Colors, Gilding and Painted Motifs in Persepolis: Approaching the Polychromy of Achaemenid Persian Architectural Sculpture, c. 520-330 bce by Alexander Nagel A Dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the Requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy (Classical Art and Archaeology) in the University of Michigan 2010 Doctoral Committee: Professor Margaret C Root, Co-Chair Professor Elaine K. Gazda, Co-Chair Professor Carla M. Sinopoli Professor Christopher J. Ratte Professor Kamyar Abdi - >'■' . ■ • - <3P • >£ t* : A *W # ^ Through the Lens: Blue Pigment from a Squeeze of the Cuneiform Inscriptions on the Facade of the Tomb of Darius I (f 486 BCE) at Naqsh-e Rustam in Iran (Ernst Herzfeld Archives, Freer Gallery of Art and Arthur M. Sackler Gallery, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC) © Alexander Nagel 2010 For I., L. and W. Nagel 11 Acknowledgments This dissertation was a tr uly int ernational collaborative p roject with lots o f c ollegial spirit. It could not have been written, and the project could never have happene d without the de dicated c ontribution of a large number of people in the US, in Iran, and Europe. This dissertation is, if nothing else, all about culture-crossing, language and otherwise. Multicultural dialogue has been imperative from the very beginning. Space permit s me to mention only a few of those who have helped tremendously in shaping this dissert ation. The actual decision to delve deep into the complex and rich world of Achaemenid Persia began as the result of the tremendous inspiration I got from Margaret Coo l Root in Ann A rbor. It w as t hrough he r c lasses t hat 1, 1 ike s o m any ot her s tud ents, w as first exposed to the pre-modern cultures of Iran. She introduced me to the world of th e artistic of pre-Islamic Iran and the Achaemenid Persians in the first place. Her enthusia sm for the arts and archaeology of the ancient Near East led me and others safely and infec ted me from t he ve ry first da y of c lass. S he he lped t o bring t he ruins of P ers epolis a live a nd encouraged m e t o pu rsue t he i deas I h ad. O ur m eetings i n h er office i n t he Kelsey Museum a t A nn A rbor, i n C ambridge/UK a nd i n W ashington, D C w ere filled with the exchange of ideas and I want to thank her humor in good times and bad, in e-mail s, over phone, and in person. Elaine Gazda has been such a constant source of academic inspiration and moral support it is hard to express my thanks. She was the most careful reader and dis ciplined and dedicated advisor. I also greatly benefited and learned from discussions wit h Carla Sinopoli, C hris Ratte, and C laudia C hemello, w ho w as influential i n formin g the in methodological framework a nd p rovided c ritics and he lpful commentaries on sp ecific issues and problems at the very beginning. At first, there was only a rather vag ue idea of what c olors a nd g ilding a re m ade of . T hen, t here w ere c hemical e lemen ts, a nd t he uncertainties in detecting even the most basic information. I w ould 1 ike toe xpress m y de epest gr atitude t o M ohammad H asan T alebian , Director of t he Parsa-Pasargadae Research Foundation, a nd K amyar A bdi, t rav eller between the cultures, so diverse only at first sight, themselves, for the contin uing support throughout the project from the very beginning. I am extremely grateful to the s taff and workmen o fP ersepolis. In p articular, I would like t o t hank M aziar K azemi, G eneral Manager of Persepolis, and Hasan Rahsaz, Director of the Conservation and Restor ation Group and his dedicated team, and all the staff members working on the site. A g reat big thank you goes out to my ne w friends i n Iran. F or t remendous h elp, comments and insightful di scussions I w ould 1 ike to t hank my friends AHA sadi, A lireza A sgari Chaverdi, Javad Jafari, Koroush M ohammadkhani and Afshin Yazdani, Saeid Rahmati , Maryam Rahsaz, Reza S heikholeslamy, M osa Zare, A buzir Shobeiry, Mehrnaz and Keramat Bordbar a nd Z arah M azoun i n P ersepolis, M ahnaz G orji, and Mohamma d Karger, the former General Director of National Museum of Iran, and Mohammad Rez a Mehrandish, t he present G eneral D irector of N ational M useum of I ran i n T ehran, a nd Anita Hemmati