.
practically impossible to obtain within the field of a humanistic
discipline (made by people, for people) like archaeology, providing a
clear definition for each of the proposed terms will (I hope) leave no
space for confusion and misunderstanding.
In regard to the Mycenaean colonisation of Cyprus, my attempt to
produce and utilise a well-defined set of terms enabled me to work
through the complex semantic web that was outlined in the previous
sections; moreover, it allowed me to adopt an alternative, much wider
point of view. My ideas concerning the nature and extent of the Aegean
movement to Cyprus at the end of the Late Bronze Age have been
presented elsewhere.
72
Suffice here to say that they are in full agreement
with none of the hypotheses discussed in the previous sections.
As far as the actual terms are concerned, I believe that colonisation
and immigration/migration should be replaced with movement or arrival
that are meant to describe the mere physical transference of groups of
people from the Aegean to Cyprus. On the other hand, politically
charged terms such as occupation, or the even more explicit hellenisation
have to be altogether abandoned. Furthermore the use of settlement
should be strictly confined to the designation of the establishment of
people as resident at a particular place and not extend as far as processes
like community or colony formation after migration. Consequently,
characterisations such as colonists, immigrants, refugees may not be used
when referring to the people, who are generally thought to have moved to
the island of Cyprus around the end of the Late Bronze Age, while the
use of the term settlers should be in accordance with the above definition
for settlement. Moreover, terms such as newcomers, incomers or arrivals
are by all means preferable.
When it comes to determining the origin of the incomers the ethnic
characterisations Greek/Hellenic should be totally avoided, due to their
close connection with contemporary politics and complicating effect
when mentioned in contexts associated with Aegean Prehistory.
73

Similarly, the mythological name Achaeans is quite confusing because it
has a Homeric origin and consequently multiple interpretations.
Therefore the geographic Aegean people, where Aegean includes the
Aegean archipelago and the surrounding lands, namely mainland Greece,
Crete and the western coast of Turkey
74
, seems more appropriate. Finally,

72
Leriou 2005.
73
Ramou-Hapsiadi 1982: 11; Dihle 1998: 19-20, note 12 and Preziosi and
Hitchcock 1999: 3-4.
74
Treuil et al. 1996: 89-108 and Preziosi and Hitchcock 1999: 4-7.
the archaeologically constructed term Mycenaeans, whenever used,
should be meant to designate the bearers of the material culture which
was typical in Mainland Greece during the period 1600-1050.
75
Last but
not least, the highly perplexing ethnic group may be replaced with
cultural group, which is thought to define the producers and/or
consumers of a particular archaeological culture.

75
Mylonas 1966; Vasilikou 1995; Treuil et al. 1996: 89-108; 403-592 and
Wardle and Wardle 1997.
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CULTS OF THE GREEK CITIES EN ARISTERA TOU PONTOU:
INTERACTION OF GREEK AND THRACIAN TRADITIONS

Dobrinka Chiekova, Bryn Mawr College, USA
dchiekov@brynmawr.edu

The cities on the Western Black Sea Coast, or as the Greeks refer to
en aristera tou Pontou, are from north to south Tyras, Istros, Tomis,
Callatis, Bizone, Dionysopolis, Odessos, Mesambria and Apollonia. The
Ancient Greeks call the western Black Sea Coast the left side of the
Pontos, en aristera tou Pontou, because it is situated on the left side to
the navigators sailing from Aegean to Pontos Euxeinos via the Straits. It
is a complicated task to draw geographical boundaries in the domain of
religious and cultural interrelations: the model of a regional pantheon
is a modern construct and not historical reality. Nevertheless, in my
opinion, this model is a valuable methodological approach for depiction
of regional cultural traits. The cults of the colony were connected with
the pantheon of its metropolis and the contacts with the local tradition
influence the religious sphere. These two aspects enable us to isolate
several common characteristics.
Ovid describes in bitter verses the place of his exile Tomis, frozen
by eternal winter, wild, and inhabited by ferocious people. He
complaints that Greek and Barbarian tongue were mixed; he had even
composed a poem in honor of Augustus in Getian language and recited it
in public (Ex Ponto, IV, 13). That very characteristic deplored by Ovid,
engaged my interest: the existence of a bi-lingual, bi-cultural area on the
Thracian coast of Black Sea between 7
th
and 1
st
centuries BCE.
Istros is the first settlement on the left side of the Pontos Euxeinos,
established around 650 BCE. Apollonia Pontica follows, around 610
BCE and Odessos, at the beginning of 6
th
century BCE. Tyras is founded
at the beginning of 6
th
or at the end of 7
th
century BCE. All four cities are
apoikiai of Miletus. The foundation date of Tomis is subject of
controversy, but it was certainly a Milesian settlement. The two Dorian
western Pontic colonies are Kallatis and Mesambria. Colonists from
Heraclea Pontica, a Megarian colony, founded Kallatis in the second half
of the 6
th
century. According to one version, Kalchedonians and
Megarians founded Mesambria at the end of 6
th
century BCE (513 BCE),
or, according to another, the apoikoi came from the Megarian cities
Byzantion and Kalchedon at the beginning of 5
th
century BCE (493
BCE). Dionysopolis and Bizone were late establishments, 3
rd
and 2
nd

BCE respectively, and the origin of the colonists is uncertain.
The relationseconomical, political, demographical, and cultural
between the colonists and the local population represent an important
and complex aspect of the phenomenon of the colonization. The names
of most of these cities are of Thracian origin: Istros, Tomis, Kallatis,
Bizone, Odessos, Mesambria. Thracian settlements existed before the
foundation of some of them and a significant stratum of pre-colonial
occupation was discovered at Mesambria. The archaeological and
epigraphic evidence supports the conclusion that since the foundation of
the Greek colonies on the western Black Sea Coast, the peace and the
concept of mutual interest prevails in the political relations between the
colonists and the Thracians versus the hostilities attested for certain
periods. An eloquent example is provided by the excavations of two
Thracian necropoleis near Odessos with vestiges of non-interrupted
occupation from 7
th
through 4
th
century BCE.
1
The foundation of
Odessos about 10 km away didnt disrupt the existence of the local
settlement. The discoveries of Greek ceramics there suggest the presence
of commercial relations between the Thracians and the colonists. We
dont yet have an exhaustive study concerning the Thracian presence in
these cities. It is important to note that a reliable documentation is still
lacking and the archeological data, including the onomastic evidence,
rarely provide unquestionable proofs as to the ethnic identity of the
persons.

1
Cf. Isaac, B., The Greek Settlements in Thrace until the Macedonian Conquest,
Leiden 1986, p. 256 et n. 272 et 273.
Chiekova Greek and Thracian Traditions 53
In the present study I will discuss specifics for the regions religious
choices and will argue that the preference for particular cults was a
consequence of an interaction with the Thracian cultural traditions. This
feature, in my opinion, is evidenced in two ways: through direct loans
of local gods and heroes, albeit in a Hellenized form, and through the
predominance and the popularity of certain cults versus others.

c, lyo, ` C6got +v

The most important deity in Odessos, at least since the Hellenistic
period, Theos Megas, the Great god is known to us through the coins of
the city. In the Roman period the Great God bears the Thracian name
Derzalas/Darzalas and his portrait was the dominant type on the coins.
Silver tetradrachms of Odessos from 2
nd
century BCE present the
portrait of a bearded god, with a ribbon in the hair, on the reversethe
God is standing, clad in a long chiton, turned to the left, holding a patera
in his folded right hand and a cornucopia in his left hand. On his right
side is the legend: ECY lEF//CY and on his left side, the
ethnikon: CZH2IJuN, under him is the name of the magistrate
responsible for the coinage, KYP2/.
2

A different image of the God appears on bronze coins of Odessos
from 4
th
century BCE: on the obverse is present a portrait identified by
some numismatists as Apollo and by others as an anonymous Goddess,
peer of the Great god; on the reverse the Great God is half-laying on a
kline, with naked torso, holding a cornucopia in his folded left hand.
3

On coins of Gordian the portrait of the god is facing the portrait of
the emperor, on the obverse is presented a corona donatica with the
name of the penteteric festival consecrated to Darzalas: Darzaleia.
4
The

2
Pick, B., Regling, K., Die antiken Mnzen von Dacien und Moesien II, Berlin
1910, n
o
2141-2144, Pl. IV, 3; cf. L. Robert, Les inscriptions grecques de
Bulgarie, RPhil 33, 1959, pp. 165-236, p. 228, n. 8.
3
Pick, B., Regling, K., op.cit. supra n. 2, pp. 522-523 et n
o
2177-2184, IV, 4-7;
Sylloge nummorum Graecorum, vol. IX, The British Museum, Part I, The Black
Sea, red. by M. J. Price, London 1993, Pl. XI, 294-300; Sylloge nummorum
Graecorum, vol. XI, The William Stancomb Collection of Coins of the Black
Sea region, Oxford, New York 2000, Pl. XII, 253-257.
4
Pick, B., Regling, K., op.cit. supra n. 2, n
o
2370-2372, Pl. V, 3.
Great God Darzalas had at Odessos a temple for which a neokoros,
elected by the Boule and the Demos of the city, was taking care.
5

Among the monuments related to the cult of the Great God, a group
of reliefs comes from sites more than 100 km away from the Black Sea
Coast, the territory included between Nicopolis ad Istrum and
Markianopolis in Moesia Inferior. On a marble plaque with dedication to
God Darzalas, is engraved an image closely resembling the one on the
coins of Odessos: a bearded God standing and clad in a long chiton,
holding in his right hand a patera over a blazing altar, and in his left
hand, a cornucopia:
6

[K]upl Zop(oXq Jop[cv
[ou(Xcu+,) c_opto+ptv ov0-
[c]kcv.

To Lord Darzalas, Tourbo, bouleutes, dedicated as
thank-offering.

Another relief with the Thracian Horseman bears the following
dedication:
7

c gk Zcp(ct /Xto, Ztoy-
vg, ltk, cocvo, ov0gko.

To god Derzis who gives ear (to prayers), I, the eques
Aelius Diogenes, offered while making a vow.

A bearded Horseman with a cornucopia is figured on a third relief
from the same region: his horse is charging against an altar and his dog
is chasing a boar.
8

5
Inscriptiones Graecae in Bulgaria Repertae I, Ed. by G. Mihailov, Sofia
1970
2
, 230 bis*: ..cc....(.)/ oyopov[o]- / oo, ko p- / o, to+, /
ko ycvc- / vo, co lc- / yoXou Zcp-/ (oXo vcck-/ po, [ou-
/ Xj, ko 6-/ ou +ctj,/ [_optv- - -].
6
Inscriptiones Graecae in Bulgaria Repertae II, ed. by G. Mihailov, Sofia 1958,
768.
7
Inscriptiones Graecae in Bulgaria Repertae II, 770 = Gocheva, Z.,
Oppermann, M., Corpus Cultus Equitus Thracii Leiden 1981, II, 2, 444.
8
Gocheva, Z. und Oppermann, M. (op. cit. supra n. 7), 1, 379 (3
rd
century AD).
The specific figure of Theos Megas in Odessos is subject to many
interpretations. There is however an aspect on which the different
interpretations agree: the chthonic character of the deity, as expressed by
the iconographic type of its images.
9

In the heart of the debate remains the question of the originGreek,
Thracian or product of syncretismof this chthonic cult.
Pick supposes that the designation Theos Megas is a euphemic name
given to the Herrscher der Unterwelt, the Greek Pluto. This
supposition is supported by the iconographical type known from coins of
Odessos, presenting the divinity laying on a kline, position typical for the
representations of chthonic divinities, while his attribute, the cornucopia,
characterizes these divinities as givers of fertility. Pick associates Theos
Megas with the anonymous Theos from Eleusis and identifies the
portrait of the Goddess on the 4
th
century bronze coins of Odessos with
the Eleusinian Thea, whose image we see on the relief of Lysimachides
discovered at the Plutonion in Eleusis.
10
On the right side of the relief of
Lysimachides (4
th
century BCE) are represented, within the iconographic
pattern of funerary banquet, Theos and Thea as identified by
inscriptions.
Hemberg supposes that Theos Megas in Odessos was one of Theoi
Megaloi from Samothrace.
11
This hypothesis however is weakened by
the fact that the Great Gods of Samothrace possess their own important
worship in Odessos and in most of the western Pontic cities. J.
Zelazowski sees Theos Megas as a deity created in the Hellenistic
period, similar to Sarapis.
12

In my view, the dominating position of Theos Megas in the pantheon
of Odessos suggests ancient roots, although any attestation before 4
th

century BCE is lacking, which provides the strongest argument in favor
of late creation of his cult. It is plausible that Theos Megas is a god with
chthonic functions and this explains the analogy with Pluto, Sarapis and
the Thracian Horseman. On the other hand, the anonymity expressed by
the name Theos Megas, too common and widespread, suggest
identification with the Gods of Samothrace. In my opinion, Theos Megas

9
A more detailed discussion on the subject will offer the chapter Theos Megas
in Chiekova, D., Cultes et vie religieuse des cites grecques du Pont Gauche
(VII
e
I
er
s. av. J.-C.), Peter Lang, 2008.
10
Pick B., Trakische Mnzbilder, JDAI 13, 1898, pp. 158-162.
11
Hemberg, B., Die Kabiren, Uppsala 1950, pp. 224-231.
12
Zelazowski, J., Le culte et l'iconographie de Theos Megas sur les territoires
pontiques, Archeologia Warszawa, 43, 1992, pp. 35-51.
was by origin a local divinity, adopted by the Greeks at their arrival. He
probably occupied a secondary position in the pantheon of the city in the
Classic period when the patron deity, likewise the other Milesian
colonies, was most likely Apollo. Then only in the Hellenistic period
Theos Megas became the City God. At that moment, at latest, this local
divinity will be worshipped as Theos Megas and will adopt the
iconographical traits of the Greek chthonic divinities. Nonetheless, I
would not assume that only at that time Theos Megas was created or
introduced. The presence of the ethnikon, Odessitn, next to his image
on the silver tetradrachms of Odessos portrays Theos Megas as the
patron deity of Odessos and a similar importance points toward a cult
with ancient roots. Similar emissions consecrated to a divinity and with
ethnikon are known for Illionto Athena Illias, for Maroneiato
Dionysus, for Thasosto Heracles Soter, all ancestral cults in these
cities.
13

It is more difficult to explain why in the course of the Hellenistic
period this cult became important. I am inclined to believe that it was at
the outcome of a military crisis. With use of little imagination, I would
even see in this apparition of the Great God in Odessos a story of
theophania similar to the story of Phosphorosepiphania at Byzantium
during the siege of the city by Phillip II.
14

The Thracian Horseman

The western Black Sea cities and mainly their chora have provided a
considerable number of monuments of the Thracian Horseman: around
300 to date. The majority of these monuments are dated to the Roman
period, and only few to Hellenistic times (3
rd
-2
nd
centuries BCE). The
vestiges of at least 10 sanctuaries of the Thracian Horseman have been
identified in the region.

13
Cf. Robert, L., Monnaies antiques en Troade, Genve, Paris 1966, p. 44,
regarding the coinage of Thasos, Maronea et Odessos: le dieu principal est
ainsi mis lhonneur dans la lgende.
14
Cf. Robert, L. in: N. Firatli, Les stles funraires de Byzance grco-romaine.
Avec l'dition et l'index comment des pitaphes par L. Robert, Paris 1964, p.
155.
I will not discuss in the following pages the complex problem of the
origin and the nature of the Horseman, which would require a thorough
examination of vast material. I will summarize the iconographic
particularities of his monuments.
The reliefs of the Horseman can be divided in two functional groups,
votive and funerary, which are united by an iconographic pattern
embracing several variants. The main elements are: the Horseman is
hunting or coming back from hunt; usually he carries a spear in his hand;
he is accompanied sometimes by a dog and the hunted animal is
generally a boar. The representation is limited on the right side by a tree
with an intertwined snake and/or by an altar. On several monuments the
Horseman is moving toward a female figure, whose hand is raised in a
gesture of benediction or salutation, or she is holding a patera.
Sometimes the female figures are threethe three Nymphs.
15

In the dedications on some monuments, the divinity is referred to as
Hpc, (latin Heron), or c, Hpc, or Kpto,. Sometimes the deity
is identified with Greek divinities, like Apollo, Zeus, Sarapis, etc. Often
the Horseman is worshipped with Thracian epithets: Karabasmos, Perko,
Karsenos, Mursine, Manimadzos, etc.
It is very likely that the cult of the Horseman is related to the status
and the ideology of the Thracian kingship. The Thracian dynasts appear
as horsemen on numerous monuments of Thracian toreutics and on
monetary emissions of the Odryssian kings.
16

15
Cf. Kazarow, G., RE Suppl. III, 1918, col. 1137-1140, s.v. Heros (Thrakischer
Reiter). Darstellung des Reiters; Id., Die Denkmler des Thrakischen
Reitergottes in Bulgarien, Budapest 1938, pp. 5-10; I. Venedikov, Der
Thrakische Reiter, in: Gocheva, Z., Oppermann, M., Corpus Cultus Equitis
Thracii I, Monumenta orae Ponti Euxini Bulgariae, Leiden 1979, pp. 1-6;
Oppermann, M., Heros equitans, Lexicon Iconographicum Mythologiae
Classicae, VI, 1, Zrich, Mnchen pp. 1073-1077 (ibid., p. 1074: from the
Bulgarian territory only originate more than 2000 monuments).
16
Fol, A., Politika i cultura v drevna Trakija, Sofia 1990, p. 154, for the coins
cf. J. Juroukova in: Izkustvo Sofia, 3-4, 1975, pp. 39-45; cf. aussi Fol, A., La
colonisation grecque en Thracecroisement de deux cultures, Thracia Pontica
4, 1991, pp. 3-14: cest le hros mythologique (le roi-prtre) qui devient la
figure centrale, surtout dans les deux scnes fondamentales dont lune est la
chasse royale o lpreuve axiologique du hros contre les basses valeurs
thiques. Le fait de terrasser la bte (de passer lpreuve axiologique) permet au
hros datteindre la perfection, dont lhirogamie marque le sommet doctrinal.;
cf. Hocart, A. M., Kings and Councillors: An Essay in the Comparative
Anatomy of Human Society, Chicago, London 1970
2
, p. 86 sq.
The eponymous hero Melsas

In Mesambria was worshipped a hero Melsas, who was in all
probability of local origin. The evidence of his worship is mainly
numismatic: a portrait of a hero with a Corinthian helmet appears on the
earliest coins of the city in 5
th
century BCE. The helmet appears
separately on coins and on reliefs. The origin of the citys name is found
in Strabo and in lexicographic texts as well as in an epitaph from 2
nd

century AD:

c+o lcog[plo lcyopcv otko,: p+cpov 6
lcvc[plo, oov lvo Xt,, +o k+loov+o, lvo
koXouvou, +j, 6 Xcc, [plo, koXouvg,
0pqkto+l.

Then Mesembria, a colony of the Megarians, formerly
called Menembria that is, city of Menas, because the
name of its founder was Menas, while bria is the word for
city in the Thracian language. (Strabo 7, 6, 1)

lcog[plo: Xt, ov+tk. NtkXoo, +:
kX0g o lXoou: [plov yop +v Xtv oo
pqkc,. , ov 2gXu[plo g +o 2Xuo, Xt,,
oX+u[plo g X+uo, [Xt,], o+c lcog[plo g
lXoou Xt,, ko 6to + ccv+cpov Xyc+ot
lcog[plo.

Mesembria: pontic city. Nicolaus (Damascenus) in book
fifth (says): it is named after Melsa, for Thracians call the
city bria. As Selymbria is city of Selys, Poltymbria is
city of Poltys, thus Mesembria is city of Melsas, and for
better resonance is pronounced Mesembria. (Steph. Byz. s.v.
(= FGrHist 2 A 90 F 43 [45]))

Èv0o6c yc kcc Eko+g 0c, , oopq,.
fgv + oXot [po+,, vv 6 o0ovo+o, kol
oypc,:

ÌouXlo Nctklou 0uyo+gp cyoX+opo, ov6p,,
lcoc[plo (sic) 6 u (sic) o+p, o [l?]Xoo
ko [plo:
(oooo +g oo ot o+Xg ko+_ct:
+p, v+c 6 [c]koot ko 6ko v+c.
E+u_c+c, opo6+ot.

I rest here, Hecate the goddess, as you see. Before I was
mortal, now I am immortal and undecaying, Ioulia, daughter
of Nikios, the greathearted man; my fatherland is
Mesembria, name formed from Melsa and bria. I lived as
many years as the stele shows: 3 times 25 and 15. May you
prosper, passers-by. (Inscriptiones Graecae in Bulgaria
repertae I
2
, 345)

A marble relief from Mesambria presents a scene of sacrifice led by
the main magistrates of Mesambria, the six strategoi, end of 2nd-
beginning of 3rd centuries B.C.: on a second plan, on the left edge is
depicted an altar on which is positioned a Corinthian helmet; another
helmet is depicted right to the small naiskos. The helmet on the altar is
the symbol of the eponymous hero Melsas and emblem of the city.
17

The adoption of local hero cults can be seen in terms of
appropriation or adaptation to the sacred heritage of the new homeland.

Apollo and Dionysus

Another mode of interaction with the local religious traditions is
perceptible in the popularity of certain cults versus other, although the
latter were central to the metropolis. In the pantheons of the Greek cities
on the Thracian coast of Pontos Euxeinos two divinities occupy a
noticeably dominant position: Apollo and Dionysus.
The various epithets with which Apollo was invoked and
worshipped in these cities are eloquent for the Milesian and the
Megarian heritage respectively. On the other hand, the cult of Dionysus
was brought along from the mother cities by the first colonists. In this
my opinion diverges from the view of Bilabel expressed in his Die

17
Inscriptiones Graecae in Bulgaria repertae V, ed. by G. Mihailov, Sofia
1997, 5102.
ionische Kolonisation, who believes that Dionysus was a Thracian deity
worshipped in the Pontic colonies.
18
However, I interpret the importance
and the popularity of Apollo and Dionysus in the pantheon of the
western Black sea cities also as a consequence of interaction with local
religious values.
The existence of solar cult among the Thracians is related by various
ancient sources and is discussed by scholars of the Thracian religion.
19

Jordanes, the 6
th
century AD author of a History of the Goths reports
that Philip II had undertaken a siege of Odessos, during which the priests
of the city, referred to as the priests Goths, opened the gates and came
out clad in white dresses and, with citharas in the hands, with music
accompany the prayers to their gods. Astounded and fascinated, the
Macedonian army had stopped before those unarmed people.
20

The historical method of Jordanes is marked by an archaizing
tendency and he incorrectly assimilates the Goths with the former
inhabitants north and west of the Black Sea, with the Thracian tribe
Getae in particular. His objective is to add glare and ancientness to the
history of Goths and the name by which his work is known is Getica
instead of Gothica. Taking into account this aspect doesnt make the
story on the Priests of Odessos easier to interpret. I refer to this narrative
preserved in a rather late source, not as an authentic report of a real

18
Bilabel, F., Die ionische Kolonisation. Untersuchungen ber die Grndungen
der Ionier, deren staatlische und kultische Organisation und Beziehungen zu
den Mutterstdten, Leipzig 1920, p. 115.
19
Cf. e.g. Soph. Tereus, frg. 582 Lloyd-Jones: HXtc, tXlot, p
po[to+ov oXo,.
O Sun, light highly honored by the horse-loving Thracians; Kazarow, G., RE
VIa, 1937 s.v. Thrake (Religion), col. 500-504 and col. 504-505; Fol, A.
Kotys, Son of Apollo, in: Studia in honorem Georguii Mihailov, Sofia 1995,
pp. 183-185; Werner, R., Aspekte der thrakischen Kultur, Chiron 29, 1999, p.
90.
20
Iord. Get. X 65:-qua tempestate Dio storico dicente Philippus inopia pecuniae
passus, Odyssitanum Moesiae civitatem instructis copiis vastare deliberat, quae
tunc propter vicinam Thomes Gothis erat subiecta. unde et sacerdotes Gothorum
illi qui pii vocabantur subito patefactis portis cum citharis et vestibus candidis
obviam egressi patriis diis, ut sibi propitii Macedonas repellerent, voce supplici
modulantes. quos Macedones sic fiducialiter sibi occurrere contuentes stupiscent
et, si dici fas est, ab inermibus terrentur armati. nec mora soluta acie quam ad
bellandum construxerant, non tantum ab urbis excidio abstinuerunt, verum etiam
et quos foris fuerant iure belli adepti, reddiderunt, foedusque inito ad sua reversi
sunt..
incident but in order to evoke ideas and motifs associating it with the
Apollonian mythological cycle: with the Apollonian bard Amphion who
builds the walls of Thebes by the music of his flute and the magic power
of Orpheus, also an Apollonian devotee, to subordinate with his songs
the whole nature. Moreover, the existence of music of Apollonian type
among the Getae is mentioned by Theopompos in a fragment, quoted by
Athenaeus.
21
The uncertainties surrounding the passage of Jordanes are
abundant, but its overall message is in perfect conformity with the
evidence of the importance of Apollo in the western Black Sea cities.
The reference to the Getae confirms the existence of synergy between
the traditions brought along by the colonists and the religious context in
the new homeland.
Another important testimony for my argument comes from
Anchialos, a phrourion of the Milesian Apollonia. Apollonios son of
Eptaikenthios, strategos of Anchialos, dedicates an altar to Apollo
Karsenos in the reign of the Thracian king Rhoemetalkas II (19 BCE-26
BCE):
Inscriptiones Graecae in Bulgaria repertae I
2
, 378:

[`/XXc]vt Kopogvct 0c-
[t cyo]Xct cocvo,
[ko t+]u_cv +v [cv
[ov0gk]c `/oXXcvto,
[E+otk]cv0ou 3t(ugv,
[o+po+g]y, `/y_toXou
[ko 2cX]Xg+tkj, ko Puot-
[kj, ]p +c ou+o ko
[yuvotk], /cov+o, ko
[+kvc]v Potg+oXkou
[pqk]v [ootXc,.

Apollonios son of Heptaikenthos, from Bizye, strategos
of Anchialos and of Selletica, and of Rysica, dedicated the
altar to the great god Apollo Karsenos, since his prayer was

21
Theop. FGrHist 2 B 115 F 216 (244) (= Athen. XIV 24, p. 627 D-E):
coo, 6`v +cooopokoo+ k+ +v Io+optv "F+ot, gol,
kt0opo, _ov+c, ko kt0opl(ov+c, +o, tkgpukclo, otov+ot.
Theopompus, in the forty-sixth book of his Histories, says: The Getae carry
out diplomatic negotiations holding citharas and playing on them..
heard, for him, his wife Leonto and his kids, during the reign
of Rhoemetalkas, the Thracian king.

Apollonios son of Eptaikenthos, a Thracian by origin, according to
his patronymic, strategos of Anchialos, is known from two other
monuments: one comes from Byzie and bears a dedication to Apollo
Paktyenos and a second is a statue of Apollo Kitharedes.
22

I would like to draw attention to the local epithets Karsenos and
Pactyenos and to the fact that the statue of Apollo Citharedes was
dedicated in a sanctuary of the Thracian Horseman. It is obvious in my
view that Apollonios has been a devotee to a Thracian solar deity
identified with Apollo.
The importance of the worship of Apollo in the western Pontic cities
is evidenced as well through the fact that the most popular divinity in
Thrace, the Thracian Horseman, usually named in different regions of
the country after various Greek deities, in the monuments from the Black
Sea shore was almost exclusively named (assimilated to) Apollo; a
Thracian epithet accompanies sometimes the Gods name. On one relief,
the Horseman is holding the attribute of Apollo, the lyre.
23

As a last observation, which seems to support my argument, I will
evoke the central position of Apollo in the Megarian colonies on the
Thracian coast of Black Sea, Kallatis and Mesambria, versus much lesser
importance in the Megarian cities on the northern and southern shore,
that is Chersonesos Taurikos and Heraclea Pontica.
It is important to emphasize that the current documentation,
epigraphic and numismatic, illustrates in a significant way that Dionysus
and especially Dionysus Bacchos was worshiped in all cities en aristera
tou Pontou.
Lucian, in his treatise On the Dance presents eloquently the
prevalence of the bachic cult in the Ionian and Pontic cities.

g v yc 3ok_tk p_got, v Ìcvlq oXto+o ko v
v+ oou6o(ovg, kol+ot oo+uptk ooo, o+c
kc_clpc+ot +o, ov0pcou, +o, kc o+c ko+o +v
+c+oyvov koo+ot kotpv, oov+cv tXo0cvot

22
Inscriptiones Graecae in Bulgaria repertae I
2
, 374 (cf. Inscriptiones Graecae
in Bulgaria repertae V, 5132); Kjakina, P. in: Izvestija na Narodnija Muzej,
Varna 3, 2000, pp. 106-115.
23
Goeva, Z., Oppermann, M., Corpus Cultus Equitis Thracii I, Monumenta
orae Ponti Euxini Bulgariae, Leiden 1979, 173.
+v XXcv, ko0gv+ot 6t` gpo, +t+vo, ko
kop[ov+o, ko oo+pou, ko [oukXou, pv+c,.
ko p_ov+ol yc +o+o ol cycvo+o+ot ko
pc+cov+c, v koo+ +v Xccv, o_ c,
ol6ocvot oXXo ko yo povov+c, +
poyo+t XXov fcp ` cycvclo, ko Xct+oupylo,
ko otcoot poyovtko,. (Lucian, De saltat. 79
Macleod)

Bacchic dance, which is especially favored in Ionia and
in Pontus, though bawdy (satyrike), has so engrossed the
people there that all of them at the appointed time forget
everything else and sit watching Titans, Corybants, Satyrs
and ox herds (boukoloi) all day long. And those who perform
these dances are the best born and the first people in each of
the cities. So far from feeling embarrassment, they take great
pride in the matter, more even than in their high birth, public
services, and their ancestral reputations.
24

This passage raises the question what did Lucian meant by the
geographical term "Pontos"?
C. P. Jones illustrated convincingly the rapport between the
description by Lucian of the Dionysiac celebrations and an epitaph of
155 BCE for a Dionysiac dancer at Amastris. Jones points out similarity
regarding several aspects: the extract of Lucian and the inscription evoke
a dance of a specific type, a bacchic dance, carried out not by
professional dancers but by people of noble origin like the late young
man Aemilianus, member probably of a Dionysiac association:

'E+o, v gv +ptokoo+v f6g ot +6c,
0gkc 6 /ltXtovv voo ot o+p,
v 0pcc Ftvo,, c, ovp +v cycvv:
op` pot, 6 kov El 0c
+ptc+jpt +cXc+v uo+tk, ovyoyov. k+X.
(SEG XXXV, 1327)

24
transl. C. P. Jones, Lucian and the Bacchants of Pontus, Echos du monde
classique 34, n.s. 9, 1990, pp. 53-63.
This was now my thirtieth year, and my father gave me
the name Aemilianus, and Geminus brought me up, a man of
noble birth. Amid incense-vessels (?) I led the revel for the
biennial god Euhios, (and led) the rite in mystic fashion, etc.

Regarding the term "Pontos" used by Lucian, Jones supposes that it
initially refers to the Roman province of the same name, but could
include cities of Paphlagonia like Amastris as well. It seems to me,
however, considering the epigraphic data revealing the range of Bacchic
celebrations and the presence of Dionysiac associations in the Greek
cities on the western and northern coasts of the Pontos Euxeinos, that the
term Pontos employed by Lucian covers all areas surrounding the Black
Sea.
I would like to draw attention in particular to the term empyra. Jones
proposes to translate empyra in the epitaph of Aemilianus as incense-
vessels, since the meaning of offerings, intended to be burned, is not
likely. Jones evokes the occurrence of the same term in a 2
nd
century
BCE inscription from Sardis transmitting a prohibition from 4
th
century
BCE to the priests of Ahura Mazda to take part in the mysteries of
Sabazios, Angdistis and Ma.
25
F. Sokolowski interprets empyra of Sardis
as recipients of incense, while L. Robert proposes victims intended to
be burned.
26
A. Fol saw in empyra different sacred objects carried
around in fire. The author evokes a parallel with the modern folk
festival of St Constantin and St Helene in Agia Eleni in Thrace and the
dance on ember, where the participants carry various sacred objects.
27

This last interpretation is most convincing for me.
In connection with Dionysus and the fire rites, an epigram from
Tomis reveals the epiclesis Pyribromos of Dionysus and suggests in
particular that rituals related to fire have been performed in this western
pontic city. The dedication presents the devotees of Dionysus organized
in a thiasos named after a woman Paso, its founder or priestess:

/yvv p 0toooto upl[po oot + [6
yoXo]
6pov oc+po, oocv py[oolo,]
[]uo+tkv [ok_oot Xo_cv o+o,. . . .

25
SEG XXIX, 1205, l. 8-10.
26
Sokolowski, F., ZPE 34, 1979, pp. 65-69; Robert, L., CRAI 1975, p. 325.
27
Fol, A., Trakijskijat Dionis, Book II Sabazios, Sofia 1994, p. 77 et pp. 250-
252.
opt6o,, op_olgv 6ctkvcvo, +[cXc+v]
`/XXo o, +oupkcpc,, Epoyvco, _c[p,]
pyov
[6]ot ko ooo, o(c lcpv 0looov.
(Inscriptiones Scythiae Minoris II (ed I. Stoian, 120)

In the name of the hallowed thiasos, to you, Roaring
with fire, he offered from his own atelier, after obtaining the
wreath of mystes among the bacchants, Someone son of
Parmis, performing an ancient ritual. And you, Bull-horned,
receive the oeuvre of Hermagenes hand and grant salvation
to the sacred thiasos of Paso.

