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 ACTA IRANICA
THE KING AND KINGSHIP IN
ACHAEMENID ART
ESSAYS ON THE CREATION OF AN ICONOGRAPHY OF EMPIRE

by
MARGARET COOL ROOT

PEETERS
ACTA IRANICA
ACTA IRANICA
EDITED BY

Ernie HAERINCK † (Ghent University) and

Bruno OVERLAET (Musées Royaux d’Art et d’Histoire, Bruxelles)

IN AEDIBUS
PEETERS
LOVANII
 ACTA IRANICA 19

THE KING AND KINGSHIP IN

ACHAEMENID ART
ESSAYS ON THE CREATION OF AN ICONOGRAPHY OF EMPIRE

by

Margaret Cool ROOT

PEETERS
LEUVEN - PARIS - BRISTOL, CT
2021
 This book was published in hardcover in 1979.

A catalogue record for this book is available from the Library of Congress.

ISBN 978-90-429-4488-6
eISBN 978-90-429-4489-3
© 2021 by Peeters, Bondgenotenlaan 153, 3000 Leuven, Belgium
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or
translated in any form, by print, photoprint, microfilm, microfiche
or any other means without written permission from the publisher
PRINTED IN BELGIUM
D/2021/0602/64
For M y Parents
Robert and Louise Cool
Preface...
List of Abbreviations. . . . . . XI
I.Introduction . . . . . . . .
II The Catalogue . . ' 43
Palace R (the Gatehouse), Pasargadae . .
Palace P (the “Residential Palace”), Pasargadae
The Behistun Relief of Darius I . . 58
The Canal Stelae of Darius I . 61
The Statue of Darius from Susa . . 68
The Tombs of Darius and his Sucwssors:Naqsh-1Rus-
tam/Persepolis . . 72
The Palace of Darius (the “Taéara”), Persepolis 76
The Apadana, Persepolis .
The Central Building (Tripylon) Persepolis . 95
The Palaces of Darius' Successors. 100
Statue Fragments from Susa . . . . 110
The “Royal Head" from Hamadan . . 114
Achaemenid Coins . . . . 116
“Official” Achaemenid Seals . 118
Religious Monuments in Egypt . . 123
Addendum: Texts Referring to Royal Achaemenid
Sculpture . . . . . . 129
III. Hierarchlcal Order The King on H i g h . . . . 131
IV. The King before Ahuramazda and the Fire Altar . 162
V. Behistun: The King Victorious . . 182
VI. The Tribute Procession .
VII. The King Appearing 1n State . . 285
VIII. Mythical Visions of Kingship and Power . 300
1X. Pax Persiana: A11 Imperial Cosmos . 309

Cited Literature . . . . . . . 312

List of Plates . . . . . . . . 335
List of Figures . 340
Index 341
 PREFACE

This monograph is an expanded and revised version of my doctoral

dissertation, which was presented to the Department of Classical and
Near Eastern Archaeology of Bryn Mawr College in 1976. Much of
the research for this dissertation was carried out with the generous
support of a fellowship from the Mrs. Giles Whiting Foundation.
Travel grants from Bryn Mawr College enabled me to tour archaeo-
logical sites and museums in Turkey and Iran, to do extensive work
at Persepolis, and later to examine important related material in
Berlin, Paris and London. This acknowledgment of Bryn Mawr’s
tangible assistance to my work cannot begin to suggest the depth of
the College’s intangible support—which has really made this book
possible. I am, furthermore, indebted to the American Council of
Learned Societies for their award of a Grant-in-Aid for Recent Reci-
pients of the Ph. D. which defrayed the costs of preparation of the
final manuscript and its illustrations.
Research conducted away from Bryn Mawr College was made
possible through the kind auspices of Dr. Firouz Bagherzadeh (Di-
rector of the Iranian Center for Archaeological Research in Iran),
Ann Britt Tilia and Giuseppe Tilia (collaborator and Director, re-
spectively, of the Persepolis restoration team of the Istituto Italiano
per il Medio ed Estremo Oriente), Pierre Arniet (Conservateur-en-Chef
des Antiquites Orientales au Louvre), Edmond Sollberger (Keeper of
the Department of Western Asiatic Antiquities of the British Museum),
and John A. Brinkman (Director of the Oriental Institute of the
University of Chicago).
It is a pleasant task to thank the friends and colleagues who must
share the credit for anything that is decent or useful in this book—
but who can take no blame at all for anything that is incorrect or
ill-conceived. First, let me say that I feel awesomely indebted to all
the many scholars whose publications are cited in the course of this
study. But more immediate and personal thanks must go to Mark
Ciccarello, Charles Dempsey, Jacques Duchesne-Guillemin, Richard
Ellis, Richard Hallock, Machteld Mellink, Arnaldo Momigliano, Carl
Nylander, Kyle Phillips, Edith Porada, Brunilde Ridgway and Lawrence
Root—who have all read and commented upon my work at one
stage or another. Their suggestions and insights have been invaluable.
X PREFACE

To Carl Nylander, friend as well as mentor, I offer special thanks

for introducing me to the Achaemenids in the first place, and then
for allowing me to graze freelyr on the green pastures of his inspiration.
And to Larry Root, my husband, I extend heartfelt thanks for his
help, his wisdom and his humor in good times and bad.
One final note: In revising my dissertation I have made an effort
to incorporate scholarship which appeared between the spring of 1976
and the spring of 1977 (when the new manuscript was completed).
But, inevitably, a few studies which had in fact been published by
that time did not become available to me until it was too late to
include them here. My apologies to those whose contributions have
thus gone unmentioned in the pages which follow.

Margaret Cool Root.

 LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS
Journals and Series

AA Archa‘blogische Anzeiger
AAA Annals of Archaeology and Anthropology
ADOG Abhandlungen der deutschen Orient-Gesellschaft
Afo Archiv fur Orient/orschung
AJA American Journal of Archaeology
AJSL American Journal of Semitic Languages and Literatures
AMI Archa'ologische Mitteilungen aus Iran
AOAT Alter Orient und alles Testament
AOS American Oriental Series
ASAE Annales du service des antiquités de I’Egypte
BagMitt Baghdader M ittet‘lungen
BAIIAA Bulletin of the Americm Institute for Iranian Art and
Archaeology
BASOR Bulletin of the American School of Oriental Research
BIFA 0 Bulletin de l'Institut francais d'archéologie orientale
RM MA Bulletin of the Metropolitan Museum of Art
BSOAS Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies
CA H Cambridge Ancient History
Cahiers de la DAFI Cahiers de la delegation archéologique francaise en Iran
C RRAI Compte rendu de la rencontre assyriologique utternationale
EW East aid West
FuF Forsehungen and Fortschritte
HSCP Harvard Studies in Classical Philology
IsMEO lstituto italiano peril Medic ed Estremo Oriente
JA Journal asiatt‘que
JA NES Journal of the Ancient Near Eastern Society of Columbia
University
JAOS Journal of the American Oriental Society
JDAI Jahrbuch des deutschen archa'ologischen lnstituts
JEA Journal of Egyptian Archaeology
JEOL Journal ex Oriente Lux
JESHO Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient
JHS Journal of Hellenic Studies
JNES Journal of Near Eastern Studies
Memoirs of The American Academy in Rome
Mitteilungen des deutschen arehtiologischen Instituts Kairo
Mitteilungen der deutschen Orient-Gesellrchafl
Mémoires de la delegation en Perse
Mémoires publie'es par les membres de l’institut fianpais
d’archéologie orientale du Caire
Monuments et mémoires publ. par l'académie des inscrip-
tions et belles lettres, Fondatian Piot
XII LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

MVAG Mitteifungen der mrderawiamchen-aegyptisohen Geeell-

schqfl
NC Numismatic Chronicle
NNM Numismlic Notes and Monographs
Oriental Institute Publications
OrSu Orientalia Suecana
PMMA Publications of the Metropolitan Museum of Art
RAssyr Revue d‘assyrl'ologz‘e
REM! Revue d’égyprologie
Srlr Studia lrml'ca
WVDOG Witsenschty'llieke Verfifl‘entlidnmg der deutwhen Orient-
Gesellschafl
24 Zeilsdmfl filr Assyriologie
21's Zeitschrift fiir dgyptische Sprache and Alt‘ertmtskmde
ZDMG Zeitschrifl der deutsdren morgenlfindischm Gesellsehafi
 I

INTRODUCTION
0» the Nature of Achaemenid Art.
“Achaemenid art” is the art of kings. It is the official art of the
Achaemenid Dynasty, which arose from the Aehaemenid clan of the
Persian people eventually to rule the Near East from 550 until the
coming of Alexander in 331 EC.1 Just as the Achaemenid Empire
was consciously created and its bureaucratic structures formalized by
the early kings of the dynasty, so the art which speaks for that empire
was, in every meaningful sense, a product of their creative effort—
brilliantly conceived and consciously evocative. It was commissioned
in the service of kingship, designed by high-level officials who were
in all probability directly responsible to the king himself; and it was
planned as an imperial programme which was intended to project, in
a variety of representational contexts, a specific set of consistently
imposed images of power and hierarchical order.
The official art of the Achaemenids thus reflects the ideals and
attitudes of the king and his most tntsted advisors—and not least
in representations involving the figure of the king himself. This is not
to say that the attitudes so reflected necessarily mirror objective his-
torical reality. But there is another realm of history which does find
reflection here even if it diverges from objective fact: this is the
realm of subjective historical self-perception. Lying somewhere on a
continuum between verism and fantasy, the image of the patron and

' It is imperative to treat as a distinct phenomenon this “Acheemenid art“—as the

Metal art'of the empire. Art which, on the other hand. was simply produced within
the sphere of the Persian political domain during the Achaemenid Period. but which
was not official art, presents special problems of definition which overlap but do not
totally coincide with those of Aehaernenid art per are. On the complexities of such
terminological distinctions, as also on other problems to be discussed in this chapter.
0.]. Brendel's work provides an indispensible theoretical framework: Prologameno to
a Book on Roman Art, MAAR, XXI (Rome: American Academy in Rome, 1953).
Other works which have influenced my approach include G. Hermeren. Representation
and Meaning in the Viwal Arts: A Study in the Methodology of [cartography and
leanology (Stockholm: Uromedelsforlaget, 1969), E. Panovsky, Metering in the Virus!
Arts (Garden City: Doubleday, 1955). and P.G. Hamberg, Smite: in Roman Imperial
Art with Special Reference to the Store Edie/s of the Second Century (Uppsala:
Almqvist & Wiksell, l945).
2 rmnooucnou

his empire which is presented in his commissio art must reflect

the image of kingship which he himself wished to be surrounded by
and to identify with, as well as the image with which he wished to
be identified by others. In the case of the Achaemenids, the artistic
reflection is of this subjective realm of historical reality”.
The Persian kings waged brutal wars, exacted heavy taxes from
reluctant subjects, and harbored fears of palace revolutions spawned
by ambitious courtiers. But, for the imperial art with which they
hoped to impress the world (and with which they themselves appar-
rently wished to identify), we shall see that the Achaemenids com-
missioned the creation of a consistently idealized vision of kingship
and empire—a vision which stressed images of piety, control, and
harmonious order.
Rulers before and after the Achaemenids have developed artistic
programmes—setting distinctive trends in art as a response to their
perceptions of the particular political/historical demands of their
reigns, and reflective of their particular aspirations and visions of
power covenants. Well documented examples (and examples which
for various reasons are of particular pertinence to our discussion)
include the art produced under the patronage of Akhenaten, Au-
gustus, Charlemagne, and the Mughal emperor Akbar’. Although
each of these cases is unique and not strictly analogous to any
other, nevertheless one may discern useful patterns of similarity by
a comparative analysis of scholarly approaches to the study of these
artistic programmes emerging from a variety of historical contexts.
Achaemenid art fits neatly into the broad conceptual framework
suggested by studies of generally acknowledged imperial programmes.

3 In this sense the official representations of the king offer a similar type of source
material as is oflered to the historian by autobiography. For theoretical analysis the
discussions of historians of autobiography are particularly helpful. See. for instance.
G. Misch. A History of Autobiography in Antiquity. trans. E.W. Dicker: (London:
Routledge and Paul. 1950); R. Pascal. Design and Truth in Autobiography (London:
Routledge and Paul. 1960); K J . Weiotraub, “Autobiography and Historical Con-
sciousness". Critical Inquiry l . 1975. 821—843. The remarks of G. Weckman are partic-
ularly appropriate here. I think: “Believing myth as myth does not mean a return to
a primal naivete. which I doubt ever existed anyway and is part of modern man‘s
misguided apprehension of the ‘primitive‘ world. We need only broaden the world
of our data. have a fuller notion of what makes up reality, and include the uniquely
human and psychic elements of life in our notion of the factual. Then the old polarities
of myth and fact. religion and science, relevation and rationality disappear". See
“Believing Myth as Myth" in Myth and tire Crisis of Historical Continuous. ed.
L.W. Gibbs and W.'l'. Stevenson (Missoula. Montana: Scholars Press. 1975), 106.
3 See below.
 m‘raonucrton 3

And in fact, within the ancient Near Eastern cultural sphere it has
the potential for being a particularly instructive case study in imperial
programming. But the representational art of the Achaemenid Dynasty
has never been analyzed as a programme, as an art with a coherent
and intentional vision behind it which may possibly be read and
interpreted‘.
The ultimate aim of this study is to show the validity of viewing
Achaemenid art as such a programme. This involves an attempt to
understand the nature of the process of creation of Achaemenid
imperial iconography, first on a theoretical level and then subsequently
on a particular level. On the theoretical level I shall demonstrate the
need to view the process of creation of this imperial art as a complex
cultural system of influences—not simply as a mechanistic “event”
of executiOn‘. This preliminary theoretical exploration is a necessary
preamble to the second level of inquiry—the particular level—because
it will show the richness of the cultural fabric we are dealing with in
the Achaemenid Period and it will show the need to see the
Achaemenids themselves as the central and commanding figures of
their own cultural history.
On the particular level, I shall present a catalogue of the known
official imperial monuments, coin types and seals which include in
their sculptural programme or figural decoration a representation of
the king or kingship. This catalogue will be followed by a series of
iconographical essays on those representational types portraying the
king and kingship in official Achaemenid art.
Finally, I shall draw together the information gleaned from the
iconographical essays in order to suggest a plausible understanding
of the total vision of kingship and empire which was intended con-
sistently to be projected through Achaemenid iconography.

