Support: Right block of a composite white marble base, badly damaged at upper edge and upper right corner of the inscribed face and cut off at left side, unless another block was formerly adjacent (w: 1.06 × h: 0.225 × d: 0.655).

Layout: Inscribed on front face in two lines of different height.

Letters: 0.025 at l. 1, 0.02 at l. 2; careful cutting, slight serifs.

Date: Late third to early second century BC (lettering).

Findspot: Found in 1929 in the Port of Cyrene, later Apollonia ➚: probably in the East Church, which is presumably the place where the agora once stood.

Place of origin: Port of Cyrene, later Apollonia ➚.

Last recorded location: Seen by J.M. Reynolds before 1974 in Shahat: Cyrene Museum. Not found by IGCyr team.

Text constituted from: Transcription from previous editors.

Apparatus

French translation

[---] (scil. fils de)[---]rès, étant prêtre d'Apollon (scil. a consacré ce monument).

Oeuvre de [d'Untel], fils d'Aristoménès, athénien.

English translation

[---] (scil. son of) [---]res, while being priest of Apollo (scil. dedicated this monument).

Made by [So-and-so], son of Aristomenes, an Athenian.

Italian translation

[---] (scil. figlio di) [---]res, quando era sacerdote di Apollo (scil. dedicò questo monumento).

Opera del [tale], figlio di Aristomenes, ateniese.

Commentary

Pugliese Carratelli edited this inscription from a photograph in the Cyrene archive with the help of a mention of the artist's signature made by Oliverio in a conference in 1938.

We follow Reynolds in relating the god's name to the office of priest with the genitive Ἀπόλλωνος, although this word-order is unusual. However, Pugliese Carratelli's idea of a dative is not impossible, the god's name being related to the understated verb of dedication and the priest being Apollo's one par excellence. The translation would then be 'being priest (scil. dedicated this monument) to Apollo'. If the former is preferred, we would have private honours with only the identification of the person featured in the lost statue, without mention of the person responsible for the monument (for this type see for instance IGCyr022900²).

There are at least two possibilites for the father's name of the dedicant, which we prefer not to restore. The preserved ending leads to a very short series of names attested in Cyrenaica. In fact, two names with a genitive ending -ρητος (a type that is not very usual) are known in Cyrenaica: on one hand we have Κρής which was Reynold's suggestion and has possibly two occurrences at Cyrene (IGCyr014700²a.c.iii.35 and IGCyr112600², both from the end of the fifth century). On the other hand, we know of Χάρης, preferred by Rosamilia with ingenious arguments which do not seem all quite convincing to Dobias-Lalou (see at Rosamilia 2023, p. 105).

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Images

Fig. 1. Face of igcyr064200 Private honours and artist's signature

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