The Masks of Ortheia

Author(s): Jane Burr Carter

Source: American Journal of Archaeology , Jul., 1987, Vol. 91, No. 3 (Jul., 1987), pp.
355-383
Published by: Archaeological Institute of America

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 The Masks of Ortheia*
JANE BURR CARTER

Abstract
Almost all the terracotta masks excavated from the
masks.1 The geographical and chronological distances
are, to say the least, intimidating, and the meaning of
Sanctuary of Ortheia at Sparta can be assigned to two
types: grotesquely furrowed demons and idealized heroes.these grotesque faces in Mesopotamia and at Sparta
The prototypes for these two categories are tracedcan hardly have been the same. Nevertheless, a strong
through Old Babylonian, Canaanite, Cypriot, Phoeni-case can be made for seeing the Mesopotamian and
cian, and Punic examples. The contexts of the Near East-
Spartan figures as manifestations of the same, probably
ern and Punic masks, mostly sanctuaries, show that the
deities associated with masks are a female fertility god-
continuous, tradition, and the implications for the
dess and her consort. This goddess may be identified as a Spartan sanctuary are surprising. As my discussion
West Semitic goddess named Asherah or Tanit. Similari-will eventually focus on the Spartan cult, I will begin
ties between the Near Eastern and Punic cults and the
with a full account of the masks from Sparta.
Spartan cult suggest that the cult of this goddess may
have been established at Sparta by Phoenicians. OrtheiaTHE MASKS FROM THE SANCTUARY OF ARTEMIS
may be the Greek name for Asherah-Tanit. ORTHEIA

Early in the second millennium B.C., a remarkable During the first decade of this century, Bri
figure appeared in Mesopotamian iconographychaeologists uncovered rich deposits of votive
(fig. 1). He wears a cap of hair like an overturned bowl,Sanctuary of Artemis Ortheia. Here were qua
and his lips are pulled back in a wide grimace. From of ivory-carvings and bronzes, small terracot
each side of his nose, deep furrows run down his face ettes and great terracotta disk acroteria, thou
and around the corners of his mouth, then curl outward lead figurines, and masses of local pottery tha
at his jawline in spirals. His grimace and the S-shaped Orientalizing and Archaic Sparta to have been
furrows around his mouth identify him immediately. tistic, cosmopolitan place. As J.P. Droop, w
Terracotta masks dedicated in the Sanctuary of Ar- lished the pottery, put it, "not the least intere
temis Ortheia at Sparta more than a thousand years the finds at the sanctuary of Orthia was the
later present equally grotesque faces, cheeks furrowedreputation of the early Spartans, which h
by deep S-shaped grooves and teeth bared (figs. 2-3). buried beneath the militarism of their descendents"
Several scholars, pointing out the similarity between(AO 52). Among the finds were several thousand frag-
the grotesque faces from Mesopotamia and Sparta,ments of terracotta masks representing, by a nose
have assumed Near Eastern prototypes for the Spartancount, at least 603 complete examples.2

* Travel and research for this article were supported by a al. eds., Elements orientaux dans la religion
Grant-in-Aid from the American Council of Learned Soci- grecque ancienne (Paris 1960) 143-53.
eties in the Summer of 1985. For permission to study objects Barrelet M.-T. Barrelet, Figurines et reliefs en terre
and assistance in doing so, I am grateful to T. Spyropoulos, cuite de la Mesopotamie antique (Paris
Ephor of Prehistoric and Classical Antiquities of Sparta, I. 1968).
Drakotou of the Sparta Museum, V. Karageorghis and M. Cintas P. Cintas, Amulettes puniques (Institut des
Loulloupis of the Cyprus Museum, P. Amiet and M. Pic of Hautes Etudes de Tunis, Vol. 1, 1946).
the Department of Oriental Antiquities in the Louvre, Y. Culican W. Culican, "Some Phoenician Masks and
Israeli and S. Israeli of the Israel Museum, and D. Ben-Tor Other Terracottas," Berytus 24 (1975-
of the Rockefeller Museum in Jerusalem, T.C. Mitchell of 1976) 47-87.
the Department of Western Asiatic Antiquities in the Brit- Manuel P. Cintas, Manuel d'archeologie punique 2
ish Museum, and U. Kasten of the Yale Babylonian Col- (Paris 1976).
lection at Yale University. SP C. Picard, Sacra Punica: Etude sur les
The following abbreviations will be used: masques et rasoirs de Carthage (Karthago
Alasia C. F.-A. Schaeffer et al., Alasia I (Paris 13, 1967).
1971). Stern E. Stern, "Phoenician Masks and Pendants,"
AO R.M. Dawkins et al., The Sanctuary of Ar- PEQ 108 (1976) 109-18.
temis Orthia at Sparta (JHS Suppl. 5, 'Barnett 147-48; SP 50; J. Boardman, The Greeks Over-
1929). seas3 (London 1980) 77.
Barnett R.D. Barnett, "Some Contacts between Greek 2 AO 177.
and Oriental Religions," in O. Eissfeldt et

355
American Journal of Archaeology 91 (1987)

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 356 JANE BURR CARTER [AJA 91

types, and these types have usually been accepted

without question by later scholars. When we allow for
the typological variations inevitable during 200 years
of masks, however, we can probably reduce Dickins's
seven types to four or even two.
Dickins counted more examples (286 pieces) of fur-
rowed, grimacing masks (e.g., fig. 2) than any other
type. He described them as having "a high bald fore-
head in which the parietal bones are usually much
emphasized, heavy wrinkles on forehead and cheeks
and a grinning mouth," and he added that "while
nearly all are clean-shaved, it will be noticed that
XLVIII, 3 shows an example with beard and whis-
kers, and that the incisions on the chin of XLVII, 1
[= fig. 2] presumably indicate a beard" (AO 166-67).
Beard and whiskers notwithstanding, Dickins ac-
cepted the interpretation proposed in 1906 by Bosan-
quet4 and labeled these masks "Old Women."
Bosanquet took as his starting point a dance men-
tioned by Pollux in a list of Lakonian dances: "Wom-
en used to dance the barullika, the invention of Barul-
lichos, in honor of Artemis and Apollo."' This dance,
Bosanquet argued, should be related to two words de-
fined by Hesychius: brudalicha, "a female face,"6 and
brullischitai, "the males who put on ugly female faces
Fig. 1. Old Babylonian
and terracotta relief
sing hymns."'7 Thus the barullika from
was a Lakonian
Mus'e du Louvre no. dance
12460.
for Artemis (Photo:
and Apollo performedJ.B.
by womenCart
(Pollux) or men wearing ugly female masks (Hesy-
Virtually all the masks from
chius), and Bosanquet concludedthe
that theseSanctua
ugly fe-
temis Ortheia were male
mademasks shouldin molds,
correspond and,
to the grotesquely fur- u
rowed masks
the series, many of the from the Sanctuary
masks were of Artemis Ortheia.
approxi
sized.3 The masks could have
This is a classic been
example of worn; m
looking at artifacts
cut-out eyes, and many have
through literary spectaclescut-out mout
and not seeing the actual
trils. Small holes at objects. the top
In fact, and
there is not a single sides of m
specifically fem-
masks seem designed ininefor
trait in any of Bosanquet's andto
thongs Dickins's
tie "Old the
the wearer's head. In some cases, when the masks Women," and Dickins himself observed beards and
seem insufficiently convex or a little small to wear, an whiskers among them. Furthermore, even if we ac-
individual may simply have held the mask in front of cepted the grotesque masks from the Spartan sanctu-
his face. ary as those used in the barullika, we would still have
Guy Dickins, who studied the masks for the final to explain the other six types. Finally, as we shall see,
publication of the sanctuary, divided them into seven there is no reason to think that the goddess worshiped

3 AO 165. "Life-size" is taken here to mean the average XLxaT KaXovo-L AKOVeor. K. Latte, Hesychii Alexandrini
size of a modern adult face, about 18-21 cm. from top of Lexicon (Copenhagen 1953) 351. The text is corrupt, but
forehead to bottom of chin. Since people may have been the ppvaAlXxa seems to be a ridiculous and ugly mask worn
smaller 3000 years ago, what seems somewhat under life- by someone in female clothing.
size to us may have been fully life-size in the second and first SPpvXXtLXLtral' o' a'oxp'a 7rpooo-rE(iea 7repLrtLOLE4ot yv-
millennia B.C. vaLKELa Ka\t luvoUv OvTEvr. Bosanquet compares the 8pv-
4 R.C. Bosanquet, "The Cult of Orthia as Illustrated by
baAXha to several other entries in Hesychius: KvptLOpa" 7Tpo-
the Finds," BSA 12 (1905-1906) 331-43. orC7TEiLa wXtva (cf. KVVOLOV and KVXLVOLOv, both defined as
5 Kat apvAXALK, rb T'ivE vprn.la BapvXXAXov, 7TpoTCOp- 7TpoO-OrTEL Ov XLvov), and KVptTTOL" O' xEOVrTE ra l ~Xtva
7rpdaoo7Ta Ka 'IraaXav, Ka oTapovrT-Er Tf KopvOaXla
XOVVTO
6 pv8aALxa80 yvvaZKEs
a-pdooooaov 'Apr4,hP
yvvatKELov. t KaL
n7apa TO 'Ar'rdhXovt. Poll. 4.104.
yEXo'ov
yEXotarTal, and he notes that Korythalia was the epithet of
Artemis at a temple near Sparta.
Kat ato-xpbv t6Oppos vTLETaL t'pLvo %v T pxbr'-rpav KaLTt
yvvaLKEa iarTa Ev GvraL. b'OEv Ka% 7 Ta tjaxpa /8pvba-

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1987] THE MASKS OF ORTHEIA 357

Fig. 2. Terracotta mask from Sanctu

in the sanctuary hadunbearded, any connection their fe

fore call
long after the last maskthem heroes. was dedicated
The second most The "Old Women," "Warriors," and
numerous "Youths"
type was
comprise more than
Dickins as "Warriors" two-thirds ofpieces,
(232 the fragments e
are bearded, "usually with
deemed classifiable by high
Dickins; he divided the remain- di
dresses" (AO 167).ing Similar
250 fragments into "Satyrs"
to(75the pieces), "Gor-
"Wa
gons" (15),
"Youths" (39 pieces, "Portraits" figs.
e.g., (10), and "Caricatures"
5 and (150). 6
by a clean shaven The "Satyrs" andand
chin "Gorgons" can
abe normal
accepted much as st
ing" (AO 167). Only a beard
Dickins defined them; the other twoseparates
types cannot. The
the boys here, and"Portraits," according to Dickins,admitted
Dickins show "extraordi-
faces were missing, "itaremust
nary realism," remain
"not conventional.., .nor gro- d
type they belong" tesque" (AO 168). If 180).8
(AO the masks were intended
Into re- relat
collection, the "Youths"
produce the features of and "Warrio
specific individuals, then they
ously handsome andanticipate human,
this development in subsequent
and Greek I art thi
regard them as variants
by 200 or 300 years. Givenof onethey
their infrequency, categ
can

8 AO 180. Dickins describes the beard-like incisions on the cheek of one "Youth" (fig. 6) as "short whiskers."

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358 JANE BURR CARTER [AJA 91

Fig. 3. Terracotta mask from Sanctuary o

better be classified raise

asthesingular
ground level in preparation for a major re-
examples of
rowed building
(i.e. sometime early
grotesques
"Old in the sixth century.or
Women") The he
dates given to
The "Caricatures" make up Dickins's styles of Lakonian pottery by the ex- cat
last resort; here he cavators
swept have been considerably
all "the lowered bygrosser
J. Board-
man.10 The excavators
exaggerated masks which fail to come put the sand level at ca. 600
under
B.C.; Boardman
other types" (AO 169). Some of these (moved the date down to ca. 570/560.
Dickins called caricatures of "Old Women," "War- Recent British excavations at the site of the Mene-
riors," and "Satyrs," do not really represent new types. laion have now yielded parallels with the Sanctuary of
Most of the others can be identified as eccentric vari- Artemis Ortheia that suggest the sand was, in fact, de-
ants of furrowed grotesques. For example, Dickins posited earlier, perhaps in the first decade of the sixth
put one mask (fig. 3) with his "Caricatures" because it century.11
is "merely terrifying and bogy-like without any ap- Heroes and furrowed grotesques were among the
parent effort at caricaturing other types" (AO 185), earliest masks found, and these types continued to be
but its essential features strongly resemble Dickins's represented until the series of life-sized masks died out
"Old Women" (e.g., fig. 2). I would, therefore, replace in the fifth century. One of Dickins's "Warriors" came
Dickins's seven types with four: furrowed grotesques, from "a purely geometric layer" (AO 165) and 20
heroes, satyrs, and Gorgons. The last two, indeed, more fragments of "Old Women," "Warriors," and
could be considered subcategories of the grotesques. "Caricatures" were found with a combination of the
The dating of the masks depends on the absolute latest style of Lakonian Geometric pottery and La-
chronology assigned to Lakonian pottery and the date konian I pottery. According to Boardman's dates, La-
of the thick layer of sand brought into the sanctuary to konian I began about 650 B.C., so the two principal

9 Of the "Portraits," Dickins illustrates two masks, incon- 10 J. Boardman, "Artemis Orthia and Chronology," BSA
testably two of the finest masks from the sanctuary, and a 58 (1963) 1-7.
nose (AO, pl. 55). One of the masks (55.1) probably belongs 11 H.W. Catling, "Excavations at the Menelaion, Sparta,
with the heroes, and the other with the grotesques (55.2). 1973-1976," AR 23 (1977) 42.

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 1987] THE MASKS OF ORTHEIA 359

types, furrowed grotesques and heroes

appeared by late in the first half of the
tury. In all, over 300 mask fragment
below the layer of sand and must conseq
fore 600/590 by the earlier chronolo
570/560 by Boardman's chronology. Th
mask fragments found above the sand i
over 3000 (AO 164), and the most proli
masks was probably contemporary wit
pottery in the first half of the sixth cen
rowed grotesques illustrated here (fi
came from below the sand.

Fig. 5. Terracotta mask from Sanctuary of Ortheia. Sparta

Museum no. 12. (Photo J.B. Carter)

What makes the masks from the Sanctuary of Or-

theia truly remarkable, beyond the inherent fascina-
tion of the frightful, is the near absence of such masks
elsewhere in Greece. Life-sized masks almost never
occur in other seventh- and sixth-century Greek sanc-
tuaries. When they do, the exceptional appearances
are worth noticing. Several life-sized hero masks and
a miniature furrowed grotesque have been excavated
in the Heraion on.,Samos, and a furrowed mask lay
with a Silenos mask in a mid sixth-century Samian
grave.12 A mask with deformed features was found in
a grave at Taranto,13 and a mask with furrows around
the mouth came from a late sixth-century tomb on
Thera.14 All these masks appear to be later than the
earliest masks at Sparta, and all three sites lay within
Sparta's sphere of influence: Taranto and Thera were
Fig. 4. Terracotta mask from Sanctuary of Ortheia. Sparta Spartan colonies, and Samos was an early and impor-
Museum, no number = AO, pl. 54.4. (Photo: J.B. Carter) tant Spartan trading partner.15

12 The hero masks have not yet been published; I am grate-tiims," JdI 32 (1917) 72 and fig. 42; Cintas 47, pl. IX.69;
ful to Dr. W.D. Niemeyer for showing them to me. Minia-Manuel, pl. 82.3. The nose slants to the right, the mouth is
ture mask ("Kaum ohne Kenntnis der bekannten Votiv-drawn up on the left, the left eye is set obliquely and is al-
masken aus dem Artemis-Heiligtum von Sparta entstand-mond-shaped, and the right eye is a narrow, horizontal slit.
en"): K.V. Vierneisel, "Neue Tonfiguren aus dem Heraion Size not indicated.
von Samos," AM 76 (1961) 48-49, pl. 22, T 1746. The eyes 14 N. Zapheiropoulos, "'AvaO-Ka ' OI pas," Prakt 1965,
are cut out, the mouth is slit through, there is a piercing at 184 and pl. 227a.
the right ear, and the left ear is missing. Ht. = 6.2 cm. Mask is Eusebius's date of 706 B.C. for the foundation of Taran-
from tomb: J. Boehlau, Aus ionischen und italischen Nekro- to has been supported by archaeology (see F. Kiechle, La-
polen (Leipzig 1898) 157-58, pl. 13.1 and 6. There is a konien und Sparta [Munich 1963] 182-83). Herodotos
piercing below the right ear, and the eyes are cut out. Ap- (4.145-58) says that Thera was founded from Sparta; the
proximately life-size (pres. ht. = 20.4 cm.). earliest pottery from graves there is early eighth-century
13 AO 172; M. Bieber, "Herkunft des tragischen Kos- (L. Jeffery, Archaic Greece [New York 1976] 185; Kiechle

