Parsa emerges from the shadow of Persepolis (Part 2)

“In one area, it may be pre-Achaemenid. And then from there we want to study the different periods, for example the Sassanid period, what happened in Persepolis during Sassanid times. From the preliminary information, I think the kiln area was also used in the Sassanid era, but we are not sure. It is necessary to understand what happened to those areas in different times.”

“We know Istakhr, near Persepolis, was a major settlement in the Sassanid era. Then, about two centuries after the advent of the Islamic era, Istakhr rebelled against the Arabs and was destroyed, and the settlement at Qasr-e Abu-Nasr near Shiraz gained importance.”

“Our aim is to study the entire history in the different eras. When William Sumner, an American scholar, studied this problem in the 1970s, he suggested that the city of Persepolis West had an area of 25 hectares, which is very huge. Probably not all but most likely some areas were built in the Achaemenid period. Maybe some were abandoned afterwards and some areas continued.”

Remains of a wall were brought to light at one of the trenches dug by the Iranian-Italian joint archaeological team searching for the residential area of commoners outside the palaces of Persepolis. It is believed to be one of the boundary walls of the city of Parsa.

“At the moment, we have only one limit of the city on one side of the city and the industrial area. This is the beginning of the work. The shift of interest from the palace to the town is very important for getting a correct view. Up until now, most of the studies were on the palace.”

“The joint Iranian-Italian project is a five-year program. Next year we will resume the excavation. For example, with Mr. Askari we will excavate a large trench in the wall of the city. We want to understand the architecture. This year was the first season. We could not make large excavations. We only made soundings, trial trenches.”

“Our joint mission also has interest in the terrace of Persepolis from two aspects, one is conservation, the other is documentation.”

“Persepolis is a world heritage site, so we agreed that our collaboration will also be for updating the methodology of restoration and conservation in Persepolis. The Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs supports the project. Because, you know, from 1964 until 1979, Italy directed the restoration of Persepolis. Professor Giuseppe Tilia, an Italian architect, who was an expert in restoration, worked there for 15 years continuously. Unfortunately, he died, but we have his son. He is a topographer and works with us.”

“This year, in the first season of the joint team’s activity, Italian conservation specialists came to Persepolis and studied with the Parsa-Pasargadae Research Foundation specialists all the problems of the stone monuments, the problems of pollution, water, heat, and snow, and also checked the durability of material used for restoration.”

Professor Callieri said the team, in collaboration with the Parsa-Pasargadae Research Foundation, is also studying the possibility of setting up a centralized data base compiling all the information on Persepolis and the surrounding area, which may also be put online on a web site.

Asked if the excavation provided further evidence of the fact that Persepolis was the only major monument of ancient times that was built by paid workers and not by slaves, Professor Callieri replied, “No new information, not yet. We understand that one of the cities which had exchanges with the Persepolis Terrace was very near Persepolis. Probably it is the city we are going to excavate.”

However, he noted that in previous excavations tablets have been found that record the payments to the workers, and added that these “objective” documents prove the workers were paid. 

“In the joint Iranian-Italian excavation in the Bolaghi Valley, we excavated one house of a village, and in the house we found one inscription in Aramaic on a pottery item which said ‘double quantity’. This means that the pot had the measure of its contents written on it. So this means there was a system of administration for which it was necessary to write the quantity. A simple peasant would not bother to write it. If there is an inscription, it means there was somebody checking, an official system. We know from the texts of Persepolis that the Achaemenid royal family and princes had many estates, and probably Bolaghi was one of those estates. So that is why administration men were sent from Persepolis or Pasargadae and the peasants had to show them one, two, three, what was the weight written on the pot.”

Asked if he found any similarities between the excavations in the Bolaghi Valley in 2005 and 2006 and the recent excavations on the outskirts of Persepolis, he said, “Similar material was used for pottery, this is a common point. But the structure that we found in Persepolis is much better architecturally, although that was to be expected. In the village in the Bolaghi Valley, the house was very simple. But the wall that we found outside Persepolis is a nice wall.”

He explained the differences by saying that the recent dig was at an inner suburb area close to Persepolis, whereas the site in the Bolaghi Valley that the team excavated was a rural village about 19 or 20 kilometers from Pasargadae.

“We have a very a clear difference between a rural village and an urban settlement.”

“This is only the beginning and once we succeed in excavating one important monument or maybe one important house, or the small houses of the workers, we can bring to light more evidence of the craft activities. We also hope to find some well preserved areas of the wall that can be used as a museum or as a tourist site. We would like to make people interested in seeing the rest of the city, to bring tourists not only to the royal terrace but also to see where ordinary people lived.”

