GOLDMAN 1940, Sandon Monument

The Sandon Monument of Tarsus
Author(s): Hetty Goldman

Source: Journal of the American Oriental Society, Vol. 60, No. 4 (Dec., 1940), pp. 544-553
Published by: American Oriental Society
Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/594084
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THE SANDON MONUMENT OF TARSUS *
HETTY GOLDMAN
THE INSTITUTE FOR ADVANCED STUDY, PRINCETON
THE EXCAVATIONS carried on at Tarsus in the spring and summer

of 1936 uncovered fragments of terracotta plaques (fig. 1) none of
which were complete, but all of which depicted the same monument
in similar manner, although, as they were not made in the same
mould, with variations in size and in minor details. The level at
which they were found, all in close proximity, and the accompany-
ing archaeological material place them in about the middle of the
second century B. C. The plaques are therefore roughly contem-
porary with the first appearance of a coin depicting a similar divine
image which has been plausibly interpreted as Sandon, the chief
god of the Cilician pantheon at least from the beginning of the
second millennium B. C. on. Coins of this general type continued to
be struck until the reign of the emperor Gallienus (260-268 A. D.;
cf. fig. 5).1 The terracottas were published in a report on the
Tarsus excavations 2 with a very brief commentary. They were
interpreted as cheap offerings at the shrine of the god. In view of
the fact that the hope of finding at least the substructure of the
monument corresponding to the one depicted on the reliefs was not
realized before the excavations closed, and opportunity for resum-
ing work may not come for a long time, it has seemed to the writer
of some interest to attempt a synthesis of the various pieces and an
interpretation of the iconography and symbolism of the monument
as a whole. For it is reasonable to suppose that the plaques repre-
sent a real and not an imaginary monument, and that it was located
somewhere at or near Tarsus itself. We know that the ancient god
of this region was equated by the Greeks and subsequently by the
Romans with Herakles,3 and, indeed, on quite a different part of
* Paper read at the annual meeting of the American Oriental Society,

il New York, March 26, 1940.
1 Hill, Catalogue of the Greek Coins in the British Museum (abbr. BMC),
Lyoaonia, Isauria and Cilicia, Pls. XXXII ff.
2 AJA 41 (1937) 274-276 fig. 26.
Dindorf, Hist. Gr. Min. 2; Agathios Hist. II 24 (p. 221 of Teubner
edition, Leipsig, 1871).
544
The Sandon Monument of Tarsus 545
the hill from the find-spot of the relief plaques and directly above
the emplacement of the 14th-13th century temple of Hittite type,
a great mass of terracotta figurines were found among which
representations of Herakles were the most numerous.4 These were
of the conventional late Hellenistic type and included, in addition
to the youthful figure with club, lion skin, and cup (fig. 2), the
bearded " Farnese " llerakles and the reclining hero with wine cup.
Among literally hundreds of fragments from this area not a single
oriental Sandon was found. Marble architectural fragments and
broken bits of inscriptions indicated that a temple of late Roman
date was nearby. Unfortunately the top of the hill had been
levelled off to make way for a concrete gun emplacement during the
first World War so that nothing was left of the actual foundations
of the building. One may, therefore, conclude that the god wor-
shipped in the temple was indeed the ilellenized hero-god and that
the Sandon of our monument represented more truly the ancient
local god who had survived side by side with the newcomer ilerakles
and was identified with the latter only by certain elements in the
population who were of foreign origin. For whom, then, was the
festival of the Pyra celebrated? In his Tarsus orations Dio Chry-
sostom speaks of the Pyre made for Herakles. These are his
words:5 "What say you? If, as seems likely and men declare,
heroes or gods often visit the states they have founded at sacri-
fices and certain festivals, though none can see them; if then,
your own founder Herakles were to come here, say during the Pyre
which you make for him so handsomely," etc. Evidently this pyre
is something specifically raised for the festival and presumably
annually consumed. Some scholars have conjectured that at this
festival, as at that of the Phoenician Melcarth, the god was burned
in effigy, and they think that the temporary structure is depicted
on the coins.6 This may be so but there is certainly no definite
warrant for the assumption in the words of Dio. Whatever the
interpretation of the coins the plaque has all the appearance of a
solid and permanent structure; and the pyre may well have been
raised either in front of the temple, in front of the monument, or
indeed, as it was apparently a popular festival, it may have taken
place at a third spot unconnected with either.
4AJA 44 (1940) 72 fig. 22, and 39 (1935) 529f.