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360 JANE BURR CARTER [AJA 91

Fig. 6. Terracotta mask from Sanctuary

Elsewhere in the only

Greece, features. The
Tiryns ears
has
life-sized terracotta stand
masks.out The
stiffly.16
fragment
five examples came While
from the
a sacred
Tirynsbothr
mas
the citadel and presumably
Spartan connected
models, theyto m
t
of Hera installed there
ilarin the ninth as
prototypes or the
eig
The pottery in the We bothros
must was
nowLate Geo
ask wha
sub-Geometric (ca. 750-650), and thus
masks may be earlier than
THE HISTORY or contempora
OF THE GRIMACING MASKS

first Spartan masks. Unlike

To safeguard the
the Cedar Spartan
Forest,
are hollow heads; the eyes are not cut th
As a terror to mortals has Enlil appointed him
wearer could probably see out of the
Humbaba-his roaring is the storm-flood, mo
scribed by G. Karo, His mouth is fire, his breath is death!17
[they have a] broad face with low forehead, g
Fifty years ago, Clark Hopkins argued in thi
truding round eyeballs under jutting brows, s
nal that the Perseus-Gorgon story and the
nose with nostrils grotesquely expanded, abo
graphy of the Knielauf Gorgon came into
ously grinning mouth framed by two pairs
mythology and art from Assyrian-Baby
tusks.... A series of large holes under the m
sources.18
cheeks evidently held tufts In Hopkins's
of hairview, theor
deathpig's
of the
Humbaba in the Babylonian
figuring a stubbly beard. On one of the two epic of Gilgamesh
vided narrative
were recovered, the cheeks elements
are smoothfor the story
andof Pers
fu
other, deep rugged Medusa, and Assyrian
furrows increasereliefs of
thehero mons
vs. demo

[supra] 82-95). Samos and Sparta: P. Cartledge, "Sparta

17 J.B. Pritchard, Ancient Near Eastern Texts Rela
and Samos: A Special Relationship?" CQ 32 (1982)
the Old 243-65;
Testament,3 with supplement (Princeton 1
Hereafter ANET.
J.B. Carter, Greek Ivory-Carving in the Orientalizing and
Archaic Periods (New York 1985) 93, 161-63. 18 C. Hopkins, "Assyrian Elements in the Perseus-Gorgon
Story," (Cam-
16 G. Karo, Greek Personality in Archaic Sculpture AJA 38 (1934) 341-58.
bridge, Mass. 1948) 33 and pl. 3.

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 1987] THE MASKS OF ORTHEIA 361

plied the prototypeThe

for relief, which app
visual representa
seus beheading the baba
Gorgon. Hopkins's
as related su
in the
text for
of interest here because the the grimacin
grimacing, f
also represents
on Mesopotamian terracotta plaquesHumb
(fig
does, without the na
recognized as Humbaba."9
Stories about this identification
Gilgamesh, the heroiccom
kin
were probably composed
a bearded in figureSumerian stan
Third Dynasty oftached
Ur, the furrowed
in face.the
P. Amiet and others have cent
21st
seen the terracotta
Sumerian stories, each personage as Gilgameshadvent
a separate atop the
severed head of Humbaba.24
the basis of the connected Epic of Gilgam
in Akkadian during the
The story Old
of Gilgamesh Babylonia
and Humbaba continued to
1894-1595). One of bethe
representedSumerian stories
after the Hittite sack of Babylon in
and the Land of 1595.
the The University of Pennsylvania
Living, describes excavated at the
of Gilgamesh andNuzihis
an enormous collection of tablets that
friend date to the
Enkidu t
Mountain where Mitannian domination
they slayof thenorthern Mesopotamia
monstrou in
This episode recurstheinfirst half
all of the later
14th century. Among these are seal
versions o
impressions
The Gilgamesh-Humbaba story, then,showing a frontal figure under vigorous w
attack
the first half of the by warriors in profile
second on each side. The central
millennium, a
figure wears a beard and
this time, the Isin-Larsa long locks that recall
period (ca. the 20
nude bearded hero
the First Dynasty at Babylon (ca. 189long familiar in Mesopotamian
the grimacing faceglyptic. Porada, who published
framed by the seal impressions
S-shaped
from
pears on terracotta Nuzi, suggests that the Nuzi lapidaries took
relief-plaques fromthe
potamian sites.21 scene from older representations of Gilgamesh, Enki-
du, and
The identification of Humbaba but confused
the the monster with the
grimacing d
bearded hero.25 Whenon
Humbaba rests primarily Assyrian,
an Iranian,Old
and North Bab
racotta Syrianwith
relief plaque artists later rendered
two the motif of hero vs. de-
heroes, on
mon, their depictions
one of lesser eminence, reflected the Mitannian
attacking aconfla-
lion-
whose face has tion of
the Humbaba and the nude bearded hero.
distinctive The
S-shape

19 F. Thureau-Dangin, "Humbaba," RAssyr 22 (1925)23 Hopkins (supra n. 18, 350) attempts to identify the lion-
23-26; Barrelet 196-98. pawed demon with Pazuzu. But the date of the Berlin
20 J. H. Tigay, The Evolution of the Gilgamesh Epic (Phi-plaque in the first half of the second millennium precludes
ladelphia 1982) 10-12, 23-24, 39-40. Pazuzu, a monster whose floruit is in the seventh century
B.C. See P.R.S. Moorey, "A Bronze 'Pazuzu' Statuette from
21 The dates for these reliefs are those suggested by Bar-
relet. The reliefs have been found at Tello, Barrelet, nos.
Egypt," Iraq 27 (1965) 36-38. Porada (E. Porada and B.
174-75 (pl. 16), 177-78, 180-83 (pl. 17); perhaps at TellBuchanan, Corpus of Ancient Near Eastern Seals in North
Asmar, Barrelet, nos. 759 (pl. 73), 831 (pl. 83); at Kish,
American Collections 1: The Collection of the Pierpont Mor-
Barrelet, no. 677 (pl. 63); at Nippur, L. Legrain, Terra-
gan Library [Washington, D.C. 1948] 82) accepts Opitz's
interpretation of the relief as Gilgamesh, Enkidu, and
cottasfrom Nippur (Philadelphia 1930) 26, no. 192; at Sip-
par, Barrelet 201 n. 2; at Babylon, Barrelet 201 n. 2 and
Humbaba and his date for the relief in the Old Babylonian
Hopkins (supra n. 18) 349; at Ur, Barnett, pl. lb (these are:
period.
top, left to right, British Museum 127444, 116834, 116833, 24 The Louvre statuette is thought to be from Tell Asmar:
bottom, left to right, 127443, 116523) and S. Smith, "The Barrelet 410-11, 415, no. 831, pl. 83. A second depiction of
Face of Humbaba," JRAS (1926) 441-42. Others, of un- this scene, on a fragmentary relief-plaque from Kish, pre-
known provenance: Barrelet, nos. 758, 760 (pl. 73), 818 (pl.
serves only the hero's lower legs standing on Humbaba's
81). See also E.D. Van Buren, Clay Figurines of Babylon head: Barrelet 350-51, no. 677, pl. 63. See Barnett 147 and
and Assyria (New Haven 1930) 216-17, nos. 1047-56. P. Amiet, La glyptique misopotamienne archaique2 (Paris
22 Berlin, Kaiser Friederich Museum, Vorderasiatische 1980) 156-57. Barrelet dates both, with a query, to the Isin-
Abteilung 7246. Published by D. Opitz, "Der Tod desLarsa/Old Babylonian periods.
Humbaba," AfO 5 (1928-1929) 207-13. See also Hopkins 25 E. Porada, Seal Impressions of Nuzi (AASOR 24, 1947)
(supra n. 18) 350, fig. 4; T. P. Howe, "The Origin and
60, and Porada 1948 (supra n. 23) 82. Another seal of this
Function of the Gorgon-Head," AJA 58 (1954) pl. 36.6,period, that of Shaushshatar, King of Mitanni, ca. 1450,
where the date of the relief is mistakenly said to be Neo-
may show the detached head of Humbaba: Barnett 146-47.
Assyrian.

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 362 JANE BURR CARTER [AJA 91

scene of two warriors in profile attacking an

always) frontal figure occurs on Assyrian c
seals, on an ivory relief and a bronze bowl fro
rud, on the gold bowl from Hasanlu, and o
orthostat reliefs from Carchemish, Tell Ha
Karatepe.26 During the Orientalizing pe
Greece, the motif was apparently borrowed to
Perseus, aided by Athena, killing Medusa.27
If we extend the comparison, the head of Hu
cut off by Gilgamesh and Enkidu, should be
type for the head of Medusa severed by Pers
fact, in the Old Babylonian period, the grimac
of Humbaba served apotropaic purposes li
Greek Gorgoneion did a thousand years lat
bodyless head, the grimacing face was na
tombs, carved on a temple door, fastened to divi
niture, and suspended above scenes of sacrific
The scheme of Gilgamesh vs. Humbaba may
survived in Greece as Perseus vs. Medusa, and the
protective function of Humbaba's head may be pre-
served in the Greek Gorgoneion, but Humbaba's dis-
tinctive face vanishes from Near Eastern terracotta re-
liefs and seals after the middle of the second millen-
nium B.C. Only on masks do the peculiar furrows of
Humbaba's face resurface in later periods. Already in
the Old Babylonian period, a terracotta furrowed face
from Kish in northern Mesopotamia (fig. 7) had cut-
out eyes (part of the right eye remains) and a hole in Fig. 7. Terracotta mask from Kish. Paris, Mus&e du Louvre
front of its surviving ear as if to attach the face to a no. 10457. (Photo: J.B. Carter)
wearer. Judging from the size of the fragment (ht. =
11.3 cm.), the intact mask would have been just under The mask was excavated in the 1911-1912 cam-
life-size and could perhaps have been worn. paigns of de Genouillac in the residential area T lo-

26 Porada 1948 (supra n. 23, 82, no. 686, pl. 101) cites As- could apparently reside in the whole figure as well as in the
syrian seals with Gilgamesh, Enkidu, and Humbaba in the head alone. On several Old Babylonian terracotta reliefs, a
Pierpont Morgan Collection and in Berlin (A. Moortgat, solitary standing figure with Humbaba's furrowed face
Vorderasiatische Rollsiegel: Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte des shakes his raised fist (Barrelet: nos. 174-75 from Tello; no.
Steinschneidekunst [Berlin 1940] no. 608). Other seals: H.J. 758 of unknown provenance). Similarly, Medusa with her
Kantor, "A Bronze Plaque with Relief Decoration from head still on her shoulders stood in the pediments of the
Tell Tainat," JNES 21 (1962) 114, n. 68. Nimrud ivory: Temple of Artemis on Corfu.
M.E.L. Mallowan, Nimrud and its Remains II (London 29 Eight Humbaba heads were fixed to tombs in Babylon:
1966) 537-38, fig. 457. Bronze bowl from Nimrud: Barnett Van Buren (supra n. 21) 216. At Tell al-Rimah, the fur-
147, pl. IVb. Hasanlu bowl, found in a ninth-century level rowed face was carved in relief on the end of a rectangular
but dated by the excavator to the late second millennium: R. stone probably in the Old Babylonian Period; the stone was
H. Dyson, Jr., "Hasanlu and Early Iran," Archaeology 13 later reused (ca. 1500-1350) in the entrance of the inner
(1960) 124-28. Carchemish orthostat of ca. 900 B.C.: D.G. temple courtyard: T.H. Carter, "Excavations at Tell al-Ri-
Hogarth, Carchemish I (Oxford 1914) pl. B. 15b. Tell Halaf mah, 1964," BASOR 178 (1965) 59-60. Humbaba's fea-
orthostat, ninth-century: M. von Oppenheim, Tell HalafIII tures protect the chair (or altar?) of a divinity on terracotta
(Berlin 1955) pl. 102a. Karatepe orthostat, seventh-century: plaques from Nippur, Uruk, and elsewhere: Barrelet 407-
H.T. Bossert et al., Karatepe Kazzlari (Ankara 1950) 409, no. 818, pl. 81. On an Old Babylonian seal, the head of
pl. 13.64. Humbaba appears suspended above a robed and bearded
27 Barnett 148-49; Hopkins (supra n. 18) 345-47; A.D. worshiper who carries a small goat as an offering to Sha-
Napier, Masks, Transformation and Paradox (Berkeley mash and, on another seal, above a supplicant goddess and
1986) 109. two priests in the presence of a god: Porada 1948 (supra n.
28 In both Mesopotamia and Greece, the apotropaic power 23) 50, no. 399, pl. 57 and 47-48, no. 383, pl. 55.

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 1987] THE MASKS OF ORTHEIA 363

cated west of the ziggurat of el Oheim

specific information was reported about
of this piece, but de Genouillac preface
tion of the finds with some general re
their date. For most of the objects, he s
certain, since all the written documents
excavations belong by their dates, writin
to the period of Hammurabi, and since
motives of the terracottas also occur on
"attribues avec certitude" to the Fir
Babylon.30
Although the Kish mask is unique (to my know-
ledge) among the terracottas of the Old Babylonian
period, several small terracotta faces (e.g., fig. 8) may
have been models of masks. They have furrows like
Fig. 9. Fragmentary terracotta mask from Enkomi (proper
the faces of Humbaba on the reliefs, and their eyes are
right cheek and bottom of right eye). Nicosia, Cyprus
sometimes pierced through.31 Like the terracotta re-
Museum no. 5887/2. (Photo: J.B. Carter)
liefs of Humbaba, the small faces disappear in the

Near East after the fall of Babylon. But the tradition

of furrowed masks recommences, in the late second
millennium, on Cyprus.
Two deeply furrowed masks from Enkomi (figs.
9-10)32 may have ancestors among the Mesopotamian
Humbaba faces. Both masks are life-sized or slightly
smaller, both are relatively thick in section (1.5-3.5
cm.), both are marked by vertical furrows down the
nose, and both have cut-out eyes. The French excava-
tors dated one mask (fig. 10) to the end of the 12th
century or the beginning of the 11th century B.C. on
the basis of its context. The other mask (fig. 9), from
an unstratified surface layer, should be of similar date.
The unstratified mask (fig. 9) has a particular rel-
evance to the earlier Humbaba faces. In some of the
earlier faces (e.g., fig. 8), furrows running across the
cheeks intersect at the side of the nose with furrows
encircling the mouth, thus forming a horizontal "V"
on the cheeks.33 In the Enkomi mask (fig. 9), these two
sets of furrows have joined, resulting in a chevron de-
sign crossing the cheek from high on the side of the
Fig. 8. Terracotta mask from Ur. London, British Museum face to the side of the nose and returning out, down,
no. 127443. (Courtesy Trustees of the British Museum) and around the corners of the mouth. The furrows of

30 The mask is in the Louvre, AO 10457. H. de Genou- Y.B.C. 10.051 (Van Buren [supra n. 21] 216-17, nos. 1051
illiac, Fouilles franqaises d'El-'Akhymer. Premieres recher- and 1055).
ches arche'ologiques a Kich 2 (Paris 1925) 5 (date), 20, P.61, 32 Fig. 9: Cyprus Museum inv. 5887/2; P. Dikaios, Enko-
pls. V.4 and 58.3 (mask). Cf. the comments of R. Opificius, mi Excavations 1948-1958 (Mainz am Rhein 1969-1971)
Das altbabylonische Terrakottarelief (Untersuchungen zur Vol. II: 779; Vol. IIIa: pl. 149.17. Pres. ht. = 7.5 cm. Fig. 10:
Assyriologie und vorderasiatischen Archaologie 2, Berlin Cyprus Museum inv. A.71.1. E. and J. Lagarce, "A propos
1961) 8-9. Barrelet (336, no. 633), more circumspect about du masque A.71.1 d'Enkomi," Syria 50 (1973) 349-54; E.
the date, gives only "?"; Van Buren (supra n. 21, 216, no. and J. Lagarce et al., "Rapport sommaire sur la XXIe cam-
1049) gives 2100 B.C. pagne de fouilles A Enkomi-Alasia (Chypre, mars-avril
31 British Museum 116834 (Barnett, pl. Ib, top middle, 1971)," Syria 48 (1971) 327-29. Pres. ht. = 12.0 cm.
from Ur), Yale Babylonian Collections N.B.C. 4465 and 33 Cf. Barrelet, nos. 175, 177, 178, 758; Barnett, pl. Ib.

