A.D. 1148-49

a.d. 1148-49, purport to present the general history of that country, with occasional items relating to india itself, from 2448 b.c., and to give the exact length, even to months and days, of the reign of each king of kashmir from 1182 b.c.: but, while we may accept kalhana as fairly correct for his own time and for the preceding century or so, an examination of the details of his work quickly exposes its imaginative character and its unreliability for any earlier period: notably, he places towards the close of the period 2448 to 1182 b.c. the great maurya king asoka, whose real initial date was 264 b.c.; and he was obliged to allot to one king, ranaditya i., a reign of three centuries (a.d. 222 to 522, as placed by him) simply in order to save his own chronology. they have given us historical romances, such as the _harshacharita_ of bana, written in the 7th century, the _vikramankadevacharita_ of bilhana, written about the beginning of the 12th century, and the tamil poems, the _kalavali_, the _kalingattu-parani_, and the _vikrama-cholan-ula_, the first of which may be of somewhat earlier date than bana's work, while the second and third are of much the same time with bilhana's: but, while these present some charming reading in the poetical line, with much of interest, and certainly a fair amount of important matter, they give us no dates, and so no means without extraneous help of applying the information that is deducible from them. again, they have given us, especially in southern india, a certain amount of historical details in the introductions and colophons of their literary works; and here they have often furnished dates which give a practical shape to their statements: but we quickly find that the historical matter is introduced quite incidentally, to magnify the importance of the authors themselves rather than to teach us anything about their patrons, and is not handled with any particular care and fulness; and it would be but a sketchy and imperfect history, and one relating to only a limited and comparatively late period, that we could piece together even from these more precise sources. the ancient hindus, in short, have not bequeathed to us anything that can in any way compare with the historical writings of their greek and roman contemporaries. they have not even given us anything like the _dipavamsa_ of ceylon, which, while it contains a certain amount of fabulous matter, can be recognized as presenting a real and reliable historical account of that island, taken from records written up during the progress to the events themselves, from at any rate the time of asoka to about a.d. 350; or like the _mahavamsa_, which, commenting on and amplifying the details of the _dipavamsa_, takes up a similar account from the end of the period covered by that work. even the greek notices of india, commencing with the accounts of the asiatic campaign of alexander the great, have told us more about its political history and geography during the earlier times than have the hindus themselves: and in fact, in mentioning sandrokottos, i.e. chandragupta, the grandfather of asoka, and in furnishing details which fix his initial date closely about 320 b.c., the greeks gave us the first means of making a start towards arranging the chronology of india on accurate lines. it is in these circumstances, in the absence of any indigenous historical writings of a plain, straightforward, and authentic nature, that the inscriptions of india are of such great value. they are supplemented--and to an important extent for at any rate the period from the end of asoka's reign in 227 b.c. to the commencement of the reign of kanishka in 58 b.c., and again from about a century later to the rise of the gupta dynasty in a.d. 320--by the numismatic remains. but the coins of india present no dates until nearly the end of the 2nd century a.d.; the case of parthia, which has yielded dated coins from only 38 b.c., illustrates well the difficulty of arranging undated coins in chronological order even when the assistance of historical books is available; and what we may deduce from the coins of india is still to be put into a final shape in accordance with what we can determine from the inscriptions. in short, the inscriptions of india are the only sure grounds of historical results in every line of research connected with its ancient past; they regulate everything that we can learn from coins, architecture, art, literature, tradition, or any other source. that is one reason why the inscriptions of india are so valuable; they fill the void caused by the absence of historical books. another reason is found in the great number of them and the wide area that is covered by them. they come from all parts of the country: from shahbazgarhi in the north, in the yusufzai subdivision of the peshawar district, to the ancient pandya territory in the extreme south of the peninsula; and from assam in the east to kathiawar in the west. for the time anterior to about a.d. 400, we already have available in published form, more or less complete, the contents of between 1100 and 1200 records, large and small; and the explorations of the archaeological department are constantly bringing to light, particularly from underground sites, more materials for that period. for the time onwards from that point, we have similarly available the contents of some 10,000 or 11,000 records of southern india, and of at any rate between 700 and 800 records of northern india where racial antagonism came more into play and worked more destruction of hindu remains than in the south. another reason is found in the fact that from the first century b.c. the inscriptions are for the most part specifically