Technical Features of the Drawings
Let us turn our attention now to the character of the drawings on the incised stones. The drawings were incised directly onto the poros blocks, a fairly soft stone that can be scratched with just about any type of sharp tool. The placement of the drawings on the blocks is quite irregular: no effort was made to center the drawings on the blocks or frame them in any way. In some cases (examples include 1, 5, 8, 10, 12, 29, 59, 67, 82, 93, 94, 99, 104) the incision work covers the whole front surface of the block, while in others (note 4, 6, 21, 27, 31, 36, 48, 53, 80, 95, 102) incision marks were made only on a portion of the front surface, leaving the remaining area blank.36 Where two or more adjoining blocks survived in situ (see Figs. 9, 12, 13), we can see that no drawing extends over the edge of one block onto the next, suggesting that each drawing is self-contained on a single block.
I use the word “drawing” to describe the material, but in fact several different techniques can be observed. Some drawings were scratched lightly into the stone, while others were cut more deeply. In a few instances the area around the incised scene was deeply carved and stone was partially cut away from the outline of the figure; examples include 31, 33, 59, 74, 95, 98, and 102. Drawing 98, which depicts a man and a lion, furnishes a particularly notable example; here the stone around the lion is deeply cut back in what appears to have been a preliminary attempt at relief sculpture.
The treatments of the individual scenes are equally variable. Some of the drawings show efforts to do careful, precise work. Others, however, are of quite amateurish character, little more than stick figures, and several consist merely of formless lines and shapes scratched onto the stones. On a number of stones one figure overlaps with another on the same block. In some cases such overdrawing seems to be the result of experimentation in the composition of the picture. For example, in drawing 1 we appear to see three drafts of a lion’s head in various poses; the lighter lines may form preliminary sketches for the subject and the more deeply incised lines create the final picture.37 Drawing 10 has the beginning of a sketch of a lion’s face above a complete lion’s head. Drawing 71 contains two attempts at drawing a human head with a helmet in addition to the final version showing both human head and body. Drawing 53 shows a lion with two tails; the inciser originally made the drawing with the tail extending down between the lion’s hind legs and later changed it to curve up and over the animal’s back. In other cases it appears that several different artists were at work, intentionally placing multiple subjects on top of another. In 9a the elevation of a building was placed over a bird. In 14, a bird shown in left profile was drawn on top of two warriors who face each other with drawn swords, while the warrior at right was drawn over a lion striding right. Drawing 98 depicts a male figure drawn over a lion; the lion is deeply cut as if for relief sculpture, but the male figure is much more lightly incised and appears to have been added later. Drawing 8 illustrates a particularly complex example. Here the head of a bird drawn in right profile shares a common line with the body of another bird; both are overlain by a lion facing right, which then merges into the outstretched wingspread of a bird in flight, with random lines across the whole. Drawing 82 also displays a complex mixture of geometric patterns and animal figures, with several birds overlapping a lion and a horse.
A large number of drawings contain random lines and arcs interspersed around a more complex subject. In at least a few cases, a pictorial scene appears to have been intentionally obscured by lines or scratches after its completion, as if someone was trying to deliberately erase the scene; examples include 13, 44, 58, 81, and 83.
Subject Matter of the Drawings
The unequal nature of the drawing styles and techniques initially gives the impression that the drawings were a completely haphazard series of scenes. A closer review of the material, however, reveals that certain subjects recur regularly, the most common being human figures, animals, and geometric motifs. These tend to fall into patterns that suggest a limited set of sources of the drawings, a circumstance which has interesting implications for their meanings.
This discussion of the subject matter of the drawings will begin with scenes of human figures. As is true of the corpus of drawings as a whole, the drawing styles used to depict human figures vary greatly. A few have an almost cartoon-like quality, such as a pair of stick figures who engage their outstretched hands as if about to fight (81), and a small beak-headed man who holds a disproportionately large spear (74). In many instances, however, the figure is more carefully drawn and a great deal of detail can be detected. In every case where indications of gender are visible the figure is male, although in some cases the figures are so schematically rendered that the gender cannot be determined, e.g., 49, 52, 54. In most instances the figure was drawn with head in profile, shoulders and upper torso full front, and lower torso and legs in profile (1, 2, 5, 8, 14, 31, 44, 46, 52, 54, 59, 88, 98). Two figures are shown with both head and torso fully frontal (49, 101), and a few are in full profile (50, 71, 77, 94). In one example (33), the drawing’s creator apparently started to make a full front figure, and then changed to a profile figure; this drawing is so poorly executed, though, that it is difficult to be certain.
Most of the human figures are shown clothed, and the costumes depicted fall into regular patterns. In the most common costume, the male figure wears a short kilt, sometimes with a visible pattern in the fabric (2, 44, 46, perhaps also 81) and/or belt (5, 44, 59, 101). This seems to be the costume of a warrior, since in several cases a weapon is also present; this can be a short sword, worn at the side (5, 31, 44, 46, 59, 101) or extended in use (14), a mace (44, 98), a spear (74), or a bow and arrow (33, 37). One pair of warriors (14) is shown with helmets, on one of which a crest is indicated. On all these figures there is no indication of clothing on the upper torso; this may be due to the simple nature of the drawing and the lack of internal detail, since one would assume that a warrior would wear some form of protection on his upper torso.
Other costumes are quite different. One, found in 71, 77, and 94, is a long gown that appears to cover the whole body and is fastened at the waist with a wide belt and belt buckle. The figures in this costume also wear a type of cylindrical headdress that also occasionally appears on a figure wearing the short kilt, e.g., 46 (both costume and headdress are described in greater detail below). On one example, 88, a figure wears a long gown that follows the contours of the body but is not belted.
When a hairstyle is visible on a human figure, e.g., 1, 8, 14, 44, 98, and perhaps 88, the style normally shown is with hair pulled to the back of the head and curling up slightly in a pigtail at the nape of the neck. In one example, 101, the figure’s hair appears to be parted in the middle, with braids hanging down on each side of the face; this is also a rare example of a figure shown in a frontal pose. None of the figures who wear the short kilt appears to have a beard, but on some of the figures who wear the long gown, 71, 77 and 94, depictions of the chin area appears to merge into the costume, suggesting that the figure may be bearded.
Several drawings merely depict a standing male figure, not obviously connected through costume or pose with a clear identity or activity. These are 1, one man walking left, the other walking right; 8, a small male figure facing right; 47, a crudely drawn figure facing right; 97, the lower torso of a rather squarish figure facing right; 52 and 54, both of which show a figure in right profile. Drawing 49 is the simplest figure of all; the drawing depicts a crudely drawn head and columnar body with outstretched arms, with no internal details to suggest gender, costume, or action.
A few scenes, however, depict human figures in poses or with attributes that suggest that a specific action or narrative element was intended. As noted above, several drawings depict warriors, either men standing and holding weapons, or men actively