(E. L. H.; G. F. H.*)
IV. Latin Inscriptions
I. Latin or Roman Inscriptions (by which general name are designated, in classical archaeology, all non-literary remains of the Latin language, with the exception of coins, letters and journals) fall into two distinct classes, viz. (1) those which were written upon other objects of various kinds, to denote their peculiar purpose, and in this way have been preserved along with them; and (2) those which themselves are the objects, written, to be durable, as a rule, on metal or stone. The first class is that ofinscriptionsin the stricter sense of the word (styled by the Romanstituli, by the GermansAufschriften); the second is that of instruments or charters, public and private (styled by the Romans firstleges, afterwardsinstrumentaortabulae, and by the GermansUrkunden).
No ancient Latin authors have professedly collected and explained or handed down to us Roman inscriptions. Some ofthe orators and historians, such as Cicero, Livy, Pliny the elder, and Suetonius among the Latins, and Polybius, Dionysius of Halicarnassus and Josephus among the Greeks, occasionally mention inscriptions of high historical interest. A few grammarians, as, for example, Varro, Verrius Flaccus and Valerius Probus of Berytus, quote ancient words orformulaefrom them, or explain the abbreviations used in them. Juridical instruments, laws, constitutions of emperors,senatus consultaand the like appear in the various collections of Roman jurisprudence.
Inscriptions (in the wider sense, as we shall henceforth call them without regard to the distinction which has been drawn) have been found in nearly every centre of ancient Roman life, but, like many other remains of antiquity, only seldom in their original sites. The great mass of them has to be sought for in the large European museums of ancient art, and in the smaller local collections of ancient remains which occur nearly everywhere in the European provinces of the former Roman empire as well as in the north of Africa, and also here and there in Asia Minor.
Only those copies of inscriptions are to be received with full confidence which are furnished by experienced and well-equipped scholars, or which have been made with the help of mechanical methods (casts, photographs, moist and dry rubbings), not always applicable with equal success, but depending on the position and the state of preservation of the monuments.36From the first revival of classical learning in the Carolingian age attention was paid anew, by pilgrims to Rome and other places worth visiting, to epigraphic monuments also. In the time of the Renaissance, from the end of the 14th century downwards, some of the leading Italian scholars, like Poggio and Signorili, and the antiquarian traveller Cyriacus of Ancona, collected inscriptions, Greek and Latin.37In the 15th century large collections of the inscriptions of all countries, or of limited districts, were made by Giovanni Marcanova, Fra Felice Feliciano, Fra Michele Ferrarino, Fra Giocondo the architect of Verona, Marino Sanudo the Venetian polyhistor, and others. At the end of the 15th and the beginning of the 16th, the first printed collections can be recorded (Spreti’s for Ravenna, 1489; Peutinger’s for Augsburg, 1508; Huttich’s for Mainz, 1520; Francesco degli Albertini’s for Rome, printed in 1521 by Jacopo Mazochi), while during the same century a long list of epigraphic travellers, like Pighius, Rambertus and Accursius, or antiquarian collectors, like Sigonius, Panvinius, Antonius Augustinus with his collaborators Ursinus and Metellus, and many others, were busy in augmenting the stock of epigraphic monuments. The series of printed epigraphicCorporabegins with that of Apianus (Ingolstadt, 1534), the only one arranged in geographical order, and is continued in those of Smetius (1558, but edited only after the author’s death by Justus Lipsius, 1588), Gruter (with Joseph Scaliger’sIndices, 1603, and re-edited by Graevius, 1707), Gudius (about 1660, edited by Hessel, 1731), Reinesius (1682), Fabretti (1699), Gori (1726), Doni (1731), Muratori (1739), Maffei (1749), Donati (1765-1775). These collections, manuscript and printed, will never altogether lose their value, as great numbers of inscriptions known to the ancient collectors have since been lost or destroyed. But, inasmuch as even towards the beginning of the 15th century, as well as afterwards, especially from the 16th down to a very recent period, all sorts of inaccuracies, interpolations and even downright falsifications, found their way into theCorpora, these can be employed only with the greatest caution. Modern critical research in the field of epigraphy began with the detection of those forgeries (especially of the very extensive and skilful ones of Pirro Ligorio, the architect to the house of Este) by Maffei, Olivieri and Marini. The last-named scholar opens a new era of truly critical and scientific handling of Roman inscriptions (especially in his standard work on theAtti dei fratelli arvali, Rome, 1795); his disciple and successor, Count Bartolomeo Borghesi (who died at San Marino in 1860), may be rightly called the founder of the modern science of Roman epigraphy.38Orelli’s handy collection of Roman inscriptions (2 vols., Zurich, 1828) is a first attempt to make accessible to a larger scientific public the results of the researches of Marini and his successors; but it was not completed, (and thoroughly corrected) until nearly thirty years later, by Henzen (Orelli, iii., with the indispensableIndices, Zurich, 1856), who, with Mommsen and De Rossi, carried out the plan of a universalCorpus inscriptionum Latinarum, previously projected by Maffei (1732), by Kellermann and Sarti (1832), with Borghesi’s help, and by Letronne and Egger (1843). After the appearance of Mommsen’sInscriptiones regni Neapolitani Latinae(Leipzig, 1852) and hisInscriptiones confoederationis Helveticae Latinae(vol. x. of the publications of the Zurich Antiquarian Society, 1854), the publication of theC.I.L., following the similar work of the Greek inscriptions, was undertaken by the Royal Academy of Sciences of Berlin.
