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Proceedings of the Danish Institute at Athens • Edited by Seven D ietz © Copyright The Danish Institute at Athens, Athens 1995 The publication was sponsored by: Consul General Gosta Enborns Foundation. The Danish Research Council for the Humanities. Konsul George Jorck og Hustru Emma Jorck’s Fond. Proceedings of the Danish Institute at Athens General Editor: Seren Dietz Graphic design and Production by: Freddy Pedersen Printed in Denmark on permanent paper ISBN 87 7288 721 4 Distributed by AARHUS UNIVERSITY PRESS University of Aarhus DK-8000 Arhus C Fax (+45) 8619 8433 73 Lime Walk Headington, Oxford 0X3 7AD Fax (+44) 865 750 079 Box 511 Oakville, Conn. 06779 Fax (+1) 203 945 94 9468 The cover illustration depicts a Bronze Statuette of a Horse found at the Argive Heraion. NM 13943. Drawing by Niels Levinsen. See p. 55, Fig. 19. Acknowledgements: An earlier version of this article forms part of my Ph.D. thesis, Buried Virtues. Death Rituals in Kerameikos, Athens, 700-400 B.C., Copenhagen 1993. I would like to take this opportunity to thank warmly my supervisor Annette Rathje for constant support across all borders while I was writing my thesis. I also thank cor dially Henrik Jacobsen for the laborious undertaking of helping me to use SPSS PC+, Bengt Petterson for his patient redrawing of my figures and valuable suggestions. The present article also profited greatly from the criticism applied to my earlier manuscript by Lone Wriedt Sorensen, Berit Wells, Mogens Herman Hansen and Anthony Snod grass - but of course no one except myself should be held responsible for the result. I also heartily thank the Faculty of Classics in Cambridge for housing me as a visiting scholar for half a year and the Danish Research Academy for financing this stay. I owe a very special thanks to Novo Nordisk Fonden for having financed my participa tion in conferences and the re-drawing of my figures and also to the State Research Council for the Humanities for financing the English revision of this article. And I thank Peter Crabb for having revised my English. However, I am unable to describe the gratitude I feel towards Anders not only for his constant readiness to discuss, criticize and furnish ideas on this article, but also to take over so many of those roles which I often failed to fulfil. “Burial language” in Archaic and Classical Kerameikos Sanne Helene Abstract for studying the relationship between mortuary practice and social structure. Houby-Nielsen In this article I attempt to present main tenden The theoretical basis has been formulated cies in the archaeological record o f Kerameikos in particular by Anglo-Saxon archaeolo 700-400 B.C. In Part I, I seek to clarify the gists. For many years, the underlying be general principles of family self-representation. lief was that social structure is mirrored in Changing conceptions o f age groups and the burial practice: the more complex the bu male and female sex in Athenian society will rial customs, the more complex was the be seen to play a dominant role and be respon burying society.2 sible fo r a general lack o f fam ily burial plots, In classical archaeology, interest in the but also fo r the difficulty o f deciding whether relation between burial customs and the Attic burial customs reflect the existence o f larg rise of the Greek city-state is linked to this NOTE 1 er kinship organizations. Main structuring debate.3 In other connections, ancient Unless stated otherwise, all principles in vase painting are seen as useful Greek burial practice has sometimes been dates in this article are B.C. analogies to the way gender roles were expressed used as a direct source for elucidating kin NOTE 2 in the actual burial contexts. ship relations and genealogies.4 Binford 1971; Saxe 1970; Recently, I. Morris has, among other for a history of archaeolog In Part II, I deal with the several large tumuli things, demonstrated how the ritual and ical thought, Trigger 1989, excavated in Kerameikos and in the Attic coun symbolic aspects of burial customs in 289-263. tryside. Contrary to current scholarly opinion, some cases impede a direct decoding of NOTE 3 which regards these tumuli as some o f the fe w aspects of the burying society (e.g. de Snodgrass 1977. certain cases o f true fam ily burial plots, I inter mography, invasions, trade, health condi pret them as extreme examples of the will to tions).5 In this he follows recent criticism NOTE 4 express gender roles in burial practice. I thus of former “processual” archaeology put Ker. V I.1, 16 and V II.1, argue that some o f these tumuli rather com forward by “contextual” archaeologists .6 199-201; Bourriot 1976, 831-1039. memorate socio-political associations such as Still, Morris also sees a rather direct rela sympotic and priestly associations. tionship between mortuary practice in At NOTE 5 tica 1100-500 and social organization. Morris 1987, 57-71 and Finally, in Part III, I briefly comment upon the This is particularly apparent in his argu 1992, 70-102. relation between the archaeology o f Kerameikos mentation for “law-like” relations NOTE 6 and the reforms o f Kleisthenes. between certain social groups (agathoi and Hodder 1985 and 1986, kakoi) and certain funerary practices.7 18-33. J. Whitley has lately presented a study on the relation between ceramic style, fu NOTE 7 nerary ritual and social organization in M orris 1987, 57-155, esp. Introduction 94-95. Greece 1100-700, in which he focuses es The main purpose of the present article is pecially on Athens.8 In this work, he em NOTE 8 to show some of the vast possibilities phasizes among other things how in Ath Whitley 1991b. which the study of Archaic and Classical ens differences in ceramic style and funer burials may afford for augmenting our ary practice are in several periods clearly NOTE 9 Whitley 1991b, 96, 105, knowledge of Athenian society.1 related to age and sex.9 On the other 110-111, 132-136, 156-158. There is a long archaeological tradition hand, he also correlates variations over 129 time in grave assemblages (e.g. wealth) to but large kinship groups (gene), w ho re NOTE 10 a development from a less institutionalized ferred to a common mythical ancestor, Whitley 1991b, 96-97, 136-137; see also Whitley hierarchical organization to a firmly estab possessed their own cults and based their 1991a, 357. lished one with a well-defined elite.10 power on hereditary, extensive landed The present study focuses on Keramei- property. These powerful families were NOTE 1 1 kos 700-400. I hope to show that in this thought to bury their dead in private ce Hoffmann 1977; Sourvi- period the relation “burial customs - liv meteries, situated on their estates in order nou-Inwood 1987; Meyer ing society” is very indirect. I will argue to create a more profound sense of prop 1988. that a burial procedure was mainly per erty and attachment to the land. F. Bour- NOTE 12 ceived as an occasion to elaborate upon riot has delivered a 1421-page-long study Bourriot 1976. the reputation of the burying group, the of this conception.12 In a critical analysis close family. For this reason, burial prac of written sources and historiography he NOTE 1 3 tice was defined by the society’s changing argues that our notion of genos is anach Humphreys 1980, 123 warns against the concept m oral concepts pertaining to age and sex. ronistic, being coloured by the role genos of “squirearchy”; Morris The implications of my argumentation are plays in 4th cent, and later sources. To 1987, 90; Whitley 1991b, i.a. that not only do burials not mirror ge strengthen his argument, he devotes about 67; for some reservation nealogy, but they are also most difficult to 200 pages to a survey of funerary practice towards Bourriot’s study, use in reconstructing the size of family - including that of Kerameikos - in which see D ’Agostino/D’Onofrio 1993, 42. units and the strength of family ties. he attempts to prove a lack of evidence for Moreover, ancient age concepts and gen kinship burial plots extending over more NOTE 1 4 der roles impede the reconstruction of so than one or two generations, exceptional Humphreys 1980. cial hierarchies and property classes. On ly four generations, before the 4th cent. the other hand, burials are found to offer Generally, scholars working within funer NOTE 1 5 Od xi 75-6; II. xxiii 245- valuable information on aspects and expres ary archaeology seem to accept Bourriot’s 248; xxiv 797-801 sions of family self-representation and of conclusions on Attic burial practice.13 elite status. Nevertheless, as pointed out by S. Hum NOTE 1 6 My argument that burial practice - in phreys14, even (nuclear) family burial Garland 1982. ways very similar to funerary art and epi groups are not easily identified before the NOTE 17 taphs - serves to express and formulate 4th cent, in Attica. Burials, especially in Humphreys 1980, 112- mental images pertaining to age and sex the Archaic period, tend to be individual 121. does not make material remains of funer ly marked by a tumulus or grave building. ary rituals stand apart from other aspects Such burials often lie in groups, within NOTE 18 of material culture in Athenian society - which it is most difficult to distinguish For non-periboloi burials, see AM 1966:1, 77 and on the contrary. For instance, several family units.