jcgy

1. MAKE WAR
Walls and Fields
Accessible and Digitalized Cultural Heritage for
Persons with Disabilities

2. Throughout history, individuals, states or political factions have gained sovereignty
over regions and resources through the use of war.

3. Warfare, regrettably a universal
human experience and more
specifically battle, is the essential
experience of war, containing the
moments when the will, the
motivation, and the psychological
reserves of the combatant were
tested to their fullest extent.
Fragment of the Sumerian stone Stele of Vultures, the first
recorded act of war in history, c. 2500, depicting a battle
between two Mesopotamian city-states. Therefore, it is also
evidence that the Sumerians maintained the first organized
professional army (Louvre Museum, France)

4. An egocentric pursuit of
personal glory and booty is
generally regarded as
characteristic of so-called
primitive warriors. Yet at the
same time, it is the approach
that creates legends and gives
material to heroic epic.
The monumental statue of Alexander the Great
(Skopje, North Macedonia)

5. Walls make the civilization –
they create a sharp distinction
between the city and the
countryside, between the municipal
jurisdiction, law and order and
the wilderness where everything
is possible. They are not only a
defensive architectonic element;
they are a political statement
indicating that society was able to
invest so much money, time and
efforts into building them.
Walls
Castle walls, Samuel fortress at Lake Ohrid (North Macedonia)

6. Consequently, too often historians perceive the
construction of urban defences as one of the hallmarks of
civilization. Sometimes walls strike aside attackers, but
sometimes they just hide what is preserved inside of them.
Instead of intercepting the incoming, they restrain the
diffusion of what is kept behind them. The research of city
walls did not highlight only the chronological and regional
variations enabling scientists to rethink how and why urban
circuits were constructed and how they functioned.

7. Looking at walls, we do not
observe only the historical
narratives about invasions, but
we can observe the benefaction,
civic pride, economy, availability
of military labour and combination
of all these factors. However most
important was the prestige, the
ability to undertake large-scale
public work to aid in the stability
of the regime and economy.
Gate of the Samuel fortress in Ohrid (North Macedonia)

8. OHRID – GORNA PORTA
The necropolises of the ancient
town of Lychnidos were
discovered in several locations
within and around the city, but
due to exceptional discoveries
at the beginning of this century,
the Gorna Porta holds a
prominent place among them.
The complex was located
alongside the Northern wall of
the Ohrid fortress right next to
its main entrance. Panorama of Gorna Porta with Samuel fortress in Ohrid
(North Macedonia)

9. During excavations,
147 graves were
discovered dating
from the 6th to the
2nd century BCE.
Today the perception
of the cemetery is
covered with the
massive fortifications
of the town.
The gates of Gorna Porta (Ohrid, North Macedonia)

10. The most important discovery was
grave 132. The massive grave
construction was dug into the stone
and enclosed with stones. Most
likely two cremated persons were
buried in the grave, but the
luxurious grave goods were placed
around the centrally positioned
golden funerary mask (numerous
bronze vessels, a silver cup and
silver pins, silver sandals and
numerous golden appliques, an iron
wagon model and a small amphora). Golden mask and glove from the grave in Gorna Porta
(Ohrid, North Macedonia)

11. VINIČKO KALE
The site of Viničko Kale
is situated southeast of
the city of Vinica in
Northern Macedonia.
The research of the
castrum started
intensively in 1977 when
two intact and five
fragmented terracotta
icons were discovered. Panorama of Viničko Kale (Vinica, North Macedonia)

12. Thus far, some 20 scenes were
reconstructed on 50 complete
and 100 fragmented icons. It is
assumed that they were produced
on the site itself and were
mounted on walls of sacral
buildings. Depicted scenes
come from the Old Testament
and psalms; include
Christological depictions and
images of Christian saints as
well as depictions of famous
wars.
Icon depicting Daniel in the Lion’s Den
from Viničko Kale (Vinica,
North Macedonia)

13. PIRAN
Piran is one of the few cities in Slovenia that kept its medieval charm –
mostly due to the tightly packed urban area surrounded by the city walls.
Developing and spreading from the 10th century the city occupied slowly
most of the peninsula and the city walls had to be relocated three times.
With the inclusion into the Venetian republic, the state-controlled
maintenance of the city walls and gates reached its peak.

