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The Archaeology of the Median Period: an Outline and a Research Perspective

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The Archaeology of the Median Period: an Outline and a Research Perspective Iranica Antiqua, vol. XL, 2005 THE ARCHAEOLOGY OF THE MEDIAN PERIOD: AN OUTLINE AND A RESEARCH PERSPECTIVE BY Bruno GENITO (Università degli Studi di Napoli “L’Orientale”) 1. Introduction Different approaches and viewpoints have been used by scholars, dealing both with the archaeological cultures of the early and dynastic Iran. These two grounds have for long time been strongly remained separated inside the limits of their reciprocal traditional scientific domain and even when compared each other, they never give the same answers to the same ques- tions. The problems related to the archaeology of early Iran has been “pour cause” related to the Indo-European movement and the consequent Iranian arrival into the Plateau, and for that to the general aspects of the prehistoric and linguistic approach to the matter. This long and debated question had different approaches, according to the differing field and area of specialisation: more theoretical and epistemological those of Renfrew (1987) and Mallory (1989) and more related to the Iranian (Harmatta, 1981) or Indian (Erdosy, 1995a; 1995b) perspective. The archaeology of dynastic Iran (the Achaemenid, the Parthian and the Sasanian, including the Median, the Alexandrine and the Seleucid sub- periods) has been, always, considered as a separate specialist ground, * I would like to thank very much Ghent University and the Royal Museums for Art and History, Brussels for the very nice and confortable accommodation in the beautiful city of Ghent. In particular I have to thank Ernie Haerinck and all the organizative staff for having invited me to the Congress and for having waited so long for the delivery of my contribution. A special thought is also due to the late Heleen Sancisi Weerdenburg who encouraged me very much to follow the study and the analyses of the Median question. After different and very far work experiences I am very pleased to go back to the question in this occasion, but I am very sorry to say that, before to deliver this paper, I could not have the possibility to read the contributions in the volume Continuity of Empire (?) Assyria, Media, Persia History of the Ancient Near East Monographs — HANEM 5 Edited by Giovanni Lanfranchi, Michael Roaf, and Robert Rollinger, just published and related to a Symposium held in 2001 in Padova. 316 B. GENITO where the dominant role has been given to the historical, historical-reli- gious and linguistic documentation: in terms of pure ethno-linguistic approach (Rossi, 1981; 1984; 1988), or philological (Rossi, 1986), and in the light of more ample ideological perspective (Gnoli, 1989) or national identity (Gnoli, 1994). Iranologists, as Burney has recently rightly empha- sized, understandably looked at later periods, because alone there may be found the texts (1999, p. 3). The coming of the Iranians on the one hand, and the realization of the long, complex and macroscopic state and dynastic processes on the other, constitute, instead the real issues from an historical point of view, and both should play the same crucial role in the archaeological approach as well. Those two distinct scientific fields, nevertheless, are more related to one another than might be expected, and still both wait for an adequate archae- ological interpretation. The continuity between the moment of the coming of the Iranians and of the realization of the first dynastic power into the Plateau, is very well highlighted by the “Median” period, which, chrono- logically, fully belongs to the early Iran, whilst as the expression of an “historical/legendary” list of kings belongs, from the other, to the dynas- tic. The patrilineal descent of the Medes has been dealt with many times by different scholars; recently either as belonging to a framework of pop- ular saga and tales (Helm, 1981), or as subject of very difficult and still unsolved philological aspects of ancient sources (Scurlock, 1990)1. Some of the events connected to the Herodotean Median history, like those related to the Scythian king Madyas and his son Prothothyes (Her. I, 103) (identifiable with the Assyrian name of the King of Scythia Partatua), his marriage with a daughter of Esarhaddon (Omen texts of Esarhaddon) (Labat, 1961), and the Kyaxares’s banquet whereas all the Scythians were 1 The list of the Median Kings according to Herodotus (I, 101) is: Deioces (55 or 53 years, possibly from 700/699 to 647/699 or 728 to 675) to be compared with the name of Daiukku, one of the governor of Manna (Annals of Sargon II, 722-705); Phraortes (I, 102) (22 years, possibly from 647/646 to 625/624 or 675 to 653) to be compared with a Zagros rebel by name Kashtaritu (Omen texts of Esharaddon); Kyaxares (I, 103) (40 years, from 625/624 to 585/584 or 653 to 585) to be compared with the name of the Babylonian