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The Middle Persian and Parthian Inscriptions on the Paikuli Tower

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The Middle Persian and Parthian Inscriptions on the Paikuli Tower Iranica Antiqua, vol. XLIX, 2014 doi: 10.2143/IA.49.0.3009246 THE MIDDLE PERSIAN AND PARTHIAN INSCRIPTIONS ON THE PAIKULI TOWER. NEW BLOCKS AND PRELIMINARY STUDIES1 BY Carlo G. CERETI & Gianfilippo TERRIBILI (“Sapienza” University of Rome) Abstract: The Paikuli inscription celebrates the victory of the Sasanian Emperor Narseh (293 – 302\3 AD) over his nephew, Wahram III, in the dynastic war which followed the death of Wahram II. It was built on the spot where Narseh met the nobles and notables of the Sasanian Empire, who had come to the border of Asorestan to pay him allegiance. The text is almost identical in its two versions and can be divided in two main parts, the first describing the events of the dynas- tic war, the second containing a long list of nobles and notables who sided with Narseh. The remains of the tower rise in a beautiful Zagros valley on top of a small hill overlooking the modern village of Barkal at the foot of the Paikuli pass, not far from the town of Darband-i Khan. Narseh’s inscription is one of the most important surviving primary sources for the history of the Sasanian dynasty, though its value as an historical document is considerably decreased because of 1 Many persons of good will have helped us to establish the presence of the Italian Archaeological Mission to Kurdistan and previously to develop our cooperation projects. The authors wish to thank Malaawat Abubaker Othman Zendin, Director General for Antiquities of Iraqi Kurdistan, Kamal Rashid Rahem (Director of Antiquities of Sulaimaniya) and Hashem Hama Abdullah (Director of the Museum of Sulaimaniya) for their constant support to our project. Special thanks are due to Angela Bizzarro, in charge of the photographic documentation, who carried out together with Gianfilippo Terribili a specific documentation campaign on the materials kept in the Museum of Sulaimaniya; she digitally processed all photos and drawings accompanying this paper checking the compatibility of blocks one with the other. We also wish to thank all those who until now took part in this project, on the Iraqi side Pakshan Mohammad (Supervisor), Mohammad Salih Karem (Geologist), Dleva Abdullah Ali (Geologist), Mahabad Amin (Archaeologist), Bykhal Abdullah (Archaeologist), Shahlal Omer (Accountant), and Karwan Abdulrahman Omer (chemist-conservator) and on the Italian side Simona Artusi, Pierfrancesco Callieri, Luca Colliva, Barbara Faticoni, Roberta Giunta, Dario Marletto, Giuseppe Morganti, Samuele Ranucci, Fabrizio Sinisi, Stefano Tilia and Alessandro Tilia of Studio 3R, who all at different stages worked at our project in the Museum of Sulaimaniya. Special thanks are due to the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, to the Italian Development Cooperation, to the “Sapienza” University of Rome and to the Soudavar Foundation who generously supported this project. 96550.indb 347 25/02/14 13:49 348 CARLO G. CERETI — GIANFILIPPO TERRIBILI its fragmentary state of preservation. From 2006 onwards an Italian team has been investigating the monument, leading extensive surveys in the valley and studying the materials now kept in the Sulaimaniya Museum, both activities continuing to the present day. This led to the identification of a total of 19 new inscribed blocks (11 MP and 8 Pth.), which are presented in this article. Keywords: Iran, Sasanian Dynasty, Paikuli Inscription, Narseh, Wahram III, Middle Persian, Parthian In this paper we are going to present a number of new blocks belonging to the Middle Persian and Parthian versions of the Paikuli (Paikuli) inscrip- tion, which have been identified in recent years. From 2006 onwards an Italian team has been documenting and studying 106 inscribed stone blocks and fragments, all coming from the Paikuli tower and the area around it, which are presently kept in the Museum of Sulaimaniya (Slemani) in the Kurdish region of Iraq.2 Our present work aims at integrating Humbach and Skjærvø’s edition, itself based—from the point of view of methodology as well—on Her- zfeld’s materials and critical works, and not at replacing it completely, since many of the readings and reconstructions proposed in their joint work are still perfectly valid.3 In our work we have applied the methodology developed by earlier scholars, systematically comparing the Middle Per- sian and the Parthian version of the inscription, collating, so-to-say, the two versions in order to obtain a continuous narration as complete as pos- sible. Though not entirely orthodox, this methodology is justified by the fact that both versions of the inscription present vast lacunae, since almost a half of the blocks are today missing. Moreover, this approach is also defensible since the texts of the two versions run parallel, with only minor variants. Here we are able to tentatively position the main new blocks in the tex- tual framework of the inscription, including all new clearly recognized 2 For a recent presentation of the status questionis and of the activities of the Italian cooperation mission concerning Paikuli see Cereti-Terribili 2012. 