Commagene

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Map showing Commagene as the vassal kingdom of Armenia (1st century BC)
Bridge of Septimius Severus

Kommagene ( ancient Greek Κομμαγηνή ) is an ancient landscape in south-east Asia Minor , which is bordered in the east by the Euphrates . To the west are the Taurus Mountains and to the south the plains of northern Syria. For a long time, Kommagene was part of different empires before it became part of the middle of the 2nd century BC. Became independent. In the first century AD, the independence of Kommagenes ended. The capital was initially Samosata on the Euphrates, later Hierapolis Bambyke , today's Manbidsch in northern Syria. Other important cities were Marasch , Doliche and Perrhe .

history

Stone Age and Bronze Age

In the landscape later called Kommagene, various settlements of the pre-ceramic Neolithic were documented, which up to the 9th / 8th centuries. Millennium BC Go back BC. These include Nevalı Çori , Gritille , Hayaz Höyük and Levzin Höyük . Only a few sites are known from the ceramic Neolithic, while various evidence is available for the Copper Age . These set in the transition phase between the Neolithic and Copper Age with the Halaf culture at the end of the 6th millennium BC. And in the 5th millennium, with the Obed period, they achieved the status of a developed farming society with extensive trade contacts (for which the Euphrates was also used). The 4th millennium BC Then brought the emergence of the first city-like settlements as well as various references to emerging states (such as the central distribution of food). In connection with a strengthening of the trade - especially with copper and flint from the commagene - the division and organization of work also differentiated. From the middle of the 4th millennium the influence of the Uruk culture , which was expanding from the south, increased , with the most important town of the Kommagene, later Samosata , emerging on Samsat Höyük .

Before 3000 BC The settlements of the Uruk culture break down violently, and archaeological finds on Samsat Höyük reveal a major fire disaster. The settlement intensity in the Kommagene, on the other hand, remained at a high level in the subsequent Early Bronze Age and the settlements of the later Copper Age were all still used. In the further course of the Bronze Age , the development of the Kommagene became more complex; While in some parts of the country there has been a clear decline in settlement activity, other cities such as Samsat Höyük and the surrounding area continued to flourish. With the end of the 3rd millennium BC The region came under the influence of the Empire of Akkad and appears in this context for the first time in written sources. In the 17th or 16th century, the Hittite king Ḫattušili I conquered a region called Uršu, which roughly encompasses the area of ​​the later Kommagene - in the 15th century, however, the country fell to the Kingdom of Kizzuwatna . In the middle of the 14th century it came back to the Hittite Empire through the campaigns of Šuppiluliuma I , during which it was until its fall around 1200 BC. Chr. Remained.

Development up to Hellenism

In the turmoil in connection with the fall of the Hittite Empire, the region of Kommagene probably came under the control of the Karkemiš Empire , which in turn became part of the 12th century BC. Several regional principalities emerged. This also included the kingdom of Kummuh , for which, however, extensive information from written sources was only available from the 9th century. The later term “Commagene” is derived from this state name. In many areas of culture and society it was still completely in the tradition of the Hittite Empire, the local upper class continued to refer to themselves as "Hittites". At the same time, however, Luwian became the usual language of inscriptions instead of Hittite , and the immigrating Aramaic peoples in turn brought their script and language with them. In addition, new Aramaic dominated centers of rulership emerged in the neighborhood of the older Hittite and Luwian influenced ones. With the expansion of the Assyrian Empire under King Aššur-nâṣir-apli II and his successor Salmānu-ašarēd III. Kummuh became a tribute to the Assyrians, but in return was able to preserve his territorial integrity. For the year 866 BC The principality appears for the first time in the Assyrian annals . In the following period, of course, the influence of the Assyrian culture on the Kommagene increased, which in the local archaeological findings can essentially be determined by the changes in art history.

Around 750 BC BC Kummuh was subjugated by the Urartians and had to join an anti-Assyrian alliance. However, this coalition was founded as early as 743 BC. Defeated at Arpad and the principality came back under Assyrian control. After the dissolution of the Kingdom of Melid , the territory of Kummuh was significantly expanded. Nevertheless, its ruler Mutallu went in 708 BC. BC again an alliance with Urartu, whereupon the Assyrian King Sarru-kīn II conquered the empire in a campaign and incorporated it as a province into the Assyrian empire. The southern part of the later Kommagene around Gaziantep probably never belonged to the Kummuhu Empire, but seems to have also become an Assyrian province after several changes of ownership in the course of the 8th century. A fortress in the southwest of Samsat Höyük and above all a palatial complex in Tille Höyük , which is presumably connected with the regional administration, date from this phase .