‘ This is not to say that others have not seen the potential for such analysis. Note.
for instance, the suggestive comments threaded through the work of E. Parade in
The Art of Ancient Iran (New York: Crown Publishers, Inc.. I965), and C. Nylander
in Ionian in Pasargadae, Uppsala Studies in Ancient Mediterranean and Near Eastern
Civilization. l (Uppsala : Almqvist & Wiksell. 1970).
5 What Goran Hermeren calls the “artistic field" in his important theoretical study.
Influence in Art and Literature (Princeton: Princeton University Press. 1975). I am in
effect proposing what might be called a “Marxist“ approach to Achaemenid art—
following the discussion of M. Schapiro. “Sty “. in Anthropology Today. ed. S. Tax
(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1962), esp. 301 f.
4 INTRODUCI‘ION

Reflections on a Process of Creation.

The imperial iconography of Achaemenid art is closely related to

the arts of the civilizations indigenous to the Near East. To be sure,
certain technical and stylistic characteristics of Achaemenid sculpture
have been traced ultimately to Greek origins. And in the course of
this work this aspect of Achaemenid art will be discussed and evalu-
ated whenever style becomes a crucial factor in the analysis of ico-
nography. But the iconographical studies presented here will focus
on Iran in the Near Eastern context simply because this is the sphere
to which the material itself leads us.
Our attempt to understand the process of creation of Achaemenid
art forces us to examine the nature of the Achaemenid relationship
to the cultures which find reflection in Achaemenid art. We must
ask, for instance, in what ways, and to what depth of under-
standing, were the Persians exposed to the art and culture of Babylon,
Assyria, Egypt, Elam, and Urartu? When we see reflections of
these civilizations in the iconography of the Achaemenid kings, to
what extent are they the result of a gradual assimilation of ideas and
forms by the Persians before their empire was ever formed? To what
extent are they the result of random eclecticism or the whim of
foreign artisans? And to what extent do they suggest a deliberate
and informed search for images drawn out of the traditions of ancient
Near Eastern civilizations? When, furthermore, we see such foreign
and antique models transformed in Achaemenid art, to what extent
do these transformations simply reflect ignorance of the originally
intended meaning of their models? To what extent are they the
reflection of an elusive Persian cultural tradition and aesthetic allowed
(perhaps quite unconsciously) to shine through the superposition of
borrowed forms? And to what extent might these transformations
rather reflect the very deliberate adaptation of models for specific
reasons?
Within the total aspect of what I have chosen to call a process
of creation, it will be seen that the impact of foreign artisans in
formulating Achaemenid iconography was limited. On the other
hand, the impact of the king and his court was of great significance.
But even the ultimate dictates of the king and his image-makers in
programmatic planning must he understood to have issued from a
complex synthesis of tangible and intangible influences and consid-
erations. With respect to the art of the Achaemenids, reflections of
 INTRODUCTION 5

deep-seated Indo-Iranian traditions may be difficult or impossible to

isolate or to identify; but the possibility of their existence and influence
must always be borne in mind when discussing Achaemenid art.
Furthermore, cultural heritage and cultural predispositions must
certainly have had an impact in determining the Achaemenids’ re-
sponse to the contemporary and antique foreign ideas and forms
which they clearly drew upon in the creation of their imperial
programme. And historical circumstances played a major role in
determining the Persians' exposure to and interest in those ideas and
forms which served as sources for Achaemenid imperial art.
In Fig. l I have attempted to suggest visually the nature of the
system of influences involved in the process of creation of Achaemenid
an.
Let us now take a closer look at the three factors shown in Fig. 1
whose relative importance in the process of creation we are attempting
to evaluate on a theoretical level: the impact of artisans, the impact
of the patron and his selected planners, and the impact of long-term
cultural/historical influences.

The Role of the Artisan: A Reassessment.

Scholarly discussions which have formed the core of literature
dealing with the creation of Achaemenid art have emphasized the
national origin of the artisans who executed the art as the primary
factor determining its nature and essence. Viewed within the context
of the history of Achaemenid studies, this emphasis upon the supreme
importance of foreign (and especially Greek) artisans is understand-
able.
Speculation about how Achaemenid art originated began in the
nineteenth century, when the reports of travelers to Persepolis,
followed by excavations at the great Assyrian cities and finally also
at Susa, had created lively interest in the Near East. Though certafn
similarities between Achaemenid sculpture and Assyrian sculpture
were obvious, several prominent investigators (among them Marcel
Dieulafoy) saw Greek influence as the primary factor determining
the nature of Achaemenid art“. In particular, the way the ubiquitous
Persian robe is rendered in Achaemenid sculpture was recognized as

° M. Dieulafoy, L'an antique de In Peru: Achéménides. Farther, Sassam‘der (Paris:

ubrairie mntrale d'architecture, etc. 1884-1885). See Nylander, Ionims, l3-16. for a
more detailed account of the history of scholarship on Achaemenid sculpture.
 3 ._ 8= 9 U 5 3. < . .3 E
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 INTRODUCTION 7

a Greek patternization. Indeed, a certain formal similarity is easy to

see between Achaemenid and archaic Greek drapery: a vertical pleat
with edges terminating in a double zig-zag pattern resembling the
form of the Greek letter “Omega": and diagonal folds radiating out
from this vertical pleat [e.g., P15. 5 and 20.21].
The situation became polarized, as knowledge of Iran increased in
the early years of this century. Ernst Herzfeld led the Orientalists in
maintaining that Aehaemenid art was an outgrowth of purely Near
Eastern, and largely indigenous Iranian, traditions. He suggested,
furthermore, that if anything, the direction of influence between
Greece and Iran was from East to West”.
Then in 1929 a fantastic discovery made at Susa was reported to
the world. Associated with the debris of Darius' palace there, the
French team had uncovered many copies of a foundation charter
which, in Babylonian, Elamite and Old Persian cuneiform, described
the construction of the palace: how the foundations were laid,
whence construction materials were brought, and even the nation-
alities of the artists and workers involved in the specific aSpects of
the project. In part, the Old Persian text has been translated as
follows:
The silver and the ebony were brought from Egypt. The ornamentation with
which the wall was adorned that from Ionia was brought. The ivory which was
wrought here, was brought from Ethiopia and from Sind and from Arachosia.
The stem columns which were here wrought, a village by name Abiradu, in
Elam—from there were brought. The stone-cutters who wrought the stone,
those were Ionians and Sardians.
The goldsmiths who wrought the gold, those were Medes and Egyptians.
The men who wrought the wood, those were Sardians and Egyptians. The men
who wrought the baked brick, those were Babylonians. The men who adorned
the wall, those were Medes and Egyptians“.
Imagine the excitement generated by this discovery: to have an
excavated and dated text, written in the name of Darius himself,

" See. for instance, E. Herzfeld. Iran in the Ancient East (New York: Oxford Uni-'
versity Press. l94l).
' R.G. Kent. Old Persian: Grammar. Texts. Lexicon. A05. XXXIII (New Haven:
American Oriental Society, I953). 142-144 (05!). On the discovery of the text. and
on the other versions, see V. Scheil. Inscriptions o'er Achéménides a‘ Suse. MDP. XXI
(Paris: Ernst Leroux, 1929): W. Hinz. “The Elamite Version of the Record of Darius‘
Palace at Sosa", JNES 9. 1950, 1-7. For recent discussion and inclusion of new frag-
ments found at Susa see Mr]. Steve. “Inscriptions des Achemenides s Suse". St Ir 3.
1974, I35-16l; and W. Hinz, Neue Wege r'm Alrpersrlrchen, tfingeu Orientfor-
schungen. III (Wiesbaden : Otto Harrassowitz, I973).
8 m'raonucrron

telling us exactly what we wanted to know! With the publication

of the Susa foundation charter (Dsi) the stage was set for scholarly
energies to focus upon the further clarification of the impact of
these Ionian artists who (as we now knew) had “wrought the stone”
at Susa.
Looking back from the vantage point of the 1970’s, we can see
that the excitement of the discovery of the charter made it easy to
overlook its problematical aspects. For one thing, this document
follows a time-honored tradition in the ancient Near East, whereby
royal inscriptions of this type were not necessarily factual accounts
in the strictest sense of the word. Rather, they were statements of
the extent of imperial domain—statements which were merely couched
in the genre of straightforward enumeration of tasks allotted to the
subject peoples and raw materials brought from their lands”. The
Dsf text was meant to be read. It was not part of a foundation
deposit buried under the palace for the perusal only of Ahuramazda.
Quite the contrary, the excavators found fragments of my copies
of all three language versions on clay tablets, marble tablets, and on
the glazed tiles of the frieze of the great hall of the palace”. Fur-
thermore, a recently discovered Elamite copy of Dsf is preserved well
enough to determine that the marble tablet was inscribed only on
four faces. The two parallel iateral faces were left uninscribed and
were perforated by holes for a rodcus- enabling the heavy tablet
to be rotated and read easily on all inscribed surfaces ’1‘.
Another sure indication of the propagandistic nature of the Susa
text lies in the fact that it makes absolutely no mention of Persians
playing any part in the building project.
Even if the text were reliable as fact, difficulties in the reading of
the three versions make it impossible to understand the intended
significance of key words. The Ionians who worked the stone are
mentioned in conjunction with stone brought for columns. Thus we
might suppose that the text refers here to the working of stone
foundations and columns rather than to the carving of reliefs. And
since there apparently was not any stone relief decorating Darius’
palace at Susa, this interpretation would seem probable. There is
also a question about the meaning of the “ornamentation with which
’ Cf. a similar text oqdea: GA. Barton, The Royal Inscriprians 013mm and
Akita! (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1929), 2l9.
m Kent. Old Persian, "0.
" F. Vsllat, “Deux inscriptions elmnites dc Darius 1"", St Ir I. 1972. 5.
 INTRODUCTION 9

the walls were adorned" which was brought from Ionia. In the
context of the passage, this would suggest ornamentation in a
precious material. The discussion is made more complicated by the
subsequent mention of “the men who adorned the walls” being
Medes and Egyptians (who are also grouped together as goldsmiths).
Clearly the text is ambiguous—and would remain so even if readings
of all the words in the three versions could be agreed upon com-
pletely".
But in the almost half-century since the discovery of the Susa
charter, scholarship on Greek artists and their role in the creation
of Achaemenid art has paid little attention to such difficulties.
In 1946 Gisela Richter published a seminal article entitled “Greeks
in Persia"”. By this time, preliminary excavations had been carried
out at Pasargadae, and the Oriental Institute had excavated Persepolis.
Also, the chronology of Greek sculpture had been greatly refined—not
least through the work of Richter herself. Richter’s aim was to dem-
onstrate that Greek artists “created" Achaemenid art.
Turning to the sculpture, she saw renditions of eyes. hair and
drapery in Achaemenid sculpture as proof of Greek workmanship
and Greek “creation". The drapery argument has gained the most
attention from later scholars (and is the only strong point of the
three, in any event) so we shall concentrate on that here”. Within
the parameters of the “absolute" chronology for archaic Greek style
developed by Richter herself, Richter was able to show in 1946 the

1’ See commentaries to the Dsf text published in the works cited in n. 8 supra.
‘5 G.M.A. Richter, “Greeks in Persia", AJA 50, 1946, 16-30.
“ For the stylistic treatment of eye and hair there are close parallels also in neo-
Assyrian art (closer, I belieVe. and more likely to have had an impact on Achaemenid
art than Richter‘s Greek parallel). For eyes. compare Pls. 20-21 here with P1. 55b. This
same comparison will sullioe to show that the snail curl in conjunction with finely
striated lines was well Within the technical repertoire of Near Eastern sculptors. What
Richter is really discussing is coilfure similarity rather than stylistic and technical
similarity. 0n Achaemenid reliefs, the stock stylistic devices used for hair renditions
(fine grooves. snail curls placed in various ways) were used in various combinations
to achieve the effects of different ooiffures of different nationalities. It is perhaps
significant that the competition she finds most useful for her argument is between an
Achaemenid representation of a Lydian tribute bearer and a Greek representation of a
Greek (her figs. 19 and 20). Similarly with her remarks on the similarity of drapery
rendition with crinkly undergarment. The comparison is there simply because the type
of foreign garment rendered on the Achaen'lenid relief (Syrian tribute group) is some-
what similar to the garments of the seated goddess on the Siphnian Treasury frieze
(her figs. 17 and IS). That Assyrian sculptors also knew how to murder crinkly drapery
is shown by Pl. 44a here.
10 INTRODUCTION

likelihood that the canonical Achaemenid drapery rendition—as

found first at Pasargadae on the figure of Cyrus from Palace P—
was the result of Greek influence. In archaic Greece, she demon-
strated, one could trace the gradual development of drapery pattern-
ization from parallel zig-zag folds stacked in one direction to sym-
metrically paired zig-zags forming an omega-shaped hemline. The
omega hemline had been formulated in Greece by the time of the
Siphnian Treasury at Delphi (sometime before 525 B. C.). Thus it
was possible to suppose that Greek artists at Pasargadae had intro-
duced to Iran the omega pattern in its full-blown form at the very
end of Cyrus‘ reign—not long before 529.
In order to prove that Greek artists were actually responsible for
carving the Achaemenid reliefs, Richter invoked the Susa charter;
and she added another bit of evidence—this time to establish the
presence of Greek artists specifically at Persepolis. This was a shoe
of Darius which had been removed clandestinely from one of the
reliefs in his palace at Persepolis and later acquired by The Metro-
politan Museum of Art. On this shoe were engraved the idle doodlings
of an undoubtedly Greek hand—presumably of a Greek artist at the
Persian court who, in Richter‘s words, “gave vent to a sudden desire
to work in his own manner. untrammeled by the restrictions imposed
upon him". Comparing the style of one of the faces inscribed on
the shoe to the face of Antaios on a crater by Euphronios illustrated
by Richter we too can appreciate the similarity, and suppose that
sometime after about 510 or 500 our Greek artist left his mark.
We can now add to this external evidence attesting to the presence
of Greek artists or stone workers at Persepolis. A Greek inscription
on a rock face in the quarry hard by the terrace says “1tv6aprxoetpt"—or
“I belong to Pytharehos". The script suggests a date between the end
of the sixth century and the beginning of the fifth. The presence of
this “speaking inscription" in the quarry suggests that perhaps
Pytharehos was a Greek contractor or quarryman who wrote this
in order to reserve the cliff face for himself. There are a few other
simple Greek name graffiti in the quarry as well ‘5.
But there are obvious differences between Achaemenid drapery and
Greek drapery of the late sixth/early fifth centuries. The Achaemenid
type (even in the "action” context of the royal hero motif) is quiet,

" Richter. "Greeks in Persia". 28.