dated: some in various eras the nature and application of which are now thoroughly well understood, often with also a mention of the year of the twelve-years or of the sixty-years cycle of the planet jupiter; others in the regnal years of kings whose periods are now well fixed. and, in addition to usually stating the month and the day along with the year, the inscriptions sometimes give, under the influence of hindu astrology, other details so exact that we can determine, even to the actual hour, the occurrence of the event registered by a particular record. a final reason is found in the precise nature of the inscriptions. a certain proportion of them consists of plain statements of events,--recitals of the pedigrees and achievements of kings, records of the carrying out of public works, epitaphs of kings, heroes, and saints, compacts of political alliance, and so on; and some of these present, in fact, short historical compositions which illustrate well what the ancient hindus might have done if they had felt any special call to write plain and veracious chronicles on matter-of-fact lines. but we are indebted for the great bulk of the inscriptions, not to any historical instinct, but to the religious side of the hindu character, and to the constant desire of the hindus to make donations on every possible occasion. the inscriptions devoted simply to the propagation of morality and religion are not very numerous: the most notable ones in this class are the edicts of asoka, which we shall notice again farther on. the general object of the inscriptions was to register gifts and endowments, made sometimes to private individuals, but more usually to gods, to priests on behalf of temples and charitable institutions, and to religious communities. and, as the result of this, in the vast majority of the inscriptional remains we have a mass of title-deeds of real property, and of certificates of the right to duties, taxes, fees, perquisites, and other privileges. now, the essential part of the records was of course the specification of the details of the donor, of the donee, and of the donation. and we have to bear in mind that not only are the donative records by far the most abundant of all, but also, among them, by far the most numerous are those which we may call the records of royal donations; by which we mean grants that were made either by the kings themselves, or by the great feudatory nobles, or by provincial governors and other high officials who had the royal authority to alienate state lands and to assign allotments from the state revenues: also, that many of them register, not simply the gift of small holdings, but grants of entire villages, and large and permanent assignments from the public revenues. it is to these facts that we are indebted for the great value of the records from the historical point of view. the donor of state lands or of an assignment from the public revenues must show his authority for his acts. a provincial governor or other high official must specify his own rank and territorial jurisdiction, and name the king under whom he holds office. a great feudatory noble will often give a similar reference to his paramount sovereign, in addition to making his own position clear. and it is neither inconsistent with the dignity of a king, nor unusual, for something to be stated about his pedigree in charters and patents issued by him or in his name. the records give from very early times a certain amount of genealogical information. more and more information of that kind was added as time went on. the recital of events was introduced, to magnify the glory and importance of the donors, and sometimes to commemorate the achievements of recipients. and it was thus, not with the express object of recording history, but in order to intensify the importance of everything connected with religion and to secure grantees in the possession of properties conveyed to them, that there was gradually accumulated almost the whole of the great mass of inscriptional records upon which we are so dependent for our knowledge of the ancient history of india in all its branches. survey of the inscriptions. coming now to a survey of the inscriptions themselves, we must premise that india is divided, from the historical point of view, though not so markedly in some other respects, into two well-defined parts, northern and southern. a classical name of northern india is aryavarta, "the abode of the aryas, the excellent or noble people." another name, which figures both in literature and in the inscriptions, is uttarapatha, "the path of the north, the northern road." and, as a classical name of southern india answering to that we have dakshinapatha, "the path of the south, the southern road," from the first component of which name comes our modern term deccan, dekkan, or dekhan. sanskrit literature names as the dividing-line between aryavarta or the uttarapatha and the dakshinapatha, i.e. between northern and southern india, sometimes the vindhya mountains, sometimes the river nerbudda (narmada, narbada) which, flowing close along the south of the vindhya range, empties itself into the gulf of cambay near broach, in gujarat, bombay. the river seems, on the whole, to furnish the better dividing-line of the two. but it does not reach, any more than the range exactly extends, right across india from sea to sea. and, to complete the dividing-line beyond the sources of the narbada, which are in the maikal range and close to the amarkantak hill in the rewa state, baghelkhand, we have to follow some such course as first the maniari river, from its sources, which are in that same neighbourhood but on the south of the maikal range, to the point where, after