If there were symbols of good luck, then there was also bad luck as well. Pliny states that Illyrians believed in curses and ‘the evil eye’.124 If you suffered from a curse or just plain bad luck, then there were ways to gain the favour of the gods and spirits. The most notable of these was sacrifice. Like many ancient cultures, the Illyrians practised human sacrifice. The Roman historian Arrian states that when Alexander the Great besieged the Illyrian town of Pelion, located in central Albania, the defenders killed three rams, three boys and three girls to gain divine favour.125 Regrettably, no Illyrian temples have survived, nor do we have any written descriptions of them, so we have no idea what they would have looked like. Following Hellenization, they presumably built their temples according to Greek architectural styles. After the Romans came in, Roman-style temples became the norm.
Interring the dead either as a whole body or a cremated one within a burial mound, often called by the Latin name tumulus, appears to have been the most common funerary practice throughout Illyria. A mound of earth, earth mixed with stones, or exclusively of stones would be piled up atop the grave; a mound of stones piled atop a grave is called a ‘cairn’. This practice lasted from the Bronze Age until well into the Roman period. The size of the burial mound, its location and the grave goods associated with the person buried within denoted the status of the deceased. Some of these could be quite huge. The impressive burial mound of Jalžabet, located near Varaždin, measured twelve metres high and two hundred metres in diameter. However, the mounds were usually much smaller than this one, which is one of the largest tumulus grave sites in all of Europe. At first, a mound was the site of just one grave, almost certainly that of a chief or another important person. However, as time went on, secondary graves tend to appear arranged in close proximity to the central grave. Apparently, other people of the community had expressed their wishes to be buried near their leader; as they followed him in life, so too do they follow him in death. They are often arranged in a rectangle around the chief’s grave, possibly so that their spiritual power can protect their chief from outside harm. One mound excavated at Sticna, Slovenia contained 183 graves, but evidence shows that these graves were placed here within a broad 300-year timespan, which shows that mounds such as this were continuously added onto year after year.126 Illyrians sometimes buried their dead in stone-lined graves, like underground crypts. This practice was widespread throughout Illyria. The rectangular grave would be lined with five large flat stone slabs, one for each side and one to serve as a lid; there was no stone for the bottom. These types of graves are not associated with burial mounds.127 Cremation graves increase beginning in the late 500s BC and continuing into the early 400s BC. This could indicate a shift in religious beliefs, possibly due to the influence of the Celtic tribes that were expanding into south-eastern Europe, since the Celts practised cremation rather than burying their dead.128
Illyrian Architecture
Illyrian-made buildings are very hard to find. After more than two thousand years of occupation and invasions, most of the old buildings that are in the western Balkans are of Roman, Byzantine, Venetian, Slavic, Austro-Hungarian or Ottoman Turkish construction. Very little architecture constructed by the region’s pre-Roman inhabitants is left. However, there are a few places where it can still be seen.
Many sources describe the Illyrians as living in heavily-fortified cities with massive stone walls. Modern archaeologists call these fortified settlements by the Serbian name gradina, based upon the Slavic words grad or grod, meaning either a fort or a fortified settlement (as in Leningrad, Stalingrad, etc.). You can still see the crumbling ruins of a few of these Illyrian forts today. Even now, they are impressive, and you can get an idea about what Roman soldiers were thinking when they were ordered to march up a steep hillside and assault the defences, all the while being hammered by rocks, arrows, javelins and ancient Molotov cocktails. These walls could be anywhere from six feet to thirty feet high, depending on how accessible the terrain was: places that could be easily attacked needed large walls, whereas places that were difficult to access could do just as well with smaller walls because the natural landscape itself provided some defence. The ancient authors themselves stated that the Illyrians were very astute in using the terrain to their advantage, and archaeology has proved this. Unlike Roman forts, Illyrian fortified settlements were not built according to a more or less standardized plan. The shape of the forts depended upon the topography of the landscape. Walls and even the locations of buildings within the fort followed the contours of hillsides and canyons. In that way, you can see how the Illyrians managed to incorporate their fortifications into the landscape rather than simply imposing their buildings upon it. In places where there was level ground, the fortifications were almost perfectly circular, while in more jagged terrain the fortifications were built in accordance with the topography. Many times, these fortified towns only had one or two gates. This would make it difficult for an attacking army to get in, but it would also make it equally difficult for the population inside to quickly evacuate if there was an emergency.129
Of all of the Illyrians’ fortified settlements that are still discernible today, arguably the most impressive is Daorson, now known as Ošanići, located near the town of Stolac, Bosnia. The site was inhabited since the Bronze Age and possibly earlier. It began as a hill fort, constructed between 1,600 and 1,500 BC; very little evidence of this original fortified settlement remains. However, it really came into its own during the time of Alexander when the city was surrounded by massive stone walls and towers. Obviously, Daorson had grown very prosperous, so much so that it minted its own coins, had a thriving manufacturing centre and was a major exporter of pottery and metal products. The oldest sections of the walls have been dated to the fourth century BC, while the rest of the fortifications date up to the middle of the first century BC. The reason for the abrupt end date is because during that exact time, the inhabitants of Daorson were crushed by the Romans led by Publius Vatinius. Since that date, the site has been abandoned.130
The stones that form the walls of Daorson are very large. Although they are cut into various-sized blocks that are more or less rectangular, they have a certain organic free-form quality to them. Many of the stones that make up the city walls are not perfectly square or rectangular but are multi-angled, which helps to better lock the stones together and resist the punishing effects of earthquakes, battering-rams and catapults. The construction seen in the walls of Daorson looks eerily similar to the walls of ancient Mycaenae or that of the Hittite capital city of Hattusha, which perhaps hints at an architectural tradition or a historical memory of building brought from further east. Before the arrival of the Romans, the Illyrians built their fortifications using ‘dry wall’ construction, meaning that they simply stacked the stones on top of one another without using any cement or mortar to hold them in place. After the Romans began coming in, the Illyrians began to use mortar.