In my view, the epiclesis Puribomos Roaring with fire echoes the
fact that rites related to fire formed part of the Dionysiac celebrations in
Tomis. This indication offers a link with the term empyra in the epitaph
from Amastris and with the passage of Lucian and seems to complement
my interpretation that the term Pontos Lucian includes the western
Pontic shore as well.
The worship of Dionysus incontestably formed part of the heritage
of Miletus and Megara. However, it seems to me that local religious
traditions were particularly favorable to the prominence in these colonies
of the bacchic Greek worship, closely related to them.

The popularity of Kybele

Another indication of contact with the Thracian religion I would see
in the popularity of Kybele in the western Pontic cities attested to since
the Archaic period. Again, this importance can be explained at least on
two levels. On the one hand, it is a sign of the place occupied by the
Anatolian traditions in the religious sphere of these cities. On the other
hand, I am inclined to assign the popularity of the Great Anatolian
Mother to the worship of a Great Goddess Mother by the Thracians.
28

28
On the Great Thracian Goddess cf. e.g. Fol, A., Trakijskijat orfism, Sofia
1986, passim; Rostovtzeff, M. I., Rozpis Kerchenskoij grobnitzy otkryty v 1891
godu, St-Petersbourg 1911, passim; Id. Le culte de la Grande desse dans
Russie mridionale, REG, 31, 1919, pp. 462-481; I. Marazov, The identity of
the Triballian Great Goddess, Talanta 20-21, 1988-89, pp. 41-51; Werner, R.,
Aspekte der thrakischen Kultur, Chiron 29, 1999, p. 87 sq. On the importance
A group of monuments with the Thracian Horseman offers support
to this suggestion, where the goddess in front of the hero resembles
Kybele but must be interpreted, most likely, as the Thracian Goddess
which representation adopts the iconographic type of Kybele.
29

There are without a doubt numerous features and aspects in the
religious tradition of these cities, which I didnt include in the present
discussion. My goal was not to exhaust the subject but to call attention to
the richness of their cultural legacy. In my view, the Greek inhabitants of
the cities en aristera tou Pontou, remaining faithful to the ancestral
nomoi inherited by the metropolis, were in the same time able to
embrace religious values of their Barbarian neighbors.

of Kybele, Demeter and Artemis-Hekate-Phosphoros in the western pontic cities
cf. Chiekova, D., Cultes et vie religieuse des cits grecques du Pont Gauche
(VIIe-ler sicle av. J.-C.) Bern 2008), ch. 3,4 and 7.
29
Tacheva-Hitova, M., Eastern cults in Moesia Inferior and Thracia (5th
century B.C.-4th century AD), Leiden 1983: n
o
39, 40, 55 a, 56, 74, 75, 82.

KADMOS, JASON, AND THE GREAT GODS OF
SAMOTHRACE: INITIATION AS MEDIATION IN A
NORTHERN AEGEAN CONTEXT
1

Sandra Blakely, Emory University, USA
sblakel@emory.edu

Samothrace abounds in traditions of heroes who come to the island
for initiation into the mysteries of the great gods. Far more numerous
than in other cults, these legendary figures crowd into the islands
imagination of itself as the recipients of its greatest ritual treasure
divine protection for travel at sea. Their number seems, at the simplest
level, a reflection of the cults most singular promise for its initiates, and
one naturally suited to the needs of a hero. That promise emerges
naturally as well from the islands location and geology set in
characteristically rough seas, and possessing but one poor harbor,
Samothrace nevertheless offered the highest beacon of the northern
Aegean Mt. Phengari, at 5,459 feet, visible from 100 miles away. This
would be significant aid for navigators, who relied on easily visible
landmarks.
2
The promise, and the heroes, may thus be easily accounted

1
I offer warm thanks to Terry Papillon and Ann-Marie Knoblauch for their
organization of the conference and the publication. A Margot Tytus Fellowship
from the University of Cincinnati provided welcome time and resources for the
further development of the argument.
2
Morton 2001: 144 n. 4, 185-189; Horden and Purcell 2000: 442; Pliny NH
4.73; Lehmann 1998: 15-17.
for as a response to the cults location and the tendencies of Greek heroic
legend.
These hero initiates offer more intricate insight, however, into the
nature of the cult and the gods than this simple explanation suggests. The
prevailing critical approach to the legends identified elements of
historical fact buried in the narrative to read through the myths to the
history hidden behind them. The myths are themselves, however,
historical artifacts cultural creations which impose pattern on the past.
Such patterns, Appadurai has argued, constitute cultural commodities,
which may be used to support groups and institutions.
3
Both the
historical elements the myths select, and the patterns into which they set
them, are determined by the institutions they support. The myths thus
reflect the structures, as well as the simple existence, of the institutions
significant enough to trade in the market of cultural memory. The
mysteries were Samothraces single greatest commodity. Travelers
flocked to the island for initiation for centuries after the 6
th
century BCE
floruit of the town was long past. The patterns of these heroic legends
reflect the particular needs of an initiatory ritual based on the type of the
Greek mysteries located in the far northeastern reach of the Greek
Aegean. The narrative dynamics of these heroes offer the background
against which the elements that distinguish Samothrace from other cults
appear not as a collection of hapaxes, but an articulate response to the
historical demands of habitation and commerce in a region that was the
boundaryland of Greek and non-Greek. These concerns reflect a patten
never irrelevant in Mediterranean history, and suggest a factor
contributing to the cult's longevity beyond its history of wealthy
patronage.
The heroes who guide this exploration are Kadmos and Jason. Both
men have an intimate connection with the islands rites and gods:
Kadmos figures in the liturgy itself, while Jason articulates its most
famous promise. The pattern they share is the type of the protocolonial, a
hero of first contact who must achieve mediation between his culture and
the indigenous inhabitants of the country to which he travels. We will
consider the heroes individually first, and then set their shared pattern
against the background of Samothracian hapaxes, including the pre-
Greek gods, the ritual installations on the site, its boundaryland location,
and the language of the liturgy. We will finally consider how the ritual

3
Appadurai 1981.
Blakely Samothrace 69
dynamics particular to the Greek mysteries shape the functional
relationship of these elements to each other.

KADMOS

Kadmos the Phoenician appears in the traditions of Samothrace as
early as the fifth century BCE.
4
Early sources mention only his marriage
to Harmonia; the islands mysteries appear first in the fourth century,
when Ephoros notes that Kadmos caught his first glimpse of his bride
while she was being initiated, carried her off, and so established the
custom of searching for the girl in the islands festivals. The hero has
unusually strong ties to the rites. Beyond the commemoration of his
marriage in the annual festival, he is cited as one of the gods of the cult,
in the guise of Kadmilos, and he shares iconographic and narrative
elements with Hermes, whose importance to the cult is attested in both
textual and epigraphical sources.
5
The hero also has an earlier connection
with the mysteries on neighboring Lemnos, where Akusilaos, writing in
the fifth century, identified Kadmilos as the father of the Kabeiroi, and a
son of Hephaistos and the nymph Kabeiro.
6
And on Imbros, an
inscription from the 2
nd
or 3
rd
century CE (IG XII 8 n. 74) lists Kasmeilos
along with Theoi Megaloi and five Titans; Hemberg has argued that this
represents a much older tradition.
7
Strabo identified these three islands as
the places most famous for the celebration of the Kabeiroi (10.3.7) It is
on Samothrace alone, however, that the rites rose to international
prominence, the identity of the gods became contested, and Kadmos
visit summoned to provide an explanation.
These gods resist easy identification. Despite their patronage of one
of the most prestigious cults in the ancient world, their character remains

4
Sources for Kadmos legend prior to the end of the fifth century suggest that
the story was already well-known by that time: Edwards 1979: 18-20; West
1985: 83; Schachter 1985; Tourraix 2000: 75-105.
5
Beekes 2004a; Cole 1984: 66-67; Hemberg 1950: 38-43, 92-96, 137, 165-66,
217-218, 316; Collini 1990: 257; Collart and Devambez 1931; Fraser 1960: p.
118-119, no. 63; Lehmann 1960: p. 121, no. 296; p. 124, no. 306a; Lehmann
1969: 232, no. 148; Astour 1967: 156; Vian 1963: 153-154.
6
Akusilaos FGH 2 no. 20; Hemberg 1950: 165-66 observes (n. 6) that
Pherekydes, FGH I 406, may have considered Kadmilos the brother of the
Kabeiroi and the nymphs.
7
Hemberg 1950: 293 disagrees with Pohlenz (Pohlenz, Neue Jahrbueher fuer
das classische Altertum 37 (1916), 556), who argued for a late date.
obscure. The literary evidence is lacunous and fragmentary; Kabeiroi are
daimones rather than Olympians, and their distinction from other divine
groups, the Kouretes, Korybantes, Daktyloi and Telchines was not clear
even for ancient authors.
8
Indeed it is in connection with Samothrace that
Strabo claims these groups are essentially identical, as he attempted to
resolve why it was that some said the gods were Kouretes, others
Korybantes, even Daktyloi or Telchines (10.3.7). None of the daimones,
moreover, appear in inscriptions from the site itself. These refer only to
Theoi Megaloi a euphemism which has occasioned two very different
hypotheses. Hemberg cited this lack of epigraphical evidence to claim
that the gods of Samothrace were not Kabeiroi at all.
9
Those working in
Indo European linguistics, however, have seen another route through this
term to unlock the identity of the gods. Kadmos Phoenician origins, and
his intimate connection with the rites, recommended reading Kabeiroi in
terms of Semitic kbr, meaning great. The term Theoi Megaloi, great
gods, thus became a Greek calque on a Semitic term and the legend of
Kadmos a signal of the derivation of the gods, and the cult, from the
Levant.
The argument has proved remarkably resilient. First proposed by
Scaliger in the 16
th
century, it continues to fuel debate.
10
It appealed to
the model of civilization moving ex oriente, and the sensibility for
scientific proof that accompanied the emergence of historical linguistics.
There are limits, however, to how well the model accords with the other
ancient data on the Kabeiroi, the site and the mysteries. When ancient
texts suggest an ethnicity for the Kabeiroi, they are Phrygian, Pelasgian,
or born from the earth in the places of their celebration, e.g. at Thebes or

8
Blakely 2006: 17-52; Hemberg 1950: 303-311, 330-354.
9
Hemberg 1950: 74-81; he has been followed by Cole 1984: 1-4, inter alia. See
Graham 2002: 49 for a critique of the argument. Epigraphical evidence from
sites beyond Samothrace include the name of the Kabeiroi: from the sanctuary
of the Samothracian gods at Delos, IG XI 2 n. 144 A, 90f , 314-166 BCE,
Hemberg 1950: 142: Chapouthier 1935: 181-182 cites in addition a round
offering table from 159/8, dedicated by a priest of the Great Gods and
Dioskouroi and Kabeiroi; in 158/7 BCE, an Athenian held the priesthood of the
Great Gods Dioskouroi Kabeiroi; in 101, a ship in honor of Mithridates was
consecrated to the Great Gods of Samothrace Dioskouroi Kabeiroi. A late
Hellenistic epitaph, possibly from Amphipolis, describes the deceased as an
initiate who saw the doubly sacred light of Kabiros in Samothrace, and the pure
rites of Demeter in Eleusis; see Karadima-Matsa and Dimitrova 2003.
10
Hemberg 1950: 318-325; Beekes 2004a; Goceva 2002; Collini 1990; Burkert
1985: 457 n. 23; Musti 2002, Mari 2002.
on Lemnos. This is the same pattern for the other daimones to whom
they are equated Kouretes, Korybantes, and Daktyloi.
11
None of these
divinities have compelling parallels in Near Eastern tradition, or
narratives of advent from the east. Herodotus compared the Kabeiroi
iconographically to Pataiki or pygmies, and claimed to have entered their
temple at Memphis (3.37). He stopped short, however, of suggesting that
they came from Phoenicia, Africa or Egypt into the Greek world and as
a matter of authorial style, is not shy of claiming derivation directly
when he wishes to affirm it.
12
The site at Samothrace, in addition, shows
no material or linguistic signs of Phoenician presence: toponymns,
theophoric names, temple architecture, or cult images.
13
Excavations
place the earliest ritual activity at the 7
th
century BCE, at which time the
ceramic evidence points to the Thracian mainland rather than the
Levant.
14
Kadmos also behaves differently on Samothrace than he does
where legends of his advent coincide with evidence of Phoenician
activity. At those sites, his establishment of the cult is clearly articulated,
and he may leave crew members to serve as priests for the gods.
15
On
Samothrace, however, he stumbles onto a ceremony already in progress;
he becomes an initiate, but not a founder. Attempts to use the hero to
connect the Samothracian site with the Theban Kabeirion run similarly
aground. There is far less evidence for the heros connection to the cult at
Thebes than there is at Samothrace, and nothing at all to suggest a role as
a bringer of the cult, despite abundant traditions that he established cults
in the city of Thebes itself.
16

11
Blakely 2006: 17-52.
12
Harrison 2000: 208-222.
13
Thasos, with a marked literary tradition of Phoenician founding activities, has
yielded limited material corroboration: Bunnens 1979: 358-366; Morris 1992:
144-146; Edwards 1979: 183; Pouilloux 1954; Vian 1963: 66.
14
Graham 1982: 116-117; 2002: 248-249; Lehmann 1998: 15; Matsas,
Karadima, and Koutsoumanis 1993; cf. Prinz 1978: 187-205.
15
Vian 1963: 134-157; Edwards 1979: 32, 80-82, for cults on Thasos, Rhodes,
Thera, Seriphos, Melos, Crete and Miletos. These stories, Vian notes, may
reflect Theban rather than Phoenician contact. Cf. Bunnens 1986.
16
Vian 1963: 134, 146 n. 5; Schachter 1981: 89; 1985: 150-151; Hemberg 1950:
129. Pausanias attributes the foundation of the Theban cult to Prometheus and
his fellow Kabeiroi, who received the rites as a gift from Demeter; Methapos
reformed the mysteries, and the clan of Pelarge seems to have been involved in
their re-establishment after an exile. There are no legends of Kadmos initiation
at Thebes, nor evidence that any of his lifes events figured in the liturgy. Only
one mutilated inscription, KASMIN, suggests a role for him on-site (IG 7.4126;

Kadmos ethnicity itself, in fact, is less consistent a portion of his
semiotic package than an essentialist reading of his myth would suggest.
The etymological arguments for a Levantine origin have long been
challenged, and caution advanced regarding arguments which rely on
etymological evidence to the exclusion of other categories.
17
The
category in which Kadmos participates, in the broader world of Greek
mythology, is that of foreign-born culture heroes, such as Danaos and
Pelops. While not foreign in archaic texts, these heroes became so by the
fifth century, as authors responded to the nationalism, racism and eastern
aggression of the late Archaic and Classical periods. Thus Kadmos
acquires both Egyptian and Phoenician origins by the fifth century; West
proposes that this could have begun in the sixth century, contemporary
with the Hesiodic catalog and the activities of the Ionian logographers,
seeking to forge a new relationship with the cultures to their east.
18
These
textual traditions are not matched, however, in the heros iconography.
Miller notes that even as the texts focus increasingly on Kadmos foreign
origin, fifth and fourth centuries vase painters depict the hero without
any sign of Orientalized dress, attendants or equipment. The most
popular episode from his life, particularly on South Italian and Sicilian
vases, is his slaying of the Theban dragon, a triumph over autochthonous
forces which suggests a mythological character most essentially that of a
founding hero.
19
His ethnicity may shift, in texts, with the rhetorical
purposes of the various authors who make use of his narrative. Thus
Pindar, possibly because of his Boiotian patriotism, makes no reference
to Kadmos foreign origins; Athenian dramatists, in contrast, found in
those origins a means to impugn the character of the Thebans who

cf. IG 7.3698), along with dubious information from Tzetzes (schol.to Lycophon
162) referring to Kadmos as the Boiotian Hermes.
17
Challenges began as early as 1807; see Edwards 1979: 51-64 for an overview
of the history; see Beekes 2004b for a recent objection. On the dangers of using
etymological evidence alone, Schachter 1985, Puhvel 1987: 19-20.
18
Miller 2005: 68-69; Gomme 1913; West 1985: 144-154; Kuehr 2006: 91-106;
Beekes 2004b; Vian 1963: 62-68; cf. Edwards 1979: 65-86.
19
Miller 2005: 83. The only depiction of Kadmos and the Spartoi comes from
Sicily, and he plays a significant role in Etruscan art as well, both of which
recommend his role as a founding hero for Greeks overseas. Krauskopf 1974:
51-52 suggests that his popularity in Etruscan art may reflect traditions of
founding heroes in the West who were among his descendants.
Medized in the Persian wars, as Demand has noted.
20
The visual evidence
signals the extent to which the legends semantic potential, even after the
fifth century, continued to extend beyond Levantine origins. And indeed,
a Phoenician origin for Kadmos, or the Kabeiroi, has never been brought
into relationship with the other factors in the Samothracian site and cult
that make it distinctive among the Greek mysteries.

JASON

Among these distinct characteristics is the unusual prevalence of
heroic initiates. Kadmos was but one of many; their numbers included
Odysseus, Agamemnon, and other Trojan heroes, Herakles, and the
earliest group of Greek heroes rumored to have set sail to foreign lands,
Jason and the Argonauts. Jason, like Kadmos, has particularly close
connections to the Samothracian cult. His name has possible
etymological connections to one of the Samothracian gods, Iasion or
Iason, who appears variously as one of Harmonias brothers, the lover of
Demeter, struck by lightning for insulting Demeters image, or one of the
Kabeiroi.
21
Jasons initiation, along with his crew, was a well-known
event. Apollonios of Rhodes, Valerius Flaccus and the Orphic
Argonautica all suggest that the Argonauts were initiated on their way to
Colchis, putting in at the island by Orpheus' request that they all learn the
rites and so sail with greater safety.
22
Diodorus Siculus seems to draw on
two traditions: he lists (5.50) Jason and the Dioskouroi among the heroes

20
Demand 1983: 53
21
Iasos, Dionysius of Halicarnassus 1.61.2-4; Iason, Conon Narrationes 21 =
FGH 26 F 1, 21; Stephanus Byzantius s.v. Dardanos; Theocritus 3.50-51
(though the scholiast claims this refers to Crete); Scholia Parisina to Apollonius
Rhodius Argonautica 1.917. Iasion, Diodorus Siculus 5.47.1-48.3; Apollodorus
Bibliotheca 3.12.1; Scymnus Periegesis 676-95 (GGM I 222-23); Strabo 7 fr. 49
= FGH 548 F 2a; scholia Laurentiana to Apollonius Rhodius Argonautica 1.916
= FGH 546 F 1a; scholia Parisina to Apollonius Rhodius Argonautica 1.915-
916; Diodorus Siculus 5.48.4-50.1; Arrian in Eustathius in Odysseam e 12 =
FGH 156 F 107; Mnaseas in Scholia Laurentiana to Apollonius Rhodius
Argonautica 1917 = FGH 546 F 1b. Hemberg 1950: 105 n. 7 notes that Iasion
Iasos, Iasios and Iason are common names for heroes or daimones throughout
the Aegean, and would have been at home on the islands of the Thracian sea; see
also Weicker 1916; Usener 1948: 156.
22
Valerius Flaccus 2.431-42; Apollonius of Rhodes Argonautica I.915-21; 467-
72, ed. Dottin p 465-70 = Kern Orphicorum Fragmenta Testimonium.
who were initiated on the island, but elsewhere (4.43.1) writes that
Orpheus was the only Argonaut to be initiated, and twice describes his
success in calling on the Samothracian gods to deliver the men from
danger on the sea (4.43.1-2, and 4.48.5-7). The Argonauts, in gratitude
for this salvation, dedicated altars to the Samothracian gods in the land of
King Byzas, and bowls at the Samothracian sanctuary itself on their way
home (4.49.8). Cole suggests that some dedications in the sanctuary may
have borne inscriptions claiming to be set up by the Argonauts.
23

The tradition of Argonauts on Samothrace does not enter the literary
record until the Hellenistic period, even though the legend itself is known
as early as Pherekydes.
24
An encounter between the Argonauts and the
Lemnian Kabeiroi, however, appears in the fragments of Aeschylus
Lemnian trilogy (TGF fr. 95-97). These suggest a meeting between the
Argonauts and a chorus, presumably of the Kabeiroi for whom the play
was named; either the sailors or the chorus members are drunk. Lemnos
is the site of Jasons marriage to Hypsipyle, a tradition established by the
time of the Iliad; one of the plays in Aeschylus trilogy bore that title.
The drunken encounter in these fragments of the Kabeiroi may reflect a
satiric parallel to Kadmos sacred wedding on Samothrace. It reflects, at
the least, the Athenian awareness of the daimones of the region, and their
encounter with traveling heroes, by the end of the sixth century BCE.
25

Jason's voyage also bears the strong Samothracian imprint of having
two of the gods of the cult travel with him the Dioskouroi. The
Dioskouroi are equated to the Kabeiroi in numerous literary sources,
including Aristophanes, Pausanias, Philo of Byblos, Damascius,
Polemon, and an Orphic hymn; they are also said to be the same as
Korybantes and Kouretes.
26
They are part of the voyage of the Argo

23
Cole 1984: 68-69, 129 n. 563. Cole notes that no archaeological evidence
from Byzantion has supported Diodorus claim for dedications there.
24
Scherer 2006: 9-42 for all the ancient sources. For Agamemnon on a
Samothracian relief, dated at the time of publication to the sixth century, see
Lehmann 1943: 130-134 and 1951: 6, n. 17.
25
Hunter 1989: 15 notes evidence that the Lemnian episode was the subject of a
much earlier epic poem, based on Homeric references to the son of Jason and
Hypsipyle in Iliad 7.468-9, 21.40-1, Odyssey 11.235-59, Odyssey 12.69-72;
Strabo1.2.38 suggested that Homers Circe was modeled on the Argonautic
Medea.
26
Hemberg 1950: 215-16, 330, 334-335; Chapouthier 1931: 181-183; Burkert
1985: 212-213. Aristophanes Pax 276-87; cf. Euripides Orestes 1635-37;
Pausanias 10.38.7; Philo in Eusebius, Praeparatio evangelica 1.10 (FHG III
already in the sixth century BCE, when they appear with the ship on the
metopes of the Sicyonian building at Delphi.
27
They are also associated
with safety in sea travel at an early date, in presocratic fragments that
antedate the Argonautica. Xenophanes in the 6
th
century and Metrodoros
in the 4
th
describe the electrical phenomenon that plays about the masts
of ships, known today as St. Elmos fire, as their manifestation.
28

Diodorus Siculus suggests that they acquired this divine power in the
course of the voyage itself (4.43.1-2). Samothracian power to ensure safe
passage is also in evidence by the fifth century BCE. Cicero writes that
Diagoras of Melos, upon seeing the votives at Samothrace, remarked that
there would have been many more had not so many perished at sea (de
Natura Deorum 3.37); Diogenes Laertius ascribes the comment to
Diogenes of Sinope (6.2.59).
29
Ciceros Diagoras would place this event
in the fifth century. Safety at sea was a concern with many ritual
expressions, ranging from magical gems and shipboard shrines to the
establishment of sacred sites on headlands.
30
The shared participation of
the heroes and the rites in this category reflects a more substantial
resonance between them than the lateness of the testimonia suggests.

567); Damascius Vita Isidori 302; Polemon FHG II 137, fr. 76 a, Scholia to
Euripides Orestes 1637; Orphic Hymn 38; Ampelius, Liber memorialis 2.3,
Scholia to Germanicus Caesar Aratea 146, Varro de Lingua Latina 5.10.57-58.
27
Hermary 1986: 586, no. 218.
28
Xenophanes, Diehls VS 21 A 39; Metrodoros, VS 70 A 10; see also Homeric
Hymn 33, Alcman Fr. 34, Euripides Helen 1495-1505, 1664-5; Jaisle 1907: 58-
72.
29
Hemberg 1950: 101 n. 3 for discussion, also Burkert 1993: 183 and 189 n. 32.
Hemberg notes in addition that, given the natural concern for safe travel to
which the islands location would give rise, it is difficult to imagine that this
promise was ever not a part of the cult. The bulk of the evidence for this promise
lies in the Helenistic period see Hemberg 100 n. 1, Lewis 1958: 102-111.
Burkert 1993: 183 notes that Aristophanes Pax 277-78 confirms the association
in that period: in this passage, Trygaeus expresses hope that the Samothracian
initiates will pray for the failure of Hubbubs journey when Hubbub returns
empty-handed, Trygaeus praises the Dioskouroi for their intervention. Given the
centrality of the Dioskouroi at Sparta, to which Hubbub traveled, other scholars
hesitate to declare this a firm identification; Olson 1998: 128 considers that this
makes a nice match.
30
Wachsmuth 1967: Morton 2001: 192-206; Halleux and Schamp 1985: 182.
This is particularly so because of the mythical status of the
Argonautica as the first long distance voyage.
31
As such, it represents the
advent of the maritime technology that shaped Greek economic, political
and military history, and made the dangers of sea travel immediately
relevant. First inventions of this sort have a prominent role in mystery
initiations;

the invention of agriculture at Eleusis is the most familiar
example.
32
A long scholarly tradition proposed that Samothrace
celebrated metallurgy, perhaps evolving from the initiatory rituals of
prehistoric metallurgical guilds.
33
This argument was based on the
associations of the Kabeiroi with Hephaistos, and the appearance of
various degrees of metal working skills among the daimones to whom
the Kabeiroi are assimilated. Samothracian Kabeiroi, however, follow
Hermes in their form, not Hephaistos as they do on Lemnos, and there is
no evidence that the cult was of particular concern for smiths or miners,
or evoked their craft as a key metaphor for the celebrants.
34
Sailing, on
the other hand, seems a very likely first invention to be celebrated in the
Samothracian cult. The clarity with which it figures in the cults
promises recommends it; so too does its significance, as a technology as
fundamental and perennial in the ancient Mediterranean economy as
agriculture. Unlike agriculture, it was deemed a hazardous occupation,
and its dangers constituted a literary topos from at least the sixth century
BCE onward.
35
Jasons status as the captain of the first ship ever made
would suit the semantics of the cult, both providing a new technology
and articulating the promise unique to the cult.
As Jason embodies the first voyage, he also embodies the first
contact in the region beyond Samothrace, on whose route Lemnos and
Imbros were key ports of call the Black Sea. Local historians of the
Black Sea, including Hecataeus of Miletus, Pherecydes, Hellanikos,
Herodoros of Heraklea, Timee of Tauromenion, Timonax, and others,
referred to the voyage to recite the foundations of their cities and their
colonies; most of the South Pontic coast was populated by the mythical

31
Herter 1942: 244-249; Couchoud and Svoronos 1921; Apollonios of Rhodes
Argonautica I.915-921.
32
Kleingunther 1976: 33-37.
33
Rossignol 1863; Gernet and Boulanger 1932: 73-82: Burkert 1985: 281.
34
Herodotus 2.51; Kern 1890.
35
Romm 1996: 127; Philo of Byblos (FHG 3.567.11) credits the Kabeiroi with
the invention of sailing.
wave of Greek Argonauts.
36
These traditions responded to a range of
historical needs and circumstances. They provided a medium for Greeks
to speculate on the reasons for colonization in the region; they also
articulated the ties between various Greek colonies, as well as between
the colonies and their mother cities.
37
Braund has traced the dynamics
enabled by the tradition of the Dioskouroi as founders. Memorialized in
the city names Dioscurias, Tyndaris, and Cygnus, the twin heroes aided
trade with other colonies located in the Black Sea, and political relations
as far afield as Sparta. The legends also reached across the cultural
divide, helping the Greeks incorporate their new neighbors into their own
narratological traditions, and providing great interest for local non-Greek
aristocrats. Malkin has explored the mediating function of these
narratives.
38
The myths serve not simply as an imposition of Greek
culture, but arenas for dialog, integration and re-invention. These
processes were ongoing, as responses to new developments demanded
new resolutions between the Greeks and indigenes. The legends reveal a
range of indigenous behaviors consonant with the variety of historically
attested phenomena, which extend from cooperative alliance to
perpetually re-erupting hostilities. Jasons encounters at a single site
often reflect both extremes. At Kyzikos he finds both a pitched battle
with hostile 50-armed autochthones and a hyperbolically ideal host in the
local prince. And at Colchis, acquiring the object of his journey, he must
battle the earth-born children of the dragons teeth, aided by the
supernatural skills of the indigenous princess Medea.
The children of the dragons teeth figure as well in the myth of
Kadmos who must, at Thebes, slay a dragon, sow its teeth, and fight the
earthborn warriors who emerge. The episode reflects a pattern which is
fundamental to both figures. Both Kadmos and Jason are heroes of first
contact Jason as the protocolonial voyager in the Black Sea, Kadmos as
the founder at Boiotian Thebes. This aspect of their narratives most
shaped the use of their legends in the Greek world, in numerous Black
Sea foundation legends, and the visual tradition of Kadmos. It casts a
more essential light on the dynamics of the Samothracian cult than do the
heroes specific connections to the liturgy and the promises of the rites.
Samothrace is positioned, both geographically and mythologically, at the

36
Valerius Flaccus Argonautica I.1-4; Lordkipanidze and Lvque 1996,
passim; Braund 1996; Lordkipanidze 1996; Lvque 1996; Tsetskhladze and De
Angelis 1994; Delage 1930: 60-67; Grammenos and Petropoulos 2003.
37
Strabo 1.2.39; Braund 1996; 2002; Grammenos and Petropoulos 2003.
38
Malkin 2005.
boundary of the Greek and non-Greek worlds. Greek, Anatolian, and
Thracian cultures converge on the island and its neighbors, Imbros and
Lemnos; together with Samothrace, these are the sites Strabo identified
as the three most important places for the celebration of these gods
(10.3.7). The daimones of the rites embody the autochthonous, pre-
Greek, non-Hellenic spirits of the place. This is the natural frame of
action for heroes whose task it is to provide first contact with a new
ethnicity. It is also, however, the framework for a ritual of initiation,
sealed by secrecy. The mysteries, positioned in this setting, suggest a
combination of ritual and symbol responsive to the need for mediation
which enabled the Mediterranean economic network.

SAMOTHRACE AS A BOUNDARYLAND

Several factors signal Samothraces geographical status as the far
northeastern boundary of the Greek world. The island lies just 29
nautical miles south of the southern coast of Thrace; to the east, on a
clear day, Troy is visible from the top of Mt. Phengari. Thracian settlers
populated the island at least as early as the 9
th
century BCE: Iron age
settlements on Vrythos and at Mandal Panagia show Thracian mainland
styles, and Zerynthos and Mt. Saos reflect pre-Greek constructions and
tribal names.
39
The Greek settlers arrived in the sixth century, and by the
fifth had established settlements on the Thracian mainland opposite, in
the coastal strip of the eastern part of the peraia. The settlements seem to
have been vital for their survival: Antiphon notes the scanty resources of
the island itself (Oratio 15, fr. 50), and the fertility of the mainland was
advantageous for the settlers.
40
The settlements seem also to provide key
advantages in terms of trading networks, positioning the Greeks at the
intersection of maritime and overland routes.
41
Appian wrote that the
Thracians, fearful of pirates and unfamiliar with the sea, had shown little
interest in the area, but the Greeks and Chalcideans made it a commercial
success, providing the Thracians with welcomed access to maritime trade

39
Graham 2002: Hemberg 1950: 120-126; Brixhe 2006: 1-2 notes that the pre-
Greek tribes of Samothrace came from the Thracian mainland in the area which
subsequently became the Samothracian peraia.
40
Isaac 1986: 125-158; Funke 1999: 55-75. Part of the peraia was considered a
gift to the Great Gods: see IG XII (8), p 40 nr. 102, McCredie 1968: 220-222.
41
Isaac 1986: 136-137; for discussion of the region as an interface in the Bronze
Age, Privitera 2005, Mountjoy 1998.
(BCE IV 13, 102). Ships sailing along the coast would have, in the Greek
settlements, nodes of access into the Odryssian trading routes of the
interior. Archibald characterizes the Samothracian peraia as a chain of
fortlets, east of which lay the estuary of the Hebros, the major access
route for trade with interior Thrace. While an integrated regional study is
needed, both the history and cults suggest fluid relations between
incoming Greeks and indigenous Thracians. Casson referred confidently
to the Samothracian merchants as the pioneers of Odryssian trade: the
mainland data confirm the potential for commerce to play a formative
role in their character and economies.
42
Imbros and Lemnos are also
characterized, in Greek history, as the loci on which the Greeks
encountered indigenous cultures, and in so doing gained access to
significant long distance routes.
43

It is not remarkable that non-Greek populations held the island
before the Greeks arrived; the extent to which the Samothracian Greeks
enrolled that fact in the historical memory of myth, and in the institutions
of the mysteries, is. Strabo, focused on the classification of ritual
behaviors among the various communities within the oikumene,
describes the various daimones of the rites Kouretes, Korybantes,
Daktyloi, Telchines or Kabeiroi as essentially identical on the basis of
their performances: armed, ecstatic dance in attendance on the Great
Mother (10.3.7). In myth, for which he had little interest, a more
essential commonality is their association with an earlier historical
stratum. This association is articulated through assimilation to earlier
generations of gods, an assertion of autochthony, and equation to
ethnicities who owned territory prior to the arrival of the Greeks. Photios
describes the Lemnian Kabeiroi as Titans; the Theoi Megaloi of Imbros
are cited alongside Titans in a 2
nd
or 3
rd
century CE inscription from
Imbros; and at Thebes, Pausanias includes Prometheus and his son
among the Kabeiroi, and describes them as the first generation of
inhabitants. A sherd from the Theban Kabeirion depicts the emergence of
Pratolaos from the soil, facing a man and a woman named Mitos and
Krateia, e.g. seed and force; the Kabeiros observes the scene, reclining in
Dionysiac form on a sympotic couch. The mysteries on Lemnos
celebrated the beautiful child Kabeiros, born in unspeakable rites, and
recognized the daimones as chthonic creatures. A lyric fragment names

42
Archibald 1998: 146-147; Isaac 1986: 127; Casson 1926: 92-93.
43
Beschi 2000; Papageorghiou 1997; Conze 1860: 77-121; Collini 1990: 272-
273; Stroud 1998; Papageorghiou 1997.
Kabeiroi together with Kouretes, Korybantes and Daktyloi as examples
of the first men, who emerged from the earth at the dawn of civilization;
Hippolytus wrote that the mysteries celebrated the primal man, Adam.
44

Mythologically, this autochthony was often connected to the daimones
emergence from the ground at the birth of Zeus; the legendary-historical
counterpart took the form of pre-Greek tribes who did battle with Greeks
over the territory from which they were eventually expelled. Thus the
Aetolian Kouretes and the Telchines on Rhodes offer striking repetition
of the pattern of pre-Greek indigenes who fail to maintain ownership of
their territory, and are either expelled to wander in search of new land, or
remain as invidious, destructive forces to vex the next inhabitants.
45

Strabo chides his contemporaries for their inability to distinguish these
historical ethnicities from the mythological daimones (10.3.7); while
only the daimones dance around Zeus, however, both mortals and
daimones are chronologically lodged in the generation prior to Greek
arrivals.
If the daimones are chronologically pre-Greek, they are also
ethnically non-Hellenic. They remain beyond the edge of the cultural
boundary: Herodotus deemed the Kabeiroi Pelasgian, Pausanias and
Aristides, Pergamene, and numerous authors, Phrygian. Nikolaos of
Damaskos described the Kaberoi emerging from the Anatolian hinterland
to aid the inhabitants of Assessos (FHG 3.388 fr. 54); Byzantine
lexicographers derived their name from Mt. Kabiros in Phrygia.
46

Mnaseas offers names for the Samothracian gods which begin with the
prefix Axio-; Hemberg notes that this is the name of a Thracian river
god.

