The Cyrenaica Archaeological Project (CAP) is an international mission under the direction of Professor Susan Kane,
On ground examination of the situation in
In 2007 the Brimingham team undertook a series of projects: 3D laser scanning and panoramic photography took place at the Wadi Bel Gadir sanctuary, King Battus I street, the Odeum/Bouleterion west of the Caesareum/Roman Forum, the Roman Forum and Basilica, and the University of Chieti tomb excavation at Ain Hofra. A magnetometry survey took place on the acropolis, areas to the north of the agora and Roman forum, an area north of the Temple of Zeus and in the vicinity of the Roman cisterns to the east of the city. A brief geoarchaeological survey of Cyrene and its wadis and hinterland was also undertaken to assess the potential of the sediments to provide detailed information relating to Cyrene's development. (see their 2007 Report).
Background
After a hiatus of 23 years, an international mission (under the direction of Professor Susan Kane, Oberlin College) will resume archaeological work in Cyrene, Libya. Cyrene, a designated UNESCO World Heritage site in eastern modern Libya, was the leading city of the Libyan Pentapolis. Settled by Greek colonists toward the end of the 7th century B.C., it remained an active Graeco-Roman city of distinctively Hellenic character until the time of the Islamic conquest (A.D. 643).
The first scientific archaeological mission to Cyrene was led by Richard Norton on behalf of the Archaeological Institute of America in the early 20th century. Subsequent foreign archaeological missions from America, Italy, and the United Kingdom have excavated in Cyrene for more than a century.
The most recent American archaeological mission in Cyrene began excavation in 1969 in the extra-mural Sanctuary of Demeter and Persephone in the Wadi bel Gadir. The project was first conducted under the auspices of the Kelsey Museum of Ancient and Mediaeval Archaeology at the University of Michigan. However, when its Director, Professor Donald White, joined the University of Pennsylvania in 1973, the project's sponsorship shifted to the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology.
The American Archaeological Mission's excavations were conducted between 1969 and 1978 when excavation work was suspended to allow for the study of the material that had been revealed. Two further study seasons took place in 1979 and 1981 before political problems between the
Setting and Context
Cyrene was the leading city of the Libyan Pentapolis or "Region of the Five Cities." Settled by Greek colonists toward the end of the 7th century B.C., it remained an active Graeco-Roman city of distinctively Hellenic character until the time of the Arab invasions (A.D. 643). The ancient town was established about 13 km inland from the Mediterranean on the 600 meter-high crest of a limestone plateau known today as the Gebel el-Akhdar or the "Green Mountain". This plateau forms an important physical barrier separating coastal eastern Libya from the Saharan region to its south. During the winter and early spring the mountain heights block the southerly drift of water-laden clouds, squeezing from them enough rain to support a fertile, temperate northern Mediterranean environment that is just 64 km north of the Sahara, one of the most arid regions on earth.
Cyrene's agriculturally based economy thrived on the export of wheat, legumes, fruit, sheep and goat-derived products, horses, and a highly sought-after herbal plant known as silphium, which grew exclusively on the Libyan gebel. The city, enclosed by a protective circuit of stone defensive walls, has two massive hills. The southwest hill (on which lie the acropolis, the agora, and forum) is totally free of modern building. The northeast hill is largely covered with the old Arab village of Shahat, stands of reforested evergreens, and cultivated ploughlands, and remains largely unexplored.
The ancient urban center was divided by three main roads. The Valley Road follows the sloping valley between the two hills to the Sanctuary of Apollo with a monumental entrance, temples, altars, fountains, theater, and later, Roman-period baths. The second road, named after the city's first king, Battus, connects the still unexcavated acropolis zone with the city gymnasium and Roman-period forum. The third road crosses the main axis of the city east of the forum. At its intersection with the Valley Road were more temples, a basilica, and a series of important Roman-period urban villas. In the northeast corner of the walled city is an impressive Doric temple dedicated to Zeus and the city's still unexcavated circus or hippodrome. An extensive series of necropoli with well-articulated rock-cut tombs line the roads and wadis leading out of the city, especially to the north, south, and west.
To the southwest of the city in the Wadi bel Gadir lies the extra-mural Sanctuary to Demeter and Persephone, a recently discovered Greek temple and theatre complex, and the still unexplored southeastern suburbs and necropoli of Cyrene that run along the main road leading from Cyrene to Balagrae (modern el-Beida).