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364 JANE BURR CARTER [AJA 91

Amrit, on the North Phoenician coast, to show the

same chevron pattern of furrows found on the Enkomi
mask (fig. 9)-continuous lines running from ear to
nose and down around the mouth. Unfortunately, no-
thing seems to be known about its provenance or
date.35 The situation is better for a circular mask, half
life-sized, with chevron furrows (fig. 11); it came from
a tomb of ca. 800-650 B.C. at Akhziv on the coast
north of Haifa.36 Its cut-out, crescent-shaped eyes are
set obliquely on the face, and its cut-out mouth is
pulled down lower on the right side than on the left,
characteristics that will reappear in Punic masks,
which, like the Akhziv mask, come from graves. A sec-
ond mask that may foreshadow Punic examples was
found at Kourion, Cyprus; its hair is vertically stri-
ated like the old Mesopotamian Humbaba, one of the

Fig. 10. Fragmentary terracotta mask from Enko

proper left cheek, and nose). Nicosia, Cypru
no. A.71.1. (Photo: J.B. Carter)

the second mask from Enkomi (fig. 10) fo

exaggerated but similar pattern. Another
mask, from Kition, represents a rather diff
on top of the preserved side of the head is a
feather-like protrusion t that may identify
the Egyptian god Bes.34
In the Levant and on Cyprus,
Fig. 11. the
Terracotta mask from Akhziv. tradition
Jerusalem, Rocke-
rowed masks continued in the first millennium B.C. feller Museum no. 44.52. (Courtesy Israel Department of
Antiquities and Museums)
Enough remains of an originally life-sized mask from

34 Larnaca Museum no. 553 (unpublished) from Areachased II, from Mr. C. Abela of Sidon in 1889. Culican (49, 51,
Room 12. Dated to the end of the 13th century. V. Kara- 54 fig. 5E) guesses at a date around 500 B.C. Inventoried in
georghis, "Kition: Mycenaean and Phoenician," ProcBritAc H. B. Walters, Catalogue of the Terracottas in the Depart-
59 (1973) 16-19. This mask differs from the Enkomi exam- ment of Greek and Roman Antiquities, British Museum
(London 1903) 70.
ples in that the lines of the face are incised into the surface
rather than modeled plastically. As restored, it is 15.9 cm.36inFrom Tomb 3 at Akhziv: Jerusalem, Rockefeller Muse-
um, Palestine Archaeological Museum Handbook, no. 225;
height and has cut-out eyes and a large, gaping, cut-out
mouth. The mask resembles a Bes from Karatepe: Bossert Israel
et Department of Antiquities no. 44.52. Ht. = 13.6 cm.
al. (supra n. 26) pl. XVI.78. See also V. Wilson, "The Culican
Ico- 57 no. 4, 56 fig. 12; Stern 112 and fig. 7. There are
nography of Bes with Particular Reference to the Cypriotthree piercings near the rim, one behind the top of each ear
Evidence," Levant 7 (1975) 82. and one at the top of the head. Culican (63 n. 23 and 62 fig.
35 Amrit mask: Damascus, National Museum, inv. A84; B) lists and illustrates the pottery from this tomb and de-
Culican 57 no. 5 and 70 fig. 20. The right ear and cheekscribes
are it as "a limited tomb group certainly not descending
preserved, and a hole for attachment just behind the below
ear. the bounds of mid-Iron II and quite possibly as early
The same chevron furrows occur on a small terracotta head as 800 B.C."
in the British Museum (A462), said to be from Beirut, pur-

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 1987] THE MASKS OF ORTHEIA 365

cut-out eyes is set cally

obliquely, the
with Group I, although the furrows mouth
on its cheeks
the right side of are characteristic
the face, of Group IIthe
and (even among Punic
incised
been to masks,
simplified
two the groups are not so homogeneous that
horizontal all
lines
members
and diagonal lines on theof each group
sides share exactly
of the same
the fea- nos
Masks from the tombs of
tures). The furrowed mask Carthage
from Akhziv (fig. 11) fol- are
lows very closelyand
the masks from Akhziv the pattern Kourion.
of Cintas's Group III. Th
an masks are not well Like thedated,
masks from Punic butsites, the grotesquely
the maj
belong to the seventh furrowed and
masks fromsixth
the Sanctuary of Ortheia at
centurie
lished evidence from East Phoenician sites is still scan-
Sparta first appear in the seventh century and prob-
ty and without precise dates, but masks (still unpub- ably imitate Phoenician models. The life-sized masks
lished) from an 11th-century temple at Tell Qasile with chevron furrows crossing the cheeks and con-
and a 10th-century level at Tell Ser'a, in addition to tinuing downward to encircle the mouth (figs. 2-3)
the late second-millennium masks from Cyprus, indi- belong to the type represented by the mask from Akh-
cate that Phoenician traders and colonists carried this ziv (fig. 11) and the masks in Cintas's Group III. In
tradition westward from their Levantine homeland.39 some of the Spartan masks, the furrows begin at the
Many Punic masks, moreover, have wart-like appli- nose, cross the cheeks, and continue outward to the
ques on the middle of the forehead or between the eye- rim of the mask,44 a variation also found in Group
brows, a feature anticipated by some of the Old Baby- III.45 There are certain differences between the Spar-
lonian furrowed faces (fig. 8) and some Phoenician tan and Punic grotesques: at Sparta, the eyes are not
masks.40 crescent-shaped, and unlike their Punic cousins, the
In his study Amulettes puniques (1946), P. Cintas Spartan faces do not have appliques on the forehead.
classified the Carthaginian grotesque masks into three In short, the Punic and Spartan masks appear to be
groups:41 the masks of Group I, the earliest, have un- independent developments from East Mediterranean
furrowed faces with flattened noses, eyes set obliquely, prototypes.
mouths pulled up on one side;42 the masks of Group II No inscription or written source associates the
have crescent-shaped eyes, hooked noses, wide name Humbaba with the grotesque masks of Cyprus,
mouths, and (usually) furrows across the cheeks and Phoenicia, Sparta, and the Punic cities. Humbaba
foreheads; the masks of Group III have furrows on does appear during the first millennium, but with a
their foreheads, furrows encircling their mouths, cres- very different face, on the terracotta models of neo-
cent-shaped eyes, and grimacing, often non-symmetri- Babylonian omen-readers. At the Cretan site of Gor-
cal, mouths. Masks corresponding to the three Car- tyn, in the second half of the seventh century, a re-
thaginian types have been found as well in Sardinia, markable series of small, furrowed terracotta faces re-
Sicily, and Spain.43 vives the old Humbaba type but probably represents
The mask from Kourion, with its obliquely set eyes the Greek Gorgoneion.46 Although the original myth-
and asymmetrical mouth, probably belongs typologi- ical identity of the furrowed face was lost, the formal

37 On display in Case E, Room XIV of the Cyprus Muse- 43 Sardinia: Group I: Culican fig. 21 (Tharros). Group II:
um, Nicosia. Published only in a photograph; its context at British Museum B393, Walters (supra n. 35, 138, Tharros)
Kourion is not known: SP 47-48 (where the date is given as = Cintas 50, pl. X.77 = Manuel, pl. 84.8; Cintas 50, pl.
"Cypro-Archaic"), pl. 14, fig. 48a. It is about 10-12 cm. in X.76 (tomb at San Sperate, see Moscati, supra n. 39, 226)
height and has no piercings around its rim for attachment. = Manuel, pl. 84.3. Group III: Cintas 52, pl. XI.82 (Cagli-
The nose crooks deliberately to the left. ari Museum) = Manuel, pl. 84.4. Motya, Sicily: Group III:
38 SP 10-14. A. Ciasca et al., Mozia 1 (Rome 1964) 61-67, pls. 44-45,
39 Culican 55, 64; S. Moscati, The World of the Phoeni- 50-51. Spain (from the cemetery of Ibiza): Group II: Man-
cians (London 1968) 163; SP 45-46, 54. Eastern Mediter- uel, pl. 84.14 = Moscati (supra n. 39) 238, pl. 77. Group
ranean precedence is now claimed for cremation graves, red- III: Cintas 51, pl. XI.81 and 83 = Manuel, pl. 84.7 and 10.
slipped ware, the Sign of Tanit, terracotta protomai, and 44 AO, pls. 49.2; 59.1; 61.1; perhaps pl. 60.3.
glass pendants as well as masks: Stern 109. 45 Louvre AO 3242, from Carthage: Cintas, pl. XI.79
40 Punic masks with appliques: SP figs. 1-3, 5, 6, 13. Old = Manuel, pl. 84.6 = SP 13 no. 5, pl. 11.5. The 13th-cen-
Babylonian masks with appliques: British Museum 127443 tury mask from Kition, Larnaca Museum no. 553 (supra
(Barnett, pl. Ib; fig. 8 here); Yale Babylonian Collection n. 34) may be another such. Other of the Spartan masks,
10.051 (Van Buren, supra n. 21, 217, no. 1055). Phoenician smaller and probably later, have only deep semicircular fur-
mask with applique: Khalde, infra n. 54. rows beginning at the nose and encircling the mouth (AO,
41 Cintas 49-51. See also Stern 110-14. pls. 59.3-4; 60.2), a pattern that also appears at Carthage
42 Cintas (pl. IX.69) includes in Group I the mask from (Cintas, pl. XI.78 and 80).
Taranto (supra n. 13). 46 The principal example of an omen-reader's model is

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 366 JANE BURR CARTER [AJA 91
evolution from the Old Babylonian furrowed f
the seventh-century masks seems clear, and t
rowed masks may have preserved Humbaba'
tional identity-the demonic adversary of a se
vine hero.

THE HISTORY OF THE HERO MASKS

One of the most celebrated discoveries from Bronze

Age Canaan in the last generation has been the Stelai
Shrine in Area C at Hazor. Among the finds asso-
ciated with the first (14th-century) phase of the shrine
is a small terracotta mask with cut-out eyes and six
piercings around its perimeter (fig. 12).47 The surface
of the face is unfurrowed and unpainted; the features
are simplified and regular. A second terracotta mask,
round-faced with round cut-out eyes, simplified but
unrefined features, and six piercings around the peri-
meter, lay in an abandoned cistern.48
The Hazor masks stand at the beginning of a long
tradition. A painted mask from 11th-century Kition
(fig. 13) follows the first Hazor mask in its finely mod-
eled features, cut-out, almond-shaped eyes,Fig. and12.
small
Terracotta mask from Hazor. Jerusalem
size.49 The hair, beard, eyebrows, and moustache are 67.1195. (Courtesy Israel Department
Museum no.
painted black; the flesh is painted red. Thetiquities
mask rep-and Museums)
resents an idealized male, presumably someone of
super-mortal status, a hero or a deity. Other more
(fig. 14).50 Hero masks from Enkomi of the lat
fragmentary (or less restored) masks fromondKition,
millennium51 wear a fussier coiffure, the
also from the 11th century, represent theeyebrows,
same typeand beard incised with patterns (fig.

British Museum 116624, published by S. Smith, "The

cenaean andFace
Phoenician Discoveries in Cyprus (London
of Humbaba," Liverpool Annals of Archaeology 1976) and An-
102, pl. XVI. Karageorghis, Cyprus (London 1982)
thropology 11 (1924) 107-14. Its features, delineated
126-27, fig.by98. aHt. = 16.4 cm.
continuous coil, imitate entrails. See also Smith (supra Museum
50 Larnaca n. nos. 4148 (= fig. 14) and 5481. No.
21); J. Nougayrol, "Textes religieux (II)," RAssyr
4148 may be66 one of the masks mentioned by Karageorghis
(1972) 141-45. Gortyn faces: G. Rizza and V.asSantafound inMaria
an 11th-century bothros near Temples 4 and 5:
Scrinari, II Santuario sull'Acropoli di Gortina V.
(Rome 1968) "Chronique des fouilles A Chypre en
Karageorghis,
260-61, pl. 32, no. 215. 1975," BCH 100 (1976) 879; V. Karageorghis, "The Sacred
47 Y. Yadin, Hazor II (Jerusalem 1960) 101-102, 115, in A. Biran ed., Temples and High Places
Area of Kition,"
pls. 182-83; Yadin, Hazor (Oxford 1972) 35-36, 67-74,
in Biblical pl. (Jerusalem 1981) 85. For no. 5481, infra
Times
15a-b. Ht. = 14.2 cm. The Stelai Shrine and this mask are n. 75.
now part of the exhibition "Treasures of the Holy Land" 51 J.-C. Courtois, Alasia III (Paris 1984) 76-77, no. 759
being shown in the United States during 1986-1988: see the (Cyprus Museum inv. 49), no. 760 (Cyprus Museum inv.
catalogue, Treasures of the Holy Land (Metropolitan Mu- 50), and no. 773 (Cyprus Museum inv. 16.53). No. 758
seum of Art, New York 1986) no. 43. A close parallel for (Cyprus Museum inv. 245) is a miniature face without cut-
this mask is the fragmentary mask from Gezer: R.A. Stew- out eyes. Cf. E. and J. Lagarce (supra n. 32) 349. A. Caubet
art Macalister, The Excavation of Gezer (London 1912) and J.-C. Courtois ("Masques chypriotes in terre cuite du
234 and fig. 383, found in a late level but attributed to the XIIe s. av. J.C.," RDAC 1975, 44-45) use the Enkomi
Late Bronze Age. masks as evidence for dating a mask in the Louvre (AO
48 Y. Yadin, Hazor 1 (Jerusalem 1958) 138, pl. 163; Ya- 22845), from an unknown Cypriot provenance, to the Late
din (1972, supra n. 47) 38-40, pl. 25d. Ht. = 16.1 cm. Bronze Age; like the Enkomi masks, the Louvre mask has a
Picard (SP 44) suggests that this mask was associated with a beard and hair marked by circular stamps.
burial, but in fact, though the cistern was used for burials in 52 Grooves divide the hair into horizontal registers. On one
the Middle Bronze IIB-C period, the strata above the skele- mask (fig. 15), the horizontal registers are subdivided ver-
tons show that it later functioned as a silo in Late Bronze I tically to create rectangular sections, and each section is
and collected sterile soil for some time before it received the grooved diagonally, the grooves on the right side slanting
Late Bronze II-III stratum containing the mask. downward to the right and those on the left side slanting
49 Larnaca Museum 3809. V. Karageorghis, Kition: My- downward to the left. On another (Cyprus Museum 16.53),

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 1987] THE MASKS OF ORTHEIA 367

In Canaan and on Cyprus, then, a mask

picting an idealized and usually bearded ma
tablished before the end of the second mille

Fig. 14. Terracotta mask

no. 4148. (Photo: J.B. Ca

Kition and Enkomi, the

with the grotesquely fu
Similarly, hero masks
several of the same site
both in Phoenicia and i
A handsome mask, sli
chased at Akhziv (fig. 1
of the Phoenician ho
some with textured ha
Fig. 13. Terracotta mask from Kition.
foreheads, Larna
most painte
no. 3809. (Photo: J.B. Carter)
are known from Khald

groups of three engraved,

vertically andparallel, upright
horizontally into rectangular sections and cresc
ternating directions in
painted.the
Eyes are cuthorizontal register
out. Only top of head and upper right
have herringbone patterns
part of face are(as does the furrowed
preserved.
Kition, supra n. 34), and
56 Sarepta: curly beards
J.B. Pritchard, Recovering are
Sarepta, a Phoeni- repr
rows of concentric cian City (Princeton
circles stamped 1978) 92-93, 153-54:
into Sar. 1362
the clay.
53 Rockefeller Museum, Jerusalem:
(fig. 86), lower Israel
left part of face, beard painted black but not Depa
Antiquities and Museums
textured, red no. 45.1;
paint on face, Palestine
eye cut out, ht. = 10 cm. Sar. Ar
al Museum Handbook 4229
223. Although
(fig. 87), upper part of head with hair divided not
into rec- excav
most certainly came tangular sections,
from thehair and eyebrows painted black,
extensive ht.
cemetery
enth and sixth
centuries
= 11.9 cm.;at Akhziv.
Sar. 4200 (fig. 88), lower half of Ht. = 13.3 cm
face, beard in-
in the exhibition catalogue
dicated by stampedTreasures of
circles, ht. = 9.6 cm. Pritchard, the Holy
Sarepta.
pra n. 47) as no. 87. Also: Stern
A Preliminary Report of the112, fig.1975):
Iron Age (Philadelphia 9 (where
is mistakenly said to Sar.
be 34
3072 (p. 34, figs.cm.); Culican
16.5 and 45.3), mask of unknown gen- 55 no
Another mask, also bought
der, two fragments atfrom theAkhziv,
top of the head showing resembles
a wide
but does not have cut-out eyes.
fillet and wavy strands See
of hair below, Stern
one piercing above 112
pl. IX.A (where it is called aon Silenus
each ear, red paint left ear, restored widthmask).
= 12 cm.,
54 Khalde: Beirut, National Museum;
found among the votive objects of Shrine 1 (p. 22) and as-Culican
fig. 11 = M. Chehab,signed
"Decouvertes
to the eighth or seventh century (p. 40); phenicien
Sar. 1343
ban," Atti del I Congresso Internazionale
(figs. 27.9 and 62.2), lower part of unbearded face, eyes cut di Stu
Punici, Rome, 1979 out,
(Romered slip over exterior1983) 168-69,
and interior; Sar. 1280 (fig. 62.3), pl.
= 5.6 cm. See also Stern fragment112,
of the right siden. 16.
of the face, eye cut Eyes
out. are cu
eyebrows, and beard are In all, 14 painted
masks were found at Sarepta;blackone came frombut not
mouth is rendered in paint and
the shrine, five from the street not
that runs frommodeled;
city to port, pai
is applied on forehead. and eightFrom
from contexts whose afunction
child's
is as yet unidenti-grave o
early Iron II. fied; their technique connects them to masks from other
55 Tyre: P.M. Bikai, The Pottery of Tyre (Warminster Phoenician, Cypriot and Punic sites: see J.B. Pritchard,
1978) pl. 24, stratum X-1, no. 7. A terminus post quem of "Sarepta and Phoenician Culture in the West," in Atti I
ca. 850 B.C. was suggested by a sub-Protogeometric sky- Congresso (supra n. 54) II, 521-25.
phos found at the bottom of stratum X-1. Hair is divided

