Honours for a woman
created: Transcription (Reynolds).
source date: Probably first century BCE;
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

[...], 185, whence [...] 26.1825, [...] 324720; [...] 353-5, whence [...] 1985.842, [...], 1988.1008 [...] 35.1716; [...], A.19, whence [...], 2013.480, [...], 12.

[...]ίαν Λευκίω τὰν Λευκίω [...] γοντηίω Λευκίω υἱῶ Ῥούφω τῶ πάτρωνος καὶ εὐεργέτα ματέρα Κυραναῖοι Ἄριστις Ταβάλβιος ἐπόησε

Apparatus

[^a1: at 1: . . . -]ίαν and Λε[υκίω at end | [Με] or [Μα]μμίαν, and Λευκίω]

[^a2: at 2: Φονταίω | [Βαρ]γοντηίω]

Translation

The Cyrenaeans dedicated the statue of [ . ? . ]ia, daughter of Lucius, mother of Lucius [ . . ]gonteius Rufus son of Lucius, their patron and benefactor.

Aristis son of Tabalbis was the sculptor

The Cyrenaeans dedicated the statue of [ . ? . ]ia, daughter of Leukios Lucius mother of Leukios [. . -]gonteios Rouphos Lucius [ . . ]gonteius Rufus son of Leukios Lucius, their patron and benefactor.

Aristis son of Tabalbis was the sculptor

Commentary

The fact that the Cyrenaeans re-used an older base for this statue is to be related to the fact that all marble used in Cyrenaica had to be imported. If the dedication is rightly dated, long periods of the first century BCE were disrupted by piracy and the Roman Civil Wars and importation of goods from abroad will have been a risky business

It is clear that the son, who takes up the greatest space, is the person who matters most to the Cyrenaeans, but he cannot be identified at present. While he may have been an Italian businessman operating in the province, the presence of his mother with him perhaps suggests that his family were immigrants, (although so far there is no indication of its presence there later), and that the mother had as a result become involved in the cult of Demeter and Kore.

The named sculptor was presumably responsible for this statue, which may therefore have been re-used. It should be noted that his patronymic is not Greek but Libyan: see Masson (1976) 40 for a comment on it.

For honours paid by the city in the Sanctuary see on C.445.