The extra-mural Sanctuary of Demeter and Persephone in the Wadi bel Gadir
The extramural Sanctuary of Demeter and Persephone was laid out about a generation after the initial foundation of Cyrene (ca 620 B.C.) and continued in use throughout the Roman period, The Sanctuary was badly damaged by an earthquake in A.D. 262 and eventually totally destroyed by an even more severe one in A.D. 365. In its heyday, which in terms of architectural expansion seems to have coincided with the reigns of Trajan through Antoninus Pius (A.D. 98 - 161), the Sanctuary covered more than 9,000 sq m. Its structures were distributed over 20 m of abruptly rising ground, broken into three major terraced divisions designated as the Lower, Middle, and Upper Sanctuaries.
One of the largest and best-preserved sanctuaries dedicated to Demeter and Persephone in the eastern Mediterranean, the hillside sanctuary is terraced on at least three levels supported by various retaining walls. The Upper Sanctuary area is still largely unexcavated. Its importance and the richness of finds are a testament to the prosperity of the city of Cyrene: in seven seasons of excavation, a great quantity of votive materials spanning the life of the sanctuary were unearthed: these include ca 4.500 terracotta figurines, ca 750 pieces of marble and limestone sculpture and reliefs, a large amount of high quality Attic Black and Red Figure, Corinthian, Rhodian, Chiot, other East Greek, and Laconian pottery, as well as Hellenistic and Roman fine wares, small votive bronzes, Archaic gem stones and scarabs, jewelry, faience, glass, lamps, inscriptions, and gold, silver, and bronze coins.
Entry to the lower northwest corner of the Sanctuary from the nearby walled city was gained in antiquity by means of a bridge across the wadi drain. Narrow steps cut in the steep opposite face of the wadi above the bridge permitted access to the city's agora through some still undisclosed opening in the walled ramparts. A monumental staircase connected the Sanctuary's upper grounds to an unidentified walled complex installed at a higher level on the great hill rising to the south. The principal entrance to the Upper Sanctuary during the Roman period was provided by a four-columned propylaeum or gate-way, strategically positioned in front of the junction of the monumental hillside staircase and the ancient road leading back to the southeast suburban quarter of the city along the rim of the wadi. In this way, the Sanctuary grounds were architecturally linked with both the city and the countryside that lay to its south. Extensive necropoli with well-articulated architectural facades stretch along the north end of the Wadi bel Gadir and also along the main road leading to Balagrae. The proximity of these cemeteries in the area around the Wadi bel Gadir Sanctuary may all be connected to the chthonic activities of the two goddesses in their capacity to protect the dead.
The history of the cult of Demeter and Persephone/Kore is linked to that of the city. Cyrenean society was a well-documented and complex mixture of peoples, most notably Greek, Libyan, Ptolemaic Egyptian, and Roman, created by the social and cultural melding of the indigenous societies with the waves of newly arriving colonists. The architectural development of the extramural sanctuary can be seen to wax and wane with the city's fortunes.
Rural and extra-mural sanctuaries can often be expressive of the territorial sovereignty of a Greek polis-the rituals conducted within them help to define local politics, society, and culture. A sanctuary in an extra-urban setting such as the one at Cyrene has a dual nature. It is first an exclusive space-the embodiment of the sacred in the countryside, a space that marks off the city from the "untamed" world of nature or from the space of other communities. It is also an inclusive space which serves, through its festivals, cult forms, and ritual practices, as a center for civic expression and for mediating contact with the peoples of the surrounding area.
In the choice of its divinities, the timing of its foundation, and its siting, the extra-mural Sanctuary in the Wadi bel Gadir conforms to de Polignac's theories on extra-urban sanctuaries in the Greek colonial world. Founded after the first generation of colonists had arrived, the sanctuary in the Wadi bel Gadir marked the young colony's first territorial expansion into the surrounding countryside. On a hillside, near a spring, in a peri-urban location (at the base of the city walls, but outside them, near the rich farmland surrounding the city), the Sanctuary was intended to be a transitional element between city and country. It served both to link the two areas and to assert the power of the city over that of the countryside.
