145-155

The Sebasteion of Kalindoia : “Feasting and Banqueting"

• Σισμανίδης, Κώστας Λ.

In 2005 investigation of Room IV in the Sebasteion of Kalindoia was completed and excavation began of Room V, directly to the south. Room IV has interior dimensions of 7.30x12.60 m, while Room V is 6.50 m long and has been explored so far to a width of 3.50 m, which is expected to reach approximately 8 m.Attached to the front wall of these rooms too were found several more almost square bases for monuments, each approximately 30 cm high and with a surface of about one square metre. Three such bases were found in front of Room IV and as many again in front of the uncovered part of Room V.Room IV. To support the roof of this vast chamber there were two, presumably wooden, columns in the centre, the stone bases of which were found in situ. The entrance opening is discernible in the centre of the facade, while opposite it in the rear wall is the mouth of the limekiln which we presented last year, with many marble sculptures. Many more fragments of such sculptures were found this year, most of them from statues.Along three of the walls (apart from the front wall) and about 2.20 m away were uncovered the remains of a low, makeshift wall built of stones and older architectural members, which, with a Π-shaped ground plan, was properly finished only on the side facing the middle of the room, while the space between the rear face and the walls of the room was simply filled in with argillaceous earth. This structure was reinforced along the facade with an additional low wall, built of mud bricks plastered with white mortar. As in Room V, this structure was a thranos, a continuous couch for symposia. Supporting evidence for this is provided by the huge quantities of pottery fragments of various cooking and symposium utensils and the numerous bones of large and small animals and birds, seashells, and snailshells.One noteworthy find from this room is a round clay tile 10.5 cm across with a relief Nike crowning the naked, seated Hermes. Behind the figures is the clearly legible name ‘Pama- sou’.Room V. Excavations so far indicate that this room was successively used for two different purposes. From the late Iste. BC to the mid-Iste. AD, it served a similar purpose to Rooms I and III, i.e. it was used for the imperial cult. This is indicated mainly by the rear wall, where there was originally a long, stepped, marble pedestal, like the ones in Rooms I and III, for imperial statues. Of this pedestal, which was subsequently removed, just two marble cornerstones remain in situ in the rear right-hand corner of the room.To this original phase belongs the pebble floor, which covered the entire surface of the room, save for the strip along the back wall where the pedestal for the imperial statues had been located.On the basis of the inscription of Flavia Mysta, which was found last year, last year’s paper concluded that, c. the mid-1st c. AD, she and her children repaired Rooms I and II and built Rooms III and IV. It seems that they also converted Room V at this time, which (like Rooms I and II) dates to the end of the Iste. BC. When it was converted, Room V also changed its function, as its original use was transferred to the newly-built Room III. As we have seen, the pedestal along the back wall was removed at this time, and a thranos some 2 m wide and 0.50 m high, built of bricks and plastered with white mortar, was built along three of the inside walls (save for the front wall). All this is clearly indicated by the traces it left on the pebble floor and on the walls of the room.The function of these Π-shaped structures in Rooms IV and V is probably connected with the information in the Kalindoia Decree of the 1st c. AD that Apollonios, priest in the Sebasteion, ‘τας τε γαρ παρ' όλον τον ενιαυτόν εκ της πόλεως κατά μήνα γεινομένας θυσίας εκ του ίδιου παριστάς ... και τοις πολείταις την εστίασιν και ευωχίαν μεγαλομερη παρέσχετο και λαϊκως πανδημεί δειπνίζων και κατά τρίκλεινον’ (11. 15-20) and ‘ιδία καθ’ έκαστον των πολειτων την πασαν εορτήν ευώχησεν εν τοις τρικλείνοις’ (11. 30-31). According to the inscription, it would appear that monthly sacrifices were made in the Sebasteion, followed by rich symposia for the citizens, both en masse and in triclinia. So it is fairly obvious that Rooms IV and V were the triclinia mentioned in the inscription, the venues for the citizens’ ‘feasting’ (estiasis) and ‘banqueting’ (euochia).

• History and Archaeology

• Αρχαιολογία

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