605 BC Kummuh was conquered by the Babylonian heir to the throne Nabū-kudurrī-uṣur II . In the palace building on Tille Höyük is for the time around 600 BC A great fire of damage, which may be connected with this conquest. A little later, however, a similarly monumental, albeit poorly preserved, new building was built there. A comparably representative building - which, however, had no equivalent predecessor - was erected on the Lidar Höyük (probably also during the Babylonian rule) . Administrative buildings on the Teleilat and Surtepe, on the other hand, testify to an archaeologically relatively inconspicuous transition between the Assyrian, Babylonian and 539 BC. Beginning Achaemenid rule. On the Tille Höyük, after the Persian conquest, a new, magnificent palace was erected over the two administrative buildings mentioned above; Structures were also found on Samsat Höyük that presumably originate from the Achaemenid period, but cannot be classified more precisely.

Classical antiquity

Not much information is available from the Kommagene from the following period; The landscape was conquered with the rest of the Persian Empire by Alexander the Great and after his death came to the Seleucid Empire during the disputes between the Diadochi . Under Ptolemy , Kommagene became 163 BC. Independent of this; the most important king was Antiochus I (69 - approx. 36 BC). After the death of Antiochus III. (17 AD) Kommagene was incorporated into the Roman Empire .

In the religion and culture of Kommagene, Hellenistic, indigenous Anatolian and Persian elements mix. Under Antiochus IV , Kommagene became independent again. However, in AD 74 it finally lost its independence and became part of the Roman province of Syria . During the imperial era , four detectable auxiliary units were named after the Commagene region, the Ala I Commagenorum , the Cohors I Flavia Commagenorum , the Cohors II Flavia Commagenorum and the Cohors VI Commagenorum .

In late antiquity, the name Euphratesia became common for the province , even if the name Kommagene remained in use. In the 7th century the area that had long been fought over between the Romans and the Sassanid Empire was conquered by the Arabs.

Post-ancient history

As a result of the Battle of Jarmuk in 636, the southeastern Taurus Mountains became the border region between the Eastern Roman Empire and the Arab world for several centuries with the Islamic expansion . The term Kommagene lost its meaning as a geographical name, the history of the landscape can essentially only be traced on the basis of the development of the settlements. The previously important Perrhe and Zeugma died out completely, their functions were taken over by new localities in the immediate vicinity. Doliche, on the other hand, remained and, under the name of Duluk, formed a regionally important Arab city of strategic-military as well as political-economic importance until the High Middle Ages. The sparse written sources also show that the late antique settlements and also Christian communities continued to exist.

When the Kommagene fell under the rule of the Hamdanids after the collapse of the Abbasid Empire in the 10th century , the Byzantine expansion attempts again began to yield minor successes. This resulted in an "unstable balance between Byzantine military leaders and Muslim rulers east of the Euphrates", which was shaped by decades of guerrilla warfare. After the end of the Armenian Bagratid Empire , numerous aristocratic Armenian families emigrated to the Taurus region and the Kommagene; Through the expansion of the Seljuks in Asia Minor, this area was cut off from the Byzantine heartland and thus effectively independent. With the exception of the reign of Philaretos Brachamios , this epoch was marked by power-political fragmentation. The fifty years of European rule by the county of Edessa as a result of the First Crusade (1097–1144) had no significant effects on the culture and social structure of the main Armenian, Syrian, Greek and Arab populations. Subsequently, the Rum Seljuks , Artukids and Halebiners took control of the area, until the end of the 13th century the Egyptian Mamluk Empire ousted the remaining powers of influence. The few remaining Christian sites and territories such as the Armenian Patriarchate in Rum Kalesi or the Syrian Orthodox Patriarchate with its seat in Barsauma Monastery , both influential cultural and religious centers, came more and more into the Muslim sphere of influence and were ultimately destroyed. In the phase of Mamluk rule, the military incursions of the Turkmens and the Mongols under Timur were decisive events. At the beginning of the 16th century, the Kommagene finally came to the Ottoman Empire and, after its decline after the First World War, to Turkey .