5 Tarsica I (Oratio XXXIII) 408 M.
6 Hill, BMC loc. cit. p. lxxxvi. Ramsay, The Cities of St. Paul 148.
546 Iletty Goldman
Let us then divorce our minds for the moment from the thought
of the pyre of Herakles and look at the monument as it has been
reconstructed on the drawing (fig. 3) .7 The reconstruction is
based on the evidence of the plaques and of numerous coins and, as
far as the facade itself is concerned, only some minor details such
as the exact nature of the mouldings remains doubtful. For the
third dimension, however, there is no evidence. We see a substruc-
ture of two steps surmounted by a wall adorned with an engaged
Ionic column between pilasters. On this, and arranged so as to
appear between column and pilaster on either side, hang a short
sword or dagger and a shield. Above the wall is a moulded archi-
trave. The details here are not clear and I should like to propose
either the conventional three bands of the Ionic order or, more
probably, on account of the curving profile, the Egyptian moulding
so popular throughout Phoenicia and other Near Eastern countries.
This is immediately surmounted by a triangle with slightly concave
sides which takes the place of a pediment but rises at an angle much
steeper than that of any known building of classical Greek or Roman
type. The angle varies on our fragments from about 550 to 600,
and the one used for the reconstruction is the least steep. Centered
in the triangle is a representation of the god, clearly indicated
by the heavy boundary lines as a relief of a type well known from
monuments. One may recall the stele of Amrit from Phoenicia or
the one shown on the cylinder seal from the Palace of Sennacherib
(fig. 4).8 It is on the analogy of these representations that the top
of the stele is rounded in the reconstruction although this detail
is not preserved on the terracotta. I know of at least one stele of
this shape among Hittite sculpture: the Fassiler relief.9 Sandon
is shown standing to right, probably cloaked (another uncertain
detail; on the coins he is sometimes said to be nude), the right
hand raised in the same gesture as characterizes the gods on the
cylinder seal. The left holds a double axe and stylized wreath. On
his back are a quiver and two other weapons, usually called bow and
sword, although the bow is not very clear in this case. He stands
upon a horned lion with folded wings. This animal usually has
7Professor Richard Stillwell of Princeton University very kindly drew

the reconstruction from coins and the photographs of the fragments.
8 Perrot and Chipiez II 204 fig. 69; cylinder seal in the British Museum.
9 Swoboda, Keil, Knoll, Denkmtfler aus Lykaonien, Pamphylien und
Isaurien 14 fig. 9.
paws in front and vulture talons on the hind legs.'0 It is a probable