“ G. Carratelli, “Greek Inscriptions of the Middle East", EW 16. 1966. 31-34.
 INTRODUCTION 1l

unmoving. Its purpose is not to suggest the subtle contours of the

body beneath it. nor is it designed to express movement or to capture
forever an artistic impression of a fleeting moment’s disarray. These
qualities seem typical of Greek sculpture of this period, but‘ foreign
to the Persian idiom”. Richter explains these differences as due to
the fact that the Greek artists working in Iran were forced to work
under what she calls "new conditions". The implication being that,
produced in the shadow of barbarian tyranny, the free spirit of Greek
art gave way to the frozen forms of servitude. In her widely read
handbook on archaic Greek art, Richter has taken this idea a step
further—devoting a special section to Achaemenid art as peripheral
Greek art, “where a certain foreign element is noticeable””.
Now, there can be no question that Greek workmen (alongside
others) played a role in the construction and decoration of the palaces
at Pasargadae, Susa, and Persepolis. The great influence of Ionian
techniques at Pasargadae shortly after 546 has been clearly demon-
strated by Nylander”. And we have noted the evidence of Greeks
at Persepolis. As for Susa, although we cannot take the foundation
charter (Dsf) as a literal description of the labor force there, never-
theless, the essential message of the document is certainly accurate.
Darius did indeed command a labor force from all over his realm,
including workers from Ionia.
But does this make Achaernenid sculpture Greek? One might
suppose that if the Persian king had wanted his images carved with
the soft drapery of ionian sculpture he would have demanded and
received just that—no matter how depressed by tyranny were his
imported artists. And if we admit that Achaemenid drapery must
look “frozen” because the patron wanted it to look just that way,
then to call it Greek is to define its essence inappropriately. Never-
theless Richter’s view has been taken up by others subsequently and
carried to unwarranted extremes. J. M. Cook for instance has called
Telephanes of lonian Phocea the “grand master of the Persepolis
friezesw". If Telephanes, whom we know of only through a few lines

1" Compare Pl. 16b here with figures from the Siphnian Treasury trials: J. Char-
bonneaux, el al., Archaic Greek Arr (620-480 8.62), trans. I. Emmons and R. Allen
(New York: Geo. Braziller, 1971), figs. 202. 203, 205. 206.
" G. M.A. Richter. Archaic Greek Arr against its Historical Background (New York :
Oxford University Press. 1949).
" Nylander, Ionirms.
3° J.M. Cook. The Greeks in Ionic and the East (London: Thames and Hudson.
1962). I36 f.
12 INTRODUCTION ‘

of Pliny, was the grand master of Persepolis, then he clearly allowed

his art to be so prescribed by the court that his Greek nationality
had no real significance in determining the nature of the art he
supposedly executed“. The same criticism must be made of Heinz
Luschey‘s attribution of the Behistun relief to Theodorus of Samos”.
It is instructive in this context to imagine how specific Achaemenid
representational motifs might have looked if rendered by Greek artists
in Greek style. Compare, for instance, the motif of the Iranian riding
habit being presented to the king on the Apadana tribute procession
relief at Persepolis [PL 24], with the rendition of a similar motif on
the Nereid Monument [P]. 69]”. In the Greek relief the attitudes of
the tribute bearers are compelling in their dramatic thrust forward,
while the Achaemenid sculpture is meant to convey through strictly
metered vertical strokes a sense of timeless solemm'ty. The riding
habit shown on the Nereid Monument is loose and fluttery. By
contrast, the Achaemenid rendition is clearly designed to articulate
the fact of this specific garment, qua specific gift—and nothing more.
Another interesting comparison is the motif painted on the shield
of a Persian on the Alexander sarcophagus 3‘. The painting is clearly
visible with the aid of special photography. The motif of the enthroncd
king receiving a bowing official must have been copied from the relief
seen on the jambs of the north doors of the Throne Hall at Persepolis
[P]. 29b]. But the stylistic differences are obvious. We note the elongated
form of the official before the king (a form which conforms to fourth
century Greek proportions), and the relaxed pose of the king himself,
slouched back in his chair in a way which is antithetical to the mood
of the Persepolis reliefs. These examples illustrate how deeply unGreek
are the Achaemenid reliefs in any but superficial details.
Within the history of Achaemenid studies, Carl Nylander’s Ionian:
in Pasargadae represents a turning point. As the title suggests, this
work deals with the impact of Ionian craftsmen and stoneworking
techniques upon the earliest Achaemcnid architecture and sculpture.
To this extent it emerges from the traditional set of problems previ-
ously established as definitive. But, without even treating here the

3‘ JJ. Pollitt. The Art of Greece 1400-31 8. C. Source: and Document: (Englewood
Cliffs: Prentice-Hall, 1965), 65 (Pliny. N. H. XXXIV, 68).
'3 H. Luschey, “Studien a: den Darius-Relief Von Biafittm'f, AMI n.F. I. 1968, 88.
’3 B.M., frieze block no. 395.
3“ V. Von Graeve. Der ”undersea-hem and mine Wet-hm“. lstanbuler For-
schungen. XXVIII (Berlin: Mann. 1970), 102-109.
 INTRODUCTION l3

importance of the data and analysis which form the core of this
study, Nylander’s introductory and concluding discussions eloquently
lay a theoretical groundwork for assessing the Greek contribution
within the context of a positiveiy asserted, essentially Achaemenid
programmatic vision. This rounding of the bend frees Achaemenid
studies from its subjection to a rather mechanistic analytical frame-
work and stimulates exploration along new lines. It allows us to see,
for instance, the Greekness of the masonry style of the Pasargadae
platform—but it allows us then to go on from there to suppose that
this style was used here because that is what the Achaemenids them-
selves actively wanted, not because a group of imported stoneworkers
took it upon themselves to decide such a crucial matter.
The fundamental issue raised by the scholarship described in the
preceding pages is this: whether, within the context of Achaemenid
art, execution constituted creation; whether the national origin of the
artists who executed the art was the primary factor determining its
nature and its essence; or whether these were determined, rather,
by the design of the king and his officials.
I would suggest that the people who set chisel to stone at the Persian
court had little to do with the real creation of Achaemenid sculpture.
From administrative tablets excavated at Persepolis which span the
years 509458, we now know that foreign laborers from many lands
of the empire—not least from Egypt, with its great tradition of
stoneworking—were brought in large groups to work at that site.
Among all these people Ionians are mentioned only a few times, and
they are never singled out for any artistic contribution”. And if we
can go by the rations allotted to these foreign workers in comparison
to the rations given to other groups at the court, then we must suppose
that in general they were treated as menials, enjoying no great status 3‘.

’5 R.T. Hallock. Persepolis Fortification Tablets, 01?. XCII (Chicago: University

of Chicago Press, I969). 2. For references in PF texts to foreign artism' rations see
for instance p. 304. PP 1049. Most of the groups of foreigners receiving rations in
these texts are designated simply as “workers". Among the less frequent designations
of specific employment of ethnically identified people we note Sardian blacksmith;
(PF 873), Sardian holapzi makers [perhaps a vegetable product] (PF 1409), Babylonian
scribes writing on parchment (PF 1947). and female Ionian irrigation workers (PF 1224).
When “artisans“ and “makers of stone“ are referred to. they are not designated by
nationality. E.g., PF 1580-1584. PF 1587, 1594, l é l l , 16”. 1633.
" Even before this evidence had become known. some scholars had suggested this
situation. E.g., K. Erdmann, “Griechische and achaemeuidische Plastik (zum gegen-
wartigen Stand der Diskussion)", M 26, 1950, 150-153; and P. Amandry, “La Grece
d'Asie et I‘Anatolie (in 8‘ an 6' siécle avant Jesus-Christ", Anatolian 2, 1968. 87-102.
14 INTRODUCTION

Recent work by Carl Nylander and Michael Roaf on the masons‘

marks found on column bases and reliefs at Persepolis suggests that
a great deal of the sculpture was carved by crews on a section-by-
section basis. Many of the “artists" at the Persian court may have
had little more relation to the finished project than does a worker
in a modern assembly line". Analysis of the parts left unfinished
on Persepolis reliefs suggests even further that individual stone carvers
must frequently have been responsible only for isolated details of a
given figure—not for an entire figure, much less for an entire com-
position [Pl. 262d“. There seem to have been hair men, jeWelry men,
seabbard men and car men plying their crafts-at the Persian court and
all working from the same or similar models to insure the stylistic
homogeneity which is so striking a feature of Achaemenid art in all
media”. Under such a system, Babylonians may have carved “typi-
cally Circe ” omega hems and Greeks may have carved guardian bull
colossi”.
A good artist can, once he has mastered the specific technical
difficulties involved, work in a variety of styles, successfully sup-
pressing his own personal and cultural idiosyncrasies and assuming
the vocabulary of a different style as occasion demands. Documen-
tation of this is provided by the Petosiris tomb in Egypt. Here a
painted relief dated to the end of the fourth century B.C. depicts
Egyptians manufacturing typical Achaemenid Persia: vessels“. So
1" Nylander has summarized the results of work on the masons' marks in “Masons‘
Marks in Persepolis-wk Progress Report", Proceedings of the [Ind Annual Symparitan
on Archaeological Research in Iran (Tehran: Iran Centre for Archaeological Research.
1974), 216-222; and in a paper presented at the meeting of the Archaeological Institute
of America in December. [915.
1' All. Tilia, “A Study on the Methods of Working and Restoring Stone and on
the Parts Left Unfinished in Achaentenian Architecture and Sculpture“, EW 18. 1968,
67-95.
’9 An unpublished seulptor's model [tom Persepolis, now in the Oriental Institute
collection. is significant in this context. The stone model is of a single ear—two to three
times life-size. See M.C. Root, Ancient lrm: A Guidebook to the Iranian Collections of
the Oriental Institute. forthcoming.
3“ The use of Aramaic as a spoken lingua franca must have made it possible for
workers of different nationalities to work side by side. See D. Weisberg. Guild Structure
and Political Allegiatce in Early Achaemenid Mesopotamia, Yale Near Eastern Re-
searches, I (New Haven : Yale University Press. [967). 5-16. Nevertheless, the PF tablets
suggest that at least on the administrative lists the workers were grouped by nation-
ality—frequently large numbers of “workers" of one nationality being transported en
masse from one place to another (e.g., PF HST—recording 547 Egyptian “workers"
going to Tamukkan [from Susal).
3' M.G. Lefebure. Le rombeau tle Petosirtit (Cairo: lmprimerie de l‘institut francais.
1924). vol. III, pls. VII and at The significance of the Petosiris relief in this context
 INTRODUCTION 15

too at Persepolis, the nationality of those who executed the reliefs

may have had very little to do with their final appearance. The crucial
thing must have been the models from which the sculpture crews had
to work.
The most serious limitation of the “artisan-oriented” approach—
whereby Achaemenid art is seen as primarily determined by the
national origins of those who executed it—is that it necessarily mini-
mizes the potential value of official Achaemenid art as a subjective
historical source. For an art which is understood as, in its essence,
an eclectic product of the cultural and technical backgrounds of an
imported labor force, cannot simultaneously be understood as, in its
essence, a reflection of the calculated imperial vision of the kings
who commissioned it.
I should now like to discuss certain aspects of Achaemenid art as
imperial art—as art which was planned by the court to look the way
it looks, both in terms of style and iconography.

Conscious lning and the Role of the King.

Representations of the king and kingship in Achaemenid art are
potentially valuable sources of historical/cultural information—but
only if we can accept the idea that they reflect the imperial image
and ideas which the patron king wished to have projected. If we can
accept this theoretical base, then the art acquires historical meaning
no matter how “meaningless” it may appear in objective intrinsic
terms. Let the following be a case in point.
In 1905 Jacques de Morgan published what may stand as the
archetypal description of Achaemenid art as a haphazard pastiche of
foreign and antique elements:
L'art acheménide, si toutefois on peut qualifier d‘art le menage incoherent
qui se trouvait en faveur a la cour des successeurs de Cyrus, n’était qu‘un
composite d‘assyrien, d'égyptien, de phénicien, de gree. de lycien, de cappa-
docien, de phrygien, de tout enfin ce que les armées du Roi des rois avaient
vu dans leurs expeditions militaires. Ces divers elements furent, le plus souvent,
associés avec le plus complet mauvais gout; rarement ils se grouperent d'une
facon agreable 3‘.

has recently been suggested also by O. Muscarella in a review of Farkas, Achaemenid

Sculpture. in BASOR 223, 1976, 71.72. See H. Frankfort, “Oriental Institute Museum
Notes: A Persian Goldsmith‘s Trial Piece". JNES 9, I950, lll-I 12.
3’ J. de Morgan, “Decouverte d'une sepulture achemenide a Suse". in MDP. VIII
(Paris: Ernst Leroux. 1905), 46.
16 INTRODUCTION

1 disagree not only with de Morgan’s aesthetic evaluation of Achae-

menid art, but also with his concept of its eclectic nature. It is worth
noting, however, that even the apparently most barbarous and ill-
conceived mélange of disparate foreign elements and period styles
can itself be revealing of the culture which commissioned it. The
eclecticism of de Morgan's Susa could, then, be understood as a
statement (however simplistic and unappealing to our eyes) of the
Persian king’s domination over every culture represented by borrowed
elements. The King of Kings might well have wished to be reminded,
as he went from place to place in his city, of the palaces and colossi
of Egypt, the temples of Asia Minor, the gateways of Nineveh, the
zigurrats of Babylon. This in itself would imply an intention behind
the art which offers some small insight into the patron”.
But there is a grander, more complex, scheme behind the choice
of antique and foreign motifs used in Achaemenid art—a scheme
which promises to offer important primary source material on Achae-
menid kingship and political attitudes. Before embarking upon the
particulars of this study of representations of kingship in Achaemenid
art it behooves us to explore certain aspects of imperial art in general
as a basis for appreciating the full potentials of Achaemenid art as
an example of this genre.

The Role of the King and his Court:

Historical Analogr'es.
From the ancient Near East we have ample evidence that kings
took an active interest in the creation of the outward declarations of
their imperial pursuits—whether with respect to court ritual and
religious observance, royal decrees and documents, or artistic repre-
sentations.
Mesopotamian traditions required that the king be directly involved
with elaborate rituals in the construction of temples and palaces.

