As with most cultural processes in the ancient world, whether they be ethnic identities or cultural exchange and interconnectivity, the prevailing view in scholarship is one mainly deriving from the literary or historiographical evidence. Although archaeological evidence has been used to identify and analyse these processes, the dominating perspective has always had its foundational origins in the literary approaches of the preceding decades. With regards to the processes of cultural change and exchange in the Hellenistic Period, the prevailing trend is one deriving from a Greco-centric perspective which as a result advocates a scholarly presupposition of a dichotomy between the Hellenes and non-Hellenes when it comes to cultural contact, as well as a focus on the eastern Mediterranean due to its significance to the expanding Hellenic culture. Because of this the Greek elements are disproportionately represented when compared to the other cultures present in the Mediterranean at the time, and the western Mediterranean is assumed to fit to the cultural patterns of the east. Such a view comes from the use of literary sources, such as Plutarch, who see the campaigns of Alexander and the subsequent conquests as a kind of cultural crusade against the barbarians, as well as the entrenched notion within the field of Classics that it is the Greeks and Romans above all else who are worthy of our attention and interest. Although more contemporary attempts have been made to see how the conquered reacted and resisted culturally to the conquerors, including Gruen and La’da, who both sought to represent the minority perspectives within the context of Ptolemaic Egypt, little has been done to represent the peripheral cultures in the west not directly influenced by Hellenic conquests, as they were never deemed by traditional scholarship to be important enough to fit within their Greco-centric agenda.[1] This means that where there are independent studies into these peripheral peoples and their material culture, they are assumed to fit into the overarching cultural bloc of the Hellenistic sphere that has been propagated by scholars who as a result only aim to analyse the Greek aspects of influence. This results in a tendency to see the ‘less sophisticated’ native elements as “passive receptacles of cultural influence rather than as active manipulators of culture”.[2] Therefore, more nuanced indications of other external or internal influences in their material culture are ignored in favour of the Greek, and no attention is given to how some influences on material culture may have transferred in the opposite direction.
The aim of this paper is to break down the dichotomy of Hellene and non-Hellene by representing the peripheral civilisations in the western Mediterranean who have thus far been demoted to a footnote in the history of the Hellenistic Period. This will be done through the analysis of the evidence provided by their material culture. I will establish the Mediterranean in this period to be a complex and varied basin for interconnectivity and cultural exchange that was not dominated by the cultural bloc of the Hellenistic world as traditionally propagated, as well as demonstrating that the peripheral peoples I will deal with used a range of external and internal influences on their material culture to create an individual identity that was not solely linked to the Greek east. Although ‘Hellenisation’ was a factor involved during this period, as well as preceding periods to a lesser extent, we must not consider it as the only process of cultural exchange occurring, as we must also consider other non-Greek influences as well as how peripheral cultures may have influenced the Greeks themselves. Where we do consider ‘Hellenisation’ and the Hellenic links with the peripheral peoples, we should see it as a relationship between Hellene and Celt, Iberian, Indian, Briton or Numidian, in order to represent their cultural significance and remove the generalising approach of considering only Hellene and non-Hellene. These civilisations were culturally linked in many ways, but also had varied influences and did not solely exist to provide a generalised cultural opposite to the Greeks.
The first section of this paper will consist of a brief discussion on the nature of the current scholarship and how recent methodological developments can lead to nuanced interpretations of the available archaeological evidence. The second and third sections will be case studies of peripheral Mediterranean cultures that have thus been subjected to a ‘Hellenistic’ scholarly focus with regards to their material culture. The case studies will cover the Numidians and Iberians respectively, and each will take a different focus owing to the varied approaches and aspects of research that each area has received. For example, much of the scholarship into the material culture of Numidia that can be used to identify external influences has focused upon elite architectural evidence, such as the royal monuments that dot the Numidian landscape. On the other hand, the evidence from Iberia includes ceramics, metalworking, sculpture and more. The resulting difference means that we will be able to represent an independent elite in Numidia that has thus far been directly linked to Hellenistic monarchs, as well as also representing a wider cultural group in Iberia. It will be important with this to divide Hellenistic influences on elites, who sought to gain prestige from the adoption of foreign elements, and other aspects of influence on the wider material culture. These two aspects combined will provide two differing perspectives that will contribute to our overall understanding of the complexities of cultural change in the western Mediterranean and how different aspects of society reacted. The final chapter will bring together the new interpretations of the case studies and present a new approach to understanding interconnectivity and cultural exchange in the Hellenistic Period. Here I will show how the methodological developments that I intend to use can be applied to this period in order to reduce the limiting effects of the term ‘Hellenisation’, and in fact offer a new term to better describe this period of Mediterranean history. Overall, I will highlight the eclectic nature of material culture in the Mediterranean and demonstrate that any overbearing focus put on the significance of Hellenic culture beyond it facilitating the conquests of Alexander is unrepresentative of the complex realitities.
