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S.A.YATSENKO TAMGAS OF IRANOLINGUAL ANTIQUE AND EARLY MIDDLE AGES PEOPLES Russian Academy of Science Moscow Press ”Eastern Literature” 2001 ISBN 5-02-018212-5 Chapter 8 |
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Selected Quotations |
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Foreword to the citation of S.A.YATSENKO work |
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The author addresses the Persian (”Iranian”)
tamgas, where the Persian state is defined as of the epoch of Arshakids and Sasanids in
their borders,
not just the modern territory of the Islamic Republic of Iran. In that respect,
the Persia is a territorial geographical phenomenon, as opposed to the cultural
and linguistic ethnos of the Indo-Iranian provenance. The Indo-Iranian component
in the Persian states were always a minority, sometimes a dominating minority,
but mostly an inferior minority among other, predominantly non Indo-Iranian
peoples. In the symbiotic relationship with all other peoples, the Indo-Iranians
absorbed elements of culture, language, and traditions from all their neighbors.
As an attentive review of the ”Persian Section” would show, the ”Persian” tamga
is a borrowing, in most cases the tamga
phenomenon is plainly associated with non Indo-Iranian peoples of the Persia, in
a minority of cases the tamga phenomenon is associated with peoples that are
not unequivocally classed as Indo-Iranians, and only in a limited number of
instances the use of tamgas can be attributed to Indo-Iranians proper. Not only
the Indo-Iranians were a minority among the Semitic, Dravidian, Türkic,
Caucasus, and other peoples, but the territory inhabited by the Indo-Iranians
was, and remains today, in spite of the pervasive forced ”Persinization”, a
lesser part of the Persian lands. Any impression to the opposite, received from
the contents of the Section 8, must be credited to the literary and doctrinal
talents of the author. If you see that the text and illustrations conflict at times, please do not despair, it could be a typo in the S.A.Yacenko publication, or a misunderstanding on the Translator's part. The tamgas are there, but the illustrations or callouts may be incorrect. A closer look at the maps from which the numbers for the images are cited would help to verify the connections and unconfuse the story. The analysis brings multiple connections between ”Persian” tamgas and the tamgas of the Middle Asia. For hydrological and demographical situation in the Aral area see Tsvetsinskaya Amudarya Sarykamysh People. For demographical and ethnic situation in the Aral area see L.T.Yablonsky Ancient Chorasmia. For the Tochar anabasis, see C.Benjamin "Migration of Yueji through Sogdia". If you see that the text refers to ”Iranians”, or to their word an ”Iranian word”, do not despair. If this study had ”Türkic-lingual” in its title, it would probably never see the light of the day, and we would have never learnt that the Ahaemenids, Arshakids, Sasanids, Kangars, Sogdys, Horasmians/Horezmians, Sarmats and Alans had common clans and common clan tamgas, that the royal families of the Persians, Middle Asians, and Sarmatians belonged to the same clans, that the dynasties of the Bospor, Olbia, Bactria were intimately connected all the way up to the Chach by their royal bloodlines, and none of the enigmatic details of these fascinating popular and royal carousels. While the term ”Iranian” pervades the pages of the work as a scent of a dead cat in a high-rise, all the justifications for it are typically contained in these type publications in a footnote 10 on page 13, or even may be hidden deeper in a comment to a footnote 13 on page 10. The radioactive potassium in the modern blood testing allows observing the bloodstreams and locate diversions, splits and clogs, and the tamgas allow us to see the origins, developments, relocations, activities and final resting places of the people who left for us these remarkable timestamps of their lives. The tracing inherently has an exceeding resolution for insights with increasing magnification, from a tribe level down to the clans, sub-clans, and in places literally down to individual extended families and historical personalities. One day we will find a mummified horse hide marked by a specific tamga with a little tail on it, and we will be able to visualize the extent of the possessions of that clan, extent of its travels, its necropolises, and its herds. As with the signage traditions of our days, the deviations from traditional orientation of the tamga are irrelevant, like is irrelevant the orientation of a 5-point star on the US emblems, or a 6-point star of the Mogen Dovid, their significance is relayed exclusively by their form and not by the conditions of the object where they are placed. On the other hand, the relative orientation of modifier marks is significant, allowing, for example, to segregate the animals of a ”right hand” family from the ”left hand” family and other kins of the clan, and therefore the mirror images carry discerning connotations. At the same time, an ”assignment” of the tamga would be quite an aberration, like renaming ”McDougall” clan into ”Stuarts”, because every member of the society has his parents, and is destined to carry their tamga to his progeny. This aspect is especially pronounced in the societies where upbringing of the youngsters