but not certain detail on our relief and has been omitted in the
reconstruction. To either side of the relief are two cylindrical objects
sometimes compared to the pileus,11 sometimes to altars.12 I
believe them to be small altars, for the pileus as a symbolic object
cannot be understood in connection with a god. On the upper left
hand plaque there are even indications that the coraplast intended
to represent flames rising from the altars. At the top, the sides of
the triangle seem to be tied together with rope or metal rings and
the whole is surmounted by an eagle. The details of the treatment
of the apex and of the eagle are taken from coin types and there
can be little doubt that the plaque, which otherwise follows the
same design as the coins, ended approximately in the same way.
Although there is, as I have said, practical identity between the
triangular superstructure of the relief and the coin types, the base
of the monument differs. On the coins (fig. 5)13 this is proportion-
ately lower and resembles closely a rectangular altar tied with
garlands and fillets and should, I think, be interpreted as such. On
coins of Marcus Aurelius and of later date, the monument some-
times appears under a canopy supported on the head and one hand
of youths wearing Phrygian caps. They stand upon the base. In
the free hand they hold palms. Ramsay's suggestion that the coins
represent a portable shrine, carried in procession, over which noble
youths held a canopy seems plausible and receives a certain con-
firmation in a terracotta found at Myrina. It represents with
elaborate detail a cave of Pan on an ornate base or altar and simi-
larly canopied, though here the canopy is identical with the arched
entrance of the cave.13a The altar tied with garlands represents,
however, a type that had entered into the JKoLT of Greek and Roman
art and is more classical than the high structure of the plaque on
which the triangle containing the image of the god rests. Disre-
garding the Greek character of the surface adornment, the origin
10 Heuzey, Les Origines orientates de Part 239; Maltaya rock carving.

" Gardner, BMC The Seleucid Kings of Syria 72, 78, 89, 112.
12 Hill, BMC Lycaonia, Isauria and Cilicia 180-181.
13 E. T. Newell, Royal Greek Portrait Coins pl. VII 26. A very small
fragment of a terracotta plaque with a base similar to that of the coins
was found in an unstratified area. Most of the terracottas found with it
were of the second century A. D. and it resembles them in technique and
finish.
13a Pottier-Reinach, La Necropole de Myrina 545 pl. xix.
548 HIetty Goldman
of this is specifically Near Eastern. The temple, the altar, the

grave, and the statue raised high above the ground are found in
the Near East, beginning with the ziggurat of Mesopotamia, con-
tinuing through rock cut buildings (such as the Urartian ones
around Lake Van) and the partially rock-cut, partially built grave
of many regions of Anatolia. The elevated monument takes its
place in Greek art through the Ionians, the Carians, and other
Anatolian coastal people of mixed population, with such works as
the Nereid Monument of Xanthos and the Mausoleum of ilalicar-
nassus. The facade with only three supporting members, though
not the most common type, can be paralleled in Paphlagonian rock-
cut tombs 14 and in a tomb from Termessos.15 These monuments
are all of the portico type.
Leaving for the moment the discussion of the arms which hang
upon the wall, let us consider the superstructure which has the form
of a very steep pediment. Such pediments are not unknown either
in Greece of the late 8th century B. c. or in Anatolia itself. To
choose one of many possible parallels there is the facade of a
Phrygian rock-cut tomb (fig. 6)16 where the sides of the pediment
are little less precipitous than those of our monument and where
the apex too suggests poles or boards, in this case crossed and with
ornamental ends. Greece offers the models of early buildings found
in Argos 17 at the shrine of Hera and one from Perachora 18 oppo_
site Corinth, where the same goddess was worshipped. The type
of the two models is substantially the same as far as the steep gable
is concerned except that one is entirely open on the front and the
other has a wide door. One thinks of the hay-loft of our barns or
the store rooms of gabled Dutch houses along the canals of Holland.
There is also the pediment of the -Urartian temple of Musasir as
depicted on Assyrian reliefs of Khorsabad which tell the story of
the eighth campaign of Sargon (fig. 7).19 This building too is of
1Perrot and Chipiez V 201, 204, figs. 136, 139.