This work, in which the previous literature is fully described and utilized, consists of the following parts:—vol. i.,Inscriptiones antiquissimae ad C. Caesaris mortem(1863; 2nd ed., part i., 1893); Ritschl’sPriscae Latinitatis monumenta epigraphica(Berlin, 1862, fol.) form the graphic illustration to vol. i., giving all extant monuments of the republican epoch (with fiveSupplementa, Bonn, 1862-1865; R. Garrucci’sSylloge inscriptionum Latinarum aevi Romanae reipublicae usque ad C. Iulium Caesarem plenissima, 2 vols., Turin, 1875-1877, must be used with caution); vol. ii.,Inscr. Hispaniae(1869; with Supplement, 1892); vol. iii.,Inscr. Asiae, provinciarum Europae Graecarum, Illyrici(1873; with Supplements and Index, 1889-1902); vol. iv.,Inscr. parietariae Pompeianae Herculanenses Stabianae(the scratched and painted inscriptions chiefly of Pompeii) (1871; with Supplement, part i., 1898; part ii., 1909); vol. v.,Inscr. Galliae cisalpinae(1872-1877; with Suppl., Et. Pais,C.I.L. suppl. Italica); vol. vi.,Inscr. urbis Romae(1876-1902; with Supplement, 1902); vol. vii.,Inscr. Britanniae(1873); vol. viii.,Inscr. Africae(1881; with Supplement, 1891-1894, 1904); vol. ix.,Inscr. Calabriae, Apuliae, Samnii, Sabinorum, Piceni(1883); vol. x.,Inscr. Bruttiorum, Lucaniae, Campaniae, Siciliae, Sardiniae(1883); vol. xi.,Inscr. Aemiliae, Umbriae, Etruriae(1888; part ii., 1901 sqq.); vol. xii.,Inscr. Galliae Narbonensis(1888); vol. xiii.,Inscr. trium Galliarum et duarum Germaniarum(1899 sqq.; part ii., 1905 sqq.); vol. xiv.,Inscr. Latii antiqui; vol. xv.,Inscr. laterum(1891; part ii., i. [vasa, lucernae, fistulae], 1899). The arrangement observed in theCorpusis the geographical (as in Apianus); within the single towns the order of subjects (tituli sacri,magistratuum,privatorum, &c., as in Smetius) is followed, with some few exceptions, where the monuments are so numerous (as in theforumof Rome and at Pompeii and Lambaesis) that they can be assigned to their original places. Running supplements to theC.I.L.are given in theEphemeris epigraphica, Corporis inscr. Latinarum supplementum(Berlin, 1872 sqq.); and the new discoveries of each year are recorded in Cagnat’sL’Année épigraphique.The inscriptions in the other Italian dialects have been published by Conway,Italic Dialects(Cambridge, 1897); cf. vol. ii. of von Planta,Grammatik der oskisch-umbrischen Dialekte(Strassburg, 1897). A Corpus of the Etruscan inscriptions was begun in 1893 by Pauli and is now nearly complete. The inscriptions of the Veneti, a N. Italian people of the Illyrian stock, will be found in vol. iii. of Pauli,Altitalische Forschungen(Leipzig, 1891). For the Christian inscriptions see De Rossi’sInscr. Christianae urbis Romae septimo saeculo antiquiores, vol. i. (Rome, 1857), vol. ii. (1888); theInscriptions chrétiennes de la Gaule of Le Blant(2 vols., Paris, 1857-1865; new edition, 1892); theAltchristliche Inschriften der Rheinlandeof Kraus (1890); theChristliche Inschriften der Schweiz vom IV.