Turfa, 'Archaeology of Early Rome and Latium', Bryn Mawr Classical Review 9503
URL = http://hegel.lib.ncsu.edu/stacks/serials/bmcr/bmcr-9503-turfa-archaeology
@@@@95.3.7, Holloway, Archaeology of Early Rome and Latium (I)
R. Ross Holloway, The Archaeology of Early Rome and
Latium. New York: Routledge, 1994. Pp. xxiii, 203; figs. 126.
ISBN 0-415-08065-7.
Reviewed by Jean Turfa -- Lansdale, PA
This work covers topics of great interest both to a general
(undergraduates) and specialist audience (teachers of Latin and
ancient history, archaeologists) and has identified many of the
hot issues of current scholarship. It discusses with some
authority the prehistoric background of the Italic (and related)
peoples, and most of the key monuments of the early period of
Roman and Latian history. This includes the Roman cities of the
Palatine hut villages, early cemeteries of the Forum and
Esquiline, the Regia and archaic monuments of the Comitium such
as the Lapis niger, and the Forum Boarium and Sant'
Omobono sanctuary. The remains in Latium predating the late
Republic are represented by the better-known or -documented
towns: Gabii (Osteria dell' Osa necropolis), Castel di Decima and
Acqua Acetosa Laurentina (tombs), Ficana (buildings and tombs),
Crustumerium (regional surveys), Lavinium (13 altars complex and
sanctuary of Minerva) and Praeneste (famous tombs). It is sure to
be attractive to students who must work in English, and to
scholars legitimately seeking background outside their own
fields. I fear, though, that discerning readers will often be
disappointed.
H. tells us (xvi) that this book was originally delivered as
a series of lectures in Sao Paolo, and unfortunately, the printed
version betrays its oral origins, apparent in a paucity of
footnote references for the material discussed. Frequently, the
most recent (sometimes variant) articles is cited, but
backup reports etc. are omitted. In a few cases, the author's
eagerness to acquaint his audience with fascinating new material
has outstripped his list of sources (see below, Murlo). And the
highlights of a thought-provoking lecture, the speaker's own
surmises and challenges, are provided here--but an
audience of readers is owed more thoroughly reasoned
arguments if they are to handle surprising new interpretations
(e.g., Sant' Omobono, earliest temple). Rarities and challenges
enliven a slide lecture--but readers cannot assess them properly
without easy access to the original scholarly publications.
Part of the problem is an identity crisis on behalf of Rome.
H. has not established a clear distinction between Roman/Latian
material culture and the culture of the neighboring Etruscans,
Faliscans, Campanians et al. Since he chooses to cite at
length a number of important Etruscan monuments, and to invest a
great deal of description (chap. 12) in the princely tombs of
Praeneste (whose luxury goods, a selection of imports and Italian
utensils, seem characteristic of the Etruscan sphere), he really
ought to have distinguished among these. He further seems to use
the term Punic somewhat indiscriminately, which is annoying,
since "Punic" should refer to the arch-enemies, the Carthaginians
and those old Phoenician colonies within their sphere. Maybe
"pseudo-Egyptian", the epithet most applied to the Phoenicians (4
times on p. 160 alone) is supposed to show the difference. Among
the commercial goods in Latian tombs, H. has dubbed "Punic" an
unspecified number of amphorae which most scholars find to be of
Etruscan or Italic manufacture (pp. 117, 167ff.). H. chose to
follow two divergent articles (chap. 9 note 3) and to omit any
reference to the dozens of substantial corpora documenting these
items. (Petrographic analysis has not covered all forms of
8th-7th century transport amphorae yet. For instance, see the
articles of P. Bartoloni, M. Py and C. Albore-Livadie in the same
volume cited, Il commercio etrusco arcaico; also P.
Pelagatti, ed., Le anfore da trasporto e il commercio etrusco
arcaico [Rome 1990, ongoing].)
The Castel di Decima amphora illustrated as H.'s fig. 9.4,
p. 119, without tomb designation, looks much more Italian than
what H. must have been imagining in parallels, such as the
Levantine ogival amphora from a burial at Pithekoussai, see David
Ridgway, The First Western Greeks [Cambridge 1992,
hereafter cited as FWG] pl. 11 left, vase 339-1, but the
bulging belly and upswept handles of the Decima find set it apart
from genuine Levantine. It presumably came from an
Italian/Etruscan workshop not previously represented in the
archaeological record.
