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Lunch at Cyrene in A.D.106 and the closing incidents of Trajan's Second Dacian War

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 March 2015

J. M. Reynolds
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Extract

Among the inscribed stones brought from Cyrene to London by R. M. Smith and E. A. Porcher, and now in the British Museum, is a group of four marble fragments which deserve renewed consideration. They were found in ruins to the north of the Temple of Apollo, which must either be the Temple of Artemis or a structure closely associated with it. They concern the activity of a priestess of Artemis during the reign of Trajan. As A. Wilhelm was the first to notice, the future tense of the verb ἀριστιϵῖ in A, l. 21 shows the text to be an invitation to ἂριστον (= approximately lunch), issued by the priestess to the maidens of the city and its territory. In view of its subsequent inscription the occasion must have been one of unusual importance; certainly no similar text has been found in Cyrene.

The last full edition was by F. H. Marshall in 1916; a re-examination of the stone suggests some new readings and restorations:

Type
Research Article
Information
Libyan Studies , Volume 7 , 1976 , pp. 11 - 18
Copyright
Copyright © Society for Libyan Studies 1976

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References

Footnotes

1. Smith, R. M. and Porcher, E. A., A History of the Recent Discoveries at Cyrene (London, 1864) pp. 75, 112 and pl.80Google Scholar. They give a drawn transcription on pl.80 (SP 2 in the commentary) and an interpreted text on p. 112 (SP 2 in the commentary) which is not always in accordance with the normally accurate drawing; it is unfortunate that the text on p. 112 was what R. Cagnat used for his republication of the main part of the inscription in IGRR I.1037.

2. It is clear that the text was inscribed on a tall narrow block (or assemblage of blocks) with a simple moulding down the left side. Although the identification seems not quite satisfactory it is difficult to see what this can have been but the architrave from the left side of a doorway (in which case it was certainly not part of the main door of the Temple of Artemis whose moulding is quite different). It may of course have been a re-used piece when it was inscribed (and the comparatively rough surface of the inscribed area, which contrasts with the “finish” of the moulding, may seem to favour this possibility), but there is no indication that the moulding was ever covered and so long as we must suppose it to have been visible the only obvious explanation is that it was from a door architrave.

3. Wilhelm, A., Anz. Wien. 1948, 313Google Scholar; cf. also Robert, L., Hellenica XI–XII (1960) 573 fGoogle Scholar. with reference to other inscribed invitations and to the comparatively small collection of inscriptions containing words from this root which describe a feast of a type clearly distinguished from a δϵίπνον.

4. Marshall, F. H., A Catalogue of Ancient Greek Inscriptions in the British Museum, vol. IV (Oxford, 1916) 1057, 1058Google Scholar.

5. I must record with gratitude advice and practical help from the late Professor Donald Strong, the late Dr. Stefan Weinstock, Dr. W. H. Plommer, and the staff of the Department of Greek and Roman Antiquities in the British Museum; for permission to publish the photographs on pl.12/15 I should like to thank the Director of the Museum.

6. Most obviously in the form of 52; but I incline to think that the differences ire adequately explained by the smaller size of the letters.

7. See Schmidt, W., Geburtstag im Altertum (Religionsgeschichtliche Versuche und Vorarbeiten VII (1909) 94 fGoogle Scholar.

8. Year 1 is reckoned from the day of accession to 1st Thoth (29th August) next following; subsequent years annually from 1st Thoth.

9. That Decebalus died in 106 is confirmed by the reference to his head on the Gemonian Stairs in that year in the Fasti Ostienses, Inscr. It. XIII.I, pp. 198 and 226/7Google Scholar.

10. SEG IX.101; and, for the date, SEG XVIII.744.

11. CIL XVI.S, 160Google Scholar.

12. Robert, L., Hellenica XI–XII (1960) 553 fGoogle Scholar.

13. SEG XVIII.744.

14. Reynolds, J., JRS XLIX (1959) 95–8Google Scholar; Goodchild, R. G., PBSR XVIII (1950) 83 f., nos.6 and 7Google Scholar.

15. Cf. SEG IX, indices.

16. For some evidence on this family see Reynolds, l.c. in n.14 above, p.97 and especially note 18; the case for regarding it as ultimately Italian in origin depends on its recurrent use of the cognomen Flamma.

17. SEG XX.741, right face, 11. 13/14.