Repository
Benghazi Museum (Sidi Khrebish excavations), H410.
Support
Stone ball from a series of twenty-three, some of limestone, others of sandstone; chipped (weight 3.05 kg; diameter 0.15).
Layout
Inscribed with one letter and perhaps another one, not contiguous.
Letters
0.035.
Place of Origin
Findspot.
Date
Between 246 and end of second century B.C. (context)
Findspot
Found during the excavations (1973-1975) conducted by J. Lloyd at Berenike pleiades; HGL : in the area of Hellenistic city walls .
Present Location
Not seen by IGCyr team.
Text constituted from
Transcription from editors.
Reynolds, 2010 Reynolds, J.M., 2010, Inscribed missiles found at Sidi Khrebish Benghazi, in M. Luni (ed.), Cirene e la Cirenaica nell'Antichità, Monografie di archeologia libica30, Cirene Atene d'Africa: attività delle missioni archeologiche internazionali a Cirene e in Cirenaica3, Roma, 225-228 - see in bibliography , pp. 226-228, whence SEG Supplementum Epigraphicum Graecum, Leiden, then Amsterdam, 1923-1971, then 1979- - see in bibliography , 60.1832. Cf. Lloyd-Kenrick, 2014 Lloyd, J., Kenrick, Ph., 2014, Excavations at Sidi Khrebish, Benghazi, 1971-75: the small finds, Libyan Studies (LS), 45, 97-150 - see in bibliography , p. 138; Reynolds-Kenrick, 2015 Reynolds, J.M., Kenrick, P., 2015, The epigraphy of Sidi Khrebish, Benghazi (Berenice): an update, Libyan Studies (LibStud), 46, 75-101 - see in bibliography , pp. 76-81.
b.1 (Perhaps no letter, but a stroke cut in the course of shaping the ball)
a) Un. b) Dix (?).
a) One. b) Ten (?).
a) Uno. b) Dieci (?).
Known through a much delated publication, the balls are not easily individuated. However, J.M. Reynolds was able to show that the letters are not related to the weight of the balls and might indicate "a numbered military position of machine" from which it was projected. In any case, it cannot be the initial of a personal name, for IGCyr111330 bears a digamma, proving that the letters have a numeral value.
The date for all the balls should be between the foundation of Berenike (246 B.C.) and phase 2 of the Hellenistic city-wall (end of second century B.C.).
Creative Commons Attributions-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.
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.