In the last fifteen years or so, there has been a flourishing interest in the history, evolution, and role of the sanctuary of Dodona in the ancient Greek world, with the publication of monographs and articles focusing on various aspects of the site, although few monographs on one of the oldest and most venerable oracular shrines in the Greek world had appeared before then. In fact, only three come to mind: by Carapanos, Parke (which deals with three oracular sanctuaries of Zeus—Dodona, Olympia, and Aphytis, devoting most of the book to Dodona), and Dakaris.[1] More recent publications have focused on various aspects of the sanctuary and are of special interest, not least the book by Meyer, in which an attempt is made to deconstruct the established chronology of Molossia and Epirus in general, an argument which, if valid, leads to a wholescale revision of the established chronology of the architectural development of the sanctuary.[2] Other publications attempt to question the identification of individual buildings set out long ago by Evangelidis and Dakaris.[3] The publication in 2013 of a corpus of 4,216 oracular tablets was a pivotal turning point, since it made available plentiful testimonia on a variety of topics related to religious practice, the political history of Epirus, as well as on the history of dialects and social structures.[4]
An important addition to this body of research is Diego Chapinal-Heras’s monograph, which is an English translation of his doctoral dissertation written in Spanish at the Universidad Complutense de Madrid. As the title suggests, the author deals with the evolution of the sanctuary of Dodona, from Archaic to Hellenistic times, more precisely to 167 B.C., when Epirus was occupied by the Romans.
The book contains eight chapters, with a bibliography, two indices (a general index and a bibliography of archaeological reports of Dodona arranged chronologically), twelve black-and-white illustrations (plans of monuments at the site, mostly taken from Dakaris’ publications, with some modifications by the author) and six color maps largely based on earlier published ones, also with modifications.
From the beginning, the author sets an exceptionally ambitious goal, aiming at a holistic treatment of the sanctuary, which considers not only the site itself, but also its relationship to the environment of the wider area, formed through routes and communications (Chapter 1). The latter are not perceived as elements determined by the natural environment, but rather as practices influencing the environment by creating a network that includes cultural, political, religious, economic, and social processes. These interactions are not static but mutate over time.
The second and third chapters deal with the evolution of the sanctuary in tandem with political developments in Epirus. These two chapters are arranged chronologically: Chapter 2 covers the Archaic and Classical periods, Chapter 3 the later Classical period to the conquest of Epirus by the Romans. The transition between these chapters is the emergence of the “Epirote Alliance” or “Symmachia” (c. 330/328-232 B.C.), a political formation that greatly affected the evolution of Dodona. As a consequence, the site was gradually transformed from an open-air sanctuary into a religious center with a structured environment. These chapters describe the causes and consequences of this complex process in the evolution of the sanctuary, while also attempting to interpret the various functions that have been ascribed to certain buildings.
The fourth chapter is dedicated to the religious underpinnings of the sanctuary. Here, Chapinal-Heras discusses the various cults at Dodona that have been proposed in the past, as well as theories about how the sanctuary and rituals functioned. He also investigates the relationships, religious and otherwise, that connected the sanctuary of Dodona with Boeotia, Athens, and Olympia.
Entitled “Entangled Epirus,” Chapter 5 deals with the province of Epirus and the routes that connected the sanctuary with the urban centers and smaller settlements of Epirus, and Molossia in particular, from Apollonia in the north to Ambracia in the south, as well as with the lesser sanctuaries. Particular reference is made to the routes connecting Dodona with other parts of Greece and adjacent lands. Here much is made of the proposals by earlier authors, especially Nicholas Hammond, regarding the routes that connected Dodona with Ambracia in the south, the Ionian coast at the mouth of the Acheron river in the southwest, as well as the routes that connected Epirus with Thessaly and Illyria.
Chapter 6 focuses on the pilgrimage to Dodona, a topic approached through archaeological data and philological and epigraphic sources, including the rich corpus of oracular tablets, in order to understand the motives of the pilgrims and their experiences, from their journey to Dodona to their accommodation in the sanctuary. In Chapter 7, it is the multifunctional character of the sanctuary that is brought to the fore, as a place where religion, politics, economics, as well as social and cultural manifestations interacted.