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 368 JANE BURR CARTER [AJA 91

(and Helalieh),57 andcome

Hazor;18
from another, "fr
graves at A
tine," is in the wearing
Royal Ontarioa Museum."
headcloth, i
On Cyprus, hero masksand an either unbearded, continued Se
Late Bronze period ormassos now
wereresides in the Fitzwilliam Museum.64
reintroduced b
cian immigrants in the On PunicIronsites, also, bearded heroes
Age. The accompanied
contex
masks have escaped documentation,
the furrowed masks, and, like their grotesque and counter-dat
parts,we
sequently elusive, but the hero masks are
can found primarily in graves
probably agre
are Archaic, mostlyrather
of thanthe
sanctuaries. A famous, almost
sixth life-size ex-
century.
mask in the Museum ample
of fromFine
Carthage (fig. 18), now in the
Arts, Louvre, has
Boston,6
the black and red paint and the
recalls masks with untextured, rectangularly sec- ha
painted
beard, and foreheadtioned
appliques
hair of East Phoenician such
and Cypriot as the
bearded
Khalde or that in themasks.65 In other bearded
Royal faces from Punic sites,
Ontario Museuthe
eyes have found
of this type have been not been cut through,at and they are conse-
Kourion (
several, including quently
examples smaller
better described as protomai than as masks.66tha

57 Sidon: Culican 55 no. 1, fig. 9; from Iron Age tomb in painted red, three piercings on crown, estimated original
cemetery to south of Sidon, a bearded mask, hair and beard width = 8.5 cm.; A175 (Tomb 83), under life-size face, hair,
divided into rectangular sections, traces of red paint, eyes cut eyebrows, mouth and beard(?) below chin painted black, eye
out, piercings at crown and ears, ht. = 11.4 cm., found with cut through, piercings below each ear and on crown, ht.
"Samaria Ware" plate not later than 600 B.C. Helalieh: = 11.0 cm.; A176 (Tomb 95), under life-size face, features
Culican 49, 51 = T. Macridy, "Melanges. Le temple d'Ech- completely surrounded by what seems to be hair and beard,
moun a Sidon, fouilles executees par le Mus&e imperial Ot-applique on forehead, eyes cut through, piercings below
toman," RBibl N.S. 1 (1904) 400, pl. XIV (upper right); each ear and on crown, ht. = 11.9 cm.
fragment of upper head with piercing at crown and applied 63 Oxford, Ashmolean Museum 22.1931, from Larnaca.
disk on forehead, from a deposit of votive figurines presum-Culican 64, fig. 18; Stern 112-14 and n. 21, pl. IX.C.
ably associated with a shrine. 64 Cambridge, Fitzwilliam Museum E.1.1970 from Ta-
58 Hazor: Yadin 1960 (supra n. 47) pls. 103.6 and 163.5: massos: R.V. Nicholls, "Recent Acquisitions by the Fitz-
about half life-size, eyes are cut out. william Museum, Cambridge," AR 17 (1971) 75, fig. 12.
59 Toronto: Royal Ontario Museum, no. 910.109: Culican Hair divided by vertical grooves, raised oval on hair above
57 no. 6, fig. 17. Complete, beard and hair not textured, no forehead, eyebrows with incised herringbone pattern, eyes
remaining paint, eyes cut out, applied disk on forehead, cut through, piercings below each ear and on crown, ht.
ht. = 11.4 cm. = 13.6 cm.
60 Boston, Museum of Fine Arts 72.161: C.C. Vermeule et 65 Louvre MNB 849. SP 20, pl. V.20 (dated to the fourth
al., Art of Ancient Cyprus (Boston 1972) no. 30. Hair, eyes, century) = Culican 69, fig. 23 = Manuel, pl. 83.7 = Stern
mouth, and beard are painted, eyes not cut through, two 110, fig. 6. Hair and eyebrows (but not beard) painted
globular appliques on forehead, piercings below ears and atblack, red slip or paint on face and neck, hair divided into
crown, ht. = 10.5 cm. rectangular sections, eyes cut through, piercings above and
61 Kourion: Cyprus Museum, Nicosia, Room XIV, Case below each ear and three across top of head, nostrils pierced
E = SP 47, fig. 48b (cf. supra n. 37). Hair, eyebrows, through, three piercings in top and three in lobe of each ear,
mouth, and beard painted black, face painted red, eyes cutht. = 18.7 cm.
through, piercings behind each ear and at crown, ht. = ca. 66 These fall into two subtypes. The first consists of two
10-12 cm. There are also two small masks from Kourion in protomes from Carthage with beards extending a short dis-
the Cesnola Collection: SP 46, pl. 13.44; both have paintedtance below the chin and cap-like hair. These two pieces
hair, beard, eyes, and eyebrows, applied disks on the fore-formed the whole of Cintas's Group IV (Cintas 51, pl.
head, eyes not cut through, hts. = 8-10 cm. Several possible XII.84-85); one came from a tomb at the foot of the Byrsa
masks are catalogued by J.H. Young and S.H. Young, Ter-hill and the other, known as "au nezem," from Douf'mes.
racotta Figurines from Kourion in Cyprus (PhiladelphiaByrsa tomb: SP 19-20 no. 23, fig. 19, dated to the end of the
1955) 25, from the Archaic Precinct Fill: no. 382, fragment sixth century or beginning of fifth = Manuel, pl. 82.6; hair
of lower face, perhaps from a large terracotta figure and notindicated by stamped circles, pierced tenon on top of head
a mask, beard indicated by stamped circles, ht. from bridgefor suspension, three stamped circles in vertical row down
of nose to chin = 10.8 cm.; no. 383, face with nose brokencenter of beard with unstamped area on each side, eyes
off, perhaps from a large terracotta figure, eyes not cutpainted black and white, cheeks painted red, ht. = 19 cm.
through, pres. ht. = 15.5 cm.; no. 384, lower part of faceDoui'mes: SP 19 no. 22, fig. 18 (dated ca. 500) = Manuel,
below eyes, beard marked with fine striations, eyes cut pl. 82.5 = Stern 110, fig. 4; hair indicated by stamped over-
through, dated 560-520 (Gjerstad). lapping circles, beard has incised or stamped design, eye-
62 Now in the British Museum: Walters (supra n. 35) 31-brows incised with crosses, chin is clean-shaven down the
32: A174 (Tomb 83), fragment of upper right of head andmiddle with beard on either side, hair, eyelashes, and pupils
face, hair and beard in low relief curls painted black, stumppainted black, sclera and cheeks painted white, tenon on top
of horn on top of head, eye not cut through, piercing be-of head pierced for suspension, bronze rings in nose and
tween ear and horn, slightly under life size; A173 (Tombright ear, ht. = 19.5 cm.
83), fragment of top of head, hair painted black, fillet The second subtype wears long hair pulled back behind

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 1987] THE MASKS OF ORTHEIA 369

hero (fig. 14). Other Spartan masks reflect more con-

ventionally Greek images of a male hero. Snail curls
like those on the forehead of the mask shown in Figure
6 (and AO, pls. 51.1 and 52.2) are extremely common
among beardless Greek youths of the Archaic period,
and the combination of snail curls with a beard (as on
fig. 6) can be seen on Herakles, Exekias's Ajax, the
Acropolis Moschophoros, the Rampin head, and the
Aristion stele.68

While the grotesque, furrowed face first appears in

the first half of the second millennium B.C., the earli-
est known hero mask is from 14th-century Hazor.
Thereafter, however, the traditions of the two types

Fig. 15. Terracotta mask from Enkomi. Nicos

Museum no. 49. (Photo: J.B. Carter)

This summary shows the tradition of hero

have been well established in the eastern and western
Mediterranean, and it should not surprise us that at
Sparta the masks of bearded "Warriors" and un-
bearded "Youths" occurred almost as frequently as the
furrowed grotesques. More is the pity, then, that none
of the Spartan heroes is completely preserved. Gener-
ally speaking, the Spartan heroes seem more freely
adapted from Semitic models than the grotesque
masks from Sparta. No Spartan hero, for example,
has the textured hair or stamped circles of many Phoe-
nician, Cypriot, and Punic hero masks. Nevertheless,
several of the Spartan heroes clearly show their lin-
eage. One smooth-faced mask (fig. 5) with a small
straight nose, a thin closed mouth, and a rather deli-
cate, pointed chin can claim the fine mask frori Hazor
(fig. 12) and the painted hero from Kition (fig. 13) as
ancestors and the almost feminine Carthaginian hero Fig. 16. Terracotta mask from Akhziv. Jerusalem, Rocke-
in the Louvre (fig. 18) as a close cousin. A more robust feller Museum no. 45.1. (Courtesy Israel Department of
type67 could trace its descent from the swarthy Kition Antiquities and Museums)

the ears and stamped with a spiral design; the beard, prob- from bottom of nose to end of beard. See also Manuel,
ably Egyptianizing, is smooth, narrow, and elongated. To pl. 82.7 = Moscati (supra n. 39) pl. 63.
this type belongs a face from a tomb-group at Utica: SP 29, Later than these, from the fourth and third centuries, are
fig. 38 (dated to end of sixth century) = Culican 71, fig. 29 bearded masks, under life-size (20 cm. with beard) from Ivi-
= Manuel, pl. 82.10; the beard has two raised ridges run- za, Spain, SP 36-37, fig. 40.
ning vertically down the center. Another example was found 67 AO, pl. 53.3.
68 See J. Charbonneaux, R. Martin, and F. Villard, Ar-
in the tophet at Motya: Ciasca et al. (supra n. 43) 68, pl. 49
= Manuel, pl. 82.8. Raised ridges run vertically down the chaic Greek Art (London 1971) figs. 110, 112, 117-18, 124,
center of the smooth beard; the protome is preserved only 300, 329, 339-40, 345, 355.

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 370 JANE BURR CARTER [AJA 91

Sarepta, and the Punic sites-offer our best hope for a

glimpse of the masks' significance.

Hazor
Area C at Hazor, inside the southwest corner of the
Lower City, consisted during the 14th century B.C.
(Stratum I-b) of several large buildings, among them
potters' workshops, and a small shrine built against
the inner wall of the great earthen rampart that en-
closed the Lower City. Yadin, the excavator, thought
it likely that the whole area, with "pottery workshops,
store-rooms, and proper dwellings which perhaps
served the temple personnel," was associated with the
shrine.69 The terracotta mask (fig. 12) lay in a potter's
workshop, Room 6225. At various other places in
Area C, stelai, a silver-covered bronze cult standard
(with a female head flanked by wriggling snakes), a
nude female terracotta figurine, and a pair of cymbals
were found, and Yadin associated all these objects,
and the mask, with the shrine.70

Fig. 17. Terracotta mask from Kourion. Ni

Museum. (Photo: J.B. Carter)

show very similar geographical and chron

terns, and the distribution of the masks
clearly the routes of transmission. Canaan
the use of masks from the Semitic culture
mia and passed it to Cyprus before the en
ond millennium. The descendents of the
Canaanites, whom the Greeks called Ph
continued to use terracotta masks and took
with them when they traded and founded
the western Mediterranean. In the cours
and colonization, in the eighth or sevent
Phoenicians introduced terracotta mask
This model explains simply and efficientl
came to be adopted by worshipers at Spa
why. To discover why, we must know mo
meaning of the masks before they came to

THE CONTEXTS OF THE NEAR EASTERN AND PUNIC

MASKS

As at Sparta, many of the Canaanite, Cypriot, and

Phoenician masks were found in or near sacred areas. Fig. 18. Terracotta mask from Carthage. Paris, Mus&e du
These contexts-at Hazor, Kition, Enkomi, Kourion, Louvre no. MNB 849. (Courtesy Mus&e du Louvre)

69 Yadin 1972 (supra n. 47) 71. The connection of potteryTemple," BiblArch 31 (1968) 21.
workshop and temple is also observable at Arad, where kilns70 Stelai like those in the Stelai Temple were found to the
from the late eighth and seventh centuries were discoveredsouth of the shrine: Yadin 1972 (supra n. 47) 71. The silver-
near the entrance to the temple and may have fired vesselsplated bronze cult standard came from building complex
for temple use: Y. Aharoni, "Arad: Its Inscriptions and
6211 at the east edge of Area C: Yadin 1960 (supra n. 47)

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 1987] THE MASKS OF ORTHEIA 371

The shrine itself, a worship

and rather modest
in Area II began in the 13thaffai
century
two main phases, one in
when copper slagthe 14th
was deposited centur
in the area of Tem-
porary with the ples 2 and 3, and
potter's the connection reappeared
workshop in in the
Ro
one in the 13th century.7
Phoenician period.'4 The
Workshop excavator
12 operated during
the later shrine as the
itfirst
had existed
"Mycenaean" when
phase of Kition. The only clueat
haps the Israelites)to destroyed the in
the identity of the deity worshiped last
Temple 1Ca
at Hazor around 1200. Ten stelai and a small seated seems to be the limestone horns of consecration at Al-
statue stood in a semicircular niche at the west end of a
tar D, in Temenos A75 to the north of Temple 1, and
rectangular room. Carved on the chest of the seated the horns of consecration from Temenos B, to the east
figure was an inverted crescent, and carved on the cen- of Temple 1. Later, in the ninth-century settlement,
tral stele, the only one with decoration, was a pair of Temple 1 housed the goddess Astarte.76
hands raised toward a disk cupped in a crescent. The The best known of the Kition masks, the jaunty
statue and stelai seem to have stood, similarly config- male face with a painted beard (fig. 13), lay on the
ured, in the earlier, 14th-century shrine. Yadin pro- 11th-century floor of Temple 5.77 As in the 12th-cen-
posed that the mask was meant to cover the roughly
tury phase of Temple 5, a large stone anchor stood
shaped features of the seated statue.72
upright near an altar in the court of the 11th-century
In his study of the symbols on the central stele, Yad-
temple, and, again as in the 12th century, the 11th-
in connected the disk and crescent with the god Baal
century altar was surrounded by bull skulls trimmed
Hamon.73 The worship of Baal Hamon is best
away and smoothed in back to be worn as masks.78 A
known, beginning in the sixth century, at Punic sites.
large bothros near Temple 5 contained a deposit of
There the disk-and-crescent symbol appears on
sacred objects from the 11th century: more terracotta
numerous stelai, as do upraised hands, the caduceus,
masks, fragments of a Proto-White Painted kernos,
and the "Sign of Tanit." The last three signs may all
fragments of naiskoi of Cretan type, and two figurines
in fact represent Tanit, the Punic consort of Baal
representing a fertility goddess.79 The evidence for
Hamon, and Yadin thus interprets the deities of the
Hazor shrine as Baal Hamon and Tanit. Temples 1 and 5 in the 12th and the 11th centuries
certainly points to a cult honoring the Cretan goddess
Kition and giving particular prominence, as on Crete, to the
bull (horns of consecration, bucrania). Statuettes
Area II at Kition yielded several masks; the earliest
seems to be the mask from Workshop 12, which com- wearing bull masks demonstrate for us how the bull
skulls were used;80 the terracotta masks, both gro-
municated by a direct corridor with the holy-of-holies
of Temple 1 and was used for copper-smeltingtesque ca. and heroic, may be associated with the same or
similar rituals.
1200-1075 B.C. The conjunction of copper-smelting