The goddesses Demeter and Kore/Persephone and their agrarian festival, the Thesmophoria (known to have been celebrated at Cyrene), must have been important to Cyrene, whose economy was heavily dependent on the production of grain and livestock. The rites of the Thesmophoria, with their emphasis on the recurrent cycling of the seasons, symbolize the ancient city's concern or a secure future-the birth of an abundant number of healthy citizen children and the growth of sufficient crops to feed them. Married women were placed in charge of the festival's conduct in accordance with the Greek view that, despite many societal restrictions, females had one inviolate power-the control of reproduction.
The Thesmophoria were of interest to the women of both the city and the countryside as well as to the local Libyan tribes who also farmed and pastured flocks. At Cyrene, this celebration may have included a procession which began in the Demeter temple in the city's agora and ended in the extra-mural Sanctuary, a procession that perhaps inspired the Cyrenean poet Kallimachos when he composed his "Hymn to Demeter", while serving as librarian to the Ptolemaic court in Alexandria. The physical movement of the women from within the city walls to the wadi outside would have a symbolic resonance. Their procession linked the "inner city" to the "outside territory" and displayed the potential fertility of the Cyrenean citizenry to those outside the polis. Rituals such as this serve both to clarify and to bridge societal gaps.
The main celebration of the Thesmophoria at Cyrene seems to have been held in the Wadi bel Gadir Sanctuary, where the remains of piglet sacrifices and the broken crockery from the ritual meals have been found. The networks of alliance, solidarity, and dependence instituted in the Thesmophoria were strengthened by the ritual meal shared by the participants. These sacrificial meals were an opportunity for the assertion of authority by persons controlling access to food, most particularly meat. In the Wadi bel Gadir Sanctuary, the leading female citizens of the polis had this power and probably used it to advantage to extend their authority over the inhabitants of the region. It was advantageous for the city's land-owning elite to control the Wadi bel Gadir cult, whose rituals symbolically protected the territory around the polis.
The extra-mural Sanctuary in the Wadi bel Gadir provides a detailed look at localized cultic activity spread over more than 800 years. The first six centuries of its architectural development display a gradual accumulation of separate parts-outer walls, terraces, gateways, steps and access doorways, "storage" rooms and other miscellaneous but all too frequently unidentifiable utilitarian structures, water works, and, above all, individual independent shrine houses, whose collective appearance appears to be the consequence of practical requirements present from the outset of the cult. To a large extent the execution of the various separate parts exhibits a pervasive conservatism. In perhaps equal measure their final assembly betrays a form of topographical determinism in which the site, as opposed to any set of abstract religious/aesthetic theories, governs the cumulative architectural result. The close link with the surrounding agricultural region has been argued to be both physical through the mechanism of monumental stairs that led to a second architectural complex on the hilltop to the south and economic based on revenues derived from the adjacent fields and grazing lands that in part may have been owned by the priesthood or were at least subject to their taxation. The extent to which the sanctuary in its final form "faced" north in the direction of the walled city or south toward the grain fields and pasture lands stretching toward ancient Balagrae will be determined by future work.
The extra-mural Sanctuary appears to have been the preserve of the city's elite for most of its existence. The emphasis on a traditional Greek cult practice, with some local variations, squares with what is said of Cyrenean culture in general-that it is a combination of traditional Hellenic, contemporary Greek, Roman, and Libyan elements. This conservative city was controlled by a land-owning elite, who sustained many of their agrarian interests through the worship of Demeter and her daughter Persephone in the extra-mural Sanctuary in the Wadi bel Gadir, and who, through the rituals practiced within that Sanctuary, extended the authority of their polis over the surrounding region.
Current Project Staff
Oberlin College:
Prof. Susan Kane, Department of Art
Prof. Samuel Carrier, Department of Psychology
Prof. Vince Gaffney
Mr. Richard Cuttler
Miss Helen Goodchild
Dr Andy Howard
Dr Gareth Sears
Prof. Donald White
ISM-CNR, Roma:
Dr. Donato Attanasio
Aptigent:
James Barker
Steve Cox
Paul McKey
In Collaboration with
Department of Antiquities, Shahat:
Abdulgader el Muzeine, Controller
Omar al Mukhtar University:
Dr. Saleh R. Akab, Department of Archaeology
Copyright © 2008 Cyrenaica Archaeological Project. All rights reserved.