Cultural monuments

The tombs on Mount Nemrut and the Hierothesia of Arsameia on Nymphaios and Karakuş are important cultural monuments . The burial mound Sesönk possibly represents another hierothesion. Among other things, the two tumuli of Sofraz and the bridge of Septimius Severus , which has the second largest arch built by the Romans at 34 m, have been preserved from Roman times .

Research history

The archaeological and historical exploration of the Kommagene began with the discovery of the burial complex ( Hierothesion ) of the Commagenic King Antiochus I on the Nemrut Dağı by the German engineer and Orient traveler Karl Sester in 1881. The discovery of this extraordinary structure meant that in the coming In two years the German classical archaeologists Carl Humann and Otto Puchstein undertook a more extensive research trip there, during which they examined the Nemrut Dağı in more detail as well as visited and documented the surrounding archaeological sites. The results of this trip were published in 1890 in the work "Travel in Asia Minor and Northern Syria".

Friedrich Karl Dörner in front of a Greek inscription in Arsameia on Nymphaios

Next, the German ancient historian and epigraphist Friedrich Karl Dörner made a contribution to researching the ancient commagene. In 1938 he went on a trip to the region together with the archaeologist Rudolf Naumann , where they published their observations and findings in the following year in the volume “Research in Commagene”. After the Second World War , Dörner intensified his research in the 1950s and carried out excavations over decades, during which he discovered, among other things, the city of Arsameia on Nymphaios , where another hierothesion with a large inscription by Antiochus I was found. He published his results as well as his other experiences on site in several popular science publications; his wife Eleonore Dörner also published the report "With the God-Kings in Kommagene" with vivid descriptions of life in the excavation camp. In 1968, Friedrich Dörner founded the Asia Minor research center at the University of Münster , which, among other things, has dedicated itself to researching the commagene. In parallel to his activities, the American archaeologist Theresa Goell - also with Dörner's participation - carried out further extensive investigations on Nemrut Dağı. This became the center of an emerging tourist boom that affected the remains of the ancient cultural landscape of Kommagene.

In the 1980s, as part of the Southeast Anatolia Project, it was decided to build various dams in southeastern Turkey, which threatened numerous archaeological sites from flooding. In view of this, the archaeological endeavors were intensified again. Thanks to various rescue excavations , many of the findings that are no longer accessible today could be examined and documented in good time. Even the not acutely threatened Nemrud Dağı was once again the subject of various research projects (see the chapter “Research History” in the article on Nemrud Dağı ). In 1987 it was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

The kings of Kommagene

Surname Reign
Ptolemy 163 - approx. 130
Samos II. Theosebes Dikaios approx. 130 - approx. 100
Mithradates I. Callinikos approx. 100-69
Antiochus I. Theos Dikaios Epiphanes Philorhomaios Philhellen 69 - approx. 36
Mithradates II. approx. 36-20
Mithradates III. 20-12
Antiochus III. 12 BC Chr. – 17 AD
Roman rule 17-38
Antiochus IV. Epiphanes 38-72
Roman province 74 - approx. 640