it has joined the seonath, the united rivers flow into the mahanadi, near seori-narayan in the bilaspur district, central provinces, and then the mahanadi itself, which flows into the bay of bengal near cuttack in orissa. even so, however, we have only a somewhat rough dividing-line between the historical northern and southern india; and the distinction must not be understood too strictly in connexion with the territories lying close on the north and the south of the line sketched above. in western india, kathiawar and all the portions of gujarat above broach lie to the north of the narbada; but from the palaeographic point of view, if not so much from the historical, they belong essentially to southern india. our modern central india lies entirely in northern india, but has various palaeographic connexions with southern india. our central provinces extend in the saugar district into northern india; and that portion of them presents in ancient times both northern and southern characteristics. eastern india may be defined as consisting of bengal, with orissa and assam: it belongs to northern india. the inscriptional remains of india, as known at present, practically begin with the records of asoka, the great maurya king of northern india,--grandson of that king chandragupta whose name was written by the greeks as sandrokottos,--who reigned 264 to 227 b.c. the state of the alphabets, indeed, in the time of asoka renders it certain that the art of writing must have been practised in india for a long while before his period; and it gives us every reason to hope that systematic exploration, especially of buried sites, will eventually result in the discovery of records framed by some of his predecessors or by their subjects. but those discoveries have still to be made; and matters stand just now as follows. from before the time of asoka we have an inscription on a relic-vase from a stupa or relic-mound at piprahwa in the north-east corner of the basti district, united provinces, which preserves the memory of the slaughtered kinsmen of buddha, the sakyas of kapilavastu according to the subsequent traditional nomenclature. we may perhaps place before his time the record on the sohgaura plate, from the gorakhpur district, united provinces, which notifies the establishment of two public storehouses at a junction of three great highways of vehicular traffic to meet any emergent needs of persons using these roads. and we may possibly decide hereafter to refer to the same period a few other records which are not at present regarded as being quite so early. but, practically, the known inscriptions of india begin with the records of that king who calls himself in them "the king devanampiya-piyadassi, the beloved of the gods, he of gracious mien," but who is best known as asoka by the name given to him in the literature of india and ceylon and in an inscription of a.d. 150 at junagadh (junagarh) in kathiawar. from his time onwards we have records from all parts in constantly increasing numbers, particularly during the earlier periods, from caves, rock-cut temples, and buddhist stupas. many of them, however, are of only a dedicatory nature, and, valuable as they are for purposes of religion, geography, and other miscellaneous lines of research, are not very helpful in the historical line. we are interested here chiefly in the historical records; and we can notice only the most prominent ones even among them. of this king asoka we have now thirty-five different records, some of them in various recensions. amongst them, the most famous ones are the seven pillar-edicts and the fourteen rock-edicts, found in various versions, and in a more or less complete state, at different places from shahbazgarhi in the yusufzai country in the extreme north-west, to radhia, mathia, and rampurwa in the champaran district, bengal, at dhauli in the cuttack district of orissa, at jaugada in the ganjam district, madras, at girnar (junagadh) in kathiawar, and even at sopara in the thana district, bombay. these edicts were thus published in conspicuous positions in or near towns, or close to highways frequented by travellers and traders, or in the neighbourhood of sacred places visited by pilgrims, so that they might be freely seen and perused. and the object of them was to proclaim the firm determination of asoka to govern his realm righteously and kindly in accordance with the duty of pious kings, and with considerateness for even religious beliefs other than the brahmanical faith which he himself at first professed, and to acquaint his subjects with certain measures that he had taken to that end, and to explain to them how they might co-operate with him in his objects. but, in addition to mentioning certain contemporaneous foreign kings, antiochus ii. (theos) of syria, ptolemy philadelphus of egypt, antigonus gonatas of macedonia, magas of cyrene, and alexander ii. of epirus, they yield items of internal history, in detailing some of asoka's administrative arrangements; in locating the capital of his empire at pataliputra (patna), and seats of viceroys at ujjeni (ujjain) and takhasila (taxila); in giving the names of some of the leading peoples of india, particularly the cholas, the pandyas, and the andhras; and in recording the memorable conquest of the kalinga country, the attendant miseries of which first directed the thoughts of the king to religion and to solicitude for the welfare of all his subjects. another noteworthy record of asoka is that notification, containing his last edict, his dying speech, issued by local officials just after his death, which is extant in various recensions at sahasram, rupnath, and bairat in northern india, and at brahmagiri, siddapura, and