Greek Epigraphy

Over the last two decades, interest in the formation, display, and dissolution of gold-glass collections has significantly increased. Recent catalogues edited by Dr Daniel T. Howells and Dr Susan Walker, specifically, brought forth a significant amount of information about the collectors, and the antiquarian networks, behind the formation of gold-glass collections within greater collections of antiquities at the British Museum and the Ashmolean Museum. My focus is on textual records and visual evidence pertaining to the history of gold-glass in its post-excavation display and circulation throughout the art market with special reference to the provenance of the collection of such glass assembled by Alessandro Recupero in his family palace in Catania. The Recupero gold-glass was sold by Tommaso and Vincenzo Capobianchi in the late 1860s to English collector Charles W. Wilshere and is now part of the Wilshere Collection of gold-glass, sarcophagi and inscriptions from Rome and southern Italy, a collection formally acquired by the Ashmolean Museum (University of Oxford) in 2007.

This paper offers a general overview of the rise and expansion of Christianity in Macedonia between the first and sixth centuries AD. It highlights that, in the absence of detailed literary sources, epigraphic and archaeological material represents our best source of information on the topic. The available evidence demonstrates that Christianity took root in the main urban centers (i. e., Thessalonica, Philippi, and Beroea possibly) in the first century and spread in all directions along the main communication axes in subsequent centuries. By the fifth century, it pervaded the entire Macedonian territory and effectuated a profound religious and cultural transformation of Macedonian society.

Στην εργασία αυτή εξετάζονται παροιμίες από το ψηφιακό αποθετήριο  (Αρχείο Παροιμιών) του ΚΕΕΛ, οι οποίες αφορούν τις σχέσεις εξουσίας κατά την περίοδο της  Τουρκοκρατίας. Η προσέγγιση είναι πολυεπίπεδη θίγοντας ζητήματα, όπως αυτά της διοίκησης, της φορολογίας και της δικαιοσύνης. Τα λήμματα αντλούνται από αντίστοιχα πεδία. Οι παροιμίες, αφενός με τον επικαιρικό και αφετέρου με τον ιστορικό -αλλά και σε κάποιες περιπτώσεις -με τον διαχρονικό  χαρακτήρα που τις διέπει, αναδεικνύουν ένα πολύπλοκο πλέγμα σχέσεων, που εκφράζει βαθύτερους κοινωνικούς και ανθρωπολογικούς προβληματισμούς.

Reading, through memory studies, the hermeneutical
process underlying the writing of the FG, the article
argues that the Maccabean epic, an integral part of
the cultural memory of Jesus the Jew and his johannist
followers, emerges with all its ambivalence and in its
constitutive matrices in the peculiar traits of the collective
memory about Jesus expressed in the Fourth
Gospel. After the Easter experience, in the light of first
Jewish war (66-74 CE) and the success of the messianic
proclamation in the Diaspora, the Johannist group rethinks
the Maccabaic matrices of its cultural memory
(history, rituals and values, especially the religious zeal)
and, without abandoning its demands (heroic loyalty
to one’s identity and mission; readiness to glorify God to
the point of giving one’s life), reconfigures them in terms
that are culturally effective for the Greek-Roman world
but profoundly anti-imperial.

The Pyrrhic victory means the hard-earned victory of one of two powers (closer to parity in strength) over the other, with losses incurred on the battlefield, and victory is closer to defeat. This kind of victory is attributed to the Eberian king Pyrrhus, who paid a heavy price for his victory over the Romans at the beginning of the eighth decade of the third B.C.; That victory cost him more than seven thousand five hundred soldiers, and Pyrrhus, despite his victory, was unable to impose his control, and Rome, despite its defeat, is still able to withstand. Thus, that victory inflicted damage on Pyrrhus the victor and was a costly victory. Undoubtedly, Greco Roman history contain similar images of the Pyrrhic victory, and there were victories that cost the victors forces life (soul) with the help of external factors despite his overwhelm, which makes him taste the bitterness of cost instead of the pleasure of victory.

On the slope of Monte di Vico at Ischia there was an inscription recording the construction of a fortress by two characters with Oscan names and some soldiers. After recalling the various hypotheses about the document’s historical context, the most recent one, though neglected, is endorsed: the two characters were archons of Neapolis, who arranged the defences of Aenaria during the First or Second Punic War. New considerations are provided about the archonship at Neapolis, besides a complete historical commentary of the document, whose importance for the history of the Neapolitan constitution is highlighted.

