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Hellenistic Epigraphic Texts from Gordion*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 December 2013

Lynn E. Roller
Affiliation:
University of California, Davis

Extract

The excavations at Gordion have produced extensive material to be added to the epigraphical record of central Anatolia. Included in this are 187 Phrygian texts written in the epichoric script of Gordion, which have recently been published by Claude Brixhe and Michel Lejeune, and a large body of pottery marks, numerical texts, and other non-verbal graffiti, which has been studied by the present author. There is in addition a quantity of epigraphical material from the Hellenistic levels at Gordion not discussed in these two works. While their individual character is quite varied, these Hellenistic texts have in common the fact that all were written in Greek script. Eleven of them consist of words or short phrases in the Greek language, while the remainder are owners' marks, i.e., names or abbreviations of names. These texts shed light on several aspects of the site during the Hellenistic period. They help document the decline of both Phrygian script and language in the settlement. They also suggest probable shifts of population during the late fourth and third centuries B.C. through the increasing use of common Greek proper names and the occurrence of Celtic names. In general, they provide a glimpse of the impact of the Greek presence on the local Phrygian populace during the fourth and third centuries B.C.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © The British Institute at Ankara 1987

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References

1 Brixhe and Lejeune, 75–214. (For abbreviations additional to those listed for this journal see end of article.)

2 GSS 1.

3 This date comes from an examination of the material in a series of cellars which appear to have been hastily dug through the floors of the monumental buildings, presumably to clear away the earthquake debris. Note especially the material from two large cellars, the North and South Cellars, Young, R. S., “The Gordion Campaign of 1965,” AJA 70 (1966) 268–9CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Young dated the earthquake to the mid-fifth century, but further study of the material from the North and South Cellars has made an early fourth century date seem more likely.

4 Both the terminology and the chronology for this period are derived from Frederick Winter's study of the Hellenistic black glazed wares found at Gordion.

5 Strabo 12.5.1–2; Livy 38.16. Winter, 46–7, has suggested that Gordion was actually abandoned for a little over a quarter century, ca. 275–40 B.C., basing his arguments largely on a hiatus in the record of imported objects, i.e. imported Greek pottery, stamped amphora handles, and coins. There is, however, no observable hiatus in the stratification of the habitation levels, and so it seems more likely that people continued to live in Gordion, but that their commercial contacts, and perhaps other forms of communication with the Greek world, were disrupted for a time.

6 Livy 38.18.11–14.7

7 Winter 3–4. See also Winter, , “PIXE Analysis and Late Classical and Hellenistic Imports to Gordion,” AJA 90 (1986) 185Google Scholar. Even if the origin of the imported black glazed wares were known, it still would be difficult to give a precise chronological date, since the black glazed fabrics of the Greek cities in western Anatolia and Rhodes, the most likely sources for vessels imported into Gordion, have not received the kind of scholarly attention given to Athenian wares and their dates and forms of development are not well known.

8 GSS 1, nos. 2B–61, 2B–65, 2B–67, 2B–74, 2B–83, 2B–88, 2B–90, 2B–96, 2B–97, 2B–103, 2B–105, 2B–107, 2B–108, 2B–409, 2B–112, 2B–113, 2B–135, 2B–137, 2B–138, 2B–140, 2B–141, 2B–149, 2B–153, 2B–156, 2B–169, 2B 178, 2B–181, 2B–196.

9 In fact, some of the items included in this corpus are just that, common Anatolian names written with Greek letters.

10 See the discussion in GSS 1, xxiiiGoogle Scholar. Of the 23 letters in the Phrygian script which are attested epigraphically at Gordion, 6 are uniquely Phrygian, but the remaining 17 (including the digamma) are common to both Greek and Phrygian. Of the 24 letters of the standard Greek alphabet, eight, Z, H, Θ,Ξ,Φ,Χ,Ψ,Ω never occur in Phrygian script.