3’ An interesting example of this type of international quotation on a most literal

level is the facade of the Gothic revival Tribune Tower in Chicago (by Hood and
Howells. I925). Stones from famous monuments all over the world are incorporated
(with labels) into the masonry—obviously meant to be a statement of some sort on the
institution represented by the building. Another example is the eclectic relief over the
door of the Oriental Institute at The University or Chicago. 1.1-1. Breasted (dressed as
an Egyptian) "receives" the cultures of the Ancient Near East through the paraphrasing
of antique sculptural motifs from many cultures into one composition. It is precisely
in this combining of incongruous elements that the relief expresses its meaning.
 muonucnon 17

These rituals often entailed physical labor as well as purely symbolic

acts 3‘.
The material collected and translated by Simo Parpola relating to
the reigns of the Assyrian kings Esarhaddon and Assurbanipal alone
gives an intimate view of the concern of the Assyrian rulers with the
activities of the scholars in their employ at the court”. We see that
Assurbanipal, for instance, took intense personal interest in the accu-
mulation of the great library of Nineveh. In one letter, he tells his
archivists which types of texts he wishes to acquire 3".
In the composition of the Assyrian royal annals the distinctive
literary styles current during different reigns suggest the involvement
and impact of the individual kings. As Leo Oppenheim has noted.
One thus gains the impression that these inscriptions were written for the king
himself. 'l'heseribesandpoetsatcourtcreatedl‘orhimhisown imageashero
and pious king; they show him in these texts as he wanted to see himself”.
This observation could be applied with equal validity to the king‘s
relationship with the court artists who executed his images in stone.
They too must have shown him as he wanted to see himself. Among
the correspondence of the Assyrian kings which has come down to
us, there are letters written between the king and his court artists.
These letters clearly document the great interest taken by the king
in official artistic representations—and especially (though not exclu-
sively) in representations of himself. Note this letter from the reign
of Sargon:

"‘ 0n royal labor see KS. Ellis, Emulation Deposits in Ancient Mesopotamia.
Yale Near Eastern Researches, II (New Haven: Yale University Press, l968), 20-33.
3’ S. Parpola. Letters from Assyrian Scholars to the Kings Esahaddan and Amr-
banipal. Pt. I : Texts. AOAT, Vfl (Neukirchen-Vluyn: 311m «in Berclter Keveher,
1970). e. g. # l7, 19. 39.
3‘ A.L. Oppenheim. Ancient Mesopotamia (Chicago: University of Chicago Pleas,
1964). 244 and n. 22.
3" lhid.. I49. As this goes to press. 5. M. Paley’s new work on Assumasirpal reaches
my desk: King of the World: Arkar-nast‘r-pai H of Assyrio 883-859 B.C. (Brooklyn:
The Brooklyn Museum. I976). I regret that I am unable to incorporate information
from this book into my own study; but i am delighted to see that Paley has a similar
view of the significance of the royal personality in the planning of imperial art.
I should also note here that R. D. Bamett‘s definitive work on the sculptures of Assur-
banipal was not available to me. See now. his Sculptures from the North Palace of
Arhurbmipal or Nineveh (668-627 EC.) (London: British Museum Publicatim Ltd.,
1976).
18 INTRODUCTION

TO THE KING
...just now...images(?) unto...we have caused to bring. an image of the king
in outline l have drawn. An image of the king of another sort(?) they have
prepared. May the king see (them) and whatever is pleasing before the king,
we shall make instead(?). May the king give attention to the hands. the
elbows(?). REV.(?) and the drapery(?). Regarding the image of the king which
they are making, there is a staff fastened in front of its side. lts hands rest upon
its knees. Since they are not favorable, I am not doing the work. Whenever I
speak to them regarding the form. (or) regarding anything whatever. they will
not hearken...”
From Egypt, we have the interesting example of Akhenaten—who
was apparently directly involved in the formulation of the distinctive
iconography and style which typifies the art of Amarna. It has been
suggested that certain stylistic trends which are traditionally asso-
ciated with Amarna art were already evidenced during the reign of
Akhenaten’s predecessor, and may thus have been part of a more
evolutionary (rather than purely revolutionary) development”. Nev-
ertheless, under Akhenaten the style and the peculiar iconography of
Amarna art were developed into a unique synthesis which shows the
effects of a consistently applied principle of programmatic planning
from above“. We have the testimony of Akhenaten‘s own chief
sculptor, Bak, as to the close supervision he received from the
pharaoh in matters of official art. In a graffito at Aswan Bak says
that he was taught by the king. And on a personal stele he describes
himself as the apprentice of the king“.

" L. Waterman, Royal Correspondence of the Assyrian Empire (Ann Arbor: Uni-
versity of Michigan Press. 1930). 1]. 233. #1051. Note also a letter to the Assyrian
king from a court scribe: “...As regards the tiara [about which the king]. our lord.
wrote to me, the beads which were shown to us are very beautiful...As regards what
the king. our lord, wrote to us: ‘1 have saved obsidian‘, if ‘eyes’ are lacking, beads
should be made of it. (and) [if] a santuppu (ornament) is lacking. a santuppu-gem
should be made of it. If it is extra. they may leave it (unused)". Parpola. Letters. §58.
And an inscription of Sargon: “...Day and night I planned how to build that city
[khorsabad]..." D. D. Luckenbill. Ancient Records of Assyria and Babylomh. 11 (Chicago:
University of Chicago Press. 1927). 63. #117.
’9 E.g.. C. F. Nims. “The Transition from the Traditional to the New Style of
Wall Relief under Amenhotep lV". J N E S 32, 1973, 181-187.
‘° W. S. Smith. The Arr and Architecture of Ancient Egypt (Harmondsworth: Penguin
Books. I958). 113—185.
“ W.W. Hallo and W. K. Simpson, The Ancient Near Earl: A History, ed.
J.M. Blunt (New York: Harcourt. Brace. Jovanovieh. 1971). 272; and C. Aldred.
Akbenaren (London : Thames and Hudson. 1968). pl. 79.
 INTRODUCTION 19

From Dynasty 5 we have the revealing evidence of the tomb in-

scription of the chief architect of king Dedhere—Isesi. The architect
quotes verbatim two letters from the king (one written by the king
in his own hand). These letters concern plans for construction of an
artificial lake. The king studied the plans carefully himself and then
approved them ‘2. Other inscriptions of royal architects at the Egyptian
court also record the direct involvement of the king in the construction
and decoration of imperial monuments—at least to the extent of
passing ultimate judgment upon plans made by the chief of works ‘3.
The inspection of pharaonic projects was apparently a major activity
of the court. And we may assume that if on such tours of inspection
the ruler was displeased, he let his feelings be known.
A 13th Dynasty stele of king Neferhotep I clearly documents the
role of this pharaoh in the planning stage of a religious monument.
Neferhotep mentions that he himself went to the archives to consult
the records of the Temple of Osiris in order to get information on
the proper way to render a cult image of the god“. This is especially
significant for our purposes, as it clearly suggests the plausibility of
considering the deliberate search for information on antique models
for a new representation as a possible means of transmission of ideas
at the Achaemenid court as well“.
Other historical analogies which may help us to appreciate various
aspects of the potential role of the Achaemenid king in the planning
of his official art include the art of Augustus, the art produced under
the patronage of Charlemagne, and the Mughal art produced in the
workshop of the Indian emperor Akbar. Each of these rulers was
very conscious of the importance of developing an art which would
represent his new empire. Augustus was no artist himself, but the
consul Agrippa seems to have functioned as his image-maker and as
the planner of his artistic programme. Similarly, Gains Maecenas was
charged with the task of formulating a literary programme“. In

‘3 J. H. Breasted, Ancient Records of Egypt (Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

1906). L # 268-273.
‘3 5.3., lbid.. #244.
“ Hallo and Simpson. History. 249; Breasted, Ancient Records. 1. #753465.
‘5 See also E. Posner. Archives in the Ancient World (Cambridge: Harvard University
Press. l972), esp. 64 f.
“ D. E. Strong, Roman Imperial Scuipmre (London : Alec Tiranti. 196]), 14 and 2| f.
See also. R. Brilliant. Gesture mid Rank in Roman Art. Memoirs of the Connecticut
Academy of Arts and Sciences, XIV (New Haven: Connecticut Academy of Arts and
Sciences. I963). with bibliography.
20 INTRODUCTION

Augustan art the message is everywhere the same: it is a glorification

of Rome and Augustus, of peace, prosperity, and old-fashioned piety,
emphasizing republican virtues but paradoxically and deliberately
bespealting the power and vision of an emperor who cloaked his
absolute authority in the trappings of constitutionality. Both in style
and in content Augustan art is art in the service of power in a specific
historical situation. The language of Augustan art is one of calculated
and subtle allusion. Power lies in the implicit rather than the explicit".
It will be seen at a later point that the similarities between the method
of portraying power in Augustan and in Achaemenid art are quite
remarkable. In this sense, the study of Augustan art affords perhaps
the best historical analogy for appreciating aspects of the nature of
Achaemenid art.
Other imperial programmes are of interest here for different rea-
sons. The art produced at the court of Aachen under the patronage
of Charlemagne is worth mention for what it can tell us about the
process of creation of a particular programme for which we have a
good deal more documentation than we have for Achaemenid art“.
Charlemagne’s art programme was directed by Einhard; and Alcuin
was in charge of the planning of the literary programme. In his life
of Charlemagne, Einhard remarks upon the king’s personal involve-
ment in the planning of the art programme. The primary purpose
of Carolingian art was didactic, to teach Christianity in a very literal
way. Artists from far away were brought to the workshops at Aachen
in order that Einhard could direct the formulation of a coherent
artistic conception in keeping with the specific concerns of his patron.
Einhard collected antique models, consciously and methodically ex-
ploiting them as material for his new art. This process has been
demonstrated convincingly by Roger Hinks in his work on the devel-
opment of Carolingian art. The art of Charlemagne cannot help us
to understand the nature of Achaemenid art in the same direct way
that Augustan art can. But on the other hand, an appreciation of
the consciousness of the process of its creation and its use of antique
models for specific reasons can tell us a great deal about the issues

‘" ForrelevantrematltsontheAugustanaseandoutheuaeofaflaspromanda
see M. Rostovtaet'l‘. Rome, trans. J.D. Duil'flmdm: Oxford University M1960),
186492.
" R. Rinks. Carolbtgt'ar Art (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, I962).
 INTRODUCTION 21

to be sensitive to in our forthcoming iconographical analysis of

Achaemenid art.
I mention one additional historical analogy which is of special
interest for the study of Achaemenid art. This is the art produced
under the patronage of the Mughal emperor Akbar in the 16th cen-
tury A. D. Like Achaemenid art, the Mughal style seemed to have
appeared full-blown, without a- developmental stage. For this reason,
the obvious Iranian elements in Mughal style led many scholars to
assume that Mughal art was essentially “import ” from Iran. And
yet, the Mughal style is, in the words of Pramod Chandra, “really
quite different [from Iranian art], possessing an originality, a vitality,
and an inner coherence and unity that could not be explained by
Iranian sources alone”‘9. Similarly, Achaemenid art is often described
as having been born fully mature; and (as we have discussed) its
obvious relation to the art of other cultures has been explained as
being the result of the impact of an imported group of artisans.
The discovery of over 200. miniatures which form part of an illu-
minated manuscript of the Tuti—nama has provided a new idea of
the formation of Mughal style. Chandra has demonstrated that
these miniatures document the step-by—step process by which artists
originally trained in other styles were re-educated in a new style—the
Mughal style. The conception of the style was formulated from
above, and imposed upon the artists who executed the minia-
tures. A guiding influence in the new style was Akbar’s desire to
emphasize Indian traditions in the creation of a new synthesis. As
Chandra notes,
The association of [the Persian artists] Mir Sayyid Ali and Khwaja Abd al-Samad
with the project accounts, no doubt, for the Persian elements in the style, but
the startling individuality of the new school can only be explained by the
patron‘s desire to look to the land over which he ruled for inspiration. From
what we can gather of Akbar’s personality and tastes, the nature of his rule,
and the details of his personal artistic and literary preferences recorded in
contemporary historical literature, a rarefied foreign and imitative art of the
type produced for Humayun would just not do. Rather painting. like archi-
tecture and the other arts, would have to sink its roots into the Indian soil
and allow itself to be transformed by Indian artistic traditions. In this context

"' P. Chandra and D. Ehnbom. The Cleveland Turf-name Manuscript and the
Origins of Mughal Painting. Catalogue of the Exhibition (Chicago: The David and
Alfred Smart Gallery, The University of Chicago. I976), l l . For fuller treatment see
P. Chandra, The Turf-name of the Cleveland Maserati of Art and the Origins of Mugltal
Painting (Graz: Akademisehe Druelt- and Verlagsanstatt, 1976).
22 INTRODUCTION

the carefully chosen words of Abd al-Fazl. the court chronicler. and himself a
learned man and gifted connoisseur. gain a new significance. Describing the
work of Abd al-Samad, he refers to the “transmuting glance of the king" as
having raised that artist to a more sublime level. giving his images a greater
depth of spirit. Here we have a clear indication of the part played by Akbar
in the evolution of the new style. We also know from the same as well as
other sources that Akbar was himself trained in painting, and this must have
put him in rather effective command of the royal atelier. He is known to have
personally recognized the talent of at least one artist, Dasavanta, who was
recruited to the royal atelier at his insistence and trained by Khwaja Abd
al-Samad. and we also know that he regularly inspected the work of his
artists. distributing rewards and increases in salaries on the basis of perfor-
mance. This kind of supervision must have further influenced the atelier to
develop a style that conformed to its imperial patron’s vision”.
Chandra’s study of the development of Mughal art gives us a clear
picture of how the idiosyncrasies and native traditions of a particular
artist can be subordinated successfully to the demands of a new style
created at a court for specific reasons having to do with the patron’s
dynastic self~conoeption. Scholarship on Mughal art thus provides a
valuable model for the formulation of certain aspects of an approach
to Achaemenid art as an imperial programme.
It is unfortunate that, compared with the kings we have been
discussing, the Achaemenid rulers have left us scant records upon
which to base any study of how their art was planned. But we may
assume that at the Persian court the Achaemenids had assembled
planners who were brought from various parts of the empire to
realize the visions of their patrons. The Persepolis Treasury and Forti-
fication tablets have yielded names and titles of many high-level offi-
cials at the Persian court—some of whose duties may have included
advising the king on matters of artistic programming. Unfortunately
Iranian titulary is not well understood 5‘.
An important bit of evidence does come from Egypt, however.
The Egyptian admiral Udjahorresne has left us a lengthy biographical
inscription in which he describes himself as having functioned as an
advisor in matters of public image-making first to Cambyses and later
to Darius 5’. Interestingly, Udjahorresne‘s work was not confined to
Egypt. His inscription mentions that he was called back to Egypt
from Elam at one point.
5" Chandra and Ehnbom. Cleveland Tart-name. 12 f. _
5‘ W. Hint. “Achirnenidische Hofverwsltung", ZAsryr 6], 1971. 260-311.
5’ G. Posener. La premiere domination parse en Egypte. Bibliotheque d'etude. XI
(Cairo: lmprimerie de l‘institut franeais d‘archeologie orientale. I936), 7-26.
 mraooucrton 23

In this context, it is significant to note that the Persepolis Forti-

fication tablets. being in part records of travel rations issued to court
personages, show how great was the mobility during the Achaetnenid
Period”. in addition to the steady and expected flow of messengers
carrying letters and documents to and from the king, there was also
a surprisingly heavy traffic of high officials moving on court business
and a great deal of traveling done even by the king and his family.
It would be misleading to think of the Persian court as anything but
a very worldly sphere where a great deal of cultural cross-fertilization
was constantly taking place.
Artists and workers also traveled 5“. An Aramaic letter of the
Persian satrap of Egypt, ‘Arsam, records correspondence concerning
his Egyptian sculptor, Hinzani. 'Arsam, who seems not to have been
in Egypt or Susa at the time, commissioned Hinzani (who had been
brought to Susa together with his household) to make a copy of
a sculpture he had once made for 'Ariam. The new sculpture once
finished was then to be brought to ’Arsam immediately”. We are
entirely justified in imagining sculptors such as this Hinzani being
brought to the court from various lands to confer with the king
on the planning of large imperial commissions. Speaking in Aramaic,
the lingua fianca of the age, such international committees could have
carried out their planning work and reported their designs to their
patron 5‘.