is traditionally a treasured right of their grandparents. The English rendition of the extensive citation of the work is much simplified, with many details omitted and much reduced references, but with an eye to preserving the logic, facts, and evidence. The citation brings forward the author's comparisons, to allow for easy visual collation of the evidence. A reader should be aware that absolutely none of the dating was performed even with rudimentary scientific instrumentation, and with the exception of the dated coinage, all other dates are within the accuracy of educated opinions, which at times significantly differ, and time to time abruptly change. Any posting's comments notwithstanding, this work is a first major overview of the accumulated research, and we all should be limitlessly grateful for the titanic work performed by the author in researching, assembling and mapping the data, and for many of his insights that lay the ground for the future researchers. The author also notably deviates from the cleansed lexicon that came to use in the Russian academical works of the Soviet period by using Türkic terminology, integral to the Russian language, for the authentic Türkic phenomena, including the very term ”tamga”. |
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Chapter 8 TAMGAS OF PERSIA |
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Tamgas of Persia are studied very unilaterally. (Here Persia is the Persian state in the
epoch of Arshakids and Sasanids in their borders, not the modern territory of the Islamic Republic of Iran). The attention of
the researchers, as a rule, concentrated on the Sasanid ”monograms”
of the aristocracy (see above). The tamga collections on
stones and bricks of the structures in the Ahaemenid centers were also published: Persepolis, Pasargadae, Behistun, Susa and Sardy, and also
were published the tamgas on
the Ahaemenid seals, which first of all were studied by John Boardman (Herzfeld). They have
many common features with the later Sarmatian and with the synchronous Middle Asian
types (fig. 32, à).
A whole series of ”nishan” tamgas is known on the Ahaemenid coins. On silver sikles (sickles? =coins - Translator's Note) sometimes are visible additional markings, made in various satrapies. Those are simple tamgas (swastika in a clockwise direction; cross with rounded ends; arch; ”letter E”, etc.). In one of the versions, they were made by official representatives of the satraps (Commonality with the Middle Asian types clearly points to Ahaemenids preserving the existing local hierarchy in the subjugated territories. In the absence of alternate sources, tamgas are a unique tool that allows such detailed insight). Of a special interest is the Parthian tamga ”encyclopedia” on a relief with shooting archer infantry on a fragment of a cliff in the mountains near the settlement Kir (southeast from Firuzabad in Southern Iran) (fig. 33, å). Here are perfunctorily depicted not less than 31 types of tamgas (probably of the Sassanian time), a part of which is was found several times (No 2-4, 10, 12, 15). They are arranged in certain order, along the edges of a frame of the old relief and in a vertical line in the center. Probably, even later there in empty space (and partially within large tamgas) were drawn a hunter with two spears, one more pedestrian phallic character and at least than five animals. More than 1/3 of the Kir type tamgas have exact match in the tamgas of other ancient ”Iranian” (quotation marks are mine - Translator's Note) ethnoses (No 1, 4, 6-8, 10-15, 26, 31). Probably, the tamgas were etched during the following Sasanid dynasty (during the Arshakids' times, the official cult image would unlikely be despoiled with perfunctorily executed carvings) (Less unlikely then the graffiti on modern memorials and national monuments, including freeways and high-rises, since we are way more enlightened and more regimented).
The royal tamgas of Arshakids (fig. 33, b/1-6) and Sasanids (fig. 33, ñ/7-13) on the coins and formal stone reliefs deserve a close attention. During both dynasties they had a simple enough form. It is indicative that the majority of Arshakids, as well as the first two Sasanids, had frequently a (blank) circle in the center of the tamga. Sometimes on different objects belonging to the same Shakhanshah (headdress, horse covercloth, coins), we see different tamgas (two at Artaban IV; fig. 33, b/6, and similar fig. 18/6; three at Artashir I: fig. 33, c/a-c.) (One would think that these objects can be inherited and belong to the previous rulers, especially if they signify heredity, real or coveted)
In some cases tamgas can tell us about relationship or political
connections with the nobility of the other countries (how
can a scholar confuse political dominance with linguistic affiliation? Especially coming
from an empire where à majority, being politically ”Russian”, if at all, spîke Russian language
as a foreign language?). The tamgas of Vologez III (111-146) (fig.
33/5 The tamga of the Parthian ruler Vologez IV (No 6: Sellwood, 1971,
279, pl. 84/131) was well-known only in the Horesm (fig. 27/71
The tamga on the coins of the last
Parthian king Artaban IV (Sellwood, 1971, 301, pl. 91, iii) is identical to the tamgas on
the coins
Indo-Saka
king Gondofar (ca. 20-55 AD). A rarest type tamga of the one of
courtiers of the first Sasanid ruler of Persia, Artashir I (225-240) (fig.