14. The most massive defensive
architecture was built on a cliff
above the city at the end of the
15th and beginning of the 16th
century. The argument for its
construction was the Turkish raids,
although the Turks never stood
before them. Constructed in the
period when gunpowder
dramatically changed siege
warfare they were less effective
but extremely visually prominent.
Gates in the walls (Piran, Slovenia)

15. With three gates and 7 towers, they created on the outside an image of a
mighty fortress, a symbolic division between the city and its surrounding that
still amazes the tourists approaching them.
Detail of the tower in the walls (Piran, Slovenia)

16. In periods of increasing economic and
political instability, the walls became
illustrations of processes within the
urban structures. Sometimes older
buildings were subsequently despoiled –
this did not indicate a wholesale urban
collapse, but the grand public buildings
acquired a new economic and symbolic
role. We can observe in such actions the
reflections of conscious attempts to re-
appropriate the legacy of the past, to
create a new and utilitarian role for the
monuments of antiquity.
Marble statue of a woman of supernatural size,
late 1st, early 2nd century (Celje, Slovenia)

17. Today we realise that city
walls do not represent only
emergency responses to
unstable political
circumstances and imminent
threat. Moreover, their
imposing dimensions and the
extraordinary care with which
they were assembled indicate
that they were conceived as
ostentatious and visually
striking public monuments.
They were monumental
statements about power and
patronage and political
legitimacy – to be sure; they
were also an effective means
of defence.

18. The world’s first historian, the
Greek Herodotus, wrote, “No one
is stupid enough to prefer war to
peace; in peace, sons bury their
fathers and in war fathers bury
their sons. However, I suppose
some god must have wanted this
to happen.” However, his words,
when describing Greek warfare
as an almost ritual system of
total fairness between identical
hoplite armies, are less
trustworthy and are actually
moralising propaganda or
deceptive lies.
Fields of war
Idealized reconstruction of the first traces of organized warfare
in northern Europe were found at the Tollense River c. 1230 BCE

19. Warfare was never fair nor heroic – it was tragic. Evolving from conflicts between
armed bands led by a warrior leader, city militia of part-time soldiers, providing their
own equipment and perhaps including all the citizens of the city-state or polis, began
to move warfare away from the control of private individuals and into the realm of
the state. Assemblies or groups of elite citizen’s sanctioned war, and generals and
other military leaders came to be accountable for their actions.
Remains of victims from the Bronze Age battle at Tollense

20. Women generally did not take part as
combatants in the past, but they
nonetheless were at the centre of the
conflict. For women are, in effect, the
cause, stakes, and victims of war:
indirectly, because they lose their
male relatives in war (fathers,
husbands, sons, and brothers); and
directly, because they are sacrificed,
raped, killed, and/or reduced to
slaves. It is worth considering,
however, that they can also be the
beneficiaries of war when they are in
the camp of the victors - some of the
wealth accrued from military conflicts
could fall to women.
Roman sarcophagus with the relief “Death of
Meleager,” 2nd century (Louvre Museum, France)

21. VAČE
One of the most fascinating items of prehistoric artistic production is the famous
belt plate from Vače in Slovenia. It was discovered on the locality Reber above
Klenik in a grave, that was already robbed – inside a wooden crate were left only
several bronze rings, a short sword or knife, an awl, several human bones and
fragments of pottery. The belt plate is decorated in the classic style of Situla art
dated to the 5th century BCE and is among the most attractive examples of this
artistic tradition.