Conscious Selection.

In studies of imperial programmes one frequently finds that the

planners have made a very systematic attempt to seek out specific
types of models for adaptation in the new art for specific political/

"‘ 5.3.. Hallock. Fortification Tablets. PF [318. I383. l397 (recording trips from
Susa to India and India to Susal—esp. PF 1397 : “Karabba the Indian set forth from
the King (to) lndia...He carried a sealed document of the King": PF 1404 (Sardis to
Persepolis): PF 1332 (Susa to Kerman).
5‘ Note records in the Fortification tablets of large groups of foreign workers (some
perhaps being artisans) transported from one city to another: PF l547 (30 Egyptian
“workers" from Susa to Matezzis): PF 1557 (547 Egyptian "workers" from Susa to
Tamukkan): PF lS'IS (26 Skudrian “workers" [from (?}] to Elam); PF 1577 (108 Cappe-
docian "workers" [from (1’)] to Elam).
’5 G. R. Driver. Aramaic Documents of the Frfih Century B.C.. abridged and rev. ed.
(Oxford : Clarendon Press. I957). letter no. I X . 32 and 71-74.
’° 0n the mechanics of how planners might have conveyed their conceptions to the
king, note the architects‘ drawings on fragmentary clay tablets from Susa: G.G. Came-
ron, History afEarIy lran(Cl1ieago: University of Chicago Press. l936). l23.
24 INTRODUCTION

cultural reasons involving the imperial visions of the patron. It is

certainly valid to suggest the possibility of Achaemenid art having
been dependent upon the same consciousness of purpose. Indeed, it
will be possible to demonstrate in the course of this study that
Achaemenid art was planned deliberately to create a certain impres-
sion; that it was not “misunderstanding" or the decadence of a
declining civilization giving way to eclecticism which led to the re-
working of prototypes; and that a great deal was done with a degree
of deliberateness seldom credited by modern man to his ancient
counterpart”.
The forcefulness of the discussions which will be presented in the
chapters to come is clearly dependent, however, upon the plausibility
of the Achaemenids’ ability consciously to select and adapt specific
motifs (especially foreign and antique ones) for specific reasons. It is
therefore appropriate here briefly to discuss aspects of the availability
of antique and foreign models in the ancient Near East generally and
in the Achaemenid Period specifically. Following this discussion we
shall survey the historical/cultural situation of the Achaemenids—in
part to establish the plausibility of conscious planning and selection
from the point of view of contextual probability 5".
Artistic motifs can be passed along from one period to another
and from one culture to another in a variety of ways. In the ancient
Near East one way in which motifs survived to be available for later
generations was simply a result of the fact that the buildings and
monuments of a city did not necessarily disappear from sight immedi-
ately after that city had been conquered, or simultaneously with the end
of an historical/political era. (This is a truism which bears mentioning
nonetheless). This aspect of survival is obvious in Egypt, where the
great monuments of past imperial glory remained visible throughout
history and where the painted tomb chapels of court officials re
mained open to visitors. It was common practice in Egypt for one
pharaoh to copy the reliefs of a famous predecessor for use on his
own monuments 5’.

5" On consciousness as an agency of change in ancient society. note the remarks

of R. McC. Adams, “Anthropological Perspectives on Ancient Trade". [XIII International
Congress of Anthropological and Ethnalagica! Sciences. August-September. I973. 5.
" Cf. Hermeren. Influence. esp. chapter 2 (“Conditions for Influence“). for an
interesting framework for dealing with such issues. Although Hermeren does not treat
the special problems of self-consciously imperial art. his analyses are useful here
nonetheless.
” See Chapter III.
 INTRODUCTION 25

There is also reason to believe that many Mesopotamian monu-

ments (even very ancient ones) remained available, at least to some
extent, even into the Achaemenid Period. For rock reliefs this is of
course obvious. But archaeological evidence attesting to the probable
visibility of (and even the reoccupation of) some neo-Assyrian pal-
aces does exist as well“. Classical sources seem generally to agree
that Nineveh was utterly destroyed, with nothing of interest being
left visible there“. But it is interesting to note the description of
Nineveh recorded by the tenth century A. D. Arab geographer, Al-
Mas'fidi:
De nos jours. l‘an 332 [Moslem calendar], ce n‘est plus qu‘un antes de mines
an milieu dcsquelles sent des villages et des terres cultivées 0n y voit encore
les traces d‘une enceinte et l‘on y trouve dcs statues de pierre surmontees
d'inscriptions“.
It is, furthermore, worth noting in this context that right at Perse-
polis—a site the total destruction of which was also legendary in
antiquity—much of the sculpture remained visible into the Sasanian
Period and even into the twentieth century". Indeed, we must
accept the fact that the classical sources often lack interest in de-
scribing those very monuments in which we ourselves may have the
most interest 5‘. Arguments ex silentio on the availability of Assyrian
city ruins into the Aehaemenid Period thus carry little weight.

W W. Andrae. Das wiedererstandene Assur (Leipzig: J.C. Hinrichs. I938). 164-171;

M.E.L. Mallowan, Nimrud and its Remain: (London: Collins. 1966). 230, 285-287.
296299. 353: A. H. Layard, Nineveh and Babylon (London: J. Murray. l897), 59! ff:
0. Loud. Kharsabad. l. 011’. XXXVIII (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, I936),
62-64. 118: Note also H. Frankfort. The Art and Architecture of the Ancient Orient.
4th ed.. rev. (Harmondsworth: Penguin. 1970), 266. n. 76; Luschey, “Darius-Reliel",
85; A. Farkas. Achaemenid Sculpture (Leiden: Nederlands historiseh-arehaeologisch
lnstituut. 1974). 57: C. J. Gadd. The Stones ofAssyria (London: Chatton and Windus,
I936). 2~B.
° ' A.I-l. Layard. Nineveh and its Remains (New York: G. P., Putnam, 1849). 128,
for a collection of sources.
‘3 Al-Mas‘fidi. Les prairies d'or. II, trans. C. Barbie: de Meynard and P. de
Councille (Paris : lmprimerie impériale. 1863). 93.
°3 E. Schmidt, Persepolis, I. DIP, LXVIII (Chicago: University of Chicago Press,
1953), 258 and p1. I99: 223. n. 11 and pls. 157458. G. Gropp. “Beobachtungen in
Persepolis". A M I n.F. 4. 1971. 25-49. For the commentaries of pcst-Sasanian European
travelers. beginning with the first visitor (Friar Odoric in c. 1325 AD.) see G.N. Cur-
zon. Persia and the Persian Question (London: Longmans, Green and Company, 1892).
vol. I. l6-17.
5‘ To Pausanias. for instance. a building which had fallen into ruins was not con-
sidered “worth seeing".
26 mrsocucrton

The careful excavation of the statue of Darius from Susa has

shown how this monument was simply left in place. with debris only
slowly accumulating around it during the ensuing centuries after the
end of the Achaemenid Period “'5. This was undoubtedly a common
phenomenon in the Near East.
Hand in hand with the more or less incidental survival of antique
monuments comes the method by which artists and scribes were
trained in the ancient Near East—-a tradition which did much to
perpetuate the use of the images of the past. Artists and scribes
learned by copying pro-existing monuments—some of which were
already antiques“. In Egypt of the Late Period. for instance, the
13th Dynasty private tombs were in effect the school rooms for
young artists". And throughout the history of Egypt, old imperial
monuments were blatantly copied for new ones“.
In addition to the chance availability of old monuments we must
also reckon with the deliberate preservation of antiquities in ancient
times, and the deliberate preservation of the trophies of war (which
Were usually treasured antiques as well) brought from one country
to another and set up in the new context where they would remain
visible. It should also be noted that information on the monuments
of foreign lands was transmitted and preserved by court artists and
scribes who accompanied ancient kings on their military campaigns in
order to record events and impressions of exotic places—much as
they did later under Napoleon 59.

°’ M. Kervran, D. Stronach. F. Vallat. and J. Yoyotte. “Une statue dc Darius

decouverte a Suse". JA 260. I972. 239.
“ J. Vercoutter. L'Egypte er le monde égéen prébeliénique. Bibliotheque d‘étude.
XXII (Cairo: lmprimerie dc l'institut francais d‘archeologie orientale. I956), 195 ff.
For analogies with the training of scribes note A. Erman, ed.. The Ancient Egyptians:
A Sourcebook of their Writings. trans. A M . Blackman (New York: Harper and
Row. 1966). and B. van de Walle, Transmission dos textes lirtéraires (Brussels: Fondation
egyptologique Reine Elisabeth, I943).
‘7 See Chapter VI, infia.
“ E.g.. Hallo and Simpson. History. 245 f.. 291. E. R. Russman. The Representation
of the King in the XXVI}: Dynasty. Monographies Reine Elisabeth. 1]] (Brussels: Fon-
dation egyptologique Reine Elisabeth. 1974). 22 ff.
‘9 T.A. Madhloom, The Chronology of Neo—Assyrim Art (London: Athloue Press.
1970. [19. n. 2. and M. Wifler. Nicht-Assyrer neuassyri’sdten Darstellungen. AOAT.
XXVI (Neultirchen-Vluyn, Neukirchener Verlag, 1975). l3. for suggestions that many of
the city-scapes shown in Assyrian historical reliefs may have been taken from sketches
done during the actual campaigns. See also .l. E. Reade. “Elam and the Elamites".
AM] 9. [976, 97405, and A. C. Gunter. "Representations of Urartian and Western
Iranian Architecture in the Assyrian Reliefs". unpublished M.A. Thesis (Columbia
University. 1975), and paper presented to the American Oriental Society (Philadelphia.
March. 1976).
 INTRODUCTION 27

The code of Hammurabi (already some 500 years old when it was
brought to Susa as booty) was apparently still displayed there until
the destruction by Assurbanipal, about 600 years later, when it was
broken, and perhaps for that reason not taken back to Assyria as a
trophy"). Other Mesopotamian monuments on display at Susa were
the great obelisk of Manishtusu and the victory stele of Naramsin'”.
Some of these Akkadian trophies may have remained visible even into
the Achaemenid Period 72. This type of thing was not limited to the
looting of relatively small objects. Assurbanipal, for instance. de-
scribes (among many other monuments) the removal of guardian
colossi after his destruction of Susa 73. And three over life-size statues
of Taharqa were brought all the way to Nineveh from Egypt by
Esarhaddon or Assurbanipal". These statues were set up in front
of a gateway in the Assyrian capital for all to see.
At Persepolis itself, the Treasury functioned in part as a museum”.
And we have interesting evidence of the continued use of an antique
seal. On several Persepolis Fortification tablets impressions are pre-
served of a seal (used by an official on behalf of Darius) which is
inscribed with the name of Cyrus l, the grandfather of Cyrus the
Great 7‘. The use of antique and “dynastic seals" is attested in other
Near Eastern civilizations, but it adds force to our discussions now
to be able to demonstrate that the Achaemenids too Were conscious
of their past in this way.
In the first millennium in the ancient Near East there was a great
interest in antiquarianism which. especially in Babylonia, led even to
the excavation of antique monuments. The antique foundation de-
posits discovered in such excavations would then be incorporated in
the foundation deposits placed under newly constructed buildings on
the same site 7’. An interesting example of this type of practice is

7° G. Jéquier, “Fouilles dc Suse 1899-1900; 1900-1901: 1901-1902". MDP, VII

(Paris: Ernst Leroux. 1905), 29.
'” Cameron. Early Iran. [29.
’3 P. Calmeyer. “Zur Genese altiranischer Motive [1]". AMI n. F. 6. 1973. 137.
7’ Luckenbill. Ancient Records, II, 310 ( $810).
7‘ Hallo and Simpson. History. 29!.
7’ E. Schmidt. Persepolis, ll. OIP. LXIX (Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
I957) 3. 56f. 66-68, 81-84.
7" PF seal #93. on tablets #692695 and 2033: Hallock. Fortification Tablets.
214-2I5. and 628. Sea] #93 ratifies a text concerning provisions dispensed in behalf
of the king in every case. See Chapter II. infra. Catalogue Entry XIII (1). Cf. P. Amiet.
“La glyptique dc la fin d'Elam", Ans Asiatiques 28. 1973. 15.
7’ Ellis. Foundation Deposits. l3f. Note also G. Goosens. "Les recherches historiques
a l‘époque uéo—babylonienne". RAssyr 42. [948, 149459.
28 INTRODUCTION

found in the deposit of King Nabopolassar (626-605). Under the floor

of the temple at Sippar was found a box containing a ninth century
tablet with text and accompanying relief. This tablet, made by the
order of the Babylonian king Nabuapaladdina, was already archaizing
at that time—as has been noted by Henri Frankfort". Then Nabo-
polassar had a clay impression of the antique tablet made; and this,
along with the archaizing ninth century original, was piously in-
terred 79. An even more striking deposit of antiques has been found
in the Parthian Period Gareus Temple at Warka. Four cylinder seals
ranging in date from the Early Dynastic Period to the Kassite Period
were found to have been carefully and deliberately placed between
the pavement joints behind and beside the podium“.

A chaemenid Art in an Historical Context.

Perhaps the greatest obstacle to the promulgation of the idea that

conscious planning by the court was a major determining factor of
Achaemenid art resides in the prevalence of a certain traditional
historical view of pre-Empire Persian culture. The Achaemenids are
generally thought of as having only just emerged from a nomadic stage
in a sort of cultural vacuum when they became the rulers of the Near
East in 550". Underlying much analysis of Achaemenid art has been
the assumption, sometimes tacit and sometimes articulated, that the
Achaemenids—still very much tied to this nomadic past, and there-
fore knowing little about such matters themselves—had to rely upon
artisans from all over the empire to envision and to plan, as well
as to execute, the art of their parvenu court.
A reassessment of the material at hand suggests that, contrary to
this generally accepted view, the Persians were hardly functioning in
a vacuum before 550. Rather, they were part of a complex network
of extensive historical and cultural relationships within the Near East.
These relationships had a profound effect on the eventual formulation
of the official art of the Aehaemenid kings—an effect of far greater
import than the cultural background of the artisans who ultimately
set chisel to stone.

