Support: Plain Northern wall of a rock-cut chamber; on the West wall IRCyr2020 M.273 and IRCyr2020 M.274 were cut above niches (dimensions not registered).

Layout: Inscribed within a tabula ansata (w: 1.47 × h: 0.46). There are three plain crosses above, and monogram crosses inside both handles.

Letters: Average 0.04 to 0.05; line 1 has mainly taller letters; alpha with oblique bar, square epsilon and sigma, phi with losange loop.

Date: Fifth to sixth centuries AD (lettering).

Findspot: Found in 1959 1 km South of Bir Tarakanet, on the east side of the Wadi Tarakenet.

Place of origin: Findspot.

Last recorded location: Studied by J.M. Reynolds in 1959 in situ at Bir Tarakanet. Not seen by GVCyr team.

Text constituted from: Transcription from editors

Apparatus

French translation

Admire, étranger, cet ouvrage divin; il est excellent

à posséder, étonnant à voir et fondé par un homme,

Samphoudion que voici, toi qui as accompli

d'innombrables ouvrages, en faisant plus de cas de celui-ci que de la demeure d'Alkinoos.

Puisse Dieu t'accorder de laisser à tes enfants le fruit

de tant de peines ! Tel est l'espoir de tous ceux qui partagent tes prières ;

car tout en détenant la charge de praepositus chez les Maures,

tu as commencé à ériger ici un monument immortel ;

ensuite, la cité t'a élu stratège

et tu as mené à bien cette (scil. charge) en même temps que tu te préposais toi-même à l'ouvrage.

English translation

Translation source: Ward-Perkins – Goodchild – Reynolds 2003

Stranger, wonder at this marvellous piece of work; for it is very good

to own and wonderful to see, and founded by this man,

you Samphoudion, who completed

very many works, regarding it as better than the house of Alkinoos.

May God allow you to leave to your sons many achievements,

for this is the desire of all who pray with you.

For, holding the office of praepositus among the Moors,

you began to raise here an undying memorial;

later on, the city elected you general

and you accomplished this (scil. office) while having set yourself over the work.

Italian translation

Ammira, straniero, quest'opera divina; è eccellente

da possedere, meravigliosa da vedere e fondata da quest'uomo,

da te, Samphoudion, che innumerevoli opere hai portato a termine,

considerando questa migliore della casa di Alcinoo.

Possa Dio concederti di lasciare ai tuoi figli i frutti

di tante fatiche! Tale è la speranza di quanti condividono le tue preghiere;

Ricoprendo la carica di praepositus presso i Mori,

hai cominciato a erigere qui un monumento immortale;

più tardi la città ti elesse stratego

e tu hai portato a termine questo (scil. incarico) mentre sovrintendevi all'impresa.

Commentary

Although a legacy for the children is mentioned, this inscription is no epitaph, nor is the chamber a tomb. The two main purposes of the poem are describing the fittings (an oil-press) and celebrating Samphoudion's deeds as a public officer and as a private builder.

Insofar as the poor illustration allows to assert, the lettering seems rather regular and careful. However the spelling follows the development of phonology, whence: many instances of iotacism; η for αι in πησί and in the transcription of prae; υ for οι in ὔκου and συνευχομένυς; some confusion between ου and ο in the spelling of the probably Libyan name of the owner in the various inscriptions of the cave; the voiced δ instead of voiceless τ expected in the word built upon Latin praepositus; an unexpected geminated ρρ for ἀείρειν.

Contrasting with those untidy spellings, the stamp of traditional paideia is evident both in words such as θεσπέσιος, ἔελδωρ, ἀείρω and in the reference to Alkinoos' palace. The poet also takes advantage of some fluctuations of the epic language such as the form in -ες at the 2nd person of sigmatic aorist.

The Μάρυσοι seem to be the Μαυρούσιοι, originally a tribe from the far West of North Africa. By the sixth century AD, the ethnic was used for all Libyans (see Procopius, BV II.10 and Desanges 1962, pp. 35-36). The switching υ/ου in the tribe's name is echoing that of the personal name Samphoudion, written Samphodion in the other inscription of the chamber. The verse part shows that it was a short vowel, a very close o or a rather open u.

L. 10, the usual final word-play relies on the equivalence between praepositus and ἐφεστώς. The feminine τήνδε should refer to ἀρχή, which is not explicit in this sentence, but may be subaudible because of the parallelism between the two elections.

Metrical analysis: although made of dactylic meters, the poem contains many irregularities. L.1: the digamma is regularly taken into account in (ϝ)έργον, whereas the last syllable of θαύμασον is taken for short. L. 2 has a supplementary syllable between 2nd and 3d feet. L. 3: in the first hemistich, the personal name produces a very irregular sequence; the second part is what normally follows a penthemimer caesura. L. 4 is a regular hexameter. L. 5 is also a hexameter, if only we read πησὶ<ν>. At l. 6 on the contrary, we should drop a final nu metri causa. L. 7 seems to have a iambic first part; the second part is approximately dactylic, with great uncertainty concerning the ethnic of the Moors. L. 8 may form a hexameter if only we admit a hiatus and restore a second alpha in the fifth foot, which is a desperate answer. L. 9 is a nearly regular hexameter, with a strange lengthening of the first syllable in στρατηγόν. L. 10 is a regular hexameter, except for the lengthening of the second in ἅμα.

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