117-18. Nude figurine: Yadin 1960 (supra n. 47) pl. "Temenos A, Floors I-II," and is thus assignable to the 12th
127.14. Cymbals: Yadin 1958 (supra n. 48) 85. or 11th century.
71 Yadin 1958 (supra n. 48) 84-92. 76 Karageorghis 1973 (supra n. 34) 15, 17-18, 24. The
72 Yadin 1972 (supra n. 47) 71-73. identification of the ninth-century temple is based on a Red
73 Y. Yadin, "Symbols of the Deities in Zinjirli, Carthage, Slip bowl with an inscription that has been read as a dedica-
and Hazor," in J. A. Sanders ed., Near Eastern Archaeology tion of cut hair by ML of Tamassos to Astarte. See Kara-
in the Twentieth Century (Festschrift Nelson Glueck, Gar- georghis 1981 (supra n. 50) 86-87, with bibliography on the
den City, New York 1970) 199-231. bowl's inscription. A marble plaque found on the Kition
74 For the mask from Workshop 12, see supra n. 34. In the Acropolis, with fourth-century accounts from the Temple of
13th century, the copper slag was not associated with archi- Astarte (Karageorghis 1976 [supra n. 49] 106-107), sup-
tectural remains. After the destruction of the area in the sec- ports the identification.
ond quarter of the 11th century, no evidence for copper- 77 Supra n. 49. Found in 1974. The floor (Floor 1) was
smelting was found until ca. 650, when a workshop contain- dated by the presence of White Painted I pottery.
ing copper slag operated to the east of Temple I. Karageor- 78 Karageorghis 1976 (supra n. 50) 877-79. Another such
ghis 1973 (supra n. 34) 10 and 25. skull trimmed for ceremonial wear was found at Toumba
The conjunction of cult and metallurgy is also found in tou Skourou: E.T. Vermeule, Toumba tou Skourou, the
the Egyptian and Semitic shrines located at the copper min- Mound of Darkness (Boston 1974) fig. 29.
ing and smelting site of Timna in the Wadi Arabah, south of 79 Karageorghis 1976 (supra n. 50) 879; Karageorghis
the Dead Sea. In particular, at the High Place in Area F, the 1981 (supra n. 50) 85. The two figurines are presumably
casting of votive implements seems to have been "an integral those discussed and illustrated by Karageorghis in his study,
part of the actual ritual." B. Rothenberg, Timna (London The Goddess with Uplifted Arms in Cyprus (Scripta mino-
1972) 114-16. ra. Regiae societatis humaniorum litterarum Lundensis,
75 An unpublished, mustachioed mask fragment (Larnaca 1977-1978, no. 2) 8, pl. 1.2-3.
Museum 5481), recovered in 1972, has written on its back: 80 Karageorghis 1976 (supra n. 50) 877; Karageorghis,

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 372 JANE BURR CARTER [AJA 91

Although the have a significant

elements of location; it was found
Cretan by Dikaios
religion
seem indisputable, above Room 43 in the northwest section
terracotta and of the recon-
bull-s
were not part of structed Ashlar
Cretan Building. Dikaios attributed
worship. On this sec-
the o
the masks, the ond, 12th-century
upright stones, phase of theand
Ashlar Building
the to fer
dess at the Kition sanctuaries mirror features of the Mycenaean settlers arriving soon after the depreda-
Hazor shrine, and the snake goddess on the Hazortions of the Sea Peoples at the end of the 13th century,
cult standard inevitably invokes the Cretan snakethe same Mycenaean refugees who were perhaps re-
goddess. Perhaps, then, a goddess similar to the "Ta- sponsible for the Sanctuary of the Ingot God. In sever-
nit" at Hazor assumed an Aegeanized form duringal rooms of the reconstructed Ashlar Building, where
the period of Mycenaean presence at Kition. The a large statuette of a young god wearing a great
pairing at Kition of bull and fertility goddess corre- horned helmet presided over a sanctuary, more bucra-
sponds not only to the Cretan evidence but also to thenia-masks were found.
divine couple at Hazor-Baal Hamon and Tanit.81 A bronze, female, janiform statuette, perhaps the
With the arrival of the Iron Age Phoenicians, theconsort of the Horned God, occupied a second shrine
goddess may have been associated with or replaced by in the southeast section of the reconstructed Ashlar
Astarte, but bucrania-masks continued to be used in Building.85 The Ingot God may also have had a fe-
her temple. It is probably the Kition goddess whomale counterpart; an altogether suitable image for
appears, nude, flanked by snakes, and escorted byher, at any rate, is the Ashmolean's bronze statuette of
two bull skulls, on a ninth- or eighth-century terra-"Astarte-on-the-Ingot," a nude female who grasps her
cotta wall-bracket from Cyprus.82 breasts and stands on an ingot-shaped base like that of
the Ingot God.86 At Enkomi, then, as at Hazor and
Enkomrni Kition, sanctuaries with adjunct industries may have
As at Kition, extensive metallurgical installations at been devoted to a male (bull) god and a fertility
Enkomi adjoined the 12th-century sanctuary in Quar- goddess.
ter 5E on the north, and, across the main north-south
street, on the west as well. Appropriately enough, Kourion
within the holy-of-holies of this sanctuary, the French Unfortunately, the two most interesting masks from
excavators found a large bronze statuette of a warrior Iron Age Cyprus have no recorded context except a
god wearing a horned helmet and standing on a base provenance from Kourion.87 Other masks, or mask-
shaped like a copper ingot. He has become the titular like faces, however, were found in the Archaic Pre-
deity of the sanctuary,83 and his presence, along with cinct Fill at Kourion, and a series of terracotta figures
the physical proximity of the metallurgists and minia- from this deposit and elsewhere on Cyprus documents
ture votive ingots, indicates close connections between the continued use of masks in the first millennium
the copper industry at Enkomi and religious obser- B.C. In terracotta groups of the late seventh and sixth
vances there. Three important hero masks (fig. 15), centuries from Kourion, human figures wearing bull-
found in 1961 and 1963 in the area of metallurgical masks or human masks dance in a ring, performing a
installations to the north of the Sanctuary of the Ingot simple ritual. One figure, masked or playing the
God, can therefore fairly claim to have a religious sig- flutes, sometimes stands within the ring. At other
nificance.84 Again as at Kition, the courtyard of the times, the central object appears to be a sacred tree, a
sanctuary held over a hundred bucrania-masks. well, a column, or an incense burner. Statuettes of sin-
One of the two furrowed masks from Enkomi gle figures from the same period and later also wear,
(fig. 9), while not in its proper stratum, did perhaps
or hold in their hands, bull and human masks.88

"Notes on Some Cypriote Priests Wearing Bull-Masks," Catling ("A Cypriot Bronze Statuette in the Bomford Col-
HThR 64 (1971) 261. lection," Alasia 30) suggests that the temple establishment
81 For the identification of Baal Hamon with El the Bull in controlled the mining and smelting of copper in 12th-cen-
the Ugaritic texts: infra n. 136. El as bull: M.H. Pope, El in tury Cyprus. For the three hero masks, see supra n. 51.
the Ugaritic Texts (Leiden 1955) 35. 85 Dikaios (supra n. 32) Vol. I, 191-212; Vol. II, 523-31;
82 See Karageorghis 1977-1978 (supra n. 79) 26-27 and pls. 276-77.
pl. XI.4 and Karageorghis 1982 (supra n. 49) 125. 86 The statuette was bought at auction in 1967 but seems
83 J.-C. Courtois, "Le sanctuiaire du dieu au lingot d'En- certainly, on stylistic grounds, to be Cypriot. See Catling,
komi-Alasia," Alasia 151-362. supra n. 84.
84 O0. Masson, "Deux petits lingots de cuivre inscrits d'En- 87 Supra ns. 37 and 61.
komi (1953)," Alasia 449-55 and 552-53, fig. 18. H.W. 88 Terracotta groups: Young and Young (supra n. 61)

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 1987] THE MASKS OF ORTHEIA 373

Sarepta those tentatively proposed for the goddesses at Ha-

At Sarepta, between Sidon and Tyre on the Phoe- zor (Tanit) and Kition (Aegeanized predecessor of
nician coast, excavators from the University Museum Astarte).
of the University of Pennsylvania have explored an The shrine at Sarepta stood in an industrial area;
industrial area devoted to making and firing pottery. fertility is emphasized by the pregnant figurine(s); the
A shrine was discovered in the northwest corner of the tambourine players suggest music and dance. All these
excavated portion of this area. As is common in Pal- elements fit the emerging pattern. Judging from the
estinian and Cypriot shrines of the Bronze and Iron Canaanite, Cypriot, and Phoenician evidence, the use
Ages, a low bench ran around the interior walls of the of masks in cult practices of the late Bronze Age and
Sarepta shrine, and a table for offerings stood at the early Iron Age can be connected to several related god-
west end of the room. A cache of votive objects in the desses of fertility: Tanit in Palestine and West Phoe-
Sarepta shrine contained two fragments from the up- nicia, an Aegeanized goddess on Cyprus, and Astarte
per section of a terracotta mask, slightly smaller than in Palestine and Cyprus.
life-size and painted; it appears to have represented an
idealized human face rather than a grotesque. Other Punic Sites
finds from the shrine include terracotta statuettes (all With few exceptions, Punic masks have come from
female, some playing a tambourine, at least one preg- graves, but their funerary context is sometimes no or-
nant), faience trinkets, beads, ivory carvings, over a dinary one. At Motya, on Sicily, for example, exca-
dozen oil lamps, and, most important, an inscrip- vators unearthed a grinning mask with furrowed
tion.89 The inscription is carved on a small rectangle cheeks in the Tophet, the Punic place where young
of ivory, and reads: "The statue which SLM, son of children were offered as burnt sacrifices and then bur-
MP'L, son of 'ZY, made for Tanit Ashtart." The ied, a combination of sanctuary and cemetery. With
shrine apparently belonged to the goddesses Tanit and the grinning mask were eight female and one male
Astarte or a syncretism of the two. Although many terracotta protomai of Greek and Egyptianizing types;
Punic inscriptions bear the name of the goddess Tanit, below these lay a group of urns containing the ashes of
this is the first incontestable occurrence of her name in sacrificed children. The date of urns, mask, and pro-
East Phoenicia. In addition, the "Sign of Tanit," also tomai falls somewhere around 500 B.C.91 Cintas
known on many Punic stelai, appears on a glass disk found masks and sixth-century protomai in the Sa-
from Sarepta.90 For the first time, we have names for a lammbo Tophet at Carthage, and earlier exploration
deity or deities associated with terracotta masks, and there yielded a miniature ivory amulet with features
the names on the ivory plaque, Tanit Astarte, are corresponding to Cintas's Group 1.92 At Motya and at

39-41, 220. Single terracotta figures: SP fig. 45; Boston,

90 Pritchard 1975 (supra n. 56) 18-20, 38. The "Sign of
Museum of Fine Arts 72.146, Vermeule et al. (supra n.Tanit"
60) and indeed the goddess herself have been thought to
no. 29; Karageorghis 1982 (supra n. 49) 143; Y. Calvet,
be indigenous to the western Mediterranean, perhaps origi-
"Protomes archaiques de Salamine," RDAC 1976, 148-49,
nating in Libya, but the growing evidence for Tanit and her
pl. XXI.3 and 6; A. Hermary, "Statuette d'un 'pretre'
sign in Phoenician contexts now confirms an eastern origin.
masque," BCH 103 (1979) 734-41. See E. Linder, "A Cargo of Phoenician-Punic Figurines,"
89 Sarepta shrine: Pritchard 1975 (supra n. 56) 13-40;
Archaeology 26 (1973) 182-87; M. Dothan, "A Sign of
Pritchard 1978 (supra n. 56) 131-48. The mask fromTanit
the from Tel 'Akko," IEJ 24 (1974) 44-49; Stern 109.
shrine is Sar. 3072 (supra n. 56). The shrine had two91 Motya: Ciasca et al. (supra n. 43); SP 39. On the subject
phases, Shrine 1 of the eighth and seventh centuries of
andtophets: Moscati (supra n. 39) 142; Moscati, "Il sacrificio
Shrine 2 of the sixth and fifth centuries. It is uncertain dei fanciulli," RPAA 38 (1965-1966) 61-68; Moscati,
whether some objects belonged to Shrine 1 or Shrine 2 (Prit- "New Light on Punic Art," in W.A. Ward ed., The Role of
chard 1975 [supra n. 56] 20, 22, 40). The mask is listed with the Phoenicians in the Interaction of Mediterranean Civili-
votive objects from Shrine 1. The terracotta statuettes were zations (Beirut 1968) 65-75; B.H. Warmington, Carthage
the most numerous type of votive (except beads), and all the (New York 1969) 145-49; L.E. Stager, "Carthage: A View
votives were appropriate for a female deity (Pritchard 1978 from the Tophet," in Phdnizier im Westen (supra n. 89)
[supra n. 56] 24-25). A pregnant figurine was found on the 155-66. G. Picard, "Le Sanctuaire dit Tanit a Carthage,"
floor of Shrine 2, and others probably belonged to the later CRAI 1945, 450.
shrine as well (ibid. 35-37). Faience, beads, ivories, and 92 The masks have not been published: SP 10 and n. 4.
lamps are listed with votives from Shrine 1 (Pritchard 1975 Female protomai: SP 23. Ivory amulette: Cintas 56, fig. 73.
[supra n. 56] 26-35). Later masks (second century B.C.), including one that com-
Inscription: Pritchard 1978 (supra n. 56) 104-107, bines the grimace of earlier grotesque masks with the snaky
fig. 103; Pritchard, "The Tanit Inscription from Sarepta," locks of a Gorgoneion, came from the Punic chapel exca-
in H. G. Niemeyer ed., Phdnizier im Westen (Madrider vated by Carton at Salammbo: SP 16, no. 16, and see SP 10
Beitriige 8, 1982) 83-92. n. 4.

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 374 JANE BURR CARTER [AJA 91

Carthage, stelai haphazard

filled the or casual imitation. On the contrary,
tophets. The ins
cord vows first to masks were
the surely brought
god Baal into Ortheia's
Hamon sanctuary alo
ginning in the for one
early of two reasons:
fifth either because the Spartans
century) to Ba
his consort Tanit, perceived afinally
and deep affinity between
to the Spartan
Tanit cult and alo
a Near Eastern cult, or because Phoenicians installed
THE GODDESS ORTHEIA
their own ritual in a sanctuary at Sparta. We must
The typology of the Spartan masks andstep back,
their then, and ask: Who was Ortheia?
pre-
sence in a sanctuary rather than in graves
Sincetie them contained no evidence of Bronze
the sanctuary
more directly to eastern MediterraneanAge occupation,than
practices the excavators concluded that the cult
must then,
to the Punic West. On the simplest level, have cometheto Sparta with the Herakleidai. The
masks can be seen as Orientalizing Greek works
deity, then, should be distinctly "Dorian," not an in-
copied from Phoenician originals about heritance
the same from the Minoan-Mycenaean past. To ar-
time
as Phoenician colonists in the western Mediterranean rive at an actual date for the foundation of the sanctu-

began to develop independent versions of the same ary, Dawkins reasoned that the Geometric stratum
eastern prototypes. Most seventh-century Greeks had was more than twice as thick as the stratum of ca. 700-
an appetite for Oriental forms, and the many seventh- 600 B.C. above it and should therefore have taken
century ivories from the Sanctuary of Ortheia93 show more than twice as long to accumulate. This would put
that Spartans shared this predilection. the foundation of the sanctuary in the 10th century
When, however, Sparta's Orientalizing tastes de- B.C., coinciding, Dawkins maintained, with "the tra-
part from more generally pan-Hellenic Orientalizing ditional date for the Dorian settlement in Lakonia."95
tastes, a shared Greek enthusiasm for eastern things But the depth of a stratum does not dependably
cannot easily account for the Spartan eccentricity. measure duration of time. In reviewing the chrono-
Masks such as Ortheia's, very rare in other Greek logy of the sanctuary, Boardman concluded that the
sanctuaries, may result from some set of circumstances sanctuary may have been founded in the eighth cen-
peculiar to Sparta. tury. With the exception of three Mycenaean gems,
In the publication of the Spartan sanctuary, H.J. clearly heirlooms, no artifact recovered in the sanc-
Rose wrote: "To identify local deities to some extent tuary can positively be dated earlier than the eighth
with those worshiped abroad is a thing which the century.96 The importation of Phoenician ritual into a
Greeks of all ages were very ready to do; to import a Spartan cult, difficult to imagine in the 10th century,
cult, or be seriously influenced by foreign ritual, is becomes much less improbable in the eighth century.
something very different, much less characteristic of Our first acquaintance with the deity of the sanc-
the Greeks, and which there is no reason for imagin- tuary comes from inscriptions found just below the
ing was done in the case of Orthia."94 If we accept layer of sand. They name the goddess as FopOaora,
Rose's viewpoint, the Spartans introduced Phoeni- FopOata, Fop0a[ta] and Fop4ata. A.M. Woodward,
cianizing objects into their local worship when they who published the inscriptions from the sanctuary,
identified "to some extent" a local deity with a Phoe- believed that the oldest form was FopOao-a and that
nician deity. This interpretation regards the borrow- the deterioration of intervocalic a produced FopOata.
ing as essentially superficial, an adaptation of foreign In the fifth century, the diphthong EL replaced at, giv-
paraphernalia to indigenous ritual, and it seems at ing FopOeLa, and in the third century the digamma
odds with the conservative nature of religious practice was replaced by 83; in the first century B.C., with the
in general and the proverbial conservatism of Spar- loss of the initial consonant, 'OpOEla became the stan-
tans in particular. The adoption of Orientalizing dard form for the next 300 years.97 No deity by the
masks at the Sanctuary of Ortheia in such overwhelm-
name of FopOaoa or any of its variants appears in
ing numbers is not likely to have been the result of Mycenaean Linear B tablets.98