3 See Humbach-Skjærvø 1978-1983 and Herzfeld 1914, 1924 and 1926, though the reconstruction reached by Herzfeld in his later years can only be seen in his archives kept at the Freer Gallery at the Smithsonian Institute in Washington D.C. In this respect, the attentive reader will notice that in some passages we have kept Skjærvø’s translation, given that in our opinion there was no reason to change it. 96550.indb 348 25/02/14 13:49 INSCRIPTIONS ON THE PAIKULI TOWER 349 Middle Persian and Parthian blocks, but still lacking a significant number of blocks and fragments which are either too small or too damaged to be positively identified at the present stage of research. Nevertheless, we aim at completing a new edition of the inscription, presenting all relevant tex- tual, historical and material data.4 A total of 11 new Middle Persian blocks or fragments belonging to previously partly known blocks, have been identified. Moreover, we pro- pose to classify as E16\17 a very worn block, though this identification cannot be taken for sure. The identified blocks are: C2 of which only two lines survive; D1bis, being the upper left corner of block D1, a block known to Herzfeld in a partially damaged form and fitting well with what we suggested to identify as block D2,5 E6 and E8, though the distribution of the text on these two blocks appears different in respect to what suggested by Prods Oktor Skjærvø; E16\17 and E17\18;F18; G1a, being a fragment of block G1, another fragment of which was previ- ously known; G14 (or possibly G15), H5. Eight newly recognized Parthian blocks have also been recovered, while we have not yet been able to place another three blocks, all belonging to the Parthian version, in the inscription’s structure. Identified blocks are: Block a5, rather well preserved, carrying six almost complete lines; a12, almost entirely readable, exception made for a small lacuna in the first line and a few minor gaps; a13 which is a rather slim block, carrying six lines as the preceding ones, almost entirely preserved; c5 also carries six lines, the first and especially the last of which are damaged, the others still satisfactorily readable; c9 is unfortunately very worn and so is c12; five lines of e6 are perfectly preserved, but the first line of the block is almost unreadable; finally, f1which is quite important to understand the architectural design of the monument, though the few letters still readable do not add much to our comprehension of the content matter of the inscription. 4 The Paikuli monument and its inscriptions, together with the history of Herzfeld’s travels to and around Paikuli, were the subject of the Iraj Afshar Lectures held by Carlo Cereti at California State University, Fullerton on November 1, 2008. 5 Comparing blocks D1 and D2 with Humbach’s suggested reconstruction in the Syn- optical tables, we would suggest that D1 was larger and D2 comparatively smaller. 96550.indb 349 25/02/14 13:49 350 CARLO G. CERETI — GIANFILIPPO TERRIBILI Middle Persian blocks Fig.1. Graphic reconstruction of Middle Persian version, based on the philological study of Humbach and Skjærvø (1978-1983, 2, p. 14), the eleven new blocks are marked in grey. PK136 C2 1 2 3 ]h(cw)y [….](ls)[ 4 ]AMT LNE nzdy[ 5[ˆwh](l)[mz](dy) mgw(pt)[ 6 PK20 D1bis 1[OSMEN]d A(YK) 2](ˆy)w YA(T)[WN-] 3 [YM](LL)[WN] 4 5 6 6 [] Reconstructed, () uncertain, |- or -| the word begins in the preceding block or con- tinues in the following one, ] or [a fracture of the rock, while […] marks a lacuna. 96550.indb 350 25/02/14 13:49 INSCRIPTIONS ON THE PAIKULI TOWER 351 PK21 D2 1 [LN](E) M(N) ˆ(l)mn[y ˆ-] 2 […]t A[H](R)[N] H(T) s[kˆ]-|n 3 […] [M](E w)hwnˆm ˆ(p)-|stpty 4 […….](t M)LKA w my(sˆ)-|n 5[ˆ](wnd)ykn MROHY (P)[W]7-|N 6 […..](w)[……] [K]ON p[r]-|ˆc PK31 E6 1 [… …](ˆ)[… … …] 2 -ry strdstn (YT)-|[YBWN] 3 stry-hwtˆdyhy 4 ](l) W dsny LA YHW[ 5 ](OL BBA) ZY (LNE)[ 6](ˆ)s(y)8 M[E] (whwn)[ PK32 E89 1 LK (ˆp)[y]n(y)[dˆpk][…] 2 [M]|-LKA (AYK)[… …. … …] 3 -(B)WN W YDOYT(N)t[…] 4 [w]|-hwnˆm OBY(DWN)t […] 5 -hry10 s(t)[rdˆly][… …] 6 [y]z(dˆn)11[…]L […] [ 7 The reading is here made more difficult by the presence of a few cracks on the rock. Given the context—compare § 23 (B10-11,06) and § 38 (D5-6,03)—the only possible read- ing is (P)[W]-N, the loop of the P being still partly visible.
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