ISic020597: ISic020597

Apparatus criticus

• Text after photograph ;
• 1: Comparetti in Orsi (1918): [— — —] πὰρ Β[ίο̄νός ε̄̓μι δο͂ρον] ;
• Manni Piraino (1975): παυρα [— — —] ;
• Guarducci (1986-1988): Παρβ[άλλοντος καὶ]
  
• 2: Comparetti in Orsi (1918): [ἆγε δ’ Ἄλεξις ἐκ Δ]άνκλας ἐ.[έ]. ;
• Jeffery (1961): [hὸς δ’] ἂν κλάσε̄ .[ε, τυφλὸς ἔσται]. ;
• Gallavotti (1975-1976): [ἔσται δὲ τυφλός, hὸς] ἂν κλάσε̄.. ;
• Guarducci (1986-1988): [Δ]άνκλας ἐμ. [δο͂ρον τἀθάναι].

Physical description

Support

Description

Fragment of a pyxis (Protocorinthian style).

Object type

pyxis

Material

ceramic

Condition

fragment

Dimensions

height: 3 cm, dim: cm, width: 5 cm, depth: cm

Inscription

Layout

The text was perhaps placed in a spiral around the pyxis.

Text condition

incomplete

Lettering

Types list:

• Β type3
• Ε type1
• Κ type1
• Κ type1.1
• Λ type1
• Ν type1
• Ν type1.3
• Π type1
• Ρ type1
• Ρ type1.5
• Σ type3

Letter heights

Line 1: mm

Interlinear heights

Provenance

Place of origin

Syracusae

Provenance found

Found in the oldest layer under the foundations of the temple of Athena in Siracusa.

Map

Current location

Place

Siracusa, Italy

Repository

Museo Archeologico Regionale Paolo Orsi , 33903

Autopsy

No Autopsy

Map

Date

Evidence

lettering, archaeological-context, material-context

Text type

ownership

commentary

The fragment of a pyxis, in typical Protocorinthian style, with cream-coloured background and bright red parallel lines, was found by Orsi in the oldest layers of the foundations of the temple of Athena. The nature of its alphabet and the place of production of the object were long debated, but it is now generally accepted (Guarducci 1986-88; Dubois, IGDS, no. 85; Arena, IGASM, no. 61) that the inscription was produced in Syracuse, on a probably imported vessel (Guarducci 1986-1988, p. 3). Guarducci's (1986-1988, p. 2) and Jeffery's (cf. 1961 p. 264) hypothesis that the dedication was made to Athena (who may or may not have been mentioned in the text according to them) is not fully acceptable. In fact, the area where the temple dedicated to Athena was built in about 480 BCE was, from the end of the VIIIth centuty to the first half of the VIIth BCE, occupied by a first structure, an archaic oikos (9.20x6 m, the existence of which was already hypothesized by Orsi 1919) the foundations of which were found by Voza during the 1999 excavations (cf. Voza 1999) in the area in front of the Athenaion. The archaic oikos may have been dedicated to a female goddess, perhaps a potnia theron, at least considering as evidence of the cult the proto-Corinthian oinochoe with a series of beasts and a female figure found during the Voza excavations (see Crispino in Voza 1999, 29-35 with image and reconstruction of the scene). Considering the lacunosity of the text, it is interesting to note that the alphabet of the inscription can only be considered of Corinthian origin. Thus indicate the use of san for the sibilant; the use of epsilon14 is, by contrast, peculiar to the colonies of Corinth (Corcyra) and not to Corinth itself, where the long closed 'e' is indicated by epsilon09 at this stage of the alphabet (so Dubois IGDS 1, p. 90); moreover, the type of beta (beta05) used here appears to be a variant of the Corinthian beta (beta08), which occurred at the same time in Megara Hyblaea. Guarducci (1986-1988, p. 2) also notes a trace of a letter after the last one on l. 2 that could be compatible with a three strokes iota (iota02), which is also a type not reccurrent in Corinth but in Corcyra in the VIII century BCE. This is therefore the only inscription known to us in Syracuse in an alphabet derived from the Corinthian one, even with some innovations. The alphabet would soon adapt to its environment, in a process of assimilation not unlike that one of the alphabets adopted by the Sikels and Elymians. Contacts and exchanges with other poleis in the area, in particular with Megara Hyblaea, would have led to the abandonment of the more purely Corinthian types, which were less used and therefore less comprehensible in the other poleis, and the adoption of new types, probably the most common and widespread in the area (see also, for the phases of the Syracuse alphabet, ISic030002). I agree with Guarducci (1986-1988, p. 2) that the last letter, of which the first vertical line remains, is mu04 considering the large space to the right of it. So the text would be an inscription declaring the name of its owner(s) (if we understood, as Guarducci does, what remains of the first line as part of a male name), like many similar ones found in Sicily in the Archaic period. It would indeed be the first case found on the island. As for the feminine name, it may derive from the name of the city founded in the VIIIth century BCE north of the eastern coast of Sicily, which Thucydides in turn refers to as originating from an indigenous word indicating the distinctive sickle shape of the area (Thuc. 6.4.5: ὄνομα δὲ τὸ μὲν πρῶτον Ζάγκλη ἦν ὑπὸ τῶν Σικελῶν κληθεῖσα, ὅτι δρεπανοειδὲς τὴν ἰδέαν τὸ χωρίον ἐστί (τὸ δὲ δρέπανον οἱ Σικελοὶ ζάγκλον καλοῦσιν). It is also common the case of an anthroponym derived from a toponym, as it is for Κρήτα (cf. Guarducci 1986-1988, p. 7) and many other cases reported by Bechtel (cf. Bechtel 1917, pp. 552-554).

