CHAPTER III

EXPLORATION AND EXCAVATION

I. THE RELATION OF ARCHAEOLOGY TO HISTORY

IN every department of human life the past century has witnessed the gradual growth of free enquiry. Documents formerly regarded as infallible have in recent years been made the subject of the severest criticism. Neither the sanction of long habitual acceptance, as in the case of the classical historians, nor the endorsement of the divine verbal inspiration attributed to the Hebrew Scriptures, has exempted the writings named from this treatment. The statements which they contain have been put to every conceivable test. Along with the textual and literary criticism of the documents themselves there have advanced pari passu the exploration of the obscurer literatures of North European and of Oriental nations, the observation and tabulation of the rites, customs, and beliefs of peoples in primitive stages of civilization, and the excavation of ancient cities and settlements. A wealth of illustrative material has thus been collected, which has undoubtedly illuminated many formerly dark passages in the historical records,

It is not to be supposed, however, that archaeological or ethnological research can supersede the labor of the historical critic, or that the results of such work can be called in, definitely to corroborate or to refute his conclusions. Doubtless the archaeologist may discover an inscription which, referring to some historical event, may supplement, or correct, the account of the same event in the pages of some ancient historian. But even such an inscription must itself be submitted to criticism. Oriental monarchs were not above exaggerating their mighty deeds beyond all reason, and allowance must be made for this weakness. Archaeological research consists principally in the discovery and the classification of the common things of daily life—houses, personal ornaments, domestic utensils, tools, weapons, and. the like. These are occasionally of value even to the historical critic; for example, they may help to expose anachronisms. If, to suggest a possible concrete case, a narrative should describe a community as using tools or weapons of iron, at a time when, as contemporary deposits indicate, it had not yet emerged from the earlier Bronze stage of culture, then the critic must re-examine his texts. Either the document is wrong in this particular, or, perchance, the word which he has rendered “iron” may be found to have some other signification. The reader will understand that this illustration is merely put forward as an example of the kind of assistance which the archaeologist may render to the historian. Archaeological evidence of this nature must, however, be cross-examined, like every other evidence. In a case such as we have supposed, the archaeologist must satisfy the historian that the deposits upon which he bases his deductions are fairly representative of the state of culture of the whole community, and not merely relics of some insignificant and thickward group of people living within its borders, but having no direct connection with the course of history.

In archaeological study we cannot always deduce causes from the observed effects with mathematical certainty: the evidence is often ambiguous, and frequently there are no indications to enable us to choose among several possible solutions of a problem. We may, for example, find a layer of ashes in a stratified city-site. The historian may tell us of a conquest or of a raid about the time of this deposit; but it is at least an even chance that the fire which produced the ashes was a mere accidental conflagration, of which no documentary record has been preserved. Indeed, it is in most cases desirable for the archaeologist to form his conclusions as to chronology and allied problems independently of the historian and for the two fellow-laborers to settle any differences by gradual approximation.

To excavate merely with the purpose of confirming written history is to court inevitable disappointment and, what is worse, to do most serious injury to the sites examined. Out of ten thousand recorded events, not more than one or two can possibly leave any permanent record upon the aspect of the sites which witnessed them. Even the scars of war quickly heal on the face of the earth. Abraham, Joshua, Samuel, David, Isaiah, Paul march in a majestic procession through Palestine, but we ransack the land in vain for their faintest footprint: they live in the written word alone. An explorer who should be so foolish as to go in pursuit of their relics would neglect, and very probably destroy, the countless valuable remains which he would actually meet. The true function of archaeological research is to discover the conditions amid which lived such heroes of old as we have mentioned; to show them, no longer as solitary, more or less idealized or superhuman, figures, but as men of like passions to ourselves moving with other men, in a busy world engrossed in its secular interests, and making daily use of the common things of life.

To excavate with the sole purpose of adding to the stock: of written history, by the discovery or tablets, papyri, or inscriptions, is an equally fatal error. It would not be too severe to describe many excavations that have been made as mere tablet-piracies. So engrossed has the excavator been in finding libraries of tablets —the importance of which no one would dream of minimizing— that he has neglected the pots and the pans, which are essential if he is to fill in the picture of the ancient life of the region.

To Professor W, M. Flinders Petrie belongs the credit for calling attention to the importance of “unconsidered trifles” and he has shown it at many times during his long career as an excavator. To mention one striking instance, by his preliminary reconnaissance at Tell el-Hesy, the site of Lachish, in Southern Palestine, he determined for all time the principles of the dating of Palestinian pottery. He proved, by comparing stratum with stratum in the mound that covered the remains of this often-rebuilt city, that every age had its own style of pot shapes or ornament, and of clay baking. At different times different foreign influences were brought to bear upon the craftsman. So completely can the evolution be systematized, that, thanks to Prof. Petrie, whose scheme has not been modified by his successors except in occasional details, it is possible to date a Palestinian mound as unambiguously as if it had been full of inscriptions. Even from horseback an observant traveler can often assign approximate limits of date to an ancient site in the country.

Among other advantages, the pottery-test affords a valuable check by which the modern identification of ancient sites can be tested and controlled. Many such identifications made in the early days of research, chiefly on the unstable foundation of similarity of name, must now be abandoned, as the potsherds show that the date of the site, and the date assigned in the literary documents, do not correspond. Seeing that the comprehension of certain historical events (as, for example, military movements) often depends upon an exact understanding of topography, the unimportant sherds which the archaeologist collects may thus not infrequently become of at least an indirect value to the historian.

The antiquities of the Near East have attracted the attention and interest of travelers from the days of Herodotus. But for the purposes of this chapter it is hardly necessary to go back further than the beginning of the nineteenth century. Before that time these monuments were a matter rather for intelligent curiosity than for serious scientific study. We recall how the Spectator, in his first number, describes himself as “making a Voyage to Grand Cairo, on purpose to take the Measure of a Pyramid” and adding, “as soon as I had set myself right in that Particular, I returned to my Native Country with great Satisfaction”. In short, having acquired a disconnected scrap of information, in itself of only moderate interest, he made no further use of it. He was typical of his time.

It was, indeed, impossible for any progress to be made in research so long as the inscriptions remained undecipherable. The outward appearance of Egyptian hieroglyphs was probably familiar to some Europeans at all times. The more remote cuneiform of Mesopotamia and Asia Minor was naturally for long quite unknown; but from the time of the publication of Pietro della Valle’s delightful letters describing his extensive Oriental travels, there was at least a scrap of knowledge available with regard to the aspect of that mysterious script, for the writer named has reproduced five characters which he saw at Persepolis; and has stated reasons for his supposition, which proved correct, that they should be read from left to right. The letter in which he gives these Old Persian characters is dated 21 October 1621. But the only sources of knowledge on which would-be decipherers could draw, down to the beginning of the nineteenth century, were the writers of Greece; and, as has been subsequently proved, even in the meager information which they vouchsafe on these obscure points, they were blind leaders of the blind.

In this chapter it is proposed to give a brief survey of the history of the archaeological researches of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, which have so greatly enlarged our knowledge of Egypt, Babylonia and Assyria, and neighboring lands; have revealed the empire of the Hittites; and have discovered the unsuspected civilization that flourished in the lands of the Aegean in the third and second millennia BC. In setting forth the material, we shall follow the order in which a pioneer expedition to any country would naturally conduct its researches. First would come a survey of the country, with an enumeration of the remains above ground; secondly, the collection and decipherment of its inscriptions; and thirdly, the excavation of its cities and burial places.

II. EGYPT