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THE SANDON MONUMENT OF TARSUS *
HETTY GOLDMAN
THE INSTITUTE FOR ADVANCED STUDY, PRINCETON
544
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The Sandon Monument of Tarsus 545
the hill from the find-spot of the relief plaques and directly above
the emplacement of the 14th-13th century temple of Hittite type,
a great mass of terracotta figurines were found among which
representations of Herakles were the most numerous.4 These were
of the conventional late Hellenistic type and included, in addition
to the youthful figure with club, lion skin, and cup (fig. 2), the
bearded " Farnese " llerakles and the reclining hero with wine cup.
Among literally hundreds of fragments from this area not a single
oriental Sandon was found. Marble architectural fragments and
broken bits of inscriptions indicated that a temple of late Roman
date was nearby. Unfortunately the top of the hill had been
levelled off to make way for a concrete gun emplacement during the
first World War so that nothing was left of the actual foundations
of the building. One may, therefore, conclude that the god wor-
shipped in the temple was indeed the ilellenized hero-god and that
the Sandon of our monument represented more truly the ancient
local god who had survived side by side with the newcomer ilerakles
and was identified with the latter only by certain elements in the
population who were of foreign origin. For whom, then, was the
festival of the Pyra celebrated? In his Tarsus orations Dio Chry-
sostom speaks of the Pyre made for Herakles. These are his
words:5 "What say you? If, as seems likely and men declare,
heroes or gods often visit the states they have founded at sacri-
fices and certain festivals, though none can see them; if then,
your own founder Herakles were to come here, say during the Pyre
which you make for him so handsomely," etc. Evidently this pyre
is something specifically raised for the festival and presumably
annually consumed. Some scholars have conjectured that at this
festival, as at that of the Phoenician Melcarth, the god was burned
in effigy, and they think that the temporary structure is depicted
on the coins.6 This may be so but there is certainly no definite
warrant for the assumption in the words of Dio. Whatever the
interpretation of the coins the plaque has all the appearance of a
solid and permanent structure; and the pyre may well have been
raised either in front of the temple, in front of the monument, or
indeed, as it was apparently a popular festival, it may have taken
place at a third spot unconnected with either.
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546 Iletty Goldman
Let us then divorce our minds for the moment from the thought
of the pyre of Herakles and look at the monument as it has been
reconstructed on the drawing (fig. 3) .7 The reconstruction is
based on the evidence of the plaques and of numerous coins and, as
far as the facade itself is concerned, only some minor details such
as the exact nature of the mouldings remains doubtful. For the
third dimension, however, there is no evidence. We see a substruc-
ture of two steps surmounted by a wall adorned with an engaged
Ionic column between pilasters. On this, and arranged so as to
appear between column and pilaster on either side, hang a short
sword or dagger and a shield. Above the wall is a moulded archi-
trave. The details here are not clear and I should like to propose
either the conventional three bands of the Ionic order or, more
probably, on account of the curving profile, the Egyptian moulding
so popular throughout Phoenicia and other Near Eastern countries.
This is immediately surmounted by a triangle with slightly concave
sides which takes the place of a pediment but rises at an angle much
steeper than that of any known building of classical Greek or Roman
type. The angle varies on our fragments from about 550 to 600,
and the one used for the reconstruction is the least steep. Centered
in the triangle is a representation of the god, clearly indicated
by the heavy boundary lines as a relief of a type well known from
monuments. One may recall the stele of Amrit from Phoenicia or
the one shown on the cylinder seal from the Palace of Sennacherib
(fig. 4).8 It is on the analogy of these representations that the top
of the stele is rounded in the reconstruction although this detail
is not preserved on the terracotta. I know of at least one stele of
this shape among Hittite sculpture: the Fassiler relief.9 Sandon
is shown standing to right, probably cloaked (another uncertain
detail; on the coins he is sometimes said to be nude), the right
hand raised in the same gesture as characterizes the gods on the
cylinder seal. The left holds a double axe and stylized wreath. On
his back are a quiver and two other weapons, usually called bow and
sword, although the bow is not very clear in this case. He stands
upon a horned lion with folded wings. This animal usually has
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The Sandon Monument of Tarsus 547
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548 HIetty Goldman
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The Sandon Monument of Tarsus 549
20 Cf., for example, Capart, L'Art 9gyptien 2 plate 171; relief from the
funerary Temple of Seti I.
