Dedication to Apollo

IGCyr030700

Trismegistos ID: 738299

Source Description

Repository

Cyrene Museum, 250 (fragm. a+b); 513 (fragm. c); 166 (fragm. d).

Support

Dark grey marble block, broken away below, reconstituted from four adjacent fragments (a and b pasted together); the back is cut obliquely, perhaps for its original use (all together 0.49; 0.195;0.09 at top, 0.17 below).

Layout

Inscribed on the face.

Letters

0.035; carefully cut, with very slight serifs; calice-shaped upsilon, slanting sigma.

Place of Origin

Findspot.

Date

First half of third century B.C. (lettering)

Findspot

Fragment c was found during Oliverio's excavations in 1928 at Cyrene : Sanctuary of Apollo, in a small building to the North of the Temple of Artemis ; the other fragments are of unknown provenance.

Last recorded Location

Seen by C. Dobias-Lalou in 1979 in Shahat : Cyrene Museum .

Text constituted from

Transcription from stone (CDL).

Bibliography

Fragment d: Oliverio, 1930 , p. 205, n. 27, fig. 62, whence SEG , 9.323; the other fragments were not previously published.

Text

|Μ̣νάσ[αρ]|χος |Κ̣αρτι|σθ[έ]|νευς |Ἀπ̣|ό̣λ[λωνι ἀνέθηκε?].

Apparatus

1 Oliverio, 1930  [---] χος

2 Oliverio, 1930  [---] νευς

French translation

Mnasarkhos fils de Kartisthenès [a consacré?] à Apollon.

English translation

Mnasarchos son of Kartisthenes [dedicated?] to Apollo.

Italian translation

Mnasarchos figlio di Kartisthenes [ha dedicato?] ad Apollo.

Commentary

Although both names are not rare in Cyrenaica, this man might be akin to the homonymous thearodokos of the Delphians mentioned in the great list Plassart, 1921 , IV.16 and registered in PP 14980. This list is now dated from the third century B.C. (J. Oulhen, unpublished thesis of 1992).

The lettering of this inscription is very similar to that of IGCyr063900 and IGCyr063100, thus placing our inscription at a date not too late in the third century. Therefore, it is tempting to assume that Mnasarkhos was either the thearodokos himself or his grandfather.

Oliverio gave no date for the lettering; the indication 'first century A.D.' given in SEG is not sustainable.

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All citation, reuse or distribution of this work must contain a link back to DOI: http://doi.org/10.6092/UNIBO/IGCYRGVCYR and the filename (IGCyr000000 or GVCyr000), as well as the year of consultation.

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