164doi: 10.2143/ANES.43.0.2018769 G. D. SUMMERS ANES 43 (2006) 164–202 Aspects of Material Culture at the Iron Age Capital on the Kerkenes Dag in Central Anatolia G. D. SUMMERS Adjunct Associate Professor Department of Anthropology University of Buffalo, SUNY USA & Graduate Program in Settlement Archaeology Institute of Social Sciences, Middle Eastern Technical University Ankara 06531 TURKEY E-mail: [email protected] In Memory of Prof. Dr. Tahsin Özgüç Abstract The exceptional Iron Age capital on the Kerkenes Dag in the upland centre of modern Turkey is the largest pre-Hellenistic city in Anatolia. It appears to have been a new foundation established at the end of the seventh century BC. It was destroyed by fire and its 7 km. of stone defences thrown down in, it seems, the mid sixth century BC after which all but the acropolis of this 250 hectare site was abandoned. Recent research has revealed considerable evidence for Phrygian cul- ture, including architecture, inscriptions and graffiti. This paper selectively sum- marises these new discoveries while making a preliminary attempt to place them within a wider Anatolian setting. Introduction1 This paper ultimately stems from two presentations given at the Third Colloquium on the Ancient Near East — The City and its Life held at the 1 Many reports, graphics, biliography, lists of team members and sponsers, in both Eng- lish and Turkish, can be found at: www.kerkenes.metu.edu.tr I am grateful to, amongst oth- 9225-06_Anes_43_08_Summers 164 17/1/07, 4:15 pm ASPECTS OF MATERIAL CULTURE AT THE IRON AGE CAPITAL 165 Middle Eastern Culture Centre in Japan in March 2004. The theme of this most excellent and enjoyable meeting was “Cultural Continuity and Dis- continuity in Ancient Anatolia”. I am pleased to take this opportunity to thank Dr. Sachihiro Omura for generously extending an invitation to present two papers at this colloquium, one on recent discoveries at Kerkenes and the other placing those discoveries in a wider setting. Since the Tokyo meeting there have been two further seasons, in 2004 and 2005, of geophysical survey and excavation at Kerkenes.2 These recent results have amplified evidence of cultural associations while definitive studies of a sculpted monument inscribed in Old Phrygian together with graffiti and other sculpture are eagerly awaited.3 Otherwise, both dendrochronlogical confirmation of a sixth century date and positive proof for dating the de- struction to the middle of the century continue to be frustratingly elusive. In keeping with the original flavour of the presentations given in Japan, the interpretations placed on incomplete evidence and suggestions that are built on those interpretations in this paper are very tentative. This is very much a work in progress. On the other hand, completion of the current ers, Susanne Berndt-Ersöz, Scott Branting, Nicholas Cahill, Kieth DeVries, Catherine Draycott, Hermann Genz, Crawford Greenewalt, Peter Kuniholm, Oscar Muscarella, Kenneth Sams, David Stronach, Françoise Summers, Natalie Summers and Mary M. Voigt for much valuable discussion, and to Marie-Henriette Gates for careful reading of a draft copy. I should add that while Françoise Summers has not co-authored this paper, without her continual drive and energy none of what follows would have been possible. 2 I am pleased to acknowledge here the support of the University of Melbourne, and par- ticularly Antonio Sagona, the depth of which is deeper than the collaborative grant that the University of Melbourne made towards the 2005 season. We expect that Kerkenes will con- tinue offer mutual academic stimulus as well as opportunities for interaction and participa- tion. I would also like to thank the Turkish Ministry of Tourism and Culture, and particularly the General Directorate of Museums and Cultural Assets as well as the staff of the Yozgat Museum, Governors of Yozgat province and District Governors of Sorgun together with the many local officials who have wholeheartedly welcomed us and facilitated our work. We hope that we have in some small way reciprocated through the full involvement of Turkish stu- dents as well as the implementation of the Kerkenes Eco-Center Project aimed at village de- velopment and rural sustainability. The research is officially sponsored by the BIAA. In addition to the Melbourne support already mentioned I would single out the Loeb Classical Library Foundation, the Joukowsky Family Foundation and the Oriental Institute at Chicago University, as well as an anonymous donor, for support of the excavations at the Monumental Entrance to the palatial complex while the Lafarge Foundation supports research students involved in the Kerkenes project at the Middle East Technical University at Ankara. It would take several pages to name all of the individuals, institutions and organisations, Turkish and foreign, who have provided support and as much again to acknowledge the indi- vidual contributions of the many team members. Such is the nature of a large international project. I can only offer a collective thank you! 3 Brixhe and Summers (in press), sculpture is being studied by Catherine Draycott. 