Continuing investigations to the archaeology and history of Troy in the Late Bronze Age and Classical Antiquity, especially to the end of the settlement phases Troy VI, VII a and VII b, to the date and circumstances of the foundation of Greek Troy (= Ilion), the so-called Troy VIII, and to its growth, in addition to the role of the Trojan myth in the form of the Greek, Hellenistic and Roman town and the surrounding region, that means to the creation of an eminent mythical or heroic space. The studies during his activities in “Topoi” concentrate on enlarging the arguments for the program described just now: The foundation of Ilion by Greeks since 1000 B.C., the development of the legend of the Trojan War by the early Greek poets, the interpretation and presentation of ancient looking remains and monuments as evidence for the myth, then in the Hellenistic and Roman epochs the building of memorial buildings, which integrated the alleged remains and monuments of the myth, and the enlargements and modernized appearences of Ilion; by all that the Hellenistic and Roman periods created new identities. The importance of Ilion in the posthomeric-archaic epoch, finally the history of the search for Troy and of the excavations and the role of Troy and the Trojan myth in Turkish history and ideology.

An important argument for the early foundation of Greek Troy as expressed above ist the laying out of a Greek cemetery: Further arguments verify that this necropolis was created immediately after the end of the latest Bronze Age settlement, Troy VII b, that is in the 10/9th century.

In Antiquity people thought, that the existence of the impressive Late Bronze Age fortification wall, protecting still Troy VIII, gave strong evidence for the historicity of the Trojan myth. This wall was renewed in its old style or with old stones by the Greek inhabitants of Ilion again and again. The northern part of the wall even served as element of the Hellenistic fortification wall of the refounded, now enlarged town; and also at that time it was regarded als testimony of the alleged historicity of theTrojan War. Contrary to recent interpretations there are good new arguments to show that this part of the wall was found by H. Schliemann and C. W. Blegen, that the ancient sources are wrong in reporting its destruction about 600 B.C. and that it was destroyed only in 85 B.C. The study of the painted archaic pottery tells much about the cultural situation in posthomeric-archaic Ilion, namely that the originality at least in one, but in an important field of the material civilization, declined since 650/600 B.C. while Ilions reputation as the most famous mythical or heroic space in the Ancient World increased.

Turkish sources and announcements of the late excavator and Turkish freeman M. Korfmann reveal that the findspot “Hisarlık” and the Trojan legend plays an eminent role in Turkish history and ideology.

Objectives of the project

The media-specific conceptualization and encoding of fundamental categories of human world perception and orientation has only recently received new attention from archaeologists, historians, classicists, anthropologists, and other scholars of ancient cultures. It is, however, of great importance to allow for the systematic distinction between various kinds of cognition and their relations to different symbolic systems like pictures, languages, and gestures with their respective semiotic qualities.

In my previous research on body concepts and gender difference (“soma / corpus. Bodily Concepts and Gender Difference in Greek and Roman Culture”) I aimed to show how differently the human body was constructed by pictoral and linguistic discourses in Greek and Roman culture. In both cultures, the body served as a place in which the primary social differences, such as age, class, and gender, were inscribed, although differently in each case. Remarkable variations can be detected between the general conceptions of the body: Overall, the Greek saw the body as a three-dimensional, functional unity, extending itself into the surrounding space, while the Roman body, although endowed with considerable performative qualities, was in a way deficient, rendered flat, without volume, the clothes hiding and disguising the subjacent body parts. In addition, in Latin not all limbs were denoted with clearly delimitating terms. Interestingly, the notions of a very concrete and tangible Greek body and a volatile and abstract Roman body have left traces both in the respective languages and artistic representations.

The present Topoi-project also combines theories of Visual Studies, Cognitive Linguistics and Cultural Anthropology and aims to analyze the culture- and media-specific modes in which Greek and Roman images function with regard to aspects of spatial perception, spatial cognition and spatial constructions. The main focus of research is addressing questions of how ancient cultures rendered three-dimensional space and objects within two-dimensional media. What kind of rules of perspective can be recognized within these images and what kind of semantic value can be attributed to a specific spatial composition? What are the relations between the pictorial conventions of spatial representations and human world perception? What mechanisms of spectator-subject construction or effects of subjectification can be observed? Are there any cognitive interconnections between pictorial and linguistic strategies of spatialization, especially regarding the spatialization of orders of knowledge and mental categories? How did certain cultural techniques shape spatial cognition and vice versa? Can we therefore account for culture-specific cognitive styles of spatial thinking?

