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Inscribed Base (©Archaeological Exploration of Sardis/President and Fellows of Harvard College)
Inscribed Base: Agonistic Inscription for Secundus, a wrestler
- Date
- Period of the second neokorate, before 212 AD., Roman
- Sardis or Museum Inv. No.
- NoEx74.008
- Material
- Marble, Stone
- Object Type
- Statue Base, Inscription
- Inscription Type
- Agonistic Inscription
- Inscription language
- Greek
- Inscription Text
Μητροδώρου Ἀτταλᾶ βουλαρχοῦντος καὶ v ἀγωνοθετοῦντος vv 4 ἐν τῇ πρωτόχθονι κὲ ἱερᾷ τῶν θεῶν καὶ μη- τροπόλει τῆς Ἀσίας καὶ δὶς νεωκόρῳ τῶν 8 Σεβαστῶν κατὰ τὰ δόγματα τῆς ἱερᾶς συγκλήτου, φίλῃ καὶ συμμάχῳ Ῥωμαίων 12 Σαρδιανῶν πόλει, ξυσταρχούντων ἀρ- χενβατῶν Π. Αἰλ. Τρύ- φωνος καὶ Τατιανοῦ 16 Εὐγάμου Σεκοῦ̣[νδος] Μίθρου τοῦ καὶ [ ]- λου Ὑπαιπηνὸς [καὶ] Σαρδιανὸς πάλην.
- Inscription Translation
- “When Metrodoros Attalas officiated as boularchos and agonothetes in the city of the Sardians, protochthonous and sacred to the gods and metropolis of Asia, and keeper of two Koinon temples of the Augusti by virtue of the decrees of the sacred Senate, friend and ally of the Romans; when Publius Aelius Tryphon and Tatianos Eugamos, the archembatai, officiated as xystarchs: Secundus, citizen of Hypaipa and Sardis, son of Mithres bearing the second name [- -]los, (was victorious in the discipline of) wrestling.”
- Inscription Comment
- Site
- Allahdiyen
- Findspot
- From a field wall west of Allahdiyen-Salihli road, ca. 1/2–2/3 km north of Allahdiyen.
- Description
Partly broken and damaged base of white marble with moldings at the top and bottom. On the rectangular upper surface there are holes for the insertion of a statue.
- Dimensions
- H. 1.22, W. 0.46, Th. 0.47, H. of letters 0.025.
- Comments
Summary of Herrmann’s detailed commentary:
13–14 ξυσταρχούντων (see no. 377, 11 comm.) ἀρχενβατῶν, etc.: Perhaps “the agon supervised/controlled by the ξυστάρχαι was held in honor of the deity to whom the adyton in question belonged: perhaps Kore, since the main festival of Sardis was the Χρυσάνθινα dedicated to this goddess” (SEG, after Herrmann). This testimony could support the idea of a board of xystarchai and is quoted as “énigmatique” by D. Rousset and J.-Y. Strasser, REG 2017, p. 10. In IGSK 24, 1 (Smyrna), no. 726, Κόρης μύσται σηκοῦ καὶ ἐνβάται οἱ ἐν Σμύρνῃ are on record: a privileged group of worshipers allowed to enter the adyton; cf., in the Sardian Zeus cult, οἱ εἰσπορευόμενοι εἰς τὸ ἄδυτον, no. 434, 5–7 (also Sardis VII 1, no. 22; and no. 354); J.-L. Ferrary, Les mémoriaux de délégations du sanctuaire oraculaire de Claros… I (2014), pp. 128–29.
For Allahdiyen as a possible location of Kore’s sanctuary see no. 691, 1–2 comm.
Period of the second neokorate (see no. 397, 5 comm.), before 212 AD (D. Rousset and J.-Y. Strasser, REG 2017, p. 10 n. 21).
- See Also
- Bibliography
- P. Herrmann, Chiron 26 (1996), pp. 335–41, with detailed commentary, and photograph p. 348, fig. 8 (SEG 46, 1532; AE 1996, 1449).
- Author
- GP