I. The State of Current Scholarship
For the literary origins of this Greco-centric perspective that prevails in traditional scholarship we must turn our attention to the historiography and oratorical works of antiquity, most notably the work of Isocrates and later Plutarch. In his Panegyricus as well as in some of his letters to Philip II, Isocrates identifies the wealth of the Achaemenid Empire as stagnant and requiring Greek manpower to make it work and transport it west; he claims this can be achieved through the establishment of Greek cities.[3] This would later inspire Plutarch in his Moralia to suggest that the conquests of Alexander and the subsequent establishment of around seventy cities were motivated by a desire to deliver Greek civilisation, literature and government to the non-Greek world.[4] Some contemporary reinterpretations of the literary sources, as well as some minimal archaeological and topographical analyses, have allowed an insight into some more pragmatic motivations for Alexander’s foundations, including facilitating further conquest, the protection of border zones and supply lines, or for economic importance.[5] Nevertheless, the original ‘Hellenising’ perspective originating with Isocrates and Plutarch has lay the conceptual framework of which scholars of classics, ancient history and even classical archaeology still unavoidably build from. In addition, it is Polybius who gives us the notion that before the expansion of Rome, the Mediterranean was divided between the Punic and Italian west, and the Greco-Asian east.[6] This ancient notion has also influenced the ways in which modern scholarship approaches cultural change in the Hellenistic Period, and there is no real evidence that the wider Mediterranean community saw it this way.
That being said, there has always been an acknowledgement of the creolization involved in ‘Hellenisation’. For example, Droysen was influential in propagating the idea that the expanding Hellenic culture merged significantly with the native cultures of Egypt and the East; something he termed as Hellenismus.[7] Moreover, Droysen identified this period as one where the boundaries of East and West moved firmly into the Mediterranean. However, although this is a rightful acknowledgement of at least some elements of reverse cultural influence, the focus still remains based around the study of the Greek east and as a result only serves to further propagate the cultural dichotomy between east and west, as well as Hellene and non-Hellene, when considering the Mediterranean as a whole. Other peripheral cultures continued to be seen as passive elements in this process and are not given their due representation. The notion of cultural influence and exchange during this period remained based around the idea of the ‘Hellenic’ and the ‘other’, and as a result no real systematic or independent studies into the ‘other peoples’ involved were enough to influence this prevailing view. More to the issue at hand, this prevailing view of cultural blocs has influenced any attempts to research into the material culture of the peripheral peoples. Coarelli and Thébert, for example, in their research into the Numidian royal monuments at Thugga claim that they are influenced solely by an eastern Mediterranean architectural tradition that exploited artistic elements and techniques from the Greek world, and from this they draw conclusions about the political nature of the Numidian royals as being inexplicitly linked to Hellenistic monarchs.[8] Equally, with regards to the study of cultural change in Iberia the term ‘Hellenisation’ refers specifically to the Greek influences manifested in ceramics, sculpture, architecture metalwork and burial rights.[9] As a result, there is a habit among Spanish and Portuguese scholars of attributing any non-local elements of material culture to either Hellenic or Punic (and later Roman) influences.[10] However, more contemporary interpretations of the material evidence not as limited by the conceptual groundwork drawn from the literary sources and based more on other contextual comparisons have highlighted a different perspective of an array of cultural influences. Quinn, for example, highlights that there were intense levels of creolization in the Numidian monuments, including Libyan and Punic, Levantine, Egyptian, as well as Greek artistic influences.[11] Moreover, Keay argues that complex regional differences in Iberia can begin to explain a varied material culture between regions that has otherwise been ascribed to external influences.[12]
What can be identified here is that for the most part interpretations of the material evidence, especially architecture, have always focused on the Greek elements as they were considered the most worthwhile factor to study; something which is unavoidably linked to the field of Classics being passionately indebted to the literary sources. That being said, there have been more contemporary attempts to limit the effects of this Greco-Roman focus, including the work of Versluys, and Quinn, to whom I am indebted to with regards to their revisionist models. By focusing solely on the material evidence and by relinquishing the models set by the traditional scholarship, we can begin to gain a better insight into the complexities of cultural change. This is the approach taken by Versluys, as well as some of his predecessors, who applied it to the Romanisation debate in order to break down the existing presupposed dichotomy.[13] Another important model to work from is that set by Quinn in her edited volume on the Hellenistic West. Quinn seeks to break down the notion of cultural blocs and limit the presupposed eastern Mediterranean cultural dominance that continues to affect our studies of the Mediterranean today, as well as highlight its varied and eclectic material culture. She argues that the separate cultural worlds of ‘Hellenistic’, as well as ‘Punic’, are modern monolithic constructs and that there is no evidence to suggest the ancients saw them that way.[14] Therefore by reinterpreting the material evidence, as well as interpreting new material evidence, through the lens of intense regional variability and cultural individuality, I hope to get one step closer to understanding the perspectives of the peoples that inhabited the Mediterranean in antiquity whilst removing the shackles of Greco-Roman cultural dominance that originates from centuries of modern scholarship.
