Dedication

IGCyr083800

Trismegistos ID: 738392

Source Description

Support

Fragment of a limestone rectangular altar with mouldings below and above and at least one compartment in the upper face (dimensions of base 1.5;0.8; restored width of inscribed area 1.02)s.

Layout

Inscribed on two opposite sides of the upper moulding (a and b).

Letters

Side a: 0.046, one letter plus space 0.9; side b: 0.045, one letter plus space 0.145; slantering sigma.

Place of Origin

Findspot.

Date

Ca. 250 B.C. (context)

Findspot

Found in 1916 at Cyrene : agora , South of the Temple of Demeter and Kore .

Last recorded Location

Studied by G. Paci before 1995 in situ.

Present Location

Not seen by IGCyr team.

Text constituted from

Transcription from previous editor.

Bibliography

Bacchielli, 1995 , pp. 130-132 (ph.), whence SEG , 45.2169; Bacchielli, 1995 , pp. 243-244 (= Bacchielli, 2002 , pp. 123-124, pl. XXX, 2).

Text

a
Εὐνομ̣[ίας Δίκας?]
b
[c. 6] ας

Apparatus

b.1 [c. 6] ας : Bacchielli, 1995  [Εἰρήν?]ας

French translation

a) (Autel) d'Eunomia [et de Dika?].

b) (Autel) de [c. 6] a.

English translation

a) (Altar) of Eunomia [and of Dika?].

b) (Altar) of [c. 6] a.

Italian translation

a) (Altare) d'Eunomia [e di Dika?].

b) (Altare) di [c. 6] a.

Commentary

The altar was first mentioned by Oliverio, 1931 , p. 21, who spoke of «altari (uno dedicato alla Benevolenza)»; Stucchi, 1984 , p. 854 followed Oliverio's implicit restoration when speaking of «l'ara di Eunoia». However Bacchielli gave for the first time photographs and added an epigraphic analysis by G. Paci. The latter argued that what remains of the last preserved letter, being slightly oblique, is no iota but a mu. Hence the restored name of Eunomia.

The lettering may be dated widely in the third century B.C.; the archaeological context for the displacement of the Demeter and Kore sanctuary of the agora from the Western side towards the middle of the piazza dates of the middle of the century. Bacchielli links it more precisely with the marriage of Berenice with Ptolemy III and argues that after the troubles following Magas' death in 250 this event was the occasion of developing the cult of Demeter as the marriage goddess and jointly that of Eunomia ('Good Order') with possibly Dike and/or Eirene, all three daughters of Themis. The placement of two names on one side and one name on the opposite side is linked to the dimensions of the missing part and to the different spacing of the letters on both sides. In spite of some good arguments, we prefer to leave the third name open, for it would be fully restored.

Anyhow the altar seems to have been shared by three goddesses, a fact that is paralleled at Cyrene, but for the fact that in the other known examples all the names are written on one and the same side of the altars, which rest against another building. The difference here would be due to the place of the altar, that was to be seen from either of its two long sides.

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