As for identity crises: throughout, all major locations such
as Ardea, Ficana, etc. are invariably termed cities--yet, in
their early centuries, they were not so complex. The work ignores
the seminal question of the chronology and mechanism of
urbanization in Italy, a much discussed issue for Etruria and of
even greater interest for Latium.
One good trait of the work: H. usually sets the background
of famous finds by describing the scholars and traditions which
gave rise to the great discoveries, sketching profiles of the
famous scholars such as Pigorini, Pinza, et al., and of
the debunked infamous such as Helbig, now shown to have been the
perpetrator of the Manios fibula hoax. It is not a cover of the
portraits drawn by Paul MacKendrick's The Mute Stones
Speak (New York and London, 2nd ed. 1983) for some
scholarship there discussed is here omitted. I suggest that, in
contrast to H.'s pp. 18-19, students still refer to MacKendrick's
table of Roman building stones, pp. 91-92 and discussion of the
pioneering work of Tenney Frank; MacKendrick's graphic table,
Fig. 3.1, p. 73, of early chronology, although one might argue
with specific dates or correlations, is still easier to read than
the two lists of H., pp. 37 and 46, which he avoids really
justifying with each other.
H. makes much of certain methodologies (cf. chap.3, notes
11ff), citing certain scholars' works but curiously omitting
relevant others, for instance, the ground-breaking analysis of
Joanna Close-Brooks on the pottery and tomb groups of Veii, with
respect to the chronology of Greek Late Geometric imports. (To
cover this, see Close-Brooks and D. Ridgway, "Veii in the Iron
Age," in Italy Before the Romans, D. and F.R.S. Ridgway
eds., London etc. 1979, pp. 95-127; also FWG pp. 129ff.
and references there.) Interestingly, H.'s chap. 1 note 66 is his
only mention of FWG, but it is incorrectly belittled as a
translation of an earlier work. Readers with interest in Greek
colonization and trade in Italy and condominium with Italic
indigenes should consult FWG and its copious, accurate
references. Start from there and its references, and Lilian
Jeffery's LSAG and CAH vol. 3.1 (1982) pp. 819-833
if you want the origins of the alphabet and skip H.'s twice-cited
article (p. 190 note 14, p. 196 note 9) now out as
ArchNews 18 (1993) pp. 1-5. And for Greek Geometric
exports and Phoenician chronologies, where H. cites only himself
and Coldstream's 1968 volume, see FWG's bibliography and
pp. 20ff., 60ff., including a number of recent Coldstream
articles such as "Greeks and Phoenicians in the Aegean," in
Die Phoenizier im Westen, ed. H.G. Niemeyer (Mainz 1982),
pp. 261-275; also G. Kopcke, "What Role for the Phoenicians?" in
G. Kopcke and I. Tokumaru, eds., Greece Between East and West:
10th-8th centuries B.C. (NYU meeting, 1990/ Mainz/Rhein, 1992)
101-113. Studies of Greek vases in Phoenician and Cypriot sites
(Tyre, Amathus etc.) are also available.
The list is far from complete here, but I hope it
illustrates the wealth ignored by H., or at least not made
accessible to his readers. In the same vein, I fail to see why H.
did not cite the short, English article by Frank Brown, "Of Huts
and Houses," in In Memoriam Otto J. Brendel (eds. L.
Bonfante and H. von Heintze, Mainz 1976) 5-12, say at note 24 of
his chap. 4, entitled "Huts and Houses"... The Capitolium of Rome
still benefits from the thorough study of Agnes Kirsopp Lake
[Michaels'] "The Archaeological Evidence for the Tuscan Temple,"
MAAR 12, 1935: 89-149. And surely H. has read, whether or
not he would agree, Charlotte Scheffer's "Domus Regiae--A Greek
Tradition?," OpAth 18, 1990: 185-191; while his comments
on the bronze Capitoline wolf statue would profit from the
stylistic and technical treatment offered by Otto J. Brendel's
Etruscan Art (Harmondsworth etc. 1978) 250-253.
It is only realistic to treat the archaeological history of
early Rome and Latium monument by monument, for the subsequent
history of these areas has made an unbroken sequence of
occupation too difficult to identify in any given region. Still,
a map or plan showing the relation of the streets cited to the
hills and other features would be welcome.
