ARCHAEOLOGICAL EVALUATION AND PROVENANCE ANALYSIS OF APOLLON’S TORSO IN SIVAS ARCHAEOLOGICAL MUSEUM

Abstract

The subject of this study is the torso of Apollon in the Sivas Archaeological Museum. This study aims to make anarchaeological assessment of the artifact and to find answers to questions about its origin by performing archaeometric analysis with the p-XRF device. The data obtained by this analysis were compared with the literature sources concerning for ancient marble quarries. It was argued that the work had artistic characteristics of sculpturing statues of 160-270 AD and is thus dated to the Late Roman Period. The hypothesis that the work may be stylistically related to Dokimeion has been proven that the raw material of work in question belongs to a marble bed stretching between Vakıf Neighborhood in the Tavas district of Denizli province and the Goktepe Neighborhood of Menteşe District of Mugla Province. As a result, the sculptured marble of Apollon was taken from a raw material source other than Dokimeion during the period when the Dokimeion workshop was active and processed by masters/sculptors and used in necropolises of the ancient world.KEYWORDS: marble quarries, Apollon, sarcophagus, p-XRF, provenance analysis