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Forword
Tomb raiders and treasure hunters
The Mediterranean in Antiquity – a short review
Life in Classical times
Burial customs simplified
Coffins and sarcophagi in many shapes and sizes
Life after death
Burying the dead
The Roman way of death
Houses for the dead
Remembering the dead
Cultural crossroads – the Roman provinces of Syria and Judaea 
A Roman Province
Decapolis and Palmyra – cosmopolitain cities of the East
The Jews
The first Christians
Martyrs and relics
Forgeries

Selected sources
People, places and events
Mythology
Glossary

THE DECAPOLIS AND PALMYRA – COSMOPOLITAN CITIES OF THE EAST

THE DECAPOLIS – LEAGUE OF TEN CITIES

The Decapolis, the league of ten cities, was an alliance formed to protect and defend the Roman Empire against enemies from the east. The heartland of the Decapolis included today’s north-western Jordan, north-eastern Israel, north eastern-Palestine, and south-western Syria. The member cities changed from time to time, and included Skythopolis, Gadara, Pella, Philadelphia, Abila and Gerasa. What characterised Decapolis cities was that they were strongly influenced by Greek and Roman culture and enjoyed a high degree of autonomy, in an area otherwise dominated by Semitic peoples and traditions.

Many tombs from the first two centuries AD can still be seen in the Decapolis area. They were hewn into the rock and consisted of one or more burial chambers. From these chambers, long shafts (loculi) for the burials extended into the walls. After the body was placed in the loculus, the opening was sealed and covered with plaster.  The shafts could be used several times by reopening and closing the entrances.

The grave busts in our exhibition come from tombs from the Decapolis cites of Gadara and Skythopolis. Unfortunately the tombs in these towns have been looted, but excavations of similar tombs from neighbouring Abila indicate that busts were places in front of the loculi, probably on the chamber floor.

Decapolis. Illustration: Johnny Kreutz © The Museum of Cultural History

NEFESH

In his work on the pre-Islamic religion of the Arabs, the Arab historian Hisham Ibn-al-Kalbi (747 – 819/821 AD) gives us a hint as to how these statues might have been used,

Thereupon he carved unto them five statues after the image of their departed relatives, and erected them over their graves. Then it came to pass that a relative would visit the grave of his brother, uncle, or cousin, whatever the case might be, pay his respect to it, and walk around the statue for a while.  (Kitab al-Asnam Al-Qalis 44-45):  

This suggests that the images of the deceased were used in a dancing or walking ritual. But what did they mean to people who erected them? 

The term nefesh is important for the understanding of how the afterlife was perceived in the Arabic and Aramaic religions. Originally nefesh meant ‘throat’ or ‘breath’, but it later changed its meaning to ‘life’ and ‘person’, and then to ‘soul’. From the 2nd century onwards, nefesh is also used to mean tombstones and monuments, suggesting that people believed that the soul could become part of the stone, and thus immortal. This idea can be compared to the Roman view that portraits were carriers of a part of the animus or anima of the people they depicted. The busts from the Decapolis region probably served as nefesh, homes for the immortal ”soul” and the embodiment of the deceased.

The earliest of these busts had few, if any, facial features, and only a contour that resembled the upper part of the human body. Busts with more realistic features seem to have developed in the 1st century AD, a time of increasing Roman political and cultural influence. The busts in our exhibition clearly imitate Roman funerary portraits, but cannot be described as such. These are stylised images rather than representations of known individuals. It seems likely that they continued to be used in their traditional role as nefesh, but with a Roman “look,” a good example of cultural fusion. 

PALMYRA – BRIDE OF THE DESERT

Palmyra, situated in today’s Syria, was not a Decapolis city, but it was one of the largest centres in the Roman province and an important stop on the caravan route to Persia. The ancient Palmyrian sculpture style is famous, and includes elaborately executed funerary reliefs.

THE PALMYRIAN WAYOF DEATH

The vast necropolises of Palmyra contain three kinds of tombs: high towers used for multiple burials, underground burial complexes (hypogea), and temple tombs. The tombs usually contain large burial chambers with long grave recesses in their walls to accommodate the bodies. These shafts were usually closed with decorated stone slabs. Sarcophagi were rare in Palmyra. We know almost nothing about the Palmyrians’ funerary rites or about people’s notions of the Afterlife. Archaeologists have found cooking equipment and food containers which indicate that feasting took place in the tombs. The presence of altars and incense burners also suggest that offerings were made.

PALMYRIAN MUMMIES

Rich Palmyrians were usually mummified, a rite known elsewhere in Greco-Roman Syria and Palestine. In Palmyra the bodies were dried without first extracting the brain and intestines as the Egyptians did. The body was tightly wrapped with strips of fine cloth and covered with a thick layer of myrrh paste. A second layer of coarse linen served as stuffing for the outer covering made of fine cloth, sometimes silk from as far away as China. The deceased was also given gifts - coins, lamps, toys, jewellery, pottery, glassware – evidence that the Palmyrians prepared their dead for an Afterlife.

GRAVE RELIEFS

Grave markers were an indispensable part of every Palmyrian burial. As nefesh, they insured the continued existence of the ”soul”. In Palmyra several types of funerary sculpture, and even tombs and monuments, may have served as nefesh.

Photo: Lill-Ann Chepstow-Lusty © The Museum of Cultural History

The most frequent type of funerary sculpture are the relief busts used to seal the grave recesses, loculi. These were produces between the middle of the 1st century AD until the fall of Palmyra in 272/3 AD. The busts themselves are often quite realistic, yet they were clearly not meant to be true likenesses of the deceased. A wide range of motifs - curtains, scrolls, styluses (writing implements), keys, spindles, distaffs, birds, leaves and grapes appear on and around the figure.  Their symbolic meaning, however, remains a mystery.

BANQUETING SCENES

Banqueting scenes, usually featuring one or two men reclining on a couch surrounded by their family or servants, were also a feature of Palmyrian tombs.  Theses sculptures may have been set into niches on the outside of tower tombs or in special compartments inside the tombs.

Photo: © The Museum of Cultural History

Five heads from our collection probably once belonged to figures from a banqueting groups.  must have been a central figure. His cylindrical cap identifies him as a priest. Other heads are those of typical bystanders. The woman may have been seated at the foot of a couch and the young sons or servants probably stood behind the main figure. These sculptures seem to derive from Greek banqueting scenes and may have served a similar purpose; to mark the wealth and social standing of the deceased.

Photo: © The Museum of Cultural History

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