Greek Tomb's Female Forms Hint Olympias May Lie Within

Best-Ever Portrait of Alexander the Great Found?

Oct 18, 2014 03:23 PM ET // by Rossella Lorenzi

 

Stunning Mosaic Floor Uncovered in Greece's Mystery Tomb

Greek Tomb's Female Forms Hint Olympias May Lie Within

Greek Tomb's Female Sculptures Fully Revealed

 

The imposing mosaic unearthed in the burial mound complex at Amphipolis in 
northern Greece might contain the best-ever portrait of Alexander the Great as a 
young man, according to a new interpretation of the stunning artwork, which 
depicts the abduction of Persephone.

DCI

It might also confirm previous speculation that the tomb belongs to Olympias, 
the mother of Alexander the Great.
The mosaic portrays the soul-escorting Hermes, Hades (or Pluto, in Latin) and 
Persephone. In reality, the mosaic most likely has human counterparts represented 
in the guise of the three mythological characters, said Andrew Chugg, author of 
"The Quest for the Tomb of Alexander the Great."
“I am thinking very much that Persephone should be an image of the occupant of 
the tomb being driven into the Underworld,” Chugg told Discovery News.

Follow the story of the tomb's discovery and  

excavation.

“That means an important queen of Macedon that died between 325-300 B.C.
 possibly at Amphipolis. So we are exactly where we always were: Olympias 
or Roxane,” Chugg said.
Chugg has considered Olympias (and Roxane, Alexander's Persian wife. in 
second place) as the person most likely buried in the magnificent tomb ever 
since archaeologists discovered colossal sphinxes and female statues known 
as Caryatids in the underground space.
According to the researcher, the female sculptures may specifically be Klodones, 
priestesses of Dionysus with whom Olympias consorted. The Greek historian 
Plutarch recorded they wore baskets on their heads filled with Olympias' pet 
snakes. The snakes would rear their heads out of the baskets, terrifying the male 
participants in Dionysiac rites and orgies.

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Chugg’s speculation was indirectly confirmed by Lena Mendoni, general 
secretary of the Greek Ministry of Culture. In a press conference, Mendoni 
said that the scene in the mosaic, recounting the the abduction of Persephone, 
is indeed “linked with the cults of the underworld, the Orphic cult-descent into 
Hades and the Dionysian rites.”
“The leader of the Macedons was always the archpriest of these cults,” Mendoni said.
Family Resemblance
Chugg, who is not involved in the excavation, noted that Persephone has reddish 
hair in the mosaic scene.
“Roxane came from Afghanistan in central Asia. There are, and I think always 
were, very few redheads there. Conversely Olympias was a Molossian, where 
redheads were reputedly common,” Chugg said.
Therefore, Olympias remains the strongest candidate in the tomb’s occupant guessing 
game, Chugg said.
“We do have for sure some indications that Alexander was reddish blond, so it would 
be expected that one of his parents at least had similar hair,” he said.

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Ancient Greek Site

More Connections
If Persephone should be seen as Olympias, shouldn’t Hades and Hermes 
have human counterparts?
Indeed, Hades looks quite similar to a range of contemporary portraits of 
Philip II. Crowned as a king, he averts the right side of his face: Philip’s 
right eye was disfigured by an arrow wound from the siege of Methone 
in 354 B.C., so the right side of his face could not be shown without spoiling 
the Hades-Philip duality.
“It is a magnificent irony to show him as carrying Olympias into the 
Underworld, since there were rumors she had been involved in organizing 
his assassination,” Chugg said.
As for Hermes, he was portrayed with particular movement, care and drama. 
Staring at us, he almost steals the show, Chugg noted. “If he is to have a human 
counterpart, he should be somebody close to Olympias who preceded her into 
the afterlife for he precedes her into the Underworld,” Chugg said.

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He noted that in the mosaic scene, Philip is depicted at about his age at death, 
which was forty-seven. He died in 336BC, twenty years before the death of 
Olympias in 316BC.
“All the human portraits in the mosaic therefore need to be consistent with the 
year 336BC in order for them to work as a group portrait of the members of the 
royal family,” Chugg said.
Therefore, Olympias would have been in her mid thirties in 336 B.C. Rendering 
her more youthful could be seen as a compliment to the deceased.
“Hermes looks like a young, clean shaven man of about 20 and there is something 
curiously familiar about him to me,” Chugg said.
The riddle has a simple solution, says the researcher.
“The male member of the royal family who was twenty when Philip died and who 
pre-deceased Olympias was their only son, Alexander the Great,” Chugg said.
He noted there is a family resemblance between Hermes and Persephone. “It is 
not difficult to believe that they are mother and son,” Chugg said.

 

By Andrew Chugg*
I wrote my initial article on this question on the morning of September 6th (a day before the announcement of the discovery of the caryatids) and I drew a number of inferences from the evidence then available:
1) Sphinxes decorated the thrones found in the tombs of two mid to late 4th century BC queens of Macedon, one of whom was Alexander’s grandmother Eurydice I.
2) Greek mythology recognized Hera the wife of Zeus as the mistress of the sphinx: the 4th century BC Macedonian kings identified themselves with Zeus, so it would make sense for their principal queens to have identified themselves with Hera.
3) The female sphinxes at Amphipolis have their closest parallel in a pair of female sphinxes found by Mariette at the Serapeum at Saqqara, which were dated to the reign of the first Ptolemy by Lauer & Picard, mainly on the basis of an associated inscription: the Serapeum at Saqqara is also a strong candidate for the site of the first tomb of Alexander the Great
4) There are strong parallels between the façades of the tombs of Philip II and Alexander IV at Aegae and the reconstructed façade of the lion monument that stood atop the mound at Amphipolis.
5) The paving in the tomb at Amphipolis closely matches paving in the 4th century BC palace at Aegae.
6) The 8-petal double rosettes in the Amphipolis tomb have an excellent match on the edge bands of the gold larnax of Philip II.
7) The evidence therefore favors an important queen being entombed at Amphipolis: Olympias, Alexander’s mother, and Roxane, Alexander’s wife may both have died at Amphipolis and are the only prominent queens that accord with the archaeologists’ firm dating of the Amphipolis tomb to the last quarter of the 4th century BC
In this extension of my first article I will describe how the newly discovered caryatids, shown in Figures 1 and 2, may be fitted into the scenario and I will explain why the symbolism of a lion particularly suits the case of Olympias. Finally, I will discuss a few objections to the candidacy of Olympias.
- See more at: http://greece.greekreporter.com/2014/09/24/is-the-mother-of-alexander-the-great-in-the-tomb-at-amphipolis-part-2/#sthash.EDeJ6qYm.dpuf