Description of Monument

White marble sarcophagus 2.00 × 0.78 × 0.81 with a tabella ansata, flanked by garlands. For further description see Isik 142.

Description of Text

Inscribed in the upper two thirds of the tabella, impinging on all mouldings. The text must have begun above, perhaps on the lid or the upper rim of the chest.

Letters

Poorly designed, cut and aligned, possibly of the late third century, perhaps the fourth; uneven heights, ave. 0.013, but rising to 0.025 sporadically; ε for epsilon, lunate sigma, ω for omega. There is a gauche attempt at artistry, perhaps in that six alphas have been placed one directly below the other on the left-hand moulding in ll. 3-8, certainly in that the last two lines are laid out with some attempt at symmetry. Unconventional spellings in ll. 1, 2, 5, 6, 7.

Date

Monument: mid third century (Isik). Text: Probably fourth century (lettering, spelling, unit of reckoning, size of fine).

Edition ἕτερος δὲ οὐδεὶς ἕξει ἐξουσίαν ἐνθάψε τινὰ ἐν τῇ σορῷ ἢ ἐκθάψε ἐπεὶ ἔστε ἀσεβὴς καὶsic ἐπάρατος καὶ τυμβωρύχος καὶ προσαποτείσει τῷ ἱε ρωτάτῳ ταμίῳ ἀργυρίου μυριάδας τρίς τῆς ἐπιγραφῆς ἀπετέθη ἐς τὸ ἀρχεῖον ἀντίγραφον

Apparatus

l. 5, there does not seem to be a space for a star = denaria at the end

l. 7, ἀποτέθη lapis.

Other additional letters read here and changes in layout proposed make no difference to the sense of what Cormack printed, except in ll.4-5 where a normal text is offered instead of his slightly aberrant προσαποτεισάτω.

Translation

- - - ? but no one else shall have the] right to bury [? anyone in the sarcophagus or to remove anyone from it], since (whoever does so) shall be (considered) sacrilegious and accursed and a tomb-breaker, and furthermore shall pay to the sacred treasury (at Rome) three myriads of silver. A copy of the inscribed text was deposited in the archive.

Commentary

The size of the fine and the calculation in myriads suggest a date in the fourth century; the lettering and spelling might be held to conform. The description of the archive as τὸ ἀρχεῖον is also unusual (although not unparalleled), but not dateable at present.

Locations

City, Village: 'Cour de l'immeuble aux escaliers de marbre' (Gaudin) Necropolis Museum (1977)

Text Constituted From

Transcription (Reynolds); publications; Kubitschek

History of Recording

Recorded by K&R (KIII.41, Abklatsch 41); by Gaudin (170); by the MAMA expedition; by the NYU expedition

Bibliography

Published from Gaudin's squeeze, T. Reinach, REG 19, (1906) 274-6, no. 184; from the MAMA records, supplemented by the notes of Kubitschek and Reichel, J.M.R. Cormack, MAMA VIII. 578, whence McCabe 576 and a comment by Roueché, Aphrodisias in Late Antiquity (London, 1989) p. 192; by Reynolds and Isik 142.

Photographs

Tabella (1977)

View (2002)

Representations

Kubitschek notebook III, 41