-IX. Jahrhundertof Egli (1895); and theInscr. Hispaniae Christianae and Inscr. Britanniae Christianaeof Hübner (Berlin, 1871, 1876). As splendidly illustrated works on the Latin inscriptions of some districts Alphonse de Boissieu’sInscriptions antiques de Lyon(Lyons, 1846-1854), Ch. Robert’sÉpigraphie romaine de la Moselle(Paris, 1875), and J. C. Bruce’sLapidarium septentrionale(London and Newcastle, 1875) can be recommended. Besides the above-mentioned Orelli-Henzen collection, G. Wilmanns’sExempla inscriptionum Latinarum(2 vols, Berlin, 1873, with copious indexes), and Dessau’sInscriptiones Latinae selectae(vol. i., 1892; vol. ii., 1903; ii., 1906) give a general synopsis of the materials. Inscriptions of interest to students of history are collected in Rushforth’sLatin Historical Inscriptions(Oxford, 1893); Leroux,Revue des publications épigraphiques relatives à l’antiquité romaine, records those which bear on antiquities. Of other works may be mentioned Ruggiero,Dizionario epigrafico di antichità romane(1886); Olcott,Thesaurus linguae Latinae epigraphicae(1904 sqq.).
This work, in which the previous literature is fully described and utilized, consists of the following parts:—vol. i.,Inscriptiones antiquissimae ad C. Caesaris mortem(1863; 2nd ed., part i., 1893); Ritschl’sPriscae Latinitatis monumenta epigraphica(Berlin, 1862, fol.) form the graphic illustration to vol. i., giving all extant monuments of the republican epoch (with fiveSupplementa, Bonn, 1862-1865; R. Garrucci’sSylloge inscriptionum Latinarum aevi Romanae reipublicae usque ad C. Iulium Caesarem plenissima, 2 vols., Turin, 1875-1877, must be used with caution); vol. ii.,Inscr. Hispaniae(1869; with Supplement, 1892); vol. iii.,Inscr. Asiae, provinciarum Europae Graecarum, Illyrici(1873; with Supplements and Index, 1889-1902); vol. iv.,Inscr. parietariae Pompeianae Herculanenses Stabianae(the scratched and painted inscriptions chiefly of Pompeii) (1871; with Supplement, part i., 1898; part ii., 1909); vol. v.,Inscr. Galliae cisalpinae(1872-1877; with Suppl., Et. Pais,C.I.L. suppl. Italica); vol. vi.,Inscr. urbis Romae(1876-1902; with Supplement, 1902); vol. vii.,Inscr. Britanniae(1873); vol. viii.,Inscr. Africae(1881; with Supplement, 1891-1894, 1904); vol. ix.,Inscr. Calabriae, Apuliae, Samnii, Sabinorum, Piceni(1883); vol. x.,Inscr. Bruttiorum, Lucaniae, Campaniae, Siciliae, Sardiniae(1883); vol. xi.,Inscr. Aemiliae, Umbriae, Etruriae(1888; part ii., 1901 sqq.); vol. xii.,Inscr. Galliae Narbonensis(1888); vol. xiii.,Inscr. trium Galliarum et duarum Germaniarum(1899 sqq.; part ii., 1905 sqq.); vol. xiv.,Inscr. Latii antiqui; vol. xv.,Inscr. laterum(1891; part ii., i. [vasa, lucernae, fistulae], 1899). The arrangement observed in theCorpusis the geographical (as in Apianus); within the single towns the order of subjects (tituli sacri,magistratuum,privatorum, &c., as in Smetius) is followed, with some few exceptions, where the monuments are so numerous (as in theforumof Rome and at Pompeii and Lambaesis) that they can be assigned to their original places. Running supplements to theC.I.L.are given in theEphemeris epigraphica, Corporis inscr. Latinarum supplementum(Berlin, 1872 sqq.); and the new discoveries of each year are recorded in Cagnat’sL’Année épigraphique.
