Imperial dedication for Diocletian and Maximian
created: Transcription (Reynolds).
source date: CE 286-293
language: ar; en; fr; de; grc; grc-Latn; el; he
availability: Creative Commons licence Attribution UK 2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/uk/) All reuse or distribution of this work must contain somewhere a link back to the URL http://inslib.kcl.ac.uk/

Bibliography

[...]κη ὑπὲρ ϲωτηρίαϲ καὶ νείκαϲ καὶ αἰωνίαϲ διαμονᾶϲ τῶν θείων Κυρίων Αὐτοκρατόρων Καιϲάρων [...] Μάρκου Οὐαλερίου Διοκλητιανοῦ καὶ Μάρκου Αὐρηλίου Οὐαλερίου Ϲεβαϲτῶν καὶ τοῦ ϲύνπαντοϲ αὐτῶν οἶκον ἡ πόλιϲ τῶν Κυρηναίων εὐτυχῶϲ

Translations

[To ?] For the safety and victory and eternal endurance of the divine lords [Emperors Caesars . . . M(arcus) Valerius] Diocletian and [M(arcus)] Aurelius Valerius] [[Maximian]], Augusti, and their whole [household: the city of the] Cyrenaeans made the dedication. With good fortune.

Commentary

Line 1: presumably the name of the god or goddess to whom the dedication was made.

Lines 3-5: Presumably after the elevation of Maximian as Augustus, but before the appointment of the Caesars, who should otherwise have been named.

Line 5: Lactantius describes Constantine as having images of Maximian destroyed in 314-18: Mort Pers. 42.1, eodemque tempore senis Maximiani statuae Constantini iussu revellebantur et imagines ubicumque pictus esse(n)t detrahebantur (translation available at CCEL). this would presumably also involve erasure of his name in inscriptions. His image was effaced in the temple at Luxor: see further E. R. Varner, Mutilation and Transformation (2004), 214-15.