II. The Numidians
As already mentioned with Coarelli and Thébert’s interpretations of the Numidian royal monuments, Numidia and its elite architectural culture has been seen as a passive element in a process of Hellenistic influence. As a result, this has led to interpretations of the political nature of the Numidian royals as being directly linked to Hellenistic monarchs in terms of displaying prestige through the use of foreign artistic techniques and forms.[15] Coarelli and Thébert identify such a tradition as originating with the sixth century tomb of Cyrus at Pasargadae, as well as being identifiable with the monument of the Nereids at Xanthos in the fifth century, the fourth century Mausoleum at Halicarnassus, the early third century Mausoleum of Belevi and the articulated tumulus in the Hellenistic Asklepeion at Pergamon.[16] The evidence they cite for such a conclusion of a dominating Hellenistic influence, from which they emphasise the direct contacts between the Numidian kings and the cities and rulers of the Hellenistic East, is the apparent local familiarity with Hellenistic iconographic ‘codes’, such as the significance of the diadem on royal coin portraits.[17] Other scholars in the same tradition, however, have argued for a solely Punic influence. Camps and Shaw for example argue that the Punic and Phoenician influences in the monuments suggest high levels of acculturation between Carthaginian and Numidian elites during the Hellenistic Period; likely driven by intermarriage between them.[18] Martinez too follows this trend by suggesting that the tower-form of the monuments is of Punic influence. Equally, Lancel, following Poinssot, claims that the Thugga monument is “the only great monument of Punic architecture still standing on Tunisian soil”.[19] Either side of this debate, however, still unconsciously advocates a cultural dichotomy, whether it be Greek or Punic. Moreover, they still propagate the notion of a cultural divide between east and west, where in the western cultures are passive receptacles to be merely influenced by Greek, or possibly Punic, cultural features manifested in artistic and architectural techniques and styles.
Nonetheless, Lancel also admits that Egypto-Greek influences derive from a lost world of Punic architecture.[20] The comparisons he draws from are the stelai with Aeolic capitals, Ionic columns, cavetto cornices and winged solar disks in the tophets at Carthage, Hadrumetum and other Phoenician colonies in Sardinia and Sicily, as well as an Aeolic pilaster depicted on an architectural fragment from Medjez-el-Bab.[21] Lancel’s allusion is significant, as what is clear is that there was an architectural tradition in Numidia that drew on a range of styles, forms and techniques from around the Mediterranean. Quinn, for example, highlights that the Thugga monument has a bilingual Libyan and Punic inscription, as well as a first story of Levantine Aeolic capitals, which were widespread in Carthage and the surrounding region during the Hellenistic Period, a second story of Greek Ionic capitals, and above a cavetto cornice related to Dynastic Egyptian architecture that had long been popular in the Maghreb; the same cultural variety can be seen with Lancel’s examples.[22]Moreover, Quinn asserts that the monument has depictions similar to the iconography and coinage of Persian Sidon.[23] These varied influences are not indicative of a single static time where an individual or group decided to draw on foreign artistic influences, but instead represents a stage of a developing tradition that had been occurring for quite some time before the Thugga monument, which dates to the third or second century BC. This development is identifiable when we consider the mausoleum from the cemetery at Pozo Moro which dates to around five hundred BC and exhibits local features alongside clear foreign influences.[24] With a range of external influences from the western and eastern Mediterranean, from the Greek, Egyptian and Punic, we can begin to see how the traditional models of dichotomy between the presupposed cultural blocs is not sufficient to represent the process of cultural change during this period; at least with regards to elite architectural forms.