Philo alone claims they are Levantine, enrolling them in the
genealogy of Sydyk in Beirut (FHG III 569; Eusebius PE 1.10).

The
daimones to whom the Kabeiroi are equated, and who are also attested
for the site, repeat this plethora of identities: Kouretes may be Phrygian,
Arcadian, Cretan, or simply earth-born; Korybantes, attending on
Kybele, come from Anatolia, but at the birth of Zeus, spring from

44
Photios s.v. Kabeiroi; IG XII 8 n. 74, see Hemberg 1950: 293; Pausanias
9.25.6; Wolters and Bruns 1940: 96, taf. 5; Hippolytos Refutatio Omnium
Haeresium 5.7.3, 5.8.9-10; PMG 985; Hemberg 1950: 292-294.
45
Blakely 2006: 27, 353-373.
46
Herodotus 2.51; Pausanias 1.4; Aristides Panegyric 2.469; for Phrygians,
Scholia to Aristophanes Pax 177-178; Scholia to Apollonios of Rhodes 1.197;
Nonnos 3.7., 3.194, 43.307-13, Scholia to Libanius Oratio 14.64; Etymologicum
Gudianum, Etymologicum Magnum, and Zonaras lexicon s.v. Kabeiroi; Beekes
2004a.
whatever ground hosts the event.
47
Daktyloi originate from either Trojan
or Cretan Ida but in a manifestation of their need to come from
elsewhere, they travel from Crete when they come to the Argonauts aid
on Mount Dindymene on the Black Sea, rather than from the much closer
Ida of Troy (Ap. Rh. Argonautica I.1123-31).
In the daimones of the island, chronological and ethnographic
boundaries thus coincide. Entrants into the sanctuary experienced
reflections of this in the installations at the site, and the language of the
liturgy itself. The sanctuary is unusually full of escharai, bothroi, and
rocks used as ritual objects. Rock altars have been identified at several
dates and loci. A gigantic stone, set into the Cyclopean wall which runs
beneath the Arsinoeion, has a leveled off surface, and indications of a
channel for pouring libations.
48
A second stone, located in the paved area
immediately outside the Arsinoeion, is separated by a narrow channel
from the tufa flooring which surrounded it. Lehmann proposed that this
space allowed libations to be poured by a person standing on a proximal
stone, which was leveled off for the purpose.
49
Facilities for libations into
the earth have been identified in four of the sanctuarys structures, and
often seem to incorporate a stone as the object of attention. A pit 2.5
meters deep, shaped like a tall beehive, occupied the central position in
the south precinct of the Orthostate structure which preceded the
Arsinoeion; its top was level with the floor of the structure.
50
A stone at
the bottom seems the object of libations poured into the shaft; animal
bones were found nearby.

Lehmann dated this to the 7
th
century;
McCredie corrected the date to the 4
th
. The other installations are clearly
Hellenistic.
51
A raised bothros, located in the far southeast corner of the
Anaktoron, held a stone; a shaft located near the doorway of the
Arsinoeion, contemporary with the 3
rd
century BCE date of the building,
runs down to the bedrock. It yielded a considerable quantity of sheep
bones, suggesting sacrificing and feasting nearby.
52
A bothros, used for
liquid libations, and an eschara, for burning, were located inside the open
air Hall of Choral Dancers; both were originally constructed in the 7
th

century, and re-installed in the 4
th
. The eschara held a fire-resistant stone,

47
Blakely 2006: 17-52.
48
Lehmann 1950: 7-8; 1951: 2-3.
49
Lehmann 1951:3-5.
50
Lehmann 1950: 11-12.
51
Lehman 1950: 11-12; McCredie 1979: 28-32.
52
For Anactoron, Lehmann 1940:334 and figure 11; for Arsinoeion, 1951: 9-10;
Roux and Lehmann 1992:239-242.
whose signs of burning suggest its position there during the rites. An
eschara has also been identified in the marble floor of the center of the
Hieron.
53
Liquid libations are argued to have taken place in the apse. In
the Roman period, a hole cut into the marble floor occupied the place
customarily taken by a cult statue. The apse-shaped hole is dated to the
Roman period, and positioned over a large piece of red porphyry which
emerged from the bedrock; Lehmann proposed a receptacle for libations
in the Hellenistic period as well.
These installations have clear chthonic force, possible Thracian
analogies, and arguable suggestions of archaism. Archibald notes that
Thracian ritual has a prominent role for pits, nameless gods and Hermes,
whose combined force reinforces the linguistic evidence for an
orientation to the cultures of the peraia.
54
A long scholarly tradition has
associated aniconic cult objects with the most primitive stage of religious
celebration. Donohue demonstrates that this evolutionary model is based
exclusively on literary sources, and contradicts archaeological and
iconographic evidence. The latter show aniconic and anthropomorphic
divinities together, suggesting that the supposedly archaic form may be a
deliberate choice rather than a survival from an earlier period. The
authors who gave rise to the archaic theory, however, were themselves
Greeks, antiquarians such as Callimachus, Plutarch and Pausanias, as
well as the Christian authors, Clement and Themistius.
55
These authors
reflected concepts that suited their interests, and were acceptable to their
audience: the aniconic could be associated with the archaic, even if
incorrectly. This sense of the past is appropriate for the pre-Greek
character of the daimones, and takes architectural form on the site as
well. The frieze of the fourth-century Propylon of the Temenos bears the
earliest example of the archaistic style in Greek sculpture. Dancing
maidens parade across its surface with the features, proportions and gait
of figures appropriate to their date, but stylized folds in their garments,

53
For Hall of Choral Dancers, see Lehmann and Spittle 1982: 17-19, 27, 44, 271
and plates LVI-LIX; for Hieron eschara, see K. Lehmann 1969: 30-31; Lehmann
1950: 5-6; 1951: 20-27; for apse, K. Lehmann 1969: 36-38. Lehmann notes that
escharai of this type, with frames to support a metal grille, are well known,
found at Lato, Perachora, Dreros, Lesbos, Thasos - all of them from the archaic
age.
54
Archibald 1999: 459.
55
Donohue 1988: 121-150; 177-194; 219-231.
and swallow-tailed mantles, which allude to the remote past.
56
And on
the western hill of the sanctuary, a retaining wall supporting Hellenistic
room 10, built at the end of the 3
rd
century, includes a faux doorway built
in a distinctly Mycenaean style. The door is a trilithon, with the relieving
triangle characteristic of Mycenaean engineering; it leads nowhere, but
evokes the distant Bronze Age past of the mainland Greeks.
57
The
structure exemplifies the sanctuarys capacity to trade in the past as a
commodity, even to the point of importing prehistoric forms otherwise
unknown on the island.
The language of the rites constitutes the third index of archaising
experience of the ritual, with manifestation in the Hellenistic period of
the cults floruit. Diodorus Siculus, writing in the first century BCE,
wrote that the autochthonous inhabitants of the island used an ancient
language which was peculiar to them, many words of which were
preserved to his day in their rites. (5.47.14-16) Archaeological evidence
for this language has been found in the form of one 5
th
/4
th
century
inscription on stone, and over 70 ceramic inscriptions from the 6
th
to the
4
th
centuries.

These inscriptions are all written in Greek letters, but
incomprehensible as Greek; the ceramic graffiti are highly abbreviated,
as are the Greek ceramic inscriptions as well.
58
The Greek ceramics,
Lehmann noted, are characteristically inscribed simply with the name of
the god to whom the object is dedicated; the non-Greek inscriptions are
believed to do the same. Five of the 62 found have the whole word,
DINTOLE, or DEN TO LE. Din is known from proper and place-
names in Thracian and Thracian-Phrygian, such as Mt. Dindymene,
where the Argonauts celebrated the rites of the Great Goddess. Bonfante
identified the language as Thracian; Brixhe affirms this conclusion,
based on the analysis of a substantial corpus of ceramic graffiti from the
temple of Apollo in Mesembria, ancient Zone, on the Samothracian
peraia.
59
The sacred language of the rites thus seems to correspond to the

56
Lehmann and Spittle 1982: 3-12; Hadzi 1982: 172-220; Lehmann 1951: 16-
18.
57
Lehmann 1998: 115; McCredie 1974; Alcock 1997: 21-22, 29. The site of
Mikro Vouni has yielded evidence of contact with Minoan Crete: see Matsas
1991.
58
Graham 2002: 250-255; Lehmann 1960: 29, 45-64; while abbreviations on
ceramic inscriptions are common in the period, the proportion of extreme
abbreviation is higher on Samothrace than known from other sites. For the stone
inscription, see Fraser 1960 no. 64.
59
Lehmann 1960: 45; Bonfante 1955; Brixhe 2006.
historical language of the pre-Greek ethnicity as Diodorus suggested it
did.
Diodorus described the use of the indigenous language some 3
centuries after the latest of these inscriptions was made.

This
extraordinarily long use has been explained as a survival from pre-Greek
times, possibly an indication that the priesthoods of the sanctuary were
held by ancient local families.
60
The dynamics of the ritual, however,
encourage more intricate questions about the linguistic encounter which
awaited the initiates. Analogous cases from other ritual settings offer
several hypotheses, including an increase in secrecy, an articulation of
political power, and a guarantee of divine cooperation. Lehmann
compares the Samothracian case to the use of Egyptian in the cult of Isis
at Rome, and notes that Pausanias observed an incomprehensible foreign
tongue in sanctuary rituals at Hierocaesarea and Hypaepa in Lydia (Paus.
5.27.5-6). Lehmann suggested the languages would heighten the secrecy
of the experience, and the sense of the sacred.
61
Eteocretan inscriptions at
Praisos on Crete offer a different investigative model, relevant to the
notion that Samothracian elites controlled the priesthoods. Viviers
proposes that the Eteocretan inscriptions were all of an official character,
either political or religious. The language was a mechanism for
supporting an ideology of autochthony that developed among the elites,
rather than simply the preservation of an intact ethnic identity from the
distant past.
62
This hypothesis is difficult to investigate for Samothrace,
given the lack of detailed information about the families and political
events inside the town itself.
A third possibility comes from the world of magic. Secrecy played a
significant role in magic, as in mystery cults; the magical papyri employ
the imagery of mystery initiations, referring to magic as a mystery, the
magicians as initiates or mystagogues, and to outsiders as uninitiated.
Betz notes the magical elements in the mystery cults as well, in the form
of fire rituals for Demophon and Triptolemos, oaths of secrecy, symbols,

60
Lehmann 1960: 18-19; Graham 2002: 254.
61
Lehmann 1960: 18-19. See also Hatzfeld 1920: 85 no. 18, pp 84-87, an
inscription from the sanctuary of Hekate at Lagina; the local Artemis, with her
surname of Carian nature, is comparable to other Olympian deities and Hekate
who appear in the area as the local adaptation to Hellenic type; the inscription
refers to the Meter Thesmophoro, suggesting the capacity for a Greek festival
with characteristics of the mysteries to become attached to the local gods.
62
Viviers 1996.
formulae, and quotations on the Orphic gold tablets.
63
The languages of
the papyri themselves are a melange of genuine Greek, Egyptian and
other contemporary languages, imitations of these invented by the
magicians, and languages which lie beyond human. These include the
speech of sacred animals, e.g. baboonic or falconic, and the language of
the daimones themselves. The latter is an imagination and imitation of
non-human language that exists prior to human articulation and
comprehension, expressed in the secret names of the gods, the voces
magicae, or authentic names.
64
The practitioners use of the language
marks his intimacy with the divine, ensures his success, and is part of a
larger pattern whereby the magical specialist impersonates the gods.
65

These ritual dynamics resonate with the Samothracian cult with
modifications at several levels. First, if the graffiti on the sherds and
the language described by Diodorus are understood as the language of
the Samothracian gods, then the Thracian identification of those
inscriptions marks the coincidence of divine and ethnographic categories.
This is appropriate for a cult whose gods, as Strabo noted, were often
confused with non-Greek ethnic groups. Second, participants in the cult
would understand the speech if they were conversant with contemporary
Thracian, as they may be if they were among those doing commerce in
the region. The language of the gods, impermeable in the world of
magic, was thus potentially transparent in the Samothracian cult. Third,
the use of the divine language would signal on Samothrace, as in the
magical papyri, an intimacy between the celebrant and the divine. In
magic this intimacy takes the form of a divine epiphany, manifested as
favors granted to an individual. The island suggests a very different
dynamic the assimilation of the initiate into the community of the gods.
This responds in the first place to the fact that the gods of Samothrace are
consistently understood as a group, even in those texts which provide
individual names, in opposition to the individual Kabeiros on the Theban
sherd, or the sacred child Kabeiro born in the Lemnian rites.
66
It is

63
Betz 1990a: 219-229.
64
Betz 1995: 164 cites I.226; IV.1812; XII.153, and refers to Hopfner 1921:
para. 687.
65
Betz 1995: 164 on the ensurance of success; for impersonation of the god, see
examples in Bourghouts 178, including no.s 2, 13, 19, 36, 91,98, 126, 145.
66
See Karadima-Matsa Dimitrova 2003: 340: Thebes, Hemberg 1950: 184-86;
a single Kabeiros is known as well at Pergamon, Hemberg 1950: 176-78,
Thessalonike, 1950: 205-210. The only indications of a single Kabeiros at
Samothrace is the Hellenistic epitaph in Karadima-Matsa Dimitrova, and an
resonant as well with the phenomenon of adoption into the divine which
appears in widely distinct mystery cults. An Orphic tablet promises the
bearer that he has become a god instead of a man; an initiate claims to
have become the son of earth and starry heaven; an inscription from the
sanctuary of Meter at Phaistos offers a miracle to those who guarantee
their lineage, but divine hostility to those who force themselves into the
race of the gods.
67
Visual evidence of masking in the context of
mysteries, such as the donkey headed figures of Arcadian mysteries,
further substantiate an altered identity.
68
Language, as Hall has
demonstrated, is a powerful marker of ethnicity.
69
By participating in the
language of the gods, the initiate becomes, if momentarily, one of their
race an adoption for which the mysteries have demonstrated ritual
authority.
It is here that the function of the mysteries overlaps with the function
of heroic myths in an evocative way. Malkin, Hall and others have noted
the capacity of foundation myths to manipulate genealogy as well as
ethnography, allowing new settlers to carve out identities for themselves
and achieve mediation, if not assimilation, with other groups.
70
The
heroic initiates of Samothrace suggest an alternative route to this kind of
genealogical manipulation. The implicit narrative of Jason and Kadmos
on the island is that of first encounters between prototypical new arrivals
and the local indigenes. The mystery cult, as the frame of this encounter,
offers a ritual means of achieving the mediation otherwise expressed
through myths of descent from the heroes line. While genealogy suited
the needs of those settling in a given area, Samothracian initiation
constituted an obtainable token of mediation tied not to the city of
ones origin but only to ones ability to travel to the rites. The blessings
of initiation then travelled with the initiatequite literallyin ensuring
safe passage. The islands location, language, chthonic installations,
archaic style, heroic initiates, traveling promises and flexible gods
combine in a narrative which is responsive to a demonstrated need the
mediation between Greeks and non-Hellenes. The need was hardly
limited to the northeastern Aegean, any more than were Samothraces

early coin, whose image W. Schwabacher interpreted as a Kabeiros see
ANSMN 5, 1952, 49-51.
67
Orphic tablets, Burkert 1985: 293-295; Burkert 1987: 20; 76-77; IC I xxiii 3;
Ghidini 2000: 13-40.
68
Jost 2003: 160; cf. Seaford 1981.
69
Hall 1995.
70
Hall 1997; Malkin 2001.
initiates. But the island drew on the images and narratives of its setting
and made them paradigmatic of patterns that defined the process of
interactions in the Mediterranean network.

CONCLUSIONS

The Samothracian rites were simultaneously transcendent and
pragmatic. At a symbolic level, heroes and travelers encountered, in the
mysteries, the daimonic hypostases of the pre- and non-Greek people
they would encounter in Thrace, Phrygia, and Thebes. The encounter
took the form of an idealized mediation: a distinctly Greek ritual form
a mystery cult in a sanctuary marked by installations at once chthonic,
archaic, and evocative of Thracian ethnicity. The Thracian elements
served the purpose of the rites they were not simply an accident of
place and survival. They were maintained, cultivated, even accentuated
by the Greeks who employed legend, architecture, and mythic type to
turn the past into a paradigm, ritually repeatable and accessible to all
comers. The prehistoric past and the ethnographic other collapse in the
ritual context; the rites insert the question of divinity into that juncture.
The mystery religions had particular power to bridge the gap between
human and divine, including the vocabulary of adoption and new
identity. Samothracian initiation ensured not merely the passage between
mortal and immortal realms, typical of Greek mysteries, but coordinated
that movement with the passage across the ethnic boundary between the
Greek and non-Hellenic worlds.
71

The scholarly impulse to investigate Kadmos ethnicity is acute in its
recognition that ethnicity and origins were potent cultural tokens in the
ancient Mediterranean, infused by networks of exchange in which
cultural difference did not dissolve into a Hellenized whole. Kadmos,
however, represents cultural categories beyond ethnicity. With Jason, he
represents the type of the protocolonial, a hero of first contact. Combined
with the geographical location, archaeological evidence, and ritual
powers of the mysteries, the heroic narratives provide a pattern in which
the autochthonous identity of the daimones was of greater semantic
weight than the heroes countries of origin. For both heroes and
daimones, however, ethnicity is less valuable as historical memory than

71
Bremmer 1999: 82 notes that two recently published Orphic gold leaves,
symbola, were described as passports: SEG xliv. 750.
as a pattern of interaction. Samothrace provided the ritual matrix through
which the adventures that defined the protocolonial heroes, both
Levantine and Thessalian, became paradigms for the interactions that
defined economic and political life in periods long after the great age of
colonization. The responsiveness of this symbolic package to these
practical needs is one factor to be added to studies of the cults long
prosperity which extended far beyond the islands own floruit, or its
narrow northern Aegean corridor.

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APHRODITE AND THE COLONIZATION OF LOCRI
EPIZEPHYRII

Rebecca K. Schindler, DePauw 0niveisity, USA
rschindler@depauw.edu

Introduction

The Greek colonial foundations along the Ionian Sea coast of
southern Italy may generally be divided into Achaian and non-Achaian
cities (fig. 1). Of the Achaian cities, Sybaris and Croton were founded
first, towards the end of the 8
th
century BC, followed by Caulonia to the
south and Metapontum to the north. These latter cities were settled by
Croton and Sybaris in order to create a buffer with the non-Achaian
settlements of Locri Epizephyrii (south), and Siris and Taras (north).
1

The shared identity of the Achaian colonies can be seen in both their
cultural assemblages (the ceramics and architecture) and their foundation
legends, which associate each of the western settlements with cities in
Achaia.
2
Moreover in the middle of the 6
th
century Metapontum, Sybaris,

1
Antiochos of Syracuse [(FGrHist 555] fr. 12) records the enmity in particular
between Sybaris and Taras. For a discussion of Antiochos' comments, see
Morgan and Hall 1996, 210-211.
2
For a review of this evidence see Morgan and Hall 1996. Morgan and Hall
conclude that at the time the colonies were founded there is almost no material
culture that would connect them with mainland Achaia, despite the fact that the
colonies "have a great deal in common" with one another (p. 213).

Figure 1: Map of Southern Italy showing the colonies
established by the 7
th
century BC.

and Croton formed a monetary and commercial alliance that was
designed to extend Achaian influence along the coast. Indeed this policy
of expansion resulted in the destruction of Siris, an Ionian colony.
3
The
Achaian alliance, however, did not last and Croton destroyed Sybaris in
510 BC. The economic and military pressure that Taras and Locri
Epizephyrii felt from the Achaian colonies led those two non-Achaian
settlements to 'bond' with one another, despite their own distinct
backgrounds: Taras was a Spartan foundation and Locri Epizephyrii was

3
See Mele 1984 for a discussion of Croton's history in relation to the
surrounding Greek poleis. For the topography and some history of the entire
region see Strabo VI.1.7-15.
Schindler Locri Epizephyrii 99
founded by colonists from mainland Locris.
4
In response to the Achaian
threat, however, both cities promote an association with Sparta.
5

One means of establishing cultural and ethnic affinity is through the
foundation and development of cults. Hera and Apollo are the deities
most often associated with the Achaian colonies. Indeed Hera has been
considered the preeminent goddess of southern Italy.
6
Within the
Achaian colonies she had temples at Metapontum (both urban and extra-
urban), literary evidence suggests she had a temple at Sybaris, and her
most famous sanctuary, the temple of Hera Lacinia, was in the territory
of Croton. When the Achaians established a new city at Poseidonia on
the Tyrhennian coast, major urban and sub-urban sanctuaries were
established for Hera. Her significance for the Achaian colonies probably
derives from the northeast Peloponnese, rather than any cult in Achaia
itself.
7
Morgan and Hall have argued that the cult of Hera Lacinia served
as a nexus for Achaian identity in Southern Italy, an identity that gains
strength from its distinction with the Dorian identity of Taras.
8
It is
notable, therefore, that cults of Hera are absent at Taras and Locri
Epizephyrii. In those cities, Aphrodite emerges as a prominent deity and
takes on characteristics usually ascribed to other gods and goddess,
including Hera. In this paper I will focus on Aphrodite's character at
Locri Epizephyrii, where we have a rich assemblage of iconographical
and archaeological evidence for her cult.
Aphrodite's presence at Locri Epizephyrii has not gone unnoticed.
However, discussions of her character there have generally focused on
her appearance on the famous pinakes from the Mannella sanctuary, a
site primarily dedicated to the worship of Persephone.
9
The rich
iconography of the pinakes makes them a valuable and unique resource

4
Locri was probably founded by colonists from Ozolian Locris (Strabo VI.1.7).
Later myths about Locri's foundation suggest that the Italian city was founded
by elite women from Locris and their male slaves. This is similar to Taras
foundation myth. For a discussion of the sources on Locri's foundation and the
significance of the myth see Van Compernolle 1976.
5
See Sourvinou-Inwood 1974 for discussion of the Spartan associations. She
argues that the Locrians latched on to Taras's more defined ethnos.
6
See Giangiulio 2002.
7
Lvque 1997.
8
Morgan and Hall 1996, 213.
9
Zancani-Montuoro 1938 and 1964, Sourvinou-Inwood 1978. Mannella was
Persephone's most famous sanctuary in Magna Graecia (see Livy XXIX.18.3-
18).
for examining cult activity, myth, and women's lives in this Greek
colony. In seeking to explain the presence of Aphrodite at this sanctuary,
previous scholars have tended to define Aphrodite's role there in relation
to Persephone.
10
There is no doubt that the two goddesses complemented
each other in some way. However, it is also clear that Aphrodite's
presence at Locri extended beyond the Mannella sanctuary, and that her
role there may have been related to and even dependent upon her other
cult functions at Locri. In order to understand more fully the Locrian
character of Aphrodite, it is necessary to take in to account all the
evidence for her worship in this western Greek city.

Aphrodite's Cults at Locri Epizephyrii

Numerous sanctuaries, both urban and extra-urban, have been
excavated at Locri. In the Archaic and early Classical periods, Aphrodite
may have received worship at three of those sites: the extra-mural
sanctuary at Centocamere/Maras Sud on the seaward side of the city
(which includes the Stoa ad and the Casa dei Leoni); the temple at
Maras, just inside the city gates on the east; and at the extra-mural
sanctuary of Mannella on the chora side of the city (fig. 2). In the 4
th

century BC there is also evidence for her worship at the Grotta Caruso
outside the city wall on the north. At the other three sites the earliest
evidence for cult activity, although not necessarily for Aphrodite, dates
to the 7
th
century BC. Locri was founded in the late 8
th
century BC,
probably between 720 and 715 BC. Thus, we would expect evidence of
the earliest cults soon after that. All three sanctuaries have a different
architectural character and assemblage of dedications, reflecting the
different ritual activities that took place at each and, hence, the different
aspects of the deity or deities worshipped there.

10
Prckner 1968 is an exception to this. He argued, based on limited access to
only certain types of pinakes, that Aphrodite was the principle deity at the
Mannella sanctuary. This conclusion has not been widely accepted.

Figure 2: Topographic map of Locri Epizephyrii showing the city
walls and the locations of the sanctuaries where Aphrodite was
worshipped.

Centocamere/Maras Sud

We will start with the two sites from which we have secure evidence
of Aphrodite's worship at Locri: Centocamere/Maras Sud and Mannella.
The extra-mural sanctuary of Centocamere/Maras Sud consists of a
large U-shaped stoa (The Stoa ad ) and a small shrine to the northeast
(fig. 3).

Figure 3: Plan of the Centocamere region of Locri Epizephyrii.
(From Barra Bagnasco 1992, reprinted with permission.)

The earliest phase of both the shrine and the stoa date to the 7
th

century BC. In the 6
th
century the stoa was reconstructed and enlarged.
Also in the 6
th
century the city wall was constructed and the stoa was
intentionally left outside, as evidenced by the jog in the wall. Each of the
rooms in the stoa is the appropriate size for a Greek dining room. Three-
hundred and seventy-one bothroi excavated in the center of the stoa attest
to the sacred nature of this building. The bothroi contained remains of
meals, as well as votive cups and terracotta figurines. An inscription
from the late 7
th
or early 6
th
century BC, suggests that Kybele may have
been the initial patron of that sanctuary.
11
However, votives from the 6
th

century onward include dedicatory inscriptions to Aphrodite on drinking
cups (fig. 4) and terracotta figurines of men reclining on kline (fig. 5).
12

11
Guarducci 1970.
12
Lissi 1961.

Figure 4: Inscription painted on a black-glaze kotyle from the
Centocamere sanctuary at Locri Epizephyrii dated to first quarter of
the 4
th
century BC: H[I]APAI TAL A4POAITAL-
ANEOHKE. (From Lattanzi 1996, 30; reprinted by permission.)

Figure 5: Terracotta figurine of a banqueter reclining on a kline
from the Centocamere sanctuary dated to the first half of the 5
th

century BC. (From Lattanzi 1996, 30; reprinted by permission.)

In addition, a limestone inscription on a square block from the small
shrine also attests to the worship of Aphrodite.
13
The votives from the

13
Barra Bagnasco and Pugliese Carratelli 1990. The inscription reads:
Hovto[j;] ovr0[r] Aoot[tot] (Pantares dedicated this to Aphrodite).
Based on the epigraphic characteristics, Pugliese Carratelli dates this inscription
to the first half of the 5
th
century BC.
stoa range in date from the middle of the 6
th
to the 4
th
century. The stoa
went out of use in the 4
th
century. At the same time the small shrine was
destroyed and then rebuilt in the form of a pastas style house. Called the
Casa dei Leoni by the excavators, this building was not a private
residence. It continued to be associated with the worship of Aphrodite, as
well as the cult of Adonis.
The Aphrodite sanctuary in the Centocamere/Maras Sud region of
Locri thus consists of a shrine and associated hestiatorion. The sanctuary
is located outside the city wall along the seacoast. Between the Stoa ad
and the small shrine is the 'Porta di Afrodite' and to the north of the
shrine (about 200 m) is another entrance to the city, the 'Porta
"portuense"', leading to the Maras sanctuary inside the city, which was
also likely to have been dedicated to Aphrodite (see below). The area
between the two gates is most certainly the 'port' of Locri.
14

To the south of the Aphrodite sanctuary, also outside of the city wall,
is a series of shops. Thus, the sanctuary of Aphrodite in
Centocamere/Maras Sud is intricately connected with maritime activity
as well as commerce. Merchants arriving from the sea would have had to
pass by, or possibly through the sanctuary in order to reach the shops. On
entering the city visitors would have had to pass through the extra-mural
sanctuary to reach the 'Porta di Afrodite', or, if entering through the
'Porta "porteunse"', they would have arrived almost immediately at the
Maras sanctuary.
The cups, terracotta figurines, and dining remains from the bothroi
indicate that the patrons of this cult were primarily men. Lacking a
complete study of the material from the bothroi, it is difficult to make
any assessment regarding the identity of the patrons, that is, whether they
were primarily local Greeks, non-local Greeks, non-Greeks, or some
combination of the three. The location of the sanctuary would suggest
that the Locrians made an effort to attract visitors engaged in trade.
Aphrodite cults are regularly found at ports, or close to or within sight of
the sea. Such sites include her famous sanctuaries at Paphos, Kythera,
and Corinth (both on Acrocorinth and at the port of Kenchreai), as well
as Eryx in Sicily. At some of those sanctuaries her temples could have
served as beacons for approaching ships. Aphrodite also has less well-
known sanctuaries associated with ports, for example at Patras
15
and

14
On the port of Locri and the excavations between the 'Porta di Afrodite' and
the 'Porta "portuense"', see Barra Bagnasco 1999.
15
Pausanias VII. 21. 10-11.
Satyrion (Taras).
16
In the Greek East, Aphrodites Milesian cults are also
often connected to the sea.
17
A number of Aphrodite's cult epithets
connect her to the sea and maritime trade, for example, Kypria, Kytheria,
and Euploia.
Parallels for the particular form (a small shrine with a facility for
ritual dining) of Aphrodite's seaside sanctuary at Locri are harder to
come by. The Stoa-ad- has no precise parallels, especially given its
early foundation date. A parallel for its function, however, may be found
just to the north of Locri at the Achaian colony of Croton. In the
sanctuary of Hera Lacinia at Capo Colonna (about 12 km from the city of
Croton) there is a building within the temenos identified as a
hestiatorion. It was built in the 4
th
century BC and has been reconstructed
with fourteen rooms that held seven couches each, which would allow
for 98 banqueters.
18
The overall character of the Hera Lacinia sanctuary
is different than that of the Centocamere/Maras Sud sanctuary at Locri.
Hera Lacinia boasts a large Doric temple and a treasury that contained
rich dedications attesting to an international set of patrons.
19

It should also be noted that the Stoa-ad- has also been associated
with the practice of ritual prostitution within Aphrodite's cult at Locri.
20

The question of whether ritual prostitution was a regular practice at Locri
has been much debated and it is not my intention here to rehash those
arguments. However, I believe that it is reasonable to suggest that if men
were banqueting in the Stoa-ad- and engaging in drinking and music
(as evidenced by the votive dedications) that they would have been
accompanied by hetairai, as elsewhere in the Greek world, and that these
women would have fallen under the protection of Aphrodite.
Taken together these factors connect Aphrodite's worship on the
eastern side of Locri with the sea and mercantile activity, perhaps to
attract outside business to the area. The fact that the Locrians went to
some length to keep the business of this sanctuary outside the walls of
the city suggests that its patrons were not all citizens of Locri and that the
function of this sanctuary may have been to attract outside business to

16
Lippolis, et al. 1995, 84-86.
17
Greaves 2004.
18
Seiler 1996, 253 and Spadea 1997, 239.
19
Spadea 1996.
20
For the arguments regarding prostitution within the cult of Aphrodite at Locri
see Torelli 1988, 599.
the city; analogous, but on a smaller scale, to the extra-urban sanctuary
of Hera Lacinia at Croton.

Mannella

The sanctuary in Contrada Mannella is another extra-mural shrine
located just outside a city gate, in this case on the northwest side of the
city in one of the low ravines that characterize the topography of Locri
(fig. 2). Paolo Orsi excavated the site in 1908-1909.
21
He uncovered a
small rectangular building and a single large bothros. The bothros
contained thousands of pinax fragments as well as other votives. The
material in the bothros dates from the late 7
th
or early 6
th
century BC to
the 4
th
century BC (although the deposit itself was not stratified).
However, the pinakes, a series of terracotta relief plaques, were only
produced from the end of the 6
th
century down to ca. 470 BC. The
majority of these terracotta plaques depict scenes of Persephone: her
abduction and rape by Hades, preparations for her marriage, and the
enthroned king and queen of the underworld. A small group of plaques
from the deposit depict episodes from Aphrodites mythic history, some
of which is obscure to us, and scenes relevant to her cultic sphere. There
are also numerous plaques for which the figures cannot be securely
identified and various arguments have been made in support of
Persephone or Aphrodite or even mortal women participating in ritual
activities. Here we shall consider only those plaques that either clearly
show Aphrodite or may be associated with her divine realm.
22

1. Aphrodite's Birth from the Sea

In the first example (type 10/3), we see a young, or at least small,
female figure standing on waves flanked by two larger women, one of
whom stretches out her arms to greet the central figure, the other holds a
cloth, suggesting she is about to wrap the young woman in the garment

21
Orsi 1909.
22
On identifying plaques that are associated with Aphrodite, but do not
necessarily show the goddess, see Sourvinou-Inwood 1978.
(fig. 6).
23
The plaque is similar, although by no means identical, to
Aphrodite's birth on the Ludovisi Throne, which was probably produced
at Locri around the same time as the pinakes.
24
The scene suggests
Aphrodite's Hesiodic birth myth the foam-born Aphrodite, offspring of
Ouranos' castrated genitals and hence Aphrodite Ourania. This story, of
course, connects Aphrodite with the sea and with the islands of Kythera
and Cyprus. It also recalls her divine aspect as the goddess of heavenly
love, the love necessary for marriage, and hence with the fertility and
stability of society.

