2.1. Text with names

Description:
White marble building blocks.
Text:
On the face of the walls.
Letters:
Painted graffiti. a is upside down.
Date:
Undateable
Findspot:
Bouleuterion/Odeon, on the north face of the outer walls
Original Location:
Findspot
Last recorded location:
Findspot
History of discovery:
Recorded by the NYU expedition.
Bibliography:
Reynolds, 'Inscriptions of the Bouleuterion/Odeon' in Ratté, forthcoming.
Text constituted from:
Transcription (Reynolds, 1967). This edition Reynolds (2007).
a
1 Προβάτο[υ]
b
1 Προβάτου
c
1 ΠΡΟΒΑΒΑΤΟΥ
d
1 Προβ[ά]το[υ]
e
1 Π[ρ]ο[?βάτου]
a
1ΠΡΟΒΑΤΟ[·]
b
1ΠΡΟΒΑΤΟΥ
c
1ΠΡΟΒΑΒΑΤΟΥ
d
1ΠΡΟΒ[·]ΤΟ[·]
e
1Π[·]Ο[·····]
<div type="textpart_block" n="a" >
<ab>
<lb n="1" />
Προβάτο
<supplied reason="lost" >
υ
</supplied>
</ab>
</div>
<div type="textpart_block" n="b" >
<ab>
<lb n="1" />
Προβάτου
</ab>
</div>
<div type="textpart_block" n="c" >
<ab>
<lb n="1" />
ΠΡΟΒΑΒΑΤΟΥ
</ab>
</div>
<div type="textpart_block" n="d" >
<ab>
<lb n="1" />
Προβ
<supplied reason="lost" >
ά
</supplied>
το
<supplied reason="lost" >
υ
</supplied>
</ab>
</div>
<div type="textpart_block" n="e" >
<ab>
<lb n="1" />
Π
<supplied reason="lost" >
ρ
</supplied>
ο
<supplied reason="lost" cert="low" >
βάτου
</supplied>
</ab>
</div>

Apparatus

Illegible traces of paint appear on several more blocks, as well as occasional single letters some of which were cut and not painted.

Translation:

? Of Probatos

Commentary:

The position of a shows that these texts were not intended for display here, and were presumably covered with plaster when the building was in use. The genitive case seems clear from b and c, so that it is plausible to take them as ownership marks of some kind - perhaps giving the name of a quarry owner or of the quarryman who cut them; this suggestion obviously raises unsolved problems relating to ancient systems for keeping a tally of work completed. If it is the case that this is a name it is, obviously, a Latin one transliterated into Greek; a number of such names were used at Aphrodisias, but I do not know of any other instance of this one.

Photographs:

Face (1976)
 Face (1976)
Face (1976)
 Face (1976)

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