Lanckoronski and others, Stddte Pamphyliens und Pisidiens II fig. 76
p. 110.
'6 F. von Reber, Die phrygischen Felsdenkmdler (Abhandlungen der hist.
Classe der K. Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften, 1898) 594 fig. 16
left.
17 Ath. Mitt., 48 (1923) pl. VI.
"8Arch. Anzeiger 1934 153-154, figs. 11, 12.
19 E. Herzfeld, Archaeological History of Iran 16 fig. 5. The reliefs, from
the palace of Sargon, are now in the Louvre.
the eighth century B. c. There is, therefore, nothing to prevent

our interpreting the superstructure simply as a pediment of a
peculiarly early type, but there are other points of view which I
should like to present. One is that it may be thought of as per-
petuating a primitive structure, an open tent or shelter under
which the statue stood, and that the heavily marked sides of the
triangle represent the poles tied together with rope or held together
by metal rings. There may have been statues that stood in the
open and were thus protected before the days of temples. The
representation of the god under a primitive shelter was preserved
in conventional Egyptian art20 and something similar may be
postulated for Anatolia. On the other hand, the architectural form
of the background may be thought of as representing the pyramid;
at once the mountain on which Anatolian gods so often stood and
the aniconic form in which they appeared. To illustrate this I show
a cylinder seal from Byblos (fig. 8)21 on which the deity mounted
on an animal faces a pyramid also mounted on an animal and
poised above an altar: a divinity facing either his own aniconic
image or that of another god. The god upon the mountain is too
well known in ilittite art to need illustration here. Even in Greece
Zeus was sometimes worshipped under the form of a pyramid for
Pausanias tells us of the rude statues of Zeus and Artemis at
Sikyon; Zeus resembles a pyramid, he says, and Artemis a column.22
The pyramidal form may well have come from Anatolia and one
may cite in support of this derivation the Cilician coins with grape
clusters around a triangular object 23 and the form of the Zeus
Dolichenos reliefs, found in various parts of Europe. He is repre-
sented against a steep triangular background. These reliefs indeed
offer the closest parallel to the superstructure of our plaque and
the strongest argument for interpreting the triangle background
as part of the religious symbolism connected with the god rather
than merely as a structural feature. Zeus Dolichenos too is a
descendant of Hittite gods, the thunder god upon the bull, and he
wandered over the Roman world in the camp baggage of her cos-
mopolitan army. I illustrate one of these bronze plaques which in
at least two instances were found in pairs as if they had formed the
20 Cf., for example, Capart, L'Art 9gyptien 2 plate 171; relief from the
funerary Temple of Seti I.
21 Contenau, La Civilization phenicienne fig. 18.
22 Pausanias II 9. 6. 23 Hill, BMC loc. cit. pi. XV 12.
550 HIetty Goldman
back and front of a single object (fig. 9).24 It has been supposed
by some that a third relief now missing must be postulated and that
all three formed the bronze revetment of a single pyramidal cult
object. But we need not enter into the realm of supposition. The
two dimensional triangle, as an abbreviated form of the pyramid,
may quite as well stand for the mountain on which the god appears.
Some of the reliefs, such as the one illustrated, seem to be shaped
at the apex like an arrow or possibly a spear head; another has been
likened to the thunder bolt of the god. No matter what the
specific interpretation, these Dolichenos reliefs bring the evidence
we need to show that the background of the relief is in many
instances part of the religious symbolism.
While we have every reason to believe that Sandon himself is an
important religious figure, at least as early as the second millennium
B. C., the fantastic animal upon which he stands cannot be traced
back further than the first millennium, at least not in precisely this
form. It represents, however, the final stylization of many very
ancient elements. These are the winged lion and the griffin or
bird lion. The horns, judged by their shape, may be those of the
goat which enters into the conception of the hybrid chimaera, or
they may have their origin in the horns of the lion-bird of
Ningiszida.25 The Hittite gods of Anatolia, on the other hand,
stand on naturalistically represented lions and bulls. The type
as it appears on our relief is fairly common in Assyrian art 26 of
the first centuries of the millenium, in Persian art,27 and a variant,
with hoofed forelegs, existed in the Armenian region of Van where
a partially preserved bronze statue of a god standing upon a
couchant winged lion was found.28
I now wish to discuss briefly the sword and dagger on the rear
24 Bronze plaque from Heddernheim; Rostovtzeff, History of the Ancient