" Frankfort. A n and Architecture. 202.

7’ Ellis. Foundation Deposits. l05. Ellis suggests that this be termed a “pious disposal
of valued antiques" rather than a “building deposit" per se.
'0 lbid.. 137.
" E.g.. H. Frankfort, "Achaemenian Sculpture", AM 50, 1946, 6-14; Richter.
“Greeks in Persia“. 15.
 INTRODUCTION 29

The discussion which follows is not intended to be a detailed

account of historical events involving the Persians. Rather, it is meant
briefly to suggest the importance of certain political and intercultural
relationships which must have had a significant impact upon the
process of creation of Achaemenid iconography.
The Persians, and also the Modes, are members of the [ado-Iranian
language group of the Indo-European family. According to generally
accepted theories on the relation of language to culture, this fact
suggests close cultural affinities between the Medes and the Persians
and between these two peoples and an aboriginal Indo-Iranian, or
Aryan, society 82. This aboriginal society presumably existed in Central
Asia before the southward dispersal of some members to north India
and the westward dispersal of others (including the Persians and the
Medes) to the western Zagros. This dispersal may have begun in the
Middle Bronze Age, and it was most likely caused by the pressure
of external forces. There is no need to view such a great movement
of populations as the fulfillment of an inherent and inexorable
nomadic tendency or “wanderlust”.
Attempts to describe the aboriginal culture of the Indo-Iranians are
based largely upon the methodology of comparative linguistics and
upon the picture of society which can be derived from an analysis
of the vocabulary of the Indo-Iranian religious and epical literature
such as the Rig Veda and the Avesra. From information we can glean
from these sources, the Indo-Iranians do not seem to have been
nomads in the sense that continuous migration was a prerequisite of
their lifestyle”. We may infer an economy based upon agriculture
and stockbreeding. Some form of kingship or chieftaincy seems to have
existed. But whether the ruler was considered divine or whether he
was a purely secular authority figure is more difficult to establish.
The basic social units seem to have been the tribe, the clan, and the
family (presumably patriarchal).

“ H. Hoiier, “The Relation of Language to Culture". Anthropology Today: Selec-

tions, ed. S. Tax (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1962). 258417;,W. P. Leh-
mann, “Linguistic Structure as Diaeritic Evidence on Prom-Culture". [mic-European
and Indo-Europem, ed. G. Cardona, H.M. Hocnigswald and A. Sena (Philadelphia:
University of Pennsylvania Press, 1970). 1-10.
‘3 Note also the remarks of E. Sunderland. “Early Man in Iran". in Cambridge
History of Iran. I, The Land of Iran. ed. “LB. Fisher (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press. 1968), 412.
30 INTRODUCTION

Many aspects of the reconstruction of lndo-lranian society are the

subject of debate 3‘. Most controversial, however, is the question of
the ideology and religion of the [ado-Iranians. While it is not within
the scope of this discussion to deal with these controversies, it is
important to note that concepts of kingship and religious ideology,
as these are expressed in Achaemenid art, are possibly related to the
as yet elusive traditions of the Indo-lranians—at least to the extent
that the Persians’ Indo-lranian heritage may have colored their re-
sponse to the Near Eastern cultures they eventually drew upon in
the formation of their imperial art.
The [ado-Iranian splinter groups whom we know as the Persians
and the Medes seem to have pushed gradually westward from their
original homeland. They had probably established themselves on the
fringes of the Assyrian sphere by the close of the second millen-
nium B.C.". The first historical record of the Persians occurs in the
Assyrian annals of the mid-ninth century". Mention of the Medes
follows shortly thereafter". Interestingly, no reference is made to
their relatively recent arrival in the Zagros. For all that the Assyrians
tell us on the matter, we should have to assume that the Medes and
Persians were indigenous to the area. The Assyrian accounts suggest
that the Persians of the mid-ninth century were ruled by Chieftains
who controlled established territories from fortified manors~much as
did the kings of the neighboring indigenous Zagros peoples”. By
contrast, the Assyrian kings carefully single out any nomadic peoples
living in tents rather than palaces ”. Recent excavations have now
“ C.S. Littleton. The New Comparative Mythology: An Anthropological Assessment
of the Theories of Georges Dumézii, rev. ed. (Berkeley: University of California Press.
1973). 25-28, with references; R.N. Frye. The Heritage of Persia (New York: Mentor
Books, 1963). 44-46.
‘5 T.C. Young. Jr.. “The Iranian Migration into the Zagros". Iran 5, 1967. ”-34.
'° Luckenbill, Ancient Records. 1. par. 58L
'7 lbid., par. 637.
" lbid., par. 581; par. 58‘] (Shaimaneser [11): "i received the tribute of the kings
of Parsua. The rest of the Parsuans (lit. Parana). were not loyal to Assur,—tl1eir
cities I captured. their spoil. their property. I carried off to Assyria”; par. 588;
par. 795; par. 784. Nevertheless. many scholars have persisted in viewing the Persians
as having been nomads until very later Note. for example. R.N. Frye. “The Insti-
tutions". Historic Ethzelrcltriften, XVIII. Beitrige zur Achiimenidengeschichte. ed.
G. Walser (Wiesbaden: Franz Steiner. I972). 84; and A T . Olmstead, History of the
Persian Empire (Chicago: University of Chicago Press. 1948), 60. The cities of neigh-
boring indigenous groups are described as "fortresses". and “strong cities“ (Manneans).
or “strong-walled cities" and “towering fortresses" (Ural-rims). Luckenbill. Ancient
Records, 11, par. 56.
" E.g., ibid., par. 818.
 INTRODUCTION 3]

affirmed this suggestion that already in the early years of the first millen-
nium the Median and Persian ruling classes had fortified citadels and
“palaces“ of a permanent nature 9°.
This, of course, does not mean that some Iranian folk were not
leading semi-nomadic existences. Then, even as today, there must
have been pasture-seeking herdsmen whose location depended upon
the season. And as today such people might have considered them-
selves connected to a specific town or fortified settlement for purposes
of trade and other needs". Sunderland suggests, actually, that there
was less nomadism in the Iron Age than there has been in recent
years in lran“.
From the ninth century until the fall of Nineveh in 612, the Persians
and the Medes were a constant source of harassment to the Assyrians
along their eastern frontier. The Assyrian annals and royal corre—
spondence indicate frequent military clashes with the Persians, as well
as with the Medea. Although the Assyrians often encountered Medes
and Persians in the same general area, the two groups are treated
as distinct peoples”.
The Assyrian sources document the full range of diplomatic asso-
ciations which inevitably accompanied military clashes. At crucial
times the Medes and the Persians were prominent in power struggles
between Assyria and Babylon. In the mid-seventh century, for in-
stance, the Persian Cyrus 1 of Anshan aided Shamash-shum—ukim of
Babylon in the latter‘s revolt against his brother, the Assyrian king
Assurbanipal. When this coalition ended in defeat, Cyrus I sent his
eldest son Arukku to Nineveh with tribute, in order to render sub-
mission to Assurbanipal 9“. The Medes, meanwhile, had achieved a
position of dominance, so that the Persian chiefs were vassals of a
united Median kingdom. It was a coalition of Medes and Babylonians,

°° E.g., the Median fortified citadel at Godin Tepe: T. C. Young, In, Excavations
at Godin Tepe: First Progress Report, Occasional Paper. XVII. Art and Archaeology
(Toronto: Royal Ontario Museum, l969), the Median site of Nush-i Jan: M. Roaf
and D. Stronach. “Excavations at Tepe Nash-i J a n : Second Interim Report", Iran I I ,
1973, [29-140; and the manor house at Babe Jan in Luristan: 0 6 . Meade. "Exca-
vations at Bibi Jan. 1967“. Iran 7, I969, [IS-130.
° ' For a classic descriptive study of a modem nomad group in Iran, including its
way of interacting economically and culturally with settled communities. see F. Barth,
Nomad: of South Persia: The Basserr‘ Tribe of the Khmeh Confederacy (Boston: Little,
Brown and Co.. l96l).
'3 Sunderland, “Early Man in Iran". 411.
°’ Young, “Migration".
°‘ Olmstead, Persian Empire. 31, with sources.
32 I mmonucnou

aided by Scythians (nomadic Aryan warriors), who at the end of the

seventh century crushed Assyria once and for all.
By this time, the Medes and Persians had for generations been
active and important participants in the history of the Near East.
They had become acquainted with the cultures of Assyria and Baby-
lon not only through the importation of a fibula or a cylinder seal,
but also through constant human interaction in warfare and diplo-
macy. They had stormed the provincial strongholds of Assyria and
they had come to the courts of the great kings bearing tribute.
It is also significant that Medes and Persians are known to have
worked as craftsmen at Nebuchadnezaar’s court, alongside others
from Egypt, Elam, Ionia, Lydia, and Byblos 9’. This fact, as evi-
denced by Babylonian pay lists, reminds us of the cosmopolitan
nature of the labor forces assembled for state projects at this period;
and it suggests that the Persians should not be thought of as isolated
from this cosmopolitan situation. It suggests further that the Persians
and the Medes had, at least by the seventh century, become familiar
with the construction craft techniques used in the great Near Eastern
capitals. Interesting corroboration of this comes from the Median
site of Nush-i Jan. Here, the cleaning of the fire temple and the
methodical filling of it with stone chips seems to have been derived
from the commonly practiced Babylonian ritual preparations for re-
building over an existing temple 9".
It is true that so far no monumental sculpture of the Medes and
Persians has been found which can unhesitatingly be assigned to the
pre—Achaemenid Period. But the sites investigated so far have been
provincial posts. The Median capital of Ecbatana has not been exca-
vated because it lies under the modern city of Hamadan. According
to Herodotus (I. 98), Ecbatana was a magnificent city with a large,
well-defended palace befitting a king, with a treasury, and with con-
centric battlements, the innermost revetted with silver and gold. It is
not unlikely that at important centers such as Ecbatana buildings
were adorned with sculpture in stone or glazed brick relief. Also, a
tradition of monumental representational art may well have been
maintained in perishable media such as wall painting and wooden

’5 E. F. Weidner, "Jojachin, K511i; von Jude, in babylonischen Keilschrifltcxteu".

