An Exploration of a 2500-Year-Old Monument: A Reappraisal of the Achaemenian Decorative Flooring Plasters in Persepolis World Heritage Site (ca. 550–330 BCE)

ABSTRACT

The red-surfaced flooring plaster of three Persepolitan palaces built during the reign of Darius I, namely the Treasury, Edifice C of the southern area of the terrace, and Tachara, the king’s private palace, were investigated by a chemical and microscopic approach using optical microscopy, scanning electron microscopy coupled with energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (SEM-EDX), inductively coupled plasma optical emission spectrometry (ICP-OES), and X-ray diffraction (XRD). The results show that the flooring plaster was formed of two distinct layers, a thick (2 cm) internal white one made of a mixture of calcite (CaCO₃) and rock fragments, and a thin external red layer with variable thicknesses ranging from 0.2 to 1.5 mm, made of a mixture of calcite and hematite (Fe₂O₃) and also small fragments of rock. An interesting aspect of the red layer is the presence of cinnabar (HgS) as red pigment mixed with hematite in Tachara, while the red colour has been provided by hematite alone in the two other floorings. Though the analytical results are in line with previous studies on Tachara flooring, it also revealed that the decorative red layer of Tachara differs from the Treasury and Edifice C. This analytical study clarified general technical aspects of decorative red-surfaced flooring in Persepolis.

KEYWORDS:

• Persepolis
• Darius I period
• plaster
• red-surfaced flooring
• calcite
• hematite
• cinnabar

Acknowledgements

The authors are grateful to Dr Eduardo Molina Piernas, Universidad de Cadiz, for his valuable comments on chemical analyses and Mohammad-Taqi Atayi, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München, for providing detailed images of the red-surfaced plaster of Edifice C and his valuable comments about archaeology of the southern complex of Persepolis.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).