93 R.M. Dawkins in AO 203-48; E.L.I. Marangou, Lak- 96 Boardman (supra n. 10) 3.

onische Elfenbein- und Beinschnitzereien (Tiibingen 1969); 97 H. Jucker and E. Risch, "Orthia oder Ortheia? Zum
Carter (supra n. 15). Namen der Gittin Orthia," Hefte des Archiiologischen
94 AO 401.
Seminars der Universitdt Bern 5 (1979) 27; J.A. Davison,
95 AO 18-19. The tradition to which Dawkins alludes ap- "Alcman's Partheneion," Hermes 73 (1938) 457-58; A.M.
parently is not the Thucydidean tradition, which sets the Woodward, "Inscriptions," BSA 24 (1919-1921) 117. The
return of the Herakleidai two generations (80 years?) after form Orthia, used in the publication of the site, occurred
the fall of Troy (ca. 1200), that is, still in the 12th century only three times in inscriptions from the site, the first in-
(Thuc. 1.12). See P. Cartledge, Sparta and Lakonia (Lon- stance being Trajanic.
don and Boston 1979) 93-94. 98 The only word in Mycenaean texts that may be related

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 1987] THE MASKS OF ORTHEIA 375

Not until the second halfthe

this interpretation, of the
name Ortheia first
describes the c
was Ortheia associated with Artemis at the Eurotas standing, pillar-like form of the old cult statue.104 A
sanctuary.99 Even then, there is reason to think thatless literally minded scholiast on Pindar (01. 3, 54)
Ortheia maintained a partly autonomous identity: theexplains that "[she is called] Orthosia because she
Hellenistic and Roman rooftiles use only the nameguides straight to safety, or she guides straight those
Ortheia (Lepo' popOelar) and never Artemis, althoughbeing born."'05
the tiles from other Spartan sanctuaries use both the None of these accounts is very convincing. The
name and title of the deity (e.g., 'AOcavav v Kpa- story told to Pausanias clearly invents circumstances
vaiS').100 Elsewhere in Greece, inscriptions bear the to explain a name or ritual already in existence. Even
name of Artemis linked to a version of Ortheia as earlyif the old cult statue did look like a post, the goddess
as the fifth century B.C.,1'0 so the absence of a singlemust have had a name before her cult image was
instance at Sparta before the Flavian period ought to made. The scholiast's suggestion, which may acknow-
be significant. For 750 years at the very least, theledge real aspects of the goddess's role in human af-
Spartans worshiped their goddess as FopOaoia, Fop-fairs, depends on a figurative sense of 6pOde that may
Oata, FopOELa, or 'OpOdEa, and, as far as present evi- have derived from the goddess's name but was not the
dence permits a judgment, the sanctuary at Sparta isoriginal reason for it. If Greek sources fail us, how-
the earliest cult of this deity in Greece. Apparently ever, the non-Greek sanctuaries where terracotta
Ortheia existed as a goddess in her own right, notmasks have been found may yield the explanation of
identified with Artemis, for a long time at Sparta. Ortheia's name.
While similarities between Ortheia and Artemis
THE ASHERAH
brought an association of the two cults elsewhere,102
only late in the cult's history at Sparta did the cycle
Run to me with your feet,
complete itself with the association of Artemis and Or-
race to me with your legs;
theia there. for I have a word to tell you,
The ancients themselves offered various explana- a story to recount to you:
tions of the name; the ancient aitiologies and the mo- the word of the tree and the charm of the sto
dern etymologies agree that the name derives from the whisper of the heavens to the earth,
pOSd, "straight, upright, standing."'03 Pausanias of the seas to the stars.106
(3.16.7) reports the local Spartan story: Astrabakos The sweeping reforms of King Hezekiah (c
and Alopekos found the cult statue bound about and 699 B.C.) and King Josiah (640-609 B.C.) a
held upright by branches of the lugos bush, hence she from Israelite worship the use of masseb
is called Ortheia, the upright goddess, and Lugodes- Hebrew word for erected stones-and other elements
ma, lugos-bound. According to a modern variant of of Canaanite religion.107 The old Canaanite place of

to this root (>*FopOF6s) is a man's name in the genitive, Kotilion above Bassai (IG V2, 429). If anyone lays a hand
otwoweo, which might be 3pOFwFoFco ("A l'oreille droite") on the freedmen, they say in their inscription, then all the
without the initial digamma (P. Chantraine, Dictionnaire money goes [r'] 'ArTdOXACO ro^L Baol[r]at Ka ro i Hav't
etymologique de la langue grecque [Paris 1968] III, 819).
This personage appears as a basileus in a list of four basileis [r]CO LVOELrr [K]a' Lr' 'AprLu TaL KOTLXEOr Kal ra Fop-
Oaao-. FopOaola here has been assumed to be the epithet of
and their several gerousiai: M. Ventris and J. Chadwick, Artemis, but the final Kai apparently adds a fourth deity.
Documents in Mycenaean Greek2 (Cambridge 1973) 172- The inscription is discussed by F.A. Cooper, "Two Inscrip-
73, PY An 22. The name may recur as o-tu-wo-we, a smith tions from Bassai," Hesperia 44 (1975) 224-33.
who had an allotment of bronze at E-ni-pa-te-we (ibid. 355, 103 M.P. Nilsson, Geschichte der griechischen Religion3 1
PY Jn658). (Munich 1967) 487; Chantraine (supra n. 98) III, 818-19.
99 Davison (supra n. 97) 458; AO 401 n. 11. 104 AO 403. Bosanquet (supra n. 4, 334) compares the
100 AO 401.
standing and seated images of Artemis Brauronia described
101 SEG 10.362 (= AM 49 [1924] 15-16), from Mt. Hy-
in an inscription as rb ~'yaqia rb 3pOdv and rb '6o0s rb
mettos, dated ca. 420: hopos hLEep 'Apr4tioS 'OpOoo(las, apXaLov.
Arl?'OKAhEL83V. 105 A.B. Drachmann, Scolia vetera in Pindari carmina
102 The cult of Artemis Orthosia, Orthasia, or Orthia is
known by inscription or ancient report from Attica, Argos, (Leipzig 1903) 121: 'OpOwola be, ob'r ~p00o E' o'LSOrplavY
3pOoi rob^ ycvvoAMEvovs. The word probably did carry this
Epidauros, Arcadia, Elis, Megara, Boiotia, and Byzantium: meaning at Epidauros where Artemis was sometimes called
S. Wide, Lakonische Kulte (Leipzig 1898) 113; W.H. Orthia and Asklepios, Orthios: Bosanquet (supra n. 4) 332.
Roscher, Griechischen und romischen Mythologie 3.1 106 From the Epic of Baal, trans. by M.D. Coogan, Stories
(Leipzig 1897-1902) 1210-11. Artemis and Worthasia from Ancient Canaan (Philadelphia 1978) 92-93 (= ANET
seem to be named as separate deities in the fourth-century [supra n. 17] 136, V AB C, lines 16-22).
bronze manumission inscription from the sanctury on Mt. 107 2 Kings 18:4 and 23:14 (cf. Deut. 16:22).

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 376 JANE BURR CARTER [AJA 91

worship, a high the asherah

place openfrom the holy
to places the
of Judah.114sky,
The cha
ly contained an word occurs
altar and 40 timesain the Old Testament."15
stone We
masseba
tuaries in Palestine of the Middle and Late Bronze gather from many of these passages that the asherah
was made of wood, that it could be the product of hu-
Age and early Iron Age enclosed an altar and standing
stone in temple courtyards.108 Although forbidden man
in manufacture, that it was stood up or planted like
the worship of Yahweh, masseboth survived amonga tree, and could be cut down and burned. In other
Old Testament passages, however, Asherah appears
the Phoenicians, and through the Phoenicians they
to be a goddess, the consort of Baal.116
passed in various mutations to cities of Cyprus and the
Punic west. Eivdence for some form of massebah ap- The discovery and translation of the Ugaritic tab-
lets, written in the 14th to 13th centuries B.C., re-
pears in all the non-Greek sanctuaries discussed above
where masks have been found. vealed the existence of a Canaanite goddess, Lady
Ten stelai stood in the Late Bronze Age shrine at Athirah of the sea, mother of the 70 gods, and consort
Hazor. In the 12th-century ("Mycenaean") phase of of the chief god, El the Bull. Canaanite Athirah is the
Temple 1 at Kition, excavators found a rectangular Hebrew Asherah, and the Ugaritic texts seem to con-
depression in the open courtyard, in front of the holy- firm the existence of the goddess. Asherah makes other
of-holies, which "may have held a rectangular col- and earlier appearances: Old Bablylonian texts call
umn."109 Stone anchors were erected next to the offer- her the bride of Anu (the Sumerian and Akkadian
ing table in Temples 4 and 5 at Kition (ca. 1200-1000 counterpart of El), and a 15th-century letter found at
B.C.), a practice known from the 23rd century B.C. Taanach in Palestine mentions a wizard of Ashe-

and later at Byblos and from the 19th century B.C. at rah.117 Her position as consort of El may have influ-
Ugarit.o10 The Sanctuary of the Ingot God at Enkomi enced the Hebrews who were settling in Canaan in
enclosed two freestanding stone blocks in its open the 13th century: inscriptions recently excavated from
court, and a rectangular pillar stood before the holy- Israelite sites name Asherah and suggest that, despite
of-holies in the Sanctuary of the Horned God.11" the Old Testament's austere and solitary Yahweh, the
Later, in Phoenician Sarepta, a socket 40 cm.2 in front Israelite deity of popular religion sometimes had the
of the offering table in the shrine of Tanit-Astarte comfort of a consort."118

probably held a massebah.112 Many stone stelai were Asherah lives, but what about the objects of the
dedicated in the tophets at Carthage, Motya, and same name so frequently mentioned in the Old Testa-
elsewhere."13 ment? These asherim have been explained as sacred
The reforms of Hezekiah and Josiah also purged groves or sacred trees,"9 as sacred poles, as wooden

Testament (Fort Worth 1949); K.-H. Bernhardt, "Aschera

108 Temples with masseboth have been excavated at Byblos
and Hazor (C.F. Graesser, "Standing Stones in Ancientin Ugarit und im Alten Testament," Mitteilungen des Insti-
Palestine," BiblArch 35 [1972] 50-55), Shechem (R.G. tuts
Bol- fiur Orientforschung 13 (1967) 163-74; S. H. Horn,
ing, "Bronze Age Buildings at the Shechem High Place,"
Biblical Archaeology, A Generation of Discovery (Washing-
ton, D.C. 1985) 13-16, with full references.
BiblArch 32 [1969] 82-102), Amman (J.B. Hennessy, "Ex-
cavation of a Late Bronze Age Temple at Amman," PEQ "116
98 Judg. 3:7; 1 Kings 18:19, 2 Kings 23:4-7. See Reed
[1966] 155-62), Arad (Aharoni, supra n. 69), Qatna (supra n. 115) 87.
(G.R.H. Wright, "Pre-Israelite Temples in the Land of117
Ca-R. Patai, "The Goddess Asherah," JNES 24 (1965) 39;
naan," PEQ 103 [1971] 23), Beth Shan (G.R.H. Wright, E. Lipinski, "The Goddess Atirat in Ancient Arabia, in
Babylon, and in Ugarit," Orientalia Louvaniensia Periodica
"Temples at Shechem," Zeitschrift fir die alttestamentliche
Wissenschaft 80 [1968] 8), and at other sites. 2 (1972) 103-104. Taanach: ANET (supra n. 17) 490.
109 Karageorghis 1981 (supra n. 50) 86. 11" A. Lemaire, "Les inscriptions de Khirbet el-Q6m et
I'Asherah de Yhwh," RB 84 (1977) 595-608; Lemaire,
110 Karageorghis 1976 (supra n. 50) 875-79. See H. Frost,
"Who or What was Yahweh's Asherah?" Biblical Archaeo-
"On a Sacred Cypriote Anchor," in Archeologie au Levant.
logy Review 10:6 (1984) 42-51; W.G. Dever, "Recent Ar-
Recueil R. Saidah (Lyons 1982) 161-66; Frost, "The Stone-
Anchors of Byblos," MelBeyrouth 45 (1969) 425-42; Frost,
chaeological Confirmation of the Cult of Asherah in Ancient
"The Stone-Anchors of Ugarit," Ugaritica VI (Paris 1969)
Israel," Hebrew Studies 23 (1982) 37-43 (I am grateful for
235-45. this reference to Prof. Alan Avery-Peck); W.G. Dever,
"Asherah, Consort of Yahweh? New Evidence from Kuntil-
111 Ingot God: Karageorghis 1982 (supra n. 49) 94; Horned
God: Karageorghis 1976 (supra n. 49) 67. let 'Ajrfid," BASOR 255 (1984) 21-37.
112 Pritchard 1975 (supra n. 56) 18.
119 The Septuagint translates asherah as oAoros (grove) or,
113 G. Picard 1945 (supra n. 91) 448-51; Ciasca etinal.two passages, as 8v6pa (trees). The Vulgate follows the
(supra n. 43) 83. Septuagint, using lucus (grove), or twice, nemus (grove). See
114 2 Kings 18:4 and 23:4-15 (cf. Deut. 16:21). Reed (supra n. 115) 6-9. This interpretation has recently
115 See, in general, W.L. Reed, The Asherah in thebeen Old defended by Lemaire 1984 (supra n. 118).