21 Contenau, La Civilization phenicienne fig. 18.
22 Pausanias II 9. 6. 23 Hill, BMC loc. cit. pi. XV 12.
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550 HIetty Goldman
back and front of a single object (fig. 9).24 It has been supposed
by some that a third relief now missing must be postulated and that
all three formed the bronze revetment of a single pyramidal cult
object. But we need not enter into the realm of supposition. The
two dimensional triangle, as an abbreviated form of the pyramid,
may quite as well stand for the mountain on which the god appears.
Some of the reliefs, such as the one illustrated, seem to be shaped
at the apex like an arrow or possibly a spear head; another has been
likened to the thunder bolt of the god. No matter what the
specific interpretation, these Dolichenos reliefs bring the evidence
we need to show that the background of the relief is in many
instances part of the religious symbolism.
While we have every reason to believe that Sandon himself is an
important religious figure, at least as early as the second millennium
B. C., the fantastic animal upon which he stands cannot be traced
back further than the first millennium, at least not in precisely this
form. It represents, however, the final stylization of many very
ancient elements. These are the winged lion and the griffin or
bird lion. The horns, judged by their shape, may be those of the
goat which enters into the conception of the hybrid chimaera, or
they may have their origin in the horns of the lion-bird of
Ningiszida.25 The Hittite gods of Anatolia, on the other hand,
stand on naturalistically represented lions and bulls. The type
as it appears on our relief is fairly common in Assyrian art 26 of
the first centuries of the millenium, in Persian art,27 and a variant,
with hoofed forelegs, existed in the Armenian region of Van where
a partially preserved bronze statue of a god standing upon a
couchant winged lion was found.28
I now wish to discuss briefly the sword and dagger on the rear
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The Sandon Monument of Tarsus 551
wall of the base. Again one may look upon them merely as dedi-
cations, trophies or decorative objects, or one may believe them to
be part of the religious symbolism. Let us look at the Temple
of Musasir (fig. 7). Here we see a great spear appearing above
the gable of the roof and on the walls the great shields of gold
dedicated by kings as they are described in the annals of Sargon.
The spear is taken to be the emblem of the god Kaldi just as a
spear was the emblem of Marduk. On the rock sculpture of Yasili
Kaya we have the Hittite god half sword, half man (fig. 10)29 and
on the building blocks of ilattusas the spear behind the altars.30
Therefore, in view of these analogies, cannot the weapons hanging
on the Sandon base be interpreted not necessarily as aniconic forms
of the god, but as symbols in which his power dwells: the sword
of his offensive strength and the shield of his protective power?
The shield plays an important role in the symbolism of Crete, whose
religious roots are certainly in Anatolia or northern Syria. This
can be illustrated by many objects from which I have chosen, as of
particular importance, some sealings found in Knossos and Zakro.
On one we have the shield and the sacred pilar (fig. 11),31 on
another the walls of a city placed under the protection of the god
through the emblem of his shield (fig. 12 a). On a third, the shield
accompanies what appears to be a shrine (fig. 12 b).32 The shield
is apotropaic: it turns away evil from the city. The clangor of the
Ancilia warns Rome of danger.33 The pillar at times has a similar
function. The pillars, or baetyls outside the tower of Troy VI, 1,
stand guard over the most vulnerable part of the fortification: the
gate.34 The custom of putting the apotropaic symbols on the walls
of a town is not lost in the course of time, although one cannot
tell how much of the original meaning has been retained. At
Isauria the shield and sword in combination, much as on our
plaque, as well as other pieces of armor, are sculptured in low relief
on one of the towers of the acropolis built probably in the first
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552 Iletty Goldman
35Swoboda, Keil, Knoll, op. cit. 125 fig. 41; construction attributed to
the Galatian king Amyntas.
"6 Ibid. 49. Six such grave monuments are listed.
37 Perdrizet, " Le Monument de Hermel," Syria 19 (1938) 66. At the time
of the dissolution of the Seleucid empire there was a local art which shows
the permanent artistic instincts of the race more strongly than under im-
perial Roman rule. " Ainsi le monument de Hermel qui, au premier coup
d'oeil, pourrait paraltre grec, apparait, quand on y regarde plus prbs,
comme un monument oriental plaque d'hellenisme" (p. 67).
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PLATE I
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PLATE
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PLATE11
FIG. 9
FIG. 8
FIG. 10
FiG. 11
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PLATE I V
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The Sandon Monument of Tarsus 553
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