Chronicles Umakishtar; after follows the so-called Scythian domination (I, 106)(28 years, starting possibly from 635 or 625), Arbaxes (mentioned only by Ctesias), Astyages (I, 107) (35 years 585/584 to 550-549) to be compared with the name of the Babylonian Chronicles of Ishtumegu. THE ARCHAEOLOGY OF THE MEDIAN PERIOD 317 killed (Her. I, 106), are clear examples of a history being mixed with a very doubtful legendary context. If one considers historically reliable that dynastic line, then one must also conventionally define the Median period as an “early-dynastic” phase, recognizing, furthermore, that its reconstruction is only based on historical grounds (Greek, Assyrian, Babylonian and Biblical sources, etc.). The archaeological documentation of the period is rather different; meanwhile the material evidence of the early Iranians is little known and it is for the major part practically un-attributable, that of the dynastic Iran is much more known, at least as far as the objects and the monumental artistic, architectural and epigraphic remains are concerned (Genito, 1996; 2000). For the early-dynastic Iran, i.e. the “Median” period it is hardly possible to single out archaeological horizons not always ethnically attrib- utable from the viewpoint of its material culture (Muscarella, 1986; 1994; Genito, 1986; 1995). The main phases of the Iron Age on the plateau have been distinguished somewhat differently by different scholars, according to the geographical area. The early modern proposal was formulated in the 70’ (Young, 1967) with main three chronological horizons; now, more or less unanimously, that chronology has been widely re-considered with the enlargement in four periods with other various and inner, though doubtfully, distinctions. The particular complexity of the Iron Age archaeological remains in Iran was soon recognised by scholars and this is why they tried to collect all of the related material culture (mainly pottery), in different periods. According to the accepted chronology, the archaeological horizon of the “Median period” corresponds to the transitional moment between the Iron Age II and III, the Iron Age I having being generally considered as the cul- tural expression of the newcomers of Iranian identity and the IV as fully merged into the Achaemenid and post-Achaemenid age. Easy associations between determined ceramic classes and a group of ancestors of historical peoples led, in the past, scholars to formulate a complex set of theories regarding origins, migrations, invasions, conquests and decadences, strongly confirmed, later with the help of accurate maps of distribution and chronological tables. One of these theoretical con- structs was certainly that related to the Indo-Aryan migration to Iran and India, through the spread of the “Grey Pottery”. With this term hundreds of different classes of pottery collected in an enormous area, extending from Sinkiang to northern India and Mesopotamia, across a very long 318 B. GENITO period of time, at least from 3000 to 500 BC, were considered all to belong to the same type, even though they had in common only the colour of the body and surface (Tosi and Vidale, 1999, p. 123). Following that construct it was suggested that the introduction of grey and grey-black pot- tery into western Iran from Northeast, would have indicated the beginning of the Iron Age and the archaeological expression of a gradual movement of Iranians from east to west. Against those theories Iron Age on the plateau remains much more complicated and still difficult to be identified from an archaeological point of view: what we can reconstruct is only a major dislocation of cultural and historical patterns in north-western Iran2 2 A brief and organic synthesis of the distribution and chronological attribution of the pottery of Iron Age in NW Iran was made by Brown (1986). According to him Iron Age I (1500-1100) is mainly represented by the ‘Elamite' goblets in the Mahidasht/Kerman- shah area (Jameh Shuran III) and in Luristan (Tepe Giyan). In Kangavar Valley (the Godin graves) and Hamadan plain, it is also marked by the so-called Early Western Grey Ware horizon (Hasanlu V/Dinkha Tepe in Azerbaijan). Iron Age II (1100?- 750? BC) is represented in the Mahidasht/Kermanshah area and in Luristan (Baba Jan III) by the ‘genre Luristan' painted ware. Iron III (800? — c.350? B.C.) with the pottery of Jameh Shuran II can be divided into early and late phases: the early represented by the mixed ‘genre Luristan'/micaceous buff ware of Baba Jan II, and the micaceous buff ware of Nush-i Jan I (main occupation and squatter) and Jameh Shuran IIB; the late therefore approximately linkable with the historic Achaemenid period. For Iron IV [ca. 350? — 150? B.C.] one intends to consider all material later than Godin II, but earlier than the Parthian ‘clinky ware' horizon. For Kurdistan and Azerbaijan, the Iron III/IV interface can be further characterized by the disappearance of the triangle ware horizon.
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