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 1987] THE MASKS OF ORTHEIA 377

cult images,120 Samaria.

and simplyAnd Ahab made
as an sacred
Asherah" (1 Kings
pla
haps an asherah could
16:31-33).be any
Asherah of
appears with El inthese
a seventh-cen-th
ing on whether it stood
tury Phoenicianoutside orTash
inscription from Arslan inside
that
was connected with popular
warns or courtly
off night demons, stranglers, and Sasam, the
whether the word evil
wasgenius, used in of
from the doorposts aa house.125
primary Philo of
tive sense. For ourByblos,
purposes,
writing in the second an
century asherah
A.C., speaks of
to mean something or-iAag
made of
Ka\L dpfovS wood
(stelai that
and wooden staffs) used inst
a sacred place. Phoenician cults; the phrase recalls "the word of the
If the Old Testament
tree andwriters have
the charm of the stone" left
in the Ugaritic Epic ofus
biguous ideas about Baal
theand couldnature
be the Greek words of
used to denote
the ash
clearer about masseboth and asherim.126
its location. Its proper plac
the altar. The asherah
Literary occurs together
and epigraphical sources support the wor- w
mical to Yahweh 14 shipor 15
of Asherah and times;
the presence of herthe
cult objectdeit
(named four times) is
among the Baal.122
Canaanites, the Israelites,Three
and the Phoe- pas
16:21, 2 Kings 21:7, 23:6)
nicians. prohibit
We do not have the p
comparable written evidence
asherah beside the for
altar
the 12th- andof Yahweh
11th-century (taci
sanctuaries at Kition
that and Enkomi
this impropriety had on Cyprus.
in No factasherah materialized
occurred
to). Eleven passagesduring
refer to
the excavations, but masseboth
then wooden objects, es- a
one breath, as concomitant
pecially large ones, rarelyinstallations
survive.127 What we do
sanctuaries. 123 have are vase-paintings and terracotta figurines that
The Old Testament leaves no doubt that masseboth provide visual evidence for the existence of asherim on
and asherim were standard fixtures in Canaanite Cyprus. The very old Mesopotamian image of two
sanctuaries, and that veneration of the asherah flour-
goats nibbling at a tree appears regularly on Cypriot
ished among the Israelites, despite the fulminations of
Late Bronze Age pottery.128 In the Near East, the tree
the prophets, from the time of the judges (12th and between the goats is a sacred tree,129 and an Aegeaniz-
11th centuries) until the Babylonian exile (586 ing ivory pyxis lid from Minet el Beida (the port of
B.C.).124 The Phoenicians continued to worship the Ugarit) reinterprets the scene with a bare-chested,
goddess as consort of Baal and to represent her with
flouncy-skirted goddess offering leafy stalks to a goat
an asherah. We know this from the Old Testament;on each side.130 The Mycenaean ivory-carver in Uga-
King Ahab (873-852 B.C.) of Israel married a Phoe- rit (or native carver under Mycenaean influence) who
nician princess: "He took for wife Jezebel the daugh-
carved the pyxis lid seems to have understood the sym-
ter of Ethba'al King of the Sidonians, and went andbolic connection between the sacred tree and the god-
served Ba'al and worshiped him. He erected an altardess and substituted the goddess for the tree. The god-
for Ba'al in the house of Ba'al, which he built in
dess who is interchangeable with a tree should be,

120 Poles: see Reed (supra n. 115) 16-17; wooden images: 126 Epic of Baal: supra n. 106. Philo is quoted by Eusebius,
Reed's conclusion.
Praep. Evang. 1.9.29 (and cf. 1.10.10). 7rrjAat KaGl p' a88
121 Lipinski's view (supra n. 117). are interpreted as masseboth and asherim by Lemaire 1977
122 Baal's altars: Judg. 6:25-30, 1 Kings 16:32, 2 Kings(supra n. 118) 605 n. 51. For a convenient text and transla-
21:3 (= 2 Chron. 33:3), 2 Chron. 34:4. For a survey of the tion of Eusebius's quotations from Philo: H.W. Attridge
asherah in association with altars and other objects: Reed and R.A. Oden, Jr., Philo of Byblos. The Phoenician His-
(supra n. 115) 38-58. tory (Washington, D.C. 1981).
123 For example: "Take care you make no pact with the 127 Karageorghis 1976 (supra n. 49, 79) suggests that a
inhabitants of the country which you are about to enter, or wooden pillar stood in the rectangular cutting on a stone
they will prove a snare in your community. You will tearbase found in the courtyard of the late 13th-century phase of
down their altars, smash their masseboth and cut down theirTemple 4 at Kition. A nearby base with a cutting of differ-
asherim, for you will worship no other god, since Yahweh's ent dimensions held, he believes, a stone massebah.
name is the Jealous One; he is a jealous God" (Exod. 128 E. Vermeule and V. Karageorghis, Mycenaean Pictorial
34:12-14). The other 10 passages are: Deut. 7:5, 12:3, Vase Painting (Cambridge, Mass., and London 1982): nos.
16:21, 1 Kings 14:23, 2 Kings 17:10, 18:4, 23:14, and III.26, V.109, VI.7-9, VI.26.
2 Chron. 14:3, 31:1. 129 Lemaire 1984 (supra n. 118) 48-49.
124 A good historical summary is given by Patai (supra 130 H.J. Kantor, The Aegean and the Orient in the Second
n. 117). Millennium B.C. (Bloomington, Ind. 1947) 86-89; R.D.
125 F.M. Cross, Jr., and R.J. Saley, "Phoenician Incanta- Barnett, Ancient Ivories in the Middle East (Qedem 14,
tions on a Plaque of the Seventh Century B.C. from Arslan Jerusalem 1982) 29-30, pl. 24b.
Tash in Upper Syria," BASOR 197 (1970) 42-49.

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 378 JANE BURR CARTER [AJA 91

from the Canaanite The Canaanite deities

point of Asherah and El appear
view, Asheraand
follows that the reappear
tree from Hazor to Cypriot
where Carthage, but we should not
goats
be Asherah's cult object.
forget that an inscription
Cypriot from the ninth-century
pots also
show a bull or bulls phase of Temple 1 at Kitionat
chewing namesa Astarte and the
tree.132
the manifest importance
ivory plaque from of bulls
the shrine in
at Sarepta names Cypr
Tanit-
aries and the likelyAstarte.
presence
Many epigraphic andof literaryCanaanite
texts, in fact,
Cyprus, we may read point to conflations
the of the threeas
bulls principal Canaanite
referrin
male deity bearing goddesses,
some resemblance
Asherah, Astarte, and Anat, as early as the to E
time of the Ugaritic tablets.
and the trees as referring to While each retains her
Asherah, El
individual character-Asherah
The motive of two bulls flanking as goddessaof tree
fertility ag
mind wayward the
and the
Israelites,
sea, Astarte as goddess ofwho
sexual love, and
"for
commandments of Anat
the Lord
as goddess their
of war-there is always a God,
tendency an
themselves molten for images
the three goddesses toofhave thetwo youn
same attributes,
made an asherah" epithets,
(2 and Kings
consorts. From 17:15-16).
the 14th century B.C. O
during the seventh and
until the sixth
second century centuries
A.C., the goddesses could ap-
parently
groups with a tree or be worshiped individually
tree-like or in combina-
object insid
masked dancers tion.137
may We must allow for some degree
represent cult of variation
dance
asherah.133 and syncretism, but even so we consistently encounter,
The discovery of Tanit in Syria-Palestine has at sites where masks have been found, the deities
demonstrated that the Punic Tanit, like Baal Hamon, Asherah-Tanit-Astarte and El-Baal Hamon.
came from the Phoenician homeland. Tanit has some- Who was Ortheia? She was, I think, a Phoenician
times been identified as the Punic equivalent of As- goddess. When the Phoenicians carried the worship of
tarte, but F.M. Cross argues that "Tanit" is actually Asherah-Tanit into the western Mediterranean, they
an old epithet of Asherah that means "The Lady of the brought the goddess to Sparta also. An upright wood-
(Sea) Serpent" and recalls Asherah's title, "The Lady en object stood in her sanctuary. The Greeks called
of the Sea," in the Ugarit texts.134 The symbols that the upright object FopOaola, a feminine adjective
appear with the Sign of Tanit on Punic stelai agree meaning "upright." The Phoenicians spoke of the
well with the character of Asherah. Ships and fish ob- goddess and her cult object by the same name, Ash-
viously refer to a sea deity. The so-called caduceus, erah. The Spartans adopted this practice and used
which often accompanies the "Sign of Tanit," can be their word for the cult object, Worthasia and later Or-
understood as a stylized version of Asherah's tree.'35 theia, as the name of the goddess.
Cross also argues that the name of Tanit's consort,
THE CULT OF ORTHEIA
Baal Hamon, should be understood as "Lord of
Mount Amanus," an old epithet of El linking him to Ortheia's masks are probably the most obv
the Amanus Mountains of North Syria.136 Phoenicianizing feature of her sanctuary

131J. Gray, The Canaanites (New York 1977)

1964)142-44,
231 151-55.
and
pl. 32. 136 That El and Asherah were known at Punic sites by their
132 Vermeule and Karageorghis (supra n. 128) IV.36, ancient titles, Lord of Mount Amanus and Lady of the Ser-
V.41, VI.2-3, VI.50. As is clear from Old Testament ref- pent, is, according to Cross, "a mark of archaism compar-
erences, the asherah was often set up in groves; this I would able to the survival of linguistic archaism at the frontiers of
take to be the setting implied by the Cypriot Late Bronze the spread of a family of language"; the epithets follow
vase-paintings that show bulls against a general background "well-known patterns, lost in central Phoenicia, surviving
of foliage. only on the fringes of the Canaanite realm (Ugarit, Sam'al,
133 Young and Young (supra n. 61). A particularly interest- Sinai, Carthage, and the western Mediterranean)." Cross's
ing group, now in the Louvre (AO 22.221), shows four fig- argument (supra n. 134, 24-25, 33) that Baal Hamon is an
ures, three with arms outspread in devout salute and one old epithet of El has found acceptance: Oden (supra n. 135)
playing the lyre, around a knobby, cylindrical object that 93 and n. 232, 142 and n. 167; A.I. Baumgarten, The Phoe-
looks more like a tree than "an incense burner or a semi- nician History of Philo of Byblos (Leiden 1981) 174.
realistic representation of a dove-cot" as Boardman suggests. 137 Oden (supra n. 135) collects much evidence to this effect
See J. Boardman, "?EIOE AOIAOI," RDAC 1971, 39, in arguing that Atargatis, the goddess worshiped at Hiera-
fig. 4, pl. 18.1. polis in Syria and described in the second-century A.C.
134 F.M. Cross, Canaanite Myth and Hebrew Epic (Cam- work De Syria Dea, combines all three of the chief Canaan-
bridge, Mass. 1973) 29-33. ite goddesses. See also R.A. Oden, Jr., "The Persistence of
135 R.A. Oden, Jr., Studies in Lucian's De Syria Dea (Har- Canaanite Religion," BiblArch 39 (1976) 31-36; Dever
vard Semitic Museum Monograph 15, Missoula, Mont. 1984 (supra n. 118) 28-29.

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 1987] THE MASKS OF ORTHEIA 379

hypothesis, that the cult of Ortheia was estab

Sparta by Phoenicians, fo rests largely on the
velopment of the Spartan masks from Near
models. To test this hypothesis, let us look ag
Sanctuary of Ortheia and ask whether charac
that seem to recur in non-Greek sanctuaries with
masks are reflected in Ortheia's cult.

The Asherah
The asherah represents, or is, or stands near a tree
or trees. We can deduce from the discovery of Or-
theia's cult image in a lugos thicket (Paus. 3.16.11)
that a similar relation between goddess and tree ob-
tained at Sparta, and we get a glimpse of Ortheia's
tree, in stylized form, standing between the goddess
and a bearded male figure on a seventh-century ivory
relief from the Sanctuary of Ortheia (fig. 19).'38
The story of Ortheia in the lugos thicket has an in-
teresting parallel in Athenaeus's tale of how pirates
tried to kidnap the cult statue of Hera on Samos.139
They carried off the statue by night, but their ship
would not move with the statue on board, and they
were forced to leave it behind. On the following morn-
ing, the inhabitants of the island found the statue near
the shore, and, believing it had departed of its own
accord, they tied it about with lugos branches to pre-
vent a second escape. The thwarted pirates and the
gullible Samians are plainly aetiological inventions to Fig. 19. Ivory relief from the Sanctuary of Ortheia. Athens,
explain the authentic core of the story, the binding of National Museum no. 15511. (After L. Marangou, Lako-
Hera's statue with lugos branches. A tree, probably nische Elfenbein- und Beinschnitzereien [Tiibingen 1969]
Hera's lugos, appears beside a male figure who grasps fig. 7)
the unclothed goddess by the wrist in a seventh-cen-
tury terracotta relief from the Samian Heraion.140 A Fertility Powers
venerable lugos tree stood in Hera's sanctuary,141 and Ortheia received dedications of nude terracotta fe-
here, as at Sparta, the sanctuary of the tree-goddess male figurines.143 Her cult had close ties to the wor-
contained masks. ship of the birth-goddess Eileithyia. Pausanias
It is again in a sanctuary of Hera that the grotesque (3.17.1) says that the Sanctuary of Eileithyai was "not
masks from Tiryns were found. The Carithaginian far" from that of Ortheia; it may in fact have been very
goddess (i.e., Tanit) is called Juno Caelestis by Latin close since Eileithyia's name is inscribed on a votive
writers,142 and we might expect that Hera, the Greek die and on rooftiles found inside Ortheia's sanctu-
equivalent of Juno, would attract aspects of Tanit's ary.144 Ortheia, a 7rdrvca 07qp ov, enjoyed the company
worship in the Orientalizing period. A few masks of animals. She often grips the neck of a large bird in
therefore turn up in Hera's sanctuaries, but the hun- each hand or holds a lion, horse, or snake.145 She col-
dreds of masks in Ortheia's sanctuary attest to the lected a votive menagerie of sheep, goats, lions, deer,
Phoenician origin of the goddess. bulls, horses, geese or ducks, eagles, dolphins, fish,

138 AO, pl. 92.1; Marangou (supra n. 93) fig. 7; Carter 141 Paus. 8.25.5; E. Homann-Wedeking, "Samos 1963,"
AA 79 (1964) 222-25.
(supra n. 15) fig. 25. A stylized asherah may also be recog-
nized among the lead votives, AO, pl. 194.39 and pl. 142 S. Gsell, Histoire ancienne de l'Afrique nord 4 (Osna-
181.13-17 (upside down), and between two lions on a fine briick 1972, repr. of 1914-1928 ed.) 255-58.
ivory relief, AO, pl. 111. 143 AO, pl. 36.
139 Ath. 15.672a-e. 144 Bronze die: AO 202 and 370; tiles: AO 143.
140 R. Eilmann, "Friihe griechische Keramik im samischen 145 AO, pls. 32, 91-93, 172.
Heraion," AM 58 (1933) 123 and n. 2, fig. 69.

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 380 JANE BURR CARTER [AJA 91

roosters, and even frogs,

Phoenicianturtles, crabs,
Herakles.154 On Kythera, and
off the coast of s
Her worshipers surely believed
Lakonia, was the oldestthat
sanctuaryOrtheia
of Aphrodite inc
fluence the fertility Greece,
of men the Sanctuary
and of Aphrodite Ourania estab-
animals.146
lished by the Phoenicians; her cult image was an
Music and Dancing
armed xoanon (46avov orrX-aurdvov).155 Phoenicians
Fragments of bone flutes, all found
probably also founded below
the more famous t
and very old
cult of armed Aphrodite,
level in Ortheia's sanctuary, were again represented by an
inscribed as
tions to the goddess, armed xoanon,
and flat atbone
Sparta.156 or
The age and prominence
ivory obj
have been plectra of the sanctuariesaat stringed
for
playing Sparta and Kytherainstrum
leave little
Among the lead figurines fromlived
doubt that Phoenicians the seventh
and prospered there,157 a
centuries, men and women play lyres
and Herodotos matter-of-factly and
tells us so. Theras,fl
woman plays the cymbals, and
who led colonists from several figure
Sparta to the island later called
Thera in his
blow on a large horn.148 All honor, was a descendent
these could of the be
Phoeni-d
of cian Kadmos, son in
musicians who performed of the King of
the Tyre (Hdt. 4.147).
sanctuary
to Theras's son Oiolykos
accompany choral lyrics like remained
Alcman's at Sparta, and his
Part
Plutarch (Thes. 31) says
descendents that Helen
built heroons, was
seen by Pausanias da
at Spar-
ta, for Kadmos,
the Sanctuary of Artemis Oiolykos, and
Orthia Aigeus,
('V son of Oiolykos
~Ep(^ 'Ap
'OpOlag) when Theseus and
(Paus. Perithoos
3.15.8). Archaeology carried
does not show the Phoe-
nicians at Sparta to have been jewelers or unguentar-
Ceramic or Metallurgical Industry
ies, but they may have been iron miners.
The search for metal resources drew Phoenician
venturers into the western Mediterranean in the Bulls

There are miniature bucrania among the bronze,

ninth, eighth, and early seventh centuries. They took
silver from Spain149 and perhaps from the Laurionivory, and lead votives158 from Ortheia's sanctuary,
mines in Attica.150 They mined away a mountain
but the bull is certainly not as noteworthy a presence
looking for gold on Thasos.151 In Lakonia, Phoeni-
here as at Kition and Enkomi, and a bull-god was
cians may have come to exploit the rich iron mines
probably
of not worshiped.
the Malea peninsula.152
Masseboth
Phoenicians had begun to settle permanently in
Greece in the ninth century-jewelers in Attica, Eu-
More than 40 small limestone plaques with reliefs
boia, and Crete, unguent manufacturers on Kos, or incised decoration were found immediately below
Crete, and Rhodes-not in separate enclaves butand ap-
above the sand layer; the most common subjects
parently living among the local people, learningare horses, warriors, and lions.'59 About a third of
Greek, and teaching local craftsmen their skills.153
these bear inscriptions with (usually) the name of the
We spot these resident Phoenicians by their products,
dedicator and (four times) Ortheia's name as recipient.
and we hear about the cults they brought with them.
They must have stood about the sanctuary or hung on a
The miners on Thasos, for instance, worshiped
walla(several are drilled through as if to be fastened