Bibliography

Digital editions

• TM: 696285
• EDR: 149832
• EDH: -
• EDCS: 64900714
• PHI: 195538
• PHI: 330112
• PHI: 331830

Printed editions

• Paolo Orsi, «Gli scavi intorno a l’Athenaion di Siracusa negli anni 1912-1917», Monumenti Antichi 25 (1918): 353–754, at 608, fig. 203
• ‘Supplementum Epigraphicum Graecum’, Supplementum Epigraphicum Graecum, 1923, http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/1607583, at 26.1122
• ‘Supplementum Epigraphicum Graecum’, Supplementum Epigraphicum Graecum, 1923, http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/1607583, at 38.0970
• Margherita Guarducci, «Nuove note di epigrafia siceliota arcaica», Annuario della Scuola Archeologica di Atene e delle Missioni Italiane in Oriente 21–22 (1960 1959): 249–78, at 249-254, fig. 1
• L.H. Jeffery, The Local Scripts of Archaic Greece, 1st edn (Oxford, 1961), at 275 no.1 pl.51
• Margherita Guarducci, «Gli alfabeti della Sicilia arcaica», Kokalos 10–11 (1965 1964): 465–88, at 141-144
• Margherita Guarducci, Epigrafia greca, 4 voll. (Rome: Istituto Poligrafico dello Stato, Libreria dello Stato, 1967), at 341-342
• Michel Lejeune, « Notes d’épigraphie sicilienne », Kokalos 16 (1970): 16‑29, at 25-27, pls. 1-2
• C. Gallavotti, «Scritture arcaiche della Sicilia e di Rodi», Helikon 15–16 (1976 1975): 71–117, at 86-88
• M.T. Manni Piraino, «Koiné alfabetica fra Siracusa, Megara Iblea e Selinunte?», Kokalos 21 (1975): 121–53, at 124-129, pl. XXXV.1
• Margherita Guarducci, «Epigrafi arcaiche di Siracusa e di Megara Iblea», Archeologia Classica 38–39 (1988 1986): 1–26, at 1-7
• Laurent Dubois, Inscriptions grecques dialectales de Sicile : contribution à l’étude du vocabulaire grec colonial, CEFR 119 (Rome: Ecole française de Rome, 1989), at 85
• L.H. Jeffery and A.W. Johnston, The Local Scripts of Archaic Greece, 2nd edn (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1990), at 275 no.1 pl.51
• Renato Arena, Iscrizioni greche arcaiche di Sicilia e Magna Grecia. V. Iscrizioni di Taranto, Locri Epizefiri, Velia e Siracusa, 1st ed., vol. 5 (Alessandria: Edizioni dell’Orso, 1998), at 61

Citation and editorial status

Editor

Jonathan Prag

Principal contributor

Valentina Mignosa

Contributors

• Jonathan Prag
• Valentina Mignosa
• James Chartrand
• Michael Metcalfe
• system
• Simona Stoyanova

Last revision

4/24/2025