Chairs and Stools and Their Status Implications in the Pylos Ta "Totenmahl" Inventory (15 min)

Presenters

Thomas Palaima, University of Texas at Austin

Abstract

The thirteen tablets of the Ta series at Pylos are arguably the most informative set of documents pertaining to paraphernalia for ceremonies and rituals in the Linear B corpus. The Ta series illuminates who the Mycenaeans in LH IIIC early were politically, socially, economically, and religiously.

I here support a disputed interpretation of the Ta series as an inventory that includes furniture for seating elite attendees at the transculturally widespread practice of a funerary feast (Totenmahl) for one of two da-mo-ko-ro who are officials who rank right beneath the wanax and lawagetas in the territorial power hierarchy of LH IIIC Messenia.

I address questions about the numbers of thornos/thronos (to-no/to-ro-no-) and thrānus (ta-ra-nu) in the Ta series and what exactly a thrānus is and how it functions separately from or paired with a thronos by using the massive detailed inventory of all the possessions of Henry VIII undertaken after his death on 27 January 1547.

An etymological breakthrough that makes sense linguistically and semantically posits that the simpler, more functional shape of built object for fixing the seated human body at rest (thrānus) comes first. The more elaborated and luxury-crafted version of seat (thronos) develops out of it. There is no reason to insist that θρᾶνυς exclusively means “footstool,” even in the five instances on the Ta tablets where thronos and thrānus are paired.

Both the Henry VIII inventory and the James Stephanoff painting (1818) of the traditional receiving room at Hampton Court Palace indicate that rank and hierarchy are reflected in seating devices. For the king, a throne. For those privileged enough to be in proximity of the king, stools or no seats at all.

In seating ritual just being given the honor of seating is a mark of higher rank and status.