11 Among the examples of graffiti consisting of one, two, or three individual letters included in GSS 1, the great majority, approximately 140 examples, occur on pottery dating from the city's post-monumental phases. Of these, about a dozen are very likely to be abbreviations of common Greek names, but the ethnic of the remainder is uncertain due to the brevity of the texts.

12 GSS 1, 2B–60 through 2B203Google Scholar.

13 Names in the nominative: 19, 22, 25, 44, 46.

14 Names in the genitive: 15, 16, 17 (two names), 21, 26, 29, 31, 36, 41, 42.

15 Uncertain: no. 28. We should also note nos. 20, 27, 32, 34, and 37, which, while only partially preserved, do include the final letters; these names also appear to be in the nominative case.

16 For examples of this name in Old Phrygian script, see Brixhe and Lejeune, G–107, G–118, G–123. G–128, G–221, G–224, G–234.

17 Examples of the name in Greek script are cited by Zgusta, no. 1199–1.

18 For the Phrygian name, see Brixhe and Lejeune, G–06, G–121, G–184, G–253.

19 Brixhe and Lejeune, no. G–275. The phonetic value of the letter is unknown.

20 See note 6 above. As Ramsay, W. M., “Phrygo-Galatian Slaves,” Classical Review, 12 (1898) 341–3Google Scholar, notes, however, a large portion of the central Anatolian population whom the Greeks and Romans called Galatians were in fact Phrygians.

21 Galatian names form only a small part of the prosopographical record at Pessinous and Ankara as well, even though it seems fairly certain that the Galatians formed a larger percentage of the population than the limited evidence implies. See Devreker, J., Les fouilles de la Rijksuniversiteit te Gent à Pessinonte, 1967–1973 (Brugge 1984) 21Google Scholar.

22 For examples of Gordion epigraphical texts from this late date in the local Phrygian script, see Brixhe and Lejeune, nos. G–150, G–220, G–221, G–230, G–231, G–233, G–236, G–244, G–247, G–252, G–253, G–254, G–262. G–275.

23 Our knowledge of the Phrygian language at Gordion is restricted by the paucity of texts containing more than a proper name, but we should note one example, Brixhe and Lejeune, no. G–221, a Phrygian text of at least five lines dating from the fourth century B.C.

24 There are a few cases of individual letters in the Phrygian script which appear to be from the late 3rd century B.C., see GSS 1, nos. 2B–200, 2B–202, 2B–203.

25 Friedrich, J., Kleinasiatische Sprachdenkmäler (Berlin 1932) 128140CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

26 Robert, passim.

27 On Skorpos and Dia, see the discussion in the catalogue entries. Diodoros, while a common Greek name, was borne by two Phrygian slaves, Sammlung der griechischen Dialektinschriften no. 1710, cf. Ramsay (supra n. 20) 342. Menekrates occurs frequently in the corpus MAMA, perhaps because of its similarity to the Anatolian name Manes.

28 This, of course, does not exclude the possibility that the Galatians spoke a Celtic language, a point implied by Livy 38.24.

Dr. Irene B. Romano, who is preparing a study of the Hellenistic terracotta figurines from Gordion, informs me that the influence of these three groups in the population can be also noted in the style and inconography of the figurines.

29 The Trojan queen Hecuba came from a Phrygian city on the Sangarios, (Iliad 16.717–19Google Scholar); could it have been Gordion?

30 Note a 4th century B.C. inscription from Thera, , IG XII, 7, no. 436Google Scholar.

31 We should remember, however, that there are also ca. 140 pieces with single letters and monograms from the post–monumental phases of Gordion published in GSS 1.

32 Brixhe and Lejeune present approximately 170 texts in Phrygian pre-dating the Hellenistic period. Sixty more, consisting of one or two letters, plus about 150 examples of non-alphabetic marks of the same period are published in GSS 1.

33 Apart from a schematic drawing published in an early preliminary report (see Young, R. S., “Gordion—1950”, University of Pennsylvania Museum Bulletin 16 (1951) 5, pl. 2Google Scholar), no general plan of the post-monumental levels of the city exists; therefore more detailed information about the provenience of an individual piece within the Hellenistic settlement is of little use in coordinating the piece with a known location.

