Inscription of Tiberinius Celerianus

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Inscription of Tiberinius Celerianus

The inscription of Tiberinius Celerianus is a dedicatory inscription for the god Camulos or Mars , which was found in 2002 in Tabard Square in the London Borough of Southwark . The votive stone , written in Latin , is the oldest known inscription document that the Londoners (probably as an organized community) and thus indirectly the ancient city of Londinium . The brief self-designation of the founder is interpreted differently. Possibly it was simply a Gaulish merchant who had moved the center of his activities to London; but perhaps he also acted as the official representative of the London people in their relations with his hometown Caesaromagus . His dedicatory inscription was probably originally placed in a temple district until it was removed and (apparently carefully) buried in late antiquity .

Find situation and description

The inscription was found on October 3, 2002 during an emergency excavation south of the Thames . It lay in a pit within the Celtic-Roman temple precinct in Tabard Square , where it must have been deliberately buried. The temple precinct consisted of at least two temples in the Gallo-Roman style . It was once adorned with statues, which were only found in small fragments. The inscription was at the bottom of the pit with the text facing up. A large shard was found above it, giving the impression that the inscription should be protected. Pottery was also found in the pit, dating back to the second half of the fourth century, perhaps even later - at this point in time the inscription seems to have landed in the ground. The excavator suspects that it was once installed in the north of the two temples. In ancient times, two Roman roads that were important for trade crossed near the temple district . After the conservation work at the Museum of London , the inscription was moved to the Cuming Museum ; today it is back in the Museum of London.

The inscription is on an originally rectangular plaque made of white (probably Italian) marble, which is broken off at the bottom - the lower edge is roughly in the shape of a flat V. The remaining piece had broken into three parts when it was found, but they could be put together without any problems. The stone is 29.4 cm wide. The height varies because the panel has broken off at an angle and is still 32.5 cm in the middle. The thickness varies and is 33 mm on the left and 25 mm on the right. The back is blank and undamaged, but the entire stone was neatly smoothed before the description and is hardly weathered to this day.

Only the first eight lines of the text of the inscription have been completely preserved. The word "primus" can be safely reconstructed from the ninth line based on the letters that have been preserved. This was probably followed by a word separator and then again a word whose first letter still has the upper curved line, so that one can assume a C or an S . Only the middle part of the tenth line, namely a V and another letter (A or M), has been preserved. The text reads as a whole (according to the Leiden bracket system ):

"Num (inibus) Augg (ustorum) / deo Marti Ca / mulo Tiberini / us Celerianus / c (ivis) Bell (ovacus) / moritix / Londiniensi / um / Primus ṣ [–––] / [–––] vạ [ –––] "

The letters are on average 3 cm high and are written neatly except for small errors. The word division is carefully executed, but not used consistently, so it probably served more decorative purposes. Two ivy leaves (so-called hederae ), which frame the word pair “moritix Londiniensium”, decorate the inscription. In line 5, remnants of an auxiliary line for the line guidance can still be seen. The original reddish painting of the letters is no longer there, but iron oxide pigments can still be detected in the depressions .

Content and analysis

The inscription opens with a consecration formula to the numina “the emperor”, so it must have been created at a time when more than one emperor ruled. This offers a starting point for the temporal classification: Since the typeface of the text can be dated palaeographically to the late second century, the reigns of the emperors Mark Aurel and Lucius Verus (161-169) or Mark Aurel and Commodus (177-180) come into consideration . The formulaic consecration to the rulers is followed by the consecration to the god Mars Camulus , i.e. the Celtic god Camulos , which is equated with the Roman Mars within the framework of the Interpretatio Romana . This is the only indication of a deity worshiped in the temple area exposed here, although Mars Camulus was also worshiped in Britain, but above all in western Gaul and Germania. Tiberinius Celerianus may have erected a holy stone for a god of his homeland. Being as Pseudogentiliz formed name Tiberinius (that of the Latin Cognomen derived Tiberinus) indicates namely towards a Gallic origin, and the abbreviation "C BELL" in the fifth row can be described as "Cives Bellovacus" ( "a citizen of Bellovaci ") Dissolve . This Gallic tribe had its main place in Caesaromagus , the modern Beauvais . The two names also identify the Gaul as a Roman citizen .