2. Aphrodite and Hermes

In a more mundane version of her character, a number of the pinax
types depict Aphrodite in association with Hermes. Mythologically
Aphrodite and Hermes may be connected as the parents of the
Hermaphrodite. However, we know little else about them as a divine
couple. Although, they rarely appear together in Greek art, they do share
a number of cults around the Mediterranean, most notably within the
Heraion on Samos
25
and at Kato Syme on Crete.
26
They may also have
shared a cult at Locri. Indeed, on two pinax types they appear together as
cult statues.
In one example of this type (10/1), Aphrodite stands facing Hermes,
extending the offering of what appears to be a lotus blossom (fig. 7).
27

23
Pinax type 10/3. Zancani-Montuoro (1938) originally grouped the pinakes
thematically (the first number) and then by individual scenes (the second
number). Subsequent studies have tended to follow her numbering system even
when disagreeing with her groupings.
24
On the Ludovisi Throne and its connection to Locri see Gullini 1982.
25
See Buschor 1957.
26
See Lebessi 1985.
27
The type of flower is difficult to identify. Prckner says that it is a rose
(Prckner 1968, 1517) but others have identified it as a lotus blossom
(Oldfather 1912, 323).

Figure 6: The Birth of Aphrodite. Pinax type 10/3. (Photo by the
author; printed with permission.)

Figure 7: Aphrodite offering a blossom to Hermes. Pinax type 10/1.
(Photo by the author; printed with permission.)
Eros stands on her outstretched right forearm, mimicking her gesture
with his own extended right arm; he holds a tortoise shell lyre in his left
hand. Hermes holds the kerkyreion in his right hand and there is a
thymiaterion between the divine pair. The scene appears to represent a
meeting between the two divine lovers but we have no mythological
context in which to place the scene. The figures posture, as well as the
presence of a thymiaterion, indicates that this is taking place within a
cultic setting. Indeed is has been suggested they are meant to represent
cult statues.
28
Even if this is the case, the goddess' attributes the flower
blossom, the lyre, and her son as an agent of her power recall
Aphrodite's powers of seduction. This charming and peaceful scene
belies the erotic nature of Aphrodite and Hermes' relationship. They are
not a married couple and Aphrodite appears here as Pandemos, the
common and erotic side of her sexual powers.
On the next example (type 3/6), Aphrodite and Hermes are clearly
shown as cult statues inside a temple of mixed Ionic and Doric orders
(fig. 8). The statue of Hermes is nude except for a chlamys draped over
his shoulders and his petasos, travelling hat. He holds a patera in his
right hand. Aphrodite is clothed in a peplos and her hair is worn down
with a filet at the top.
29
She appears to be holding a dove in her right
hand but most of the remaining examples are badly damaged at this
point.
30
In front of the temple, a bare-foot young woman and young man
are pouring a libation on an altar.
The plaque is iconographically rich and suggestive of Aphrodite and
Hermes cultic personality at Locri. The seemingly somber libation
being performed by the mortal couple is subtly undermined by the erotic
relief on the altar a satyr copulating with a hind. This complicates the
interpretation of the plaque. In the overall context of the pinakes the
mortal couple would seem to be either betrothed or married. However,
they are pouring a libation to an unwed divine couple on an altar

28
Prckner 1968, 1617. Prckner also notes that Hermes is not looking
directly at Aphrodite. However, the details were probably painted and it is
possible that he could have been shyly glancing at her. I see this interpretation as
unlikely given Aphrodite's gesture.
29
Aphrodite is always shown in the pinakes with her hair down, as an unwed
maiden.
30
Zancani-Montuoro (1938, 212) suggests that it could also be the legs of a
cock, but this is likely based on analogy with the numerous examples of
Persephone holding a cock on other pinakes and is not necessarily appropriate in
the context of Aphrodite.
depicting an erotic sexual act that stands outside the bounds of the civic
intercourse necessary for reproduction. I would argue, therefore, that this
pinax type would have been a dedication made by worshippers of
Aphrodite who fall outside the bounds of civic society but who also
recognize the overall power of the Mannella sanctuary to protect all
women within Locrian society.

Figure 8: Aphrodite and Hermes as Cult Statues. Pinax type 3/6.

The depiction of Aphrodite and Hermes in an architectural and cultic
setting also implies more than an abstract association in myth and
suggests that the two shared a temple at Locri. The temple in the plaque
has Ionic columns and a Doric frieze. At the pediments peak, a
gorgoneion sits over a sima decorated with palmettes. The Ionic order is
rare in the West, known only at Locri, in the Maras sanctuary (see
below), at Hipponion, a sub-colony of Locri, and at Syracuse for the
Temple of Artemis. The coroplasts use of the Ionic order in this pinax
type would be unusual if he was not making reference to a specific
monument. A careful examination of the triglyphs in the Doric frieze
shows that they are actually tetraglyphs, a detail that would create
technical difficulties for the coroplast, and unnecessary unless based on
an actual monument.
31

Another plaque showing an architectural setting with mixed Ionic
and Doric elements (type 3/5) also appears to relate to the sphere of
Aphrodite (fig. 9).
32
The type is fragmentary, but we can identify two
female figures, one playing an aulos with her hair tied up in a sakos and
the other with her hair down. We cannot see whether the second figure is
holding any attributes. In the pediment, two doves flank a central
metope. The oddity of the central metope aside, similarities with the
pinax depicting Aphrodite and Hermes as cult statues and the doves,
suggest that we are within Aphrodite's sphere.
The final example (type 10/2) moves away from the cultic sphere
and into mythological narrative. It shows Aphrodite in a chariot being
pulled by two winged genii, one male and one female (fig. 10). One
holds an alabastron, the other a dove both symbols of Aphrodites
powers. Behind Aphrodite, Hermes is attempting to step into the rear of
the chariot as it is lifting off the ground; however, his rear foot is still
firmly planted on the ground. Aphrodite is turning around to look
Hermes as he mounts the chariot. Zancani-Montuoro, trying to link this
scene with the pinakes as a whole, identified Aphrodite and Hermes as a
divine couple travelling to the wedding celebration of Persephone and
Hades.
33
G. Zuntz also connects the scene with the overall theme of the
pinakes, suggesting that Aphrodite, as the goddess of love, was a
necessary attendant at Persephones wedding and that Hermes, as
psychopompos, had to show Aphrodite the way.
34

31
Zancani-Montuoro 1938, 214 and Prckner 1968, 28. Zancani-Montuoro
argued that the temple in the plaque represented the cult building of the
Mannella sanctuary and that the cult statues are those of Persephone and Hades.
Prckner, on the other hand, associated the temple in the pinax with the Maras
temple at Locri. No elements from the frieze of the Doric phase of that temple
survivie. However, another temple at Locri, Casa Marafioti, had pentaglyphs
(see Gullini 1988, 367).
32
Prckner 1968, 6667, pl. 11, figs. 2 and 4; Orsi 1909, fig. 13; Quagliati 1908,
fig. 81.
33
Zancani-Montuoro 1964, 395.
34
Zuntz 1971, 165166.

Figure 9: Temple of Aphrodite (?). Pinax type 3/5. (Photo by the
author; printed with permission.)

Erika Simon, however, suggested that the scene is not related to
Persephone at all, but rather shows the birth of Aphrodite. Her
conclusion is based on a similar scene depicted in relief on two Tarantine
altars. These show Aphrodite in a chariot being pulled out of, or perhaps
over, the sea by two winged figures, a male and a female.
35
Although the
composition of the Locrian pinax is similar to the Tarantine altars, there
are a number of reasons why an identification of the birth of Aphrodite
does not fit.
36
First, Hermes has no place in Aphrodite's Hesiodic birth
myth. Moreover, Hermes is not an innocent bystander, but an integral
part of the scene. There is also no indication that they are rising up out of

35
Simon 1959, 2831, figs. 13 and 14. One of these altars (now in Trieste) is
published by Wuilleuimier (1939, 4334, pl. XLI, 5), who identifies the winged
male figure as Eros and Aphrodite as a young bride; the opposite long panel of
the altar shows the goddess assisting in a bridal chamber (pl. XLI, 6).
36
For objections to Simon see Prckner 1968, 234.
the water.
37
While, it is possible that such a detail could have been added
in paint this would be awkward considering the location of Hermes feet.

Figure 10: Aphrodite and Hermes in a chariot. Pinax type 10/2.

Finally, as we have seen, another pinax type, (type 10/3) clearly depicts
Aphrodite's birth from the sea.
This pinax appears to represent a narrative scene from Aphrodite's
mythic history, but one that is now lost to us. In addition to the Tarantine
altars, the best parallels for this scene are wedding processions on Greek
vases of the 5
th
century BC. In such example, it is not uncommon to see a
bride in her chariot with the groom, who is holding the reins, stepping in
behind her.
38
In this case, however, Aphrodite is clearly in control as she
is the one holding the reins, and rather than heading for the house of the
groom, the chariot is headed up towards Aphrodite's heavenly house.
Whether this is a true marriage procession, and therefore a big gap in our

37
Waves are prominently indicated on the Tarantine reliefs.
38
See, for example, a red-figure pyxis by the Marlay Painter (London, British
Museum: 1920.12-21.1), Beazley Archive #216210, illustrated by Boardman
1989, fig. 243.
knowledge of Aphrodite and Hermes' mythic history, is perhaps not as
important as the fact that this was a votive dedication made by Locrians
who had a good reason to propitiate Aphrodite and Hermes together for
powers that they represent as a couple. Nevertheless we are left with the
sense that there are particulars of Aphrodite's (and Hermes') mythic
history that are not preserved to us but that were of particular importance
to the colonists at Locri Epizephyrii.
There are also a number of pinax types that refer to Aphrodite's role
with in the context of the wedding and marriage but which do not depict
the goddess herself. We have already mentioned the two female figures
within the temple. Other pinakes include those which show a woman
preparing for her wedding (kosmesis) (type 6/1-9) and scenes of young
women picking fruits in a garden setting (type 4/3), which has been
related to Aphrodite's connections with gardens (particularly at Athens)
but which could also relate to Persephone. One difficult pinax type to
interpret (9/1-7) depicts a young woman lifting the lid of a basket that
contains a male child. The identity of the child has been much disputed.
39

I would argue that the child in the basket represents Adonis, whom
Aphrodite gave to Persephone for safe keeping and over whom the two
goddesses later fought. We should recall that Adonis himself receives
worship at Locri in the 4
th
century sanctuary at Centocamere/Maras
Sud.
40
The pinax may be an early indication of his place within Locrian
cult. Moreover, he serves to forge a connection between Aphrodite and
Persephone at the Mannella sanctuary. It is less clear, however, who
would be offering such pinakes at the sanctuary.
Taken together the pinakes reflect a number of different aspects of
Aphrodite's Locrian cult. She is a goddess of love and sexuality, both
pure (for marriage) and erotic (for other needs). Together Aphrodite and
Hermes may also represent the protection of travelers and merchants, a
role that fits with Aphrodite's sanctuary on the seaward side of the city.
They may also be seen as gods of initiation Aphrodite for girls entering
womanhood and Hermes for boys entering manhood.
41
At the Mannella
sanctuary, a cult that seems exclusive to women, Aphrodite may have
received worship from a variety of patrons, and when she appears with

39
Suggestions include Dionysus, Iakchos, and Erichthonios. See Sourvinou-
Inwood 1978, 116, n. 113 for a complete bibliography on the identity of the
child. Sourvinou-Inwood herself believed that the child was not divine but a
symbolic dedication to Persephone to place the child under her protection.
40
Barra Bagnasco 1994.
41
On Aphrodite and Hermes as gods of initiation see Marinatos 2003.
Hermes he adds another dimension to her cultic personality there. The
depiction of the two of them within a temple as cult statues, however,
suggests that they received worship at Locri independent of Persephone's
cult
One other find from Mannella deserves some attention. Among the
numerous terracotta figurines from the bothros the bust of an armed
female figure stands out. It was identified by the excavators as an Armed
Aphrodite (Aphrodite Armata).
42
Although unusual, the type is not
unheard of in Greek art, nor is the association of Aphrodite with military
affairs.
43
This supports the idea that Aphrodite served as much a military
role at Locri as a civic one. It also suggests a connection with Sparta,
where Pausanias (III.15.10) describes another Aphrodite Armata.

Maras

Just inside Locri's northeast city gate, only 250 meters from the
shrine at Maras Sud, is the Maras temple (fig. 2). The earliest building
here dates to the end of the 7
th
century BC. This so-called Primitive
Oikos was a rectangular building with a short pronaos and cella.
44
Large
terracotta plaques painted with geometric designs covered the outside of
the building. This phase is contemporary with the earliest shrine
constructed at Maras Sud and it is possible that the two structures were
conceived and built together. In the 6
th
century the building was enlarged
with a peripteros. And then, in the second quarter of the 5
th
century, it
was rebuilt as an Ionic temple.
No inscriptions and few votive materials were found in association
with this temple. Despite this lack of information, a number of scholars
have associated the Maras temple with the worship of Aphrodite. Paolo
Orsi first made this suggestion in the late 19
th
century. In 1890 he claims
to have found a deposit of terracottas in close proximity to the temple
that included female figures holding either a dove or a pomegranate. Orsi
identified these figures with Aphrodite.
45
Unfortunately, both the finds

42
Museo Nazionale di Reggio Calabria inv. #6034.
43
See Osanna 1990.
44
The sanctuary was originally excavated by P. Orsi in 188990 (Orsi 1890,
24862) and subsequently by A. de Franciscis in the 1950s, see various entries
in the Fasti Archeologici and De Franciscis 1979. The phases of the temple
were reconstructed by G. Gullini. For a full discussion and plans see Gullini
1980, 11110, pls. 315.
45
Orsi 1890, 262.
from the deposit and its location are now lost. Another noteworthy find
from the area is a terracotta statuette of a female figure holding two
geese by their necks, dated to the 6
th
century.
46
Geese are sacred to
Aphrodite and this potnia theron type may be further evidence of
Marass association with the goddess.
47

Two scholars, G. Gullini and M. Guarducci, have argued that the
Ludovisi Throne came from the Maras temple and that the temple was
dedicated to Aphrodite.
48
The throne has sculpted figural reliefs on
three sides: the one long side shows the birth of Aphrodite from the sea,
one short side shows a hetaira playing double flutes, and the other
depicts a veiled matron burning incense. It has been dated to 460-450
BC, contemporary with the Ionic phase of the Maras temple. Gullini
argued that the Ludovisi Throne would have been on the southern end of
the large altar at the east side of the Ionic temple and that the Boston
throne would have been on the northern end.
49
This theory is
problematic; not least because the measurements of the two pieces do not
match the width of the altar and the marble of the throne does not show
signs of having been exposed to the elements for a long period of time.
50

Guarducci also believed that the Ludovisi and Boston Thrones came
from the Maras temple. However, she placed them inside the temple as
a parapet for the stone-built bothros in the cella.
51
Based on the
dimensions of the bothros reported by D. Mertens, Guarducci
demonstrated that the Thrones could have fit on top of this feature. The
pit created by the stone feature was not, in fact, a bothros. No votive
objects or sacrificial remains were found inside of it and its true function
remains obscure.

46
See Costabile 1991, 137. The piece is unpublished but on display in the
Museo Nazionale di Reggio Calabria.
47
Bodson 1978, 97. For representations of Aphrodite riding a goose see LIMC
s.v. Aphrodite 90346. See also Simon 1959, who associates this imagery with
the birth of Aphrodite; and Dessenne 1949.
48
The authenticity of the Ludovisi Throne, and its supposed companion piece
the Boston, has at various times in the past century been called into question.
For a recent review of the problem see R. Newman and J.J. Herrmann 1993.
103-112.
49
Gullini 1982.
50
For objections to Gullinis hypothesis see Guarducci 1985, 5.
51
See Guarducci 1985 and Costamagna and Sabbione 1990, 196210. This is
not a novel suggestion. Prckner (1968, 90) suggested that the squared feature in
the center of the temple at Maras was a base for the Ludovisi Throne and the
Boston Throne, and that this served to protect some sort of sacrificial pit.
The only other indication for the identity of Marass patron deity is
the pedimental sculpture. Costabile has reconstructed the find-spots of
these pieces and hypothesizes that the eastern pediment would have
displayed a scene with a central draped female figure alighting and the
Dioskouroi on either side.
52
The Dioskouroi figure prominently in
Locris military history. During the war against Croton in 540 BC, the
Dioskouroi are said to have appeared at the battle of Sagra, saving the
day for the Locrians.
53
This pedimental group may commemorate the
Locrians victory at the battle. The female figure in the pediment has no
identifying characteristics and Aphrodite does not appear to have played
a role at Sagra. However, as we have seen from the evidence at
Mannella, Aphrodite at Locri may have been considered a polis deity
with military functions. Moreover, she does figure prominently in
another military engagement.
In 477/6 BC, when the Locrians were under attack from Rhegion,
they swore an oath to Aphrodite, invoking her to save them. The oath is
reported by Justin (21.3.2-5), based on Pompeius Trogus, as an example
of the Locrians immorality because they promise to prostitute their
daughters in the sanctuary of Aphrodite in return for redemption from the
attack. The practice of prostitution within the cult of Aphrodite at Locri
is controversial and the meaning of the reference to such acts in the oath
has been debated. However, the oath itself may be taken as evidence that
the Locrians considered Aphrodite a polis deity with military powers. In
the moment of their greatest need, she was the deity to whom they
turned. Ultimately, the Locrians were saved from Region's attack by
Hieron of Syracuse. Gullini, has suggested that the Locrians built an
Ionic temple to Aphrodite as a substitution for the vow of prostitution.
This is, of course, entirely speculative.
54
However, the Maras temple
shows certain architectural affiliations with the Ionic temple of Artemis
on the island of Ortygia in Syracuse and it appears that it served as a
place to commemorate Locri's military victories. Although not
conclusive, there is also some compelling evidence to suggest that
Aphrodite was its patron deity. If this is the case, then Maras would
have been the urban seat of Aphrodites cult at Locri Epizephyrii.

52
Costabile 1995.
53
Strabo IV.1.10.
54
Gullini 1996. On the possible connections between the Maras temple,
Aphrodite, and the pinakes from the Mannella sanctuary, see also Torelli 1988.
Aphrodite and Colonization in Southern Italy

From the evidence presented here we may conclude that Aphrodite
served a variety of functions within the Locrian polis. She was a
protectress of sailors, travelers and thus a patron of commercial activity;
she is a potnia theron, as well as military goddesses; and she was
protectress of marriage, as well as women who may have fallen outside
the traditional roles of family and marriage. While individually these
aspects of Aphrodite's cultic personality are found elsewhere in the
Greek world, they are not often found altogether in one polis. It is thus
necessary to attempt an explanation for the way variety of ways in which
the Locrian colonist chose to worship Aphrodite.
It is typical when looking for the origins of a particular cult
among the Greek colonies to turn to the mother city. However, it rarely
holds true that Greek colonists adopt wholesale the cults of their mother
cities. In the case of Locri, we know too little about the cults of mainland
Locris to draw any comparisons, but it is doubtful that Aphrodite's cult at
Locri was based on some homeland version. It more likely grew out of
the immediate needs of the Locrian colonizers in response to their
particular western circumstances. On the Ionian Sea coast, Taras, the
other non-Achaean colony, also has affinities with Aphrodite. The
original colony was established there at the site of Satyrion, just to the
east of the later town. A sanctuary dating to the 7
th
century BC at
Satyrion has been identified with Aphrodite. A 6
th
century BC
inscription, on a vase by Exekias, is dedicated to 'Basilis'. Osanna argues
convincingly that this is the same Basilis, i.e., Aphrodite Basilis, reported
by Pausanias on the acropolis of Sparta. This conclusion is not surprising
as Taras was a Spartan colony.
55

Taras and Locri, however, share more than an interest in Aphrodite
as a polis deity. According to her foundation legend, Taras was founded
by Spartan women and their male slaves, possibly helots, who had gotten
together when the Spartan men were off fighting the Messenians. The
Locrians have a similar foundation legend. Their city, too, was founded
by women who had fled with their male slaves while their husbands were
off helping the Spartans against the Messenians.
56
For the Locrians, the
adoption of this foundation legend may have been a way of both

55
Osanna 1990.
56
For a discussion of both these legends see Pembroke 1970.
strengthening ties with Sparta, while at the same time distancing herself
from her Achaian neighbors, in particular Croton.
That Locri and Croton were in competition with one another in the
second half of the 6
th
century BC is indicated by descriptions of the
Battle of the Sagra River. Although the date of the battle is uncertain,
several sources recount the event in more or less detail, including Strabo
(VI.1.10), Timaeus (preserved in Justin 20.2.10-3.9), and Diodorus
(8.32). Strabo tells us that 10,000 Locrians, with help from Rhegion,
fought against 130,000 Crotoniates and that the Locrians miraculously
won. Other sources attribute Locri's victory to the Dioscouroi, who were
sent to assist by Sparta. We have already seen that the Disocouroi appear
on the pediment of the Maras temple at Locri. The suggested date for
the battle ranges from the early 6
th
century to ca. 510 BC.
57
Timaeus
connects this battle to the joint attack of the Achaian colonies
Metapontum, Sybaris, and Croton against Siris, an Ionian colony. He
suggests that Croton turned around and attacked Locri as well, perhaps
because they had tried to assist Siris. But it is also possible that the
Locrians were the agressors, taking advantage of Croton while she was
occupied by the war with Siris. Strabo concludes that the loss of life
suffered by Croton led to a serious decrease in her population (VI.1.12).
Whatever provoked this battle, and whenever it occurred, it is a clear
example of animosity that existed between Locri and Croton.
It is not hard to understand then that the Locrians would attempt to
distinguish themselves from Croton, as well as the other Achaian
colonies, through their cults, in particular by promoting Aphrodite as a
significant polis deity. Many of Aphrodite's functions at Locri overlap
with those traditionally associated with Hera. For example, her role in
marriage at the Mannella sanctuary. Moreover there are some structural
similarities between the Crotoniate sanctuary of Hera Lacinia at Capo
Colonna and Aphrodite's Locrian sanctuary at Centocamere/Maras Sud.
They are both outside the boundaries of the polis and they are both
situated on the sea, probably to attract merchants. Although the
architecture at Capo Colonna was carried out on a much grander scale,
both sanctuaries have a temple building with subsidiary structures for
ritual dining. Studies of Hera's cultic personality at Croton attribute to
her many of the same characteristics as Aphrodite at Locri: potnia theron
and hoplosmia, a protectress of women and children (kourotrophos), and

57
On the date of the battle see Bicknell 1966.
a goddess of manumission.
58
Like Aphrodite at Locri, Hera at Croton
appears to have taken on aspects of several other goddesses.
59

In conclusion, the colonists of Locri Epizephyrii were conscientious
of the fact that they were not 'Achaian'. The richness and complexity of
Aphrodite's cult at Locri may be seen as a direct result of the role that
this particular cult played in establishing Locrian identity on the Ionian
Sea coast.

58
Maddoli 1984, 313-319.
59
Maddoli (1984, 321) suggests that, in addition, to Aphrodite, Hera at Croton
has aspects of Artemis and Athena.

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COLONIZING NAPLES: RHETORIC OF ALLURE AND THE
17
TH
CENTURY SPANISH IMAGINARY

Yolanda Gamboa and Noemi Marin, Florida Atlantic University, USA
ygamboa@fau.edu.com
nmarin@fau.edu

After some years of French and Aragonese rule, Naples became part
of the Spanish Empire with its annexation in 1503, during the reign of
Ferdinand of Aragon and Isabella of Castille. From that time until 1707
Naples functioned as viceroyalty, where the viceroy governed the
province in the name of and as representative of the Spanish monarch.
Naples, thus, was to become one of the most desirable political
assignments for Spanish governors but also the site of political
controversy. By the seventeenth-century this viceroyalty (and its palace)
was the post of Spanish grandees such as the Count of Lemos, a patron
of the arts. The succession of the Count of Lemos by the polemical Duke
of Osuna, and subsequently by two family members of the Count Duke
of Olivares, who lived lavishly, were some of the reasons that angered
Spains grandees and brought the conspiracy and subsequent downfall of
the Count Duke of Olivares, minister to king Philip IV, as well as the
Neapolitan revolt of 1647.
1
The Neapolitan court became famous throughout Italy for its refined
chivalric habits, as well as a center of studies and culture, even though

1
The political intrigues of this time are well documented in John Elliots
biography of the Count Duke of Olivares.
Naples social problems were great from the start of the viceroyalty due
to the exploitation of Neapolitan finances that Florentine and Catalan
bankers caused, its closer links to the Vatican, and the subsequent
taxation imposed by the Spanish viceroys. With the passing of centuries,
Naples as a city experienced population growth, changes, becomes a
center for creative arts, and revolted in 1647 against what was perceived
as a foreign, oppressive rule. A site of military support, contributing to
the Spanish grandeur and an indicator of prestige (Brancaforte 151),
Naples remained the epitome of the Empires glory and an alluring place
in the Spanish Imaginary.
2
In fact, the different place occupied by the American colonies and by
Naples in the Spanish 17
th
century Imaginary points to a colonizing
process that is by no means homogeneous and that relies on the rhetorical
construction of a locus of otherness, an inviting locus open to new
participation for its possible subjects. If the key to reconstructing
Neapolitan past could only be found by tracing the Spanish heritage, as
Benedetto Croce realized, (Brancaforte 327), likewise, a reconstruction
of the Spanish past is to be found in the city of Naples as a place for a
new colonizing narrative.
How then do the Spanish writers engage with Imaginary Naples and
create a powerful and alluring place outside of Spain, yet engaged fully
with Spanish life and national identity? By looking at some literary
examples, the paper examines some rhetorical strategies used by Spanish
writers of the 17
th
century to invoke Naples as a discursive place of
allure, a place where narratives of the outside join the Imaginary ethos to
create the political and social life in the viceroyalty of the time. Viewing
rhetoric as a contextual art where social and culturally-recognized
meanings illuminate how writers negotiate in literary texts rhetorical
space, the paper explores Burkes perspective on identification and myth
as image as related to Naples and its place in the Spanish Imaginary of
the 17
th
century.

2
Although this article is based on references to Naples encountered in selected
Spanish literary pieces of the 17
th
century, Naples remained a location of allure
in later centuries as in the Spanish zarzuela, musical plays written in the 19
th
century. We thank Domingo Plcido for his comment as well as for his
indication regarding the emerging field of Italo-Spanish relations among current
historians.
Gamboa/Marin Colonizing Naples 127
Naples: Between Political Entity and Imaginary Colony

References to the elegant vice royal Neapolitan court abound in the
literary works written in Spain in the 16
th
and 17
th
centuries, also known
as the Spanish Golden Age. Represented by means of lavish settings,
parties, and refined courtesans, Naples is not only a locus of historical
importance or a mere literary topos. Naples of the 17
th
century Spanish
literature becomes an alluring and complexly constructed commonplace
for the critique of the excesses of the colonial enterprise as we can see in
works by Lope de Vega, Leonor de la Cueva y Silva, Tirso de Molina,
and Mara de Zayas.
Spain being a colonizing power, Naples is constructed in most
literary works as an Other to be desired, a locus encouraging those
wishing to progress or deseosos de medro (in Jos Antonio Maravalls
words), as a place of allure and a political space, a literary and
rhetorically persuasive image for cultural development, economic
progress, and flourishing arts.
Naples is the setting of Lope de Vegas El perro del hortelano [The
Dog In The Manger] (1618). The title of the play, which literally
translates as The Peasants Dog alludes to a Spanish saying the
peasants dog neither eats nor lets you eat which is also referred to
within the play (l.3071). Both title and plot allude to the attitude of the
protagonist, beautiful Neapolitan Countess Diana of Belflor who plays
with the emotions of the suitors she rejects and particularly her servant,
Teodoro, whom she desires and eventually ends up marrying. Whereas
on the one hand, it points at the idleness of the Neapolitan courtiers
embodied in the countess, on the other hand it also points at the
possibility of love despite class differences. Note that both Neapolitan
idleness and love free of class constraints happen in Naples as the setting
removed from the Spanish Court and where the exotic spatial axis
provides the possibility of a paradigmatic difference (Yoon 417). In
other words, locating the play on a place on the outside allows for a
critique of the Spanish mores.
Naples is not only an idyllic place, full of beauty and grandeur, as
one character says Tiene hermosura y grandeza/Npoles (l 2775-6), it
is also the place where you can find a hit man for a price Que hay en
Npoles quien vive/de eso y en oro recibe/lo que en sangre ha de volver
(l.2405-7) [There are people in Naples who live/of that and receive in
gold/what in blood they will turn]. As it is customary with this popular
playwright, whose plays were the entertainment of the masses, very
much in the way Hollywood movies function today, his critique is subtle,
his message doubtful, and the greatness of Naples is tempered with its
inherent conflicts.
Less subtle than Lope de Vega, Leonor de la Cueva y Silva depicts
the lavish Naples in her play La firmeza en la ausencia (c.1647) [Faithful
Despite Absence] as the place for a sensual and alluring action, a site of
promises of luxury and critical insight into the court of the Neapolitan
Viceroyalty.
3

A los dichosos aos que cumpla
El rey ordena Justas y torneos
Donde Npoles muestra en bizarra
Su belleza, su amor y sus deseos;
Aqu suena la drica armona
All canciones que, afrentando Orfeos,
Eran dulce recreo a los sentidos,
En tantas variedades suspendidos.

On the occasion of his birthday
the king orders jousts and tournaments
whereby Naples shows its youth,
its beauty, its love, and its desires;
Here the Doric harmony plays
there, songs competing with Orpheus
are heard, sweet solace to the senses,
in so many delights suspended.

The description of this scene, a festive setting ordered by the king, is
followed by the description of different participants in the joust (the king,
Armesinda, and other nobles), paying attention to the detail and color of
the dress. Tarantoss prince wears an outfit de tela verdegay vestido
airoso/sobre ncar, [of green silk and mother of pearl](l. 67-8)
Visinianos con recamos de plata [with silver thread] (l.82), and
Salernos todo de fina plata guarnecido [adorned in fine silver] (l.92),
in fact, all of the outfits are embroidered either in silver or precious
stones like ncar [mother of pearl]. These descriptions are not to be

3
Unless otherwise noted the translations in the text are our own. To our
knowledge, there is no English translation available of La firmeza en la
ausencia.
taken as a reflection of the customary clothing of the time but rather as
symbolical, as several women writers contemporary to De la Cueva y
Silva use clothing as a rhetorical device. If colors may be employed to
represent the emotions of the characters, as Amy Kaminsky argues, the
excessive richness and details in the clothing described may be pointing
to a critique of the Neapolitan courtiers. They represent the lavish
Neapolitan court where expenditure in festivities appears to be affordable
and condoned by the viceroy. However, underlying this opening scene
and in relation to the plot (where the king of Naples, in love with
Armesinda, a lady from the Court, sends her lover to war, only to have
her prove her faithfulness) is a critique of the licentiousness of a class
who believes to have power over the Others. Written by a woman after
the Neapolitan revolt of 1647, this play may be a political allegory
echoing the sentiment present in a certain group of nobles in Spain who
saw the excesses of the Neapolitan viceroyalty and brought the downfall
of Count Duke of Olivares.
4
Richness and excess in the descriptions of
Naples function thus as a critique of political mores.
Another writer whose complex critique relies on the world of
allusion is Tirso de Molina. In his trilogy commanded by the Pizarro
family to glorify its members and the colonial enterprise, he includes a
subtle critique by means of his references to chocolate, a term alluding
to the excesses of the aristocracy as well as to the consumption of the
colonies by means of the cocoa trade.
5
While references to the colonial
enterprise may be present in this trilogy, Tirso de Molinas use of the
Naples viceroyalty as a locus for social and cultural critique is to be
found both in El condenado por desconfiado [Mistrusting and
Condemned] (1635) and El burlador de Sevilla [The Trickster of Seville
and The Stone Guest] (c.1630), the work that initiates the legend of Don
Juan.

