Читать книгу Rome and the Black Sea Region - Группа авторов - Страница 18

A smaller sample of twenty-six dated inscriptions from Amastris shows a somewhat different pattern (Table 2).³⁴ Here the earliest inscription dates from 50/51 AD, i.e., half a century earlier than in Amaseia. It is, however, no less than 121 years after the introduction of the Lucullan era; and as mentioned above, Amastris is in fact one of the few places where we have certain evidence of the use of the calendar immediately after its introduction. The end of the use of the calendar likewise coincides with the invasions in the 250s and 260s AD. Between these end points, the inscriptions are distributed more evenly than in Amaseia, with only a slight increase in the first half of the second century. The concentration of four inscriptions under Septimius Severus is probably coincidental. With regard to the ethnic character of the names, we see a clear development away from purely Greek names over time. In the three earliest inscriptions of the first century AD, all names are of Greek or Iranian inspiration. During the first half of the second century, Greek names still dominate but Latin names or Latin tria nomina with a Greek cognomen begin to appear; after the middle of the century only a single Greek name appears. In two instances, a father with a Greek name gave his children Latin names.³⁵ This could be a sign of the times or of the upward mobility of the persons that appear in the epigraphic record.

Fig. 4. Ethnic composition of the names in the dated inscriptions from Amaseia (based on French 1996).

The last examples I shall present here concern the cities of Pompeiopolis, Neoklaudiopolis and Hadrianopolis in inner Paphlagonia. Apart from two inscriptions from Neoklaudiopolis from the 120s, dated inscriptions only begin in the 160s (Table 3), yet end around 260, with one late example from the 280s.³⁶ The small size of the sample and the scattered distribution does not permit a detailed statistical analysis of the development in the use of names. Suffice to say that at least some non-Greek, non-Latin names still occur among the inscriptions.

Table 3. Chronological distribution of the inscriptions from inner Paphlagonia: Neoklaudiopolis, Hadrianopolis, Pompeiopolis, and Germanikopolis (based on Leschhorn 1993, 481-484).

Decade	Number of inscriptions
AD 50-59	0
60-69	0
70-79	0
80-89	0
90-99	0
100-109	0
110-119	0
120-129	2
130-139	0
140-149	0
150-159	0
160-169	4
170-179	2
180-189	1
190-199	6
200-209	1
210-219	3
220-229	1
230-239	2
240-249	3
250-259	4
260-269	2
270-279	0
280-289	1
Total	32

Keeping in mind the danger of overinterpretation, I think that the three examples given here can be taken as evidence of how the custom of erecting inscribed monuments (particularly of a funerary nature) to commemorate oneself and one’s family spread among a wider section of the population. It began on the coast in the first century AD and then slowly penetrated the hinterland before the mid-second century. In most cities it coincides with the introduction of local coinage, the more common use of Latin names, the construction of public buildings, and probably other, less clearly dated phenomena such as changed land-use and settlement patterns. It is difficult to say whether these changes were perceived as Romanisation by the local population, but they were certainly a product of the favourable conditions offered by the Pax Romana.

Notes

1 Magie 1950; Jones 1971; Marek 1993; Mitchell 1993; Syme 1995.

2 Strabon 12.3.39.

3 Syme 1995, 115.

4 Mitchell 1993, 84. Olshausen & Biller 1984 (map) for location.

5 Saprykin & Maslennikov 1996, 1-14.

6 French 1996b, 78.

7 Dalaison 2002, 261-276.

8 French 1996, 82. Appian (Mithr. 65) furthermore relates that Murena captured 400 villages belonging to Mithridates.

9 Doonan 2004.

10 Doonan 2004, 47.

11 Doonan 2004, 103; 111-112.

12 Doonan 2004, 47.

13 Matthews, Pollard & Ramage 1998.

14 Matthews, Pollard & Ramage 1998, 203.

15 Özdogan, Marro & Tibet 1999; Özsait 2002; 2003; Özsait & Özsait 2002; Dönmez 1999 – to mention a few. In her new book on the Pontic kingdom, Erciyas (2006, 53-62) offers a summary of all the surveys conducted in Pontos.

16 Alcock 1993, 48.

17 For the beginning of the era, see Perl 1968, 299-330.

18 Callataÿ 1997, 8-9 & 33-36.

19 Leschhorn 1993, 83-86. McGing 1986, 66. Justinus 37.4.3.

20 An inscription from Phanagoreia dated to the year 210 (88/87 BC) published by Vinogradov & Wörrle (1992, 159-170), and another newly found inscription from Olbia dated to the year 220 (78/77 BC) published by Krapivina & Diatroptov 2005, 167-180.

21 Leschhorn 1993, 418.

22 Leschhorn 1993, 106-115.

23 Waddington, Reinach & Babelon 1925, 176, no. 19.

24 For the earliest occurrence of the era in the different cities, see Leschhorn 1993, 481-484.

25 Anderson, Cumont & Grégoire 1910, no. 66.

26 Pliny (NH 7.24; 25.3) reports that it was a well-known fact that Mithridates spoke twenty-two languages and never required the service of an interpreter. Gellius (17.17) offers the figure of twenty-five, and Aurelius Victor (De vir illustr. 76.1) claims that he spoke fifty languages.

27 For inscriptions on wood in the Roman period, see Eck 1998, 203-217.

28 IK 47, p. 1-2.

29 French 1996, 86-87.

30 Anderson, Cumont & Grégoire 1910, 109-187.

31 Burnett, Amandry & Carradice 1999, 236-238. The legend on a Julio-Claudian coin formerly read as Ε[ΤΟΥΣ] ΜΑ (year 41) turns out to read EΠI ΒΑΣΙΛΑ. Basila served as legate of Galatia sometime during the first decades of the first century AD.

32 For more examples of the impact of the Antonine Plague, see Duncan-Jones 1992, 108-136.

33 Olshausen 1974, 153-170.

34 Marek 1993, 157-187.

35 Marek 1993, 170, no. 48; 184, no. 104.

36 See Marek 1993, 135-155; 187-210, for the inscriptions from Pompeiopolis and Hadrianopolis. See Anderson, Cumont & Grégoire 1910, 46-108, for the inscriptions from Neoklaudiopolis. In Hadrianopolis, two statue bases for Hadrian and Antoninus Pius, respectively, testify to the fact that inscriptions were erected before the practice of dating the inscriptions was introduced in epitaphs.