Introduction
The Hellenistic kingdom of Commagene exerted an outsized influence on the vola-tile world of post-Seleucid Western Asia given its small size and relatively recent in-dependence It was an important player within the complex military and diplomatic crises that unfolded between the Romans and Parthians Through astute and at times double-dealing diplomacy, strategic marriage alliances, and, eventually, close coopera-tion with the Romans, the kingdom survived all other post-Seleucid kingdoms in Ana-tolia and the Caucasus, not to mention most other Hellenistic kingdoms across the Mediterranean, Western and South Asia more broadly This achievement is even more remarkable given the fact that Commagene itself, that is, the fertile land between the Euphrates River and the Taurus mountains, did not enjoy a long continuous histo-ry as an independent state or even a semi-autonomous province before the province fragmented from the Seleucid Empire around 163/162 BCE Indeed, the last time that Commagene ruled itself before it broke from the Seleucid Empire was as a neo-Hittite principality in the 8th c BCE as attested in Luwian epigraphic documents 1
Commagene experienced the height of its geopolitical influence under Antiochos I Theos (ca 69 – ca 36 BCE) who portrayed himself as the heritor of an ancient, con-tinuous and transregional – even imperial – legacy of royal power anchored on his de-scent through the Orontid and Seleucid dynasties to Dareios I, Seleukos Nicator and Alexander the Great Antiochos I introduced and monumentalized ‘newly ancient’
Iranian cultic traditions across his kingdom and used them as the centrepiece of his campaign of strategically crafting and foregrounding a royal identity that could
com-1 Discussed in Versluys 2017, 138–139
pete and outflank any other regional rivals 2 After the dissolution of Tigranes II’s Arme-nian empire (ca 69/68 BCE), to which Commagene was briefly tributary, Antiochos I monumentalized his cultural and religious reformation of his kingdom In a relatively short time he seeded the kingdom with numerous small sanctuaries ensuring that cult centres were accessible to all his subjects and, suggested by archaeological and in some cases just epigraphic evidence, created huge open-air funerary cult complexes at the tombs of his father and, possibly, his grandfather The most magnificent of all was his own mountaintop tomb and cult site at Nemrud Dağ, whose colossal cult statues, in-scriptions, and stelae of his paternal and maternal ancestors rendered his dynastic and imperial claims powerfully vivid in visual, architectural, discursive and ritual terms 3
Many previous appraisals of Commagene’s religious and royal traditions have por-trayed them as eccentric to any larger transregional development in the Hellenistic world or ancient Near East, thus either the aberrant fantasies of a monomaniacal ty-rant, or even an idiosyncratic survival of a hyperlocal Hittite tradition 4 It has been a commonplace in scholarship to state that Commagene developed at the cusp of multiple cultural and political spheres 5 Indeed, this cultural diversity was strategically shaped and displayed as a key element of its Hellenistic rulers’ foreign policy As all ancient societies beyond the size of a village, Hellenistic Commagene was culturally complex Albeit awkward, ‘culturally complex’ is a term I prefer to others, like syncretic or hybrid, which assume an original, fictional state of cultural purity 6 These problems of continuity, cultural depth and complexity dovetail with historiographical problems Past scholarship has often described the Hellenistic kingdom as “marginal to the Hel-lenistic world” or more charitably simply “between east and west” 7 Moreover it has sought the origins of Antiochos I’s cult as mapping onto and growing directly from a mixed population, the residue of Achaemenid or Seleucid colonization, or converse-ly the result of a passive bricolage of deracinated images and ideas drifting along ‘the Silk Roads’ While not accepted as truly western, Commagene has also not been fully claimed as ‘eastern’, that is, as an integral part of the Iranian world, especially by those who seek a monolithic unchanging Zoroastrianism traceable from the Bronze Age to the present day 8
Luckily scholarship has recently undergone a salutary reorientation in the last few years, which has recontextualized Antiochos I’s reforms within a wider late-Hellenis-tic phenomenon wherein rulers caught between Rome and Parthia sought to bolster
2 For a relatively comprehensive survey of the archaeological and epigraphic evidence and overview of a variety of problems in the study of the site and Commagene, see Brijder 2014
3 For an entry into the cult and its archaeology, see Brijder 2014 and Versluys 2017 4 The historiography is surveyed in Versluys 2017, 293–299
5 For a survey of exploration and study of region see Brijder 2014, 176–310 and Versluys 2017 6 See the comments of Dietler 2009 and Canepa 2010
7 The treatment of Commagene in Classical Studies scholarship is discussed in Versluys 2017, 13 8 E g Boyce – Grenet 1991, 338