4
Teresa Soufas indicates that the play was probably written around the midpoint
of the playwrights life and that it is set in the 16
th
C, the time of the French
invasion contained by the Spanish troops, a moment of Spains strength, in order
to offer contrast with the time of the revolt of Naples.
5
See Yolanda Gamboas article regarding the colonization of Mexico in terms
of the consumption of the Other. Note that Mexico becomes an alluring place as
well in the Spanish imaginary. Besides the allusion to colonizing the palate, an
important aspect of the civilizing process carried out by the Spaniards, it is
also a promise of continued riches for those involved in the colonial enterprise,
very much like Naples.
El condenado por desconfiado is a play about redemption,
organized around the lack of trust in the word of God, falling prey to
evil, and free will. It centers around the conflicts of Paulo, a hermit, who
in a moment of weakness is tempted by the devil who asks him to go to
the city of Naples by following sinner Enrico. Notable in this
construction is that the setting for falling into evil is Naples, a city that,
as we saw previously in Lopes play, is known both for its beauty and its
danger. As an imaginary place of the outside, its exoticism is a double
-edged sword. A tempting location for the Spanish aristocracy, the
richness it promises leads to licentiousness and abuse of the colonized
Others.
Tirsos well-known El burlador de Sevilla presents Naples in a more
lighthearted way but still as a critique of the licentiousness of the
Neapolitan court. It opens up with a scene in which Don Juan has a
sexual encounter in the dark with Duchess Isabella of Naples under the
pretense of being her lover. The setting is where Don Juan resides at the
beginning of the play, and where he is exempt from punishment due to
his aristocratic lineage and his uncles position in the court as
ambassador and kings guard. Don Juan will flee from Naples and will
continue his amorous exploits in different locations and with women of
different social status.
A very poignant passage of this play is what is known as the Loa of
Lisbon (l.721-857), a long alluring description of the natural and created
riches of Lisbon which Don Gonzalo de Ulloa, comendador mayor,
reports to the king of Naples after returning from his embassy. The
hyperbolic and delightful language used by don Gonzalo leads the king
to say Ms estimo, don Gonzalo,/ escuchar de vuestra lengua/esa
relacin sucinta,/que haber visto su grandeza (l.858-61) [I rather, don
Gonzalo/listen in your own words/this brief relation/that see its
greatness]. This passage has given the critics much to think about,
though mostly it is agreed that the description of the greatness of Lisbon
contrasts with the corruption of Seville and, I will add, to that of Naples.
Don Juans presence in Naples points to his social and political mobility,
which is possible only for a small sector of the Spanish population at the
time.
Contemporary of Lope de Vega, and a popular, well-known writer,
Maria de Zayas y Sotomayor wrote two collections of framed short
novels containing ten novels each, namely, Novelas amorosas y
ejemplares (1637) [The Enchantments of Love: Amorous and Exemplary
Novels], and Desengaos amorosos (1647) [The Disenchantments of
Love].
6
Multiple references to Naples, together with those to the Count
of Lemos in her novels are likely to be direct references to her stay in
Naples and not mere literary topos. However, as Zayas researchers have
noted, these two collections differ in tone, especially regarding the
position of women, the first being more humorous and the second being
more critical of her time. The same is true of her allusions to Naples, as
the analysis of the references to Naples in three different novels will
show. Research into the Neapolitan politics can throw light into the
biographical details of Mara de Zayas.
Naples is the setting of the fifth novel in her first collection, namely,
La fuerza del amor [The Power of Love]. Her description of Naples,
the city where the main character is born, conforms to the alluring
descriptions we have seen in the works of other contemporary writers of
Zayas:

En Npoles, insigne y famosa ciudad de Italia por su
riqueza, hermosura y agradable sitio, nobles ciudadanos y
gallardos edificios, coronados de jardines y adornados de
cristalinas fuentes, hermosas damas y gallardos caballeros

Naples, a famous city in Italy, is renowned for its
wealth, noble citizens, splendid buildings, pleasant location,
and great beauty. It is crowned with many gardens and
adorned with crystalline fountains, lovely ladies, and elegant
gentlemen. (Enchantments 159)

However, aside from a reference to the importance of witchcraft in
Naples where, como no hay el freno de la Inquisicin y los dems
castigos, no les amedrentan [theres no restriction by the Inquisition or
other punishment sufficient to frighten them] (Enchantments 173), which
contributes to the common place of Naples as place where evil lurs, the
rest of the references allude to the entertainment at the rich and idle
Neapolitan court: es uso y costumbre en Npoles ir las doncellas a los
saraos y festines que en los palacios del virrey y casas particulares de
caballeros se hacen [It was the custom in Naples for maidens to attend
parties and soirees given in the viceroys palace and in other private
homes of the nobility](Enchantments 160)]; sase en Npoles llevar a

6
Both of Zayass collections are available in English translation by Patsy Boyer.
The translations included here are Boyers.
los festines un maestro de ceremonias, el cual saca a danzar a las damas
y las da al caballero que le parece [Another custom in Naples was that
at the parties there was a master of ceremonies who would lead the ladies
out to dance and give them to a gentleman chosen by him]
(Enchantments 161); tom un arpa en que las seoras italianas son tan
diestras [She took up her harp, which Italian women play very well]
(Enchantments 168).
References to Naples in the Zayas second collection are not merely
descriptive but include a veiled political critique of the Spanish colonial
enterprise, as they tend to become more specific. For instance, in the first
novel, La esclava de su amante [Slave To Her Own Lover], Manuel,
the character with whom the heroine is in love, departs to Naples in the
service of Castilles Admiral, who, according to Alicia Yllera, the editor
of the collection, seems to be Juan Alfonso Enrquez de Cabrera. He uses
his relationship with a servant friend of his to get a position as a
gentilhombre de su cmara (150), however pompous it may sound, a
man-servant position. Naples is a desirable post, even as a servant. The
other reference is in the eighth novel, El traidor contra su sangre
[Traitor To His Own Blood], where Alonso, the main character, departs
for Naples after having brutally killed his sister. Naples seems to be a
place where a well-off Spaniard can escape with impunity, because the
characters father writes letters in his favor to don Pedro Fernndez de
Castro, Count of Lemos and Naples viceroy to grant him a place as
soldier (385-6). Alonsos criminal behavior will continue in Naples,
partially due to his association with a hijo de espaol y napolitana,
hombre perdido y vicioso [a Neapolitan, son of a Spaniard who was a
wastrel and a degenerate, debauched in every way, helped lead him more
deeply into vice] (Disenchantments 289). The view of Naples changes in
Zayas novels in the ten years distance between her novels, probably due
to political circumstances.
In Zayas works other references to Naples relate to the Count of
Lemos, as found in the first Desengao. Zayas writes glowingly about
him in the fifth of her Novelas:

Don Pedro Fernndez de Castro, Conde de Lemos,
nobilsimo, sabio y piadoso prncipe, cuyas raras virtudes y
excelencias no son para escritas en papeles, sino en lminas
de bronce y en las lenguas de la fama.
Don Pedro Fernndez de Castro, count of Lemos. He
was a very noble, wise and devout prince whose rare virtues
and outstanding qualities should be written on bronze
plaques and on the tongue of fame rather than just on paper].
(Enchantments 178)

Zayas subservient attitude in this passage, together with her
admiration towards the Count seems to indicate, on the one hand, a
relation of patronage, and on the other hand, the presence of Zayas
within the Counts entourage. Pedro Fernndez de Castro, seventh Earl
of Lemos was indeed Neapolitan viceroy from 1610 to 1616. He is
known to have favored the arts and letters and supported the literary
academies, like academia degli occiosi which started in 1611. He also
continued building the royal palace, spent on ceremonies, and built the
university (Green 297). This aspect is of great importance because it
throws light into her allegiances in a time of political intrigues since the
Count of Lemos was involved in the conspiracy that brought about the
downfall of the Count Duque of Olivares. Zayas presence in the literary
circles of the Count of Lemos may very well be an initial stage of her
later participation in the aristocratic and political circles of opposition to
the Count Duke.
In fact, literary references to the lavish Neapolitan Court are, in all
likelihood, veiled political references to Olivares relatives and their
abuses at Court. That critique of nobility living in excess, in part by the
oppositional aristocratic literary group, constitutes a relevant portion of
the Spanish imaginary and of a world of literary (as well as political)
allusion.

Rhetoric and Space as an Argument of Allure

A cultural metropolis during the Aragon rule (1442-1503) historical
Naples flourishes in the 15
th
and 16
th
century as a center for urban and
cultural development. However, the discovery of the New World
displaced the economic center of the Spanish Empire towards the
Atlantic and Naples was exploited with taxes but was no longer the
center of attention. From a literary and rhetorical perspective, Naples of
the 17
th
century remains a location of allure, yet regarded as a place for
the excessive, therefore associated with licentiousness, and even evil
dangers.
The rhetorical problem underlining this research is how Spanish
literature of the 17
th
century engages Naples as the cultural colony of
choice. The Vice royal Neapolitan court is the epitome of the Empires
glory in Spanish Imaginary, where elegant and lavish settings depict
primary alluring qualities for an important site of luxury outside of
mainland Spain.
While the first part of the paper features Naples as a literary
presence, rhetorical approaches can offer additional insight into cultural
reconstitution of place as an argument of allure. Rhetorically, the Spanish
writers of the Imaginary invoke the cultural legitimacy of the Spanish
colonizing powers by locating Naples as a meta-narrative of Otherness.
As depicted by Maria de Zayas and Leonor de La Cueva y Silva, Naples
embodies Spanish promises of a most alluring Outside, a discursive
setting where colonization happens with evocative force, a mythical site
of legitimation for luxury, for an abundance of mores, and, of course, for
culture.
7
As such, Naples embodies a literary Outside from where
audiences can view the Spain of the 17
th
century, its history and its
powers, its colonizing legitimacy and its locus for prosperity and politics.
Such a rhetorical move shares with exilic discourse relationships
between outside and inside, between presence and absence of allure,
between public memory arguments of past and present political power.
8

Utilizing the rhetorical space of the outside, like many writers of exile,
the writers presented in this paper create a literary Naples as a favorable
site for the discourse of Spanish cultural life. The significance of such
reinvention of space is the negotiation of locus against and within
political power. Legitimacy, however, implies a social, political, and
cultural context within which space re-enacts power. This requirement
proposes a notion of rhetoric that interpellates the rhetor to legitimize his
or her culture through discourse.
9

7
The use of the Outside spelled with capital letter is borrowed from Andrei
Codrescus work on poetic exile (Codrescu, 1990).
8
Joseph Brodsky, the famous exiled poet, points out in his works on exile as a
literary home the nostalgic qualities of the place, a discursive site where past and
present evoke a cultural locus of pertinent participation in the public life of a
city/country/space (Brodsky, 1994).
9
Charland (140), borrowing the term from Althusser, defines interpellation as
an active term, stating that: Interpellation occurs at the very moment one enters
into a rhetorical situation, that is, as soon as an individual recognizes and
acknowledges being addressed. An interpellated subject participates in the
discourse that addresses him. . . . Note, however, that interpellation does not
And yet Naples is not a mere place of the Outside, (political, cultural
and/or poetic) as exilic sites often are in literary works.
10
Rather, all
mentioned writers construct the Neapolitan court of the 17
th
century as an
argument of allure, legitimizing discursive, political and historical
significance outside of mainland Spain. Distinct from literary works on
exile where place functions as an external and alienated locus, depictions
of Naples of the Imaginary vector arguments from the inside (Spain) into
the outside (Neapolitan Viceroyalty) as a legitimate colonizing action.
11

Looking at rhetorical strategies, literary authors like Lope de Vega,
Tirso de Molina, Leonor de la Cueva y Silva, and Mara de Zayas engage
Naples as argument of allure in order to create an evocative identity of
the colonized Outside, thus interpellating both culture and context within
discourse. As a locus of elegance, glory, but also a possible setting for
danger and sin, Naples appeals to audiences, carrying important
rhetorical force and public legitimation in relation to 17
th
century Spanish
politics. Naples is not an Italian colony, but an extension of Spain, a
legitimized court where promises of luxury, political mores, and cultural
practices of 17
th
century aristocracy, all legitimize an alluring and
alluding locus of glory for Spain of the Outside, a glorified colony.
According to Kenneth Burke, symbolic action (language) constitutes
human reality by, through, and within which, humans instantiate
political, social, and cultural paradigms of discursive action.
12
Viewing
rhetoric within a dramatistic approach, Burke looks at language (and
rhetoric) as an intricate locus of dialectical relationships for social action.
Rhetoric for Burke is rooted in an essential function of language itself,
a function that is wholly realistic and continually born anew; the use of
language as symbolic means of inducing cooperation in beings that by
nature respond to symbols (43). Simultaneous identification-with and
division-from that occurs when writers (rhetors) address an audience
constitutes the dialectical relationship that governs a main aspect of
rhetoric (46). Burke explains that identity represents ones uniqueness
as an entity and identification constitutes in rhetoric an acting together;

occur through persuasion in the usual sense, for the very act of addressing is
rhetorical.
10
See Marins argument (73-115) about Codrescu and poetic exile.
11
Marin (2007) 157-169.
12
Burkes entire work is written under the assumption of language as symbolic
action, which he articulates overtly in The Philosophy of Literary Form and in
Language as Symbolic Action (Burke [1941] 1-138, 3-44). See also Foucault
(1972) 215-37.
and in acting together, men have common sensations, concepts, images,
ideas, attitudes that make them consubstantial (21).
Burkes relationship between identity (as national Spanish identity in
this case) and identification reveals a rhetorical perspective called for by
an alluring cultural colonizing site such as Naples of the Imaginary
Spain.
13
His perspective on identity and identification appears useful in
that it reveals how the discourse of the Imaginary Outside engages with
constructs of identity, with cultural dimensions of space, and with the
public sphere.
14
While Burke develops much less the concept of identity
in his writings on rhetoric, identification focuses on a dialectical process
in which the speaker draws on shared interests to establish rapport
between himself [herself] and his [her] audience. Burke views
identification in relation to persuasion, since a speaker persuades an
audience by the use of stylistic identifications; his act of persuasion may
be for the purpose of causing the audience to identify itself with the
speakers interests; and the speaker draws on identification of interests to
establish rapport between himself [herself] and his[her] audience.
15

Accordingly, Burkes emphasis on identification as a rhetorical strategy
supports how the mentioned writers depict the Imaginary Naples in
relation to Spanish identity and public/political voice in the land of the
Outside. Depicted as alluring (in all of the writers chosen), but also as
dangerous (in Lope, Tirsos El condenado por desconfiado, and Zayas),
Naples as a colony does not carry only political and literary identity in
the 17
th
century. Naples of the Imaginary becomes more than a colony of
the Spanish Empire, transforming itself into what Burke calls myth,
since it gravitates to the side of image, invoking imagination, rather than
reason to explicate political or cultural identity.
16

All of the writers examined depict Naples of the Imaginary as a
discursive site of identification, a rhetorical place to exercise, criticize
and/or revisit Spanish mores of high-class society. A rhetorical nexus of
identification and persuasion for writers and audiences alike, Naples
expands into a critical site for audiences to reflect, view and identify the
Spanish political and cultural power in the Outside. Rhetorically, the
choice of Naples as the literary setting for the works mentioned assists
audiences to view such Spanish viceroyalty as THE discursive and
legitimate locus for all Spanish court events inside and outside the

13
Burke (1955) 19-29, 43-46.

14
Burke (1955) 21-46.
15
Burke (1955) 46.
16
Burke (1947) 195.
country. In other words, Naples becomes a rhetorical site that legitimates
colonization as a performer of genuine Spanish identity while in the
Outside, a salient and legitimate colony where luxury and Spanish lavish
lifestyle interact with political corruption and power.

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DEBATING THE ORIGINS OF COLONIAL WOMEN IN SICILY
AND SOUTH ITALY

Angela Ziskowski, Bryn Mawr College, USA
aziskows@brynmawr.edu

In 1975, Giorgio Buchner proposed, on the basis of jewelry from
the site of Pithekoussai, that the colonys women must have been natives
of the area, rather than Greek women who made the journey to Sicily and
South Italy with their husbands and families.
1
While there has yet to be a
consensus on this issue, the scholars who support Buchner (and the
possibility that colonizers from Greece married indigenous women from
the local areas) have gained the most traction.
2
This paper discusses
three separate sites from this region, each of which provides convincing
material evidence that Buchners original assertion, in favor of hybrid
marriages between Greeks and local women, is correct. Mortuary
evidence from the graves at Pithekoussai, Metapontum, and Morgantina,
including an analysis of the morphological characteristics of human

1
G. Buchner, Nuovi aspetti e problemi posti dagli scavi di Pithecusa, in
Contribution a ltude de la socit et de la colonization eubeenes (Naples,
1975) 59-86.
2
Discussions of Buchners work and these fibulae can be found in J.N.
Coldstream. Mixed Marriages at the Frontiers of the Early Greek World, in
Oxford Journal of Archaeology 12.1 (1993) 89-107 and
J. Toms, The Relative Chronology of the Villanovan Cemetery of Quattro
Fontanili at Veii, in Annali Archeologia e Storia Antica (AION) 8 (1986) 41-
97.
remains and the use of hybrid funerary architecture, lends further support
to Buchners ideas about the native origins of women at Pithekoussai.
Evidence from Pithekoussai would also suggest that this was not a
phenomenon unique to the site but rather that intermarriage seems to
have been a regional trend.
It was the lack of comparable data from each site that led to the
piecemeal structure of this discussion. Scholars have examined particular
sites, but a cohesive examination spanning both geography and a wide
range of archaeological evidence has up to this point been missing.
3
My
approach to the material brings together disparate forms of evidence in
different media and contexts from which one can see a valid argument
arise. When a holistic methodology is employed, logical conclusions
emerge. Each piece of evidence, standing alone, is hardly adequate proof
of the indigenous origins of colonial women. However, if one examines
data, both diverse and from geographically distant sites, and the
information independently supports one side of the debate, then it is
reasonable to believe that taken together, the culmination of evidence
builds a solid argument. Such is the case with women in the western
colonies. I have compiled a range of material which varies from
ceramics to mortuary customs to morphological attributes. Analyzed
together, they produce a solid and convincing argument. Most
importantly, if we accept the native origins of the women of these
colonies, we can begin a dialogue on the significance and influence of
women on colonial culture.

Studying Colonial Foundations

While a number of cities sent out prospective colonies to Sicily and
Italy during the archaic period, there are few historical records discussing
the presence or absence of women among these enterprises. Why this
was not considered an issue worthy of mention in more ancient texts is
difficult to say. Although not specific to Magna Grecia, Herodotus
(i.146.2-3) makes a reference to the colony of Miletus that has been used
as evidence both for and against intermarriage with native women. He
states, and as for those who came from the very town hall of

3
A majority of the authors cited in this article analyze evidence from one site
and rarely contextualize this evidence in order to examine broader trends in the
western Greek colonies.
Ziskowski Colonial Women 141
Athensthese did not bring wives with them to their settlements, but
married Carian women whose parents they had put to death.
4
While a
seemingly conclusive statement on the issue, A.J. Graham argues that it
could simply be an aetiological story to explain the customs of the
women in this colony, who neither addressed nor dined with their
husbands, or that Herodotus specifies the fact that they brought no
women because it was an exception and not the rule.
5
Regardless of how
one interprets this passage, it provides no resolution to the issue since it
is the sole instance which refers specifically to this question.
It should also be noted that the concept of intermarriage between
Greeks and individuals from other cultures was not particularly unusual.
There are many instances of Greeks marrying women from other
societies. For instance, Aeschines informs us that Demosthenes
grandfather, Gylon, married a woman from Scythia.
6

Several important questions arise if the Greeks intermarried with
local populations. In part, the significance of determining the identity of
the women in these colonies rests on the fact that they were in fact
founding colonies intended, among other things, to spread Greek
culture. If the Greeks did indeed set out to new lands with a
predetermined plan to marry local non-Greek women, what does this say
about their understanding of cultural identity? Did the colonizers believe
that the local women would have no effect on the cultural identity of
their hybrid offspring? The issue of intermarriage therefore involves
more than simply clarifying local and regional customs or identifying
ethnicity, it raises broader issues of self-identity of the Greeks and the
role of women in the creation of this identity.
Furthermore, the colonies were not being settled by the Greeks alone
in these areas. There is evidence for the presence of Phoenician burials
by 750 BCE in the cemetery at Pithekoussai.
7
In addition, there seems to
be evidence at this same site for cultural influence from the Levant as

4
Herodotus i.146.2-3 tr. A.D. Godley (London and Cambridge, 1946)
5
A.J. Graham, Religion, Women and Greek Colonization, Atti Vol. XI, N.S.
1(1980-1981) 293-314.
6
Aeschines, iii, 171-2.
7
M.J. Becker, Human Skeletons from the Greek Emporium of Pithekoussai on
Ischia (NA): Culture, Contact, and Biological Change in Italy after the 8
th

Century BC, in Social Dynamics of the Prehistoric Central Mediterranean
(London, 1999) 217-225.
well.
8
The multicultural environment at Pithekoussai demonstrates that
no society is easily divided into one, two, or more ethnic or cultural
groups and this should be ever present in the readers mind when
examining the material from these sites. Moreover, the presence of
foreigners could presumably raise the bar for a colonial Greeks need for
a well-defined and recognizable identity within such a community.
The issues of hybridity at Greek colonial sites add fuel to the
ongoing debate involving ethnicity and identity. A group of people is
rarely, if ever, homogenous and well-defined. Jonathan Hall has stated
that ethnicity can not be physically defined but that it is a social and
subjective identifying characteristic of a group and that it needs to be
actively proclaimed and reclaimed by the group in question.
9
It is also
well known that identifying biologically distinct societies based on
material culture is difficult, if not impossible.
10
Nonetheless, it is
reasonable to assume that the first encounter of two groups, distant both
geographically and culturally, might leave a visible mark on the
archaeological record, if only temporarily during this first collision of
culture. Furthermore, studying the mortuary practices at these sites can
reveal an effort on the part of the colonial inhabitants to perceptibly
proclaim their cultural identity. Although such material must be
approached with a degree of caution, it remains worthwhile to investigate
the evidence available in order to better understand the early
convergences of separate cultures.
Of the three sites discussed below, Pithekoussai was the first to be
founded by Greek colonists. It was established sometime in the eighth
century BCE. Metaponto was founded in the second half of the seventh
century BCE. Lastly, Morgantina was founded during the second quarter
of the sixth century BCE.
11
Accordingly, these three sites will be
discussed chronologically. It is reasonable to infer that if the earliest site,
Pithekoussai, chose not to bring women to the new colony and

8
D. Ridgway, Seals, Scarabs, and People in Pithekoussai I, in Periplous.
Papers on Classical Art and Archaeology Presented to John Boardman
(London, 2000) 235-243.
9
J. Hall, Ethnic Identity in Greek Antiquity (Cambridge, 1997) 182.
10
Ibid.
11
Colonial foundation dates are traditionally based on the relative chronology of
Thucydides (most established in reference to the battle of Himera in 480 BCE).
In more recent times, archaeological evidence has substantiated the accuracy of
these dates. See I. Morris, The Absolute Chronology of the Greek Colonies,
in Acta Archeologica 67 (1996) 51-59 for a thorough summary of this subject.
participated in the practice of intermarriage, then the later colonies too
may have followed in this tradition. Thus the evidence from
Pithekoussai will also hopefully aid in supporting the argument of
intermarriage at the later sites as well.

Pithekoussai

Pithekoussai, situated on the north-west extremity of the volcanic
island of Ischia in the Bay of Naples, was first settled by Euboean
merchants prior to 770 BCE. At some point after this, additional
Euboeans must have joined these merchants at this entrepreneurially-
advantageous site.
12
The area of the cemetery at Pithekoussai occupies
the Valle di San Montano, a valley that is located behind the natural
harbor.
13
Excavations have yielded approximately 1300 graves from all
its periods of occupation.
14
These tombs make up at most only 10% of
the known original burials.
15
Nonetheless, the excavated graves available
for study provide ample evidence to support the practice of intermarriage
between the Greek colonists and the indigenous population.
Physical human traits from the occupants of these burials provide
fascinating insight into the understanding of the origins of colonial
women. Tooth morphology plays an important role in the evidence from
Pithekoussai, as it does at Metaponto, which I will discuss below. The
bifurcation of a tooths root occurs when the root divides into two or
more separate parts. It is often used to identify different populations
since it can vary substantially from group to group.
16
M.J. Becker has
extensively analyzed the presence of this trait at Pithekoussai. He has
demonstrated that the bifurcation of the root of the maxillary first

12
M.J. Becker, Human Skeletons from the Greek Emporium of Pithekoussai on
Ischia (NA). Culture, Contact, and Biological Change in Italy after the 8
th

Century BC, in Social Dynamics of the Prehistoric Central Mediterranean
(London, 1999) 217-225.
13
D. Ridgway, The First Western Greeks (Cambridge, 1992) 45.
14
Ibid. p. 46. The chronological range of these graves extends from the 8
th

century BCE to the 3
rd
century CE of which 493 are from the initial years of the
colonys foundation (called the Eubeoean period by Ridgway).
15
Ibid.
16
I. Kovacs, A Systematic Description of Dental Roots, in Dental Morphology
and Evolution (Chicago and London, 1971) 211-256. This article provides a
more in-depth discussion on the bifurcation of the roots of teeth.
premolars (teeth in the upper half of the mouth behind the canines and
primarily used for chewing) is a dental trait commonly observed among
people indigenous to central Italy.
17
It is most common during the period
from ca. 900 to 600 BCE.
18
Interestingly, Becker points out that the
remains of the earliest inhabitants of Pithekoussai exhibit no evidence for
this trait but the later population demonstrates a low incidence of it.
19

This may suggest that the earliest burials at Pithekoussai were not local,
but later burials with a low incidence reflect the result of intermarriage
and the gradual assimilation of this morphological trait into their genes.
While immigration of locals into the urban colony has been offered as an
explanation for the presence of this trait, its later appearance can also be
explained by the assimilation of the trait into the Greek colonys
population from the heterogeneous offspring of marital unions with the
indigenous women possessing this biological characteristic.
Giorgio Buchners discussion of the jewelry from Pithekoussai
stirred much of the original debate on this topic. He suggested that the
fibulae, or garment pins, at the site were of indigenous origin and that it
was only logical that women would have controlled the fashion trends of
jewelry which were most often meant for them.
20
Such fibulae are found
at numerous sites in Sicily and South Italy. The graves at Pithekoussai
contain many variations of the most common Italic types of fibulae
which include the arched bow with a swollen leech shape, a thinner
bow on which bone or shell can be threaded, and a more elaborate type
which assumes a serpentine form.
21
An important fact is that no
examples of Euboean types of fibulae have been found at Pithekoussai,
nor do any of the varieties found share any resemblance with types
known from Euboea or anywhere else in Greece.
22
This discounts the
possibility that Greek women came to the area from the mainland and
then later developed a taste for the local jewelry because presumably the

17
Becker 1999. p. 222.
18
Ibid.
19
Tomb 149 provides a specific example of this trait. M. J. Becker, Human
Skeletal Remains from the Pre-Colonial Greek Emporium of Pithekoussai on
Ischia (NA): Culture Contact in Italy from the Early VIII to the II Century BC,
in Settlement and Economy in Italy. 1500 BC-AD 1500 (Oxford ,1995) 273-281.
20
G. Buchner, Early Orientalizing Aspects of the Euboean Connection, in D.
and F. Ridgway (eds.), Italy before the Romans (London, 1979) pp. 29-43.
21
J.N. Coldstream. Mixed Marriages at the Frontiers of the Early Greek
World, in Oxford Journal of Archaeology 12.1 (1993) 89-107.
22
Coldstream 1993. p. 91.
women would have initially arrived with their own Greek pieces of
jewelry of which there is no archaeological evidence. If this were the
case, we could expect to find these types in at least some of the earliest
Pithekoussan tombs. Moreover, not only do the graves in question
contain Italic fibulae, but the Greek foundries from the site also provide
evidence for the production of such types.
23
Jewelry found at the
colonys blacksmith quarter on the Mezzavia ridge indicates that the
colonists (or hired members of the local population) were making Italic-
style jewelry in their own foundries.
24
This implies that either the
colonists were making Italic forms (and not Greek forms) for a market
that demanded this (local women?) or that the indigenous population was
working in the Greek foundries in which case there is additional
evidence for intimate contact between the two groups. The absence of
mainland Greek forms of jewelry at Pithekoussai is the strongest
evidence indicating that no Greek women ever arrived at Pithekoussai.
The production of Italic types of fibulae in the Greek foundries also
points to a lack of need for Greek womens jewelry. One then can
speculate that the women in the colony were local inhabitants of the area
and not women from Greece.
An additional piece of evidence for the practice of intermarriage at
Pithekoussai concerns the attribution of Greek-Etruscan names. D.
Ridgway has discussed pottery found in the area that was incised with
graffiti of names such as Larth Telicles and Rutile Hipucrates.
25
Proper
names formed by combining Greek and Etruscan elements provide
strong evidence for close, as opposed to casual, relationships between
these two communities. The families chose names which identify with
both cultures. Since these names do not occur any later than the seventh
century BCE, one can reason that initially, as the two populations
intermarried, they named their children after both parents cultures but
gradually the population and cultural differences became harder to
identify.
26
Thus the two-culture names disappeared sometime in the
seventh century BCE. Moreover, the fusion of Etruscan and Greek

23
Coldstream 1993. pp. 91-93.
24
Ibid.
25
D. Ridgway, The Etruscans, in J. Boardman, N.G.L. Hammond, D.M.
Lewis, M. Ostwald (eds.), The Cambridge Ancient History 4, 2
nd
edition
(Cambridge, 1988) 634-75. While these strange inscriptions occur in the
Etruscan language, they refer to Greek pottery shape names such as the askos,
reinforcing the multi-cultural nature of them.
26
Coldstream 1993, p. 101
cultures coincides relatively well with the adoption of alphabetic writing
by the Etruscans around 700 BCE.
27
J.N. Coldstream has pointed out
that it would have been very easy for the child of such a union to start
applying his fathers recently acquired literacy to his mothers
language.
28
These bicultural names provide excellent evidence to
suggest that there was a cultural union between the Greek colonists and
the native population and that this most likely resulted from marriages
between the two.

Metapontum

Metapontum is located on the mainland of Italy on the coast of the
Ionian Sea set between the rivers Basento and Bradano.
29
The colony
was established by Greeks from another colony, Sybaris, sometime in the
second half of the seventh century BCE.
30
Although the site has
produced a wide variety of archaeological evidence, the material for this
discussion comes entirely from the Pantanello necropolis where over
three hundred burials were excavated.
31
These burials present striking
evidence for the presence of indigenous women within the Greek
colonys community.
The colony of Metapontum is exceptional in the fact that it is a
secondary colony since its mother city, Sybaris, was also a Magna
Grecian colony founded by Greeks at the end of the eighth century BCE.
Sybaris is located approximately 50 miles south and west of
Metapontum.
32
The colonial roots of Metapontums original settlers
should not drastically influence the issue at hand. If the original Sybaritic
colonists had not adopted the practice of intermarriage, then Metapontum
would have remained Greek in identity. Therefore one could still
examine the question of Greek and indigenous intermarriage at the
second site. On the other hand, if intermarriage between Greeks and
natives had already occurred at Sybaris, and there is no reason to

27
Ibid.
28
Ibid.
29
J. Coleman Carter, The Chora of Metaponto. The Necropoleis (Austin, 1998)
2.
30
Ibid. p. 7.
31
The Pantanello necropolis is divided in two areas to the east and west. The
western area yielded 276 burials while the Eastern Necropolis yielded only 48.
32
J.S. Callaway, Sybaris (Baltimore, 1950) 1-3
discount that it could have, then one might wish to argue that this
discussion of intermarriage no longer centers on Greeks vs. natives, but
that it represents a more general trend in colonization. That is to say, the
possibly-intermarried population at Sybaris, which would found
Metapontum approximately one hundred years later, would now be a
mixed group of Greeks, natives, and their bi-cultural offspring and
descendants. Intermarriage can continually be examined at Metapontum
(between the mixed descendants of Sybaris and the indigenous
populations at Metapontum), it is just a question of which cultures are
intermarrying. Although the origin of the Sybaritic colonists questions
what societies and identities we may find at Metapontum, the issue of
marriage between (Greek) colonist and indigenous local is still present
and important.
As at Pithekoussai, an examination of certain funerary remains from
Metapontum can add some fuel to this discussion. Mortuary practices
represent an important form of display and identity for most cultures.
The contracted position of a burial was more commonly a feature of the
indigenous, Italic populations while the supine burial was more popular
among the Greek colonists. These two types of burial are found
uniformly among the graves of both men and women at the necropolis of
Metapontum.
33
There is also a consistent lack of evidence for childrens
burials among graves of contracted and supine individuals.
34
Moreover,
the two forms of burial are found spread across a wide range of ages,
excluding small children and infants.
35
Lastly, the supine and contracted
burials appear to share a uniform modesty in their form and grave
goods.
36
These facts aid in suggesting that there is no reason to believe
that the supine and contracted burial forms are representative of a
particular or exclusive segment of a single society. Instead, it is more
likely that these two burial forms are the product of two different cultures
with separate mortuary customs. This is relevant because a group of
three skeletons that share physical indications of an identical infectious
disease on their bones comes from the necropolis of Metapontum. J.
Coleman Carter points out that two of the infected skeletons were
discovered in the contracted position while the third was found in the

33
Carter 1998 pp. 65-66, 555.
34
Ibid. p.64.
35
Ibid. p. 555.
36
Ibid. p. 66.
supine position.
37
These three skeletons could represent two separate
cultures at the site.
The disease which was discovered on the bones of the skeletons was
identified as treponematosis. This is a particular type of disease which
originates from the Treponema species of bacteria which is also
responsible for modern syphilis infections.
38
Not all strains of this
disease necessitate venereal transmission but they do require close
contact with the sores of the infected. In fact, modern versions of this
disease are most often spread through mouth-to-mouth contact.
39
It is
impossible to establish the exact types of contact, sexual or otherwise,
necessary for the ancient strain of this disease to spread. Nevertheless,
the fact that skeletons from two culturally distinct types of burial share
the infectious marks of treponematosis suggests physical (probably
sexual) contact among the seemingly distinct groups at Metapontum. It is
highly unlikely that two populations would have suffered from an
identical infectious disease with no contact between them. Moreover,
since the disease is spread through close, physical contact, we can
speculate that intimate unions between the colonial and local populations
were being formed and responsible for the transmission of the disease
between two distinct, burying populations. Although it is not necessary
for this contact to result in marriage, it is logical that it could have and it
did most likely result in offspring of the two distinct cultures.
In addition to the shared treponematosis between different burial
types, the tooth morphology of the Metapontines also suggests that
intermarriage may have occurred between the colonial and native
populations. The presence of a particular odontoscopic trait at the
necropolis can argue again for the gradual amalgamation of the physical
traits of these two groups. J. Pinto-Cisternas argues that a concavity
present on the mesio-lingual border of the crown of the tooth is a trait
with a highly restricted geographic distribution.
40
He refers to it as the
Etruscan upper lateral incisor because it is found in approximately

37
Ibid. p. 168.
38
For more modern material on this disease, one can consult Proceedings of
World Forum on Syphilis and other Treponematoses (Washington, D.C., 1962)
39
http://www.emedicine.com/med/topic2305.htm Medical website.
40
J. Pinto-Cisternas, J. Moggi-Cecchi, E. Pacciani, A Morphological Variant of
the Permanent Upper Lateral Incisor in Two Tuscan Samples from Different
Periods, in Aspects of Dental Biology: Palaeontology, Anthropology and
Evolution (Florence, 1995) 333-339.
30% of Etruscans from the seventh to the first centuries BCE.
41
This
number is based on two separate samples, one of forty-seven skulls from
Etruscan populations and the other from seventy skulls of a Florentine
population from the nineteenth century CE.
42
Interestingly, the skeletal
material from the Pantanello necropolis finds this lateral incisor only to
be present in 18% of the people buried there.
43
Moreover, the same study
examined teeth from thirty cosmopolitan (modern) Greeks.
44
Not one of
the Greeks exhibited this trait. This suggests that it would traditionally
not be found in a Greek population. If this trait remains consistently
present in 30% of the Etruscan population into the first century BCE, the
very presence of it and the fact that only 18% of the population at
Metapontum exhibited this trait must be due to some fact outside of
natural evolution. The low (yet statistically present and significant)
occurrence of this trait among the burials at Metapontum suggests an
Etruscan presence within the colonial population. The integration of
Etruscans, exhibiting the trait, and the colonists, who show no signs of
this trait, would offer an explanation for its diminished occurrence at
Metapontum. The intermarriage of colonial men to the native women
would reduce the presence of such a trait, without eliminating it entirely,
which is exactly what one sees in the chora of Metapontum. Such
genetic and morphological attributes of the skeletal material provide very
convincing evidence that the burials found in the necropolis at
Metapontum were made up of a mixed population which had
incorporated some of the characteristics of the (Greek) colonists and the
indigenous societies already present in the area.