literature

Web links

Commons : Commagene  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ On the Neolithic and Chalcolithic in the Kommagene: Wolfgang Messerschmidt: Kommagene before Alexander. A brief cultural history of the country from the Chalcolithic to the Iron Age. In: Jörg Wagner (ed.): God kings on the Euphrates. New excavations and research in Kommagene. 2nd edition, Philipp von Zabern, Mainz 2012, ISBN 978-3-8053-4218-6 , pp. 23–31, here p. 23 f.
  2. ↑ On the history of the Kommagene in the Bronze Age: Wolfgang Messerschmidt: Kommagene before Alexander. A brief cultural history of the country from the Chalcolithic to the Iron Age. In: Jörg Wagner (ed.): God kings on the Euphrates. New excavations and research in Kommagene. 2nd edition, Philipp von Zabern, Mainz 2012, ISBN 978-3-8053-4218-6 , pp. 23–31, here p. 25.
  3. ^ John David Hawkins: Corpus of Hieroglyphic Luwian Inscriptions. Volume 1: Inscriptions of the Iron Age. Part 1: Text. Introduction, Karatepe, Karkemiš, Tell Ahmar, Maraș, Malatya, Commagene (= studies on Indo-European linguistics and cultural studies. Volume 8.1). Walter de Gruyter, Berlin / New York 2000, ISBN 3-11-010864-X , p. 330.
  4. ↑ On the cultural and social development of the Kummuh empire: Wolfgang Messerschmidt: Kommagene before Alexander. A brief cultural history of the country from the Chalcolithic to the Iron Age. In: Jörg Wagner (ed.): God kings on the Euphrates. New excavations and research in Kommagene. 2nd edition, Philipp von Zabern, Mainz 2012, ISBN 978-3-8053-4218-6 , pp. 23–31, here p. 26 f.
  5. ↑ On the early evidence for the cowardly kingdom: John David Hawkins: Corpus of Hieroglyphic Luwian Inscriptions. Volume 1: Inscriptions of the Iron Age. Part 1: Text. Introduction, Karatepe, Karkemiš, Tell Ahmar, Maraș, Malatya, Commagene. Walter de Gruyter, Berlin / New York 2000, ISBN 3-11-010864-X , p. 330 f.
  6. ^ Wolfgang Messerschmidt: Commagene before Alexander. A brief cultural history of the country from the Chalcolithic to the Iron Age. In: Jörg Wagner (ed.): God kings on the Euphrates. New excavations and research in Kommagene. 2nd edition, Philipp von Zabern, Mainz 2012, ISBN 978-3-8053-4218-6 , pp. 23–31, here p. 27.
  7. ↑ On the later history of the kingdom of Kummuh Wolfgang Messerschmidt: Kommagene before Alexander. A brief cultural history of the country from the Chalcolithic to the Iron Age. In: Jörg Wagner (ed.): God kings on the Euphrates. New excavations and research in Kommagene. 2nd edition, Philipp von Zabern, Mainz 2012, ISBN 978-3-8053-4218-6 , pp. 23–31, here pp. 27–29.
  8. ↑ On the mentioned archaeological findings Wolfgang Messerschmidt: Kommagene before Alexander. A brief cultural history of the country from the Chalcolithic to the Iron Age. In: Jörg Wagner (ed.): God kings on the Euphrates. New excavations and research in Kommagene. 2nd edition, Philipp von Zabern, Mainz 2012, ISBN 978-3-8053-4218-6 , pp. 23–31, here p. 30 f.
  9. ↑ Hansgerd Hellenkemper : Commagene in the Middle Ages. In: Jörg Wagner (ed.): God kings on the Euphrates. New excavations and research in Kommagene. 2nd edition, Philipp von Zabern, Mainz 2012, ISBN 978-3-8053-4218-6 , pp. 215–222, here pp. 215 f.
  10. ↑ Hansgerd Hellenkemper: Commagene in the Middle Ages. In: Jörg Wagner (ed.): God kings on the Euphrates. New excavations and research in Kommagene. 2nd edition, Philipp von Zabern, Mainz 2012, ISBN 978-3-8053-4218-6 , pp. 215–222, here p. 217.
  11. ↑ For the high and late medieval history see Hansgerd Hellenkemper: Commagene in the Middle Ages. In: Jörg Wagner (ed.): God kings on the Euphrates. New excavations and research in Kommagene. 2nd edition, Philipp von Zabern, Mainz 2012, ISBN 978-3-8053-4218-6 , pp. 215–222, here pp. 217–220.
  12. ^ Carl Humann, Otto Puchstein: Travel in Asia Minor and Northern Syria. Executed on behalf of the Royal Prussian Academy of Sciences. 2 volumes (text volume and atlas volume), Reimer, Berlin 1890 ( digitized version ).
  13. ↑ Friedrich Karl Dörner, Rudolf Naumann: Research in Commagene (= Istanbul research. Volume 10). Archaeological Institute of the German Empire, Istanbul branch, Berlin 1939.
  14. ^ Friedrich Karl Dörner: A rediscovered kingdom Codex-Verlag, Gundholzen / Böblingen 1967 (2nd edition 1971).
  15. ↑ Friedrich Karl Dörner: The throne of the gods on Nemrud Dağı. Kommagene: The Great Archaeological Adventure in Eastern Turkey. Lübbe, Bergisch Gladbach 1981 (2nd and 3rd edition 1987).
  16. ↑ Eleonore Dörner: With the god kings in Commagene. Experiences in a German excavation camp in eastern Turkey. Knoth, Melle 1983, ISBN 3-88368-063-X .
  17. ↑ Jörg Wagner: Foreword. In: The same (ed.): God kings on the Euphrates. New excavations and research in Kommagene. 2nd edition, Philipp von Zabern, Mainz 2012, ISBN 978-3-8053-4218-6 , pp. 7–11, here p. 7.

Coordinates: 37 ° 33 '  N , 38 ° 30'  E