jatinga-ramesvara in mysore. some three years before the end of his long reign of thirty-seven years, asoka became a convert to buddhism, and was admitted as an upasaka or lay-worshipper. eventually, he formally joined the buddhist order; and, following a not infrequent custom of ancient indian kings, he abdicated, took the vows of a monk, and withdrew to spend his remaining days in religious retirement in a cave-dwelling on suvarnagiri (songir), one of the hills surrounding the ancient city of girivraja, below rajagriha (rajgir), in the patna district in behar. and there, about a year later, in his last moments, he delivered the address incorporated in this notification, proclaiming as the only true religion that which had been promulgated by buddha, and expanding the topic of the last words of that great teacher: "work out your salvation by diligence!" this record, it may be added, is also of interest because, whereas such of the other known records of asoka as are dated at all are dated according to the number of years elapsed after his anointment to the sovereignty, it is dated 256 years after the death of buddha, which event took place in 483 b.c. for the two centuries or nearly so next after the end of the reign of asoka, we have chiefly a large number of short inscriptions which are of much value in miscellaneous lines of research--palaeography, geography, religion, and so on. but historical records are by no means wanting; and we may mention in particular the following. from the caves in the nagarjuni hills in the gaya district, bengal, we have (along with three of the inscriptions of asoka himself) three records of a king dasaratha who, according to the _vishnu-purana_, was a grandson of asoka. from the stupa at bharaut in the nagod state, central india, we have a record which proves the existence of the dynasty of the sunga kings, for whom the _puranas_, placing them next after the line of chandragupta and asoka, indicate the period 183 to 71 b.c. two of the records from the stupa at bhattiprolu in the kistna district, madras, give us a king of those parts, reigning about 200 b.c., whose name appears both as kubiraka and as khubiraka. from besnagar in the gwalior state we have an inscription, referable to the period 175 to 135 b.c., which mentions a king of central india, by name bhagabhadra, and also mentions, as his contemporary, one of the greek kings of the punjab, antalkidas, whose name is familiar from his coins in the form antialkidas. from the hathigumpha cave near cuttack, in orissa, we have a record, to be placed about 140 b.c., of king kharavela, a member of a dynasty which reigned in that part of india. from a cave at pabhosa in the allahabad district, united provinces, we have two records which make known to us a short succession of kings of adhichatra, otherwise known as ahichchhattra. from a cave at the nanaghat pass in the poona district, bombay, we have a record of queen nayanika, wife of one of the great satavahana-satakarni kings of the deccan. and from the stupa no. 1 at sanchi in the bhopal state, central india, we have a record of a king sri-satakarni, belonging to perhaps another branch of the same great stock. the historical records become more numerous from the time of the kushan king kanishka or kanishka, who began to reign in 58 b.c., and founded the so-called vikrama era, the great historical era of northern india, beginning in that year.[27] for the period of him and his immediate successors, vasishka, huvishka and vasudeva, we have now between seventy and eighty inscriptions, ranging from 54 b.c. to a.d. 42, and disclosing a sway which reached at its height from bengal to kabul: we are indebted for some of these to the buddhists, in connexion with whose faith the memory of kanishka was preserved by tradition, but for most of them to the jains, who seem to have been at that time the more numerous sect in the central part of his dominions. the dynasty of kanishka was succeeded by another foreign ruler, gondophernes, popularly known as gondophares, whose coins indicate that, in addition to a large part of north-western india and sind, his dominions included kabul, kandahar, and seistan. this king is well known to christian tradition, in connexion with the mission of st thomas the apostle to the east. and the tradition is substantially supported by an inscription from takht-i-bahai in the yusufzai country on the north-west frontier, which, like some of his coins, mentions him as guduphara or gunduphara, and proves that he was reigning there in a.d. 47. gondophernes was followed by the kadphises kings, belonging to another branch of the kushan tribe, who perhaps extended their sway farther into india, as far at least as mathura (muttra), and reigned for about three-quarters of a century. for their period, and in fact for the whole time to the rise of the guptas in a.d. 320 we have as yet but scanty help from the inscriptions in respect of the political history of northern india: we are mostly dependent on the coins, which tend to indicate that that part of india was then broken up into a number of small sovereignties and tribal governments. an inscription, however, from panjtar in the yusufzai territory mentions, without giving his name, a kushan king whose dominion included that territory in a.d. 66. and an inscription of a.d. 242 from mathura has been understood to indicate that some descendant of the same stock was then reigning there. the inscriptional records for that period belong chiefly to southern india. meanwhile, however, in the south-west corner of northern india, namely in kathiawar, there arose another foreign king, apparently of parthian extraction, by name nahapana, described in