33/8 And another rare type of tamgas
of one of the
last Sasanids, Husrau II (fig. 33/12
To speak about
”simple coincidence” in all above situations
is hardly possible. In case of the existence of earlier prototypes in the
territories neighboring Persia and populated with related peoples, some
connections may be considered (marriages between
nobility, benevolence?) . In the case of the likeness of this or that late-Parthian
royal
tamga with the synchronous tamgas on neighboring countries,
Horesm and Bactria (the last obviously belonging to ordinary clans because they are
marked
on bricks, produced by the local residents in the construction of the fortresses
in their labor obligations: see section 1.8, and on the kitchen ceramics of ordinary
inhabitants) (”obvious” may be too rush a judgment; in marriage
the spouse had her own hereditary tamga, passed only directly within her clan;
benevolence such as adoption may include a bestowal of a tamga, but that would be an
extraordinary isolated event; a use of the master's tamga on bricks and kitchen ceramics may have
been simply required for logistical purposes), the concurrence of the tamga types allows assumption of a common ancient
heritage. The noted tamga of a clan of one of
the courtiers of the first Sasanids (with the type that could develop still in
the Parthian
time) can truly reflect the kinship with the Sarmatian nobility (taking into
account that the Aorsian or Alanian clan brought it to Sarmatia in the mid of
the 1st century AD from their initial
territories in the Northern Caucasus). An original feature of the Parthian time is the manner to display the large
royal nishan tamga on the right side of the two types of the headdress, a conical
and hemispherical form. In one case on a conical cap a tamgas is
shown in a row of seven schematical images of a world tree (seal of ”anbarkat” Vakhuden-Shapur). Such
a ”tiara”, bestowed by shahanshah, gave a ”right to
participate at the royal table, a voice at the meetings with the king, and opinion in
the councils” (Amm. Marc. Res gestae. XVIII. 5-6). Are known priestly
headdress where a large clan tamga
is placed in a usual place on the right side, and a small simple tamga (probably, an
additional tamga of a separate family) is placed on the forehead (fig. 14/à
A second person following shahinshah
has both on his headdress, and on the horsecloth an original tamga (fig. 14/î
Starting with the Parthian Orod I (80-77 BC), such tamgas sometimes were depicted on a headdress of the ruler. For the Sasanids, this Parthian tradition is already known from Artashir I; the later tamgas is depicted for another shahanshah on a dish from the Red Glade with scene of bear hunt).. A detailed analysis of the aristocratic ”monograms” (Shahanshah's tamgas were much simpler in design!) was repeatedly provided in the literature (last report see: Gyselen, 1995, fig. 1-7). However, to take these tamgas, after the prevailing today in the science version of E.Hertsfeld (see Introduction), the monograms proper from the letters of the name of the carrier, in my opinion, is baseless. The fact is that they almost never contain letters of the Pehlevi alphabet, and are easily ”disassembled” into two-three component elements, which almost in all cases are identical with the common tamgas of the other ”Iranian” (quotation marks are mine - Translator's Note) peoples of that time (fig. 33, à). Fig. 33. Tamgas of Parthian (b) and Sassanian (a, c-e, d, 31-35) Persia and Hellenistic Margiana (d, 1-30)
In the case of the two components, it is possible to presume
a formation of the new type by joining the tamgas of two aristocratic
(parental?) clans (see Section 1.3 and 1.5). The three-component tamgas are
found much less frequently. It is possible to presume
that they may have arisen from
the ”double” tamgas by the next division of a noble clan. In any case it is
necessary to possess uncontrollable imagination to see, after many celebrated Iranists, in such tamgas
any realistic images of the tips of the Zoroastrian temples or
banners, or a symbology for complex titles, etc. (see Introduction). On the bricks of the fortresses in the northeastern fringes of the state (in the Southern Turkmenia) are known tamgas of the builders. In all cases the tamgas obviously belong to the clans of the local residents forced to the construction (see Section 1). The earliest tamgas are associated with the ancient inhabitants of the Margiana in the 3rd century BC, i.e. with the period of Seleukids rule. They are in the Merv fortresses: Gyaur-kala and Erk-kala (fig. 33, d/1-30). To the later time belong the small fortresses in Akdepe (fig. 33/31,35), near the settlement Keshi (fig. 33, d/32-34). At the same time, naturally, each collection is very specific. If, on the construction of both fortresses in the populous area of Merv was used the labor of a large number of different clans (the exploration work documented approximately 15 tamgas in each; while only two common types were found, and four different letters were used to serve as tamgas), for the small fortifications in the Keshi and Akdepe were documented only three types in each. Very few publications were made for the tamgas on ceramics; they cover the territory of Mesopotamia during the Parthian time.. |
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