TOMB ARCHITECTURE AND FUNERAL PAlNTlNG OF ANCIENT MACEDONlA: IVth - IIIrd CENTURY B.C.Maria Tsibidou-Avloniti The systematic excavations that have been carried out in the last forty years, combined with chance discoveries either by grave-robbers or during the course of technical works in Macedonia have brought to light more than eighty funerary monuments, either individual ones or groups of tombs near the great centres of that time (Vergina, Lefkadia, Dion, Thessaloniki etc.). They constitute a special category kyrown as «Macedonian» tombs, because most of them have been found in Macedonia and northern Greece in general, and because their use spread mainly during the years when the Macedonian dynasty was at its zenith, i.e. about the middle of the 4th century until the first half of the 2nd century B.C. They are, however, also to be found in other areas of the ancient world with similar political and social conditions (Asia Minor and Alexandria of Egypt) since most of them appear to have belonged to important companions of the King or to local lords and landowners. They are the most impressive ancient Greek funerary monuments in terms of their construction, decoration and wealth of offerings. And despite the fact that almost all of them were looted mainly in antiquity, they not only provide important evidence on Macedonian architecture and painting, but also suggest the social organisation and the burial customs of that period. The discovery of the two unlooted royal tombs at Vergina in the autumn of 1977 and 1978 was very significant, as this site is now identified with Aigai, the ancient capital of the Macedonians and the consecrated burial site of their kings. Professor Andronikos' suggestion that the great double-chambered tomb with the monumental facade was that of Philip II, one of the most important kings of Macedonia and father of Alexander the Great, has stimulated the research of these peculiar buildings. In 1987 the discovery of the double-chambered tomb with the splendid marble throne, the so-called tomb of «Eurydike», was of equally great importance. Apart from the uniqueness of the painting on the back of the throne and the impressive Ionic pseudo-façade represented at the rear wall of the chamber, the great significance of this find lies in its architectural form and its early dating: dated with certainty by the excavator around 340 B.C., it is the oldest known Macedonian tomb. This early form of monument, with the vaulted roof disguised under a solid rectangular construction, rejects the theory concerning the origin of this type in the period after the campaign of Alexander the Great. In the opposite, we may be now sure that the creation of the vault which supports the load of the earth was merely the inevitable solution to the problem of roofing monumental tombs in Macedonia, where social reasons led to excessive enlargement of the underground burial monuments already from the beginning of the 4th century B.C. The Macedonian tombs may be described as underground buildings comprising one or two chambers, which after their construction ahd the end of the burial ceremonies were covered with earth in the shape of a conical tumulus. In the main chamber there were usually one or more couches where the dead were placed. Sometimes a ritual cremation took place first and then the burned bones were placed in special precious urns (or chests) always accompanied by valuable grave-offerings: piecious jewelry for the women, weapons for the men, silver or clay vases, Iamps and various figurines, sometimes most elegant gold diadems and wreaths. The number of burials in some of these tombs show that they were mainly monuments where the members of a family were successively buried. These particular monuments always have a vaulted roof that forms their distinctive feature, together with their elaborate fa9ades. The façades of the simpler tombs took the form of house façades (a plain pediment or architrave with a doorway-opening in the centre). Though, in the most monumental tombs they resemble the façades of Doric or Ionic temples, with columns or pilasters and the corresponding entablature. Rough poros stone was almost always used in their construction, covered with layers of white plaster in order to give the impression of marble. Marble was comparatively rare in Macedonia, and was therefore used only to decorate specific parts of the tombs, such as the doors and their frames, the thresholds and the structures inside the tombs - couches, thrones etc. Many times the architectural features on the façade and the interior are emphasized with various colours: red, dark blue, pink, green, violet, yellow ochre and black, applied to the basic white plaster, while in some exceptional cases impressive painted compositions decorate large areas of the walls, invaluable witnesses of the lost art of the Classical and Hellenistic period. The paintings were usually executed in the fresco technique, though in some parts of the compositions a mixed technique of fresco and tempera was used. The main composition was painted on a substrate of two layers of lime-plaster, the upper of which was the thinner. The lime-plaster dried slowly, enabling the painter to complete his composition and allowing the paint to penetrate the plaster and stabilise the colour. Nevertheless, it was exactly the custom of the Macedonian aristocracy, foreign to other Greek cities, of burying their dead beneath conspicuous funerary mounds, protected against any change of the climate and maintaining a steady temperature, to which we owe the preservation of the paintings. There are no other monuments of the Classical and Hellenistic periods anywhere else in Greece in which large surfaces are preserved covered with painted compositions, executed in the techniques formulated at the end of the 5th and in the 4th cent. B.C. So it is rather obvious that the most significant contribution made by the Macedonian tombs to our knowledge of ancient Greek art is that they form a valuable source of information on late Classical and Hellenistic architecture and also on ancient monumental painting . (Maria Tsibidou-Avloniti)
