Dedication related with the telesphoria
IGCyr130200
Trismegistos ID: 738849
Source Description
Repository
Cyrene Museum, 511.
Support
Part of a white marble rectangular block, broken off at left and right and also at the back (0.18; 0.20;0.145).
Layout
Inscribed in two lines on the face, which is covered with black (probably soot).
Letters
0.027-0.03 ; guidelines 0.03; no serifs, only thickening ends of bars and hastae; slanting sigma.
Place of Origin
Findspot.
Date
End of fourth or beginning of third century B.C. (lettering)
Findspot
Found before 1977 at Cyrene pleiades; HGL : presumably Sanctuary of Apollo .
Last recorded Location
Seen in 1977 and again 2004 by C. Dobias-Lalou in Shahat : Cyrene Museum .
Text constituted from
Transcription from stone (CDL).
Bibliography
Not previously published.
Apparatus
2 [c. 5 - 7]ια : [Καρνῆ]ια : (or) [Ἀρταμίτ]ια || τελεσ̣[φορ] [c. 3 - 4] : τελεσ̣[φορέων] : (or) τελεσ̣[φορήσας]
French translation
[---] is fils de Khar [---] ( a consacré ce monument) en accomplissant / après avoir accompli la telesphoria .
English translation
[---] is son of Char [---] ( dedicated this monument) while accomplishing / after having accomplished the telesphoria .
Italian translation
[---] is figlio di Char [---] ( ha dedicato questo monumento) mentre celebrava / dopo aver celebrato la telesphoria .
Commentary
This is one more instance of a dedication related to the rite of telesphoria . Whenever known, the provenance of all the other ones is the sanctuary of Apollo. Moreover, some of them add the precision of either Karneia or Artamitia . One of the two celebrations was plausibly mentioned here. It might seem possible to argue in favour of the shorter form, due to the fact that men's names ending in ις are generally speaking short and that those hitherto attested in the Hellenistic period at Cyrene have at most 6 letters before this ending. However between the 5 letters corresponding to the former celebration and 7 letters corresponding to the latter the difference is too small to allow any certitude.
Similarly, there are a lot of names beginning with Χαρ in the region and this cannot help to decide between the present or aorist participle of the verb τελεσφορέω at line 2, as both forms are attested.
Moreover, it should not be quite excluded that at line 1 more than one person was mentioned and that the participle at line 2 was at the plural. With the shortest restorations, the block would have been 0.60 wide, which is a common dimension, but it is not impossible to imagine that it was wider and thus to add to the restoration a mention of the tithe or of Apollo or of the verb of dedication. All those possibilities should remain open.
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