Traditionally royal courts have been centres of art and culture, and monarchs who have understood the importance of the arts in creating the spectacle of a theatre state have benefited greatly from the patronage they bestowed on painters and sculptors, musicians, poets, playwrights, and theatrical impresarios. Louis XIV made Versailles the hub of European artistic expression and his rich patronage of the greatest artists of the day meant that they devotedly created for him a flattering artistic language (which we might call ‘propaganda’) by lauding the king as God’s anointed and thus an undisputed ruler (Burke 1994). The arts have always played a crucial role in the projection of monarchy and court culture expressed itself through the court arts, which were expressions of a monarchic ideology, and patronage of the arts was a means by which rulers demonstrated power, good taste, and munificence. As yet, however, there has been no systematic study of the patronage of the court arts by the Achaemenid monarchs (as noted by Kuhrt 2010). This is perhaps a result of the scarcity of source materials which speak in any meaningful way of the interaction between the Great King, his court, and the artists who served him, although occasional references emerge showing kings and nobles commissioning works of art, like an equine statue custom-made for Arsama, the satrap of Egypt (Driver 1956: no. 9), or a bespoke statuette of beaten-gold representing Artystone/Irtasduna, which was commissioned by her husband, Darius I (Herodotus 7.69). In Assyria we know that monarchs could be very active in promoting and commissioning royal art and a letter sent by a craftsman asks King Sargon to review some preparatory sketches for a new statue which had been ordered:
We have caused to bring an image of the king; in outline I have drawn [it]. An image of the king of another sort they have prepared. May the king see (them) and whatever is pleasing before the king, we shall make instead. May the king give attention to the hands, the elbows, and the dress. (Waterman 1930: vol. II, p. 233)
There is no reason to doubt that the Achaemenid kings did not have a similar hold on the manufacture of the royal image as they had over the ideological texts created for them and in the Persepolis archives we do occasionally hear of specialist craftsmen serving the monarch’s needs at the heart of Empire (PF 872-4, 1049) - one is even mentioned by name: ‘Addarnuris the Assyrian who [carves] cedar (?) (wood) (at) Persepolis’ (PF 1799). A distinct artistic repertoire of motifs (the Persian hero with animals or monsters, sphinxes, human-headed winged bulls) can be found in large-scale three-dimensional sculpture and wall reliefs from Iran and other areas of the central Empire, as well as in cylinder and stamp seals dispersed throughout (predominantly) Asia Minor. These are unified in style and manufacture; that style has been termed the ‘court style’ because the artefacts comprise a carefully constructed artistic programme that flourished at the royal artistic centres and was then disseminated across the realm (Boardman 1970: 305-9; Kaptan 2002: vol. I, pp. 107-32).
The world of the performing arts was also part of Achaemenid court culture and, given Persia’s long and noble history of producing fine poetry and song, it is no surprise that the tradition can be traced back to at least the Achaemenid period. In fact we know of a court tradition for stories told through music from passing references to singers at the court (E1) and songs about the heroic deeds of Cyrus the Great seem to have been especially popular (E2, E3). In the sources, royal concubines are expressly noted for their musical skills: ‘During dinner (the king’s) concubines sing and play the harp, one of them taking the lead as the others sing in chorus’ and we learn that, ‘at night they sing and play on harps continually while the lamps burn’ (Heraclides F1 and 2; also E1), which feasibly suggests a ‘complex and developed form of musical entertainment’ (Kuhrt 2010: 907). Perhaps their musical repertoire went beyond heroic tales about Cyrus, to include love songs and tragic romances like the doomed love affair of Stryangaeus and Zarinaea recorded by Ctesias (F7, F8a-c; Llewellyn-Jones and Robson 2010: 36-9) which was almost certainly based on an Iranian poetic tradition and the story of Zariadres and Odatis, preserved in precis by Chares of Mytilene (E4), who ascertains that it was ‘very well-known among the barbarians. . . and. . . [was] exceedingly popular’.
Where there was music, there must have been dance, and we learn that the court was not only entertained by professional dancers like Zenon of Crete, ‘who was, by far, Artaxerxes [Il’s] preferred performer’ (Ctesias F31 = Athenaeus 1.22c), but by the Great King himself, who, during the feast of Mithra, was encouraged to drink and then dance the so-called persica, a war dance, by ‘clashing shields together, crouching down on one knee and springing up again from earth. . . in measured time to the sound of the flute’ (Xenophon, Anabasis 6.1.10). Dance it seems was both a courtly art and an expression of manliness, ‘for the Persians learn to dance as they learn to ride and they consider dance movements related to riding and very suitable for getting exercise and increasing fitness’ (Athenaeus 10.434e), although combat sports proper were also enjoyed as a court entertainment. A royal command performance was given before Darius II by the famous Greek panc-ratist Poulydamas and an appreciative court of spectators thrilled to the foreigner’s feat of wrestling (and killing) three Immortals (E5; see Llewellyn-Jones 2012: 343-5, with fig. 17.4).
It is also worth noting, in the context of dance, the importance of codified movement and gestures - what can be called ‘correct deportment’ - generally practised by elites as part of the visual display of court culture. In most court societies this form of outward behaviour - correct bodily carriage and facial countenance, specific hand movements and feet positions - was an expression of the inner being and Elias was keen to study these aspects of the ‘presentational self’ in the European courts. He believed that court arts such as painting and sculpture recorded ‘actual gestures and movements that have grown strange to us, [but were once] embodiments of a different mental and emotional structure’ (Elias 1994: 49). Achaemenid art might indeed record similar attitudes of courtly carriage, such as the so-called ‘hand over wrist’ gesture, which can be seen employed by elite men (and even women) and which might denote respect or even prayer (Root 1979: 272-6), while in the audience scene (F3) the challi-arch’s gesture of raising his fingers to his lips could be interpreted as an act of reverence, greeting, or even subordination (and contrasts with Xenophon’s description that hands were hidden within long sleeves when in the presence of the monarch; Cyropaedia 8.3.12; Hellenica 2.1.8). At Persepolis courtiers are depicted performing a series of gestures (like hand-holding and delicate touching) which emphasise their intimate and sociable interactions.
Cup-bearers who served the Great King with his wine (see below) had to be adroit at the art of handing the silver receptacles to their users and the elegant skill of presentation was highly regarded, as becomes clear from Xenophon’s description of the act: ‘Now the cup-bearers of those [Persian] kings have an exquisite way of serving the wine: they pour it without spilling a drop and they present the cup with three fingers; they proffer the cup on the tips of their fingers and offer it in the most convenient position for the drinker to take hold of it’ (Cyropaedia 1.3.8). This is, to use Elias’ term, an expression of civilite, a cultured behaviour expected of a courtier, and there can be little doubt that other examples of this mode of behaviour were present in the sophisticated court culture of Persia. Moreover, the mores of the royal court spread out to the provinces as well because, as Xenophon would have it, Cyrus the Great ‘commanded all those who were being sent out as satraps to imitate him in everything they had seen. . . [and to] educate their children at court’ (Cyropaedia 8.6.10). Ideals of courtly deportment, etiquette, as well as ceremonials and the pleasures of court society thus systematically spread throughout the wider Empire.
World History
