Le Nord : revue internationale des Pays de Nord - 01.06.1944, Page 99

SWEDISH EXCAVATIONS
89
Soli.M During the four years in which the Cyprus Expedition
was working in the field, work was made at Soli with longer or
shorter intervals. The topographical investigations took a con-
siderable part of the time, and they also at length led to the
discovery of the temple-site near Cholades. The acropolis of
the town was excavated completely, but proved to be much de-
stroyed; only small remains of a temple were found here. In other
places large buildings in the town were localized by trial diggings,
thus the completely classical palace, large colonnades, the harbour
and a large building near it, and the city-walls. The greater
excavations which were completed were those of the mentioned
temples at Cholades and the Roman theatre. Strabo mentions a
Temple of Isis and Aphrodite in the town, and another temple
dedicated to Jupiter is mentioned in the Acta Auxibii. After the
excavation of the area, we know that both of these temples were
part of a large complex of temples built during a long time.
The complex consisted of no less than five different temples,
which showed an exceedingly interesting architectural develop-
ment from Early Hellenistic times to about A. D. 300, from the
Old Cypriote courtyard temple with a liwan-formed cella con-
nccted with the courtyard (see above) to a close and firmly
planned building, where the original courtyard was nearly com-
pletely covered. The early temple-form is found in various
variants in Mesopotamia, Syria, Asia Minor, Palestine, and Cy-
prus, and it has always been in the centre of the discussion of the
Oriental temple-forms. Perhaps the most remarkable feature of
the architectural development at Soli is the fact that the temples
in their last phase show striking correspondences in plan and
otherwise in the cultic arrangements with certain of the earliest
Christian basilicas of a somewhat later date. The fundamental
64 Principal publications: "Westholm, The Temples of Soli, Stockholm
1936, and Swed. Cyp. Exp. III, p. 399. Minor articles on the temples
of Soli and finds from there are: Westholm, The Temples of Soli,
in the Corolla Arch., Lund 1932, p. 172; —, The Paphian Temple
of Aphrodite and its Relation to Orient Architecture, in the Acta
Archaeologica, Copenhagen 1933, p. 200; —, Cypriote Temple Plans
and Certain Christian Basilicas, in the Actes du XIVme congrés intern.
d’hist. de l’art, Bále 1936; —, Ett portratt av Agrippina d. a.
fran Soli, in the Konsthistorisk Tidskrift 1932, p. 11. An interesting
find of Byzantine coins from the Swedish excavations of the theatre
at Soli has been treated by Westholm, A Hoard of Byzantine Bronze
Coins, in the Numismatiska föreningens arsskrift 1940, p. 135.