34 Note also the remarks of Boardman, J., “Pyramidal Stamp Seals in the Persian Empire,” Iran 8 (1970) 21CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

35 Weinreich, O., “Stiftung und Kultsatzungen eines Privatheiligtums in Philadelphia in Lydien,” SBHeidelberg 16 (1919) 168Google Scholar = SIG 3 985.

36 Dr. Irene B. Romano informs me that a deposit of figuriness was uncovered in one of the houses from the second post-monumental phase of Gordion (second half of the third–early second century B.C.); this deposit included a figurine of Tyche, one of Kybele, together with other female figures and the two inscribed stone bases discussed below, nos. 7 and 8.

37 Agathos Daimon is one of the divinities mentioned in the inscription from Philadelphia, see above, n. 35.

38 Young, R. S., “Progress at Gordion, 1951–1952,” University of Pennsylvania Museum Bulletin 17 (1953) 7Google Scholar, fig. 3. Naumann, F., Die Ikonographie der Kybele in der phrygischen und in der griechischen Kunst. 1st Mitt Beiheft 28 (Tübingen 1983) pl. 47, fig. 2 and 4Google Scholar.

39 See Roller, L. E.A Hellenistic Statuette from Gordion: Kybele among the Muses,” AJA 90 (1986) 209Google Scholar.

40 Arete is mentioned in the inscriptions from Philadelphia, supra, n. 35. For examples of dedications to Hosios and Dikaios, see RECAM II, p. 16Google Scholar and nos. 44, 45, 242. See also the comments of Gasparro, G. S., Soteriology and Mystic Aspects in the Cult of Cybele and Attis (Leiden 1985) 115, n. 42CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

41 Buck, 32.

42 The other knucklebones with graffiti are all unpublished. Listed according to their Gordion inventory numbers, they are: BI 223, flower within circle; BI 372, flower within two circles; I 211, A; BI 66,Δ; I 187, ΔE; BI 531, ×; I 224; H; I 385, A written twice; I 240, E; BI 385, H. On knucklebones as gaming pieces, see A Guide to the Exhibition Illustrating Greek and Roman Life3 (London 1929) 200–4Google Scholar.

43 For the form of the genitive, see Buck, 87. The name Sokos also occurs in Iliad 11.427 ffGoogle Scholar, as the name of a Trojan warrior.

44 For this form of the genitive, see Buck, 88.

45 On the name Attas, see Robert, 528–30.

46 Brixhe and Lejeune, nos. G–107, G–118, G–119, G–120, G–123, G–124, G–128, G–148, G–234.

47 Young, R. S., “Old Phrygian Inscriptions from Gordion: Towards a History of the Phrygian Alphabet,” Hesperia 38 (1969) 281, no. 46 aCrossRefGoogle Scholar.

48 Young, R. S., “The 1963 Campaign at Gordion,” AJA 68 (1964) 280, pl. 83, fig. 5CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

49 RECAM II, 14Google Scholar.

50 This comment is based on the use of the ix ending, which is attested in other Galatian names of this period, see Weisgerber, L., “Galatische Sprachreste,” Natalicium Johannes Geffcken zum 70. Geburtstag (Heidelberg 1931) 151–75Google Scholar, and Dressier, W., “Galatisches,” Beiträge zur Indogermanistik und Keltologie. Julius Pokorny zum 80. Geburtstag (Innsbruck 1967) 147–54Google Scholar. None of the names proposed here as Galatian can be paralleled exactly by a known Galatian name.

51 Brixhe and Lejeune, nos. G–06, G–121, G–138, G–184, G–253. While this name is often associated with the god Attis (cf. Diodoros 3·58), its use as a personal name need not imply any reference to a divinity. Note the remarks on the use of the name Attis above, and also the comments of Robert, 62–3.

52 Brixhe and Lejeune, 79, and G–275.