ISic003578: Honours for Heia Melpo, priestess of Augusta

Latin, honorific, plaque

edited, View in current site

Photo J. Prag courtesy Soprintendenza BBCCAA di Messina
1HEIAEMELPONI
2SACERDOTIAUGUSÍ¡T..

Apparatus criticus

  • Text from autopsy

English translation

(Set up for) Heia Melpo, priestess of Augusta ...

Physical description

Support

Description
A slab of pink breccia-like marble, with dark grey veins. Intact at the top, left and right, but the lower part is missing; the surviving upper part is broken in two pieces which have been joined together. Front and rear faces are smooth. The edges are rough, and have been lightly cut back on the reverse, presumably for fixing in a wall or monument; there are traces of mortar on the reverse. Holes (for fixing pegs?) are preserved in the right edge (10.5 cm from the top) and the top edge (one 7cm from right corner, a second 12.5 cm from left corner).
Object type
plaque
Material
marble (pink)
Condition
No data
Dimensions
height: 28.6 cm, width: 49-49.5 cm, depth: 3 cm

Inscription

Layout
The front preserves two lines of Latin text, with a large vacat above, but the second line is only partially preserved. It is impossible to know how much has been lost from the lower half.
Text condition
No data
Lettering
The letters are relatively tall and narrow, deeply cut and somewhat irregular, with plain triangular serifs and triangular interpuncts. E has lightly upward pointing bars, of equal length; A is taller than the other letters (70 mm); all the hastae are off-vertical in M; P is open. Guide lines are visible.
Letter heights
Line 1: 60-65mm
Line 2: 55mm
Interlinear heights
Interlineation line 1 to 2: not measured

Provenance

Place of origin
Halaesa
Provenance found
Excavated in 1971, from room 7 of the west portico in the agora
Map

Current location

Place
Halaesa, Italy
Repository
Antiquarium e sito archeologico di Halaesa, 30598
Autopsy
On display in the lapidarium on site
Map
TODO: use the geo information in the museums dataset

Date

AD 42 – AD 200
Evidence
context lettering

Text type

honorific

commentary

Although the stone is missing at the very start of line 2, there is no reason to think that anything is lost before the initial S. Despite the loss of the lower part of the line, the reading is clear except at the very end of the line. The lack of space towards the line-end has led the engraver to link the top of the S and the T, effectively in ligature. The final two letters are less certain: there are three separate marks preserved; the first is clearly a triangular apex, and surely an A; the second mark looks to be incidental damage rather than part of a letter stroke (the compression of letters would be extreme if it were part of a letter); the final mark looks to be a very short horizontal, with an upward serif at the end, which is most compatible with the top of an E, albeit a very short one, to be explained by the desire of the engraver to fit the word in before the edge of the stone. Priestesses of the Augusta are more commonly described as sacerdos divae Augustae, but instances of sacerdos Augustae are also attested (e.g. ILS 6486, Aeclanum; AE 1998 no. 416, Interamnia Praetuttiorum; AE 1971 no.79, Formiae). For a survey of Italian examples of priestesses of the imperial cult, see Granino Cecero, M.G. 2007. Flaminicae e sacerdotes del culto imperiale nell’Italia romana: primi esiti di una ricerca in corso. In Acta XII Congressus Internationalis Epigraphiae Graecae et Latinae, II, 643-54. Priestesses in Sicily are attested at Termini (ISic000100) and Gozo (ISic003469) and Messina (ISic000267). Cult for Livia post-dates AD 42 (but this text need not reference Livia specifically), and this text presumably therefore dates to the later first or second century AD.

The Greek name Melpo(n) is not common in either Greek or Latin epigraphy (here in the Latinised dative), with the form Melpon (Μέλπων) only attested for men (including once at Lipara, ISic002847); the female form Μελπώ (LGPN V4: 31221) is only known from Phagres in Macedonia.

Bibliography

Digital editions

Citation and editorial status

Citation
No data