Furthermore, evidence of strong local influences demonstrates that there was a significant element of active agency from the part of the Numidians involved, building from a long-held architectural tradition. Gsell, for example, who highlighted the possibility of local influences in the early 20th century, suggests that the articulated circular form of the Madracen near Batna builds from a much older style seen in the bazina tomb-type, which leads him to suggest that they were “indigenous monuments dressed in a cloak of foreign extraction”.[25] This is corroborated by Camps, and later Krandel-Ben Younès, who argue that the Madracen is a local form embellished by outside influences.[26] What is clear is that there was a local tradition that built on older Numidian forms, but also used architectural and artistic techniques from around the Mediterranean as forms of embellishment, likely as a source of prestige for the various elites and monarchs who sponsored their construction. Quinn highlights that the purpose for these foreign influences was not to align “their monuments with one or another ‘cultural tradition’”, but in order to point to “a variety of places and ideas that reinforced their local power, status and authority”.[27] Therefore, we must look at the Numidian royals not as a mere receptacle to serve in the presupposed dominating process of ‘Hellenisation’, but instead as part of an independent society that chose to adopt various techniques and styles from a range of other cultures. By emphasising the local elements and the variety of external influences, we can begin to represent the Numidian elites in their own right and work from their perspective. The east-west cultural divide begins to diminish when we consider the range of Punic, Egyptian, Levantine, local, and even Greek influences, alongside the prior assertions that the Numidians were ‘Hellenised’. There was clearly a significant level of cultural independence that allowed the Numidians to adopt foreign influences to facilitate their own motives. This is a stark contrast to the presupposed assumption that they were in some way forced to adopt Greek, or Punic, influences by a form of cultural dominance.
Numidian contact with the Greek and Phoenician cultures would have been direct owing to the colonies on the North African coast. Law highlights that many of the Punic colonies “…served as victualling stations along the coasting routes to Spain and Egypt, but… also had an economic significance of their own as centres for fishing and as post for trade with the peoples of the interior”.[28] He goes on to highlight that smaller colonies further west of Carthage served as emporia and provided access to the commodities of the interior of Numidia and the Maghreb, mainly ivory, hides and cedar wood.[29] Although contact with the Phoenician colonies would have been more direct owing to proximity, and possibly served more of an economic motive, the contact with Greek colonies in Cyrenaica would have taken a similar in terms of cultural influence. We can identify the possibility of Punic influence in terms of technological innovations, including arboriculture and iron-smelting, as well as some cultural influences such as the Phoenician rite of child sacrifice in Thugga.[30] However, we must acknowledge that there was a significant level of cultural independence. We must also consider the fact that the Punic and Greek colonies is North Africa would have incorporated elements of the local population into their colonies, resulting is a more creolized material culture.[31] It would have been the nature of these contacts that facilitated the varied influences on the architectural culture of the monuments discussed. However, owing to a lack of ceramic and other sufficiently datable evidence, we can only conject on the actual extent of direct contacts. Quinn concludes by stating that “the builders bolstered their prestige by co-opting global references, and their legitimacy by co-opting local ones”.[32]
III. The Iberians
Iberia also has the same presupposed place in the process of Hellenisation, as well as being similar to Numidia in that they had direct cultural contacts with both the Greek and Carthaginian colonies nearby. However, as already mentioned, the evidence and thus the interpretations of the internal and external influences on Iberian material culture are based on a wider range of archaeological evidence, including coins, burial practices and urban architectural remains. As a result, we can infer more about the wider population rather than being limited to the elite. That being said, there are still some limitations in the availability of archaeological data, and Keay highlights that “for most towns… a full understanding of the interplays between local traditions and eastern Mediterranean influences is hampered by a lack of systematic fieldwork and publication…”.[33] Because of this I will not include an analysis of the ceramic evidence, mainly because of a lack of an accurate understanding of the assemblages, as well the fact that numismatic evidence and burial practices allow us a far more nuanced insight into the self-conceptualised identities of those that created and participated in them. This lack of material evidence is likely linked to the presupposed traditional views that are the subject of this paper. For example, the town of Arse-Saguntum (modern Sagunto in Valencia) features in various historiographical sources, including Dionysius of Halicarnassus and later Silius Italicus, who both incorporate it into Greco-Roman mythology, as well as Strabo, who claims that the Saguntines originated from Zakynthos.[34] This literary link between the Iberian cultural landscape and the Hellenic world cannot be ignored as providing the impetus for the traditional literary-based views that the Iberians were subject to the process of Hellenisation. Even if the origin of the Saguntines is true, and we do not necessarily have any reason to think otherwise, it should not be used as evidence for a vast wave of cultural changes across the peninsula, and we must instead consider the archaeological evidence. In reality, Iberia was in direct contact with the Greeks and Carthaginians, and later Romans, due to the presence of colonies as well as preceding maritime networks across the Mediterranean. As a result, we must account for the eclectic nature of the material remains and infer from them a much more complex picture of cultural change and influence.
