PREHISTORIC
PART 1 – Ch.IV
Achilles’ tumulus or burial mound in Alba island
(Leuce)
(Today “Serpents’ Island” in the Black Sea, near the mouths of the Danube,
in front of the arm of Chilia and at
a distance of 41.06km from its mouth).
One of the
most famous prehistoric tumuli, which Arctinos,
the most important cyclic poet, as well as the Roman geographers, attribute to
our countries, is “the burial mound of
Achilles”, the foremost hero of the Iliad.
According to Homer, the bard of the Trojan War, Achilles was the son of Peleus and the sea goddess Thetis,
Nereus’ daughter. Peleus, Achilles’ father, appears as lord over the Pelasgian
people of the Myrmidons, and Achilles is lord of the courageous Myrmidon
soldiers and other neighboring Pelasgian tribes, which take part in the heroic
war against the Trojans, as allies of the Greeks (Iliad, II, 681; XVI, 168).
The Iliad doesn’t mention anything
about the circumstances of Achilles’ death. But in the Odyssey (XXIV, 36) it is
told that he fell at Troy, that his body was dressed in divine cloth and burnt
on the pyre, that his bones were placed in a golden urn, together with those of
Patroclus, and that the Greeks raised on top of everything, on the shore of the
Hellespont, a large, high tumulus, such as to be seen from far away out in the
sea, by the people who lived at that time, as well as those who shall live in
the future. So, according to Homer, Achilles was buried on
But in the poem Aetiopida, written by Arctinos,
epic poet from Miletus, who had continued and completed the Iliad, we are told
that Achilles was killed at Troy by Paris, Priam’s son, helped by the god
Apollo, and that, after a lot of fierce fighting, Ajax and Odysseus managed to
steal his body from the hands of the Trojan enemies, and bring it to the Greek
ships. Once here, Achilles’ mother Thetis came with her sisters and the muses,
wailed and mourned him, then removed her son’s ashes from the pyre and took
them to Leuce (
So, there existed in classical
antiquity two versions about the place where the bones of the great prehistoric
hero had been deposited; one told by Homer’s Odyssey, that Achilles was buried
in Troy’s plain and another tradition, amended, represented by the oldest
cyclic poet, that Achilles fell at Troy, but his ashes were taken and buried in
Leuce island. This last opinion was adopted and supported by the most competent
Roman authors.
Pliny the Old, whom Varro names the most erudite man the Romans ever had, tells us
very clearly that the tumulus, or Achilles’ burial mound is in the island
which is consecrated to him, called
“the Achillis island” or “Achillea”, located at a distance of 50 Roman miles away from the Danube Delta
(Peuce) and that a temple consecrated to this hero was also built there
(Hist. Nat. IV, 27.1).
The island and
After Tabula Peutingeriana,
Segm. IX. 3.
(Miller, Weltkarte des
Castorius)
Similarly, the Roman geographer Mela, who had used the best sources of
the antiquity, tells us that Achilles is
buried in the island named Achillea, between Boristene and Ister (De situ
orbis, II, 7). And the Greek geographer Dionysius
Periegetus from Bithynia, who lived in the times of the emperor Domitian,
writes the following: “Above the left side of the Euxine Pontos, in front of Borystene (read here the arm of the
Danube called Boreostoma) there is
in the sea a very renowned island,
consecrated to heroes, island which is called Leuce, because the wild animals which live there are white (albe). It is said that there, in Leuce
island, reside the souls of Achilles and
other heroes, and that they wander through the uninhabited valleys of this
island; this is how Jove rewarded the men who had distinguished themselves
through their virtues, because through virtue they had acquired everlasting
honor” (Orbis description, v. 541).
Pausanias also tells us “there is in the Euxine Pontos, near the mouths of the Ister, an island consecrated to Achilles, covered with forests and full
of animals, some wild, some tame. In this island there is also Achilles’ temple and his statue” (III, 19, 11).
And Arrian of Nicomedia, the most distinguished of the chroniclers of
Alexander the Great’s expeditions, gives us the following details about the
island of Achilles: “Close to the mouth of the Istru named Psilum, if one navigated with the north wind, there is an island in
the open waters of the sea, which some call the island of Achilles (‘Achilleos
nesos), others Achilles’ road (Dromos Achilleos), and others still, because of its color, Leuce
= the white (alba) island. It is
said that the goddess Thetis raised this island from the sea, for her son
Achilles, who dwells there. Here is his temple
and his statue, an archaic work.
