Gold, Frankincense and Trade
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By LEE LAWRENCE
Washington
After stirring excitement across Europe, "Roads of Arabia" has come to the U.S. to parade remarkable archaeological finds from the Arabian Peninsula. The version on view at the Smithsonian's Arthur M. Sackler Gallery might be trimmer than its predecessors, according to Sackler chief curator Massumeh Farhad, but it still boasts 300-plus noteworthy objects. Particularly exciting is the unexpected range of works and the fact that many were unearthed in the past decade, some by fortuitous accident, others the product of concerted archaeological research the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia has been undertaking with increasing determination since the 1970s.
Department of Archaeology Museum, King Saud University, Riyadh
A giant sandstone figure carved in the fourth to third centuryB.C.
The works come primarily from centers that arose along two sets of routes: the first used by traders and immigrants as early as the sixth millennium B.C.; the second by pilgrims who, after the seventh century, traveled to Mecca from every corner of the expanding Islamic world. Colossal statuary and delicate bronzes, intricate reliefs and fragments of murals, stylized anthropomorphic steles and beautifully inscribed tombstones along with a variety of vessels and jewelry all speak of a rich cosmopolitan past hidden under today's desert landscape.
Roads of Arabia: Archaeology and History Of the Kingdom Of Saudi Arabia
Arthur M. Sackler Gallery Through Feb. 24
Arthur M. Sackler Gallery Through Feb. 24
The show takes us on a grand tour of the artistic exchange, skilled workmanship and sheer luxury that flourished along trade routes. Vessels decorated with starburst patterns of fronds and interlacing snakes, for example, came to light in the northeastern coastal center of Tarut. Dating from the third millennium B.C., they were probably imported from southwest Iran, while the 4-foot-tall statue of a man displayed nearby was made locally and emulates work from neighboring Mesopotamia, from the hands clasped over his chest to the remarkable attention paid to his ears. A bit further inland, archaeologists discovered the first-century tomb of a young girl laid to rest with a gold funerary mask, glove and jewelry. Such a sumptuous burial points to a wealthy, stable society and leads some scholars to believe they may have found Gerrha, a city often mentioned in Hellenic sources but yet to be pinned on a map.
Then come troves from the northwest. On a stone cube that may have served as an altar, reliefs dating from the fifth to fourth centuries B.C. feature a winged creature and a bull whose horns frame a full moon. The first recalls Zoroastrian imagery; the second, an Egyptian motif. There is also a prominent crescent moon, a reminder that from about 553 to 539 B.C. the capital of the last Babylonian king was in the Arabian city of Tayma—a move made, he said, so he could better worship the moon god Sin. The priest depicted to the left of the bull might suggest another reason: He seems to be burning incense, and Arabia, as Greek historian Herodotus wrote in the fifth century B.C., "is the only country which yields frankincense and myrrh."
National Museum, Riyadh
The markings on the stone carving may support claims that Arabia was where man first domesticated the horse.
Made from the sap of trees grown in the southern part of the peninsula, incense was the source of much wealth. By camel caravan and ship, traders exported it to Egypt, Greece, Rome, Persia, India and China, where buyers used it to make oils for embalming, ointments and perfumes. They also burned copious amounts of incense to honor their deities and to mask the stench of their cities. One of the incense routes went through Tayma. Here, as elsewhere in Arabia and farther north in Jordan's better-known Nabataean center of Petra, the levies traders paid fueled the growth of a lavish society.
Nowhere is this more apparent than in the two galleries devoted to Al-Ula, where giant sandstone figures loom like superheroes. Carved in the fourth to third century B.C., they once stood about 9 feet tall, part of the architectural scheme of temples built by the Lihyanites, who ruled from about the sixth to the first century B.C. One particularly impressive statue boasts broad shoulders, slim hips and enviable abs. His pose is reminiscent of ancient Egyptian art, but his muscle tone screams Greco-Roman. The scale is not, however, always grand. A charming relief (6th- to 4th-century B.C.) shows a fearsome lioness midstride with a cub reaching up to suckle.
The Sackler's exhibition designer, Jeremiah Gallay, marks the transition from trade to the pilgrimage routes by moving us from well-lit galleries to a dark chamber where softly illuminated tombstones rise, ethereal. From a cemetery north of Mecca, they display an unexpectedly rich variety of scripts and decoration dating from the ninth through the 15th centuries. By laying them out in a square, Mr. Gallay also evokes the footprint of the Kaaba, the holy shrine in Mecca that Muslims circumambulate in yearly pilgrimages. In a recess off to the right, we see a 17th-century Kaaba door and copies of the Koran.
Bookending the show are smaller sections that relate to the show's subtitle: "Archaeology and History of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia." The most interesting finds are early stone carvings of animal heads unearthed two years ago; Ali Al-Ghabban, the show's principal curator, speculates they date as far back as 7000 B.C. Mr. Al-Ghabban's full title is vice president of antiquities and museums, Saudi Commission of Tourism and Antiquities, and he is particularly galvanized by the head of a horse where faint grooves might indicate a bridle. If contextual evidence supports his dating, then Arabia could claim it was where man first domesticated the horse. This is an honor scholars currently attribute to Central Asia—witness the Sackler's show on the ancient cultures of Kazakhstan just down the hall.
After all this, the thumbnail story of Saudi Arabia's formation and archaeological digs in the peninsula feels odd, almost like a plea to secure for this oil-rich kingdom a spot on the world cultural map. Unnecessary, really: The art already has done that.
Ms. Lawrence is a writer based in Brooklyn, N.Y.
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