his records, whether by a family name or by a tribal appellation, as a chhaharata or kshaharata, in whom we have the founder of the so-called saka era, the principal era of southern india, beginning in a.d. 78: in respect of him we learn from the _periplus of the erythraean sea_ that he was reigning between a.d. 80 and 89, and from inscriptions that he was still reigning in a.d. 120 and 124: at the latter time, his dominions included nasik and other territories on the south of the narbada; and the _periplus_ names as his capital a town which it calls minnagar, and which ptolemy would locate in such a manner as to suggest that it may be identified with the modern dohad in the panch mahals district of gujarat, bombay. nahapana was overthrown, and his family was entirely wiped out, soon after a.d. 125, by the great satavahana king gautamiputra-sri-satakarni, who thereby recovered the territories on the south of the narbada. on the north of that river, however, he was followed by a line of kings founded by his viceroy chashtana, son of ghsamotika, to whom ptolemy, mentioning him as tiastanes, assigns ujjain as his capital: these names, again, show a foreign origin; but, from the time of his son jayadaman, the descendants of chashtana became hinduized, and mostly bore purely indian appellations. the coins show that the descendants of chashtana ruled till about a.d. 388, when they were overthrown by the great gupta dynasty of northern india. only a few of their inscriptional records have been discovered: but amongst them a very noteworthy one is the junagadh (junagarh) inscription of chashtana's grandson, rudradaman, bearing a date in a.d. 150; it is remarkable as being the earliest known long inscription written entirely in sanskrit. from southern india we have, at nasik, inscriptions of the satavahana king gautampputra-sri-satakarni, mentioned just above, and of his son vasisthiputra-sri-pulumayi, and of another king of that line named gautamiputra-sri-yajna-satakarni; and other records of the last-mentioned king come from kanheri near bombay, and from the kistna district, madras, and testify to the wide extent of the dominions of the line to which he belonged. the records of this king carry us on to the opening years of the 3rd century, soon after which time, in those parts at any rate, the power of the satavahana kings came to an end. and we have next, also from nasik, an inscription of an abhira king named isvarasena, son of sivadatta; in this last-mentioned person we probably have the founder of the so-called kalachuri or chedi era, beginning in a.d. 248 or 249, which we trace in western india for some centuries before the time when it was transferred to, or revived in, central india, and was invested with its later appellation: we trace it notably in the records of a line of kings who called themselves traikutakas, apparently from trikuta as the ancient name of the great mountain harischandragad in the western ghauts, in the ahmadnagar district. we can, of course, mention in this account only the most prominent of the inscriptional records. keeping for the present to southern india, we have from banawasi in the north kanara district, bombay, and from malavallji in the shimoga district, mysore, two inscriptions of a king harit putra-satakarni of the vinhukadda-chutu family, reigning at vaijayanti, i.e. banawasi, which disclose the existence there of another branch, apparently known as the chutu family and having its origin at a place named vishnugarta, of the great stock to which the satavahana-satakarnis belonged. and another malavalli inscription, of a king siva-skandavarman, shows that the satakarnis of that locality were followed by a line of kings known as the kadambas, who left descendants who continued to rule until about a.d. 650. from the other side of southern india, an inscription from the stupa at jaggayyapeta in the kistna district, madras, referable to the 3rd century a.d., gives us a king madhariputra-sri-vira-purushadatta, of the race of ikshvaku. and some prakrit copperplate inscriptions from the same district, referable to the 4th century, disclose a line of pallava kings at kanchi, the modern conjeeveram near madras, whose descendants, from about a.d. 550, are well known from the later records. reverting to northern india, we have from the extreme north-west a few inscriptions dated in the era of 58 b.c. which carry us on to a.d. 322. the tale is then taken up chiefly by the records of the great gupta kings of pataliputra, i.e. patna, who rose to power in a.d. 320, and gradually extended their sway until it assumed dimensions almost commensurate with those of asoka and kanishka: the records of this series are somewhat numerous; and a very noteworthy one amongst them is the inscription of samudragupta, incised at some time about a.d. 375 on one of the pillars of asoka now standing at allahabad, which gives us a wide insight into the political divisions, with their contemporaneous rulers, of both northern and southern india: it is also interesting because it, or another record of the same king at eran in the saugar district, central provinces, marks the commencement of the habitual use of sanskrit for inscriptional purposes. the inscriptions of the gupta series run on to about a.d. 530. but the power of the dynasty had by that time become much curtailed, largely owing to an irruption of the huns under toramana and mihirakula, who established themselves at sialkot, the ancient sakala, in the punjab. we have inscriptional records of these two persons, not only from kura in the salt range, not very far from sialkot, but also from eran and from gwalior. and next after these we have inscriptions from mandasor in malwa, notably