146 H.J. Rose, AO 402. terity," CQ 27 (1977) 116.

147 Flutes: AO 236-37, pls. 161-62. Plectra: AO 239, 153 Coldstream (supra n. 150) 261-75.
pls. 166-67. 154 Hdt. 2.44.
148 The musicians occur in the chronological groups Lead 155 Hdt. 1.105; Paus. 3.23.1.
I-IV (first half of seventh century to ca. 560: see W.G. 156 Paus. 3.15.10: vabso ap'apo" Ka 'A po8lrrls $gavov
Cavanagh and R.R. Laxton, "Lead Figurines from the
Menelaion and Seriation," BSA 79 [1984] 34-36) but not in to~rrdrvGto'. See J.G. Frazer, Pausanias's Description of
Greece 3 (London 1898) 338; L.R. Farnell, The Cults of the
Lead V-VI. See AO 262, 269, 276 and pls. 180, 183, 189, Greek States 2 (Oxford 1896) 653-54.
191,195-96. 157 See D. van Berchem on the Phoenician practice of intro-
149 Diod. Sic. 5.35. Moscati (supra n. 39) 180, 230-32. ducing their native gods when they established a commercial
150 J.N. Coldstream, "Greeks and Phoenicians in the Ae- entrepot in a foreign city: "Sanctuaires d'Hercule-Melqart:
gean," in Phbnizier im Westen (supra n. 89) 265. contribution ia l'&tude de l'expansion phenicienne en Medi-
151 Hdt. 6.47. A.J. Graham, "The Foundation of Thasos," terran'e," Syria 44 (1967) 75-79.
BSA 73 (1978) 86-97. 158 AO, pls. 89d; 170.3; 180.27-28; 186.26; 194.25.
152 R. Drews, "Phoenicians, Carthage and the Spartan Eu- 159 AO 187-95; pls. 64-74.
nomia," AJP 100 (1979) 46. A.J. Holladay, "Spartan Aus-

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 1987] THE MASKS OF ORTHEIA 381

with a nail or the gateway at Neither

suspended). Tell el-Far'a (19th century
the B.C.) inscr
may
the decorations indicate the occasion of these dedica- have been sacrifices for the protection of a vulnerable
tions, but they must have been offerings of thanks or point of entry, and infants buried in jars in the 15th-
commemoration. Masseboth at Canaanite, Phoeni- century B.C. high place at Gezer and at Tell el-Hesy
cian, and Punic sites served similar functions.160 were probably sacrificed as part of a ritual.'63
No charred infants are reported by the excavators
Child Sacrifice of Ortheia's sanctuary (and the limestone stelai have
The particular event commemorated by the stelai in no apparent connection to such sacrifices), but a story
Punic tophets was the immolation of a young child. told to Pausanias may preserve some trace of Or-
Diodorus Siculus, describing Agathocles's near cap- theia's earliest rites:

ture of Carthage in 310 B.C., says that the Cartha- The Limnatai of the Spartiates and the Kynokoureis
ginians considered their danger a punishment for not and the men from Mesoa and Pitane, while sacrificing
sacrificing their noblest male offspring to Kronos (i.e., to Artemis were led into disagreement, and from this
Baal Hamon). into bloodshed, and, after many died on the altar, sick-
ness was destroying the rest. And there was an oracle
Being eager to make amends for the fault, they picked
out two hundred of the most illustrious children and to them about this, to bloody the altar withf human
blood. And whomever the lot laid hold of used to be
sacrificed them in public; and others, being under ac-
sacrificed, but Lykourgos substituted the whipping of
cusation, gave themselves willingly, in number not less
the ephebes, and now, in this way the altar is replete
than three hundred. There was among them a bronze
with human blood. (3.16.9-11).
image of Kronos, stretching out its hands, palms up
and inclining toward the earth, so that the child placed By the late fourth century B.C., according to Diodo-
thereon rolled off and fell into a sort of chasm full of
rus, the noblest Carthaginians purchased the children
fire. (20.14.5-6) of others and offered these for sacrifice in place of their
The Carthaginian recourse on this occasion follows, to own. Similarly in the tophet at Hadrumetum, animal
a drastic degree, the practice of the Phoenicians as re- bones began to replace human bones during the fourth
ported by Philo of Byblos: "It was the custom among century.164 The whipping of ephebes on Ortheia's
the ancient ones [Phoenicians] that, in circumstances altar could be a substitution for the original rite of
of great dangers, the rulers either of a city or a tribe child sacrifice introduced by the Phoenicians.165
gave the dearest one of their children as a ransom to
the avenging daimons in place of the destruction of Male Consort
all."'161 Male deities have been conspicuous in the non-
Greek sanctuaries examined here. A male presence
Sites of child sacrifice have not been excavated in
Phoenicia, but Old Testament writers knew of this
appears to be an essential element of these cults, and
abomination among their neighbors. Along with mas-male figures are similarly prominent in the sanctuary
of Ortheia. The male and the female beside the sty-
seboth and asherim, Josiah "defiled Topheth, which is
lized tree (fig. 19) can probably be identified as Or-
in the valley of the sons of Hinnom, that no one might
theia and her consort. It seems to be the same pair,
burn his son or his daughter as an offering to Molech"
(2 Kings 23:10), and the Hebrews themselves maywithout the tree, who are represented holding a
once have dedicated their first-born sons to Yah- wreath between them on a terracotta plaque and two
weh.162 Both Phoenicians and Israelites had Canaan- ivory reliefs.'66 The iconography suggests marriage,
ite precedent for child sacrifice: two infants buried in and some form of hieros gamos may have been part of

160 R. Dussaud, "Deux stdles de Ras Shamra portant une 164 Warmington (supra n. 91) 149. In fourth-century Car-
dedicace au dieu Dagon," Syria 16 (1935) 177-80. Seethage, apparently, bought children rather than animals
Graesser (supra n. 108) 41-44. were substituted for noble children; the substitution of ani-
161 Eus. Praep. Evang. 1.10.44 (= 4.16.11); Attridge andmals for children seems to have been more common in the
Oden (supra n. 126) 60-63; Baumgarten (supra n. 136) seventh and sixth centuries (Stager, supra n. 91).
19-20, 221-22, 247-52. 165 The idea that human sacrifice was ever practiced at
162 Exod. 13:1-2 and 22:29; Num. 3:11-13 and 8:16-18. Sparta has, to be sure, been rejected: Nilsson (supra n. 103)
163 Gray (supra n. 131) 60-67. Cf. 1 Kings 16:33: in the487-88. But the original practitioners would have been
days of King Ahab (ninth century), "Hiel of Bethel built Phoenicians, not Spartans.
Jericho; he laid its foundation at the cost of Abiram his first- 166 Terracotta: AO 154 fig. 109. Ivory reliefs: AO, pls. 94
born, and set up its gates at the cost of his youngest sonand 97.2; Marangou (supra n. 93) 26-30, no. 9, fig. 24;
Segub." Carter (supra n. 15) 145-47, 185 n. 101, 186 n. 106, fig. 44.

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 382 JANE BURR CARTER [AJA 91

Ortheia's ritual.167'her protector.

The In the Gilgamesh of
importance epic, O
Hu
dwells in
cred union with a male the Cedar
hero orForest, "the abode
deity wouof th
account for the affinities of
Throne-seat of Ortheia's
Irnini."174 This cult w
is a divine
aries of and Humbaba
especiallyHera, on wasSamos
apparently itsbutguardian.
als
Several ly, the
reliefs Gorgoneion,
ivory
from thespiritual descendent of H
Sanctuary
depict a winged and bearded
guarded Greek temples.male. L. M
A third protector o
persuasively argued thatEgyptian
the grotesque this godwinged
Bes, proliferatedm
Palestine
taios,168 son of Apollo and Cyprus
and during the late
Cyrene, hero-second
nium B.C.,
and flocks, who taught menand a furrowed
how mask to from
make Kitio
n. 34) seems
milk, how to keep bees and to reproduce
take his features. hon
their On an
to cultivate the olive tree
century B.C. and extract
pithos found its
at Kuntillet 'Ajrfo
ence of Aristaios ineastern Sinai, two Bes
Ortheia's figures keep watch
sanctuary ou
that the Spartans seated lyre-player who
associated themay be the godde
consor
with this Greek rah.'75
deity of Wearers
flocks of grimacing
and agricu masks m
nection between Aristaios and
guarded Ortheia during Ortheia
a ritual in which her
membered had no part.
in the tradition that he marrie
of Kadmos, which isOn to the othersay,
hand, the polarity
a of hero and demon
Phoenician.1
Two of the reliefsdoesshow
suggest that theyAristaios
are adversaries. If so, the hero as a w
holding a large bird may have
in vanquished
each the demon,
hand.as Gilgamesh de-
On a t
feated Humbaba
relief, Aristaios holds his or, to substitute the hero
more par excel-
usual attri
or bucket containing lence of seventh-century oil,
milk, Greece, as Perseus
and defeated
honey
mankind, Medusa.'76 More ominously, the
and a pick-hoe, demon (or agricultu
his demons)
Twice Aristaios is carved on
may have laid low the
the hero, and what underside
we can surmise o
ing animal; such reclining
about the hero's personality at theanimals,
Sanctuary of Or- ra
were frequent theia is not auspicious for at
dedications his victory.
Ortheia's sa
may reflect AristaiosTheas
characteristics
god of Aristaios have little in com-
of herds.1'7
Fin
sixth-century vase mon
from with the remote and supreme El,
Eretria but we haveAri
puts
noticed that the epithets,
company of an Ortheia-like powers, and consorts of
Mistress ofthe A
Ugaritic goddesses seem to have been to some extent
THE MASKS OF ORTHEIA
interchangeable. In particular, we have seen the name
of Astarte
Two types of masks, the grimacing demon and attached
the to sanctuaries where masks were
found
idealized hero, predominate in the Semitic at Sarepta and Kition. The conflation of Ashe-
tradition
and at Sparta.173 The obvious candidate rah
forand
theAstarte
hero may have been underway as early as
at Sparta is the male figure shown withthe Amarna letters,
Ortheia on where one individual has a theo-
phorous
ivory reliefs and apparently associated with name that sometimes contains a form of Ash-
Aristaios.
The hero's relationship to the grimacingerah and sometimes
demon, how- Astarte.'" The Old Testament
ever, is less obvious, and there may havespeaks
been ofnone.
Baals and Astartes but once substitutes
Asherah
The two figures could have functioned quite as the partner of Baal. By the time of the
separate-
ly, one as the consort of the goddess and the translation
Greek other as of the Old Testament (third century

167 I have attempted to argue for an hieros gamos in the171 Marangou (supra n. 168).
Sanctuary of Ortheia ("Masks and Poetry in Early Sparta")172 Cook, LIMC (supra n. 170) 604 no. 7.
in the forthcoming Early Greek Cult Practice. Proceedings173 Phoenician and Punic glass pendants conform to the
same two basic types: bearded male and grotesque. See
of the Fifth International Symposium at the Swedish Insti-
tute in Athens, June 1986. Stern 16.
168 L. Marangou, "Aristaios," AM 87 (1972) 77-83. 174 ANET (supra n. 17) 82, Tablet V (i). Irnini is a form of
169 Roscher (supra n. 102) 548. Ishtar.
170 The relief of Aristaios with sack and pick-hoe (Maran-175 The inscription on the pithos speaks of Yahweh and his
gou, supra n. 168) is now in the British Museum but cer-Asherah: see Dever 1984 (supra n. 118). Lemaire 1984
tainly came, on stylistic grounds, from Sparta. The icono-
(supra n. 118, 46) denies that the seated figure is Asherah or
graphy of Aristaios was identified and discussed by S. Papa-
anything more than "simply a lyre player."
spyridi-Karousou, "Un Hp&^ro- EvpEr 7s dans quelques 176 As I argue in "Masks and Poetry" (supra n. 167).
monuments archaiques," ASAtene 24-26 (1946-1948) 177 ANET (supra n. 17) 483-84. J.B. Pritchard, Palestini-
37-46. See also B.F. Cook, "Aristaios," BMMA N.S. 21
an Figurines in Relation to Certain Goddesses Known
(1962-1963) 31-36 and LIMC 2 (1984) 603-607. through Literature (Philadelphia 1943) 60 n. 9.

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 1987] THE MASKS OF ORTHEIA 383

B.C.), Astarte and Asherah seem

Tammuz enter Greek religion asto have
Aphrodite and Ado-bee
synonymous."' Ortheia too
nis.182 The pastoral may
nature of Aristaiosbe dual-
corresponds
possessing the cult well
object of Asherah-Tan
to Dumuzi/Tammuz, and it may be that Or-
tended by the consorttheia's
of lover was an early form of the Greek Adonis.
Astarte.
The Sumerian goddess
Presumably Inanna
because her primarytakes as
identity was Ashe- h
band named a shepherd
rah-Tanit,Dumuzi, prosperous
Ortheia was never assimilated to Aphro-
sor of cattle and sheep, milk
dite, as happened and
with Astarte cheese.'79
at other sanctuaries in
impulsive Inanna is seized with
Greece. When Ortheia's a merged,
identity desire to v
long after,
Nether World. As shewithdescends,
a Greek goddess, her strong her clothing
associations with the
animal world
elry are removed, and when caused her to be called Artemis.
she reaches Ere
and the Anunnaki, queen and
The grimacing masks, then, judges
may have represented of th
world, she is turned into
the fiends whoa pursue
corpse and
and kill Ortheia's lover. hung
There o
There she might is no indication
have stayed, that mock battles
but between
her Dumu- faith
senger Ninshubur went to her
zi/Tammuz/Adonis and his foesfather Enki,
were ever enacted in
caused Inanna to be revived. Escorted
the Near East or in Greece, by a s
but women at the Alexan-
infernal demons, thedrian festival of Adonis
galla, Inanna bore the dead god to the
returns t
per world in search shore,183 of someone
and Etruscan worshipersto take
of Astarte buried a her
low. The demons first want to take Ninshubur and god, probably Adonis.184 Perhaps at Sparta, demons
then two others, but in each case Inanna refuses, be- jeered as a procession of mourners carried a masked
cause Ninshubur and the others have mourned her effigy to its burial.
absence in dust and sackcloth. Finally Inanna spies Ortheia's masks have revealed much about her, but
Dumuzi heedlessly sitting on a throne, and she tells much is still mysterious. Actors or effigies moved stiff-
the galla to carry him off. Dumuzi flees desperately, ly, wearing these masks or perishable masks like
metamorphosing into a gazelle or a snake, but he is them, performing a ritual out of the East. Their parts
caught and killed by the galla. Sumerian cult texts la- are lost, but a little over a century later other actors,
ment the death of Inanna's shepherd.-80 The Semitic wearing other masks, played the death of Pentheus in
names for Inanna and Dumuzi are Ishtar (or Astarte Athens. To this most Attic of the arts, what gift did the
among the West Semites) and Tammuz. In the Ugari- sons of Kadmos give, and the school of Terpander?
tic texts, the death of Baal provides a parallel for the DEPARTMENT OF CLASSICAL LANGUAGES
death of Dumuzi, and ritual lamentations for Baal TULANE UNIVERSITY

may have been observed at Megiddo."' Astarte and NEW ORLEANS, LOUISIANA 70II8

"78 Pritchard 1943 (supra n. 177) 59-72. For example, the Structure and History in Greek Mytho-
cult: W. Burkert,
phrase "to the Baals and the Astartes" (1 Sam. logy12:10) is(Berkeley 1979) 105-11.
and Ritual
183 In(to
given in Greek as roiZs BaaXt Ka't roLs 7- A"rErTL Theoc.
the 15 (early third century B.C.). See A.S.F.
Baals and the groves), thus using the usual Greek
Gow,transla-
"The Adoniazusae of Theocritus," JHS 58 (1938)
180-204.
tion
179 of Asherah
ANET (supra(ahXo'os, grove)"Dumuzi
n. 17) 41-42, to render
andAstarte.
Enkimdu." 184 In the bilingual Phoenician-Etruscan inscription of ca.
180 "Inanna's Descent to the Nether World," ANET (supra 500 B.C. from Pyrgi, a dedication to Astarte by the Etruscan
n. 17) 52-57; S.N. Kramer, The Sacred Marriage Rite king of Caere mentions "the day of the burial of the deity":
(Bloomington, Ind. 1969) 107-33; T. Jacobsen, The Treas- G. Bonfante and L. Bonfante, The Etruscan Language
ures of Darkness (New Haven 1976) 47-63. (Manchester 1983) 52-56; Die Gattin von Pyrgi (Akten des
181 Parallels between Tammuz and Baal: N. Robertson, Kolloquiums zum Thema, Tiibingen 1979, Florence 1981);
"The Ritual Background of the Dying God in Cyprus and M. Delcor, "Une inscription bilingue &trusco-punique re-
Syro-Palestine," HThR 75:2 (1982) 324, 334-40, 348-49. cemment decouverte ai Pyrgi: son importance religieuse," Le
Zechariah 12:11 speaks of the "mourning for Hadad Rim- Museon 81 (1968) 241-54. W. R6llig, "Beitrige zur nord-
mon in the plain of Megiddo"; this seems to be Baal Hadad semitischen Epigraphik, 1. Die ph6nizische Inschrift aus
of the Ugaritic texts. Pyrgi," Die Welt des Orients (1969-1970) 108-18.
182 For an overview of the spread of the Dumuzi/Tammuz

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