jars, hole‐mouth jars, jars with basket handles, amphorae, bottles, and lamps allow us to trace settlement during this period in the Levant. This pottery is poorly decorated. The only characteristic feature is the wedge‐shaped and reed impressed decoration. Some vases have the shape of Bes.
A much more precise indicator is the imported Greek ceramic, which was found in all larger sites, but on the coastal sites more than inland, as pottery had to be transported from the harbors to the inland sites. Although east Greek and Corinthian pottery was still being imported, from the sixth century BCE on, Greek pottery is mainly Attic (Nunn 2014).
The bulk of Attic pottery consists of plain black glaze ceramic. The oldest Attic sherds in Israel/Palestine go back to 540–530 BCE and belong to the black glaze ceramic and the black figure ceramic types. The export of red figure ceramic began as early as c. 520 BCE, immediately after its invention. The repertoire of shapes is mainly limited to drinking vessels (skyphoi, cups, or cup‐skyphoi, bowls, and bolsals), storage vessels (bell crater, calyx crater, and column crater) and vessels for transport of wine, oil, or perfume (lekythoi, amphoriskoi, juglets). Plates and lamps were also relatively numerous. A few Panathenaic prize amphorae have been found. Many other shapes common among Attic ceramics do not occur at all.
The largest number of examples of black figure ceramic comes from the Haimon Painter workshop and his followers, and from the Beldam Painter, who are all of moderate quality. Among the best represented red figure painters is the Pithos Painter. But, along with the average quality, high‐quality vessels also found their way to the east. Finally, it should be noted that simple shapes of the black glaze ceramic were locally imitated.
When the Greek ceramic of al‐Mina was discovered, L. Woolley, its excavator, and many other scholars were enthusiastic about the “irrefutable” proof of Greek presence on the Levantine coast. However, it turned out that the relevant store room was not filled with Greek jugs, but with Levantine imitations of Greek jugs. Since then, the focus of mainstream research concerning the presence of Greeks in the Levant has changed. The material and textual evidence for the constant settlement of a significant Greek community is scant. The limited repertoire of shapes and motifs and the fact that the vessels were partly found in store rooms, indicate that the Greek tableware had been deposited to be subsequently distributed and sold. Almost all graffiti found on the Greek ceramic is Phoenician. The Greek influence left a heavy imprint on terracottas, seals, and statues during the Achaemenid time. But this was a phenomenon of fashion which of course presupposes contacts with Greeks, but no large permanent settlement whose design was adapted for certain objects. The cliché, that the Levantine did not like pictures, has been deconstructed. Even if seen from the Attic point of view the quality of the Greek vessels is average, from the local point of view, the Attic ceramic was incomparably more beautiful than the pictureless local variety.
Inner Levantine trade existed. The amphorae used to transport wine or oil in Israel/Palestine were generally not from Attica, but from Phoenicia or eastern Greece.
It is possible to distinguish two main regions for the local terracotta types (Nunn 2000a). They were generally solid, but a few are hollow and molded, sometimes with a stamped face.
The northern region reaches from north Syria to Amrit and includes the inland area. There, the main terracotta types are clay plaques with a woman en face and riders. The women are nude or dressed. They are very often presenting their breasts, or, when dressed, holding their arms alongside their body or carrying a flower on their breasts. Some have a crown or a polos on the head (Figure 18.2). These clay figurines are the subject of a general study (M.G. Micale). Preliminary results hint at the fact that these women with seemingly “Greek” features are more ancient than the nude ones and that they quickly spread under the Achaemenids.
Figure 18.2 Private collection: Terracotta of a woman, H. 15, 1 cm (Nunn 2000a, pl. 11, 15).
Figures of a male rider were so common that they are plainly called “Persian rider.” But the Syrian types are worthy of special mention as some variations are mostly confined to this region: there are male riders bearing a child, but there are also female riders, some with small added faces, and riding figures sitting under a very dominantly‐depicted canopy.
The second large region is situated south of the one aforementioned. Whereas Syria was not very permeable to foreign influences, the Phoenician clay figurines, which are two‐ and three‐dimensional, show an amazing thematic and stylistic diversity. One can observe the fine graduation between local Near Eastern, Egyptian, and Greek elements engrafted on local types. Nude women presenting their breasts, dressed pregnant or breastfeeding women, seated and standing men with different caps, horsemen, or masks were found all over this region, apart from Samaria and Judea. More Greek coined clay figurines show nude youths, men with caps or helmets, and dressed women. It seems that clay figurines were mainly locally produced, very few could have been imported from eastern Greece.
The clay figurines were mainly found in sanctuaries (Lakhish) and their refuse pits called favissa or bothros (Amrit, Kharaib, Dor, Makhmish/Tel Michal, Tell es‐Safi, Tel Zippor, Tel Erani) and rarely in tombs (Akhziv, Atlit).
A few figures are clearly representations of gods, but it is still impossible to identify the majority of them. Whether they represent gods and goddesses or cultic staff, their primary function was to protect, the living and the deceased alike.
Seals can be found as original or stamped on clay. However, in the case of the Levant a high percentage of the originals come from the market (Nunn 2000a; Stern 2001). Seals have been found all over this region, but more densely on the coast. The neo‐Assyrian and Late Babylonian tendency to use stamp seals continues into the Achaemenid period. Only few cylinder seals remained in use in inland Syria and Jordan. Two thirds of the stamp seals consist of scarabs and scaraboids, the others are mainly domes and conoids. The seals can be divided into groups, which are clearly defined according to their style and motifs: Isis, Nephtys, and Horus, other gods, Bes, Herakles, griffins, sphinx, lions are – although stylistically different – typical of the Phoenician and Egyptian groups. The main local Achaemenid motif is the “master of the animals,” who is represented on scarabs, on the bullae of Wadi Daliyeh, and on the large group of the Levantine glass conoids. Graeco‐Persian elements remind us of Greek iconography. Seals of the Phoenician group were mostly found on the coast, those of the Egyptian group mostly inland. The Achaemenid and Levantine groups, which are characterized by a poor and repetitive set of motifs, are widespread. Most of the seals are locally made, but some were imported from eastern Greece. The jaspis seals of the Phoenician group find their equivalent in the so‐called Tharros group from Sardinia. How exactly the exchange occurred between both shores of the Mediterranean Sea is not clear.
In contrast to the figurative seals, which were for private use, the administration of Juda, Samaria, and Ammon used, as in the Iron Age, seals which only bear an inscription.
Even though around half of the anthropoid sarcophagi were discovered in the necropoles around Sidon, they were fashionable and affordable to the elite of the entire coast between Arwad and Gaza (Frede 2000; Lembke 2001). The Sidonian kings Tabnit and Eshmunazar II fetched two anthropoid sarcophagi from Egypt about 525 BCE. Sidonian production started later – around 480 BCE. These oldest sarcophagi show Egyptian elements, but are stylistically already Greek influenced. However, five clay anthropoid sarcophagi were found in 1996 in a necropole near Amrit. If their dating between 510 and 450 BCE turns out to be correct, the very first imitated sarcophagi may have been made in a Cypriot‐influenced style. The four famous elaborated sarcophagi from the Sidonian necropolis, now exhibited in the Archaeological Museum of Istanbul, were made between 425 and 330–310 BCE.
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