One key aspect of the material evidence which is increasingly informative of cultural influence and change are coins, which are a prominent feature of Iberia’s archaeological landscape owing to the Greek, Carthaginian and Roman settlements, as well as the ones of an Iberian nature. However, we do not find distinctly Greek coins at Greek colonies, nor distinctly Iberian coins at the local settlements, unless they have by chance travelled from Greece. Instead, the coins excavated at the various urban or rural sites across Iberia indicate a high level of creolization and cross acculturation. For example, the Iberians of Tarraco, as well as most towns in Citerior, were not directly influenced with regards to their coin depictions until the Augustan Period, when Latin inscriptions were included on their coins.[35] Instead, the Iberian elements in these settlements minted bronze and silver coins bearing homogenous depictions of a head of a youth and a galloping horseman, as well as bearing local inscriptions.[36] These local elements, however, like many coins minted by other Iberian and Celtiberian communities, “were localised interpretations of widespread Hellenistic-period imagery…”.[37]Some more inclined to the traditional scholarship on Hellenisation may cite these Hellenistic influences as evidence in favour of their view. However, the regional variability of how the Iberians adopted various external influences demonstrates that any single homogenous process such as Hellenisation will not suffice to represent the complex realities. Keay highlights that “communities in south-west, south-east and eastern Iberia, as well as on the Balearic Islands, developed their own regional dynamics that drew differently upon continued Greek influences as well as those from a growing Punic presence in the south-western Mediterranean”.[38] What is clear is that the varied regional nature of the Iberian communities meant that they could draw on Greek influences in varying degrees and as they saw fit. Moreover, the Iberian communities that drew from Greek and other cultural influences tended to be located on the Mediterranean coast and the nearby interior. The hill communities deeper into the peninsula did not see the same level of cultural change. They were not, therefore, serving as passive elements in an overbearing and homogenous cultural process originating in the eastern Mediterranean. Instead, some communities were amalgamating Hellenic and Punic cultural features alongside their own local traditions likely to participate in this growing pan-cultural community in southern and eastern Iberia.
Moreover, cultural creolization was not limited to the Iberian communities, and we can identify certain aspects of cultural exchange in the Greek colonies in Iberia that cast doubts on the presupposed monodirectional nature of traditional Hellenisation. Emporion was a Greek colony founded in the sixth century in what is now Catalonia. There was a period between the late third century and the early second century when the predominant symbols on their coinage were typically Greek, with depictions of Artemis and a winged Pegasus.[39] However, preceding this was a period between the late fourth and late third centuries BC when the coins took a distinctive Carthaginian style.[40] Furthermore, they were eventually replaced by bronze coins with Iberian inscriptions which lasted well into the first century, although the Greek winged Pegasus continued to be depicted.[41] What is clear is that at different stages an intense level of cultural exchange can be identified, whether it be Greek influences on Iberian coins, or Iberian and Carthaginian influences on the Greek examples. This combined with the regional variability of the Iberian communities demonstrates the eclectic nature of the period and should begin to dissuade any real attempts to propagate the term ‘Hellenisation’ in its traditional form. In addition, the clearly varied interplay between the identifiable cultures demonstrates that the dichotomy between Hellene and non-Hellene is no longer useful when we consider how these communities actually interacted. It is likely that these settlements included Greek, Punic and Iberian elements that fosterd their own collective identity; something shown through their coins. Therefore, such mixed communities can not fit into the dichotomy propagated by traditional Hellenisation.
A similar interplay between Greek and Iberian cultural forms can also be seen with the burial practices in the cemeteries on the outskirts of ancient Emporion from the early second century BC onwards.[42] This, like the conclusions drawn from the numismatic evidence, demonstrates the creolized nature of the Greek colony and is testament to either direct influence from neighbouring Iberians, or at least the adoption of some Iberian elements into the population which would in turn lead to cultural influences. Moreover, with regards to Iberian settlements we can also identify a variety of influences on burial practices at different times that demonstrate more beyond the Hellenistic influences. For example, the second and first-century burials at the cemeteries of El Tolmo de Minateda in Albacete and at Vilajoyosa in Alicante show possible Roman influences in that the cemeteries were arranged along roadways.[43] Equally, other regional Iberian influences can be detected in southern Catalunya and northern Pais Valenciano where the stelai include Iberian inscriptions and resemble similar monuments from lower Aragon.[44] This is again testament to the true eclectic nature of the material culture and shows that by analysing such evidence over the literary sources we can begin to remove the Greco-centric shackles that have inaccurately shaped our understanding of cultural exchange in Iberia, as well as the wider western Mediterranean.
