Chapter One:
THE MOST RECENT DATE ANALYSIS OF
THE L. ARTORIUS CASTUS INSCRIPTION
The date of the now famous Lucius Artorius Castus memorial stone, found in Podstrana, Croatia, has long been subject of debate. Needless to say, having some idea as to when the stone was made has a huge bearing on our ability to fix Castus in a historical context.
Fortunately, I was able to obtain excellent treatments of the stone’s style from two leading Roman epigraphers.
The first comes from Dr. Benet Salway
(https://www.ucl.ac.uk/history/people/academic-staff/dr-benet-salway):
“Coming to the stone cold without any presuppositions and basing my opinion purely on the script, I would favour a date in the Severan period (AD 193-235) or up to a decade or so later. I base this on the high degree of ligaturing in the design.”
This
sentiment was echoed in more detail by Prof. Abigail Graham
(https://ics.sas.ac.uk/people/dr-abigail-graham):
“I have come across this before but not in detail.
A few key points.
Visual cues (like stop marks or ligatures) alone are seldom reliable indicators of date. However, combined with a series of other elements, they can be helpful.
I know Benet Salway and Roger Tomlin. For the Antonine date, I think Roger subscribed to Miletic's theory, which is based on archaeology and historical evidence for camps. My issue is that there are several mistakes in Miletics assessments of the inscriptions, that suggest he is referring to them, rather than looking at them carefully. He wants the pieces to fit together, but that does not necessarily mean they do. https://storicamente.org/miletic_bekavac_castus_liburnia_italy
I note several issues, and I can see why Benet has gone for a later Severan date.
Dating by style alone is dangerous, but there are stylistic, spelling and practical features that are incredibly rare before a certain time.
There are a few things that, in my mind, make it very hard to accept an Antonine date, at the earliest, one could say Commodus, but it’s a stretch. These have to do with a combination of visual features, ligatures, spacing, stops, textual organisation and spellings.
Ligatures & Spacing. Ligatures can happen at any time for practical reasons: when cutters run out of space (often in the right hand margin). As texts become more complex, this happens more often. By the time of Septimius Severus, however, they also become decorative, and some seem deliberate, even artistic. Quite a few ligatures in this text happen early on in a line (ll 2-3, 5, 6) not as the carver ran out of space, and with the letter T. Two unusual ones of curved forms also fall beneath each other. ll. 7-8. Also line 9, there was no need for a ligature of 'TE" there was plenty of space (compare with a practical use of ligature NTE at the end of line 8). Ligatures of vowels and T form become popular under Septimius Severus, and occur regardless of spacing. cf. Line 2 of this text from Britain. https://romaninscriptionsofbritain.org/inscriptions/1151.
Terms: "Duci" tends to be used in the 3rd c. CE. I found one use in Pannonia on a shield referring to Commodus (180-191). for [Vi]ctoria [re] duci . All other uses are Severan or later.
Spellings: Another dating issue noted by Salway is the replication of letters "Legg" (or "Augg" ""praeff" to show a potential plural. I cannot find a single example of this anywhere in the empire before Sept Severus (201 CE), though it occurs frequently after.
The lovely letters, the contrast between deep and light chisel cuts (for another example of this Severan from Pannonia cf. https://lupa.at/26913, also note the fine triangulate interpuncts), plus the double letters, the ligatures for decorative rather than functional use... As well as spelling and terminology all point to Severan or a bit later. At the earliest, this could be 180, but the issue is, it does not look anything like the parallel text cited by Miletic CIL 3. 11695 https://www.flickr.com/photos/156429244@N04/43444599171.
A monumental text from this period (ca. 179/180) has no ligatures, and different lettering style altogether. It is hard to believe that a man born in ca. 100, in his fifties by 154, as he claims, was commemorated in ca. 180-190. It is not impossible, but it would be incredibly rare.
Where do the interpuncts fit in? You are right to observe these: this is a beautifully arranged inscription with skilled carving. Dating at text involves taking in the whole picture, and reconciling skill and message with the medium. Few texts are perfect and this had moments of difficulty, but it is beautifully rendered. The idea that all ligatures are from lack of talent does not hold, in theory or in practice. That double letters are a series of errors in common terms "legg", "praeff" is hard to accept, especially when these features emerge after 200 CE Legg= at least 22 cases, all dating to the 3rd. C. CE, most between 200-250. "praeff" 40+ cases, none dating before 200. I lean towards Benet Salway's date: Severan or later. I'm not sure one can rule out something from 180, but it would be an anomaly. It's a shame Miletic's archaeology/history and the dating don't align, but this happens often.
We
have to be very careful about seeing what is there, as opposed to what we want
to see.”
***
No comments:
Post a Comment
Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.