on two great monolith pillars of victory, of a king vishnuvardhana-yasodharman, which show that he overthrew mihirakula shortly before a.d. 532, and, describing him as subjugating territories to which not even the guptas and the huns had been able to penetrate, indicate that he in his turn established for a while another great paramount sovereignty in northern india. we have thus brought our survey of the inscriptions of india down to the 6th century a.d. there then arose various dynasties in different parts of the country: in northern india, in kathiawar, the maitrakas of valabhi; at kanauj, the maukharis, who, after no great lapse of time, were followed by the line to which belonged the great harshavardhana, "the warlike lord (as the southern records style him) of all the region of the north;" and, in behar, another line of guptas, usually known as the guptas of magadha: in southern india, the chalukyas, who, holding about a.d. 625 the whole northern part of southern india from sea to sea, then split up into two branches, the western chalukyas of badami in the bijapur district, bombay, and the eastern chalukyas of vengi in the godavari district, madras; and, below them, the successors of the original pallavas of kanchi (conjeeveram). these all had their time, and passed away. and they and their successors have left us so great a wealth of inscriptional records that no further detailed account can be attempted within the limits available here. we must pass on to a few brief remarks about the language of the records and the characters in which they were written. alphabets. the inscriptions of asoka present two alphabets, which differ radically and widely: one of them is known as the brahmi; the other, as the kharoshthi or kharoshtri. for the decipherment of the brahmi alphabet we are indebted to james prinsep, who determined the value of practically all the letters between 1834 and 1837. the decipherment of the kharoshthi alphabet was a more difficult and a longer task: it was virtually finished, some twenty years later, by the united efforts of c. masson, prinsep, c. l. lassen, h. h. wilson, e. norris, sir a. cunningham, and john dowson; but there are still a few points of detail in respect of which finality has not been attained. the kharoshthi script was written from right to left, and is undeniably of semitic origin; and the theory about it, based on the known fact that the valley of the indus was a persian satrapy in the time of darius (521-485 b.c.), is that the aramaic script was then introduced into that territory, and that the kharoshthi is an adaptation of it. except in a few intrusive cases, the use of the kharoshthi in india was limited to the valley of the indus, and to the punjab as defined on the south by the territory watered by the bias (beas) and the satlaj (sutlej): and the eastern locality of the meeting of the two alphabets is marked by coins bearing kharoshthi and brahmi legends which come from the districts of the jalandhar (jullundhur) division, and by two short rock-cut records, each presented in both the alphabets, at pathyar and kanhiara in the kangra valley. outside india, this script was notably current in afghanistan; and documents written in it have in recent years been found in chinese turkestan. in india it continued in use, as far as our present knowledge goes, down to a.d. 343. the brahmi alphabet, written from left to right, belonged to the remainder of india; but it must also have been current in learned circles even in the territory where popular usage favoured the other script. various views about its origin have been advanced: amongst them is the theory that it was derived from the oldest north-semitic alphabet, which prevailed from phoenicia to mesopotamia, and may, it is held, have been introduced into india by traders at some time about 800 b.c. it is, however, admitted that the earliest known form of the brahmi is a script framed by brahmans for writing sanskrit. also, the theory is largely based on a coin from eran, in the saugar district, central provinces, presenting a brahmi legend running retrograde from right to left; from which it is inferred that that was the original direction of this writing, and that the script eventually assumed the other direction, which alone it has in the inscriptions, after passing, like the greek, through a stage in which the lines were written in both directions alternately. but we can cite many instances in which ancient die-sinkers were careless, wholly or partially, in the matter of reversing the legends on their dies, with the result that not only syllables frequently, but sometimes entire words, stand in reverse on the coins themselves; moreover, the eran coin, being one of the earliest known indian coins bearing a legend at all, may quite possibly belong to a period before the time when the desirability of working in reverse on the dies presented itself to the indian die-sinkers. in all the circumstances, the evidence of the eran coin cannot be regarded as conclusive; and we require some inscription on stone, or at least some longer record on metal than a brief legend of five syllables, to satisfy us that the brahmi writing ever had a direction different from that which it has in the inscriptions. further, if there is any radical connexion between the brahmi and the semitic alphabet indicated above, so many curious and apparently capricious changes must have been made, in adapting that alphabet, that it would seem more probable that the two scripts were derived from a joint original source. in view of the high state of civilization to which the hindus had evidently attained even before the time of chandragupta, the grandfather of asoka, it must still