In the concluding eighth chapter, the author recapitulates what was covered in the previous chapters, particularly the evolution of the sanctuary as an entity, the role played by Dodona in Molossia and Epirus, especially as a link between the various ethne in the area, and the routes connecting the sanctuary with the wider area. The chapter also deals with Dodonain the broader context of the Greek world. The discussion is not limited to mainland Greece, but brings in the colonies of Magna Graecia, especially their connection with Dodona, on the basis of our literary and epigraphic sources.
The chapters are divided into sub-sections, in which individual topics are presented and analyzed. Sometimes the author returns to specific subjects in the following chapters, particularly with regard to the material remains, including the numismatic evidence and the votive offerings.
The ambitious goals of the study predetermine some of its shortcomings, largely due to insufficient documentation about the various phases of excavation at the site. Although the author acknowledges the problem by sporadically referring to objects that lack meaningful contexts (see, for example, p. 30, section 2.4.3.1 on the votive offerings), much more could have been said about this at the beginning of the book. Moreover, sub-section 2.1, “Finding the archaeological site,” which refers to the history of research at the sanctuary, is overly brief, without any criticism, so much so that the reader does not comprehend the extent of the excavations carried out at the site, the research agenda and the methodology of the time. In particular, the overview fails to convey that the interventions of Constantin Carapanos (who was Greek, not French as is inadvertently noted on p. 8) were extensive. He excavated an area of some 20,000 square meters, and revealed most of the buildings known today (including the remains of the so-called temple of Zeus; a Christian basilica; the main entrances to the peribolos at east and southwest; two stoas inside the east and west sides of the peribolos, with 11 and 25 pedestals respectively in front of them; part of the theater and the bouleuterion; a portion of a retaining wall southeast of the temple of Zeus; and a large rectangular building outside the peribolos). Furthermore, these early excavations generated an enormous number of small finds. In truth, although Carapanos’s activities brought to light one of the most important sanctuaries of the ancient Greek world, and filled an entire hall of the National Archaeological Museum of Athens, the excavations were little more than treasure hunting. Unlike ordinary treasure hunters, however, Carapanos published the finds in exemplary detail in 1878.
More recent excavations are covered in Chapinal-Heras’s Appendix II, which is a list of 20th and early 21st-century excavation reports, without titles or any further comment. This was a lost opportunity, as a brief summary of the location in the excavation grid, together with the main results of each intervention, would have contributed substantially to our understanding of the context of movable and non-movable finds. After all, it is on the basis of these finds, and the buildings with which they are associated, that the author and earlier scholars have built their interpretations concerning the evolution of the sanctuary and its various parameters. These shortcomings have led to potential errors. For example, the discovery of animal bones in the theater orchestra—despite the author’s reservations, and their lack of specific context—cannot support theories about sacrifices that took place within the theater, nor the kind of venationes that occurred when the orchestra was remodeled into an arena (p. 33).[5] Other examples of hypotheses presented in the book could be mentioned, which, although interesting, are based on insufficiently documented archaeological data.
The division of each chapter into multiple sub-sections (Chapter 2 is divided, for example, into 24 of them) occasionally confuses the narrative, especially when the author notes that he will return to the subject, without giving adequate reference (e.g., p.60). The choice of published drawings and maps is also not in line with the purported holistic approach to the site: there is, for instance, no topographic plan of the entire site in which the different architectural phases of the buildings are marked in different colors. There are also a few errors, such as the description of the Dodona valley (pp. 12–13), where it should be Saracovista (not Saracovitsa). The source of the river Arachthos and its course are not near Dodona; similarly, the source and course of the Louros River are not at the border of the valley, since between the Dodona valley and the river source rises Mount Tomaros (not Promaros, known today as Olitsika).