Professor Callieri also commented on the Frataraka period, which came after the Seleucid period and before the Sassanid era.

“The Fratarakas were the local aristocracy. And Frataraka is a title which means governor. This is a title which was used by the Achaemenids. We have Aramaic papyri from Egypt which mention governors with the title of Frataraka. It is an ancient Persian term. And the first king in Fars who issued coins using the title Frataraka was named Baydad, which means given by God. It is a Persian term. They did not take the title of king but used the title governor. He was issuing coins, so it means he was asserting independence. If you issue a coin you are asserting independence. But still they did not call themselves kings. So why did they select this title? It is my idea that they thought of themselves as a kind of representatives of the former kings of Fars, the Achaemenids, but they called themselves governors as a sign of respect for the Achaemenids, as if they were governors for the Achaemenids.”

“There is a connection. The Fratarakas were the intermediate stage of Persian kingship between the Achaemenids and the Sassanids. I am sure that the Sassanids were very well aware of the fact that the Fratarakas and the Achaemenids came before them. It was never written anywhere, and many scholars say the Sassanids had no such idea. But I am sure they had such an idea. Also, in their architecture, there are some similarities. In Firuzabad, the Ardashir Palace uses the same type of lintel decoration as the Tachara of Darius. Why? It is not by chance. And the first king of the Sassanid dynasty, Ardashir, was the last of the Fratarakas. That is the connection. And the Fratarakas ruled from the second century BC to the beginning of the third century CE. Four hundred years they ruled Fars. They had a very important role in the transmission of ideology.”

“The Parthian kingdom was very decentralized. So probably the Parthians had accepted that Fars was independent. But we have no Parthian period in Fars, because there were the Fratarakas.”

“The Parthians were more interested in Mesopotamia. They focused more on this area. The Sassanids were also interested in Mesopotamia. In Mesopotamia, agriculture is fantastic. They had flat land, water, two, three crops a year.”

“Probably the Parthians were not very interested in the Iranian Plateau, although they had an important presence in Ecbatana. Professor Azarnoush finally understood the important structures brought to light in the excavations of the Hakmataneh (Ecbatana) tepe belong to the Parthian period.”

When asked about the fact that this site had previously been identified as Median, Professor Callieri said, “Now we are certain that those structures are Parthian.”

“We have one important piece of evidence from the Sassanid period in Persepolis. We have a Pahlavi (Middle Persian) inscription on the stone of the Tachara Palace of a prince of the Sassanid dynasty, the prince of Sistan, who on his way back to Sistan, stopped in this area called Sad-Sotun (One Hundred Columns) and made some offerings for the ancestors. It is very clear, the Achaemenids are the ancestors.”

“The Fratarakas used Persepolis. We are sure the Greeks and Fratarakas used Persepolis because archaeologists found some reused structures in Persepolis, after the Achaemenid era.”

“The southwest corner of the Persepolis Terrace has very important traces of post-Achaemenid times. The area next to the palace of Xerxes has evidence of use during the Seleucid and Frataraka periods.”

Professor Callieri also pointed to the interactions between the Persians and the Greeks and Romans, saying that although the Achaemenid Persian Empire and the Greeks fought against each other in wars and the Sassanid Empire and the Roman Empire also fought wars against each other, the people had many close contacts and always had some relations and exchanges in the areas of art, commerce, and culture.

“In the Achaemenid era, there were many contacts with Greece. Many Greek cities were Achaemenid. Ephesus and Miletus were Achaemenid cities. We have this idea that Greece and Persia were only enemies. It is not true. Politics always tends to make things very sharp. But fortunately, men always have relations.”

“Alexander married three Iranian princesses. One was Roxane, the daughter of Oxiartes, one of the chiefs of Sogdia, the second was Barsine, also called Stateira, the daughter of the last Achaemenid king, Darius III, and the third was Parysatis, the daughter of Artaxerxes III.”

“Seleucus I, the first king of the Seleucid dynasty, married Apama, who was the daughter of the Bactrian chief Spitamenes. So the Seleucid dynasty was half Iranian since the mother was Iranian. We have to learn much more about the history of the Achaemenid and post-Achaemenid eras up to the Sassanid era. It’s very important.”

“I think Fars and Persepolis are some of the roots of Iranian culture. It’s the importance of this empire. It was the greatest empire of ancient times. Fantastic organization, a multicultural civilization, so well organized. It is an important Iranian heritage. So I think it is necessary for us to investigate in this field.”

RM/MMS/HG

END

MNA