Classical topomythopoiesis: the origins of some spatial types

Abstract

thinking toppled the Olympian gods as the bearers of truth, yet keeping them alive as subjects for poetry and, by extension, the art of placemaking. It needn’t be overstated here that the expansion of the Greek world towards the East following Alexander’s conquests resulted in growing wealth, ambitious city-building and the monumentalisation and geometrisation of gardens and parks following Persian examples. Within one such park, the royal gardens of Alexandria, stood a hill ascended by a spiral path dedicated to the god Pan, hence called Paneion. The horned goat-god roamed the wilderness where, during the Hellenic period, his sanctuaries were found in rustic settings such as Mt Lykaion. Within the grid of Alexandria we now find him on a civilised mountain — a simulacrum of his native ‘towering crags’. Although the mound may have been constructed as a religious space for sacrifice and mantic dancing, our only historic description of it recounts a rather more secular experience: In short, the city of Alexandria abounds with public and sacred buildings. The most beautiful of the former is the Gymnasium, with porticos exceeding a stadium in extent. In the middle of it are the court of justice and groves. Here also is a Paneium, an artificial mound of the shape of a fircone, resembling a pile of rock, to the top of which there is an ascent by a spiral path. From the summit may be seen the whole city lying all around and beneath it. This account from the first century BC by the Greek geographer Strabo (64 BC–AD 24), who had a penchant for describing views from mountains, has been interpreted by Bowe to indicate that the mound satisfied the ‘desire to look beyond the enclosure of a garden’. If so, we thus see a shift in the experience of mythopoetic places from religious epiphany to aesthetic delight. Rome: monumentalisation of the burial mound Strabo also scribed a rare account of an artificial, Roman mound. Describing the verdurous Campus Martius in Rome, he noted the presence of a number of burial mounds, highlighting one in particular: The most remarkable of these is that designated as the Mausoleum, which consists of a mound of earth raised upon a high foundation of white marble, situated near the river, and covered to the top with ever-green shrubs. Upon the summit is a bronze statue of Augustus Cæsar, and beneath the mound are the ashes of himself, his relatives, and friends. Behind is a large grove containing charming promenades. Like the Paneion, the Mausoleum of Augustus stood in a public park. Based on the description, this artificial mound was more for looking at, than for looking from. Also, the text makes no reference to myth, yet we cannot dismiss it as an example of topomythopoiesis too easily. Constructed during Augustus’ lifetime on the eve of Empire in 28 BC, the structure is a synthesis of the tumulus and the tholos: a conical mound of earth (supported on a drum) topped by a circular temple with an earthen roof crowned by a statue — a dim reflection of the temple-topped hills of mythopoetic gardens from Stourhead to Dessau-Wörlitz. According to R. Ross Holloway, the tomb was unprecedented in Rome and not based on Etruscan tumuli, but rather a deliberate evocation of the Trojan burial mounds featured in the Iliad and the Aeneid, the latter composed by Virgil in the years directly preceding the construction of the Mausoleum: High o’er the field there stood a hilly mound, Sacred the place, and spread with oaks around, Where, in a marble tomb, Dercennus lay, A king that once in Latium bore the sway. classical topomythopoiesis