• m14-612-10
    Inscribed Roof-Shaped Cinerarium Lid Fragment (©Archaeological Exploration of Sardis/President and Fellows of Harvard College)

    Inscribed Roof-Shaped Cinerarium Lid Fragment: Funerary Inscription for [- - -] Alexion, son of Philippos, of the tribe Tmolis

    Date
    Before 9 BC., Hellenistic or Roman
    Sardis or Museum Inv. No.
    IN60.043
    Material
    Marble, Stone
    Object Type
    Cinerarium Lid, Inscription
    Inscription Type
    Funerary Inscription
    Inscription language
    Greek
    Inscription Text
    		Ἐπὶ Λαβιηνοῦ τ̣[οῦ	      ]
    		ου v ἐμβολίμο[υ Ξανδικοῦ?]
    		ζ´ vac. ἀπιόντος· [	      ]
    	4	Φιλίπου Τμωλ[ίδος ὁ καὶ?]
    		Ἀλεξίων v ἐτ[ῶν	      ]
    		         ἄτεκνο[ς].
    Inscription Translation
    “In the year when Labienus, [son of - - -], held office, on the seventh day from the end of the intercalated (month) [Xandikos?], (died), without children [- - -], son of Philip(p)os, (of the phyle) Tmolis, [with the second name] Alexion, aged [ x ] years.”
    Inscription Comment
    Site
    Sart Mustafa
    Description

    Left half of a roof-shaped cinerarium lid of marble.

    Dimensions
    H. 0.35, W. 0.24, Th. 0.06, H. of letters ca. 0.017.
    Comments

    Herrmann’s text and restorations; his commentaries are the base for the following notes.

    1 Herrmann refers to Sardis VII 1, no. 120 (ἐπὶ Ἑρμίππου Λαβιηνοῦ), probably a double name; here it seems that the name of Labienus’s father followed. Therefore, Herrmann hesitates to see both Labieni as one and the same person. He qualifies Buckler and Robinson’s idea of an identification with the famous Q. Labienus (on him notably Cass. Dio 48, 24, 4–6; 26, 3–5) as speculation even if it is a reasonable assumption that Labienus was present at Sardis when Cassius and Brutus met there in 42 BC (Plut. Brut. 34, 1).

    2 Either the month Xandikos or Hyperberetaios were intercalated before the calendar reform of 9 BC; see E. Gibson, ZPE 42 (1981), p. 216; and P. Thonemann, ZPE 196 (2015), p. 137.

    4 For the phyle Tmolis (ΤΥΜΩΛΙΣ, as it seems, Sardis VII 1, no. 34; cf. ibid. no. 152, 3, with L. Robert, Op. Min. III, pp. 1612–13: [Μ]ηνὸς Τυμωλεί[του]), see nos. 350, 24–25 and 573; N. F. Jones, Public Organization in Ancient Greece (1987), pp. 356–57; and U. Kunnert, Bürger unter sich; Phylen in den Städten des kaiserzeitlichen Ostens (2012), p. 126.

    6 Herrmann wonders whether ἄτεκνος was added to illustrate the situation of the deceased or if the term had legal relevance (like on the tablets of Herakleia, V. Arangio-Ruiz and A. Olivieri, Inscr. Graecae Siciliae et infimae Italiae ad ius pertinentes [1925], no. 1, I 151 ἄτεκνος ἄφωνος [= intestatus] or the νόμος τῶν ἀτέκνων in the manumission documents from Epirus [P. Cabanes, Symposion 1977 (1982), pp. 197–213]).

    See Also
    Bibliography
    Unpublished. Herrmann, ms.
    Author
    GP