41
Carter cites that the material on this particular dental characteristic comes
from an abstract presented at the Ninth International Symposium on Dental
Morphology, 3-6 September 1992, Florence. It was entitled, A Morphological
Variant of Permanent Upper Lateral Incisor in Two Tuscan Samples of Different
Ages, by J. Pinto-Cisternas, J. Moggi Cecchi, and E. Pacciani. The published
article of this presentation is cited in the previous footnote.
42
Pinto-Cisternas 1995. p. 333-336. The author also cites that the trait is
observed in two additional Italic skeletal populations, respectively from
Alfedena and Campovolano, through personal communication with A. Coppa.
43
Carter 1998. p. 518.
44
Pinto-Cisternas 1995. pp. 336-337.
Morgantina

A third site, Morgantina, is located east of the modern town of
Aidone in east-central Sicily.
45
The site sits on the Serra Orlando ridge
and the cemeteries discussed are on the hill known as the Cittadella.
46

The material available includes the burials and grave offerings of sixty-
seven tombs investigated during the American excavations at the site.
47

The site was a thriving indigenous settlement and in the second quarter
of the sixth century BCE a flood of Greek material culture (pottery,
architecture, and mortuary structures) appears in the archaeological
record.
48
It is believed that Greek settlers arrived from one of the coastal
colonies, such as Katane, and integrated closely into the local
population.
49
Based on the evidence from the burials at the site, it
appears as if these Greeks too brought few or no women and found wives
among the local Sikel population already present in the area.
Mortuary customs and burial rites are often steadfast and sacred to a
group of people. Significant changes in such practices could be
attributed to the overwhelming influence of a new culture; such might be
the case at Morgantina. The standard form of burial for most indigenous
populations in Sicily was the rock-cut chamber that entombed multiple
burials. This type of burial dominates the site of Morgantina before the
second half of the sixth century BCE.
50
In addition, C. Lyons points out
that this type of burial is not attested as a traditional form of Greek
burial, either on the mainland or in the colonies.
51
Many other forms of
burial suddenly appear at this site when the Greek colonists first arrive.
The new forms of burial that appear at Morgantina in the second half of
the sixth century BCE include familiar types from the Greek mainland

45
C.L. Lyons, Morgantina Studies. Vol. V. The Archaic Cemeteries (Princeton,
1996) 3.
46
Lyons 1996. p. 3.
47
Ibid. 1996 p. 7. Many other tombs were excavated during the course of Orsis
work at the site. However, the information recorded during the excavations
from 1957-1989 (a majority of the graves were excavated in 1969 and 1970) by
Princeton University is the most complete.
48
C. L. Lyons, The Archaic Necropolis of Morgantina (Serra Orlando), Sicily
(Bryn Mawr College Diss., 1983)
49
E. Sjqvist, Sicily and the Greeks. Studies in the interrelationship between the
indigenous populations and the Greek colonists (Ann Arbor, 1973)
50
Lyons 1996. p. 15.
51
Ibid. p. 18.
and other colonies. Among these types are fossa graves, tile-built graves,
sarcophagi, wooden coffins, enchytrismos burials (child burials within
vessels), urn cremations, and soil inhumations.
52
To put it generally, the
rock-cut chamber tombs and multiple burials at Morgantina are specific
to indigenous forms of burial and all other forms materialized with the
arrival of the Greek colonists who preferred single inhumations over
multiple burials.
Three major points must be made about the continuity and changes
of the indigenous burial practices at Morgantina after the Greek colonists
arrived. First, the use of the indigenous rock-cut chamber tomb remains
the dominant form of burial in the Cittadella throughout the history of the
site, well after the appearance of the Greeks, and this indicates that there
was strong continuity in the native populations culture and heritage.
53

One could argue that this continuity demonstrates that the native
population maintained a respected and important role among the Greeks.
Nor were they forced into cultural submission and assimilation. There is
no question of their consistent and continuous cultural presence and their
influence on this new, Greek colony. Second, there is evidence for
various types of burial which can be considered hybrid funerary
architecture, integrating aspects of both the indigenous rock-cut chamber
tombs and the numerous Greek burial forms.
54
For instance, one finds
among the burials in the Cittadella forms such as chamber tombs with
roof tiles and vaulted ceilings, rock-cut sarcophagi in chamber tombs,
and chamber tombs containing nails around the bodies which would
imply that a wooden coffin had been used.
55
These hybrid burials may
belong to hybrid families, made up of Greeks and Sikels of whom neither
wished to abandon their own mortuary customs. Lastly, it is also
significant that the majority of the purely Greek tomb types were used
for the burial of children and infants.
56
This suggests two scenarios: the
first, put forth by Lyons, is that the Greek adults who had come to
Morgantina adopted many of the native burial rites.
57
But this provides
little explanation for the use of Greek burial forms for children and
infants. A second scenario explaining this phenomenon is that the

52
Ibid. p. 15.
53
Lyons dates indigenous-style chamber tombs well into the fifth century BC.
Ibid. pp. 28, 135-226.
54
Ibid. p. 28.
55
Ibid. Catalogue, pp. 135-226.
56
Ibid. p. 28.
57
Ibid.
children of these proposed unions were now part of both cultures and that
there might have been some cultural convention which dictated that a
child ought to be buried by the heritage and customs of his or her father,
who would have been a Greek. If both parents were non-natives, it
would seem illogical for a family to adopt aspects of local, native
mortuary rites for their own burials, while demanding a customary Greek
burial for their child who actually had fewer ties to Greece than his or her
parents. There must be a reason to explain why the adults in the
community would change their beliefs and participate in native burial
customs while the children did not. The indigenous heritage of the
mother can explain part of this and the possibility that a childs burial
followed the customs of the father might account for the rest. The burial
customs from Morgantina demonstrate that there appears to have been a
cultural fusion between the native and Greek populations at the site. The
continuity of native burials, the hybrid tomb forms, and the unique
presence of infant Greek burials all suggest that intermarriage might have
occurred between the indigenous women and the Greek men who had
settled in their territory and adopted many of the local customs.
A second form of evidence for intermarriage at Morgantina, as at
Pithekoussai, is the jewelry of the indigenous women, in particular the
fibulae, found in the mortuary record of these cemeteries. Once again,
the types of fibulae present at this site are all varieties of those common
at sites in Sicily and South Italy. What is particularly interesting here is
that none of these forms predates the establishment of the Greek colonies
in the area.
58
Since these Italic forms appear after the establishment of
this colony, it is logical to believe that the Greek colonists are making
them. This production of Italic types of fibulae, such as the navicella,
clearly reinforces a close connection between the colony and the
indigenous inhabitants of the region. As at Pithekoussai, these jewelry
forms are Italic and most likely for Italic women.
Although the most compelling evidence for intermarriage at
Morgantina is the hybrid funerary architecture, the presence of local
jewelry types reinforces the idea that Greeks were marrying local
women. The evidence from Morgantina points to the gradual fusion of
the two populations and intermarriage is a reasonable consequence of
this fusion. The mortuary evidence from Morgantina provides
compelling evidence for the practice of intermarriage among the arriving
Greek colonists and the established native culture.

58
Ibid. p. 97.

Summary

The three sites of Pithekoussai, Metapontum, and Morgantina, all
provide a range of archaeological evidence in favor of intermarriage
between the Greek colonists and local populations. At Pithekoussai one
finds a low incidence of the bifurcation of premolars, a trait common in
central Italy, which suggests that the genetic traits of the local population
were integrated into the Greek colony. There is no evidence of Greek
jewelry forms and the Italic types are actually being produced at the
Greek site, indicating a preference for this over a Greek style. The
complete absence of Greek jewelry implies that Greek women never
even arrived here in order to abandon their mainland taste in jewelry.
Finally, there is epigraphic evidence on pottery with names containing
both Greek and Etruscan components. Later, we find at Metapontum the
presence of the Etruscan lateral incisor, a trait found in biological
Etruscans, identified in 18% of the buried population here. The reduced
presence of an Italic genetic trait in the Greek colony could result from
bi-cultural descendants at the site. In addition, both contracted and
supine burials, most likely representing two cultures with different burial
customs, shared the markings of treponematosis on their bones
suggesting that the disease was transmitted through close contact of one
culture with the other. At the final site of Morgantina, one sees evidence
of hybrid funerary architecture which mixed the mortuary practices of
the indigenous Sikels and the Greek colonists. Here also the presence of
native jewelry points to the possibility of intermarriage between these
two cultures.
One might argue that the lack of comparable evidence across sites
weakens the validity of the claims made here. However, it is the broad
range of material presented that serves to reinforce the hypothesis that
the Greek colonists may have been marrying into the local population.
The evidence ranges from morphological characteristics, to epigraphic
graffiti on pottery, to unique mortuary practices. The lack of comparable
evidence does not come from the fact that the material is unique and
unusual to each site. Rather the particular and specific agendas of each
sites excavations are primarily responsible for the types of material
which were recorded. By culminating these disparate forms of evidence
into one cohesive argument, it is possible to see a picture forming of the
relationship which existed between Greek colonists and the locals
indigenous to the areas in question.

Discussion

After presenting the evidence to suggest that the Greek colonists
married indigenous women, one must ask what this implies about the
ancient Greek notions of identity. One might wish to contend that this
act, founding the colonies without women, was not a choice but rather a
necessity, arguing that women (and children) were incapable of making
the journey. But it seems that to leave behind the family of a male
colonist negates the purpose of colonization. Cited as the most frequent
reason for a city to found a colony is typically the lack of space and/or
food in the mother city.
59
If the polis were trying to alleviate one of these
problems, how would it be helpful to send off the men but to leave their
families still attached to their land and with fewer means to care for it?
Similarly, if famine were an issue, sending only the males would leave
their kin still requiring nourishment and with even fewer providers. If
colonization were necessary to alleviate strains on a city, it would make
most sense for colonies to be founded by intact families who could leave
behind homes and property, removing entire kin units of providers and
dependents together. For this reason, it may have been a deliberate
choice and not a necessity that the colonies were founded without the
female component of society.
A.J. Graham proposed that women had to have come to the colonies
from Greece in order to fulfill the religious roles that were exclusive to
them.
60
While the archaeological evidence presented here indicates that
this may not have been the case, it is still important to consider the
implications of the Greeks establishing new colonies devoid of the
influence and practices of their women. Were the Greeks aware that the
process of assimilating women into their colony from another population
would gradually change the makeup of their own society?
The choice of the Greek colonists (and most likely the polis which
financed the expedition) to establish these colonies without the female
portion of their population allows one to speculate if women were

59
A.J. Graham, Colony and Mother City in Ancient Greece (Chicago, 1983)

60
Graham 1980. pp. 293-314.
considered replaceable by local inhabitants found near the new
settlement. It is well known that it was the fathers status, and not the
mothers, that determined whether or not a child could attain Athenian
citizenship up until the third century BCE.
61
This fact argues that the
Greeks were aware of their cultural identity through heredity by the very
fact that they controlled Athenian citizenship by examining the parents
lineage. Thus one can not argue that they simply were unaware of such
ideas. Nonetheless, whether it was due to an ignorance of the
transmission of cultural practices, or because the Greeks simply had little
concern for such matters, the fact that they would have chosen to
intermarry among the native populations in the areas which they settled,
and not to bring their own wives and daughters, suggests that they
underestimated the influential power of women on the transmission of
their own culture and customs.
Although the evidence presented here contends that that the Greeks
did indeed marry into the indigenous populations of Magna Grecia, it
should be obvious that more work is necessary at sites in Sicily and
South Italy, as well as those of other colonies established by the Greeks,
in order to carefully identify and discern the societies that were present in
the archaeological record. If an archaeological investigation were carried
out attempting to identify the distinct societies present at a Greek
colonial site, at least culturally if not biologically, one could begin an
earnest dialogue regarding the Greek conceptions of self-identity. Until
then, we must use the disparate miscellany of evidence available in order
to speculate on the nature and intent of the earliest Greek colonial
endeavors.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

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Emporium of Pithekoussai on Ischia (NA): Culture Contact in Italy
from the Early VIII to the II Century BC, in Settlement and
Economy in Italy. 1500 BC-AD 1500: 273-281. (Oxford, 1995)
_______, The Human Skeletons from the Archaic Cemeteries, in
Morgantina Studies. Vol. V. The Archaic Cemeteries: 227-237
(Princeton, 1996)

61
E. Cantarella, Pandoras Daughters. The Role and Status of Women in Greek
and Roman Antiquity (Baltimore and London, 1987) 51.
_______, Human Skeletons from the Greek Emporium of Pithekoussai
on Ischia (NA): Culture, Contact, and Biological Change in Italy
after the 8
th
Century BC, in Social Dynamics of the Prehistoric
Central Mediterranean (London, 1999) 217-225
G. Buchner, Nuovi aspetti e problemi posti dagli scavi di Pithecusa, in
Contribution a ltude de la socit et de la colonization eubeenes
(Naples, 1975) 59-86
_______, Early Orientalizing Aspects of the Euboean Connection,
Italy Before the Romans (London, 1979) 29-43
J.S. Callaway, Sybaris (Baltimore, 1950)
E. Cantarella, Pandoras Daughters. The Role and Status of Women in
Greek and Roman Antiquity (Baltimore and London, 1987)
J.N. Coldstream, Mixed Marriages at the Frontiers of the Early Greek
World, in Oxford Journal of Archaeology 12.1 (1992) 89-107
J. Coleman Carter, The Chora of Metaponto. The Necropoleis. Volumes I
and II (Austin, 1998)
A.J. Graham, Colony and Mother City in Ancient Greece (Chicago,
1983)
_______, Religion, Women and Greek Colonization, in Atti Vol. XI
(N.S. 1) (1980-1981) 293-314
J. Hall, Ethnic Identity in Greek Antiquity (Cambridge, 1997)
I. Kovacs, A Systematic Description of Dental Roots, in Dental
Morphology and Evolution (Chicago and London, 1971) 211-256
C. L. Lyons, The Archaic Necropolis of Morgantina (Serra Orlando),
Sicily. Bryn Mawr College Dissertation. (Bryn Mawr, PA, 1983)
_______, Morgantina Studies. Vol. V. The Archaic Cemeteries
(Princeton, 1996)
I. Morris, The Absolute Chronology of the Greek Colonies, in Acta
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Lewis, M. Ostwald (edd.), The Cambridge Ancient History 4, 2
nd

edition (Cambridge, 1988) 634-75
_______. The First Western Greeks (Cambridge, 1992)
_______, Seals, Scarabs, and People in Pithekoussai I, in Periplous.
Papers on Classical Art and Archaeology. Presented to John
Boardman (London, 2000) 235-243
E. Sjqvist, Sicily and the Greeks. Studies in the Interrelationship
between the Indigenous Populations and the Greek Colonists (Ann
Arbor, 1973)
A.D. Smith, The Ethnic Origins of Nations (Oxford, 1986)
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Quattro Fontanili at Veii, in Annali Archeologia e Storia Antica
(AION) 8 (1986) 41-97
World Forum on Syphilis and Other Treponematoses. Proceedings
(Washington, D.C., 1962)

MYTH AND HISTORY IN OIKIST TRADITIONS: ARCHIAS OF
SYRACUSE

Antonella Carfora, Universit degli studi di Napoli Federico II, Italy
antonella.carfora@katamail.com

In this paper I shall briefly introduce an oikist tradition that grew
around the foundation of Syracuse in the middle of the eighth century
BCE. Through this we shall try to understand the origin and the
circulation of the myth and whether we can find elements based on a
historical record. We shall show the myth as it has been handed down
from literary sources. The version, as it has reached us, is taken from late
sources, Plutarch, Diodorus Siculus and from a scholium of Apollonius
Rhodius Argonautica in a uniform way, except for some variants. We
shall try to find the nucleus of this tradition based probably on a previous
myth settled in Boeotia. Finally we will try, if it is possible, to recognise
in it an archaic tradition.
The date of the foundation of Syracuse, following a Thucydidean
chronology,
1
is about 733 BCE; another chronology reached us through
the mediation of Ephorus and Philistus that advanced the ktisis to 756
BCE
2
According to Plutarch,
3
Archias, the founder of Syracuse, was

1
Thuc., VI 3-4. See T.J. Dunbabin, The Western Greeks, Oxford 1948, p. 435.
2
Philist., FGrHist, 556 F 2= St. Byz. s.v. Duvmh; G. Vanotti, Larchaiologhia
siciliana di Filisto, in Hesperia 3. Studi sulla grecit dOccidente, a cura di L.
Braccesi, Roma 1993, pp. 133-135. Also in Diodorus Siculus we find a non-
Thucydidaean chronology that probably derives from Ephorus of Kyme: T.
forced to leave Corinth because he killed Actaeon. Archias, fallen in love
with Actaeon, decided to steal him from the house of the father Melissus
but during this attempt a brawl broke out which caused the death of
Actaeon. Melissus, who was not able to obtain justice for his sons
murder, committed suicide after invoking Poseidons curse on the
Corinthians. A plague broke out and Archias, under the order of the
Delphic oracle, was forced to leave Corinth. This source gives too much
weight to the Delphic oracle
4
and underlines the importance that the god
had in general in the Corinthian colonisation of Syracuse. In fact
antiquity has handed down two foundation oracles.
We have notice of a common prophecy given to Archias and
Myscellus, the oikist of Croton. When they were consulting the oracle,
the god asked them whether they chose wealth or health; Archiass chose
wealth and founded Syracuse, Myscellus chose health and founded
Croton.
5
Another oracle comes from Pausanias.
6
Also Diodorus Siculus
7

describes the episode of Actaeon and Archias but he stopped at the
young mans death. Finally, the story is described in a scholium of
Apollonius
8
in which Archias is mentioned and includes the Delphic
oracle, but this source presents differences: Archias is not the main
character and there is only a general reference to the Bacchiads. Then the
author introduces a new element: the departure of Chersicrates,
Corcyras founder, involved in the same story of Archias. Finally, as in
the other text, Pheidon of Argos is mentioned, but now he is in the same
generation of Melissus and not in that of Habron, like in the Plutarchaean
text.
9

The dead boy has the name of a mythical hero of Boeotia: Actaeon,
who, having surprised Artemis naked, died torn by his dogs. The story is

Alfieri Tonini, comm. Diodoro Siculo, Biblioteca Storica, libri XIV-XVII,
Milano 1985, pp. 35 ss.
3
Plut., Mor.,772e-773b.
4
C. Dougherty, The Poetics of Colonization: From City to Text in Archaic
Greece, New York 1993, p. 179, n.1
5
Strabo VI 2,4, C 269.
6
Paus. V 7,3.
7
Diod., VIII 10.
8
Ap. Rh., IV 1212.
9
G. Ragone, Riflessioni sulla documentazione storica su Fidone di Argo, in
Argo, una democrazia diversa, a cura di C. Bearzot, F. Landucci, Milano 2006,
pp. 48-49.
Carfora Archias of Syracuse 161
told by Apollodorus, in the Library.
10
In the text Apollodorus refers of
two different versions: Actaeon, son of Autonoe and Aristaeus,
according to Acusilaus, perished because Zeus was angry at him for
wooing Semele; but "according to the more general opinion, he saw
Artemis bathing. And they say that the goddess transformed him into a
deer, and drove his fifty dogs mad, which devoured him. Almost the
same version appears in Pausanias,
11
who presents the opinion of
Stesichorus of Himera: Actaeon, while hunting, saw Artemis was
bathing. The goddess cast a deer skin round Actaeon in such a way that
his dogs would kill him, but like Stesichorus says, it is because Actaeon
wanted to take Semele as wife.
Actaeon is torn by his dogs while the Corinthian hero is rent by his
parents and by Archias. H. Jeamarie has observed that the first myth
refers to a ritual of diasparagmos and of mania attributed to a Dionysian
phase of the Greek religion.
12
This is an element that we can find also in
the Corinthian Actaeons death, establishing another similarity with the
Boeotians myth. But Actaeons kidnapping by Archias reminds us of
some traditions of archaic, aristocratic, and military Greece. Strabo, who
refers to a passage of Ephorus from Cuma,
13
describes the organization
of the Cretan agela that could be the example for the other Doric society.
The tradition of the kidnapping could correspond to a custom practised in
old Corinth. In the same way the tragic event of this kidnapping was a
pretext in Crete and in other places to see Actaeons myth in this way.
The ritual, described by Ephorus, gives us a chance to understand
that these practices had a homosexual background. The boy perhaps
between 14 and 16 is chosen by an agelaos, after his parents consent
and setting the day of the kidnapping. If the robber belongs to the same
rank or to a higher one, his parents pretend a resistance. In this case the
boy has a passive task. The fiction keeps on until the boy is dragged to
the robbers house. After two months of isolation, the boy comes back
home with military equipment, he makes a sacrifice to Zeus, and he

10
Apollod., Bibl., III 4,4
11
Paus., IX 2,3.
12
H. Jeanmaire, Dionysos: histoire du culte de Bacchus, Paris 1951, pp. 201,
266. B. Sergent, Lomosexualit dans la mythologie grecque, Paris 1984, p. 264;
J. Harrison, Themis. A Study of Social Origin of Greek Religion, New York
1962, p. 15.
13
Ephor., FGrHist., 70 F 149 = Strabo, X 4,20, C 483. See Will, Korinthiaka,
Paris 1955, p. 180 ss.; M. Broadbent, Studies in Greek Genealogy, Leiden 1968,
pp. 50-56; Sergent 1984, pp. 38-53.
declares his loyalty to his patron: he is not passive anymore, but gives his
consent. This ritual recalls rituals of initiation and the transition from
youth to adult age. The story of Actaeon, son of Melissus, rent by his
parents and his robber, a member of the Bacchiad dynasty, has elements
in common with Cretan rituals: the leitmotif of the kidnapping and of the
contrast of the parents. However the Corinthian myth does not seem
modelled directly on the Cretan ritual but on the story of Actaeon, son of
Aristaeus, linked to beekeeping. The foundation of Syracuse seems
furthermore to be linked at the guilt to its founder Archias and it also
recalls an initiatic ritual of passage to adulthood.
14

There are a lot of similarities between Boeotias Actaeon and the
Corinthian hero. They have in common, apart their name, also the tragic
end. Plutarchs description gives importance also to another element: he
reports that Habron, grandfather of Actaeon, went to Corinth to avoid the
revenge of Pheidon of Argos. Settled in the village named Melissus, he
had a son to whom he gave the name of the village. This is the father of
the Corinthian Actaeon. Boeotian Actaeons father is Aristeus, who is
linked to beekeeping. Diodorus,
15
describing the myth of Boeotian
Actaeon, tells us that Aristaeus, first taught to Man the art of
coagulation of milk, the building of the beehives and the olives
cultivation. The name Melissus is the name of the town where the
exiled Habron escaped but also the drone that reminds us of the
function of Aristaeus, the beekeeper. It is also important to linger over
the name of the father of Melissus, the exiled Habron. This name derives
from the word: habrosyne. The adjective habrs appeared in the archaic
period with a positive connotation, but it is absent in Homer, in Hesiod
and in the oldest poets like Callinus, Tyrtaeus, Archilochus and
Alcman.
16
The adjective is used by Sappho, Semonides, and Alcaeus
between the end of the seventh and the beginning of the sixth century
BCE.
17
It is possible to establish the origin of the word in this period. The
concept of Habrosyne comes from a Lydian Greek context of Minor
Asia. Habros recalls the luxury, the splendour of the gold dress, the

14
Dougherty 1993, pp. 179-184.
15
Diod. Sic., IV 80, 81-82.
16
Xenoph., fr 3 Gentili Prato; Theogn., 722; Sol. fr. 18 Gentili-Prato; Sapph.,
fr. 100 voigt; Semon., fr. 7, 57 sgg. See M. Lombardo, Habrosyne e habr nel
mondo greco arcaico in Forme di contatto e processi di trasformazione delle
societ antiche, Pisa-Roma, 1983, p. 1088, n. 41-42 and ss.
17
Sapph., fr. 100 ; fr. 58,25; fr. 44,7; fr. 128; fr. 140 Voigt; Semon., fr. 7, 57
sgg. ; Alc., fr. 42,8 Voigt.
refinement of the ointment, and reminds us of objects like the Lydian
mitre or of the use of garlands and perfumes. There are characteristics
typical of Asiatic nobles. The series of Lydian products reminds us of a
substantial transformation of the social-economic situation compared, for
example, to the luxury of Homeric basileis. In the later period there is the
condemnation of habr. The adjective does not show in the positive way
the refinement and splendour typical of the oriental world but it becomes
synonymous with weakness and immoderate luxury. This contrast of
values corresponds to the Ionic rebellion and the Persian wars. After the
Greek victory over the Persian empire, there were new cultural models
based on the contrast between the Greek world and the oriental one.
Habrosyne is replaced by the notion of tryph with a negative
connotation. If Habrons name derives from the adjective habrs, its
origin can be found in the archaic period, when the adjective had a
positive connotation. Therefore this element could let us place the origin
of the legend in that time.
There is also in Boeotia another legendary figure whose destiny has
elements in common with the Corinthian myth, in particular with
Melissus. This concerns Milicertes, son of Ino and Athamas. The name
of Melissus and Milicertes have the same root mel- that shows the honey
and reminds us of the function of Aristaeus. The legend of Milicertes is
reported by different sources.
18
Athamas, father of Milicertes and brother
of Sisiphus ruled in Boeotia. He provoked Hera to anger, having taken
with him the young Dionysus, illegitimate son of Zeus and Semele, Inos
sister. The goddess drove Athamas mad and he killed his son Learchus,
hunting him as a deer. Ino, wife of Athamas threw Melicertes into a
boiling cauldron, then she sprang into the deep with the dead child. And
she is called Leucothea, and Melicertes transformed into a daimon is
called Palaemon. Sisyphus instituted the Isthmian games in honor of
Melicertes. So There is a link with Corinth because the games dedicated
to Milicertes-Palaemon are those of the Isthmian region. But there is a
link with the myth of Archias because the suicide of Melissus happened
during the celebration of the Isthminian Games, in honour of Melicertes-
Palaemon. At the altar he pronounced curses against Corinthians, guilty
of having left unpunished his son Actaeons death. Melissus died like
Melicertes; they threw him into an abyss during the games to honour the
memory of Milicertes. They have in common the ritual of katapontimos

18
Schol. Od., V 334; Apollod., Bibl., III 27-29; III 4,3. Sergent 1984, p. 269 and
pp.146-150.
that happens in their death. The katapontismos has a positive
connotation: Melissus and Milicertes, thrown from a cliff, established the
application of the social rules. Melissus, as is evident in Plutarchs
passage that descirbes the tragic end, was thrown into an abyss situated
under Poseidons temple. According to Will, this abyss corresponds to
the underground adyon of the Palaimonion, the temple where Melicertes-
Palaemons grave was, the temple sacred to Poseidon. In conclusion,
Will said that the death of Melissus on Palaimonion was perhaps a
cathartic ritual that opened the Isthmian Games remembering death of
Melicertes to whom these games were dedicated. There were these
ceremonies also when Poseidon became the main God. Palaimonions
rituals had to be considered as the protymata of ceremonies in honour of
Poseidon. Just as Melicertes, so Melissus was foreign and died in the
same way. The story of Melissus and his son Actaeon could be a variant
of Melicertes and his cousin Actaeons myth.
19
The two myths mix
together and the Corinthian variant will be the background on which
Archias story will be based.
Another important element recurs in the legend of the foundation of
Syracuse: Plutarch says that Archias will be killed in Sicily by his lover
Telephos uJpo; tou' Thlevfou dolofonei'tai, oJ;" ejgegovnei me;n aujtou'
paidika;. The name of Telephos reminds us the mythical hero, son of
Herakles who, according to the tradition, led the Greeks at Troy.
20
The
myth says that Telephos was breast-fed by a doe like that of Artemis
21

and became dumb because, after having killed his uncle in a hunt, was
sent to Mysia under the order of an oracle. Here, he obtained
purification.
22
We have, in this tradition, the same relation between
homicide, expulsion ordered by the oracle, and purification like in the
myth of Archias, and Heraklides himself.
Archias myth was perhaps not all unknown by the poetry of
Eumelus of Corinth, who organised the prehistory and the Corinthian
myth history. We know from Pausanias
23
that Eumelus belonged to the
Bacchiads dynasty, as did Archias and his friend Chersicrates. This
gives us an important chronological annotation. The Bacchiads had the
power in Corinth until the seventh century BCE, when Cypselus ruled.