Mélmges ofl'erts d Monsieur Rem! Demand, II (Paris: Paul Gettthner, 1939). 923-935.
9‘ D. Stronach, “Tappeh Nusi-Jin : A Case for Building Rites in 7th/6th Century 3. C.
Media?" Proceedings of the [Ind Annual Swami-tum on Archaeological Research in Iron
(Tehran: Iran Centre for Archaeological Research, 1974), 223-238.
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 During the journey, in company with convalescents and men on
furlough, old men, and women in mourning, she was astonished to
find herself so much attached to the hospital which she had entered
almost against her will, drawn by something which seemed not to
belong to her real self.
"Most of the women that I have met there," she reflected, "are of
an unlovely pettiness, and one would say that they strive to
transform the most innocent act into a shameful offense, from a
desire to believe that there are traitors, guilty persons everywhere,
and by a strange inclination to find the presence of the devil in every
corner! And yet their service is excellent." Cunning malice,
destructive backbiting, scandal set on foot by inconsiderate
comments on trivial acts, often meaningless and that might well have
been left unnoticed, open jealousy, absurd vanity, the most insidious
intrigues to work up to distinction; to sum up, utter triviality—all these
composed a body of customs recognized, admitted, in no respect
casting a blot upon respectability. Only one thing led up to the mark
of infamy: anything which nearly or remotely might resemble love.
How surprising this had appeared in the eyes of a Parisian
woman of twenty-seven, who had lived in the world of society during
the years between 1905 and 1914!
Odette mused upon that social circle, young, cheerful, given to
sports, relatively kindly and prosperous, who before the war had
surrounded her.
What had become of Simone de Prans, Rose Misson, Clotilde
Avvogade, Germaine Le Gault, and M. de La Villaumer? She had
received brief missives from them, postal-cards rather than letters.
On her part, had Odette perhaps disconcerted her friends by the
accounts she sent them; had she perhaps wearied them by her
persistent grief? Simone and Rose still had their husbands, the
former grievously wounded, the other still whole, running about in his
car as usual; Avvogade was attached to Great Headquarters. Can
any one understand the sorrow from which he does not himself
suffer?
 On reaching Paris Odette was singularly impressed. When she
had gone to Surville in 1914, to forget the war and think only of her
dead, she had been surprised to find herself on the contrary all the
nearer to the war. The trains of wounded, life among the wounded,
the almost sole society of men but recently escaped from death; all
this was far different from her recluse life in the apartment of the Rue
de Balzac, which had indeed recalled the memory of Jean, but had
also recalled the memory of the time of peace. Monotony of
occupation, the continual living-over of the same emotions, at last
dulls the sensibilities. The war as it appeared to her after eighteen
months of hospital experience was a state of things to which her
organism and her thought had become moulded. The long daily
weariness, the constantly renewed effort, dulled her senses and
confused her perception of events.
Paris in March, 1916, seemed to her much more like war than
Surville. The battle of Verdun was at its height, and all Paris was
ringing with its echoes wherever one might be. Newspapers,
conversations, the tramways, the metro, the taxi chauffeur who gave
you change, the woman who sold you a magazine, servants,
masters, the rich, the poor, bank employees, even to the sellers of
violets in the streets, all brought to mind the war and Verdun, yet
mutely, less by outcries than by quiet words, less by words than by
changed color, the graying of the hair or of the beard, faded eyes,
new wrinkles, and a certain indefinable manner. The whole earth and
everything that it bears, every creature moving upon it, were a single
sensitiveness, raised to its most acute degree. Acts and gestures
apparently most remote from the war, receptions, dinners, the crowd
at the entrance of the moving-picture shows, of classical concerts, of
the few remaining music-halls, only showed the necessity for certain
temperaments to tear themselves away from the nightmare of
Verdun. Every one was affected by it, and so much the more as they
were forced to tell themselves: "There are those who are suffering
infinitely more than we."
Odette, in her apartment, was once again overwhelmed by her
personal sorrow. She had lived in Surville with her grief buried in the
depths of her heart, for though everything she saw reminded her of
Jean she had no leisure to give herself to dwelling upon the past. In
the Rue de Balzac all her sorrow came to meet her entire as on the
first day. It seemed as if her stay at Surville had done nothing for her.
When Simone de Prans came to welcome her, it seemed to Odette
that her friend had just arrived with the terrible news, and she melted
into tears. Her tears surprised Simone, who dared not reproach her
with exaggerating her sorrow, but who yet brought herself to give her
to understand that so long and so violent a grief was not fitting, that
no one any longer wept like that. Odette, made docile by eighteen
months of punctual obedience to orders, did not resist, made no
objection. "No one any longer wept like that"; it was a custom, one of
those sovereign customs, which a Parisian woman instinctively
accepts. Simone had said: "You understand, there are too many!"
Which signified, such misfortunes are too numerous; they are raining
down on everybody. The human heart would not be equal to its task
if it must be always sympathizing; each woman in mourning would
herself die of it, creating a new and superfluous pain. She spoke with
the greatest ease of her Pierrot, one leg paralyzed, one arm five
centimetres shorter than the other and with shattered nerves. He
was at the Ministry of War, and was content. She told of a ceremony
which she had accidentally witnessed that morning, passing the
Madeleine on her way back from the Flower Market. "A fine
marriage, you know; red carpet on the steps, a crowd to right and
left. Just as I was passing the doors opened, and up above I saw the
young couple."
"There are still men to marry?"
"Listen; she, who appeared to be pretty, a lovely girl, a brunette,
tall, leaning, as if enamoured, on her husband's arm; he in uniform,
his decorations flashing on his breast. Oh, the handsome fellow, not
thirty years old! He held himself upright, splendid, not looking at his
feet; two large eyes wide open and fixed, as if he were speaking to a
superior. She seemed to be indicating the steps by a gentle pressure
of the arm, that he might not lose an inch of his fine height. Behind
them one could hear the swellings of the great organ. There was an
impulse to applaud, for he was evidently a hero, unmaimed and
superb. Every one was glad in the happiness of his charming wife,
though pitying her in the midst of admiration, for to-morrow her
handsome officer must return to the firing-line, and the war is
endless. Suddenly there was a movement in the crowd, murmurs,
whisperings, faces turned pale; the handsome officer had just
missed falling, my dear, notwithstanding the care of his young wife to
hide his infirmity, for he was blind!"
"It's frightful, frightful," exclaimed Odette.
She had seen and nursed most grievously wounded soldiers; but
unconsciously a sort of convention had been established in her mind
by which nothing that she saw, or that happened in the hospital at
Surville, should move her. This first result of the war which had faced
her elsewhere than at Surville, and under another aspect, impressed
her almost intolerably. On the other hand, Simone had become
accustomed to the dramatic scenes which at times occur in Paris,
where everything is perhaps all the more sad because the war
drama is close at hand, aping normal life. This juxtaposition of the
manners of a time of peace and these shadows of the pit which
mingle with the life of every day, more like a prolonged dream than
like reality, produce surprising effects upon reflective minds.
Simone de Prans, who for a time had taken up work in a model
hospital, an American hospital, was no longer a nurse. That was no
longer done.
"What about our good Rose?" asked Odette.
"Rose Misson has arranged her life. She has resolved not to yield
to things; she has been too much teased about her old husband,
always going about in his automobile. Neither Rose nor her husband
is disturbed by that; he remains on his seat; she dresses, visits the
shops as in former times and receives the few friends who are not
indignant because her husband has not lost two or three limbs.
Between ourselves, I think she is a woman who is doing a great deal
of good."
"Only she does not cry it upon the housetops?"
"No; they will be upbraided for it all their lives, she and her
husband; he, free from all military obligation, for having 'ambushed'
himself in his automobile, she for having retained her placid manner,
her good humor."
"I thought that optimism was in fashion."
"Optimism, yes, but not naturalness. The approved sort of
optimism consists in unendingly predicting victory, with the jaw of a
tigress, and in determinedly transforming all bad news into a presage
of success. But those who maintain a quiet confidence without
talking about it, and make life around them more pleasant by their
usual good temper, are suspected of indifference."
"And in all this, what about you, Simone?"
"Me? I have a husband deep in government councils, haven't I? It
is a power in these days. People leave me alone."
"And Germaine?" asked Odette.
Simone appeared somewhat embarrassed. People hardly dared
to talk of Germaine Le Gault. Germaine Le Gault had lost her
husband at about the same time with Odette, and almost under the
same circumstances. Like Odette, Germaine adored her husband.
Germaine had taken the loss even more deeply to heart than Odette;
her life had even been in danger. Germaine, like Odette, still wore
her deep widow's mourning. And Germaine was now in love; in love
beyond the possibility of concealment, in love with a head physician
in whose service she had worked. He was a married man and a
father.
"La Villaumer insists," said Simone, "that in her case it is simply a
lack of imagination, and that no one should blame her. He says, you
understand, that she is unable to bring before herself, as you do, for
example, a vision of her husband. If she had been capable of
bearing about with her a persistent picture of him, she would have
been faithful, if it were only to a picture; but she has no imagination;
it is necessary to her that her mind should rest upon an object. It is
one explanation—probably a paradox."
At that moment they heard in the neighboring apartment the
playing of an excellent pianist which had formerly lulled the reveries
of Odette when she was waiting for Jean. That neighboring
apartment, into which the Jacquelins had never set foot, was
separated from theirs only by a thin partition and a door. The music
had often fretted Jean, but when Odette was alone she had loved to
hear it.
"Listen!" said Odette. "Oh, it is more than eighteen months since I
have heard music!"
"That is so," said Simone; "in Paris one finds a little of everything
that one used to love; it is that that hurts."
"What is she playing?" asked Simone after a moment.
It was a revery; two lovers who are seeking one another, groping
in the darkness of a garden on a lovely summer night; you hear their
hesitating footsteps, you suspect their vexed and feverish gestures,
their eager lips that call one another without imprudently
pronouncing a name; though their footsteps creak upon the gravel
and a fountain drops its slow pearls into the basin. Suddenly the
music of a waltz attracts them separately to the lighted house, and
they exchange kisses on the steps of the entrance, before being
swallowed up in the intoxicating motion.
"Oh!" exclaimed Odette, thrilled, "do you remember, do you
remember?"
"What?" asked Simone.
"Why, everything! Everything that happened before, before this
end of the world that never ends!"
Odette, overcome by the harmonious reminder of the waltz of a
possible festival, of the joy of living, of being pretty, young, beloved,
could only repeat:
"I haven't heard ... anything ... for more than eighteen months,
Simone! Do you remember that evening at Mme. Sormellier's, at
Bellevue, where both our husbands were so beautiful?"
"And we, too, Odette! We shall be old after the war. We shall have
had hardly five or six years of youth. I will confess to you that
sometimes I juggle with fate. I go to see Clotilde, who refuses to
permit herself to be touched by events. She says: 'I can do nothing
about it; I am good for nothing. Let the world let me alone as I let it
alone! Till my last hour I will stay with my flowers, my books, and my
music.'"
"Ah! Clotilde, yes; do you know, I had forgotten her!"
"Everybody is forgetting her, and she forgets everybody. Her
husband is at Great Headquarters; he often comes. She is a
privileged person, and she says: 'Why should I not accept all the
good that is offered me?'"
"Yes," said Odette, "it is tempting, but I could not do it.—No, I
could not.—See, I tried to shut myself up with my grief. Well, I could
not. It is too great—this universal sorrow—too absorbing. Listen!"
The pianist next door, still devoted to her Chopin, which she
performed in a remarkable manner, was beginning the First
Nocturne, the one that contains that phrase of lamentation,
heartrending in its sober scheme and its sustained phrasing, without
outcry or burst of passion, leaving the soul to the lasting sense of
human woe.
"Oh, listen—listen!"
The pianist was accompanying herself with her grave, finely
cadenced voice, following without words the sinuous course of the
thrice-repeated utterance of sorrow. Odette began to sob; her nerves
were unstrung by the apparent return to things of former days, while
yet acutely conscious of the dreadful present.
"I must give up this apartment, after all," she said between her
sobs.
"Yes, you will have to," replied Simone; "you would be
overwhelmed with your sense of loss."
"For that matter I must give up everything."
"Everything? What more, do tell me!"
"Myself! See, I cannot delude myself longer."
"My poor Odette! You are hardly four days out of your hospital,
and you go to pieces! We are only kept up by the presence of those
who have suffered a thousand times more than we. You can't
imagine what it is for me that my Pierrot has miraculously escaped
death, with his body half destroyed. It is he who saves me from
unhappiness. Those who have looked death in the face and yet have
returned to life find it beautiful, whatever it is, and their wonder at it
spreads to all around them."
"Yes, yes. I have felt that. If I had my poor Jean, even all broken
to pieces, I should think only of the joy of having him safe. But I have
him no longer, and the past draws me, at times, as if some one much
stronger than I were taking me by the arms and drawing me
backward with irresistible power. Do you remember Isadora dancing
among her children and throwing flowers in one of the motives of the
ballet of "Armida"? And that great fool Antoine Laloire behind us,
crying: 'When one has seen that one may well say, "Thank you," to
God and close one's eyes forever!' He had no idea how well he was
speaking. They say he had a splendid death."
"Yes. All our admiration must from this time forward be given to
the beauty of our warriors. Harmonious forms, enchantment—we are
done with them all, my poor child, done with them!"
"Done with them! So they say. So I thought, too, when I saw those
men coming in by the hundreds, reduced to a mass of bleeding pulp;
I still think so when I think of the long line of devastation which is
spreading over Europe, of all those human beings who are every day
dying around their torpedoed vessels; but think! The moment the art
of our former days is able to realize itself anywhere, beyond a
partition, it rises upon us like the sun that has been two days hidden.
It will rise again, Simone! If only a few individuals are left who can
hear a note, a shepherd will be found to invent the flute once again,
by bringing reeds together."
"You say that because the art of which you are speaking only
increases your sadness. You are cultivating your sadness, and
loving it still. If you were less melancholy, like me, you would consent
to accept the new life just as it offers itself; but you will always see it
irremediably disfigured, poisoned by an overwhelming horror. Life
from henceforth is a Lady Macbeth with red and horrific hands,
marking with a bloody spot everything that it touches. What fine art
could flourish except by means of men not yet born, men who will
not come into the world until after this horror is no longer spoken
about?"
"Remember what those poor friends of ours used to say when
they talked so well in our gatherings of former days: the flowers that
bloom on graves are as fresh and the harvests that grow on
battlefields are more abundant than those on fields that have never
known crime and death; they are innocent, divinely innocent of all
the past. The souls of artists are like flowers; and they purify the
imaginations that have been soiled."
"And the conclusion is that you and I both, my dear, have after all
a good share of optimism, otherwise called a reserve strength upon
which we can draw for a certain time. Let us hope it may be for a
long time. And we find the same thing under the distress of nearly all
men. Ah, how strong life is!"

XI

Odette began a round of visits.

For the most part they were visits of condolence. She went first to
Mme. de Blauve, who had lately lost her young son, that charming
boy of seventeen whom Odette had seen for a second in the Avenue
d'Iena flying to the recruiting-office, to take the place of his father,
who had been killed in the second month of the war. Mme. de Blauve
had come back from Rheims, where at that time she had been a
nurse, under unceasing bombardments; she had returned to her
daughters, who were now growing up. Odette found the family no
more crushed or morose than at the first time. The father,
Commandant de Blauve, adored by all, was dead; the elder son, in
his nineteenth year, was dead.
"Happily," said Mme. de Blauve, "I have one left."
 "How old is he?" asked Odette anxiously.
"He is about to enlist," said Mme. de Blauve simply. "Through him,
I hope that our name will be represented to the end."
Every one knew that this last son was her Benjamin, petted more
than all her other children. Her present anxiety was for her
daughters; she would fain have married them at once.
"Marry them!" cried Odette; "but to whom, at such a time as this?"
"To good young soldiers, that they may soon have children."
Not the slightest emotion, though the family was truly affectionate;
one single idea—to come to the defense of the country, by whatever
means. Odette could not but admire, though at the same time she
trembled.
"How far advanced is your mourning?" asked Mme. de Blauve
almost severely.
"What?" asked Odette.
"I mean, how long is it since you lost you dear husband?"
"Just eighteen months," replied Odette.
"You are young," said Mme. de Blauve; "my child, you still have
duties to perform."
"But," said Odette, bewildered, "I am doing what I can."
"We will speak again of it in a few months," said Mme. de Blauve.
"I shall not lose sight of you. I count you among the good ones."
She dwelt upon the word "good" as she bade Odette good-by.
Odette did not in the least grasp Mme. de Blauve's meaning. Did
she find her "good" because she had for a long time been
conscientiously doing a nurse's duties, and did she think of sending
her to some difficult post, requiring courage and constancy? She
was cheerfully ready for anything. Only one thing troubled her; it was
that the memory of Jean seemed to be relegated to so distant a past,
seemed to hold so small a place in the thoughts of the people whom
she was about to see, she being still in deep mourning, and having
been away only seventeen months, to mourn for Jean.
Why did Odette go directly from the Avenue d'Iena to see
Clotilde? Not in the least by reason of the love of contrast, or the
need for it, but because she was passing the Place of the United
States, which attracted her with its trees adorned with their young
leafage.
She found Clotilde as she had always found her, extended upon
an ancient couch, amid twenty cushions, a dozen books and
magazines, in an elegant room, with a bunch of carnations flaunting
their glory, and hyacinths in pots surrounding the young woman with
a fragrant suggestion of spring.
"Ah!" exclaimed Odette as she entered, without quite perceiving
the significance of her exclamation.
Clotilde, perfumed and her tall figure clothed in a Babani robe,
kissed her joyfully.
"You haven't fallen off much, Odette. Tell me, are these your
cheeks? No more rouge than in the old days? Oh, how often I think
of your loss, my dear!"
She was the first person, except La Villaumer, who had spoken to
her of her loss. Then there was still some one who remembered
what had been her happiness, her extraordinary happiness.
"I haven't written to you, Odette, because I was too lazy, and
because I need to imagine the face of the person to whom I write. So
far away, under your nurse's cap, I couldn't tell—you are pretty; I
love you always. Oh, how sorry I am for you!"
Odette, surprised, embarrassed, still under the influence of the life
she had been leading, spoke as every one did:
"There are so many of us who deserve to be pitied."
"No, Odette, no; I am not saying that. No doubt there are many
widows and many young women whose husbands or lovers are
maimed, disfigured, ruined. But there are not many who, before all
that, have truly enjoyed life and love. You have known love. You
have had a few years that are worth being regretted."
Tears rose to Odette's eyes. They were tears that gave no pain,
which rather comforted her. It seemed that she had long been
waiting to shed such tears. She had so constantly heard
conventional words, forced expressions, the result of a strained
situation which there was surely no reason to criticise; but, except
from her wounded soldiers, she had not before heard words simply
human.
Clotilde was not afraid to talk persistently of Jean, not because
she felt that at bottom she was giving pleasure to her friend, but
because her thoughts naturally turned to attractive things, and she
loved to remember that charming couple of perfect lovers that Jean
and Odette had been. Never having checked her instinct, it now told
her that Odette, in spite of her tears, enjoyed the revival of these
memories. It was not Jean the soldier, Jean the hero, whose praises
Clotilde sang. Odette had heard so many praises of heroes! She had
handled so many with her own hands! There had never been but one
Jean. He was Jean, just Jean, a fine, good, and handsome fellow
who had nothing military, nothing surprising about him, except just
that he was beloved. Who had dared to talk to her of that Jean since
the war? No one. Clotilde was doing it in the unconsciousness of a
woman who was still what she had been before. And Odette had felt
some apprehension about seeing Clotilde again, just because she
had feared that Clotilde had really not changed enough!
The interview was soothing, even delightful to her. Clotilde
seemed almost to have forgotten the war—a little more and she
would have made her forget it. She talked of the books that she was
reading; books written earlier than the present time; she talked, too,
laughingly of her clothes, on the pretext of the diminished resources
of the family; she spoke of certain middle-aged and even old men,
saying that they had not been appreciated in the days when there
had been plenty of young fellows. She offered her friend a cigarette;
she smoked, and the two women looked at each other through curls
of long, light clouds, as if in a dream.
 Odette went out somewhat amazed at the incredible ivory tower
which Clotilde had succeeded in building around her youth, her
beauty, and her selfishness.
"Is Clotilde selfish?" she asked herself, as she turned from the
Square of the United States. "And yet how she asked about my
Jean! Clotilde is like every one else; she is interested in just one
thing, has a passion for it. She has kept as by a miracle the one
thing that she had before the war, and that is love. Everything that
represents love captivates her; one feels that she gives herself up to
it. The others yield to a different passion which, by the conditions of
our time, takes on a more sympathetic form. Mme. de Blauve with
sacred fury throws all her family into the jaws of Moloch; Mme. de
Calouas, in Surville, has a passion only for the wounded, exclusively
for wounded soldiers; I have seen her utterly insensible to an
accident to a civilian; most of those women in the hospital had a
passion for their duties there, thought themselves degraded when
they had not the number of beds that satisfied their pride, lamented
as if for a public misfortune when, by chance, fewer wounded
soldiers came. There are even people whose passion it is to have no
passions—and they are the most to be dreaded. Why should Clotilde
deprive herself of her bouquet of carnations, her pot of hyacinths,
her perfumed cigarettes, while they serve to create around her the
illusion by which she lives, and of which, when the occasion comes,
she gives her weary friends the benefit for a whole hour? Yet, could I
do like her? No; decidedly not. Did not I, then, love love as she
does? I do not know, I loved Jean. Then I am less simple than she;
everything affects me. And everything is shaken. I am not flattering
myself when I recognize that I am alive to more than one thing. I
wanted to be wholly devoted to one—to my sorrow. I believe that I
am alive only to my grief, and yet sometimes I think that in this I am
mistaken."

