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Like other Aramaic dialects in the Near East, such as Palmyrene, Nabataean, and Hatrene, Syriac was commonly employed in inscriptions and official documents, which were produced in the kingdom of Edessa. About one hundred and fifty such inscriptions and documents survive, the vast majority of which are chance finds; the continuous settlement of Edessa up to modern times has precluded systematic excavations, and many more inscriptions are certainly still to be recovered. Most of the known inscriptions are helpfully collected, published, and translated in one volume (Drijvers and Healey 1999; its numeration is followed here), with recent additions of new finds (notably Healey 2006; Önal 2017: 132–141); they all come from Osrhoene, with the only known exception being three short graffiti on sherds found in Krefeld, in Germany, that may suggest a link with merchants from Edessa (Luther 2009). Several inscriptions are on mosaics and are often accompanied by a rich iconography; they demonstrate a link to so-called Parthian art (for which see Chapter 12), but their technique and geometric ornamentation are Roman (Chapter 16). The language of these inscriptions is known as “Old Syriac,” thus differentiating it from “Classical Syriac,” the language used in the manuscripts and employed for literature, from which it differs in some important orthographic and morphologic features (most notably in the rendering of the proto-Semitic *ś and the use of different prefixes to mark the masculine third person singular imperfect). Scholars are still divided on the origins of the linguistic peculiarities of Classical Syriac, and possible explanations include a chronological development of Old Syriac or a reflection of a different register or variety in the spoken language (Van Rompay 1994; Healey 2008a, 2017; Gzella 2019).

A considerable group of Old Syriac inscriptions are funerary in nature and mark the burial sites of members of the Edessene elites during the first three centuries CE. A representative of this material is the earliest surviving dated inscription, which was likely put up in the year 6 CE to mark the tomb of the governor of Birtha (now Birecik), a strategically placed settlement on the Euphrates (As 55). As frequently occurs in Old Syriac inscriptions, the text is reported in the first person by the dedicatee; his name was Zarbiyan and, in the inscription, he declares: “I made this tomb for myself and for Ḥalwiya, lady of my household, and for my children.” References to the family of the deceased are a common feature of Syriac funerary inscriptions, which often include portraits of the deceased together with family members, either in stone relief or in mosaic. Family ties are emphasized in these inscriptions, but especially important was any eventual connection of the deceased with members of the royal family. In the inscription of Zarbiyan, the deceased introduces himself not just as the “governor of Birtha,” but also as the “tutor of ‘Awidallat son of Ma‘nu son of Ma‘nu,” who can arguably be identified as the son of the king of Edessa Ma‘nu IV (d. 13 CE). Zarbiyan’s role of “tutor” (mrabbyōnō) is probably best understood as a special guardianship position that he had for a member of the royal family; this role may have equivalents in the Hatrene Aramaic mrabbyana, as is attested in a dedicatory inscription put up in the first half of the third century (H203:2; Vattioni 1981; Aggoula 1991; Beyer 1998), and in the Nabataean cognate rbw, used for the tutor of a third-century king Gadimat, “king of the Thanouēnoi,” in the context of a Greek bilingual inscription in which the word is translated as tropheus in Greek (RES 1097). According to Millar, this title indicates the extension of Hellenistic courtly culture into these kingdoms (Sartre 1979; Millar 1993: 431–434).

The question of possible links with Hellenistic court life arises with another funerary inscription in mosaic, found in the northern cemetery of Edessa and part of the so-called Abgar mosaic (Am 10), which decorated the family tomb of a local notable, a certain Barsimya. This mosaic includes Barsimya’s portrait together with individual portraits of his grandfather, mother, brother, and son, but also, and most importantly, a prominent portrait of the king of Edessa, Abgar VIII (176–211), who occupies the central portion of the composition and is addressed as “my Lord and benefactor” in the inscription. Here, both iconography and text express the strong allegiance of Barsimya to the king, and there is a possibility that the Syriac terminology should be understood as a calque of the Greek euergetēs (Healey 2009: 243–245).

Several other inscribed mosaics from Osrhoene survive (mostly dating back to the second and third centuries CE) that similarly portray the deceased together with family members. Am 2, Am 3, and the Gadya family mosaic (Önal 2017: 132–134) represent 6, 13, and 4 individual portraits respectively; here, each person is represented individually, enclosed by a quadrangular frame, and is identified by Syriac labels. Conversely, other funerary family mosaics represent the figures standing as in a family portrait (Am 4, Am 5, Am 11, Cm 14), or, in one case, as an entire family taking part in a funerary banquet (Am 8). In this last mosaic, the deceased is depicted reclining on a couch, surrounded by his wife and members of his family; other inscribed scenes of funerary banquets survive also in stone (As 16/17, As 12, As 14; Drijvers 1977: 899 about possible links with the iconography in Palmyra). Conversely, a trace of rather more earthly banquets is represented by the fine silver jug that was found in a private house in Dura-Europos, inscribed, in Syriac, with the name of the owner and the weight of the silver (Bo 1): its decorative motifs, enriched by bunches of grapes and satyrs’ masks, indicate that the vessel was used to pour wine and likely attests to the adoption of the practice of the symposium among Syriac speakers (Baur et al. 1933: 178–181, 229–231, pl.XII). Other funerary inscriptions in stone (rather than in mosaic) include portraits of the deceased in relief, following a custom that might be compared with practices in Palmyra and Zeugma (As 6, As 26, As 40, As 43 possibly representing three women, As 50, As 60; Chapter 12); another link to burial practices in Palmyra comes from the remains of a tower-tomb south of Edessa, which is inscribed in Greek and Syriac and perhaps belonged to a member of the Edessene royal family (As 62; Healey 2017: 8–9).