The indication of origin is followed by a description of the founder as "moritix Londiniensium" . The word moritix - or moritex - is not known in classical Latin; it is a term of Celtic origin. The Celtic word * mori-teg- / tig- means something like "who goes to sea", so "seafarer" or "seaman", and was apparently taken up as regionalism in the Latin of the northwestern provinces of the Roman Empire, although it was the basically the same Latin term nauta . Possibly moritex / moritix had a specific, narrower meaning, which suggested a takeover into Latin. In this regard, Monique Dondin-Payre and Xavier Loriot are specifically thinking of a representative of London in his hometown of Caesaromagus, which is located “across the sea”, comparable to the office of proxenos in ancient Greece.

The word Londiniensium is the genitive plural of the (presumably substantivated) adjective Londiniensis , which refers to the city of London, which was called Londinium in ancient times . On the one hand, it can be understood as a neuter ("the Londoner [things]"), so that it was initially assumed that Tiberius Celerianus was moritix (in the sense of "trader") with goods from Londinium. It is more likely, however, that the adjective is meant as masculine / feminine (“the Londoner [citizen / trader / ...]”). The moritix Tiberinius Celerianus seems to have been in the "service" of the Londoners or to have been part of them. The term should not mean the entire city population, but rather the more narrowly defined community of citizens. Perhaps the Londinienses should even be understood as a college or some other firmly organized group that was active in trade or business. From the dedication of an inscription to the two Augusti by the moritix Tiberius Celerianus, it has been concluded that this corporation of the Londinienses must have been under state supervision or support, possibly because of the importance of its activities.

The term “Primus”, which can be deduced in the eighth line from the letters still preserved, could be a personal name and then either designate a second donor or the person who carried out the consecration for Celerianus. It is more likely, however, that the word simply translates as “the first” / “the most important”. In this case it could either refer to Tiberinius Celerianus and his activity as Moritix or "Londoner" or introduce a second, lost section of the inscription.

translation

According to the previous epigraphic studies, the inscription can be translated as follows with a certain probability:

The Numina [= divine powers] of the emperors
(and) the god Mars Camulus
(consecrated this) Tiberinius
Celerianus,
citizen of the
Bellovacians (and) moritix of
the “Londoners”;
the first / most important ... [or: Primus ...]

Other translations are possible for the last lines received after the name:

  • “… Citizens of the Bellovacians and Moritix ; the first / most important of the Londoners ... ”- This translation only makes sense if the Londinienses / Londoners are understood to be a (merchant) community to which non- urban citizens such as the Bellovak Tiberinius could also belong. If, on the other hand, one understands the entire citizenship of London by “Londoners”, the variant is ruled out.
  • “… Citizens of the Bellovacians; the first / most important moritix of the Londoners ... "