The inscriptions in the other Italian dialects have been published by Conway,Italic Dialects(Cambridge, 1897); cf. vol. ii. of von Planta,Grammatik der oskisch-umbrischen Dialekte(Strassburg, 1897). A Corpus of the Etruscan inscriptions was begun in 1893 by Pauli and is now nearly complete. The inscriptions of the Veneti, a N. Italian people of the Illyrian stock, will be found in vol. iii. of Pauli,Altitalische Forschungen(Leipzig, 1891). For the Christian inscriptions see De Rossi’sInscr. Christianae urbis Romae septimo saeculo antiquiores, vol. i. (Rome, 1857), vol. ii. (1888); theInscriptions chrétiennes de la Gaule of Le Blant(2 vols., Paris, 1857-1865; new edition, 1892); theAltchristliche Inschriften der Rheinlandeof Kraus (1890); theChristliche Inschriften der Schweiz vom IV.-IX. Jahrhundertof Egli (1895); and theInscr. Hispaniae Christianae and Inscr. Britanniae Christianaeof Hübner (Berlin, 1871, 1876). As splendidly illustrated works on the Latin inscriptions of some districts Alphonse de Boissieu’sInscriptions antiques de Lyon(Lyons, 1846-1854), Ch. Robert’sÉpigraphie romaine de la Moselle(Paris, 1875), and J. C. Bruce’sLapidarium septentrionale(London and Newcastle, 1875) can be recommended. Besides the above-mentioned Orelli-Henzen collection, G. Wilmanns’sExempla inscriptionum Latinarum(2 vols, Berlin, 1873, with copious indexes), and Dessau’sInscriptiones Latinae selectae(vol. i., 1892; vol. ii., 1903; ii., 1906) give a general synopsis of the materials. Inscriptions of interest to students of history are collected in Rushforth’sLatin Historical Inscriptions(Oxford, 1893); Leroux,Revue des publications épigraphiques relatives à l’antiquité romaine, records those which bear on antiquities. Of other works may be mentioned Ruggiero,Dizionario epigrafico di antichità romane(1886); Olcott,Thesaurus linguae Latinae epigraphicae(1904 sqq.).
II. Information regarding the forms of letters used on Roman inscriptions will be found under the articlesLatin Language,PalaeographyandWriting(cf. Hübner,Exempla scripturaeepigraphicae Latinae, 1895). The forms of the single letters vary not inconsiderably according to the material of the monuments, their age and their origin. Carefully cut letters, especially when on a large scale, naturally differ from those scratched or painted on walls by non-professional hands, or hewn on rocks by soldiers; and small incised (or dotted) letters on metal or ivory and bone, and those painted on earthenware, or impressed on it or on glass before burning, are also necessarily of a different character. The letters, ordinarily drawn withminiumon the monument before being cut (and also often painted, after having been cut, with the same colour), sometimes have been painted with a brush, and thence receive a peculiar form. To save space, on coins first and afterwards in inscriptions also, two or three or even more letters were joined, especially at the end of the lines, to anexusor aligatura. This system of compendious writing, very rare in the republican epoch, and slowly extending itself during the 1st century, became rather frequent in the 2nd and 3rd, especially in Spain and Africa. There is no constant system in thesenexus litterarum, but generally the rule is observed that no substantial element of a single letter is to be counted for twice (thuse.g.isitorti, notTiti). Numerals are usually distinguished from letters in the ancient period, down to the end of the republic, by a stroke drawn through them, as in++VIR,duo(m) vir(om)++Sduo semis(sestertius),500; it was afterwards put above them, as inĪĪVIR,XVIR,VIR,duovir,decemvir,sevir.39
The direction of the writing is in the very oldest inscriptions from right to left and from left to right in alternate lines, an arrangement technically calledβουστροφηδόν(D. Comparetti,Iscrizione arcaica del Foro Romano, Florence, 1900; H. Jordan,Hermes, vol. xv. p. 5, 1880), and in the Sabellic inscriptions similar arrangements are not infrequent. In all others it is from left to right. Each word is separated from the other by a sign of interpunction, which is not wanted, therefore, at the end of lines or of the whole text. Exceptions to this rule occur only in the later period (from the 2nd century downwards), and sometimes under special conditions, as when abridged words form the end of the line. Here and there even the different syllables of each word are separated by interpunction. The interpunction is formed by a single dot (except in some very ancient inscriptions, such as the recently found Forum inscription