In addition to being used in funerary settings, Old Syriac had an important royal status within the kingdom of Edessa, as can be gauged from its use on coins (see below) and from official dedicatory inscriptions. Not unlike Palmyra and Hatra, Edessa was rich in monuments and sculptures that celebrated the royal family and members of the local elites; an important trace of dedicatory statuary survives in the form of a column that still stands on Edessa’s citadel. As its inscription makes clear, the column once held a statue of the Edessene queen (or princess) Shalmat, daughter of the crown prince Ma‘nu, and was set up in the first half of the third century CE by a high-ranking official in the kingdom (As 1). The inscription also attests to the use, in Edessa, of the Middle-Persian title paṣgriba, usually understood as “crown prince,” which can be compared to the same title in Hatra (Gnoli 2002; Mosig-Walburg 2018; see also CIL IV 1797, the Latin funerary inscription, set up in Rome, of the Edessene “crown prince,” filius rex, Abgar Phraates); at the same time, this inscription demonstrates the continuing importance of the royal family after Edessa was made a Roman colonia in the early third century (Millar 1993: 476–477).

Other inscriptions have a religious or votive character and demonstrate the interaction between Semitic and Mesopotamian cults and Greco-Roman religion. A group of inscriptions from a site about 60 kilometers southeast of Edessa, Sumatar Harabesi, attest to the continuation of the cult of Sin (the Mesopotamian god of the moon, also venerated in nearby Harran) and are part of a sanctuary area where altars, reliefs (As 27/28), and betyls were erected in honor of the god; no trace of the cult of Sin, however, survives in inscriptions from Edessa itself (Healey 2019). Other inscriptions make reference to Maralahe, the “Lord of the gods,” in a funerary setting (As 20), or to record the erection of votive pillars, thanks to the involvement of local governors and cultic personnel (As 36, As 37). Hints about concepts of an afterlife might come from funerary inscriptions that use the term “house of eternity” for a tomb (As 7, As 9, As 59, Am 1, Am 2, Am 3, Am 5, Am 6, Am 7, Am 10), or from curses upon anyone removing the bones of the deceased (As 20, Bs 2). A religious character, possibly also related to the afterlife, has been suggested for some funerary mosaics with Greco-Roman mythological subjects, such as two mosaics representing Orpheus playing the lyre (Am 7; Healey 2006), which have been connected to the cult of Orpheus, and a mosaic representing a phoenix standing on a funerary stele beside an (empty?) sarcophagus (Am 6; Healey 2017: 5–6, 2019: 60–62).

There survive also inscribed mosaics from the second and third centuries CE that raise important questions about the familiarity of Syriac speakers with Greco-Roman culture, mythology, and even literature, despite the language barrier between Greek and Syriac. The Euphrates Mosaic (228/229 CE) is inscribed in both Greek and Syriac and represents a personification of the river-god Euphrates surrounded by two symbolic female figures; they might represent Fecundity and an interpretatio graeca of the Syrian goddess Atargatis (Bm 1; see also Chapter 16). Another especially remarkable inscribed mosaic depicts a Greek mythological scene, the creation of mankind by Prometheus, where Zeus, overseeing the scene, is identified as “Maralahe” (Cm 11, Bowersock 2001). Furthermore, an especially impressive circle of mosaics reproduces selected scenes from the Iliad, with characters labeled in Syriac; the mosaics were produced at a time when no Syriac translation of this text is known to have circulated (or of any other piece of Greek classical literature for that matter), and Syriac speakers must have been aware of this text from Greek sources. The mosaics depict specific scenes from the Iliad, including 1.318–338, when Briseis is led away from Achilles, and 9.182–198, when Achilles and Patroclus receive the embassy of the Greeks in Achilles’s tent (Cm 3, Cm 4, Balty and Briquel-Chatonnet 2000). The mosaics with Syriac inscriptions from a villa recently discovered SW of Edessa and dating back to the first half of the third century CE include the representation of the myth of Achilles on Scyros (in the triclinium, together with other mythological scenes of dubious identification) and playful naked Erotes picking grapes from vines that develop out of craters; the scenes can be compared with iconography from Zeugma and Palmyra (Abdallah et al. 2020).