Methodology

The systematic analysis of selected works of art is carried out on two different levels: First, from a long-term diachronic perspective, focussing on genre-specific conventions of spatial representations in Greek vase paintings, Greek and Roman wall paintings or relief sculpture. Pictorial strategies of hierarchization and categories of spatial order are of special interest, particularly if they can be traced back to extra-pictorial cognitive domains. Second, a couple of case studies will provide a more in-depth analysis of iconographic, stylistic and compositional elements and could point to the semantization of certain spatial phenomena in different periods of ancient art history.

By examining the spatial terminology of Ancient Greek and Latin within the framework of Language Typology, General Linguistics, Historical Semantics and Cognitive Linguistics, culture- and epoch-specific habits of seeing may be detected. This can open access to a cognitive dimension which is narrowly linked to everyday practices of spatial orientation and exploitation. Both the picture and the language analysis would profit from a broader cross-media and cross-cultural approach.

Conceptual framework

One aim of analyzing the pictorial monuments is to formulate an alternative to the explicitly or implicitly teleological model of traditional art history. This model states a process of gradual approximation to (quasi) central perspective compositions in the course of the history of Graeco-Roman art. Therefore it seems necessary to examine cross-culturally the different strategies for rendering three-dimensionality in two-dimensional media. It seems especially interesting to compare the different usage of spatial elements, such as diminution of size in depth, overlapping and clustering of figures, multiplication of viewpoints, combinations of top views and frontal representations, bird’s eye view, parallel perspective, foreshortening, etc., most of which are prevalent to various degrees in Egyptian, Near Eastern, Anatolian, Greek, Roman and Roman provincial art. What aesthetic values and semantic aspects can be connected with these methods of evoking the illusion of spatiality? Are there any differences? Which objects and figures were usually rendered in which manner and what qualities were ascribed to these objects by representing them in different kinds of perspective compositions? Even though some Egyptian or Neo Assyrian pictorial compositions seemingly show comparable solutions when depicting human beings, animals, objects, architectural elements, or landscapes—avoidance of figural overlap, usage of vertical dimension indicating the front-behind relation between objects, phenomena of transparency, additive combination of multiple object faces (‘Wechselansichtigkeit’), perspective of importance—the similarity to early Greek images might be superficial and limited to individual pictorial elements. Perhaps those differences also apply to cognitive frames and conceptual schemas within those respective cultures.

The study of a representative sample of pictorial monuments has also to take into account that multiple, i.e. genre- and content-specific modes of spatial representations existed simultaneously in a single cultural context. As B. Kaeser showed in his important study on geometric, archaic and early classical vase paintings, the development towards increasingly complex spatial representations cannot be understood as an attempt to achieve a more ‘naturalistic’ rendering of space. In fact, the main intention of the vase painters was to emphasize selected functional qualities of objects. Generally speaking, in early Greek art the spatial relations of objects to each other seemed to be more important than their orientation to an implicit spectator. Only from Classical times onward does the viewing subject become a point of reference. The simultaneous occurrences of perspectival and non-perspectival manners of representations therefore do not imply the incapacity of the artist but must be explained on a semantic level. A further illustration of the semantic character of spatial elements is provided for instance by artistic products of Roman provincial art. Pictorial monuments of the capital Rome are already characterized by the concomitance of a picture language deriving from Hellenistic traditions, where ‘realistic’ proportions and a coherent perspective prevail, and completely different formal tendencies, which once were labelled as ‘folk art’ by art historians. This side-by-side of different spatial solutions is even more complex in the artistic productions of the periphery of the Greek and Roman world (i.e. Egypt), where spatiality and dimensionality obviously were considered as the epitome of Greek manufacture.