of the regal period and those of Pisaurum, where, as in Greek and other Italian monuments, three dots ∹ are used). According to the technical skill of the different periods in stone-cutting this dot is in some very ancient inscriptions quadrangular, or similar to an oblique cross (×), or oblong (as a bold stroke), but, as a rule, triangular, and never circular. This triangular dot changes, by ornamentation, into a hook () or a leaf (); the ivy-leaf-shaped dot is especially frequent in inscriptions from about the 2nd century downwards. The dot is always placed at the middle height of the letters, not, as now, at the foot of the line. In large texts of instruments the interpunction is often omitted; in the later period it is often entirely wanting; and in short texts, in the disposition of the lines, in the varying sizes of the letters employed, in the division of words at the end of the lines, &c., certain rules are observed, which cannot be detailed here. In some instances older inscriptions have been cancelled and more recent ones substituted (e.g.on milestones), especially in the case of thedamnatio memoriae(in cases of high treason), in consequence of which the names of consuls and emperors are often cancelled; but in modern times also inscriptions have been deliberately destroyed or lost ones restored.
For understanding the texts of the inscriptions an accurate knowledge of the system of abbreviations used in them is necessary (see Cagnat,Cours d’épigraphie latine, 3rd ed., 1898). These are almost invariablylitterae singulares; that is to say, the initial letter is employed for the entire word (in all its grammatical forms), or if one initial, as belonging to more than one word, is not sufficiently clear, the first two or even the first three letters are employed; rarely more than three. Abbreviations in the true sense of the word (by dropping some letters at the end) are to be found, in the older period, only at the end of lines, and not frequently. In the later period some instances of them have been observed. Thelitterae singulares, as Valerius Probus taught, are either generally employed (usus generalis) in all classes of written documents (and so in literature also), as, for instance, those of the individual names (thepraenomina), the names of days and feasts (kal.forkalendae), and those of the chief magistrates (cos.forconsul) and the like; or they belong chiefly (but not exclusively) to certain classes of documents, such as those used in juridical acts (l.forlex,h.forheres,s. d. m.forsine dolo malo, and so on), in sepulchral inscriptions (h. s. e.,hic situs est) or in dedicatory inscriptions (v. s. l. m.,votum solvit libens merito), &c.40
It may be observed here that thepraenominaare, as a rule, always written in the universally known abbreviations (in the few instances where they are written in full it is a consequence of Greek influence or of peculiar circumstances). Thegentiliciain -iusare abridged, in the republican period, in -i(in the nominative, perhaps for -is). In the always abbreviated indications of ancestors or patrons (in the case of slaves and freedmen), asC.f.,Gai filius,M.l.,Marci libertus(s.forservusis not frequent), the feminine gender is sometimes indicated by inversion of the letters. Thus.l.(orlib.) orW(an invertedM)l.designates amulieris libertus;andare used forfilia,pupilla. On thetribusand their abbreviations, and on the so-called militarytribus(which are names of colonies collocated, for the sake of symmetry, at the place usually occupied, in the nomenclature, by thetribus), and on the other indications of origin used in the designation of individuals, the indexes to the above-named works give sufficient information; on the geographical distribution of thetribussee Grotefend’sImperium Romanum tributim descriptum(Hanover, 1863). For the abbreviations of official charges, urban and municipal, and, in the imperial period, civil and military (to which, beginning with the 4th century, some Christian designations are to be added), see also the explanations given in the indexes. Among these abbreviations the first instances are to be found of the indication of the plural number by doubling the last letter; thusAugg.,Caess.,coss.,dd.nn.(domini nostri), are used from the 3rd century downwards (see De Rossi’s preface to theInscriptiones Christ. urbis Romae) to distinguish them fromAug., Caes., as designating the singular. In the later period, a dot or a stroke over the abridged word, like that upon numerals, here and there indicates the abbreviation.