Sometimes the Illyrians settled close to rivers, which made very good natural barriers. They could be fished and they served as highways for boat-based trade, rowing up and down the rivers trading goods with other riparian settlements. However, sometimes these rivers flooded and damaged the buildings. The clever Illyrians adapted to this situation by doing something that many people who live in or near flood zones do today: they built elevated houses, mounted on wooden stilts. It should be said that archaeologists have only found a small handful of sites that follow this construction plan. Considering that these buildings were constructed atop wooden piles and that wood rots (especially in a waterlogged setting like that), no wonder that few traces of such dwellings have been uncovered. Actually, the very fact that people have discovered these remains at all is nothing short of miraculous.131
Figure 5: Ruins of the city walls of Daorson. (Photo by Lsimon, 5September 2009. Public domain image. Wikimedia Commons)
If the riverbank was rather steeply sloped, then the buildings would be terraced, like a set of stairs, l
eading from the river up the slope of the hill. Archaeologists have discovered one such settlement as this located at Donja Dolina, approximately eight miles upstream from the town of Bosanska Gradiška, on the banks of the Sava River. A wooden palisade wall made of vertical logs was placed on the upstream side of the village, arranged perpendicular to the river’s flow. It was made of two rows of logs, and the empty space in between was packed with dirt. Buildings were arranged in rows, with narrow streets and alleyways running parallel to the river. The houses were all square-shaped and constructed around a framework of thick wooden beams. The houses’ walls were made of wooden rounded beams laid horizontally, one on top of the other. The ends of these beams were narrow, and the points of the beams of one wall fit into the empty gaps between the pointed ends of the beams of another wall, interlocking and interleaving together. Afterwards, the floors and walls were covered with a smooth layer of plaster-like clay. The roofs were made either of flat wooden planks or were thatched with straw; in a riverine setting like this, reeds to make thatched roofs would be readily available. The floor plan of a single house averaged at twenty-five square metres in area, and was usually divided into three sections: the large main room which contained an open hearth, a smaller bedroom, and a small storage room. The central hearth itself was usually made of clay. Archaeologists have hypothesized that this was not simply a fireplace where food was cooked but possibly had a multi-purpose role, acting as both a fireplace to keep warm, a place to cook food and a place to give religious offerings. In one of the storage rooms, archaeologists found several pottery jars filled with carbonized grain. Animal pens were even built in this fashion. We know this because large amounts of preserved animal manure have been uncovered at one of these sites, so we can hypothesize that one of these elevated buildings was actually used as a barn.132
Despite the preserved remains found at Donja Dolina, this should not be taken as the standard form of Illyrian architecture. Not all Illyrian villages were built in this way. Indeed, it seems that there was no discernible ‘Illyrian’ style of architecture. Houses could be constructed of wood or stone. They could be square or circular, large or small. They could be separate or attached to each other. Architecture, therefore, depended upon regional style, geography and the availability of building materials. Most Illyrian houses consisted of one large room rather than several small rooms. The houses themselves were also fairly small by many people’s standards. The remains of one stone dwelling, discovered at Monkas near Rovinj, measured only 4 x 6 metres in area. Like the impressive stone walls, pre-Roman stone houses were also constructed using a dry-stacking technique. The roofs could either be made of a thick layer of thatch or overlapping flat tiles made of limestone.133
Everyday Life for the Ancient Illyrians
Regrettably, very little information exists concerning how the Illyrians went about their everyday lives or how their societies were laid out. We know the obvious facts: they were ruled by chiefs, they had warriors, etc., but we have very little in the way of specific cultural anthropological information. We do not know if there were such things as ‘man’s work or woman’s work’, we don’t know the role that religious officials played in society, and we don’t know about the exact role played by the tribal chief.
