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Inscribed Block (©Archaeological Exploration of Sardis/President and Fellows of Harvard College)
Inscribed Block (re-used as drain cover slab between Mocaic Inscription and Monumental Arch): Building Inscription in distichs, under Flavius? Maionios
- Date
- Ca. 5th–6th century AD., Roman
- Sardis or Museum Inv. No.
- IN70.007
- Material
- Marble, Stone
- Object Type
- Architecture, Inscription
- Inscription Type
- Building Inscription
- Inscription language
- Greek
- Inscription Text
- - - - - - - - - - - - - Μαιόν[ιος] μεγ̣άλῳ̣ . ΗΔΕ̣ Ι̣ Ι̣ Ε̣ Ι̣[ ] pentameter 2 αὐτὰρ ὁ πειθόμενος τεχνήσ[ατο – ⏑⏑ – –] hexameter κρηπεῖδα κρατερὴν κρείσονα [– ⏑⏑ –]. pentameter
- Inscription Translation
- “[- - -] Maion[ios] with great [- - -]. But he obeyed and executed skillfully [- - -] a mighty foundation, which is stronger [than - - -].”
- Inscription Comment
- Site
- Sardis
- Sector
- RT
- Trench
- Syn 70
- Locus
- Monumental Arch (area of)
- B-Grid Coordinates
- E117.5 / S10 *96.6
- Findspot
- Road Trench, Monumental Arch, found face up next to the mosaic, no.
424 , reused as a cover slab in a repair to the drain that separates this mosaic from the arch foundations.
- Description
Block with a vertical break near the midpoint; cut off above; the left side seems to be original, while the back is heavily picked but smoothed from being walked upon.
- Dimensions
- H. 0.60, W. 1.17, Th. 0.24, H. of letters 0.04–0.045.
- Comments
This is the fragment of a building inscription in distichs, the beginning of which is lost.
1 It is highly probable that the Μαιόν[ιος] of the first preserved verse is identical with the magnificentissimus count and consularis, Φλ(άβιος) Μαιόνιος, mentioned in no. 424. He had probably been asked by Sardis to construct a foundation; the last distich mentions that he fulfilled the request.
3 κρηπίς: “groundwork, foundation, basement,” also “walled edge” or “abutment” (LSJ s.v., II). M. Chr. Hellmann, Recherches sur le vocabulaire de l’architecture grecque d’après les inscriptions de Délos (1992), pp. 242–43 deals with the term. According to her, it “est avant tout utilisé…pour la plate-forme ou le soubassement à degrés…d’un important édifice public, soubassement visible au-dessus des fondations proprement dites….” Furthermore “mur de soutènement à gradins” or, in plural, the seats (“gradins”) of a theater (ibid.).
Flavius Maionios may thus have financed a massive stabilizing repair of a “mighty basement/foundation” for the monumental arch; this might be identified with the “Packed Columns Area” just to its north. Maybe the epigram said that this new “basement/foundation” was “stronger” [than the former building was].
- See Also
- Bibliography
- Mentioned in BASOR 203 (1971), p. 14; text unpublished.
- Author
- GP