Syro-Palestinian art and architecture

Syro-Palestinian art and architecture, the art and architecture of ancient Syria and Palestine.

The countries bordering the Mediterranean between the Sinai Peninsula and the Nur Dağları (Amanus Mountains), to which the names Palestine and Syria are often loosely applied, had in fact no geographic integrity or clear historical definition. The interior of Syria and its extension beyond the Euphrates have in the past always been separated ethnographically, and sometimes politically, from the coastal cities of the Levant, the associations of which were with Cilicia and the trade routes of Palestine. In early historical times both Syria and Palestine, however, were continuously dominated by one or other of the great imperial powers—Egyptian, Mesopotamian, or Hittite. This situation was in no way conducive to the coherent development of indigenous culture; consequently, the individual contribution of these countries to the total accomplishment of ancient Middle Eastern art is of secondary importance.

An exception to this generalization must be made where prehistory is concerned, however. An archaeological sounding at Jericho, which carried back the history of settled communities far beyond the earliest finds made in the Tigris valley, uncovered a small, symmetrically planned religious building (dating from approximately 7000 bce); this should perhaps be regarded as the earliest attempt at formal architecture. In a setting only a century or so later, a strange collection of human heads was found, their features competently modeled in plaster, sometimes over the bone of actual skulls.

Early in the 2nd millennium bce, the Levant and its coastal cities became a dependency of Egypt. Local rulers imported Egyptian works of art, which afforded some stimulation to regional craftsmanship. The tombs of the rulers—at Byblos, for instance—were furnished with objects of fine craftsmanship in gold, ivory, ebony, and obsidian. The objects that were made locally can easily be distinguished from those imported from Egypt by the comparative ineptitude of their ornament. Egyptian motifs were generally adopted as elements in decorative design, but they were copied without precision and without regard for their meaning; the results, therefore, were of very uneven quality. The aesthetic failings of partly or wholly derivative ornamental styles characterized Levantine art for many centuries to come.

More obvious signs of regional individuality are apparent in the development of Syrian architecture at this period. It is perhaps best seen in the smaller cities of the interior, which were less subject to Egyptian influence. Two palaces at Alalakh (modern Tell Aƈana, Turkey), in the plain of Antioch, built, respectively, in the 15th and 13th centuries bce, show some characteristically Syrian features. Wooden-pillared porticoes at the entry to reception suites mark the development of a standard palace unit, known as a bit hilani, generally adopted some centuries later by the Syro-Hittites (see art and architecture, Anatolian: Hittite period). Basalt orthostats, as yet unsculptured, anticipated those of the Neo-Assyrian palaces; and mural paintings, like those at Mari, decorated the chambers of an upper story in the Cretan manner. The earlier palace produced a single stone head that illustrates the contemporary Syrian sculpture style at its best. The remaining examples are crude.

During the early centuries of the 1st millennium bce, a strip of the Levant coast, from Ṭarṭūs (Syria) to somewhere south of Mount Carmel, became the homeland of a Canaanite people known as Phoenicians. As a result of archaeological excavations, something is known of their architecture as well as that of the contemporary Israelites in Palestine. Much information has been obtained about their walled cities and the development of their fortifications from the 18th century bce onward. It appears that by the time of King Solomon, in the 10th century bce, such military architecture had been standardized, for at three cities—Hazor, Megiddo, and Gezer—walls and gates alike are almost identical. Walls are of the casemate type (parallel walls with a space between) with internal chambers, and gateways are elaborate, with flanking towers and an approach through several transverse chambers. In the 9th century bce the invention of a more effective battering ram necessitated replacement of casemate walls by more solid structures.

The rather scanty remains of Canaanite temples have also been found at Hazor and elsewhere. They consisted of a courtyard, main hall, and sanctuary, all on a single axis, with occasional side chambers. The Hazor building showed a feature corresponding to the biblical description of the “brazen pillars” on either side of the central doorway of Solomon’s Temple, which had been built by Phoenician craftsmen in the 10th century bce.

Two forms of Phoenician and Syrian craftsmanship take a high place in the repertoire of ancient Middle Eastern art: the carving and decoration of ivory, and the repoussé ornament of ceremonial bowls and other bronze objects. Some of the finest examples in both categories are to be found among the vast assemblage of material imported or appropriated by the Late Assyrian kings and found in their palaces, particularly at Nimrūd. Ivory carving has a long history in Syria and Palestine, as is shown by the well-known ivories from Megiddo, some of which are dated as early as the 14th century bce. So much study has been devoted to their design, especially to its non-Egyptian content and the original contribution of regional craftsmanship, that some scholars think it possible to distinguish purely Syrian designs from those of the Phoenician workshops.