19
Will 1955, p. 172 ss. See Broadbent 1968, pp. 48 ss.
20
Procl., Chrest., 80 Seve.; Schol. Hom. A 59. Cfr. A. Bernabe, Poetae Melici
Greci, pars I, Stuttgart, Lipsia 1987.
21
Apollod., Bibl., II 7,4; III 9,1; Diod. Sic., IV 33,11; Paus., VIII 48,7
22
Hyg., Fab., 244.
23
Paus. II 1,1= Eumel., T 1 B.
Eumelus may also be the author of several epic poems: the Titanomachy,
based on the divine prehistory of Corinths dynasty, a work close to
Hesiods Theogony; the Korinthiak, the Corinthian history from Ephyra,
Ocean and Tetis daughter and the first inhabitant of the region; the
Europia a Novsto" tw'n JEllhvnwn and the Bougonia. According to West,
it is an epic Corinthian cycle in which every work is dated around the
seventh century BCE. To him is attributed the composition of a
prosodian that the Messenians dedicated to Apollo when Phintas was the
king, in the generation before the first Messenian war in the eighth
century BCE. According to Pausanias, this would be the unique original
work of Eumelus. To fill the chronological differences with the other
works, West recommends lowering the date to the second Messenian war
and not to the first one. According to this chronology, Clemens
Alexandrinus
24
says that |u.`, :. |,..-., v,.cu.,, ..
.v..`j-..c. A,.c . u,c-ucc, -.cc... The task is related
to a previous notice that gives us a relative chronology between
Simonides, Archilochus and Callinus; v,.cu.,, .. shows that
Eumelus was the oldest of the three poets but contemporaneous to
Archias.
If we go back to the foundation myth, it is important to specify that
the consonance with Boeotias mythology must not surprise us because
of the links of Corinth with Euboea and Boeotia.
25
In particular, Eumelus
had to know the Theban myths very well, because he was Europias
author.
26

Another element of closeness with Boeotia is given by the fact that a
member of the Bacchiad dynasty, Philolaus Of Corinth was active in
Thebes as a legislator. He was the main character of a legislative reform
in which the number of the kleroi, even if they were different for size,
was equal to the number of citizens.
27
According to this interpretation,
given by Aristotle, this measure did not concern only the present, but was
also for the future, for keeping constant the number of lands of the
patrons. In another passage,
28
Aristotle talks about Pheidon of Corinth. It
is impossible to have a date or a precise context, but it underlines that
Pheidon was one of the oldest legislators of the town, and all this

24
Clem. Alex., Strom., I 131,8= Eumel., T 2 B.
25
A. Debiasi, Lepica perduta: Eumelo, il Ciclo, lOccidente, in Hesperia 20.
Studi sulla Grecit dOccidente, a cura di L. Braccasi, Roma 2004 p. 38.
26
Eum., T 4 e fr. 11B.
27
Arist., Pol., 1274 a.
28
Arist., Pol., 1310 b.
reminds us of an archaic epoch previous to the tyranny of Cypselus.
According to Will,
29
Pheidons legislation was a conservative action. In
fact, the division of lands for inherited succession brought about a
breaking of the property and so too the loss of influence of the
aristocratic rank composed of rich landowners. It was necessary to
control the births to obtain this kind of result.
Will links Pheidons legislation with that of Philolaus, applied in
Thebes even if he was born in Corinth. The purpose of both was to avoid
the breaking of the kleroi. The first did this through the prohibition of the
division of lands, the second through controlling births. The legislation
of Philolaus is transfered to Thebes in Pheidons law and a defensive
action of the landowners. Even if it was mentioned above that the
Titonmachy could be near Hesiods Theogony, it is important now to say
that modern criticism recognizes in the Europia, as in the Korinthiak,
the influence of Hesiod. There are a lot of elements in common between
the two poets, as was evident even to the ancients. In fact Clemens
Alexandrinus perhaps referring to the edition in prose of the Korinthiak,
says ta; de; JHsiovdou met hvllaxan eij" pezo;n lo;gon kai; wJ" ijvdia
ejxhvnegkan Eujvmhlov" te kai; jAkousivlao" oiJ iJstoriogravfoi. The
work of Eumelus would be the result of the presentation in prose of
Hesiods poetry.
Hesiod did not ignore the story of Actaeon and Artemis as it results
from some fragments (346W) in which the name Aktaion appears.
30

Perhaps it is not rash to suppose that Hesiods version is previous to
Eumelus and, because of this, archaic. The first version of the myth,
perhaps linked to Hesiod, could have been taken by the Corinthian
Eumelos who created a Bacchiad version. If Eumelos was responsible
of the adaption of the myth of Actaeon, we have to ask why Pausanias,
who knows its works, does not refer to this Corinthian myth. In his work
he records the myth of Aktaion devoured by his dogs and, speaking
about the colonization of Syracuse, makes its foundation from Archias.
We may suppose that Pausanias did not know the whole poem of
Eumelos but only the syngraph.
The story of the foundation of Syracuse and of its oikist, the
Corinthian Archias, has been formulated in myth by the ancient tradition.
If we read it in these narratives, it seems to belong to the sphere of the

29
Will 1957, pp. 317-318. See P. De Fidio, Corinto e lOccidente tra VIII e VI
sec. a.C., in AMG, XXXIV (1994), pp. 83-85; Salmon 1986, pp. 63-65.
30
Fr. 346 W; see fr. 112-113 in Esiodo, Opere, a cura di Aristide Colonna,
Torino 1977. Cfr. p. 18.
myth without a historical connotation. The foundation is thought to be a
consequence of the guilt of Archias toward Actaeon and could be a
classic example of several mythic versions created around the foundation
of colonies. Also, the emphasis on the task of the founder could be the
reflexion of the late epoch in which there was the need to give an
important origin to the colonial foundation also through the valorisation
and the exaltation of the founder hero. Some recent studies
31
have tried to
devalue this kind of tradition linked to the Greek colonies of the west
that could be situated in the later period in relation to the colonial
foundation with a clear, ideological element that could not have an
objective historical value. But I am talking in particular about the
strength of some traditions linked to a founder that could be late
inventions, identities created for ideological or propaganda purposes. The
goal of this work is revising this setting. The example of Archias in
Syracuse is in this case very emblematic because he is a mythic character
but remembered also by an archaic tradition linked to Archilochus. A
fragment of Archilochus, handed down by The Deipnosophistes of
Athenaeus
32
mentions the wicked Aithiops, member of the colonial
expedition that went with Archias towards Sicily and would have given
his lands received in the new colony instead of a honey bun. The text
says these words, without doubts kai; ou|to" met jArcivou plevwn eij"
Sikelivan oJvt! evjmellen ktivzein Surakouvsa"... this, going to Sicily
with Archias when he had to found Syracuse. The foundation of the
colony is pertinent to Archias, who, in the seventh century, is considered
the guide of the expedition.
The fragment of Archilochus is the oldest one linked to Syracuses
foundation and shows that Archias was already known in the first half of
the seventh century BCE. The fact that the tradition is archaic means it is
necessarily a myth even if it has had an extension into the following
period and leads us to revalue the historical reliability. It gives us some
elements that are surely archaic, as the name of the founder, already
known from Archilochus in the seventh century BCE.

31
R. Osborne, Early Greek Colonization? The nature of Greek settlement in the
West in Archaic Greece: New Approaches and New Evidence, ed. by N. Fisher,
H. van Wees, London 1998, pp. 251-269; I. Malkin, Exploring the validity of
the concept of foundation: a Visit to Megara Hyblaia, in Oikistes. Studies in
Constitutions, Colonies and Military Power in the Ancient World. Offered in
Honor of A.J. Graham, ed. by V.B. Gorman, E.W. Robinson, Brill, Leiden,
Boston, Kln 2002, pp.195-223.
32
Archiloc., fr. 293 West= Athen., Deipn., I 167 d.

THE MYTH OF THE METROPOLISCOLONISATION,
COSMOPOLITANISM, AND ITS CONSEQUENCES

Kristoffer Momrak, University of Bergen, Norway
kmomrak@gmail.com

Introduction

The consequences of Western Mediterranean colonisation in the
Archaic period for the development of the Greek polis, in the 8
th
to the 6
th

century is a topic relevant for students both of ancient history and
cultural developments in colonial situations. The consequences of
colonisation for the colonised should not be overlooked, but this paper
will focus on changes among the colonisers themselves, as a result of the
establishment of new settlements abroad. The study of the early polis is
bedevilled by uncertainties, not least because most sources are
comparatively late, such as Herodotos, Thukydides and Aristotle. The
impression gleaned from these indirect sources is inevitably influenced
by the poleis contemporary with these writers. With few exceptions, like
Homer and Archilochos, there are no early references to Greek
colonisation. The earliest Greek settlements abroad are attested
exclusively from archaeology. However, the available written evidence
for colonial foundations will be used to investigate the dynamics of early
Greek colonisation in the West, and to test some current theories on how
Greek settlements abroad were established.

The early polis and Greek settlements abroad

The Greeks established apoikiai, lit. away from home, and
emporia, or trading posts, from the 8
th
century BCE all around the
Mediterranean. How were they established? Were they state-led
expeditions, private enterprises or both? A.J. Graham warned against
simplifying colonial scenarios, pointing out that the foundation stories of
founders banished from their mother-cities often contrast with the
historically good relations between the colony and its mother-city
(Graham 1964, 7). There seems to have been a fleeting distinction
between different forms of colonial settlements. John Wilson argues that
the difference between emporion and polis was blurred in the Archaic
period (Wilson 1997, 206). Emporia sometimes evolved into poleis.
Thus, the differences between emporion and apoikia, or between mother-
city and colony, are not easy to establish for the early period of the polis,
the 8
th
century onwards. These settlements will be discussed as
settlements of a polis type, i.e. citizen-states and city-states.
Most Greek colonies claimed to have been founded at one moment in
time as the result of an expedition from a mother-city, a metropolis,
under the leadership of a named individual, the archegetes, expedition
leader, also called the oikist, founder. The archegetes acted as a rule on
instructions from Apollo through his oracle at Delphi. These stories are
called ktisis traditions, or foundation legends. Are the foundation legends
true? Was the colony established in a single, rationally planned act?
Several scholars believe so. Irad Malkin claims that the oikist was
responsible for organising the political and religious space of the
territory. This was in part done through the establishment of cults
(Malkin 1987, 183-186). Similarly, A.M. Snodgrass maintains that
agricultural land in the earliest colonies was provided for the colonists in
a single act (Snodgrass 2004, 9). This does not mean, however, that the
colony consisted of colonists from only one mother-city, or only of
Greeks. Snodgrass accepts that the Western colonies were a
cosmopolitan environment, from the archaeological prominence of
Phoenician artefacts and settlements at Sardinia and southern Spain
(Snodgrass 2004, 2).
The colony was supposed to share the same cults to the gods as the
mother-city, the metropolis. Franois de Polignac draws attention to the
fact that the establishment of cults was part of the Greeks taking
possession of foreign territory. These cults were established quite
Momrak Metropolis 171
rapidly, within the space of a single generation (Polignac 1995, 98-100).
The origins of a colony were important for diplomatic relations and
sympathies in conflicts between poleis. Colonies also had cults dedicated
to founding heroes, and these heroes were remembered in foundation
legends. The descendants of the oikist were of course interested in the
maintenance of such foundation legends to strengthen their own claims
of local pre-eminence.
The ktisis-traditions have recently been put into doubt by some
scholars. Robin Osborne argues that the foundation legends do not fit the
archaeological sources: The earliest colonies were established in stages,
not all at once, as can be seen from the existence not of one overall grid
plan for a colony like Megara Hyblaia, but several separate grids. This
makes it doubtful that there was a single rational act behind the
establishment of a colony (Osborne 1998, 252-256). The literary
evidence for colonisation from the 8th century, the Homeric epics,
indicates that settlements were improvised affairs by roving seafarers as
well as more organised colonisation (Osborne 1998, 256-260). Instead of
state-led expeditions, settlement in the West was a product of a world in
which many were constantly moving across the seas (Osborne 1998,
268). The impression gained from the Homeric epics is corroborated by a
citation from Archilochos regarding the colonisation of Thasos where he
states that "the misery of All-Greeks has rushed to Thasos" (Archil. 102
[tr. Gerber]). The pull of a new place to settle precedes the push of an
existing community.
Recent colonial studies focus on terms like hybridisation to describe
the culture of new settlements. Peter van Dommelen argues that the
archaeology of the Western Mediterranean reveals a complex situation
of mutual influencing, and creative subversion of culture in the
relationship between colonisers and natives (van Dommelen 1997, 319).
Criticism has been raised at theories of acculturation that divides settler
culture and indigenous culture into separate, impermeable spheres, and
positions technologically advanced societies over primitive ones (Lyons
& Papadopoulos 2002, 7). This contrasts sharply with the tradition from
T.J. Dunbabin and his book The Western Greeks (1948), with his
emphasis on the close cultural and political ties between mother-city and
colony, after a model reminiscent of British colonialism (De Angelis
1998, 545-546).
The study of the Western colonies is important for any discussion
about the origins of the polis and urbanism in Greece. The earliest
colonies in the West where founded before several of the poleis in
Greece were urbanised. Early colonies should be discussed as part of the
history of the development of the polis; they may have played a role in
shaping the Greek polis as a kind of community where the citizens equal
the constitution, living in an urban environment with central political and
religious institutions; the polis as citizen-state and city-state.
The literature on Greek colonies is vast, and as the above short
synopsis of recent scholarship shows, there are several vexed questions.
How were the first colonists organised? Was there a gradual
establishment of settlements, or were the colonies established as poleis at
once? Did the colonists maintain contact with the society they had left?
The use of the very term colony is difficult. The connection between
metropolis and colony was much weaker in Archaic Greece than that
between early modern colonies and their home countries. Colonies were
not established mainly to exploit foreign resources in the name of a
national state the colonists wished ultimately to return to. The Greek
colonies were supposed to became the new permanent homes of the
colonists. Moses Finley argues that the Greek colonies should be labelled
settlements, not colonies, since they were poleis in their own right
(Finley 1976, 174). But, as has been argued above, this distinction is not
very relevant for the early polis
Greeks were not alone in their settlement of the Mediterranean. The
Phoenicians also established settlements abroad. The Greeks and
Phoenicians have been regarded as enemies and competitors in the
Mediterranean, but this view is now discarded by most scholars. John
Boardman states that the symbiosis of the two peoples is more
remarkable than their competition (Boardman 2001, 37-38). Trade
resulted in Greek contact with other peoples in the colonial environment,
and led to cultural borrowings and innovation in Greece (Burkert 1995,
14-25). Whereas Greeks of the Dark Age lived on rather isolated
farmsteads and in small hamlets, the Phoenician city states of the Levant
thrived throughout the Early Iron Age, into the Greek Archaic period and
beyond. It is during the intensification of Greek and Phoenician relations
in the Mediterranean that the Greek polis emerges as a distinct form of
political organisation, from the 8
th
to the 6
th
century.

The polis, politics and urbanism

The development of the Greek polis in the 8
th
to the 6
th
centuries
coincides with an active period of colonial establishments. How did the
Greeks come to prefer to settle in centralized poleis rather than
continuing to live in hamlets? Population pressure alone cannot explain
the development of city-states in Greece: centralization and urbanization
would not solve the problem of land hunger. What are the origins of the
polis?
There are difficulties defining the polis. From an archaeological
point of view, monumental buildings give a clue to the development of
urban features. Urban features, however, are not necessarily the hallmark
of a polis. The classic example is Sparta, which, according to
Thukydides, would not have been recognized as a mighty polis from its
material remains (Thuc. 1. 10). Not all poleis had impressive buildings or
elaborate fortifications, but they were still poleis in the sense of political
communities. Alkaios claims that warlike men are a citys tower (Alc.
112. 10 [tr. Campbell]). The community of citizens could be seen as the
defining feature of the polis. On the other hand, the simile of the warriors
and the tower would not be possible without the actual existence of
fortifications.
The earliest written sources to the Greek polis, the epics,
describe cities with towers and walls. They also refer to colonies,
something which demonstrates that the earliest poleis and colonies were
contemporary. In the Odyssey, Homer describes the society of the
Phaiakians. They were forced to migrate by the oppression of their
neighbours, the Cyclopes. Their king, Nausithoos, let his people move to
faraway Scheria, where he erected walls, let houses be built, established
temples to the gods and divided the land into lots (cf. Hom. Od. 6. 4-10).
The foundation of their society resembles that of a colony. When
Odysseus arrived, the Phaiakians were ruled by the king, or basileus
Alkinoos, who ruled in concert with twelve other basileis (Hom. Od. 8.
390-391). There is an agora on the harbour, where foreigners are
received by the community leaders, who are seated on seats of stone. The
rest of the community also participates at their meetings (Hom. Od. 8.4-
8). Public games are held there (Hom. Od. 8. 109-110). There is mention
both of council and assembly among the Phaiakians. In several respects,
the society of the Phaiakians resembles a polis. They are an antithesis to
the uncivilised Cyclopes, who know neither law nor political institutions
(Hom. Od. 9. 112). The polis is defined both through its buildings and
through its political institutions.
The polis as a kind of political community precedes the polis as a
monumental city. Settlements grew into cities in part for political
reasons, because of the need for administration and centralized
institutions that were housed in central structures in the polis. Greek
poleis soon constructed planned agoras and communal temples. James
Whitley points out that towns, after all, were the centres of poleis, and
the polis was a centre of power (Whitley 2001, 179).
The organisation and monumentalisation of the agora is an indication
of the urbanised polis. The earliest known planned agora is that of
Megara Hyblaia on Sicily, from the 8
th
century BCE. The agora was both
a place for assembly and a marketplace. The dual function of the market
place is also found in most Near Eastern cities, where the city gates
served as market place and place for civic business, such as meetings of
assemblies and councils. This is a common feature of city-states, and not
restricted to Greece.
The polis is the physical extension of the political unity of the
inhabitants of city and countryside. It is also a kind of political ideology,
where the citizens equal the constitution. The polis in its fully developed
form has the combination of an urban centre with a central sanctuary,
written laws, and civic institutions involving the participation of all or
some of the citizens. It usually had a restricted rural hinterland. These
traits are common for several city-states in antiquity, such as the
Phoenician city-states of the Levant. A common feature between Archaic
Greece and the Near East of the 8
th
century is a concern for justice for the
common man., against judges who tread on the weak and destitute at the
agora or in the city-gates, i.e. in the institutions for adjudication in the
city-state. The kings or basileis in Hesiods Works and Days are judges,
and are criticised for taking bribes and passing verdicts that benefit the
mighty. Zeus is the protector of justice, Dike, and he will punish the
unjust (Hes. Op. 201-280). This reveals a concern for justice and the
proper working of central institutions in the 8
th
century, and is an
indication of the problems of the nascent polis. The same concerns are
found in the Iliad (Hom. Il. 17. 384-389). They are paralleled by the
Biblical prophet Amos (Am. 5. 7 and 12-15). In all three instances,
warning is given about divine punishment against such transgressions.
There have been several discussions of the typological
relationship between city-state cultures, the most recent being the
investigations of the Copenhagen Polis Centre under the leadership of
Mogens Herman Hansen (Hansen 2000). No agreement has been reached
on the question whether there are any real similarities between Greek and
Phoenician city-states. James Whitley rejects any parallelism between
Greece and the Levant, because the Phoenician city-states were
monarchies, whereas the Greek poleis were citizen-states (Whitley 2001,
166). But there are indications that the rulers of Phoenician city-states
shared power with the council and the assembly (Sommer 2000, 246-
249). Their trading settlements abroad can hardly be described as
monarchies, because of their small size. Conversely, Greek colonies,
such as Kyrene, were ruled by basileis. The sharp divide between the
Greek and Phoenician city-states seems overstated, and their structural
and historical proximity should be kept in mind in discussing the early
polis and Greek colonisation.

Trade and migration

The world of the 8
th
century Mediterranean may be glimpsed through
the mythological elaborations of the Homeric epics. Odysseus does not
only encounter Sirens and Cyclopes, he also meets Phoenician traders
and Phaiakian colonists. Odysseus lived in a world where people
traversed the seas in search of new land and new resources, people to
barter with and slaves for agriculture and production. The Greek polis
was formed in a time of busy activity between the established political
centres of the Aegean and beyond. In this period, also, several new
settlements were established. The Mediterranean Iron Age was a time
when peripheral areas, such as the Levant, Greece, and Italy grew in
power and importance compared to the Bronze Age, when Mesopotamia
was the main centre of developments. It may seem like the pendulum had
swung from the Orient to the Occident. The beginning of this rise in
importance for the West was the colonisation period in Greece, which is
also characterised by Orientalising art and the spread of the alphabet
throughout Greece and Italy. The Greeks were not alone on their
journeys. Phoenicians, Syrians, and Etruscans were also active;
Phoenician traders especially have left their testimony in Greek literature
as well as archaeology.
The Greeks were present quite early in the Levant, at Al Mina and
further inland in Syria. There has been much debate on the nature of
these settlements. They are dated to the 10
th
century BCE, nearly two
centuries before the end of the Dark Age in Greece. However, they prove
only that the connection between Greece and the Near East was never
severed completely. Few would now argue that Greeks in the Near East
at this early stage were any more than mercenaries or traders, and
certainly not that they were colonists in autonomous polities. Jane C.
Waldbaum points out that the Greeks made no lasting impression on the
culture of their neighbours at this point (Waldbaum 1997, 12). However,
these international Greeks may have served an important function as
bringers of foreign impulses to Greece. They were probably both elite
people and more humble persons, seeking profit and adventures abroad.
The Greeks were also present in Anatolia from before the end of the
Dark Age. There have been Greeks resident in Ionia since the Late
Bronze Age. Mycenaean finds at Miletos point to their settlement there,
as does the mention of Ahhijawa, or Achaians, in Hittite sources
(Mountjoy 1998, 47-51). The Ancient Greeks themselves were
convinced that the Dorian, Ionian and Aeolic cities along the coast of
Western Anatolia were the result of waves of invasions in the Early Iron
Age, the so-called migrations of the Greek tribes. What have been
called waves of migration are now considered to have been more
prolonged and piecemeal processes involving migration of smaller
groups rather than entire populations. The historicity of the migrations
has been cast into doubt. Recently Jonathan Hall has pointed out that the
tradition of the Dorian migration is more of a charter for alliances in 5th
century Greece than a useful key to understand linguistic and material
changes in Dark Age Greece (Hall 2007, 43-49). It may seem like the
Greek migration myths are more of an attempt to explain the distribution
of Greek dialects than real memories of ancient migrations. Not least, the
ancestry of the Greek cities in Anatolia became important during the
Persian Wars, when these cities were under attack from the Lydians and
Persians, and appealed for help from their own kin. The myths of the
tribes and their political functions should be kept in mind when
considering the truthfulness of the ktisis-traditions of colonial
foundations and the development of the Greek polis.

Colonisation in North Africa

Colonisation, the establishment of new, permanent Greek settlements
beyond the Aegean, started in the West. The first Greek colony was
Pithekoussai on the island Ischia in the Bay of Naples. It was established
by Euboians in the 8
th
century BCE. After some time, Pithekoussai lost
importance to the coastal settlements. These colonies traded with
Etruscans, Phoenicians and Carthaginians. Unfortunately, there are no
details about how these early colonies in the West were founded. After
Homer, Herodotos is our oldest Greek source to the establishment of
settlements abroad. The most detailed account of a colony is that of
Kyrene, in Libya, which is told by Herodotos. This colony was later than
the 8
th
century colonies of Italy and Sicily, ca. 630 BCE, but the
background for its establishment probably resembles the earlier colonies.
The foundation stories from Sicily will be discussed below. Herodotos is
a very interesting source, because he relates several stories according to
different sources, some of which are in conflict with each other. The
stories also include obvious folk tale motives.
The story of Kyrene began in Sparta. Theras, warden to the
adolescent kings of Sparta, planned to leave Lakedaimon to establish a
colony. He was of Kadmeian descent, and decided to depart for Thera,
where his Phoenician kin lived already. Theras gathered colonists who
faced execution in Lakedaimon and founded settlements in friendship
and cooperation with the inhabitants of Thera. According to Herodotos,
the island got its name Thera from Theras (Hdt. 4. 147-148).
The narrative of Herodotos continues with a new story, where a
descendant of Thera goes to Delphi and is unexpectedly given
instructions to form a colony in Libya. Since he did not know the
whereabouts of Libya, and was of old age, the oracle was forgotten (Hdt.
4. 150). Thera suffered severe drought for seven years, and someone
remembered the oracle. With the help of a Phoenician resident at Crete,
the Therans learned of Libya and the offshore island of Platea. They
found the island and left their guide behind. While waiting for the
Therans to return, the marooned Phoenician received help from Samians
who had been driven off their course. They told of their adventures in
Tartessos, near the southern tip of the Iberian Peninsula, where they had
traded for silver at a vast profit. Meanwhile, on Thera, the citizens drew
lots between brothers to fill the roster of colonists, and they departed for
Libya led by Battos (Hdt.4.151-153).
The stories of the Therans and Kyreneans agreed up to this point,
according to Herodotos, but the Kyreneans had a completely different
story about Battos, saying that he descended from a Cretan woman who
had narrowly escaped death at the hands of her wicked father. She gave
birth to Battos on Thera. Battos stuttered, and went to Delphi to get
advice for his speech impediment. At Delphi, he was unexpectedly given
instructions to found a colony in Libya. He refused, calamity followed,
and the Therans demanded that he fulfilled the oracle. After an abortive
attempt, the colonists wanted to return to Thera, but the Therans greeted
them with arrows. They therefore departed again and established
themselves at Platea, off Libya (Hdt. 4. 154-156). The settlement on the
island was not to the Apollos liking, and the colonists established a new
colony on the mainland, with assistance from the local Libyans. The
initial good relations soured when more colonists arrived, and they
waged war on the Libyans. Inner strife also threatened the colony, and a
new settlement was established at Barke (Hdt. 4. 157-161).
The conflicting stories of the origins of the colony are quite telling.
They are similar in their outline, but diverge in their details. Battos is an
important person in all versions, but the account of his background
varies, as well as whether it was he who received the oracle of Apollo or
not. What do these stories tell about the origin of Greek colonies? The
oracle of Delphi plays an important role. Emphasis is put on the negative
effects of non-compliance with the oracle. Some elements, such as the
drought on Thera and the division of brothers are telling of the problems
with land hunger and inheritance in Greece, which may have motivated
colonisation. However, the colonists do not leave home because of such
problems; Apollo had already told the Therans to found a colony. The
role of the oikist is emphasised, he is the main character behind the
colonial venture. It should be pointed out that the descendants of Battos
ruled Kyrene as kings. Irad Malkin argues that Battos was a historical
figure that was honoured with a hero cult at Kyrene, something which is
corroborated by several inscriptions (Malkin 1987, 204-212). However,
the Kyrenean tradition of Battos contains obvious folk-tale motives, such
as his wicked grandfather, or his mysterious speech impediment, and
indicates that whatever historical memory was preserved about the
colonial foundations was soon transformed into myth.
The stories in Herodotos emphasise the links between Lakedaimon,
Crete, Thera and Kyrene, to establish the Dorian background for the
colonists. This shows the need for a metropolis, a place of origin for
Greeks abroad. The initial settlement of Thera by Theras and the
Lakedaimonian refugees demonstrates the often amicable relations
between colonists and locals, as does the assistance of the Libyans at
Kyrene. Of note are the Samians who had been to Tartessos and the role
of the Phoenician from Crete. It shows how information was passed by
word of mouth among seafarers. It also reveals a different side to the
establishment of Greek colonies, not as settlements founded by an
archegetes on the order of Apollo, but as heterogeneous settlements of
emigrants, traders and local people. The stories served as a charter for a
predominantly Dorian polis founded from Thera. At Kyrene the
purported Theran decree for the founding of the colony was inscribed in
stone in the 4
th
century (SEG 9. 3, 20. 714). This further corroborates the
tradition of a state-led expedition, but it should again be pointed out that
the emphasis on Battos from Thera as the founder was a tradition that
strengthened the claim to power of the local dynasty.

Colonisation on Sicily

The oldest Greek colonies are found on Sicily and in Italy, the
Magna Graeca. Thukydides gives much information on the founding of
the colonies on Sicily as a description of the political and demographic
situation on the island. His account is rather terse, and is probably a
condensed version of various myths. Where Herodotos relates different
and conflicting versions, Thukydides attempts to give a concise account,
with relative dates for the founding of the different settlements.
Thukydides dates may be based on the counting of generations, but the
sources to his account of the earliest colonies are unknown. He is
unlikely to possess accurate knowledge about the foundation of the
Sicilian colonies he discusses. They were founded in the 8
th
century,
about three hundred years before his time, and his sources must have
been largely stories, similar to those Herodotos used in his account of
Kyrene discussed above.
Thukydides gives information on who established the Greek colonies
on Sicily, and whence the colonists came. The colonists encountered
indigenous island inhabitants, as well as Phoenicians and Etruscans. The
Greeks were looking for land for agriculture, which is abundant on
Sicily. There is, however, no direct correlation between demographic
growth in the mother city of the colonists and the establishment of
colonies abroad. There was no explosion in population growth in the 8
th

century, at least not in Attica, which is one of the best-documented areas
for the Archaic period (Osborne 1996, 80). Therefore, land hunger
cannot be the only explanation for colonisation. Trade, adventure and
political struggles at home were also factors prompting ventures abroad.
According to the account of Thukydides, the early colonies on Sicily
have a founder and a mother-city, such as Naxos, founded by the
Chalkidians of Euboia led by Thukles, or Syracuse, founded by Archias
of Corinth. There was also secondary colonisation, when the colonists
moved on to a new place from their original colony, such as Leontinoi. A
colony might choose to have a new founder as replacement of the
original one, such as Katane, founded by Thukles, but regarding
Euarchos as their founder. There were colonies seeking to establish an
additional colony which sent for an oikist from their mother-city, like
Selinus, founded by Megara Hyblaia, led by Pamillos of Megara. A
colony might have several oikists, organised as a joint venture, such as
Gela. Some colonies were more disorganised, such as Zankle, founded
by pirates from the Chalkidian city of Kyme. Later, when Zankle
prospered, it was decided that its founders should be Perieres and
Krataimenes, one from Kyme and one from Chalkis (Thuc. 6. 4).
Colonies often had inhabitants from several cities, such as Himera.
Refugees from one colony might join another. Some colonies changed
their founder in face of political changes. Kamarina changed its founders
from the original Laskon and Menekolos, to Hippokrates of Gela, as part
of a ransom for prisoners of war. When the city was later sacked, it was
founded again by the Gelans (Thuc. 6. 5). The Egestans exhorted the
Athenians to come to their aid against Syracuse, lest they rather join their
fellow Dorian Peloponnesians against the Ionian Athenians (Thuc. 6. 6).
As can be seen, Thukydides is at pains to include the various
foundation stories into a coherent history of the Greek settlement of
Sicily. The variety of foundations on Sicily shows that not all colonies
were established like a ready polis from a metropolis, however. In the
following, it will be argued that the foundation of colonies was part of
the development of the polis, and not a diffusion of the polis type of
settlement abroad. The purpose of the foundation stories will be
investigated, with a view to the diplomatic aspects of tribal affiliations in
the Greek world of the 5th century BCE.

The myth of the Metropolis

It is not exactly known how the earliest colonies were established.
The dynamics of colonial foundations remain conjecture. However, the
impression gained from Thukydides is that colonial ventures were
organised by poleis in Greece, which sent out expeditions led by
appointed leaders. These leaders were later commemorated, even
venerated, as heroes. Robin Osborne argues that the establishments of
colonies in the 8
th
century were not state-led expeditions, since none of
the establishments seem to have been planned to a higher degree than
feasible by the community of colonists themselves, on the spot (Osborne
1998, 260-261). This view implies that the colonies were not planned
very much in advance, but was the result of travels for trade and booty,
and expeditions of landless farmers looking for a place to start again.
Thus, there was no metropolis, and no archegetes or oikist. The stories
about the foundation of colonies were myths. Why were these myths
created and maintained? As will be seen, there may have been several
reasons for the tenacity of ktisis-traditions.
The claim that foundation stories are myths may seem refuted by the
fact that Archilochos mentions a follower of Archias, founder of
Syracuse, who set out from Corinth (cf. Thuc. 6. 3). The mention of
Archias by Archilochos as leader of the expedition to Syracuse is
preserved in Athenaeus, as an example of intemperance: one of the
colonists who went with Archias supposedly bartered his allotment of
land for a honey cake (Ath. 4. 167d-e).
The colony Syracuse was founded ca. 734 BCE, and Archilochos
wrote approximately a hundred years later. Thus, the use of this text as
evidence for the historicity of Archias is dubious. Rather, foundation
stories may be understood as being deliberately created and preserved to
legitimate the power of local leading families in the colonies. The
descendants of the founder would emphasise the role of the archegetes
over other factors contributing to the establishment of colonies, such as
migration, trade and interaction with local inhabitants. As Carol
Dougherty demonstrates, stories about Greek colonisation follow a
narrative scheme, focusing on typical characters such as the murderer in
need of absolution, with specific roles in the plot that are repeated from
the story of one colony to another (Dougherty 1993, 38). This should
make us wary of their purported truthfulness.
Herodotos and Thukydides present Greek colonisation as planned
operations led by an appointed archegetes, the leader of the colonial
expedition. He was later honoured as oikist, as the hero of the colony.
The citizens who joined the colonial venture were appointed, elected or
joined as volunteers, and the mother-city sent them out to establish a new
city. The new city was supposed to have the same laws and cults as the
mother-city, and honour its precedence. There are foundation myths and
dates for several Greek colonies, some may be found in Thukydides or
Herodotos, others are known in later compilations, like in the Chronikon
of Eusebios. At closer inspection, the foundation myths seem to fill a
political function rather than being a true account of the foundation of the
city. Not only did the stories of the founding fathers serve their
descendants; the cult of the hero provided a civic focus and was utilised
in the establishment of space in the new territory. But the very
connection to a metropolis also had consequences for foreign affairs and
diplomacy. During the Peloponnesian War (431-404 BCE), it became
crucial whether a city was Ionian or Dorian, and to whom the colonies
belonged. The Athenians, who were Ionians, fought against the
Peloponnesians, who were Dorians, for supremacy in Greece. Alliances
were forged with reference to ancient ancestral ties and tribal affiliations.
Marshall Sahlins points out that 5
th
century Athens and Sparta used
the myths of the Ionians and Dorians to emphasise the differences
between themselves: the Athenians were autochthonous, sprung from the
soil of Attica, whereas the Dorians were immigrants from the north. The
hero of the Athenians was Theseus; the Dorians venerated Herakles.
Both poleis used myths to construct their own history (Sahlins 2004, 82-
95). The active use of myths is also evident in Greek colonies. Evidence
in Thukydides shows the importance of the tribal affiliation of a colony.
The fiction was not always politically interesting, and colonies might
replace their oikist and found the city again. Amphipolis decided to
replace their former Ionian oikist Hagnon with the Dorian Brasidas
(Thuc. 5.11).
During the Peloponnesian War, the ideal relationship between the
metropolis and its colony was formulated. This is found in Thukydides'
account of the fight between Corinth and Kerkyra for Epidamnos in the
5th century BCE. Epidamnos was founded in the 7
th
century, and its
origins became politically and strategically important during the tensions
leading up to the Peloponnesian war. Epidamnos lies on the way to Italy
and Sicily, whence both the Peloponnesians and the Athenians might get
support. According to Thukydides, it was founded as a colony by the
Kerkyreans, led by Falios. Kerkyra, in its turn, had been founded by the
Corinthians, and the oikist of Epidamnos, Falios, was sent for from
Corinth (Thuc. 1.24). The Kerkyreans argued that a colony honoured its
mother-city as long as it was treated well. Colonists were not sent out to
be slaves, but to have the same rights as those they left behind in the
mother city (Thuc. 1.34). The Corinthians argued that they had not
established colonies to be spurned by them, but to be their leaders and to
be treated with the proper respect. They claimed that their other colonists
honoured them, and that they were particularly loved by their colonists
(Thuc. 1. 38).
Here, it is obvious that the bond between colony and metropolis was
rather loose. The colonial status of Kerkyra was used as an argument for
the annexation of Epidamnos, and it was no bad thing that this city was
strategically placed on the sea route to the West. There is no clear
definition of the legal status of the colonies, and Thukydides states that
the factions preferred war to litigation or jurisdiction by the oracle at
Delphi (Thuc. 1. 28). The distant past was used as an argument to subdue
disobedience or allay hostile feelings. This shows that the traditions of
colonies and founding heroes were not so much memories of ancient
history as political tools to evoke sympathy from allies.