If we must jump from the Palatine hut village to the Regia
and Lapis niger, why complicate the process with other
digressions such as the northern Etruscan site of Murlo (pp.
55-57)? Although the chronological period under discussion
should be the 7th century, H., with a brief notice of the Murlo
Lower Building, proceeds to describe at length the Archaic, Upper
or Courtyard Building instead. It is better represented in the
recovered finds, but it was constructed c. 575 B.C., and, while
it might have had a similar plan, the Lower Building of the end
of the 7th century has only been exposed in part, and can only be
documented as a single, long narrow rectangular structure,
probably protected by terracotta revetments and rooftiles. These
revetments included some cut-out acroteria of the type H. later
(pp. 60ff.) attributes to Acquarossa and Rome, and they were
studied by the same Swedish experts whose works are "cited" for
Acquarossa ("various fascicles of Skrifter 38"), but H.
chooses to ignore the very early Murlo examples--and thus the
strongly Etruscan aspect--of the material.
H. curiously gives NO references for his presentation of the
Murlo material, leaving one to imagine that the chronologically
relevant Lower Building looked just like the Upper Building.
Throughout subsequent notes, H. cites a plethora of good but very
abstruse references, frequently in Italian journals difficult of
access. Yet, where a series of site reports and specialty
studies, almost all in English, exist for the Murlo material, the
reader is offered not a one. Further, H's reference to a
"sea-horse" (hippocamp) statue on the Murlo roof can only have
been derived from a paper delivered at the 1993 Archaeological
Institute of America annual meetings by the originator of that
identification, Dr. Danielle Newland. This represents material
from her dissertation (Bryn Mawr College, 1994) which has
otherwise not yet been published. Maybe one can play fast and
loose in an oral presentation, but there is no excuse for
rendering this into print without professional acknowledgement.
H. believes, inexplicably, that the gens, "a
phenomenon of the social changes of the ninth and eighth
centuries, was in full flower by the time the Murlo building was
built", and that "this consideration clarifies much about Murlo".
No proof, except a fanciful assumption that the human statues on
the roof represent clan leaders. On one page (56) H. says the
seated personages on the Murlo frieze plaques should "be
interpreted as mortals", and on the facing page, that the same
figures, when three-dimensional statues, "must be divinities"....
It is true that Etruscan inscriptions of the 6th century often
show the use of family names, the formulaic equivalent of the
Roman nomen gentile, but that the social and political
conditions were the same in northern Etruria seems unlikely and
unknown. The use of matronymics would seem to suggest otherwise.
Why the gratuitous speculations here for material that is not
even Latian?
H. attempts (chap. 5) to tear down past identifications of
monuments, such as the single, later double temples at the
Sant'Omobono site in the Forum Boarium, on the grounds that
associations with Fortuna and Mater Matuta are too convenient and
are not attested by any 7th or 6th century inscriptions. He then
(pp. 80, 90) proposes his own identification of the cult with
Minerva--because an Etruscan sanctuary, the Portonaccio, built
slightly later at Veii [he says simultaneously], also had
terracotta statues of Menrva and Hercle on its roof, and
inscriptions naming Menrva were found there! (This was the same
temple previously attributed to Apollo because one of its other
statues portrays him, among other scenes of Greek and Italian
myth/legend...) Again, archaeologists who can navigate this
material have no reason to--they will use the primary sources,
and may well take offense at the book's tone. Neophytes would be
either desperately misinformed or at least disenchanted at its
lack of logic. The association of the feline reliefs on the early
temple at Sant'Omobono with the Artemis temple at Corfu ignores
all sorts of discrepancies, like a difference of two or more
generations, and it is not germane to the problems of
interpretation.
Another logic problem: H. prefers a low date for the
so-called Servian walls of Rome; they are definitely the oldest
of Rome's masonry defensive circuits. H. cites (pp. 91ff.) the
presence of an agger and fossa, ditch and mound
structure as a development evolved to counter the threat of 4th
century and Hellenistic artillery, and so the configuration of
the Servian walls means they came after the invention of Greek
artillery. How then do we explain the construction of
agger and fossa at Murlo at the end of the 7th
century, as at a number of cited Latin towns, most notably Ardea?
The cemetery and street patterns are the key to the Servian
enceinte, surely (see chap. 7 note 14), although the evidence H.
illustrates as strongest--a Genucilia plate from Esquiline tomb
LXI--isn't actually the evidence he's talking about! His fig.