World, Rome, P1. XCI 4.
25 Frankfort, Cylinder Seals 119 fig. 33. Van Buren, Iraq I 60. ".
a monster which has flat head and forked tongue of a serpent, but
is horned and has the horned cap and spiral side-locks betokening a
deity." Early seals with hybrids are also well illustrated in Frankfort's
interesting discussion of the origin of the Cretan griffin, BSA 38 (1936-37)
106 ff.
20 See above, n. 10.
27 Swindler, Ancient Painting fig. 129; winged gryphon from the Palace
of Darius and Artaxerxes, Susa.
28 Heuzey, op. cit. P1. IX.
wall of the base. Again one may look upon them merely as dedi-
cations, trophies or decorative objects, or one may believe them to
be part of the religious symbolism. Let us look at the Temple
of Musasir (fig. 7). Here we see a great spear appearing above
the gable of the roof and on the walls the great shields of gold
dedicated by kings as they are described in the annals of Sargon.
The spear is taken to be the emblem of the god Kaldi just as a
spear was the emblem of Marduk. On the rock sculpture of Yasili
Kaya we have the Hittite god half sword, half man (fig. 10)29 and
on the building blocks of ilattusas the spear behind the altars.30
Therefore, in view of these analogies, cannot the weapons hanging
on the Sandon base be interpreted not necessarily as aniconic forms
of the god, but as symbols in which his power dwells: the sword
of his offensive strength and the shield of his protective power?
The shield plays an important role in the symbolism of Crete, whose
religious roots are certainly in Anatolia or northern Syria. This
can be illustrated by many objects from which I have chosen, as of
particular importance, some sealings found in Knossos and Zakro.
On one we have the shield and the sacred pilar (fig. 11),31 on
another the walls of a city placed under the protection of the god
through the emblem of his shield (fig. 12 a). On a third, the shield
accompanies what appears to be a shrine (fig. 12 b).32 The shield
is apotropaic: it turns away evil from the city. The clangor of the
Ancilia warns Rome of danger.33 The pillar at times has a similar
function. The pillars, or baetyls outside the tower of Troy VI, 1,
stand guard over the most vulnerable part of the fortification: the
gate.34 The custom of putting the apotropaic symbols on the walls
of a town is not lost in the course of time, although one cannot
tell how much of the original meaning has been retained. At
Isauria the shield and sword in combination, much as on our
plaque, as well as other pieces of armor, are sculptured in low relief
on one of the towers of the acropolis built probably in the first
29 Garstang, The Hittite Empire PI. XXV.

30 Ibid. fig. 5 p. 92.
31 Evans, Palace of Minos III fig. 208 p. 317.
32 S. Hogarth, JHS 22 (1902), " The Zakro Sealings," figs. 29 and 30 p. 88.
" There two types show obvious use of the shield as a symbol, probably of
divine protection extended to the buildings associated with them."
33 Livy, Epit. LXVIII; Servius on Aeneid, VIII, 3.
34C. W. Blegen, AJA 38 (1934) 241 and fig. 18.
552 Iletty Goldman
century B. C.35 Sword and shield appear so frequently on graves