their legitimacy and lineage through similar programs of monumental building and re-ligious renovation or reinvention These included the Hasmonaean and Herodian sov-ereigns of Judea, the rulers of Emesa, the Ituraeans and Nabataeans 9 The goal for all of these newly formed kingdoms was to appropriate ancient traditions and manufacture a venerable past on which to build the royal identities of their new kingdoms While this has been identified as a phenomenon of the post-Hellenistic East, viewed from a broader perspective, as observed by M J Versluys it is not dissimilar to Octavian’s own eclectic and experimental legitimizing program, which celebrated and monumen-talized his lineage and ‘renewed’ the ancient religious traditions of his realm in order place his nascent dynasty at the centre of all political and religious traditions 10 Indeed, it is only because of Octavian’s and Rome’s eventual dominance over the Greek world that his experimentations seem natural and inevitable
While Commagene is now starting to find a place within the Hellenistic Mediter-ranean, it is only beginning to be fully and meaningfully integrated into the history of the Iranian world Building on recent work, this chapter thus offers an inquiry into the origins of Commagene’s Persian royal legacy and Iranian religious traditions un-der Antiochos I, and the cultural and geopolitical contexts that informed their devel-opment 11 Its primary goal is to provide historical nuance for the ‘Persian traditions’
that scholarship has frequently treated as a complete invention or the outgrowth of a monolithic and essentialized Zoroastrianism It considers the extent to which these traditions grew from an Iranian constituency in place within Commagene since the Achaemenid period or, more likely, arose from a more restricted courtly or dynastic milieu In so doing, it analyses the dynastic legacy of the Orontids of Sophene and Ar-menia and the techniques by which they crafted their royal identity and the nature of their impact on Commagene In particular, it seeks to strike a balance between the epi-graphic and archaeological evidence offered by the Antiochos I’s monuments, which offer the most abundant evidence, and what we can descry about the region’s and the dynasty’s earlier traditions from the archaeological record and fragmentary textual sources This chapter and the larger body of work on which it builds, by necessity, challenges the assumption that there is a unified and naturally replicating tradition of Persian kingship, manifesting itself in palatial, sacred architecture, ruler representation, or gardens 12 Ancient and modern identities alike have strung together data-points to provide a linear developmental history from any of these precursors; however, none of them were continuous, determinative nor essential of Commagene’s later Hellenistic
9 Kropp 2013; Versluys 2017, 232–241
10 Discussed within context in Versluys 2017, 219–248
11 This chapter introduces ideas that expand on the evidence and arguments laid forth in Canepa 2018, 5–7 95–121) In addition, the papers in Strootman – Versluys 2017 have offered new points of view on the nature of Persian identity in the post-Achaemenid world from different approaches 12 Argued in depth in Canepa 2018
history Instead they resulted from active efforts and choices of those in power to shape and control their identity This is especially stark when it comes to Commagene’s rath-er scant Achaemenid hrath-eritage These traditions all, some to a greatrath-er, othrath-ers to a lessrath-er extent, were raw conceptual, ritual or topographical material, out of which the later Hellenistic kings wrought their identity, especially at points of crisis and opportunity Royal identity in the wider Iranian world that extended beyond Persia itself was just as much practiced and constructed in relation to the natural and built environment as expressed in discursive terms
Understanding Persian Culture and Identity in Commagene
Within Commagene, Antiochos I’s monuments overshadow all other sources: Antio-chos I’s reign has provided scholarship with by far the greatest amount of indigenous, primary-source epigraphic and archaeological evidence for the reconstruction of the Commagene’s post-Achaemenid history His inscriptions present the greatest volume of indigenous textual sources, the cult regulations contained within provide our only emic description of Commagenian religion, and, spurious or not, the lineage recon-structed from his stelae offers the most detailed, indigenous and continuous account of Orontid dynastic history we possess extending from the Achaemenid Empire through the 1st c CE and the region’s early stages of incorporation into the Roman Empire Given the paucity of what exists for the period before Antiochos I, methodologically this requires comparing and putting into dialog his magnificent monuments and ex-tensive inscriptions with a fragmentary archaeological and textual record and poorly preserved bronze coinage
