V 9. Cherson. Building inscription (or dedication) of Bishop Theodore, VIth century C.E.
Monument
Type
Door jamb.
Material
Proconnesian marble.
Dimensions (cm)
H. 50.0, W. 22.0, Th. 20.5.
Additional description
The sides are decorated with mouldings; there is a dowel hole on the back; the front is vertically divided into two halves by a roughly worked central band (along which a door frame would have been fitted). Broken off at the bottom.
Place of Origin
Cherson.
Find place
Sevastopol (Chersonesos).
Find context
Church No 15 ("basilica in basilica")
Find circumstances
1889, excavations of A.L. Bertye-Delagard.
Modern location
Moscow, Russia.
Institution and inventory
State Historical Museum, 33492.
Autopsy
November 2007.
Epigraphic field
Position
Vertically, on the right and left of the front.
Lettering
Lapidary. Kionedon. Letters are ornate, with serifs; kappa with elongated vertical, omicron in the shape of upturned horseshoe with inward curling ends, and almond-shaped; pi with extended horizontal, tailed rho, diamond-shaped sigma, upsilon and omega with short horizontal bar through the middle.
Letterheights (cm)
2.5–9.0.
Text
Category
Building inscription.
Date
VIth century C.E.
Dating criteria
Palaeography, archaeological context.
Editions
L1. Latyshev 1895, 23 № 28 ; 1.1. Latyshev 1896, 32–33, № 26; 1.2. Millet 1900; 1.2.1. Latyshev 1897, 150; 1.3. Latyshev 1901, 75, № 26; 2. Vinogradov 2006, 291 № 2; 2.1. Vinogradov 2007, 265 № 16.
<div type="edition" xml:lang="grc">
<div type="textpart" subtype="column">
<ab>
<lb n="1"/><supplied reason="lost">Ἐ</supplied>
<lb n="2"/><supplied reason="lost">π</supplied>
<lb n="3"/><unclear cert="low">ὶ</unclear>
<lb n="4"/>τ
<lb n="5"/>ο
<lb n="6"/>ῦ
<lb n="7"/>ἐ
<lb n="8"/>π
<lb n="9"/>ι
<lb n="10"/>σ
<lb n="11"/>κ
<lb n="12"/>ό
<lb n="13"/><supplied reason="lost">π</supplied>
<lb n="14"/><supplied reason="lost">ο</supplied>
<lb n="15"/><supplied reason="lost">υ</supplied>
</ab></div>
<div type="textpart" subtype="column">
<ab>
<lb n="1"/><supplied reason="lost">Θ</supplied>
<lb n="2"/>ε
<lb n="3"/>ο
<lb n="4"/>δ
<lb n="5"/>ό
<lb n="6"/>ρ
<lb n="7"/>ου.
</ab>
</div>
</div> Apparatus criticus
1-3: . Latyshev 1895, Latyshev 1896; [ἐπ]ὶ Millet; [ἐπὶ] resp. [ὑπὲ]ρ Latyshev 1897, Latyshev 1901; [ἐπ]ὶ resp. [Κύριε βοήθε]ι Vinogradov
Translation
In the time of bishop Theodore.
Commentary
Kionedon is characteristic of Christian building inscriptions carved on door frames in Early Byzantine period: Grégoire 1929, no. 53 (Pergamos); IGLS 382 (Antiochene, 523 C.E.) The letters in the left column are half the size of those in the right: the carver was apparently afraid of running out of space (cf. V 7).
1-3. Initially, Latyshev had refrained from restoring the beginning of the text, but when Millet suggested reading [ἐπ]ὶ there, he objected that the vertical hasta could equally belong to rho, as in [ὑπέ]ρ. This preposition, however, in the Northern Black Sea region, occurs only in the formulae "For the prayer," "For salvation," and the like, while an independent dedicatory formula is unknown. Since the total height of the monument is unknown, another alternative restoration could be the formula Кύριε, βοήθει, often used with the genitive (Wessel 1989, no. 517; Feissel 1983, no. 262; Bandy 73A; Grégoire 1929, nos. 96, 148, 226). It occurs in the already mentioned Grégoire 1929, no. 53, however, the restoration of the right column leaves no room for that formula to fit in the left one, while the possibility that it would not have fully fit onto the door frame (as in Pergamum) is unlikely.
4-22. Bishop Theodore is not otherwise known from historical sources in Early Byzantine Cherson. It is quite probable that a bishop was the ktitor of Church 15, which is important to consider if one is to understand its particular structure and decoration (see Gaydukov 2005a). The archaeological finds firmly date the construction of this basilica to the VIth century (see Sorochan 2005, 735).
The letters are close to the Early Byzantine monumental script (e.g., see pi with extended horizontal in V 94, originating from the same church, or omega in V 27), albeit carved in a more ornamental fashion. All lettershapes, except omicron, have VIth-century analogies, but they are totally alien to the local epigraphic tradition of Cherson (see Morss 2003), and lead to the conclusion that the carver must have been a foreigner.
Images
© 2015 Andrey Vinogradov (edition), Irene Polinskaya (translation)
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