In this article Ι present the editio princeps of a fragmentary inscription carved on a relief stele made of island marble housed in the National Archaeological Museum. The inscription, a consolation decree issued by the Milesians dueling in Aigiale, one of the three cities of Amorgos island, is a typical species of decree of Roman times in Amorgos. A combined study of the decree and the relief representation on the stele, depicting a couple in a banquet, is quite revealing of the institutions of the aristocratic society of the island in that era.

This is the draft of a paper in preparation for the series Attic Inscriptions Online (AIO) Papers. In the final version, which we plan to publish in early 2024, the chronological scope of the chart will be extended to 200 BC and the entries in it will be keyed to footnotes recording such fresh observations on readings, dates, prosopography etc. as are currently presented in the notes on relevant AIO entries. In the meantime I should welcome any corrigenda or suggestions for improvements

This paper tries to show that the use of mysteric jargon and certain ritual elements in Imperial cult was devised and adopted in order to suggest a specific understanding and experience of Imperial power. The world of mysteries provided the collective framework of meaning within which those stimuli made complete sense. To this end, I will explore one of the main lines of inquiry that runs through the present volume: how and why Imperial cult made use of the collective semantic value of the mysteries.  In pursuing this question, I will focus on what is, in my opinion, one of the most promising lines of thought in the recent development of sensory studies, that is, the actual shaping of experience by cultural constructs.

The paper offers the second half of a comprehensive survey of the two most important Boiotian regional festivals, i.e. the Basileia of Lebadeia and the Pamboiotia of Koroneia. The author contends that these competitions had a regional impact and were performed independently of the existence of a federal government in Boiotia. This article, in particular, addresses the Hellenistic and Roman periods of these festivals. The third and the second centuries BC (Section 3), before the dismantlement of the Boiotian koinon in 171 BC, saw the great success of both the Basileia and the Pamboiotia. The Basileia were an individual competition and the federal government decided, around 221/0 BC, to declare this a sacred festival. The Pamboiotia became, from the early third century BC, a military event, because there were contests for military units and these could perform their training. This difference explains why, after 171 BC, the Pamboiotia disappeared and the Basileia continued as a local festival with a new name, Trophonia (Section 4). The first century BC saw a new regional organization, in Boiotia, with the reprise of a koinon. The Roman koinon was not a political body but could manage regional festivals and the Boiotians as a whole decided to rename the Trophonia with their original name and to restart the Pamboiotia. The author claims that the Roman government strongly influenced the choice to abandon the military aspects of the Pamboiotia. The external influence also explains why, in the imperial period (Section 5), the Basileia were probably renamed Kaisareia and substituted by the imperial cult in Lebadeia. The late, short fate of the new Trophonia in the third century AD is exceptional and could indicate that the Boiotian koinon now chose to focus more on the Pamboiotia as a regional festival. The cult in Koroneia is still important in the imperial period; the last clear signs of individual contests in Koroneia date to the first century AD and in the II Century AD Koroneia was mostly a meeting point for the Boiotians. The study demonstrates that the longue durée of the Pamboiotia and the Basileia (fifth/fourth cent. BC-third cent. AD) depends on the Boiotian use of these regional festivals as carriers of collective memory.

The study analyses the ancient sources relating to the Hellenistic site of Aï Khanum in Bactria in order to delineate social and cultural relations in an ethnic context of interference and to remove the perspective of comparison and the alternative of categories perceived as monolithic and, at best, juxtaposed.

Class: An Album of Examples 122-276 CE album intro The first three (no.1-3) pre-date the governorship of Petronius Mamertinus, when this style of writing became prominent. Its origin seems to have been in cursive writing (no. 3 >50%, less so no.1 <25%). Replacing internal pen lifts with loops improved writing speed, so there is a functional component to the more obvious stylistic ones. No. 2 is non-cursive, but uses looped features, though inconsistently. No.4 (PSI V 446, 133-37), a decree from the prefect, is a refined, stylized version of this script (or this subset of stylistic features) written with great regularity. No.5 (BGU 20.2863), a copy of a letter from a judge to the prefect, is in a very similar hand, without the calligraphic refinements.

The epigraphic record of the Archaic age related to Zankle consists of a few documents: these are coin legends and dedications to Olympia, inscribed in the Chalkidic alphabet, which enlighten the history of
the city between the late VI and early decades of the V cent. B.C. Six previously unpublished vascular graffiti, coming from urban excavations carried out by the Superintendence of Messina in the 70s-90s, now fill the gap related to the first centuries of life of the Chalkidic polis and its urban territory. The inscriptions nrr. 1, 2, 3, and perhaps nr. 4, precede the oldest monetary legends of Zankle of the last quarter of the sixth century. The oldest graffito (nr. 1), engraved on local ceramics, was presumably written in Zankle toward the end of VII cent. B.C., the other three are on SOS and à la brosse amphorae and pose the problematic relationship between written text and life stages of this type of vessels. The two most recent graffiti (nrr. 5 and 6), dating back to the first decades of the V century, probably record the oldest evidence of graphemes of the eastern ionic alphabet found on the soil of Zankle and can be contextualized within the phenomenon of ‘Ionification’ of the alphabets of Sicily, which occurred some decades before the so-called reform of Archinus in Athens.