be regarded as possible that they were the independent inventors of that which was emphatically their national alphabet. the brahmi alphabet is the parent of all the modern hindu scripts, including on one side the nagari or devanagari, and on the other the widely dissimilar rounded forms of the kanarese, tamil, telugu, and other southern alphabets; and the inscriptions enable us to trace clearly the gradual development of all the modern forms. languages. the great classical indian language, sanskrit, is not found in any inscriptional records of the earliest times. it is not, however, to be supposed therefrom that the use and cultivation of sanskrit ever lay dormant, and that there was a revival of this language when it did eventually come to be used in the inscriptions; the case simply is that, during the earlier periods, sanskrit was not known much, if at all, outside the brahmanical and other literary and priestly circles, and so was not recognized as a suitable medium for the notifications which were put on record in the inscriptions for the information of the people at large. in northern india, the inscriptions of the period before 58 b.c. present various early prakrits, i.e. vernaculars more or less derived from sanskrit or brought into a line with it. from 58 b.c., however, the influence of sanskrit began to manifest itself in the inscriptions, with the result that the records present from that time a language which is conveniently known as the mixed dialect, meaning neither exactly prakrit nor exactly sanskrit, but prakrit with an intermixture of sanskrit terminations and some other features; and we have, in fact, from mathura (muttra), a locality which has yielded interesting remains in various directions, a short brahmanical inscription of 33 b.c. which was written wholly in sanskrit. the mixed dialect appears to have been the general one for inscriptional purposes in northern india until about a.d. 320. but a remarkable exception is found in the inscription of rudradaman, dated in a.d. 150, at junagadh in kathiawar (mentioned on a preceding page), which is a somewhat lengthy record composed in thoroughly good literary sanskrit prose. also, the extant inscriptions of the descendants of rudradaman--(but only four of their records, ranging from a.d. 181 to 205, are at present available for study)--are in almost quite correct sanskrit; and this suggests that, from his time, the language may have been habitually used for inscriptional purposes in the dominions of his dynasty. that, however, is only a matter of conjecture; and elsewhere pure and good sanskrit, without any prakrit forms, appears next, and is found in verse as well as in prose, in the two inscriptions from eran and allahabad, referable to the period about a.d. 340 to 375, of the great gupta king samudragupta. from that time onwards, as far as our present knowledge goes, sanskrit, with a very rare introduction of prakrit or vernacular forms, was practically the only inscriptional language in the northern parts of india. we can, however, cite a record of a.d. 862 from the neighbourhood of jodhpur in rajputana, the body of which was written in maharashtri prakrit. in southern india we have an instance of the mixed dialect in the nasik inscription, referable to a.d. 257 or 258, of the abhira king isvarasena, son of sivadatta, which has been mentioned on a preceding page. with the exception, however, of that record and of the few which are mentioned just below, the inscriptional language of southern india appears to have been generally prakrit of one kind or another until about a.d. 400, or perhaps even somewhat later. sanskrit figures first in one of the records at nasik of rishabhadatta (ushavadata), son-in-law of the kshaharata king nahapana, which consequently gives it almost as early an appearance in the south as that which is established for it in the north; but it is confined in this instance to a preamble which recites the previous donations and good works of rishabhadatta; the record passes into prakrit for the practical purpose for which it was framed. sanskrit figures next, in an almost correct form, in the short inscription of not much later date at kanheri, near bombay, of the queen (her name is not extant) of vasishthiputra-sri-satakarni. it next appears in certain formulae, and benedictive and imprecatory verses, which stand at the end of some of the prakrit records of the pallava series referable to the 4th century; but here we have quotations from books, not instances of original composition. we have a sanskrit record, obtained in khandesh but probably belonging to some part of gujarat, of a king named rudradasa, which is perhaps dated in a.d. 367. but the next southern inscription in sanskrit, of undeniable date, is a record of a.d. 456, belonging to the vyara subdivision of the baroda state in gujarat, of the traikutaka king dahrasena. the records of the early kadamba kings of banawasi in north kanara, bombay, exhibit the use of sanskrit from an early period in the 6th century; and records of the pallava kings show it from perhaps a somewhat earlier time on the other side of india. the records of the chalukya kings present sanskrit from a.d. 578 onwards. and from this latter date the language figures freely in the southern records. but some of the vernaculars, in their older forms, shortly begin to present themselves alongside of it; and, without entirely superseding sanskrit even to the latest times, the use of them for inscriptional purposes became rapidly more and more extensive. the vernacular that first makes its appearance is kanarese, in a record of the chalukya king mangalesa, of the period a.d. 597 to 608, at badami in the bijapur district, bombay. tamil