of this region (fig. 13)36 that Keil and his colleagues were aston-
ished and attributed it to the presence of many armorers among
so warlike a people. I believe, however, that as in the case of our
Tarsus Sandon monument the explanation lies elsewhere and in a
less practical sphere.
A distinction should be made between apotropaic emblems and
aniconic forms which are closer to fetishes. Mystic thought is
perhaps least subject to change in the course of time. The cross in
the Christian religion is not an embodiment of Christ but the
instrument by which his act of sacrifice and atonement was accom-
plished-and, as such, one to which his power is attracted and
before which prayers are spoken. In a similar way the sword and
the shield may be conceived of, not as divinities, but as symbols
embodying or attracting divine power. I suggest it as an interpre-
tation in consonance with early religious concepts and the known
symbolism of Anatolia and the eastern Mediterranean. The Sandon
of Tarsus, then, takes its place among those late Hellenistic and
Roman monuments which demonstrate in iconography and sym-
bolism the persistence of ancient forms and religious ideas. As
Perdrizet has noted,7 it was just at the time to which our Sandon
monument may be attributed that there was a recrudescence of
oriental ideas and forms.
I should like to return once more to a brief discussion of the
architecture of our relief. It is related to three types which are
themselves interrelated: (1) the rock-cut chamber tomb; (2) the
rock relief sculpture; and (3) the isolated monument with a solid
core. Of the three, we know least about the latter type which appears
both in Syria and Palestine. If we make our choice among them it
is clear that only the rock sculpture is possible for our monument.
Only so could the relief of Sandon appear on a vertical surface.
35Swoboda, Keil, Knoll, op. cit. 125 fig. 41; construction attributed to
the Galatian king Amyntas.
"6 Ibid. 49. Six such grave monuments are listed.
37 Perdrizet, " Le Monument de Hermel," Syria 19 (1938) 66. At the time
of the dissolution of the Seleucid empire there was a local art which shows
the permanent artistic instincts of the race more strongly than under im-
perial Roman rule. " Ainsi le monument de Hermel qui, au premier coup
d'oeil, pourrait paraltre grec, apparait, quand on y regarde plus prbs,
comme un monument oriental plaque d'hellenisme" (p. 67).
PLATE I
PLATE
,N~~~~~~~~~II
Ir~~
0101 .
.K;.~~~~~~~~ WRI
PLATE11
FIG. 9
FIG. 8
FIG. 10
FiG. 11
PLATE I V
co /o
A I O ,~~~7E
There is absolutely no parallel, as far as I know, for a free-standing

building of the Hellenistic period with a pediment as steep as that
of the plaque. Rock reliefs are characteristically ilittite, and
Anatolian, too, is the heavy squatness of the Sandon monument.
The rock-cut tomb is eliminated as the unbroken fagade of the
terracotta shows that there was no chamber or open portico. Our
monument, however, has certain features in common with the type
with solid core. Among the more interesting examples of this is
the so-called " Tomb of Absalom " near Jerusalem (fig. 14). 38
One can see that, translated into relief, the tepee-like roof would
look very much like the concave-sided triangle of the plaque. The
same is true of the pyramidal crowning member of such monuments
as that of ilermel in Syria which Perdrizet believes was raised to
commemorate a local king.39 Monuments with solid core and rock
reliefs have in common with the monument of the Tarsus terracotta
the wall adorned with engaged architectural members; and in all
three the significance lies not in what the monument contains-
as in the tomb-but in what it commemorates and presents.
88 Fyfe, Hellenistic Architecture P1. VI A.

89Perdrizet, loc. cit.

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The Sandon Monument of Tarsus

Author(s): Hetty Goldman

THE EXCAVATIONS carried on at Tarsus in the spring and summer

* Paper read at the annual meeting of the American Oriental Society,

4AJA 44 (1940) 72 fig. 22, and 39 (1935) 529f.

7Professor Richard Stillwell of Princeton University very kindly drew

paws in front and vulture talons on the hind legs.'0 It is a probable

10 Heuzey, Les Origines orientates de Part 239; Maltaya rock carving.

of this is specifically Near Eastern. The temple, the altar, the

1Perrot and Chipiez V 201, 204, figs. 136, 139.

the eighth century B. c. There is, therefore, nothing to prevent

24 Bronze plaque from Heddernheim; Rostovtzeff, History of the Ancient

29 Garstang, The Hittite Empire PI. XXV.

century B. C.35 Sword and shield appear so frequently on graves

There is absolutely no parallel, as far as I know, for a free-standing

88 Fyfe, Hellenistic Architecture P1. VI A.

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