The book uses the available archaeological, philological, and epigraphic evidence referring to the evolution of the sanctuary, its cults, and oracular procedures. The author is also well aware of the recent literature on Dodona and his command of the bibliography is solid. In section 3.3.1, for example, which provides a discussion of the buildings dedicated to various gods according to Dakaris’s identifications (Zeus [E1], Dione [Γ], Themis [Ζ], Aphrodite [Λ]), and the deified Herakles (A), Chapinal-Heras clearly notes that these buildings were not temples but perhaps treasuries, archive rooms, or even dining places. However, his arguments, for the identification of building A as the treasury of the Molossians, building Λ as a treasury of the Chaonians, and building Γ as the treasury of the Thesprotians, although attractive and reasonable, lack any epigraphical, philological, or archaeological documentation.
In his introduction (p. 7), the author notes that “The goal is to avoid writing an archaeological guide…”, with reference to Dakaris’s guide. Despite the author’s claims, the book could be perceived as a commentary, not only on Dakaris’s archaeological guide, but also on much of the research conducted since the discovery of the sanctuary.
In the end, a truly holistic study of the sanctuary of Dodona is yet to be written. Such an undertaking, however, requires the definitive publication of the buildings already excavated, of the numerous coins from the newer excavations in the Archaeological Museum of Ioannina, together with those of the old excavations by Carapanos in the Numismatic Museum of Athens, and of the pottery and all other small finds made of various materials. Whatever the limitations of Chapinal-Heras’s work, the author cannot be faulted for the simple fact that the results of the more recent excavations at of the site are far from being definitively published.
Notes
[1] Carapanos, C. 1878. Dodone et ses Ruins, Paris; Parke, H.W. 1967. The Oracles of Zeus: Dodona, Olympia, Ammon, Oxford; Dakaris, S. 1982. Δωδώνη. Αρχαιολογικός οδηγός, Ioannina.
[2] Meyer, E. A. 2013. The Inscriptions of Dodona and a New History of Molossia, Stuttgart. See also, among others, Katsikoudis, N. 2005, Δωδώνη: Οι τιμητικοί ανδριάντες, Ioannina; Moustakis, N. 2006. Heiligtümer als politische Zentren. Untersuchungen zu den multidimensionalen Wirkungsgebieten von polis über greifenden Heiligtümern im antiken Epirus, München; Lhôte, É. 2006. Les lamelles oraculaires de Dodone, Genève; Eidinow, E. 2007. Oracles, Curses, and Risk among the Ancient Greeks, Oxford; Dieterle, M. 2007. Dodona. Religionsgeschichtliche und historische Untersuchungen zur Entstehung und Entwicklung des Zeus-Heiligtums, Hildesheim; Piccinini, J. 2017. The Shrine of Dodona in the Archaic and Classical Ages: A History, Macerata.
[3] Emmerling, Τ.Ε. 2012. Studien zu Datierung, Gestalt und Funktion der ‘Kultbauten’ im Zeus-Heiligtum von Dodona. Hamburg; Quantin, F. 2008. “Recherches sur l’histoire et l’archéologie du sanctuaire de Dodone. Les oikoi, Zeus Naios et les Naia,” Kernos 21, 9–48; Mancini, L. 2015. “Da Eracle a Zeus. Suggerimenti per una rilettura globale del ‘Naiskos A’ di Dodona,” ASAA 91, 335–68. For the identification of the various building in the sanctuary see, Evangelides, D., and Dakaris, S. 1959. “Το ιερόν της Δωδώνης Α. Ιερά Οικία,” ΑΕ 1–194.
[4] Dakaris, S., Vokotopoulou, I., and Christidis, A. Ph., 2013. Τα χρηστήρια Ελάσματα της Δωδώνης των ανασκαφών Δ. Ευαγγελίδη, Athens.
[5] There is no firm evidence for an Augustan date of this remodeling, as Dakaris claimed; see Piccinin, J. 2013. “Dodona at the Time of Augustus, A Few Notes,” in M. Galli (ed.), Roman Power and Greek Sanctuaries: Forms of Interactions and Communication, Athens, 177–92; and Zachos, K. 2016. “Η Δωδώνη στους ρωμαϊκούς χρόνους,” in S. Eleftheratou and K.I. Soueref (eds.), Δωδώνη. Το μαντείο των ήχων, Athens, 30–33.