That day she felt an overwhelming lassitude. Clotilde had lapped

her in "soft odors." As she was asking herself how she could finish
the day she bethought her that she had been told that Mme.
Leconque was another Clotilde, that is to say, a fairy capable of
drawing one out of the war mood, though she belonged to a social
set that was just now holding it as a great honor to give to it
unstintingly both life and fortune.
"I must not fail of seeing her," said Odette to herself, "and just now
I prefer another Clotilde to a second Mme. de Blauve, who makes
me shudder." She took a taxi to the end of the Avenue du Bois.
Mme. Leconque was at home and alone. Muffled up in an ermine
coverlet, in a room brightened by a wood-fire large enough to warm
an assembly-room in the city hall, and surrounded by objects of art,
ancient trinkets, Watteaux, Fragonards, she lay on a couch near a
majestic bed, high and royal, covered with Venetian point,
determinedly knitting, amid yawns, little stockings of coarse wool, for
refugee children.
"You, at least, have had enough of this butchery," she said.
Odette, under her mourning-veil, admitted that for her part she
found no pleasure in it.
"I should be glad to know," went on Mme. Leconque, "what sort of
a life they are giving us."
Odette looked around at the great wood-fire, the walls of the
room, a perfect museum, and at the silky fleece that enwrapped the
form of the dissatisfied woman.
"They have just telephoned me," Mme. Leconque went on, "that
we have evacuated Malancourt. Just look at my stockings, if you call
them stockings! I admit that I never paid seventy-five francs a pair for
mine—I always sent to London for them and got them at thirty-five
francs. And to-day I am wearing stockings at 3 francs 95!"
"Why do you?" asked Odette.
"You would despise me if I paid more for them, in these days. You
are in mourning, my poor dear; you don't think about these matters.
Do you know where we are all getting our clothes? In the Rue
d'Alesia, my child, in a store where they sell ribbons on the main
floor for eight sous a metre, and up-stairs you find models of all the
great Paris dressmakers at a third of the regular price. You might go
there out of curiosity; I'll take you, if you like. You will find ten autos
at the door, lined up before the tin-shop, the general shops, the
house-painters, and the wine-shops. And where do you think we try
on? Anywhere, no matter where. On the staircase, in the corridors, in
the shop itself, three women together, not to speak of the old
husbands and the men on leave, in a little parlor decorated with two
opposite mirrors! Absolute promiscuity, a mob that reminds you of
the old Neuilly fair; broken windows, no heat, and drafts of air that
pierce through the lungs! My dear, I bought a charmeuse gown there
for one hundred and seventy-five francs that would have cost seven
hundred and fifty at Lanvin's! The Duchess of Chateauruque goes
there; the wife of the ambassador from X. goes, too. Can you
imagine such a thing? Oh! we run against picturesque things during
this war! Do you believe that life can go on this way?"
"I don't think so, indeed," said Odette.
"I see that you aren't pitying us. Well, for my part I tell you that I
have had enough of this war, and that I despise it! Do you
understand? I despise it. Ugh! ugh! and ugh!"
Odette returned home along the darkening streets, thinking of
Mme. de Blauve, the terrible. She felt much indulgence for Mme. de
Blauve, the terrible.

XII

Odette had bought a newspaper. During the night the Germans

had made a series of massed attacks, debouching upon Malancourt
from three directions at once. Our troops had evacuated the
devastated village "while keeping its outlets."
Once again she tried to take refuge in her memories of love. But
this evening the portraits of Jean that she saw around her did not
speak to her of love. She felt that Jean, if he were there, would not
talk of love that evening, but would turn away like an overwrought
man to whom the beloved one insists upon saying: "Kiss me!" She
could distinctly see the gesture which, however, she had seldom
known. She could almost hear Jean saying: "My little love, I am
anxious.... It is not that I lack confidence, but they are advancing
step by step; it is disquieting, disquieting. You will think me cruel, but
I should be glad to go back there. I would rather be there, do you
see?" If he had been with her on permission he would have gone
back! What torture! And she said to herself: "If he had not been killed
the second month he would have been killed since then: twenty
months without respite under the shells!"
Days passed; the German attack upon Verdun wrought upon the
great public of France a great silence. No noise, not an exclamation,
no excesses in Paris; an imposing calm; a quiet crowd upon the
boulevards, perfect order even on Sunday; almost gayety around the
men who were home on leave who went about surrounded by young
women in short skirts, Anamite caps or toques borrowed from the
Palais, painfully walking on extravagantly high heels! Between four
o'clock and seven every one was reading the newspaper. They were
sold all through the city, not with loud shouts as if all Europe had
been put to fire and sword, as when celebrated trials were going on;
now that Europe actually was put to fire and sword, with less uproar
than after the Auteuil races. In almost every heart the sublimity of the
French struggle, the universal respect which it evoked throughout
the world, overcame apprehension, stifled the sense of uncounted
losses, and dominated that crater on the banks of the Meuse, in
eruption over an extent of thirty-five kilometres, its lava
overwhelming a whole countryside.
Odette was invited to dine with officers who had returned from
that hell, who were going back to it; and these men talked futilities
like every one else: partly from kindliness, partly for their own
pleasure, or in courteous resumption of the decorum of former days.
Between two witticisms they would relate an episode such as no
story of the age of fable could offer. Many of them were men who
two years before had danced the tango, whom strait-laced old
twaddlers had in those days held up to opprobrium. Thus Odette met
again a young fellow of twenty-four, a captain, an officer of the
Legion of Honor, lacking several fingers, wounded in the leg and the
breast. He had the same simplicity, the same childlike grace, as in
the old time at the Casino in Surville, and yet he had taken part in
actions infinitely more grand than those of the Homeric heroes or of
the wars of Cæsar or Alexander.
He kissed a lady's hand, and that same evening went back to the
jaws of the volcano. And that same week the word came that after
having been three times buried alive in the undermined earth, his
young body had been blown to atoms on Hill 304.

XIII

The next morning, her friend La Villaumer having come to see her,
she introduced a subject which had been tormenting her.
"The individuality of the soldier is not obliterated," said La
Villaumer. "Either he expects to come through safe, believing himself
to be a privileged person among the unlucky, or else he says to
himself, 'I shall die, but it will be for something worth while,' and that
even exalts his individuality. When that disappears or becomes
attenuated it is by excess of suffering, of hoping against hope for the
end of all that he is enduring—mud, cold, the incessant wooing of
death, and ills without number, have annihilated in him all power of
thought and feeling. And still it would be speaking too strongly to say
that he goes deliberately to meet death. Never has any living being
failed to pay to death the honor of a particular deference."
"Do you think," asked Odette, "that one's individuality can be
suddenly lost, or is it not rather unconsciously modified from day to
day? You see, in the latter case no one can tell how far the
metamorphosis may go! I see many people who have changed in the
last eighteen months, and who seem not to be aware of it. I feel very
clearly that I myself am different. I find only one part of myself
unchanged; the part which binds me to the memory of my poor
husband; nothing there is modified even in the very slightest degree
—nothing; when I have leisure to think intently of him, I become
again precisely the woman I used to be."
"Yes, but with grief in addition."
"That is true."
"It is that which modifies us. It broadens us when it finds a heart in
us, and for that matter it exists only so far as it finds a heart. It holds
within itself many possibilities. Your grief began with embracing your
personal calamity; that alone; and it still hugs it to itself, that is most
natural; but it has unconsciously taken a further step, embracing the
sorrows of others, a change which you never looked for. And that is
making of you another person."
"Will every one like me find themselves a tone above or below
what they used to be—as if the whole keyboard had been
transposed?"
"I do not think so," said La Villaumer. "Nature changes little. Only
sensitive souls are modified, and they are rare. It is they who at last,
at the long last, act upon and change those around them. Characters
change little, never fear! Yet this war will have been so intense that
those at least who have had a part in it will retain something of it, like
a strong leaven which will cause new things to germinate. We must
expect new things; but we must not look to see the human race
thrown off its centre. Historians, sociologists will have their work to
do, while philosophers, moralists, the general run of writers may go
on as they have done. The word 'democracy,' for instance, will cover
much paper——"
"Do you believe in such a thing, yourself?"
"I believe in the word as I believe in all words. It is a mistake to
disdain the old-fashioned verbalism—rhetoric, eloquence. The
majority of words are hollow—yes, but they are hollow like bells
whose sonorousness may by itself shake the whole world. Those
who use words are inspired by various things, and generally by
sentiments that they cannot acknowledge; yet the word touches the
finest chords in the soul of men whom one wants to win over.
'Democracy' has a tone——"
"Which will work good?—or evil?"
"Alas! The popular instinct and an inevitable necessity urge men,
in spite of words, to enslave themselves, and they will of their own
accord submit to the tyranny of new leaders, new groups
representing interests of which the crowd will know nothing. Almost
all my pessimism is founded on the irresistible character of this law.
Men must be commanded, and no one can be sure that those who
command will not abuse their authority or the confidence which is
freely granted to them. However, the official programme of
democracy will be to devote all its effort to the well-being of poor
humans who have not an average of fifty years to live in this world,
who no longer believe in another world, and who in truth have some
legitimate aspirations to live their few years for their own benefit, and
with as little pain as possible."
"Poor men!"
"Yes, 'poor men!' That expresses the immense pity that will well
up in every breast, throughout the entire universe. Fate will have
demanded much of the human race. No doubt man has suffered
through all time; but in a manner so prolonged and so scientifically
cruel—no! At all events, never have men suffered in such great
numbers; never have they been so acutely conscious of their
sufferings. And then, in former times men who suffered had not been
learnedly informed that the world had come to the end of suffering.
Those who are suffering now believed themselves to have reached
the highest point of a period of progress in every direction. Never
had man more firmly believed himself to be on the border of the
Promised Land, than at the very moment when he stumbled into the
infernal pit! What an aggravation of torment! Men may have been
sacrificed for far-off ends which too often have not been attained;
they may have been obliged, merely for their own preservation as
living beings, to obliterate their own intelligence, and to become
through long years—they themselves have said it—a sort of brute.
Those who will survive will not ask the meaning of subtleties, or will
not be in a condition to understand them. They will have only one
thought: 'And now, what of me, me, me?'"
"A revival of individuality, then?"
"Yes, but of a fierce individuality, in which all that has for so long a
time been stifled within them will urge them on to mistaken acts; or
else of an exhausted individuality which will be the prey of exploiters
never known before."
"Then you do not believe in a general betterment after this
upheaval?"
"I only believe in more or less prolonged periods during which
faith in betterment is possible."
"But, after all, man has goodness within him! He carries an ideal
in his breast!"
"That is to say that he carries within himself—nowhere but in
himself—that small portion of happiness which he may ever hope to
attain. In fact, I hold him to be truly happy only as he exercises
goodness, or as he aspires to what he deems the best. Man, the
child, the savage, very clearly recognizes justice, much less clearly
the beautiful; but the idea of the beautiful, however imperfect it may
be in him, moves and may make him better. If he permits himself to
slide down those inclines which deviate from these ideas, he may
experience a dizzy joy of a bad kind. He may work himself up to
enjoy strange pleasures, but seldom without at the same time
perceiving that he is duping himself, and that pure and deep joy is
not in these things. Yes, it is in himself that man finds his sole source
of felicity, as the glowworm his light. It may be that justice is entirely
inapplicable and the beautiful wholly conventional, but what we may
be sure of is that the inclination toward the just and the beautiful is
most fruitful in happy results, though they will perhaps never find
absolute realization."
"That is all very well; but in fact you believe neither in beauty nor
in justice!"
"I believe in the passionate endeavor of man toward beauty and
justice."