Iberia had been subject to Hellenic influences for some centuries before the establishment of the Hellenistic kingdoms in the east.[45] Keay highlights that “Phoenician and Greek colonies in the south and north-east were instrumental in the circulation of a complex blend of eastern Mediterranean ideas and imports among indigenous communities from at least the seventh century BC onwards, which together with pre-existing indigenous Late Bronze Age traditions, formed the cultural context out of which the Iberians were to develop in the course of the sixth and fifth centuries BC onwards”.[46] This amalgamated cultural identity was to reach its height during the Hellenistic Period with regards to a scholarly perspective due to all of the cultural influences identified above becoming clear within the material record. However, with Iberia we must continue to consider this longer development whilst also focusing on the native elements that persisted. As such, we should not see the Iberians as being a ‘Hellenised’ culture that was somehow subject to renewed Greek cultural influences in the Hellenistic Period. As demonstrated, despite various limitations in the archaeological record, there is plenty of material evidence which we can use to represent this peripheral culture in its own right. The Iberians used external factors for the development of their own regional identities and must therefore be considered culturally independent from the Hellenistic east.
IV. ‘Hellenisation’ in Context
The case studies presented in this research show the comparisons between two distinct Mediterranean cultures, as well as highlighting the similarities and differences between two aspects of these societies: the elite reception of external and internal cultural influences and that of the wider non-elite population. Although there would have been socially elite factors involved in the numismatic and burial evidence from Iberia, the depictions on coins served as a wider method for a society to transmit its self-conceptualised identity, and the burials were also representative of wider societal patterns. As a result, it is not important for the scope of this research to identify the elite factors involved in these elements when compared to the royal monuments in Numidia. What is clear, however, is that with both the elite reception and that of the wider population, there were intense levels of creolization in terms of cultural traits as well as physical artistic influences within the material record. Although they served to facilitate the transmittal of the identity of groups of differing social status, their motives nonetheless show a variation on a theme. In Numidia we see the elites adopting a range of foreign techniques in order to further legitimise their power and authority to those of whom they ruled. Quinn characterises this when she claims that “none of this seems to be about exclusive cultural or ethnic identity, but rather about the exploitation of real symbolic sources of power”.[47] Equally, in Iberia we can identify various Greek and other external influences being adopted by a varied but ultimately limited group of Iberian communities that are situated near the foreign colonies. Here, this may not be so much about power but more about facilitating commercial and other interactions with the Greek and Punic colonies on the peninsula. It is because of these adoptions of Hellenistic customs and influences on their material culture, combined with the literary origins of much of what we historically know about these people, that traditional scholarship has seen them to be directly subjected to the process of Hellenisation.
‘Hellenisation’ as a term in its simplest unadulterated form means the transferal of Greek culture to a non-Greek people and may remain useful when discussing the cultural processes that occurred in the vast tracts of land conquered by Alexander and the Diadochi, as well as possibly with regards to Greek influences deriving from earlier colonial efforts. However, the issue derives from its application in modern scholarship which presents it as an overarching and dominating process that in turn does not represent the other perspectives involved. Keay highlights it as “…an asymmetrical term that privileges the Greek over other traditions, such as Carthaginian and Iberian, in the history of the Mediterranean, on the implicit basis that Greek cultural traditions were somehow superior and, as a consequence, the cultural standard to which peoples around the Mediterranean aspired”.[48] This then is where the weakness of the term lies when considering the actual complexities in both elite and non-elite spheres as highlighted in the case studies above. It has become unavoidably linked to a Greco-centric perspective, and the term ‘Hellenisation’ cannot continue unless we also intend to consider terms such as ‘Iberianisation’ or ‘Numidianisation’ as equally significant processes. It is clear from the archaeological evidence from Numidia and Iberia that there were significant elements of ‘native’ influences on the Greeks, as well as other external factors, such the Punic which influenced both the ‘natives’ and the Greeks alike. The use of the term has created a presupposed dichotomy between Hellene and non-Hellene, and as a result does not allow for sufficient representation of the other perspectives in the area of cultural exchange and change in the Mediterranean. Keay raises another issue with the term, in that it “…wrongly decentralizes dialogues about cultural changes away from key local and regional issues towards traditions germane to the eastern Mediterranean, converting peoples such as the Iberians into passive respondants at the western periphery of an eastern dominated oikoumene”.[49] The dichotomy highlighted here that limits the use of the term derives from the assumption that these ‘peripheral’ cultures fit with the cultural standards of the east. I continue to use the term ‘peripheral’ in this paper for convenience, as so with the terms ‘Hellenistic’ and ‘Hellenisation’, yet we must move past the notion that they were somehow peripheral to a centralised Greek world and instead represent the Mediterranean as a complex network of cultures and contacts. In reality, the material evidence shows increased levels of cultural independence among these peoples and a continuation of local traditions that show the term ‘Hellenisation’ to be thoroughly outdated by what should be the modern standards within scholarship.