Pure, Curator. In Tehran, I would like to thank Abdulrasoul Vatand oust, former Director of the Research Centre for Conservation of Cultural Relics, Iran for his support f or t he pr oject, Firouzeh S epidnameh, and M argrit H akimpour a nd B arbara Helwing of the German Archaeological Institute. IV I o we m y de epest gratitude t o the di rectors and r epresentatives of t he s taff of archaeologists working on the preservation of the major Achaemenid capital in mo dern Shush, ancient S usa, especially M ohammad Reza C hitsas, former di rector of Sh ush Archaeological C omplex, RezaChanany, General M anager, Bijan Heydari and Kazem Borhaniahang from t he C onservation T earn, and M osa Zare, Lida S ayahi a nd S ara Esmaeili for a rranging contacts, dr iving a nd pr oviding a ccess t o s tudy s ome of t he material discussed here. I would like to thank Fatima Mohseni for sharing inform ation on her important work on the wall paintings from the Shaour Palace. For sharing kno wledge about the magnificent site of Pasargadae I would like to thank Hamid Reza Karami . For the invi tation and permission to include r ecently excavated material from the s ite of Qaleh Kali on the old Achaemenid royal road between Persepolis and Susa I would like to thank Professor Daniel Potts, University of Sydney, and the members of his de dicated team, Bernadette McCall, Amanda Dusting, Sydney, and Cameron Petrie in Cambridge . In Italy, I was fortunate to conduct research in the documentation archives of A nn Britt and Giuseppe Tilia, today in the branch of the Istituto Italiano per lAfri ca e l'Oriente (IsIAO, former Istituto Italiano per il Medio ed Estremo Oriente) Museo Nazional e dArte Orientale ' Giuseppe Tucci'. Access to the papers of Giuseppe and Ann Britt Tili a, who worked for IsMEO on the colors of Persepolis during their long involvement on th e site between 1964 and 1978, was kindly provided by Gherardo Gnoli, Umberto Sinatti an d Oscar Nalesini. I owe special t hanks t o Pierfrancesco C allieri of t he U nive rsity at Bologna, w ho s upported m y w ork i n va rious w ays, a nd m y good friend G ia n P ietro Basello, Ravenna. For pe rmission t o s tudy a nd i nclude i mportant Persepolitan doc umentation and objects from the collections and archival records of the Oriental Institute at C hicago, I owe pa rticular t hanks t o G eoffrey E mberling, G il S tein, J ohn L arson, a nd H elen McDonald. F or pe rmission t o study the s cientific r eports a nd doc umentatio n f rom recently conducted an alysis of a r elief s culpture f rom t he Hall of 100 Colu mns from Persepolis in the Arthur M. Sackler Museum at Harvard I express my sincerest gra titude to S usanne E bbinghaus, toe onservation s cientists K atherine E remin, N araya n Khandekar, and J udith Lerner. In N ew Y ork, J udith a nd A Ian Lerner were e x tremely generous, making most important information available to me from the time when J udith was w orking on the col ors of P ersepolis: I had a great t ime at N ew J ersey and B ruce Springsteen rocks! In France, I would like to thank Beatrice A ndre-Salvini, Agnes Benoit, Brigitte Bourgouis, Annie Caubet, Francois Demange, and Elisabeth Fontan. In the UK, I wo uld like to thank St John Simpson, Janet Ambers, British Museum, London, Lindsay All en, and Betsy McCormick. I thank Lucilla Burn, and Anders Allen, Cambridge for allow ing me to study an object from P ersepolis in the Fitzwilliam M useum. In Berlin, I ow e particular thanks to Stefan Simon, Sabine S chwertfeger, Regina Ricarda-Pausewei n, and especially Marisa Pamplona of the Rathgen Forschungs-Labor, who joined me on one of my tr ips to Takht-e J amshid and was 1 eading me s afely t hrough the d ata r e ports and assured me what is possible, what is not possible to detect with hard science eq uipment. I also thank R alfB . W artke, Barbara F eller, Evelyn Klengel-Brandt an d Beate S alje, Vorderasiatisches Museum, and Jens Kroger and Ute Franke-Vogt, Islamisches Museu m. Continuing across the globe in Europe, I would like to thank Jan Stubbe Ostergaa rd, and VI Maria-Louise Sargent in the Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek in Copenhagen in Denmark, and all members participating in the fantastic Copenhagen Polychromy Network project.