ISic000284: Block of marmor Luculleum bearing quarry inscription
- ID
- ISic000284
- Language
- Latin
- Text type
- honorific; building
- Object type
- block
- Status
- No data
- Links
- View in current site
Edition
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Apparatus criticus
- Text of Muscolino;
- 1: Mommsen et al.: cur(ante) Pater(no?) p[r]oc(uratore); although Muscolino and others print: P[R]OC, parts of the R are clearly visible in the photograph.
- 2: The end of the text is partially damaged / lost by the cutting back of the rear step, and additional numerals are possible after the V.
Physical description
Support
- Description
- A block of 'marmor luculleum' or Africano, from the Teos quarries. The block is quadrangular, but is cut back on the front in a sequence of three steps, deepest at the bottom and stepped back to the top. The rear is also cut back in a single very shallow step at the top. The exposed faces are all relatively smooth.
- Object type
- block
- Material
- marble
- Condition
- complete
- Dimensions
- height: 81 cm, width: 76-78 (top to bottom) cm, depth: 50-80 (top to bottom) cm
Inscription
- Layout
- Two single lines of text, one on the left and one on the right side. Both texts run left to right, and so the text on the left runs from the rear of the stone to the front, while the text on the right runs from the front to the back. The text on the left is missing the opening letters, having been inscribed prior to the removal of the 'step' from the rear of the stone. The text on the right appears to be essentially intact.
- Text condition
- complete
- Lettering
-
- Letter heights
- Line 1: 30-35mm
- Interlinear heights
- Interlineation line 1 to 2: mm
Provenance
- Place of origin
- Tauromenium
- Provenance found
- Found in excavations directed by Cavallari in the ancient theatre in the period 19-24 July 1841; still visible in the theatre
- Map
Current location
- Place
- Taormina, Italy
- Repository
- Antiquarium del Teatro Antico , 3555
- Autopsy
- None
- Map
Date
Explicitly dated to the consulship of 108 CE (AD 108 – AD 108)- Evidence
- office
Text type
commentary
'Rediscovery' of the stone in 2023 facilitated a full rereading by Francesco Muscolino, on the basis of which it is clarified that the inscription is a typical quarry mark reflecting extraction of the block from the imperial quarries on Teos. The block has had more than one piece cut from it, but is one of various pieces of marble from the second century CE never fully utilised in the renovation of the theatre. Whether the block reflects Trajanic or Hadrianic restoration works remains uncertain, since the date on the block reflects its extraction or storage (e.g. at Ephesus or Ostia), not its ultimate use. Manganaro's identification of the block as local stone of Taormina is unfounded.
Bibliography
- Digital editions
- TM: 491492
- EDR: -
- EDH: -
- EDCS: 21900315
- PHI: -
- Printed editions
- D. Lo Faso Pietrasanta (Duca di Serradifalco), Antichita Siciliane esplorate ed illustrate (Palermo, 1832), at V.42 tav.24.10
- T. Mommsen, Inscriptiones Bruttiorum Lucaniae Campaniae Siciliae Sardiniae Latinae. Pars posterior. Inscriptiones Siciliae et Sardiniae, Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum, consilio et auctoritate Academiae Litterarum Regiae Borussicae editum, 10.2 (Berlin: G. Reimer, 1883), at 10.6996
- Filippo Coarelli e Mario Torelli, Sicilia, 2a ed., Guide archeologiche Laterza 13 (Roma: Laterza, 1984), at 361
- Giacomo Manganaro, «La Sicilia da Sesto Pompeo a Diocleziano», Aufstieg und Niedergang der romischen Welt 2.11.1 (1988): 3–89, at 25 n.101
- Francesco Muscolino, ‘A Block of Marmor Luculleum/Africano in the Ancient Theatre of Taormina (CIL, X, 6996) with Notae Lapicidinarum (AD 108)’, Marmora 19 (2023): 123–41, https://doi.org/10.19272/202301401009, at 123-141
- Discussion
Citation and editorial status
- Editor
- Jonathan Prag
- Principal contributor
- Jonathan Prag
- Contributors
- Jonathan Prag
- James Cummings
- James Chartrand
- Valeria Vitale
- Michael Metcalfe
- Tuuli Ahlholm
- Simona Stoyanova
- system
- Last revision
- 8/5/2024