S. Rebecca Martin - The Art of Contact: Comparative Approaches to Greek and Phoenician Art

The Art of Contact

Comparative Approaches
to Greek and Phoenician Art

S. Rebecca Martin

This book is made possible by a collaborative grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.

Copyright 2017 University of Pennsylvania Press

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Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper

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ISBN 978-0-8122-4908-8

Color plates follow

Map 1. The Mediterranean, showing a simplified reconstruction of Phoenician and Greek colonies and trading areas. By Sveta Matskevich.

Map 2. Greece and the Aegean. Redrawn by Sveta Matskevich after Hall 2002, map.

Map 3. Phoenicia and Cyprus. Redrawn by Sveta Matskevich after http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/0410/feature2/images/mp_full.2.jpg .

Map 4. The Achaemenid Empire. Redrawn by Sveta Matskevich after Briant 2002, 366, .

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Here is the inquiry of Herodotus of Halicarnassus so that things done by man not be forgotten in time and that great and marvelous deeds, some by the Hellenes, some by the barbarians, not lose their glory; and especially that the causes may be remembered for which these waged war with one another. Those of the Persians who have knowledge of history declare that the Phoenicians were the cause of the dispute.

The proem (1.1.11.5.4) to Herodotoss history of the Greek-Persian Wars is a discussion of causation. For good reason it is one of the most studied passages in classical history. then kidnapped the king of Tyres daughter Europa.

As far as Greek-Phoenician contact studies go, there is something to learn in these Persian tales. At first it is surprising that Herodotoss Persian sources do not blame the Greeks from the outset, or not directly; It is a compelling idea with which to begin.

Many attempts have been made to sort through and characterize just this kind of intense interaction in the eastern Mediterranean in which the coastal Levant was a regular participant.

Hellenization is a problematic and dissatisfying term thought to describe an acculturation process through which people become more Greek. but in fact are fundamental critiques of the concepts merits. As I will argue, Hellenization and Orientalization by any other names are just as flawed.

Although its proponents now tend to describe it as an active process on the part of the Hellenized, Of these alternate models, hybridity is currently the most popular in ancient Mediterranean studies, though, as I will argue, it can serve as another proxy for acculturation. Hence this book requires at least brief reconsideration of the ideas of culture and acculturation; of what it meant to be, become, or behave like a Greek or Phoenician; and of modern scholars ability to define their boundaries and interactions from the available evidence. The discussion will avoid the idea that Greek cultural imperialism was inevitable.

The Art of Contact is written with a classical audience in mind, particularly for those interested in GreekNear Eastern contact studies, art history, and historical methods. Its premise is straightforward: the methods we use to study ancient history shape our perceptions of it; art histories of the first millennium BCE Mediterranean Yet I neither call for an end to positivism nor espouse a new, overarching theoretical model. Rather, Art of Contact takes a long but selective view of Greek and Phoenician art and artistic interaction, and a holistic view of their modern study, in order to advocate for greater awareness of the relationship between theory and the writing of ancient (art) history.

It should be clear, I hope, that I am not following longue dure approaches that deemphasize events over long-term processes. Rather I am trying to use a handful of works of art (events) over a reasonably long stretch of time to critique still-popular dichotomies, evaluate terminology, and destabilize ideas about fixed long-term processes. Geographically and chronologically diverse case studies are preferred to the sustained study of a particular time, place, or class of objects, because the problems of interpretation I wish to address are, I believe, pervasive. A comprehensive study would not suit. Of course it would be idle to deny that the decisions I have made are personally intriguing. I work in the eastern Mediterranean and so have favored the region with which I am most intimately familiar. Yet I think it is important to avoid emphasizing the Mediterranean context as a perfect route to understanding, because the idea of a single Mediterranean context, no matter how connected, is false, and the complementary notion of a Greek or Phoenician context is in itself often quite problematic. Since culture and context are always problematic in the study of Phoenicia, Phoenicia is an important idea to study, not least of all in comparison to our much more comprehensive notions about Greece.

Some of the particular objects that make up the case studies come from quite clear contexts, such as coins minted in fifth- and fourth-century Sidon and Tyre. Othersfrom Hellenistic Delos, for examplewere selected precisely because of the difficulty (often impossibility) of assigning a clear-cut cultural context to their Thus, while critical and to some extent minimalist, this book is not pessimistic about the possibility of writing Greek and Phoenician art histories.

My claim that art is a key tool in the understanding of Greek-Phoenician contact is not in itself new, and in several respects it reflects traditional priorities in the field of Greek art history, notably the theory of style. I am attempting to espouse an alternate approach to this fundamental issue, however, one that proceeds from criticism of grand narrative contact histories, and one that sees no important distinctions for historians between the terms art, craft, and material culture. Although many of the examples that follow are recognizable as art, I am not concerned here with the problem of fine arts (les beaux arts) versus minor arts or crafts, as it seems to me that we can use the term art in the sense of expressive object. It is nonetheless important to keep in mind that ancient people could and did distinguish between arts and crafts, artists and craftsmen, some being held in higher esteem.

But as James Porter and others have pointed out, all arts and crafts result from material manipulation, suggesting that, as in the contest of line drawing between Apelles and Protogenes (Pliny