This island is not inhabited and goats graze on it, not many, which the people
who happen to arrive here with their ships, sacrifice to Achilles. In this
temple are also deposited a great many holy gifts, craters, rings and precious
stones, offered to Achilles in gratitude. One can still read inscriptions in
Greek and Latin, in which Achilles is praised and celebrated. Some of these are
worded in Patroclus’ honor, because those who wish to be favored by Achilles, honor
Patroclus at the same time. There are also in this island countless numbers of
sea birds, which look after Achilles’ temple. Every morning they fly out to
sea, wet their wings with water, and return quickly to the temple and sprinkle
it. And after they finish the sprinkling, they clean the hearth of the temple
with their wings. Other people say still more, that some of the men who reach
this island, come here intentionally. They bring animals in their ships,
destined to be sacrificed. Some of these animals they slaughter, others they
set free on the island, in Achilles’ honor. But there are others, who are
forced to come to this island by sea storms. As they have no sacrificial
animals, but wish to get them from the god of the island himself, they consult
Achilles’ oracle. They ask permission to slaughter the victims chosen from
among the animals that graze freely on the island, and to deposit in exchange
the price which they consider fair. But in case the oracle denies them
permission, because there is an oracle here, they add something to the price
offered, and if the oracle refuses again, they add something more, until at
last, the oracle agrees that the price is sufficient. And then the victim
doesn’t run away any more, but waits willingly to be caught. So, there is a
great quantity of silver there, consecrated to the hero, as price for the
sacrificial victims. To some of the people who come to this island, Achilles
appears in dreams, to others he would appear even during their navigation, if
they were not too far away, and would instruct them as to which part of the
island they would better anchor their ships” (Periplus, Ponti euxini, 32, 33).
The heroic cult of Achilles in Leuce
island was widespread in Graeco – Roman antiquity, not only in the big commercial
centers of the Black Sea, but even in different ports and maritime cities of
the Archipelagos and the Adriatic Sea, whose economic interests were tightly
connected to the riches of the Black Sea.
Achilles from Leuce island was
especially venerated, until late in the Roman epoch, as the Lord and master of the Black Sea, Pontarches, and as the
main protector of the navigation in those parts – epithet, the sense of which
seems at first examination mysterious, from a historical point of view, but the
origin of which harks back to the times when Achilles had the title of King of Scythia even during his life (Kohler, Memoire, p.578, 634-643; Ouvaroff, recherches sur les antiquites
de la Russie meridionale, II. p.46; Lykophron
apud Kohler, Ibid. p.552).
The sailors of the Black Sea made
detours to Leuce island, some of them in order to place, willingly or not, on
the altar of him, who bore the title Pont-arch or sovereign of the Euxine
Pontos, their due, as custom duty; others in order to escape the terrible
storms and the black mists of this vast and deep sea; and still others, in
order to pray to god Achilles for their happy return from the waters of this
inhospitable sea.
To Achilles from Leuce island were
dedicated a number of important commercial centers of the Greek waters, like
the ports named Achilleion in
Mesenia (Stephanus Byzanthinus), Achilleios in Laconia (Pausanias, lib. III, 25,4) and another
town in Baeotia (Pauly,
Real-Encyclopadie). Similarly, an important commercial centre, placed in prehistoric
antiquity under the special protection of Achilles, seems to have been the town
Old – Chilia, near the north arm of
the Danube Delta, which is called even today the arm of Chilia (or Achileii).
Even the name Psilon stoma given to this arm in Alexander the Great’s epoch (Arrianus, Periplus Ponti euxini, c.31,
3, 5), seems to be only a Greek phonetic alteration of the popular ancient form
Chilleion stoma, or the mouth of
(A)Chiliei. And finally, even the name Lykostomum,
under which the name Chilia appears during the Middle Ages, has a much older
origin. From a historic and geographic point of view, Lykostomum is nothing
else but leuchon stoma, the mouth near the white (alba) island or Leuce.
Chilia was the most important
commercial point at the mouths of the Danube even as late as 200 years ago.
Prince Dimitrie Cantemir writes
about this: Chilia, the principal city of the district of Chilia, is a renowned
town, called at, not only by ships of the neighboring maritime ports, but by
ships of other lands, more distant, from Egypt, Venice and Ragusa, which deal
with importing from here wax and raw hides of oxen (Descriptio Moldaviae, p.
21) [1].
[1. In older times, the sand and mud deposits at the mouths of the
Danube being not so extensive, Old
Chilia (TN – Chilia Veche) was almost a seaport (see the map of Vignola from 1686, “Moldavia et
Valachia”, and the map “Danubii pars infima” of Homannus (d.1724), reproduced in Analele Acad. Rom. S, II, T, H,
Memories; also “Tabula geographica Moldaviae” of Prince Cantemir, in Descriptio Moldaviae.