The Mothers of Political Invention

The establishment of colonies was probably not as straight forward
as Thukydides wants us to believe. The image of state-led expeditions in
the Archaic period is probably modeled on settlements from later
periods, when the polis was well established in Greece. The early
colonies were not Greek communities transplanted abroad, but represent
a new form of cosmopolitan society. From excavations, it has been
demonstrated that some colonies were also inhabited by local peoples, as
well as other foreigners, like the Phoenicians in addition to the Greeks
(Boardman 1999, 165-168; Ridgway 1992, 116-118). The polis was still
in an early phase of its development in mainland Greece in the 8
th

century. If there were no proper poleis in Greece, how could they send
out colonists to establish new poleis?
The polis as a community of citizens living in a centralised
settlement with common political and religious institutions emerges in
the same time period as the early colonisation of the West. It may be
argued that the typical Greek polis was formed in the colonial period.
This is maintained by Irad Malkin, who points out that the societies on
the mainland had the chance to redefine and reorganise themselves when
they sent away parts of the population. Also, the establishment of new
settlements abroad encouraged rethinking political organisation (Malkin
1994, 2). This may in part explain the development of the polis
phenomenon. The Greeks may also have learned from their experiences
among the older city-state cultures of the Mediterranean such as the
Phoenician city-states in the Levant and their western colonies.
It is beyond doubt that the establishment of city-states in the Archaic
period in Greece did not take place in a vacuum. The Greeks were not
alone, and this is reflected in their material and intellectual culture. They
may also have had political role models in the colonisation period. It may
be objected that a city-state is the logical solution to the challenge of
political organisation, and is in no need of any specific foreign
influences. However, several traits of Greek political culture, like written
laws and writing in general, assembly courts and popular assemblies, and
monumental temples as political and ideological centre for the city, are
traits of poleis held in common with the more ancient city-state culture of
the Phoenicians. The Phoenicians colonised the Mediterranean in the
same period as the Greeks, but belonged to a city-state culture from their
mother-cities in the Levant. Their political structure was highly
developed, and was most likely preserved in their colonies.
The political institutions of the Phoenicians are known indirectly,
from the Egyptian 10
th
century story of the trader Wen-Amun and his
journey to Phoenicia, the Biblical prophet Ezekiel and Aristotle. They
had rulers, but also councils of elders and popular assemblies. It has been
argued that the Phoenicians were traders only, and did not establish
settlements for agriculture or long-term residency. Carthage is the
exception that confirms the rule. Remains of agricultural activities and
buildings have been excavated at Phoenician sites in Spain, although it
must be admitted that Phoenicians were less interested in conquering the
hinterland than were the Greeks (Moscati 2001, 50). The status of the
Phoenician colonies is undecided: Hans Georg Niemeyer points out that
they were not cities in the same sense as the colonies of the Greeks in
the West. They appear rather to constitute a different model, one which
is reminiscent of Karl Polanyis port of trade (Niemeyer 1990, 485).
As with the difference between the early polis and different types of
Greek colonies, however, the distinction between port-of-trade and other
forms of settlement seems overstated for the Western Mediterranean in
the Archaic period.
The Phoenicians lived as neighbours to the Greeks on Sicily.
Thukydides states that the Phoenicians established themselves round
about Sicily on promontories and islets in order to trade with the Sikels,
an indigenous people of Sicily. With the arrival of the Greeks, the
Phoenicians left most of these sites and established themselves in the
vicinity of the Elymians, another Sicilian people, and lived in Motya,
Soloeis and Panormos (Thuc. 6. 2). Not all Phoenicians avoided the
Greeks, however. During the Athenian preparations for the attack on
Sicily in 414 BCE, the Egestans fooled the Athenians into believing they
were rich in gold and silver, by borrowing silver and golden tableware
from neighbouring towns, Greek and Phoenician, for display (Thuc. 6.
46). This indicates friendly relations, rather than hostile competition.
Rather than using a model of competitive nations to describe the
dynamics of ancient colonial environments, Peter van Dommelen's
(1997) concept of hybridisation, the mutual changes that occur in
encounters between cultures, may be a more fruitful approach.

Conclusion

The Greek colonies in the West were cultural mingling spots and
political laboratories. The political culture of the Greeks was formed
during their colonial experiences. It did not emerge out of nothing, but as
the result of a cosmopolitan dialogue with other cultures of the
Mediterranean. The Greek myths of the metropolis as they are expressed
in Herodotos and Thukydides functioned as forms of political
legitimation for local ruling families, for making alliances, and as
anchoring points for Greeks abroad back in something they perceived as
their cities of origin. These myths overshadow the heterogeneous origins
of the Greek poleis. Colonisation as a consequence of trade, adventure,
land hunger, or political instability sent the Greeks out into the world,
and it was there the Greeks learned to become what we know today as
the Greeks of history. The Greek polis culture is a result of a
cosmopolitan culture of the Iron Age, and has no one mother, but several
mothers.

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MYTHICAL ORIGINS OF GREEK TOPONIMY IN THE
NORTHWEST IBERIAN PENINSULA
1

Domingo Plcido, Universidad Complutense, Madrid
placido@ghis.ucm.es

The northwest area of the Iberian Peninsula is the furthest from the
Mediterranean World, which means that it is that much less influenced
by the colonial world, Greek and Phoenician, in the archaic age. Hence
the presence of place-names interpreted as a Greek Toponymy sets out
specific problems, different from that raised for the Mediterranean and
meridional worlds.
2

From the perspective of classical authors, it seems that the presence
of metals in the basins of the Minius and Sil Rivers has influenced the

1
This paper is part of the project Formas de ocupacin rural en el cuadrante
noroccidental de la Pennsula Ibrica. Transicin y desarrollo entre pocas
prerromana y romana, subsidized by the Ministerio de Educacin y Ciencia,
with reference number HUM2004-04010-C02-01, and was presented in the
conference Mythology and Iconography of Colonization, held at the Villa
Vergiliana, Cumae, Italia, at 2-6 October of 2006. I thank professors Alfonso
Mele, from the Universit di Napoli, and Terry Papillon and Ann-Marie
Knoblauch, from Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, for the
invitation. Their interventions in the colloquium, together with that of other
participants, such as Yolanda Gamboa and Noemi Marin, have helped to
improve the contents.
2
Adrados 2000, and 2001.
geographic configuration of territory. Thus, Strabo, in 3.2.9, where he
collects information from Posidonius (F239 Edelstein-Kidd= 47 Jacoby)
about Artabri, in Lusitania, underlines that their soil abounds with silver,
tin and white gold, brought by the streams. Posidonius seems to have
received his knowledge as a result of contacts with the Roman armies in
the age of Brutus and, in his account, already mentions metals in relation
to the Artabri. He may refer therefore to the region south of Galicia and
north of Portugal when he describes the Artabri as farthest on the
northwest of Lusitania; he does not consider the subsequent conquests
as far as the Cantabrian coast, on the concept that Lusitania made up a
projection from what in the beginning of the expedition was considered
inhabited by those who were already labeled Lusitani. From the
southwest the name is extended as far as the borders of the campaign.
Then the knowledge of the Peninsulas far west by Roman people starts
with Decimus Brutus campaign, who, according to Velleius Paterculus
description, reached all the peoples of Hispania (penetratis omnibus
Hispaniae gentibus), empowered many men and towns and, for the sake
of extending Empire upon those hardly heard of, aditis quae uix audita
erant, deserved the cognomen Gallaeicus (Vel. Pat. 2.5.1). Velleius
language shows him to be the leader of the campaign.
Florus (1.33.12), for his part, says that Brutus went through the River
Oblivion (flumen Obliuionis) and he didnt go back, after covering the
ocean coast, until he had contemplated the sunset and the fire extinction
in the water, not without a certain fear of committing a sacrilege on the
part of his troops; the river, fearful to the soldiers, is mentioned in the
descriptive progression, after Celticos Lusitanosque et omnis Gallaeciae
populos. The tradition gathered by Florus locates, thus, all the peoples
of Gallaecia, the same as Lusitanians and Celtics, before the River
Oblivion, in this way constituted as earths border before the access to
the enigmatic world of the west. Orosius (5.5.12), however, separates the
Gallaeci from the Lusitani, as a people who came in their support, as if
the northern border of the prouincia Lusitania was already established,
because the flight is placed in ulteriore Hispania.
The geographic localization of the campaign is thus enclosed from
the start by a mythical reference to worlds edge. Also, according to
Appian (Hisp. 72.304-305), Brutus was the first Roman who went over
the River Lethe, Oblivion, in 137 BCE, after crossing Durius. Then he
advanced through Minius and fought against the Bracari, who would be
settled between Oblivion, Lethe, and Minius. Here Gallaeci are not
mentioned, surely because the presence of these ones as a people
Plcido Iberian Peninsula 193
localized in the vicinity of Durius has become diluted before the
spreading out of the name as far as the conventional spaces of the
Lucenses and the Bracarenses, as they are defined and localized in Pliny,
3.28, or in Ptolemy, 2.6. Tranoy
3
believes that the name Callaeci, in a
restricted sense, would be placed in the age of the campaign, in the
region of Cales (ItAnt 421.8: Calem), in the outlet of the river (TIR K29
VIf), a region where the combats of Brutus took place. Actually, near
Porto was found the dedicatory (CIL II 2422) of Gallaecia to a grandson
of Augustus
4
, interpreted by Tranoy
5
as a sign of Roman will to define
the ethnic and territorial entity Gallaecia, which in this way is spread out
to territories that will be credited consequently to Bracarenses and
Lucenses.
Plutarch (Quaest. Rom. 34, = Mor., 272D) says that Brutus, who
invaded Lusitania, was the first to cross the River Lethe with an army,
from which is deduced that the idea of an extensive Lusitania remains, as
far as the borders reached by Brutus. Livy (Per. 55) refers to the
conquest of Lusitania, which he spreads likewise as far as the Ocean:
Lusitaniam ... usque ad Oceanum perdomuit; as his men refused to go
beyond the River Oblivion, he himself seized the flag in order to
persuade them. What spreads up to the Ocean is indeed an unknown land
identified as Lusitania. The Periochae from Oxyrhinchus states:
Obliuionis flumen planus transiit. Strabo, in 3.3.4, when he refers to the
River Lethe, says that some identify it with Limaeas and the others with
Belion; he mentions Baenis or Minius, and thus he marks the border to
the campaign of Brutus and thus in the same way the border to the realist
perception of the territory. Strabo says that, according to Poseidonios,
Minius begins in Cantabria
6
. The pass of the borders of River Oblivion
toward Galaic territory, now identified, serves likewise as access to a
new territory characterized by the presence of precious metals, about
which there are only mythical references linked to the experiences of the
colonial world. However, Minius serves as communication to the
territories where the conquests of the republican age have occurred, a
region in parallel with that inhabitated by the Artabri. The Cantabri are
known, through Catos Origenes, 7.28.4, as a reference for the
localization of the source of River Iberus. Poseidonios establishes the

3
Tranoy 1981: 66.
4
Dopico and Rodrguez 1992: 395.
5
Tranoy 1981: 150.
6
F224 Edelstein-Kidd=49Jacoby.
link between the north of Lusitania and Cantabria across the River
Minius, identified to the Sil, between the campaigns of Brutus and those
of Cato.
Such experiences constitute the place from which Justins mention of
River Chalybe would proceed. The text of Justin is included in a longer
reference (Epit. 44.3) that contains a description of the wealth in metals
of Galicia
7
. The metals are found, then, among the factors that favour the
establishments of archaic contacts, in a field where literary tradition
establish a certain parallelism between east and west
8
. The presence of
metals, what is identified in several authors with Galicia, would be the
basis even for the extension of the name, which is defined already in the
Roman Age in the moment of the campaigns of Brutus and Caepio, at the
same age in which the reference to Greek tradition appears applied to the
region. So, Justin says that Gallaeci had a Greek origin (Gallaeci autem
Graecam sibi originem adserunt) and relates to that the River Chalybe,
where gold is found. Justin speaks about its wealth in gold and calls the
River in it Chalybus, a name used also in Black Sea. Metals are in the
root of name of Gallaecia in the age of conquest of Brutus, as is
mentioned by Posidonius, who first speaks about the geographical space.
It would be the place that Pliny attributes to Helleni, Groui, Tyde,
names of peoples identified as Greeks, Graecorum subolis omnia in
4.112. Indeed, Pliny, in this text, after the Cileni, in the direction of
south, begins the description of the conuentus Bracarum including the
peoples of Greek stock: Helleni, Groui and the castellum Tyde, which
would be placed to the northwest of the Minius, toward the coast. Also
there is the oppidum Abobrica. To the north of Minius only the names
that Pliny enumerates as being of Greek origin belong to the Conuentus
Bracarensis (Graecorum subolis omnia), beside the oppidum Abobrica
and the peoples Leuni and Seurbi, to which a firm localization is not
attributed
9
.
Ptolemy (2.6.44), mentions Todai of the Grouii, localized, in his
coordinates, far inside the conuentus Bracarensis, quite in the south of
Minius, while TIR, K29 VId, places them quite near the coast: Tyde in
Tuy, at the outlet of Minius. ItAnt 429.7 goes through from Bracara and
mentions Limia, Tude, Burbida, etc., in the direction of Luco Augusti,
where such names have been integrated in Roman Geography.

7
Camassa 1984: 173-4. Gangutia

1989: 103-109.
8
Plcido 1996: 55-63.
9
TIR K29 V/VId; Plcido 2002: 131.
Strabo mentions also Amphilochos, who died en Kallaikois, among
Galaici, in the tradition of burials of Trojan heroes. The Ambracian gulf,
where Amphilochia is found, is a place of Hellenisation through heroes
like Odysseus. Hecataeus cites Ambracia as land of Geryon. Teucer
comes through Cyprus, a Phoenician place, where the cult of Astarte is
placed. From the point of view of the material culture, objects from
Greece are found in Phoenician places, in a koine in which Cyprus has an
important place.
Strabo, 3.4.3, mentions likewise two towns, one named Hellenes and
another Amphilochoi, immediately after his reference to Teucers
expedition, all according the authority of Asclepiades of Mirlea because
this says that some of those who made the expedition with him set up
among the Calaici, en Kallaikois, and explains the name of Amphilochoi
by the fact that Anphilochos died there and his companions wandered
nomadically as far as the inland. The figure of Amphilochos appears very
often in traditions about origins of cities in Asia Minor, in a narrow
correspondence between the myth and the heroic cults that usually are
identified with burials, on several occasions with an oracular character
linked to the figure of the seer Calchas (Strabo 14.1.27; 5.16). Herodotus
(7.91) attributes to the Pamphilians an origin coming from the
companions of Amphilochos and Calchas in the return journey from the
Trojan War. Also according to Herodotus (3.91), Anphilochos founded
Poseideon, in the border between Syrians and Cilicians. The features of
the mythical personage would be adapted by Asclepiades to northwestern
regions of the Iberian Peninsula lately known by Romans, where they
found traces of the previous presence of populations, protagonists of the
western colonisations, more probably Phoenicians than Greeks.
According to one of the versions of the legendary traditions, Teucer
himself would have gone from Troy to Cyprus, a place very related to the
Phoenician travel toward the west. This is, then, a first impression about
the Greek references as forms of taking on possible evidences about
Phoenician travellers.
Justin, 44.3.3, also refers to Amphilochi as Gallaeciae... portio, in the
same context that he deals with metals. About Amphilochi, Gangutia
10

connects the mention of their presence in Hispania to the reference of
Hecataeus to Gerion, as a result of a tradition from Ambracias gulf,
whose Hellenism is linked to the same myth
11
. It looks then like an

10
THA IIA, p. 140, with n. 289.
11
Malkin 1998: 144-145.
instrument for ethnic self-definition, as Odysseus himself in other cases,
mainly among peoples that are difficult to define. From Thucydidean
narrative (3.107-114) and from the way in which he refers to those
peoples, Malkin deduces that the Attic historian contemplates the
phenomenon as one peculiar form of being lately Hellenized
12
. In the far
northwest of the Peninsula this identification would appear through the
action of Roman Hellenized expeditionary people who search for
precedents in the colonial world, in spaces identified with mythical
Hellenic travels.
Through Archaeology, thanks to the objects of the material culture,
we can claim an approach to historical phenomena that with some
certainty are behind such mythical traditions and toponymic references.
The objects of Hellenic origin that are found in different points of the
Western Mediterranean Sea would arrive at first through the Phoenicians,
whose travels and stable establishments are documented in a systematic
way at least from the 7
th
Century, but the Greeks themselves would
frequent at least sporadically the different regions starting from the
previous Century
13
. In this span of time, the role of Cyprus as a vehicle
for the traffic is very illustrative, as well as the settlements in the Syrian
coast, such as Al Mina, where the abundance of Greek objects reveals the
existence of important contacts, at least from the origins of Archaism.
They are the stages of collaborations or rivalries that define a cultural
koin, through which common ideas that affect the peoples known by the
Phoenicians at the pre-colonization age are transmitted
14
. Herodotus
(7.90) refers to Cyprus as a place of meeting for Salaminians, Athenians,
Arcadians, Phoenicians, Ethiopians...
15
. In 7.195, Herodotus himself
mentions the Aphrodision of Paphos, a religious centre of the island
related to the cult of Phoenician Astarte.
Collaboration between Phoenicians and Greeks exists in places on
the Peninsula. Strabo tells about Odysseia near Abdera, a Phoenician
colony, and his citation is seen in Poseidonios, Asclepiades, and
Artemidoros. Hellenic tradition chooses also Phoenician places as
localisation for other heroes. Strabo speaks also about information about
lotophagoi from Gadeira.
Collaboration between Phoenicians and Greeks in the colonial world
was developed in places as significant as Pithecousai, where contacts and

12
Malkin 1998: 154.
13
Perreault 1993: 81.
14
Baurain 1997: 248-269.
15
Bunnens 1979: 119.
an intensive cultural transfer take place before the Persian Wars
16
. When
the Greeks arrive in Sicily, on the other hand, Phoenician colonies were
already settled there (Thuc. 6.2.6). It is common, however, to accept an
older date for Phoenician colonization in the west generally. There they
enjoy prosperity in the 7th Century. Since that time objects of Greek
pottery begin to appear in the necropolis in the Phoenician colonies of
the Western Islands
17
. Also the Phoenician colonies in the Iberian
Peninsula were characterized by the presence of Greek pottery at least
since the 8
th
Century
18
. Results of archaeological research point out then
the way in which the ways of cultural transfer were produced.
Strabo referred to a Phoenician foundation (3.4.3) before coming to
the northwest lands, to the place called Odysseia, in Baetica, settled
above Abdera, and he quotes Poseidonios
19
, Asclepiades and
Artemidoros as sources. The city of Odsseia, placed in the south of
Iberia, is linked, according to the author to a sanctuary of Athena where
shields and breakwaters were deposited as records of Odysseus travel.
Greek tradition chooses places identified as Phoenician to localize the
spaces linked to their heroes.
The geographer joins the foundation of a place, Opsicela, to Ocelas,
Antenors fellow, who is likewise mentioned in 3.2.13, together with
other heroes, Trojans, like Aeneas, or Achaeans, like Diomedes or
Menelaus, or like Odysseus himself and the city of Odysseia, with
Athenas sanctuary, where his weapons are found, beside Heracles,
whose expedition is linked to the Phoenicians travels. Antenor appears
likewise linked to foundations in Cyrene and in Venetus, among another
places. The geographer comments that Homer knew the excellence of the
West Lands throughout the Phoenicians, which allows him to transform
them into a scenario for the heroes wanderings. In 3.4.3, Strabo
mentions that some, like Artemidoros, trust in the information about the
Lotophagi proceeding from Gadiras merchants. To Strabo it seems to be
evident that the Greek references are linked to the Phoenician presence in
the Peninsula.
The relations between Greeks and Phoenicians continued active as a
scenario for cultural transfer at least until the Persian Wars
20
. Gadir
pursued direct contact with Greeks uninterruptedly at least until the 6th

16
Domnguez 2000: 247.
17
Tusa 1995: 24.
18
Sanmart-Grego 1995: 72-73
19
F247 Edelstein-Kidd= 50 Jacoby
20
Plcido 2000: 269-270.
Century, as is shown in potteries bearing salted fish found in Greece, as in
traditions that also help to shape western images among the Greeks
21
.
Greek travels along the Mediterranean Sea, such as they appear
reflected in the most ancient mythical traditions since the Homeric
poems, are linked in the literary references themselves to Phoenician
travels, placed between traditions and the new realities that incorporate
them as a part of the symbolic memory. Greek travels are connected to
traditions of Phoenician trips. Menelaus and Odysseus travel in
Phoenician ships through Cyprus, Phoenicia, Libya. The knowledge of
west by the Greeks comes from the Phoenician experiment.
Thus it appears in Menelaus travels in Odyssey or in the references
of fictitious travels of Odysseus. The travels of Menelaus, in Odyssey
4.83-85, throughout Cyprus, Phoenicia, the Egyptians, Ethiopes,
Sidonians, Erembi, and Libya, are mentioned in Strabos commentary,
1.2.31-35, who, in order to do a realistic interpretation, alludes, among
another places, to Gadir and to the Columns. On this basis, Fear
22
links
some fragments of Odyssey to the knowledge of Far West by the Greeks in
the age of the poem, always on the idea that such knowledge was possible
because of their contacts with the Phoenicians.
The tradition of Homeric heroes is projected throughout the Hellenistic
and Roman ages, in a particular way in Strabo, worried by the
geographical historicity of the poet. However, traditions about the
connection with the Phoenician world extend also down to him. Thus, in
3.4, he refers to Abdera as a Phoenician foundation that seems to be
confirmed by the data that archaeological research is revealing
23
. Strabo
himself links this place to the Athena sanctuary in the inland highlands.
Athena is, in the epic narrative, the deity who appears as protector and
guide for Odysseus and considered as a navigator along Mediterranean
Sea. Strabo depends on Poseidonios, Artemidoros and Asclepiades of
Mirlea, on Hellenistic tradition. In these authors general references to the
nostoi would be found, and concretely to Teucer and his travels down to
Gallaecia. Also Artemidoros is the author referred by Stephan of
Byzantium in connection to Abdera of Iberia (THA IIB142a). Tradition
goes back then to the world of the nostoi, understood as a point of
reference toward the ethnic identification of the periphery populations
from the Archaic period down to the Hellenistic
24
. Athena plays a

21
Lpez Castro 1997: 95-105.
22
Fear 1992: 21-23.
23
Lpez Castro 1995: 33.
24
Malkin 1998.
traditional role in the mythical manifestations of heroes ordeals, with the
capacity to become also a patroness to Hellenized emporia cults. In many
occasions, the mythical origins preserved in long-standing traditions had
in the Hellenistic World a key moment, as a factor to assume the past in
order to shape an imaginary world, solid and prestigious. It seems that
Poseidonios must have been an important element in the creation by his
learned mentality and his wishes to retrieve the past in the presence of
the transformations that his own age experiences, between the Greek past
and the establishment of the Roman hegemony. In Hispania, Poseidonios
shows signs of knowing the regions of southwest, of colonial tradition, and
of northwest, where mythical references here said to appear and where he
emphasizes the territorial importance of River Minius, as a point for the
delimitations and for the relations to the peoples settled to the west and as a
point of reference in the metals production.
Odysseus and Menestheus appear in mining regions and Ports of
Trade. Olyssipo is situated on a tin route of the Atlantic. Occupation was
made by Brutus in 139 BCE. A tradition of travels by North Africa
appears in Colaios story, heir of Heracles and Melkart. The translation
of myth to the north is placed by Brutus. The River Oblivion is the
border line. In the Rias Bajas there are remains in Vigo, perhaps a
sanctuary, found in the works of Sea Museum. Brutus Galaicus was in
contact with peoples of the worlds edge, the names that Pliny
enumerates as being of Greek origin (Graecorum subolis omnia), between
Spain and Portugal, in Cale, Oporto. They are exotic places with
memories from orientalizing ages.
In Hispania, Odysseus and Menestheus appear localized, respectively,
in the mining regions inside the Baetica and in the harbour, as a reflection
of colonial concerns that can go to the Phoenicians, as well as the
foundation of Olysippo in the tin routes
25
. Pliny (34.156-7) and Strabo
(3.2.9), refer likewise to tin in Galicia.
The occupation and fortification by Brutus in 139 resulting in the
Phoenician reference becoming a Greek reference, which produces the
effect of defining it as Greek in Roman ages. Odysseus story as well as
Heracles and the Argonauts in their travel over the west
26
develop in soils
that already had been visited by the Phoenicians
27
. Odysseus grows firm in

25
Fabre 1981: 166
26
Plcido 1996.
27
Fabre 1981: 333
the myth as a pattern for colonial promotion toward the west and his
figure experiences a long legacy until the Hellenistic Age.
In the literary tradition the transfer is produced from Phoenician
travel along the north of Africa (Diodorus, 4.17-18) to the ordeal travel
of a young citizen performed by the traveller Coleus
28
, who reaches the
oikoumenes limits, on the footsteps of the ordeal myth by antonomasia,
Heracles western travel, who arrives also to the limits and even marks
them with columns as signs, but who follows in his turn the footsteps of
Phoenician Melkart, with whom he shares cult places. Melkarts
sanctuary can be prior to Gades foundation, defined as a free place in the
interchanges in the transitional period. The real presence of sanctuaries
devoted to deities entrusted to guarantee civilization
29
favours the
development of imaginary travels with Heracles as protagonist. In this
way, many places are used as a point of contact between colonists from
both origins, which makes the cultural transmission and the assimilation by
the Greeks of Phoenician experiences easy, which take form in the
mythical legends. The Islands of Rhodes and Cyprus, the coasts of the far
east of the Mediterranean Sea, Pithecousae, and many other colonial
centres work as such centres
30
.
Heroic myths embody the representation of exploits and dangers,
throughout which the travellers are stimulated and advised. Myths
correspond frequently to cult places devoted to heroes, but also to sexual
attraction sanctuaries, like those devoted to Aphrodite and Astarte. In the
female are concentrated the contradictions between necessity and travels
dangers
31
. The excavations in colonial necropoleis show how much the
connection to native women determined the colonies formation, which
had to cause an impact in the configuration of Greek imaginary for that
purpose. The preoccupation with the female reflects the problem of
reproduction in a travellers world. Females gain a special protagonist role
in the cults of the goddess Iuno, Aphrodite, Astarte, as revealed in the
frequent presence of images
32
. The tradition related to the colonial world
gathers the travels of other Homeric heroes, as Teucer and Anphilochos,
localized in the northwest of the Iberian Peninsula, in the space where
Greek names of Galicia mentioned by Strabo, Pliny or Ptolemy are
localized.

28
Plcido 1993: 81-89.
29
Moreno 2001: 99-117.
30
Plcido 2003: 7-18.
31
Plcido 1991: 567-577.
32
Blzquez 1992: 192.
In his description of the western coast, Mela, 3.10, quotes a Durio ad
flexum Groui, the Grovi as a people differentiated from the Celtici, who
occupied the Atlantic front, and localized where the Minius flow and the
Limia River, cui cognomen Obliuionis, whose surname is Oblivion.
The flexus is that which is shaped after the western right line to the Celtic
promontory (9). Sieberman
33
understands by this the aggregate of estuaries
known as Ras, Vigo, Pontevedra and Arosa. The course from southwest to
northwest is carried through on the basis of colonial age.
This is the space where the tradition of the river Oblivion is localized,
related to Brutus by every source. Thus, Strabo, 3.3.4, as is seen above,
mentions River Lethe, which some call Limea and other Belion; this
comes from the territories of the Vaccaei and Celtiberes; he also
mentions the river Benis that they call Minius. Strabo considers it the
biggest among the Rivers of Lusitania, which reflects the conception
derived from Brutus conquest, as an occupation of an ample territory
inside which the Galaeci are included, and this favors the use of epithet
Galaicus. Also Artabri are the furthest in Lusitania. The conception
derived from the expansion from the south is present in every case. Thus
the peoples of Greek Lineage are linked geographically to the space of
the Rivers identified to the River Oblivion. They are new and exotic
places that hold a memory of the colonial orientalizing age.
They are the imagined landscapes that everybody joins until the age
of the Roman conquest, perhaps the base of traditions loaned on theirs
contacts with exotic peoples.
The Port of Menestheus, near Turris Caepionis, from Caepio, in the
expedition of 139, constitutes the toponymy tread by Roman expeditions
towards the north. He takes Via de la Plata, Cancho Roano, the way of
penetration of orientalizing style. Before that, there is already a tradition
from Avienus, who cites Phoenician Himilco. Philhellenic Romans
assume mythical ideology, elaborated with Phoenician realities and
Greek objects.
To the furthest southwestern end of Peninsula, Strabo, 3.1.9, refers to
the port called of Menestheus, perhaps connected to possible Attic
interests, corroborated by the ancient presence of Attic pottery, where we
find the oracle of the same hero and Caepios tower. The description of
this place makes the scholars think about a Phoenician Hellenized cult.
Mela, 3.4, refers to monumentum Caepionis. The consul of 140, Q.
Seruilius Caepio returns to the war in Baeturia, invades the Vetones

33
Ad loc., Paris, Les Belles Lettres, 1988.
territory and founds camps, like Turris Caepionis, Castra Cepiana, in
Setubals estuary, and Castra Seruilia, near Casar de Cceres. The
treason of Viriatus in 139 contributes to forming the myth. His actions
are set in the beginning of the so-called Va de la Plata, between the
Rivers Tagus and Durius. Also the pacts of Caepio with the grant of
lands are placed here. In the same year 139, he undertook the expedition
towards the territory of Galaeci, after having fought against Viriatus
(Appian, Hisp., 70.300). His celebrity was characterized by his
connection to philhellenic circles
34
.
Concerning the northwest, it is a region well known by Phoenicians
and Phoenecians (Avienus, Ora maritima, 114-7), where colonists from
Carthage arrived and also from the people established about Heracles
columns. Avienus makes a reference to Himilcos travel, maybe before
480. Such considerations coincide with the evidence of a Phoenician
presence in material culture, of orientalizing style, according to the last
finds. Therefore, Avienus refers to that territory as a possible basis for a
Phoenician periplus
35
or for Himilco
36
. The references (114-45; 380-89;
404-15)
37
allude frequently to tin, a fundamental preoccupation of
Phoenician travellers. However, Greek toponymy also reveals contacts
with possible navigators, indicative of the existence of a koin
38
.
All this encourages the theory, applied normally to the spaces either
in the Mediterranean Sea or linked to the strait
39
, where the Greek myths
work themselves out through awareness of the Phoenician accounts, but
leaned back on Greek experiences, that in turn lean back likewise on
Phoenician precedents. The phenomenon corresponds thus to a complex
frame of relations in which the chronological precedence in no way
imposes its conditions. In short, Greek myth, as a privileged way of
expression, specially suitable to express the human preoccupations of
societies in the origins of Archaism
40
in the formation of the imaginary
world, assert itself as an instrument to explain Phoenician contacts
integrated in a certain way as Greek History.
Phoenician places and sanctuaries have Greek objects, which become
fundamental to Greek names by philhellenic Roman generals. Greek

34
See Salinas 1988, passim and, mainly, p. 145.
35
Alvar 1995: 21-37.
36
Salinas 1992: 469.
37
Gonzlez-Ruibal 2006: 126.
38
Gonzlez Ponce 1995.
39
Plcido 2002a: 123-136.
40
Plcido 2002b: 5-19; 2004: 19-40.
myths lie on Phoenician knowledge and Greeks contacts, but not always
on direct experience, like commodities. Greek people feature a
mythology on Phoenician knowledge that travels, like Greek ceramics
and emporoi, in Phoenician ships. Roman Philhellenic people give Greek
names to place with a Phoenician real presence and metals and confuse
memories of Greek knowledge.
In the territories of northwest Peninsula, obvious contacts are
established, from the 5th century, with the Mediterranean peoples,
throughout Gades, as a centre for the southwest settlements and for
relations between the Mediterranean Sea and the Atlantic Ocean, on the
basis of former contacts documented on Atlantic coasts since the Bronze
Age. The Phoenician sailors can have arrived in those regions from the
9th century, which is linked to the so-called Tartessian orientalizing
world, that projected itself to the image of the Oestrimnis of Avienus. On
the other hand, in the Tartessian world, Greek contacts of places like
Onuba
41
are neat, localized in the southwestern area, perhaps a starting
point for northwestern contacts. For a hypothesis has been set out that
neutral sanctuaries exist in the southwest of Galicia
42
, in the style of that
of Melkart, as can be the case of the remains found in the Museo del Mar
(Sea Museum) that is in construction in Vigo. Greek pottery appears all
over the area from Vigo, in La Lanzada Beach, and towards the south,
where a rectangular structure exists with a foreign aspect, of the 5-6
th

centuries
43
. In this way, significant also is the deposit of the Castro del
Torroso in Pontevedra that gives occasion to the beginning of the First
Iron Age in Galicia, that is, the Castrea Culture
44
. In Castromao, where
Coeliobriga is localized, between the Limia and Minius Rivers, Greek
vessels of 4th century have been found.
The Phoenician contacts with the regions of the northwest Peninsula
are always clearer. The mythical or geographical references are found in
Greek literature. Plinys and Ptolemys descriptions and the heros
references in Strabo represent the projection in the Roman age of
mythical Greek creations that alluded to that space, where Greek
presence appears secondary and subsidiary in relation to Phoenician
presence. News comes from the age of the creation of a colonial
Mediterranean koin. Information about the northwest is doubtless

41
Fernndez-Miranda 1979: 49; 1991: 87-96.
42
Gonzlez-Ruibal 2004.
43
Gonzlez-Ruibal, 2006, 132.
44
Mederos and. Ruiz 2004-2005: 351-409.
subsequent to the apogees period of colonial practice, but from then on
identifications could be started when communities were influenced by
orientalizing culture. This will supply the attribution of Hellenic features
to the Atlantic spaces, only grown firm throughout the Romans
philhellenic arrival at the expansions time from Olisipo to the River
Oblivion, which was linked to diffusion of denominations as Celtics and
Turduli, already applied beforehand to the southwest Peninsula. Thus,
they occur as mythical traditions to ambiguous remains and records
derived from the complex relations of the colonial world.

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