The funerary paintings discovered in Macedonia, executed on the walls of the tombs, on marble stele and on funerary furniture gives us the possibility to observe certain major aspects of ancient Greek painting between the mid of the 4th and the mid of the 3rd centuries B.C., a period coinciding with the reigns of Philip II, Alexander the Great and Cassander. The two big compositions that decorate the façade of the tomb of Philip II and the interior of the Tomb of Persephone at Aigai (Vergina) demonstrate in different ways deep knowledge on the construction of complex images, where depth is clearly evoked as well as assimilated experience on the impression of movement. These paintings offer to us the chance to imagine, through tangible testimonies and not only through ancient author's descriptions, how famous Greek painting looked like. Besides, the Bella Tombs at Aigai (Vergina), the three monumental tombs discovered in Lefkadia = ancient Mieza (the Tomb of the Palmettes, the Tomb of the Last Judgement and the Tomb of Lyson and Kallikles), as well as the recent, remarkable archaeological discoveries in the area of ancient Chalastra (Aghios Athanasios) near Thessaloniki, have enriched considerably our knowledge on ancient painting. But also, other less impressive or less well preserved funerary monuments discovered in different areas of ancient Macedonia (Pydna, Pella, Derveni, Aineia, Potidea, Amphipolis, Drama) provide us with interesting informations on the development of the art of painting in Macedonia after the expedition of Alexander the Great in Asia. These paintings, as well as the entire painted decoration that adorns Macedonian tombs reveals more or less according to each case, a pronounced taste for the use of colour. This preference makes itself evident on their monumental façades, where plenty of architectural details are accentuated with vivid colours and where paintings embellish the friezes and the pediments, as well as on the polychrome mortars of their interiors. But we can also observe it on funerary furniture, like on the kline of the Tomb of Potidea, the Tomb of Amphipolis, the Bella Tomb II at Aigai (Vergina) and notably on the marble throne in the Tomb of Eurydike of the same necropolis, an impressive monument, not only for the pictorial quality of the composition that figures on its back, but also for its rich decoration in gold and vivid colours that cover almost all its surfaces. Painting Materials and Techniques a.The supports and the preparation layers Funerary Macedonian paintings are mainly executed on three kinds of supports: on the walls of the tombs that are prepared with a plaster, on marble or on stone. Painted friezes made of wood, once decorated the façade of the tomb III at Aigai (Vergina), but today there is almost nothing preserved. On most of the walls of the monumental tombs, we can observe a high quality of mortars and a refined technique of polishing. of the final layer of plaster applied on the wall, that give us valuable evidence of the existence of an experienced local craftsmanship that knew how to obtain resistant mortars, often coloured with pigments, and was able to imitate, with polished finishes, white mar ble surface. The stratigraphy and the constituent materials of the plaster layers varies according to the monument. These differences are most evident when monumental tombs and smaller graves are to be compared. Obviously, more elaborated techniques are applied to the walls of monumental tombs and we have also observed a difference in the use of the constituent materials. In monumental Macedonian tombs the interior walls are usually covered with plasters that a,re consisting of 3 to 4 different layers. A rough preparatory layer, that can be made out of two different layers, in contact with the stone, is quite thick (3-4 cm) made of a lime-based matrix and very coarse aggregate composed of small pebbles. The second layer is usually much thinner than the first, but it has the same type of matrix, while the third layer consists of a white plaster thick around 2-3 mm, made of a lime based matrix and crushed marble. The façades of the Macedonian tombs are prepared in a simpler way as far as it concerns the number of plaster layers applied on the walls. We have observed that event on the parts of the façade bearing painted decoration, the plaster is almost never prepared with more than two layers : a rough layer to cover the imperfections of the support and a very thin white layer of 2 to 5 mm, composed of lime and crushec marble. Macedonian graves bearing painted decoration are usually prepared to receive two layers of plaster, a rough beige layer composed with lime and clay and a smoother white layer composed with lime and sand. Crushed marble is almost never used in these less refined plasters. Funerary marble stele from Aigai (Vergina) do not receive any kind of preparation on their surfaces. Colour is directly applied on the support. The same practice is observed on the marble throne of the tomb of Eurydike at Aigai (Vergina) . A very thin coloured preparation layer has been applied on the surface of the funerary kline of the monumental tomb of Potidea, exposed in the Archaeological Museum of Thessaloniki. b.The pictorial surface: pigments and binders
The scientific examination of a representatrve number of samples taken from Macedonian tombs and graves showed the use of a range of inorganic pigments either deriving from naturally occurring minerals, or artificially made and a range of organic pigments, mainly consisting of blacks and red lakes. Mixtures of pigments were practised quite often in order to achieve a variety of hues, enriching thus the relatively restricted palette of an ancient painter. The pigments identified thus far can be summarised as follows: Pigments were applied either diluted with water and applied on a wet wall, according to the socalled fresco technique, or they were mixed with an organic binder, such as a gum, egg, protein, according to a tempera or secco technique. The fresco technique is based on the reaction that takes place during the hardening process of the limebased mortar. Painting should be applied on the surface of the wall as it dries out so that chemical binding of the pigment with the mortar is achieved through the slow transformation of lime to calcite. The most representative example of this technique can be observed in the tomb of Persephone at Aigai (Vergina), where many direct incisions used as a preparatory drawing have clearly been made on a wet plaster. Colours should have also been applied on a wet plaster, since they seem to adhere perfectly to the plaster and preserve a certain transparency and brilliance that is often characteristic of a fresco technique. Mixed techniques and tempera or secco techniques have also been used in wall paintings to obtain highlights or for the application of superposed paint layers. In these cases either lime wash is used as a binder for the pigments or an organic substance. Natural organic materials employed as binders for tempera techniques are difficult to identify on ancient paintings, either because of the alteration of their original chemical composition or because of their complete deterioration. Nevertheless, the scientific examination for the identification of the medium used for the painting of the throne of Eurydike at Aigai (Vergina) revealed the use of gum, a vegetable substance that has been traditionally used as the binding medium for Egyptian inks and paintings. Different materials and painting techniques seem to have been used according to the final aesthetic result that painters in ancient Macedonia would desire to achieve, demonstrating assimilated knowledge on the materials properties and expertise on the possibilities of creating the impression of volume. (Hariklia Brecoulaki)
■ BIBIIOGRAFIA
M. Andronikos, Vergina. The Royal Tombs and the Ancient City (1984) |
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