9225-06_Anes_43_08_Summers 165 17/1/07, 4:15 pm 166 G. D. SUMMERS program of excavation at the “Cappadocia Gate” and the “Monumental Entrance to the Palace Complex” in 2005 might make this selective sum- mary of current thinking of some value to students of Iron Age archaeology in Anatolia and beyond. Location of Kerkenes and its Identification with Pteria Kerkenes is located on a low granitic mountain on the northern edge of the Cappadocian Plain (Fig. 1). The choice of this elevated and exposed position demonstrates preferences that outweighed the disadvantages of long and bitter winters combined with exposure to strong winds.4 Caravans or hostile forces alike approaching Kerkenes from the south and southeast would have been impressed or intimidated by distant views of its gleaming new walls. The position commands a natural east-west route, today fol- lowed by the modern transcontinental highway, while overlooking several possible ways northwards to the Black Sea, south to the Cilician Gates or southeast towards the mountain passes of the Anti-Taurus. One important factor in the choice of this particular location was doubt- less the relative abundance of perennial water seeping from fissures in the granite. Part of an explanation for the exceptional size of the walled city, 2.5km2 surrounded by seven kilometres of stone defences pierced by just seven city gates, may very well have been the desire to include sufficient water sources within the circuit (Fig. 2).5 It seems reasonable to suggest that the ancient name of this, the largest known pre-Hellenistic city in Anatolia, would occur somewhere in the an- cient records. If this presumption has validity there is only one candidate, and that is the place that Herodotus calls Pteria.6 This equation was first perceived by Przeworski a year after von der Osten's first publication of the site,7 while the arguments were more fully set out by the present author.8 The textual evidence has recently been subjected to detailed scrutiny by 4 A suggestion made early on in research at Kerkenes, before the truly urban nature was understood, that the city might have been a seasonal capital has been abandoned. 5 On the east side of the Kale, for instance, the line of the wall appears not to follow the most defensible line of the Kale itself but a course further to the east, with the result that springs at the base of the Kale lay protected within the defences. 6 It is however true that the ancient name of Midas City, to take but one example, is un- known. On the other hand, if the dates of the foundation, and consequently of the destruc- tion, are to be raised significantly it might be expected that some mention of the city at Kerkenes would be recognisable in Neo-Assyrian records from the time of Midas. 7 Przeworski, 1929, following Osten, 1928. For the history of exploration see, for the mo- ment, Summers and Summers 1998. 8 Summers 1997. 9225-06_Anes_43_08_Summers 166 17/1/07, 4:15 pm ASPECTS OF MATERIAL CULTURE AT THE IRON AGE CAPITAL 167 Tuplin.9 There is no cause to repeat or amplify those arguments here; suf- fice it to say that the strong arguments in favour of identifying Kerkenes with Pteria depend on the destruction being in some way connected with events surrounding the “Battle of Pteria” fought between Cyrus the Great of Persia and Croesus, King of Lydia, around the middle of the sixth cen- tury BC. This would have taken place but a few weeks before the capture of the Lydian capital Sardis for which a date in the 540s seems highly prob- able.10 Kerkenes as a new Foundation Whether or not the Kerkenes Dag was the Hittite Mount Daha and re- gardless of what Hittite cult installations may lay buried beneath, or have been obliterated by, Iron Age structures and terraces, it is safe to say there was no urban settlement at the site before the foundation of the Iron Age city.11 No Second Millennium pottery or objects have ever been found. Ten years of extensive and intensive remote sensing, employing balloon photog- raphy, micro-topographic differential GPS survey together with a variety of geophysical methods have shown that the major streets and many of the urban blocks were laid out only after the line of the city defences and, at the same time, the position of each of the city gates had been decided upon (Figs 3 and 4).12 There are good reasons to think that much of the urban plan together with the internal division of urban space, formed an integral part of the process of founding the city — indeed it is hard to imagine that it could have been otherwise — even if many less desirable portions of ur- ban space, such as steep slopes and marshy areas, were left open in the ini- tial phase of establishment.