V 250. Sougdaia. Demonstrative inscription, before 1240 C.E.

Monument

Type

Wall block. 

Material

Yellow Kapselian sandstone. 

Dimensions (cm)

H. 22.0, W. 36.5, Th. unknown.

Additional description

On the front: a cross formed by four intersecting arcs. The bottom arc is closed with another arc in mirror image, forming an eye shape. Cut off at the top; used as a spolium, built into a wall. 

Place of Origin

Sougdaia. 

Find place

Sudak. 

Find context

Fortress, west of the city gate, Block I, Tower of the XIIIth century. 

Find circumstances

1995, excavations of of I.A. Baranov 

Modern location

In situ. 

Institution and inventory

In situ, no inventory number. 

Autopsy

September 2003, September 2009. 

Epigraphic field

Position

On the arms and the intersection of the cross. 

Lettering

Lapidary. 

Letterheights (cm)

3.2–4.0.

Text

Category

Demonstrative. 

Date

Before 1240 C.E. 

Dating criteria

Archaeological context. 

Editions

L1. Vinogradov, Dzhanov 2004, 405–408, № 3. 

Edition

Φῶς,
ζωή

Diplomatic

ΦΩΣ
ΖΩΗ

EpiDoc (XML)

<div type="edition" xml:lang="grc">
   <ab>
      <lb n="1"/>Φῶς,
      <lb n="2"/>ζωή
   </ab>
   </div> 

Translation

Light, life.

 

Commentary

Inscriptions with the formula "Light, life" are known in the Northern Black Sea region since the VIth century (see Introduction IV.3.C.b), and in the Mediterranean region they are known even earlier, in the Vth century.

The basis for our date for this monument is not so much the lettershapes, which are not distinctive, but the type of the cross and the archaeological context. The stone block (in secondary use: the top is missing) was built into a wall of the XIII-XIVth century - terminus ante quem. Crosses drawn with a compass inside a circle are well known in Crimea, starting from the Middle Byzantine period (see, e.g., V 89). The closest paralle, however, is V 254, also from Sudak. Therefore, the most likely date for our monument is IX-XIth centuries. The original use of the block is not entirely clear: it may have been part of some church's masonry.

The inscribed block is built into the inner surface of the eastern wall of a defensive tower, whose construction date is determined on the basis of radiocarbon analysis. The dating of a cypress-wood beam from the masonry of the northern wall was conducted by N.N. Kovaluykh and V.V. Skripkin (M. P. Semenenko Institute of Geochemistry, Mineralogy and Ore Formation, the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine), and as a result of subcaliber analysis, a date of 1240 C.E. +10 years was obtained, corresponding well to the general stratigraphy of that sector of the archaeological excavation. The destruction date of the western wall is definitively dated by the silver coins of the Golden Chorde Khan Tokhta (1291-1313), discovered in the excavations of 1996.

 

Images

(cc) © 2015 Andrey Vinogradov (edition), Irene Polinskaya (translation)
You may download this inscription in EpiDoc XML. (This file should validate to the EpiDoc schema.)