It will be too fragmentary to identify a range of ‘-isations’, which would not represent the Mediterranean as the basin of interconnectivity that it was, whether they focus on the Numidians, Iberians, Carthaginians or any other Mediterranean culture. We must instead look to other terms to explain the processes of cultural change and the breaking-down of cultural barriers that occurred during the Hellenistic Period. I alluded to the work of Versluys in the first section of this paper, and it is the methodology presented by him that inspired me to apply it to the Hellenistic Period. As well as advocating the sole use of material evidence due to the limitations of the literary sources, it was Versluys who saw similar limitations in which the way the term ‘Romanisation’ has been used by colonial and post-colonial scholars, in that it propagates a dichotomy between the “Roman and Native” whilst doing little to represent the immense regional variability, as well as how these ‘native’ cultures influenced the Romans.[50] Cultural change in the Roman Empire varied massively from province to province, and region to region, owing to different customs and motives among their elites, as well as their wider populations and their distinct material cultures and histories. However, the traditional scholarship remains content with advocating one homogenous model. Equally, with regards to the Mediterranean during the Hellenistic Period, many scholars remain content to advocate the homogenous model of ‘Hellenisation’ when in reality the material evidence suggest increasingly complex processes. What I suggest here, following Versluys, is that the term ‘globalisation’ would serve as a better alternative to ‘Hellenisation’, in that it accounts for other aspects of cultural influence whilst removing the unwarranted Greco-centric perspective that the Hellenes culturally dominated the Mediterranean. ‘Globalisation’ would lay the conceptual framework for considering the Mediterranean as an interconnected whole not dominated by a single culture and would also begin to make a case for focusing ‘Mediterranean’ history and culture as a wider term, rather than the predominating classical focus on Greece, and subsequently Rome. The conquests of Alexander opened up the world in a way that had never been seen before. However, although it allowed the spread of Greek culture further than before, it also ushered in a period of willingness among Hellenistic monarchs and Greeks settled around the Mediterranean to adopt many other customs and cultural features. Yet despite this, we continue to consider the cultural distinctions originating in the historiography of the preceding period as adequate to explain a new age of interconnectivity and complex networks of cultural exchange. Unprecedented eclecticism was a feature of most of the major Mediterranean cities during the Hellenistic Period, so too with the variety of cultures and peoples.
William Minter recently completed an MLitt in Classics at the University of St. Andrews.
Notes: [1] E.S. Gruen, ‘Greeks and non-Greeks’, in G.R. Bugh (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to the Hellenistic World (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006); C. La’da, ‘Ethnicity, occupation and tax-status in Ptolemaic Egypt’, Eggito E Vivino Oriente, Vol. 17 (1994) [2] J.C. Quinn, ‘Monumental power: ‘Numidian Royal Architecture’ in context’, in R.W. Pragg, and J.C. Quinn, The Hellenestic World: Rethinking the Ancient Mediterranean (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013), p. 192. [3] Isocrates, Panegyricus 187; Letters to Philip 103. [4] Plutarch, Moralia 328 d-e. [5] R. Morkot, The Penguin Historical Atlas of Ancient Greece (London: Penguin Books, 1996), p. 111; P.M. Fraser Cities of Alexander the Great (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1996), p. 176; A.B. Bosworth, Conquest and Empire: The Reign of Alexander the Great(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988), p. 247; N.G.L. Hammond, Alexander’s Newly-Founded Cities (1998), p. 253. [6] Polybius, The Histories 1.3.3-6. [7] J. Droysen, Geschichte des Hellenismus (Hansebooks, 1878) [8] F. Coarelli and Y. Thébert, ‘Architecture funéraire et pouvoir: réflections sur l’hellénisme en Numidie’, MEFRA, Vol. 100 (1988), p. 811. [9] S. Keay, ‘Were the Iberians Hellenised?’ in Pragg, and Quinn, The Hellenestic World, p. 300. [10] Ibid., p. 301; cf. García y Bellido, Hispania Graeca (Barcelona, 1948); M. Almagro-Gorbea ‘L’Hellénisme dans la culture ibérique’, in Akten des XIII. Internationalen Kongresses für Klassische Archäologie (Berlin, 1988); O. Jaeggi, Der Hellenismus auf der iberischen Halbinsel. Studie zur iberichen Kunst und Kultur: Das Beispiel eines Rezeptionsvorgangs. (Mainz, 1999) [11] Quinn, ‘Monumental power’, p. 179. [12] Keay, ‘Iberians’, p. 305. [13] M.J. Versluys, ‘Understanding objects in motion. An archaeological dialogue on Romanisation’, Archaeological Dialogues, Vol. 21, No. 1 (2014), p. 1; Webster and Cooper 1996; Mattingly 1997. [14] Quinn, ‘Monumental power’, pp. 190-191. [15] F. Coarelli and Y. Thébert, ‘Architecture funéraire et pouvoir: réflections sur l’hellénisme en Numidie’, MEFRA, Vol. 100 (1988), p. 811. [16] Quinn, ‘Monumental power’, p. 187. [17] Coarelli and Thébert, ‘Archetcture funéraire et pouvoir’, p. 812 and p. 815; cf. Quinn, ‘Monumental power’, p. 187. [18] G. Camps, ‘Modèle hellénistique ou modèle punique? Les destinées culturelles de la Numidie’, in Actes du III congrès international des études phéniciennes et puniques, Tunis, 11-16 novembre 1992 (Tunis, 1995); B.D. Shaw, ‘A peculiar island: Maghrib and Mediterranean’, in Irad Malkin (ed.), Mediterranean Paradigms and Classical Antiquity (London, 2005), p. 125 [19] S. Lancel, Carthage: A History. Trans. by A. Nevill (Oxford, 1995): 307; L. Poinssot Les ruines de Dougga (Tunis, 1958), p. 59. [20] Ibid., p. 307. [21] Ibid., pp. 305-14. [22] Quinn, ‘Monumental power’, p. 179. [23] Quinn, ‘Monumental power’, p. 181. [24] Quinn, ‘Monumental power’, p. 211. [25] S. Gsell, Historie ancienne de l’Afrique du Nord, Vol. VI, p. 262. [26] G. Camps, Aux origines de la Berbérie. Monuments et rites funéraires protohistoiques (Paris, 1961), p. 200; Camps, ‘Modèle helénistique ou modèle punique?’, p. 247; A. Krandel-Ben Younès, La présence punique en pays numide (Tunis, 2002), pp. 100-2. [27] Quinn, ‘Monumental power’, p. 204. [28] R.C.C. Law ‘North Africa in the period of Phoenician and Greek colonization, c. 800 to 323 BC’, in J.D. Fage, (ed.) The Cambridge History of Africa (Cambridge, 1979), p. 126. [29] Ibid., p. 128. [30] Ibid., p. 133. [31] Ibid., pp. 131-132. [32] Quinn, ‘Monumental power’, p. 210. [33] Keay, ‘Iberians’, p. 314. [34] Dionysius, Roman Antiquities 1.50.2-3; Silius Italicus, Punica 1.273-753; Strabo, Geographica 4.6. [35] L. Villaronga, Corpus nummorum Hispaniae ante Augusti aetatem (Madrid, 1994); J. Untermann, ‘La latinización de Hispania a través del documento monetal’, in M.P. Garciá-Bellido and R.M. Sobral Centeno, La moneda hispánica ciudad y territorio, (Madrid, 1995); cf. Keay, ‘Iberians’, p. 307. [36] Ibid., p. 162. [37] Keay, ‘Iberians’, p. 308. [38] Ibid., p. 303. [39] X. Aquilué, P. Castanyer, M. Santos, J. Tremoleda, ‘Greek Emporion and Roman Republican Empúries’, in L. Abad Casal et al (ed.) Early Roman Towns in Hispania Tarraconensis (Portsmouth, 2007), pp. 21-4. [40] Ibid., pp. 21-4. [41] Villaronga, Corpus nummorum Hispaniae, pp. 140-51. [42] López Borgoñoz 1998: 276-87. [43] L. Abad Casal, ‘El tránsito funerario’, pp. 75-100. [44] F. Beltrán Lloris, ‘Writing, language and society: Iberians, Celts and Romans in northeastern Spain in the 2nd and 1st centuries BC’, BICS, Vol. 43 (1999), pp. 139-40. [45] Keay, ‘Iberians’, p. 302. [46] Keay, ‘Iberians’, p. 301. [47] Quinn, ‘Monumental power’, p. 210. [48] Keay, ‘Iberians’, p. 318. [49] Keay, ‘Iberians’, p. 318. [50] Versluys, ‘Understanding objects in motion’, p. 1, p. 7, p. 12 and pp. 14-15.
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