Tabula Traiana

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The Table of Emperor Trajan (Tabula Traiana)

The Tabula Traiana ( Latin for table of Traian is) one in the rock of Iron Gate carved, the Roman Emperor Trajan dedicated inscription at the foot of Alma shear mountains , near the Serbian village of Golo Brdo west of Kladovo in Djerdap National Park .

history

Photo from 1908

The Tabula Traiana , visible on the rock face on the Serbian bank of the Danube , was under the Roman Emperor Trajan in 100 AD on the occasion of the completion of the road construction section of the Roman road (called Donausüdstraße by historians ) (from the Danube sources near Donaueschingen to Romania) from Golubac as far as Kladovo below the Iron Gate gorge, carved directly into the rock.

In 1972 during the construction work for the joint power station project Đerdap of the then Yugoslavia and Romania, the inscription was carved out together with the rock and moved to a higher level in order to preserve it. Today it is only visible from the water. Since the construction of the dam, the water level of the Đerdapsees has almost reached the lower edge of the table, while the “Trajan Street”, designed here as a gallery, runs far below the water level today.

The "Trajan-Strasse", Latin "via iuxta danubium", called Donausüdstrasse by today's historians , is the eastern extension of the Roman military road, which was built around 45 AD, which runs from the "beginning of the Danube" at Hüfingen fort near Donaueschingen only to Danube breakthrough at Weltenburg above Kelheim . Trajan had this strategically important road extended to the east around the year 100 after he had conquered the Danube Gorge known as the Iron Gate as a preparatory measure for the Dacian wars . The road led to the east of Belgrade. Emperor Trajan had built a Danube port there for supplies and had the Trajan's Bridge built over the Danube. Even before the power plant was built, the Danube Gorge at the Iron Gate was so narrow that there was no space for a road between the river and the rock face. Trajan's architect Apollodorus of Damascus therefore had the street run over beams (a balcony-like construction) that were fixed horizontally on one side in the rock. Seen from the opposite bank, the Roman legionaries seemed to float over the water of the Danube. The construction of this road is depicted on the Trajan's Column in Rome .

execution

The double-edged Tabula Traiana, a so-called tabula ansata , with a length of 4.10 m and a height of 1.75 m is held on both sides by winged genii , over which floating dolphins can be seen. It is crowned by a canopy with rosette-decorated cassettes , above which there is a representation of an eagle with open wings. Right and left three six-petalled rosettes are carved into the stone as reliefs. The inscription field was covered with stucco and the letters were emphasized with red paint; remains of both were preserved when they were found.

inscription

The former building inscription comprised six lines, four of which are still legible today. The remnants of the last two lines were originally interpreted differently from today's reading:

Imp (erator) Caesar divi Nervae f (ilius)
Nerva Traianus Aug (ustus) Germ (anicus)
pontif (ex) maximus trib (unicia) pot (estate) IIII
pater patriae co (n) s (ul) III
montibus excisi [s ] anco [ni] bus
sublat [i] s via [mr] e [fecit]

Translation for example: “The son of the divine Nerva and ruling emperor, Nerva Traianus Augustus Germanicus, Pontifex Maximus, holder of tribunician power for the fourth time , father of the fatherland and consul for the third time, placed cantilevered beams after he had cut down the mountains (ancones) restore the road. "

Otto Benndorf translated anconibus sublatis "on or with raised cantilever beams", whereas Theodor Mommsen translated "after removing the corners". He wanted to see cliffs in the ancones that were in the way and that had been removed as part of the road construction. Erich Swoboda understood anconibus sublatis to mean that “Traian removed the beams and struts”. According to Swoboda, these beams and struts were structural elements of an originally Tiberian road construction and became superfluous after the route had been sufficiently widened by the Trajan work on the rock. Only one other inscription names ancones , especially their craftsmen, who appear in the inscription as donors after the work is done. In his treatment of this inscription, Martin Gabričević translates ancones as “ consoles ”.

literature

Web links

Commons : Tabula Traiana  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Remarks

  1. ↑ Openings carved in the rock of the Kazan received a horizontal beam construction that supported the 550 cm wide road.
  2. ↑ CIL 3, 8267 , originally published as CIL 3, 1699, the editors read in lines 5 and 6: mont [ibus excisis amni] bu [s] / sup [er] at [is viam f] e [cit].
  3. ↑ Reported at Otto Hirschfeld : Epigraphische gleaning for Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum volume III. from Dacien and Moesien. In: Meeting reports / Academy of Sciences in Vienna, Philosophical-Historical Class. Volume 77.7. 1874, pp. 417-420 ( digitized version ).
  4. ^ Theodor Mommsen in: Prometheus . Volume 4, No. 160, 1892, p. 64.
  5. ↑ Erich Swoboda: Research on the Upper Moesian Limes. Hölder-Pichler-Tempsky, Vienna 1939, p. 86.
  6. ↑ Erich Swoboda: Research on the Upper Moesian Limes. Hölder-Pichler-Tempsky, Vienna 1939, pp. 80–88.
  7. ↑ AE 2003, 1533 .
  8. ↑ Martin Gabričević: Road construction in the Donja Klisura of the Iron Gate in the light of the newly discovered inscription. In: Arheološki vestnik. Volume 23, 1972, pp. 408-416, for the inscription see also the entry in the Heidelberg Epigraphic Database .

Coordinates: 44 ° 39 ′ 17 ″  N , 22 ° 18 ′ 29 ″  E