Page 276 - The Art & Architecture of the Ancient Orient_Neat

NOTES

this rightly with the Ala^a Huyuk reliefs (p. art and the sculptures of the ninth-seventh century
pares
5 ' b.c., which we have labelled north Syrian (Akur-
50).
Df 2, cf. ibid., figures ~7 9- t]lc lions cannot belong to the imperial period
43. Akurgal, op. cit., plate a, 2. (ibid., 72, n. 201a) is not convincing; his figures
44. It is relevant to recall here the huge basalt 25-48 show that the lions arc certainly not closer to
figure of a lion standing over a man which was those of the first than those of the second millcn-
found at Babylon (Koldcwcy, Das wiedcrcrstchciidc njuin< They share, moreover, with the god at the
Babylon, I59» figure rot). Although it is unfinished, R0yal Gate of Boghazkcuy the most peculiar
the material and the subject seem to point to a non- clcvicc Qf hair rendering by a network of single
Mesopotamian origin. It was possibly a trophy Jincar spirals. It is of some importance that we now
brought down on a Euphrates raft from north ijons mac[c’m the thirteenth century b.c. as
Syria. squarcly shaped, and as crudely modelled as those
45. Giitcrbock, loc. cit.', Moortgat thinks that Qf north Syrian art. They come, on the one hand,
these themes arc due to Hurrian, i.c. north Syrian from the southern periphery of the Hittite domains,
influence (Zcitschrift fiir Assyriologic, N.F. xiv from Alalakh (Plate 151, c and d) and, on the other,
(1949), 15S). There arc Mitannian or Hurrian from Byblos (Figures 76 and 77).
traits in Hittite religion and Hurrian texts have been The date of the lion gate of Malatya is, in any
found at Boghazkcuy. But there is 110 proof at all casc> not a mere matter of chronology. The point
of die existence of‘Hurrian’sculpture in stone, or at issuc [s this: could the city preserve intact a
of monumental art of any description which could detailed iconographical tradition throughout the
be labelled Hurrian or Mitannian. The problem period of the migrations of the Sea-People which
has been carefully considered by K. Bittcl (‘Nur utterly destroyed the Hittite empire? The reliefs
hcdiidschc odcr auch hurritischc Kunst?’, in from the lion gate tally in a number of small
Zcitschrift fiir Assyriologic, N.F. xv (1950). 256-90). details with those from Yasilikaya; there must have
In view of the occurrence of allegedly ‘Hurrian’ bccn continuity, not merely in beliefs, but in imag-
themes in Hittite seals, there is no need to invoke a cry. On the other hand, Malatya lay on the very
foreign origin. In this controversy it has been over­ route which the Kashi from the Pontic shores and
looked that the continuity of Mesopotamian t}lc Mushi from central Anatolia must have taken
civilization viuatcs the alternative ‘Iiitdtc or when, as an aftermath of the migrations, they
Hurrian’ from the start, since both derive much of harassed Assyria. Consequently we should need
their repertory from one and the same source. This strong proof before we could accept the view that
is, for instance, clear in the ease of die monsters at jt survived unscathed.
Yasilikaya (Figure 53), which have a Mesopotamian Dating the Malatya sculptures to the empire does
ancestry going back to Akkadian times and may not mcail that the lions and die reliefs are found
have reached north Syria and Anatolia indepen- whcrc they were placed originally; on the evi­
dently at any time between 2300 and 1300 b.c. trary, there is strong evidence diat they were rc-
Exactly the same is true of the bull-man, the god llScd in a building dadng to the eighth century b.c.
emerging from the mountain, and so on. In (Dclaportc,Malatya, plates xiii-xv). It is also true
some eases independent origin of motifs can be t|iat the Malatya sculptures differ in several points
proved. Bittcl has pointed out that the wings of fr0m those of Boghazkcuy and Yasilikaya, but the
the winged disk have turned-up tips in Hittite art, same is true of die reliefs of Ala<;a Huyuk, as we
while they arc straight on north Syrian monu- ]iavc : seen. Hittite art did not possess a body of
ments (op. cit., 264 ff., 267). tradition and local variations exceeded in scope
46. Giitcrbock, loc. cit. those found in Egypt or Mesopotamia. Even die re­
p. 129 47. See below chap. 10. Ekrem Akurgal has use of the royal name Sulumcli - whether as a con-
systematically studied these sculptures (Remarques scious bnk with tlie imPcrial °r because it I
Stylistiques stir les reliefs de Malatya, Istanbul, 1946), actually remained in use - docs not imply that a full
and has established their close affinity to imperial anc^ detailed iconographical tradition linked die
Hittite art. But even he docs not dare to draw the twelfth and the eighth century,
conclusion that they belong to the second millcn- 4S. His name, Sulumcli, is known in the eighth
nium, as his own evidence suggests to 111c. This is century, and has been taken as proof that the reliefs
due to his overrating the continuity between Hittite arc as late, but Landsberger has shown (Sam'al,
247