Possible points of intersection between visual and linguistic conceptualizations of space might be found in the field of abstract cognitive categories, which determine not only certain linguistic locative expressions but also the disposition of spatial elements in pictorial compositions. It could be shown that not only directional relations and topological configurations of objects, such as coincidence, containment, contact, support, and contiguity, motivated perspectival representations, but even more so functional qualities and gestalt properties—above all relations of power and causation. If these functional aspects were important stimuli for artistic innovation in early Greek art, it is remarkable that similar cognitive categories have an impact on the spatial expressions of certain languages, especially in the usage of locative prepositions. It remains to be determined whether this is also true for Ancient Greek and Latin. Complementary to the analysis of pictorial monuments, a diachronic study of Greek and Latin expressions for static and dynamic spatial configurations could therefore provide information about linguistic peculiarities. What features of spatial terminology are characteristic for Greek and Latin? What elements contrast both languages with other languages? Which social practices shaped the cognitive domain of spatiality in different languages? Where are homologies and differences between visual and linguistic phenomena to be found and how can they be explained?

“Archaeotopia” focuses on archaeological sites as culturally charged locations and as a category of space sui generis in the contemporary cultural landscape. The mere act of designating a site – often accompanied by distinct physical markings and a change in legal status – can lead to abrupt termination of most previous and alternative uses, such as settlement and agricultural activities or the material exploitation of the physical remains of the past. The designation, development and maintenance of archaeological sites involve numerous interest groups and stakeholders, including local residents, landowners, academic experts, their institutions and funding bodies, policymakers at different administrative levels, visitors of all shades, local staff and economically interested parties. While archaeology and the notion of an archaeological site represent an ideational import from the Western world, this scenario is further broadened by such constellations as local versus foreign, national versus international, etc.

Fig. 1: Carthage: Archaeological zone on Byrsa Hill Huge pillars originally supporting a large platform comprise part of a massive Roman building scheme on Byrsa hill, which buried the ruins of older Punic houses. Archaeological excavation allows for the paradox of giving a simultaneous insight into the Roman layers and the Punic houses historically destroyed and covered by them. The extended excavation zone is surrounded by modern suburbia. It’s up to the recipients to decide to which period Carthage belongs (photo: Stefan Altekamp)

Fig. 2: Thebes: Houses in Qurna The village of Qurna with locally-run souvenir shops amidst the ancient Egyptian necropolis of Western Thebes – before the settlement was finally pulled down and its inhabitants removed from the archaeological zone in 2008 (photo: Wikipedia)

Fig. 3: Middle Nile: Workmen in front of Lion Temple Local workmen in front of the rebuilt Lion Temple at Musawwarat es-Sufra (Sudan): a new profession with a strong impact on the socioeconomic constitution and sociocultural identities of nomadic groups living in the vicinity of the archaeological site (photo: Thomas Scheibner)

Whereas their status alone can bring archaeological sites into the focus of manifold political, economic and cultural interests and make them an arena of multiple social practices, they are also frequently subjected to severe physical transformations by individual interest groups. Usually, archaeologists and other academic parties enjoy privileged access for the sake of research, preservation and dissemination of historical knowledge. But archaeological sites can also be impregnated with further, potentially very divergent cultural
messages by other stakeholders, or can lend themselves to intensive commercial exploitation.

“Archaeotopia”, one of the projects within CSG V, investigates the motivations, scope and regulating factors of interventions in archaeological sites by a multitude of interest groups. The processes of identity formation triggered by and expressed in these appropriations are analysed in representative case studies using a variety of methods, which include topological survey, anthropological fieldwork and the evaluation of media coverage, textual material and pictorial sources. At present, studies on Carthage (Tunesia – Fig. 1), Thebes (Egypt – Fig. 2) and a range of smaller sites in the Middle Nile Valley (Sudan – Fig. 3) are envisaged. Due to their genesis and their ongoing appropriation by multinational agents, all of these sites offer a global perspective. After all, these sites are embedded in modern social contexts. Local communities at least partially dissociate themselves from them, but at the same time favour their appropriation under certain circumstances. Of specific brisance is the concept of the intrinsic value of cultural heritage, which appears as a foreign import in these contexts. It does, however, play a fundamental role in the appropriation of these sites by international, national and local stakeholders – discussion of this concept will therefore be an important part of the project.