Ist es jemals gerechtfertigt, ein Denkmal zu zerstören? Im Folgenden werfe ich einen Blick auf die Denkmalstürze der letzten Jahre. Ich betrachte sie als einen Versuch, das kollektive historische Gedächtnis einer Auffrischung zu unterziehen. Solche Kritik an Denkmälern als antidemokratischen Vandalismus abzutun, greift zu kurz; eher könnte man von Artikulationen eines »Sinns für Ungerechtigkeit« sprechen.

This was a virtual lecture at the workshop, entitled as "Lists and Inventories of Textiles from Ancient to Modern Times" which was held on 9 November 2023, via Zoom, in Romania.

As textile production was a key part of ancient Graeco-Roman societies and the ancient textile industry was the largest economic sector in these societies, textile inventories can be defined as major epigraphic texts as well. Some of such sources exist both in Greece, Turkey and Egypt written on stone in ancient Greek and Coptic languages. This lecture will conduct a study in order to understand what historical data can be drawn from these epigraphic texts, as Coptic and Greek inscriptions are not unusual on garments from Classical eastern Mediterranean. After initial comments on the role of Greek inscriptions as 'archives', this lecture will review the existence of textile references in the epigraphic sources of the Graeco-Roman ancient economies. The study is sketched with epigraphic documentation of land exploitation and textile production in the Mediterranean area. The use of textiles as votive offerings and ritual dress using epigraphy will be one of the major focuses of this lecture.

Keywords: epigraphy, Greek epigraphy, Coptic epigraphy, Greece, Turkey, Egypt, textile inventories, textile archaeology.

Main references

'Textiles, trade and the urban economies of Roman Asia Minor', in K. Piesker (ed.) Greek Epigraphy and Comparative Ancient History: Two Case Studies.

A. Bresson, Greek Epigraphy and Ancient Economics, in: J. Davies and J. Wilkes (eds.), Epigraphy and the Historical Sciences, Proceedings of the British Academy (London 2012; online edition, British Academy Scholarship Online, 31 Jan. 2013).

C. Brøns, Gods and Garments: Textiles in Greek Sanctuaries in the 7th to the 1st Centuries BC, Ancient Textiles Series 28 (Oxford: Oxbow Books, 2017).

M. Durand, Inscribed Fabrics from Egypt. A Study in Greek and Coptic Textile Epigraphy, Journal of Coptic Studies 11, 2009, 157-180.

M. Harlow and M.-L. Nosch, Greek and Roman Textiles and Dress: An Interdisciplinary Anthology (Oxford: Oxbow Books, 2014).

The Graduate School of the Cluster of Excellence "Understanding Written Artefacts" at CSMC invites applications for doctoral scholarships within the Graduate School Scholarship Programme (GSSP) of the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD), for a 3-year period of doctoral studies starting from 1 April 2024 onwards. Awardees will receive a full scholarship (1200 EUR/month) plus health insurance and additional allowances (for details, see here). An extension to four years is possible in well-grounded cases. We are looking for highly qualified and very motivated international candidates (non-German citizens) with excellent English skills and holding a Master's, Diploma or equivalent degree in any discipline concerned with the study of manuscript cultures and written artefacts. In particular, we welcome applications from candidates from developing and emerging countries. About CSMC as a research environment CSMC has created a cross-disciplinary and international research environment for the holistic study of handwritten artefacts and the rich diversity of global manuscript cultures beyond traditionally held boundaries of academic discipline, time, and space. Today, around 150 researchers from over 40 academic disciplines are working on more than 60 research projects, many of which combine the humanities with the natural sciences and computer sciences. To get an impression what it is like to study written artefacts at CSMC, watch these films.

