ISic003588: Honours for Emperor Volusianus
- ID
- ISic003588
- Language
- Latin
- Text type
- honorific
- Object type
- plaque
- Status
- No data
- Links
- View in current site
Edition
Apparatus criticus
- Text from autopsy and study for edition of 2017
Physical description
Support
- Description
- Two joining fragments from a slab of off-white marble with faint blue-grey veining. The upper right corner of the slab is preserved, intact along the upper and right margins, but broken below and to the left. The preserved edges are roughly finished and/or damaged. On the reverse of the stone is a second Latin inscription over two lines (see ); the left margin of the inscription on the reverse, although regular, does not appear to be original to the inscription, and so the stone appears to have been recut to create the right margin for the text here under discussion; in other words, this text is the second and later of the two preserved.
- Object type
- plaque
- Material
- marble
- Condition
- No data
- Dimensions
- height: 35.5 cm, width: 38 cm, depth: 2.0-2.7 cm
Inscription
- Layout
- Parts of three lines of Latin text are preserved, with guide lines top and bottom of each line.
- Text condition
- No data
- Lettering
-
- Letter heights
- Lines 1-3: 77-78mm
- Interlinear heights
- Interlineation: not measured
Provenance
- Place of origin
- Halaesa
- Provenance found
- Excavated in 1971, in room 7 of the west portico of the agora
- Map
Current location
- Place
- Halaesa, Italy
- Repository
- Antiquarium e sito archeologico di Halaesa , 30600B
- Autopsy
- On display in the lapidarium on site
- Map
Date
June 251 — October 253 CE (AD 251 – AD 253)- Evidence
- internal-date
Text type
commentary
The presence of CAES(ari) and AFINIO provide the key to this text, which appears to be preserved for about 50% of its width, since the first part of the standard titulature of the emperor Volusianus is Imperator Caesar Caius Vibius Afinius (June 251-October 253 AD; see Peachin, M. 1990. Roman Imperial Titulature and Chronology, A.D. 235-284. Amsterdam: J.C. Gieben, at 277-280 for titulature). Given this identification, the most plausible interpretation of the letters BEL (note absence of interpunct after the L, suggesting this is not the end of the word), would seem to be the name Veldumnianus, which follows the name Gallus in most dedications to this emperor. Variant renderings of this presumably unfamiliar (in Sicily) name are fairly common (e.g. AE 1953 no.12, Uldum[nia]no, CIL 8 no.22465, Voldumiano), but in this case we have an example of the very standard confusion of B and V. The substitution of B for V is more common generally in intervocalic positions, but well attested, particularly in Rome and southern Italy, in the initial position also (see Adams, J. 2007. The Regional Diversification of Latin 200 BC - AD 600. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, at 624-666). Although good statistics for Sicily are not available, the phenomenon is attested on the island.
It is impossible to be certain exactly which of Volusianus’ other titles followed in the rest of this text, although the apparent narrowness of the stone implies a shorter rather than a longer text. Most simply one might expect Imperator Caesar Caius Vibius Afinius Gallus Veldumnianus Volusianus Pius Felix Augustus, and at the end perhaps Res Publica Halaesinorum, given that this was the body named in the honorific for the immediately preceding Emperor, Traianus Decius ISic003587
The earlier inscription ISic003589 is on the reverse of this stone.
Bibliography
- Digital editions
- TM: 645667
- EDR: -
- EDH: -
- EDCS: -
- PHI: -
- Printed editions
Citation and editorial status
- Editor
- Jonathan Prag
- Principal contributor
- Jonathan Prag
- Contributors
- Jonathan Prag
- James Cummings
- James Chartrand
- Valeria Vitale
- Michael Metcalfe
- system
- Simona Stoyanova
- Last revision
- 1/19/2021