22. Represented is an archaic method of fighting - an engagement between two
horsemen accompanied by two further warriors and an unarmed man with a
large hat. Several spears in the air create the impression of a comic-like visual
narrative including a temporal delay of action. Also the complex composition
with a single person turning away from the action, suggest that this scene could
be more than an illustration of a mythological scene. Perhaps it is a
transformed reflection presenting a real conflict, visual artwork of a historical
event materialized out of the oral tradition of Iron Age nobility.

23. MARVINCI
In the Valandovo valley is located
one of the most impressive
archaeological sites in North
Macedonia. On the peak of a small
hill, overlooking the valley on the
southwest side of the village
Marvinci is located at the site of
Isar. Covering some 5 hectares it
could be divided into at least two
areas – the acropolis of the pre-
roman settlement and the Roman
and Late Roman town. In the late
3rd century a castrum was built on
the southeast slope of the acropolis.

24. In the debris from a ruined wall of the military
castrum was discovered a Hellenistic grave
monument. The tombstone was carved out in the
form of a naiskos – a small temple so characteristic
for Attic funerary architecture.
It represents a young man called Zoilos, son of
Isholaos, wearing his full military gear. It is one of
the few depictions of a hoplite wearing chest armour,
a helmet, a spear and a Macedonian shield. Behind
him is a depiction of a snake and the pediment of an
altar. His armament as well as the background of the
image, especially the sake as a chthonic element
suggest, that the deceased was a hero and
represented as such on his tombstone. Although as
times changed his grave marking lost its primary role
and was secondary used as a stone block in the
construction of the military fort. Naiskos shaped tombstone of Zoilos
in full Macedonian gear (Isar –
Marvinci, North Macedonia)

25. PTUJ
Poetoviona was the most important Roman city on the territory of today’s
Slovenia. Originally a Celtic centre, it was occupied in the Augustan period by
the Augustus Eight Legion that remained there for almost half of the century.

26. One of the most extraordinary documents, not illustrating only
the process of Romanization, but presenting to us the life and
fate of a soldier that died 2000 years ago is the grave monument
of Marcus Petronius Classicus.
Born in today’s region of Abruzzi in Italy, he was among the first
members of the Roman military post stationed in Poetoviona.
When he died his brother, also a member of the same legion,
built a grave monument and transferred his bones to their
homeland.
His monument is decorated with all the recognitions of his service
– topped by the centurion’s helmet with a transverse plume are
depicted his centurions stick and shin-guards. Moreover, there are
his decorations – an oak crown as well as armillae and phalerae
on his helmet indicating that Marcus was an often decorated and
admired military officer.

27. The actions of ancient
warriors were shaped by
habits and of the
accustoms influenced by
the socio-economic and
practical military context
in which they fought.
They were bloody-
minded pragmatists that
pursued the complete
destruction of the enemy
– but they had very
limited means at their
disposal to achieve this.
The Nereid monument from Xanthus (Turkey) shows a phalanx of eight
hoplites, uniformly armed (British Museum, England)

28. The training or rather the lack of
it caused stubborn amateurism in
most ancient armies (Spartans,
Macedonians and Romans being
among others qualified
exceptions). Even more, armies
consisting of free men did not
lack systematic training, they
actively resisted it – and armies
were clumsy masses of ill-
disciplined militia that simply
were not capable of grand
manoeuvres or tactical
masterstrokes.
Detail of Trajan's Column (Rome, Italy)

29. Since troops were not
expendable the tactical
plans focused more on
keeping them alive than
winning the battle – tactics
focused on carefully
secured conditions in
which the fight could be
reduced to a quick and
decisive encounter. An Attic sarcophagus with a depiction of a sea battle between the
Greeks and the Persians at Marathon (Pula, Croatia)

30. Accessible and Digitalized Cultural Heritage for
Persons with Disabilities
Thank you for your attention!
MAKE WAR
Walls and Fields