The Graduate School of the Cluster of Excellence "Understanding Written Artefacts" at CSMC invites applications for doctoral scholarships within the Graduate School Scholarship Programme (GSSP) of the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD), for a 3-year period of doctoral studies starting from 1 April 2024 onwards. Awardees will receive a full scholarship (1200 EUR/month) plus health insurance and additional allowances (for details, see here). An extension to four years is possible in well-grounded cases. We are looking for highly qualified and very motivated international candidates (non-German citizens) with excellent English skills and holding a Master's, Diploma or equivalent degree in any discipline concerned with the study of manuscript cultures and written artefacts. In particular, we welcome applications from candidates from developing and emerging countries. About CSMC as a research environment CSMC has created a cross-disciplinary and international research environment for the holistic study of handwritten artefacts and the rich diversity of global manuscript cultures beyond traditionally held boundaries of academic discipline, time, and space. Today, around 150 researchers from over 40 academic disciplines are working on more than 60 research projects, many of which combine the humanities with the natural sciences and computer sciences. To get an impression what it is like to study written artefacts at CSMC, watch these films.

In this brief paper we will focus on six dams of the Roman period in Asia Minor, respectively Böğet, Örükaya, Seleucia Pieria, Ancyra, Aezani and Sardis, which are presented here in some outlines. The aim of this article is to introduce these ancient engineering monuments all together.

Recensione di S. Kaczko, Archaic and Classical Attic Dedicatory Epigrams: An Epigraphic, Literary and Linguistic Commentary, ‘Trends in Classics – supplementary Volumes’, 33, Berlin-Boston: De Gruyter 2016, «Athenaeum» 109.2, 2021, pp. 679-684

Creative practitioners inside academia are often tasked with explaining how their embodied practices constitute research. The Peribiophoty project reverses this paradigm to ask: how does academic research constitute embodied practice?  By considering the personal and intellectual contexts (peri), surrounding academics and their biographies (bio), through audio-visual representation (photy), we investigate how academic thinking is embodied thinking. The notion that “traditional” research only involves the brain is challenged by the audio-visual representations of thoughts and ideas embedded in objects, experience, time, and interactions. Peribiophoty makes its propositions about academic thinking through embodied presence and rhythmic juxtapositions of gesture, things, place, text on screen and voice. It evokes the narrative pasts and selves of the project’s literature, history, and digital games scholars as substantively entangled with their ongoing research programs and demonstrate...

A large number of sources-mainly inscriptions-from the Hellenistic and Roman Imperial periods attest to the transfer of movable or immovable property to a community (polis, deme or association) by means of a perpetual conditional endowment in order to finance a purpose determined by the donor from the income generated by the investment. The management of the endowment is delegated by the donor to the recipient community. Much more than any other type of gift, these endowments (known as 'foundations' or 'Stiftungen' in previous literature) are used to finance cult activities. In many cases they relate to a cult in general, but in other cases, they relate to specific activities, always linked to the community in question, such as sacrifices, banquets, contests, and even entire festivals. Very often, the purpose of an endowment is to finance a new cult or a special celebration, which may even bear the name of the donor or provide for rituals to honour the donor during his lifetime or after his death. In this type of endowment, the aims of the donor and the recipient meet and serve each other, creating a win-win situation: the donor demonstrates his piety while ensuring his and his family's prestige or memory within the community, and the community has the opportunity to enhance its religious life and increase the number of shared celebrations for its members, thereby strengthening its cohesion, its identity and, ultimately, its very existence. The seminar takes place Tuesday, September 26, 2023, 17.00 (Athens) with live presence at the Swedish Institute or online via Zoom.

The article can be found here: https://muse.jhu.edu/issue/50395

The Syriac Julian Romance, a tripartite fictional account of the reign of the Emperor Julian, was hitherto only partially known from two manuscripts. This article publishes the missing first section from Vat. Sir. 37, a section that narrates the death of Constantius II. The complete text allows us to demonstrate that the narrative was composed by a single author and that the tripartite structure does not reflect three older, separate texts. Further, we identify the Miscellaneous Chronicle of 640 as the source for most of the historical information in the Romance. This implies a new date in the first half of the seventh century, which is supported by other chronological indications in the Romance.

This essay addresses physical as well as epistemological visibility of Christian(ized) inscriptions as part of the cityscape of late antique Ephesos by looking at two case studies. The first is arguably the most well-known Christian inscription from Asia Minor—the epigram by one Demeas on his alleged destruction of an image of Artemis; the second largely obscure inscribed honours of an high-standing imperial official.
    I argue that Demeas inscription, although looming large in scholarly narratives of "Christianization" of the region, would have fallen short of making a visual, and communicative, impact, set as it was in a densely-inscribed written space around the Library of Celsus. The proconsul's honorific epigram, while demonstrably featuring New Testament language, is equally problematic as a means of communicating Christian ideas as another, non-conspicuous inscription with stronger contenders for attention of city dwellers.
    I conclude by offering critical remarks on how the visual significance of inscriptions as physical and spatial objects may be at odds with their elevated meaning when approached and analyzed as texts in printed editions, and how the recent trends in scholarship towards enhanced appreciation of materiality may change this.