Antiochos I created a cohesive image of his dynasty through his epigraphic and ar-tistic output He did so not just as a vanity project, but as a foundation for his claims to Commagene and, indeed, any region previously held by other branches of the Orontids that he could get his hands on Viewed from the standpoint offered by Antiochos I, Commagene was an ancient and deeply rooted political entity with a long-established cultural and political identity, whose religious traditions he himself laboured tirelessly to reinvigorate in the form practiced by his ancestors While the land of Commagene was important to him, his kingship did not derive nor was it dependent on it Accord-ing to Antiochos I, the origins of the dynasty and the ultimate source of its legitimacy lie with the Achaemenid dynasty and the Persian Empire, which was augmented and strengthened through intermarriage with the Seleucids In effect, his emphasis on dy-nastic tradition was compensate for the relative youth and small size of the kingdom itself
In his monumental inscriptions the king proclaimed that he returned his land to the ancient religious traditions of his Persian ancestors, which he restored and renewed Given that we have little archaeological evidence of previous monumental cult sites
and his new cult centres were quickly abandoned after his reign, we must question whether these particular traditions were as deeply rooted and supported by Comma-gene’s populace as he proclaims in his inscriptions As we will see, this is not to say that evidence is completely lacking for a certain depth of Commagene’s Persian traditions, but rather that their development was not as linear and monolithic as he implies, nor without major points of inflection caused by internal and external forces Antiochos built on centuries of effort on the part of his dynastic forebears to create an identity that would be geopolitically useful within the fluid political situation after the fall of the Achaemenid Empire and those efforts changed Orontid dynastic culture and their lands considerably
Commagene shared many characteristics with other kingdoms that flourished in Anatolia, Northern Mesopotamia and the Caucasus after the fall of the Persian Em-pire that were similarly ruled by post-satrapal Persian dynasties 13 With the rise of the Parthian, Pontic and Armenian empires, new currents of post-Achaemenid, Iranian kingship gained prominence, challenging and eventually blending with those of the Seleucid Empire For the last century before the common era, within Anatolia and the Caucasus, these post-satrapal, ‘neo-Persian’ traditions became the gold standard of legitimacy until ultimately overshadowed by those of Rome The Orontids cultivat-ed royal and religious traditions that ticultivat-ed them to an Armenian-Cappadocian-Pontic politico-cultural continuum and foregrounded their eminent Persian and Macedo-nian dynastic roots The manner in which Antiochos I conceived of and performed his identity was by no means unique other than the fact that he left the largest and best-preserved monuments Moreover, these monuments, like Antiochos I’s royal image, deliberately incorporated the traditions of his neighbours to appropriate and outflank them We see this in everything from his use of the tumulus for his funer-ary monument to his adoption of the kitaris, the royal headgear signifying supreme royal power in the region It should be emphasized that among all of these dynasties, this Perso-Macedonian identity was a carefully constructed elite idiom cultivated and showcased by kings and aristocrats speaking to each other more than their own popu-lations 14 In fact, while we do not have detailed information, what we do have indicates that non-elite culture in Commagene was very different from that of the ruling dynas-ty The unchanging antiquidynas-ty of the kingdom’s Perso-Macedonian identidynas-ty was a trap that Antiochos laid for us and one that scholarship often willingly walks into
13 Canepa 2017; Canepa 2018, 5–7 95–121
14 Strootman 2017; Canepa 2017; Lerouge-Cohen 2017; Canepa 2018
Ruptures, Reinventions and Continuities in the History of Commagene Commagene existed as an autonomous political entity only twice in the first millenni-um BCE with no direct political links connecting the two and with only very tenuous evidence of demographic and cultural continuities Its name is detectable in the name of the late-Hittite principality of Kummuḫ, whose territory was by and large contin-uous with the core of the Hellenistic kingdom 15 Following the incorporation of the region into the Assyrian Empire in 850 BCE, the king of Kummuḫ ruled as a vassal of the Assyrian king This arrangement lasted until 708 BCE when Sargon II conquered Kummuḫ outright, removed the king, and turned it into an Assyrian province 16 The land of Commagene did not exist as an semi-autonomous or independent state again until the region broke away from the Seleucid Empire around 163/162 BCE to form an independent kingdom During the intervening five and a half centuries, the region was ruled by more important adjacent regions, such as Cappadocia, Syria or Sophene, and passed among multiple empires and their successor states