Like every ancient society, the Illyrians had slaves. In fact, the Greek historian Theopompus says that the Ardiaei tribe (pronounced AR-dee- AY-ee) alone had 300,000 slaves as part of its population. This is assuredly an exaggerated number, since the city of Rome had 200,000 slaves during its height, and the population of the entire Ardiaei tribe was certainly smaller than the number of people who dwelt in the Eternal City. A more reasonable figure is given by Agatharchides of Cnidos, who states that some of the wealthy elites of the Dardanian tribe could possess up to 1,000 slaves; in peace they worked the fields and in war they fought under the command of their masters.134
Our earliest records of Illyrian clothing come from the sixth century BC, and consist almost entirely of carved stone depictions, especially tombstones, of the Illyrians by Greek artists or perhaps by native Illyrians trained in Greek artistic styles. However, I have to say that most of these date to the last few centuries of the Roman Empire, when the state was already in decline. Since fashion styles change considerably from one decade to the next, let alone from one century to the next, we cannot automatically take it for granted that the clothing seen on these monuments would have been identical to the clothing that the Illyrians wore five or six centuries earlier.
The men mostly wore sleeved long tunics; short tunics are rarely portrayed in art. During Roman times, the sleeves were wider and they could also be removed, fixed into place by clasps on the shoulders. These long tunics are believed to be the precursor of the garment called the dalmatic (i.e., the ‘Dalmatian tunic’) worn by members of the Catholic clergy. Sometimes they wore a cloak over this, presumably during wet or cold weather, which was similar to the Greek chlamys or the Roman sagum, fastened at one shoulder with a brooch. It is uncertain if Illyrian men wore trousers; Aleksandar Stipcevic states that Illyrian men seldom wore trousers, while John Wilkes hypothesizes that their use was common.135
We have more evidence of what Illyrian women wore, mostly in the form of grave goods and depictions in stone carvings. A typical woman’s outfit consisted of three parts: an undergarment, an outer garment and a cloak. The undergarment was similar to a man’s long tunic, except that it was longer, reaching down to the floor. Over this sleeved undergarment, the women wore an outer garment that came in various styles. One was a sleeveless version, which was fastened on the shoulders with fibula clasps. A belt would then be tied around the waist so that the upper part would blouse over it, and then a second belt would be tied over that bloused-over part. Another style of outer garment was designed so that the upper part would be tight-fitting, like a bodice or a corset, but from the waist down it would be pleated and bell-shaped. The cloaks that women wore were often hooded. Ancient authors called it the cucullus Liburnicus, or ‘the Liburnian cloak’. In artwork that does not show women wearing hooded cloaks, the women are portrayed wearing scarves covering their heads. The scarves were not tied around their heads: the ends freely fell down the sides and were draped on the shoulders. At other times, they wore large shawls made of thick heavy material that covered the head and upper body. Therefore it would appear that according to Illyrian social custom, women were banned from appearing bare-headed and must always have their heads covered out of modesty.136
Hats or other types of head coverings were mostly worn by Illyrian women and they came in various styles:137
1.A small skullcap that was similar in style to the small white fez called the qeleshe, worn in Albania. It is suspected that the qeleshe is a modern version of this earlier Illyrian cap.
2.A conical leather or fur cap, similar in shape to a Slavic cap called the šubura.
3.A skullcap with a wide wavy brim, worn only by soldiers; essentially an Illyrian ‘boonie hat’.
The types of shoes that were commonly worn by men were made of leather with upturned toes. These types of shoes are today called opanci, and are still worn today in some areas of the Balkans. It is possible that the Slavs who moved into the region copied this style of shoe from the Illyrians. Although they conformed more or less to a general form, some were more boot-like, others more sandal-like.138 Japode-style shoes were made from a single piece of leather that had the toe turned backwards and held in that position with a leather strap that was tied around the ankle.139
As in all societies from ancient times to modern times, appearance could be augmented with the use of jewellery. If you’ve got, you flaunt it. The Illyrians were no exception, and they could be just as glittering and gaudy as anyone around in those days. Belt plates were broad enough for highly-complex decoration; many of them depict warriors and battle scenes. Brooches and necklaces were common, used both by men and women. Pendants suspended from necklaces could be geometric or organic in shape. Pendants in t
he shape of human heads were common among the Japodes and Liburnians. The triangle was the most common geometric ornament, and who knows what it might have represented? Possibly a representation of the mountainous landscape in which the Illyrians lived? Or maybe an abstract depiction of the rays of the sun radiating downwards from the sky? Or maybe an axe that gave protection, similar to amulets worn by Germans and Scandinavians that represented Thor’s hammer? Or maybe it was simply a design or a shape that had no meaning at all. Since there are no ancient written records explaining what these shapes and designs mean, and since we can’t ask any Illyrians about their meaning, we’ll never know what these things represent, and any ideas that modern historians propose are purely guesswork that will never be conclusively proven. Regional styles were also prevalent in terms of the jewellery that people wore. Northern Illyrians, like the Japodes and Liburnians, wore pendant necklaces with images of the human face. Southern Illyrians were fond of wearing pendants shaped like birds. Necklaces made of Baltic amber beads, or necklaces decorated with an amber pendant, were also common. Illyrian chiefs also sometimes wore large bronze Celtic-style torques around their neck as a symbol of their rank.140
The Great Illyrian Revolt Page 8