7.5, p. 98, illustrates neither the Esquiline find, nor the
name-plate in the Rhode Island School of Design which he cites.
Although the caption says "similar", his Brown University plate
has a foot, unlike the piece at issue, and its painted decoration
is slightly different. (See BullComm 40, 1912: 81 fig.
24.) I find his lowering of the dates of this group somewhat
arbitrary; certainly many of the export contexts for Genucilia
plates seem to agree with Del Chiaro's original 4th century and
following generation production period. Production of the popular
item did continue for a long period. In fact, though, the
association of that particular plate with the tomb remains
tenuous as well.
Yes, the illustrations have their problems. Almost all are
cadged from other publications, whose authors or proprietors are
duly thanked, but the original publications are not referenced.
So when the buildings at Satricum are illustrated (chap. 11,
figs. 11.1-11.5, 11.16) in greatly reduced reproductions, it is
not easy to go back to their original Dutch publications--which
you must do in order to read labels or see any meaningful
details. Fig. 11.9, a roof segment, is shown upside down. Maybe
that's why H. didn't say anything about the revolution in
structure which its terracotta revetments indicate: this is the
changeover before the end of the 6th century, from low, figured
frieze plaques to revet horizontal beams to the much deeper,
openwork plaques with abstract and floral ornament. The
decoration is for a different structure with much deeper
architrave beams, among other things. Much thought has been given
to this by Etruscan and Italic experts, but none is presented
here.
And with H.'s willingness to recycle illustrations, why did
he substitute for the famous fibulae of the Roman Forum burials
(or maybe duplicates from related contexts) artifacts without
provenance from Brazilian and other collections (figs. 3.1-3.5)?
Throughout, H is quick to associate a known archaeological
feature, such as the tumulus, so-called heroon of Aeneas at
Lavinium, or the Lapis niger, etc., with ancient historical
references. He then takes the lack of correlation as proof that
the ancients couldn't even keep their own history straight for a
mere 250 years or so. He never allows for the possibility that
the problem could be ours--that we have rushed to link each
recovered monument with something or someone famous, whether or
not the association is proven.
Another speculative example: chap. 9 at note 3, in reference
to Gras' insight into the discrepancy between the presence of
wine jars in Latian women's graves and the ancient sources, H.
says we should simply throw out all the ancient texts, and then
suggests his own notion--even more fanciful, that the ancient
authors have all misunderstood a Roman comedy reference taken out
of context!
Plenty of interesting topics are introduced only to
languish: the Latian predilection for miniaturization
(passim). Skepticism is well placed on just how
Homeric Italian banquets were (chap. 9 note 3)--H. is
right to remind us of an Italian/Sicilian koine from the Late
Bronze Age: thousands of families over dozens of generations had
a full repertoire of customs and would have seen no compelling
reason to abandon these. Further tidbits of support for early
wine use and communal eating are beginning to be known e.g. F.
Delpino, "L'ellenizzazione dell'Etruria villanoviana: sui
rapporti tra Grecia ed Etruria fra IX e VIII secolo a.C.,"
Atti II Congresso Internazionale Etrusco (Firenze 1985)
[Rome 1990] I, pp. 105-116.
The overriding importance of family traditions in religion
and burial has long been recognized for Romans, with the example
of the Scipiones (cf. Mute Stones p. 92 etc.); the
analysis of early Gabii by Anna Maria Bietti-Sestieri as cited by
H. is now available for English readers (The Iron Age Cemetery
of Osteria dell'Osa (Rome) - A Study of socio-political
development in central Tyrrhenian Italy [Cambridge 1992], so
why not avail oneself of that and cut out the too facile
derivative work?
This is not a concerted effort at damage control, there is not the
space. What references H. provides are not incorrect, at least their
errors are not especially misleading (Archeologia Laziale volume
numbers are off by about two since they are confused with the concurrent
series numbers as Quaderni del Centro di Studio per l'Archeologia
etrusco-italica; Stips Votiva (chap. 5 note 10) is actually
1991. As for H.'s more abstruse references such as (chap. 5 note 14) his
own "Aedes Minervae in Foro Boario," in Rivista do Museu de Arqueologia
e Etnologia da Universidade de Sao Paolo concerning that belabored
identification of the temple under Sant-Omobono, I haven't succeeded in
checking it, mehercle.