Web links

literature

  • Simon Corcoran, Benet Salway, Peter Salway: Moritix Londiniensium: A Recent Epigraphic Find in London. In: The British Epigraphy Society, Newsletter. NS, Volume 8, Fall 2002, pp. 10-13 ( PDF online ).
  • L'Année epigraphique . 2002, No. 882; 2003, No. 1015; 2008, no. +774.
  • RSO Tomlin, MWC Hassall: Roman Britain in 2002, II: Inscriptions. In: Britannia . Volume 34, 2003, pp. 361–382, here p. 364 (with photo and precise drawing of the inscription).
  • James Noel Adams : The Word moritix in a New Inscription from London. In: Journal of Papyrology and Epigraphy . Volume 143, 2003, pp. 275-276.
  • Monique Dondin-Payre , Xavier Loriot : Tiberinius Celerianus à Londres: Bellovaque et moritix. In: L'Antiquité classique . Volume 77, 2008, pp. 127-169. (on-line)
  • RSO Tomlin, RP Wright, MWC Hassall: The Roman Inscriptions of Britain . Volume 3: Inscriptions on Stone Found or Notified between 1 January 1955 and 31 December 2006. Oxbow Books, Oxford 2009, ISBN 978-1-84217-368-8 , pp. 30 f., No. 3014.
  • Roger Tomlin: Inscriptions. In: Douglas Killock (Ed.): Temples and Suburbs: Excavations at Tabard Square, Southwark. Pre-construct archeology Limited, London 2015, ISBN 978-0-9926672-5-2 , pp. 192-193.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ L'Année épigraphique 2003, No. 1015.
  2. ^ RSO Tomlin, MWC Hassall: Roman Britain in 2002, II: Inscriptions. In: Britannia. Volume 34, 2003, pp. 361-382, here p. 364.
  3. ↑ Martin Henig et al: Statuary, Sculpture, Inscriptions and Architectural Fragments. In: Douglas Killock (Ed.): Temples and Suburbs: Excavations at Tabard Square, Southwark. Pre-construct archeology Limited, London 2015, ISBN 978-0-9926672-5-2 , pp. 187-198.
  4. ↑ Douglas Killock: Temples and Suburbs: Excavations at Tabard Square, Southwark. Pre-construct archeology Limited, London 2015, ISBN 978-0-9926672-5-2 , p. 66.
  5. ^ In addition, Monique Dondin-Payre, Xavier Loriot: Tiberinius Celerianus à Londres: Bellovaque et moritix. In: L'Antiquité classique. Volume 77, 2008, pp. 127–169, here pp. 127–129 (online)
  6. ↑ Width and height are stated differently in the literature: For the width there are also the information 28.5 and 29.5 cm, for the height the value 39 cm. The dates given here follow L'Année épigraphique 2002, No. 882, as well as RSO Tomlin, RP Wright, MWC Hassall: The Roman Inscriptions of Britain . Volume 3: Inscriptions on Stone Found or Notified between 1 January 1955 and 31 December 2006. Oxbow Books, Oxford 2009, ISBN 978-1-84217-368-8 , pp. 30 f., No. 3014.
  7. ^ A b R. SO Tomlin, RP Wright, MWC Hassall: The Roman Inscriptions of Britain . Volume 3: Inscriptions on Stone Found or Notified between 1 January 1955 and 31 December 2006. Oxbow Books, Oxford 2009, ISBN 978-1-84217-368-8 , p. 31, no. 3014.
  8. ^ AE 2002, 882
  9. ↑ Simon Corcoran, Benet Salway, Peter Salway: Moritix Londiniensium: A recent epigraphic find in London. In: The British Epigraphy Society, Newsletter. NS, Volume 8, Fall 2002, pp. 10-13, here p. 11 ( online ( memento from March 3, 2016 in the Internet Archive )).
  10. ↑ For distribution in detail Monique Dondin-Payre, Xavier Loriot: Tiberinius Celerianus à Londres: Bellovaque et moritix. In: L'Antiquité classique. Volume 77, 2008, pp. 127–169, here pp. 134–138 (online)
  11. ↑ CIL 13, 8164a : Apollini / C (aius) Aurelius C (ai) l (ibertus) / Verus negotiator / Britannicianus / moritex d (onum) d (edit) / l (ocus) d (atus) d (ecreto) d (ecurionum) (inscription from Colonia Claudia Ara Agrippinensium , today's Cologne ).
  12. ↑ James Noel Adams : The word moritix in a new inscription from London. In: Journal of Papyrology and Epigraphy . Volume 143, 2003, pp. 275-276; on regionalism see the same: The Regional Diversification of Latin 200 BC - AD 600. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 2007, on the inscription in particular pp. 311-312.
  13. ↑ Monique Dondin-Payre, Xavier Loriot: Tiberinius Celerianus à Londres: Bellovaque et moritix. In: L'Antiquité classique. Volume 77, 2008, pp. 127–169, here pp. 139–145 (online)
  14. ↑ Simon Corcoran, Benet Salway, Peter Salway: Moritix Londiniensium: A recent epigraphic find in London. In: The British Epigraphy Society, Newsletter. NS, Volume 8, Fall 2002, pp. 10-13, here p. 11 ( online ( memento from March 3, 2016 in the Internet Archive )).
  15. ↑ a b A kind of collegium sees in the Londinienses James Noel Adams: The word moritix in a new inscription from London. In: Journal of Papyrology and Epigraphy . Volume 143, 2003, pp. 275–276, here p. 276. On the other hand, Monique Dondin-Payre, Xavier Loriot: Tiberinius Celerianus à Londres: Bellovaque et moritix refer to the entire citizenry . In: L'Antiquité classique. Volume 77, 2008, pp. 127–169, here p. 147 (online)
  16. ↑ So L'Année épigraphique 2002, No. 882.
  17. ↑ Simon Corcoran, Benet Salway, Peter Salway: Moritix Londiniensium: A recent epigraphic find in London. In: The British Epigraphy Society, Newsletter. NS, Volume 8, Fall 2002, pp. 10-13, here p. 12 ( online ( memento from March 3, 2016 in the Internet Archive )).
  18. ↑ On this translation Monique Dondin-Payre, Xavier Loriot: Tiberinius Celerianus à Londres: Bellovaque et moritix. In: L'Antiquité classique. Volume 77, 2008, pp. 127-169, here pp. 145 f. (on-line)