While the toponym was extremely ancient, all streams of evidence point to pro-found changes in the region’s demography, its people’s language and culture, as well as the political, cultural and religious traditions of its elites Following a revolt, the Assyr-ian Empire deported the majority of Kummuḫ’s inhabitants, exchanging its population with one drawn from Mesopotamia While this population exchange certainly was not accomplished in toto it seems to have been substantial enough to break any linguistic, cultural or local political continuities in the region 17 The Assyrian deportations appear to have greatly changed the region’s demography and possibly catalysed changes in the spoken vernacular wiping away all evidence of subsequent use of Anatolian languages, like Hittite or Luwian, beyond toponyms Either through transfer or assimilation, by the Hellenistic period the majority of Commagene’s population appears to have spo-ken Syrian Aramaic and Roman commentators understand the land to be culturally and geographically part of ‘Syria’ not just because of its administrative incorporation 18 As we will explore in greater detail below, several sites, such as Samosata, have yielded evidence of a long history of intermittent settlement Although many were reoccupied, our present evidence suggests that no major palatial or cult site in Commagene was continuously inhabited or in use from the Achaemenid through the Hellenistic period, the sites that were important for the Hellenistic kingdom did not seem to play a major role in the Achaemenid period While the Assyrian period changed the demography and possibly precipitated shifts in the vernacular of the region’s population, the coming
15 Kummuḫ was possibly in the orbit of Carchemish Messerschmidt 2012, 26; Brijder 2014, 52–53 On the geography of the region in the Roman period, see Str 2,12,2 2,14,1–2 12,1,2 Cf Marciak 2012 16 Brijder 2014, 52
17 Hawkins 1975; Summer 1991; Facella 2006 73–78
18 E g Plin HN 5,66; Str 11,12,3 16,1,22; Lucian Syr D 1; Versluys 2017, 38–41
of the Achaemenids and Seleucids made the most profound impact on the culture and identity of Commagene’s elite, their royal and aristocratic culture, and, ultimately, the identity of the independent kingdom
The history of Commagene under both the Achaemenid and Seleucid empires is very murky, and we lack clear evidence of many pivotal historical moments, not to mention fine-grained archaeological evidence of the official presence of either empire After the Assyrian period, the region does not appear in a literary source until Cicero’s brief mentions in his letters followed by Antiochos I’s epigraphic testaments and later Roman sources Our only continuous source of evidence, both positive and negative, is archaeological After trading hands between Egypt and the Neo-Babylonian Em-pire, the region fell to the Persian Empire with Kyros the Great’s conquests 19 Unlike Melitene to the north, Commagene does not appear in any Persian epigraphic or ar-chival source and unless one appears it remains unclear which Achaemenid satrapy or subsatrapy controlled it 20 Because Commagene’s Hellenistic rulers traced their an-cestry to the Orontids some interpreters, especially those that wish to emphasize the region’s late-antique and early-medieval affiliation with Armenia and extend it further back in time, have speculated that Commagene might have formed an administrative unit within the Achaemenid satrapy of Armina This is perhaps conceivable though no evidence of any kind can confirm this and it is also possible that the region formed part of a different, more proximate administrative unit, most likely Tauric Cappadocia 21 This is certainly not to deny Commagene’s close relationship with the lands ruled by Armenian kings after the Hellenistic period but rather to clarify the origins and nature of the relationship It is unclear when exactly Commagene became the possession of an Orontid-ruled satrapy or kingdom, but the weight of the evidence suggests that this most likely occurred only well after Alexander in the early-3rd c BCE As had occurred elsewhere in Anatolia and the Caucasus former satrapies were seized by new dynasties and old frontiers dissolved as post-satrapal dynasties opportunistically claimed and lost new kingdoms and dynastic spheres of influence ebbed and flowed 22
The Persian Empire left a very light infrastructural footprint on Commagene and founded no major settlements that show direct evidence of a close connection with the imperial centre An important Persian-period aristocratic residence was construct-ed at Tille Höyük, a site with previous Assyrian occupation While overshadowing the Assyrian remains, the architecture of the complex does not bear the marks of imperially sponsored architecture as have been documented at numerous other sites elsewhere in the empire that implant ground plans and architectural forms that are
19 Neo-Babylonian and Egyptian periods surveyed in Brijder 2014, 52
19 Neo-Babylonian and Egyptian periods surveyed in Brijder 2014, 52