In ancient Greek geography, another topical name appears at the mouths
of the Danube, ‘Achilleios plaxi. Hesychius
believes that it refers to Achilles’ island, Leuce (Kohler, Ibid. p.543, 729). But the meaning of the word plaxi (= plain, surface) cannot be
applied to a small and convex island, like Leuce, so this name probably refers
to the arm of Chilia. Another port
on the Danube, dedicated to Achilles, seems to have been Celeiul, from the county of Romanati, once an important commercial
centre, where ruins and a lot of Roman relics can be still found today. A stone
bridge across the Danube (built by Constantine
the Great) had existed there, bridge, the ruined pillars of which can still
be seen when the water recedes, and from this bridge a Roman stone paved road
led towards Transylvania. Even an island in the Danube, located downstream from
this place, in front of the village Dasova, bears the name of Celeiu. And an island named Achillea
also exists near the shore of Asia Minor (Pliny, Hist. nat. V, 37,1)].
This is the first prehistoric epoch
in the history of the commerce, always lively, on the Black Sea, epoch in which
Leuce island appears to have sovereign rights over Pontos, dominates the
navigation and traffic of produce across this sea, and at the same time extends
its influence to the principal ports of the Archipelagos [2].
[2. Even Aquileia, important
port of the Adriatic Sea, seems, by its name, to have been once consecrated to
Achilles. This would prove that the commercial ties between the Adriatic and
the Black Sea had started way back in the prehistoric epoch, that even before
the settling of the Genovese, Venetians and Ragusans on the shores of the Black
Sea, the merchants of Aquileia were protected by the Pontarch from Leuce
Island].
Apart from its holy image, Leuce
Island from the mouths of the Danube, was at the same time renowned in
antiquity as an island of healing.
Here, according to an old tradition of the oracles, those who had been gravely
wounded in wars nurtured back their health. So, Leonym, the lord of the
Crotoniens from Brutius, who had received, during a fight with the Locriens, a
chest wound of which he suffered greatly, consulted firstly the oracle of
Delphi, regarding his health, but the prophetess (Pythia) sent him to Leuce
Island, at the mouths of the Danube, from where he then returned healed (Pausanias, lib.III.19,13). Ammianus Marcellinus (lib. XXII, c.8)
also tells us that in Leuce Island there were healing waters (aquae).
From all this, and especially from
Arctinos’ account, from the precise information transmitted by Pliny and Mela,
and finally, from the sacred cult of Achilles in Leuce Island, results in a
wholly convincing way, that the ashes of this great hero of the Trojan times
were brought to and laid in Leuce Island. His tumulus or burial mound was known
here until later times. “Insula Achillis
tumulo eius viri clara”, says Pliny,
and Mela repeats “ibi Achilles situs est”.
But as to his grave on the shore of
the Hellespont, about which speaks Homer, it seems that it was only a simple
cenotaph, or a commemorative monument. Such a symbolic grave of Achilles also
existed, according to Pausanias, in
the city Elis in the Peloponnesus, having been built and dedicated to him as
ordered by the oracle (lib. VI, 23, 3). The words of the geographer Strabo are significant regarding this,
because he mentions at Achilleion, on Troy’s territory, only the monument of Achilles, but avoids to
affirm that Achilles had been buried there (XIII,1,32,39,46). Schliemann, the active explorer of
Homeric antiquity, had tried to find the ruins of Achilles’ grave on the shores
of the Hellespont. He writes “at a distance of 250 feet from Hellespont, at the
feet of Sigeu promontory, on the spot where old Achileum existed, there is an
earth tumulus, 4m high to the south, and 12m to the north, which has been
considered from a deep antiquity as being Achilles’ grave. In 1882 I explored
this tumulus, but I did not find any trace of bones, ashes or coals” (Ilios,
p.862). So, Schliemann thinks that this tumulus, presumed to be of Achilles,
exactly like that of Patroclus, and like six other funeral mounds, which he had
explored, were only simple cenotaphs,
a sort of monuments, which in the ante-Homeric antiquity were in general use.
(There exists even today with the Romanian people a whole cycle of folk
ballads, in which the deeds of this distinguished hero of the Iliad are sung.
About the Romanian traditions of Achilles, and especially of his country and
nationality, we shall talk in the last part of the history of the Pelasgians,
regarding the memorable event known under the name of the Trojan War).
THE SUPPOSED CENOTAPH OF ACHILLES, NEAR THE
(SCHLIEMANN, Ilios p.855)