appears next, between about a.d. 610 and 675, in records of the pallava king mahendravarman i. at vallam in the chingalpat (chingleput) district, madras, and of his great-grandson paramesvaravarman i. from kuram in the same district. telugu appears certainly in a.d. 1011, in a record of the eastern chalukya king vimaladitya; and it is perhaps given to us in a.d. 843 or 844 by a record of his ancestor vishnuvardhana v.; in the latter case, however, the authenticity of the document is not certain. malayalam appears about a.d. 1150, in inscriptions of the rulers of kerala from the travancore state. and on the colossal image of gommatesvara at sravana-belgola, in mysore, there are two lines of marathi, notifying for the benefit of pilgrims from the maratha country the names of the persons who caused the image and the enclosure to be made, which are attributed to the first quarter of the 12th century: this language, however, figures first for certain in a record of a.d. 1207, of the time of the devagiri-yadava king singhana, from khandesh in the north of bombay. bibliography.--the systematic publication of the indian inscriptions has not gone far. cunningham inaugurated a _corpus inscriptionum indicarum_, by giving us in 1877 the first volume of it, dealing with the records of asoka; but the only other volume which has been published is vol. iii., by fleet, dealing with the records of the gupta series. the other published materials are mostly to be found here and there in the _journals_ of the royal asiatic society of london, its bombay branch, and the asiatic society of bengal, in the _reports_ of the various archaeological surveys, and in the _indian antiquary_, the _epigraphia indica_ and the _epigraphia carnatica_; and much work has still to be done in bringing them together according to the periods and dynasties to which they relate, and in revising some of them in the light of new discoveries and the teachings of later research. the authority on indian palaeography is buhler's work, published in 1896 as part 2 of vol. i of the _grundriss der indo-arischen philologie und altertumskunde_; an english version of it was issued in 1904 as an appendix to the _indian antiquary_, vol. xxxiii. (j. f. f.) iii. greek inscriptions etymologically the term inscription ([greek: epigraphe]) would include much more than is commonly meant by it. it would include words engraved on rings, or stamped on coins,[28] vases, lamps, wine-jar handles,[29] &c. but boeckh was clearly right in excluding this _varia supellex_ from his _corpus inscriptionum graecarum_, or only admitting it by way of appendix. giving the term inscription a somewhat narrower sense, we still include within it a vast store of documents of the greatest value to the student of greek civilization. it happens, moreover, that greek inscriptions yield the historian a richer harvest than those of rome. partly from fashion, but partly from the greater abundance of the material, the romans engraved their public documents (treaties, laws, &c.) to a large extent on bronze. these bronze tablets, chiefly set up in the capitol, were melted in the various conflagrations, or were carried off to feed the mint of the conqueror. in greece, on the contrary, the mountains everywhere afforded an inexhaustible supply of marble, and made it the natural material for inscriptions. some greek inscribed tablets of bronze have come down to us,[30] and many more must have perished in the sack of cities and burning of temples. a number of inscriptions on small thin plates of lead, rolled up, have survived; these are chiefly imprecations on enemies[31] or questions asked of oracles.[32] an early inscription recently discovered (1905) at ephesus is on a plate of silver. but as a rule the material employed was marble. these marble monuments are often found _in situ_; and, though more often they were used up as convenient stones for building purposes, yet they have thus survived in a more or less perfect condition.[33] inscriptions were usually set up in temples, theatres, at the side of streets and roads, in [greek: temene] or temple-precincts, and near public buildings generally. at delphi and olympia were immense numbers of inscriptions--not only those engraved upon the gifts of victorious kings and cities, but also many of a more public character. at delphi were inscribed the decrees of the amphictyonic assembly, at olympia international documents concerning the peloponnesian cities; the parthenon and acropolis were crowded with treaties, laws and decrees concerning the athenian confederation; the heraeum at samos, the artemisium at ephesus, and indeed every important sanctuary, abounded with inscriptions. it is a common thing for decrees ([greek: psephismata]) to contain a clause specifying where they are to be set up, and what department of the state is to defray the cost of inscribing and erecting them. sometimes duplicates are ordered to be set up in various places; and, in cases of treaties, arbitrations and other international documents, copies were always set up by each city concerned. accordingly documents like the _marmor ancyranum_ and the _edict of diocletian_ have been restored by a comparison of the various fragments of copies set up in diverse quarters of the empire. greek inscribed marbles varied considerably in their external appearance. the usual form was the [greek: stele], the normal type of which was a plain slab, from 3 to 4 or even 5 ft. high,[34] 3 or 4 in. thick, tapering slightly upwards from about 2 ft. wide at bottom to about 18 in. at the top, where it was either left plain or often had a slight moulding, or still more commonly was adorned with a more or less elaborate pediment; the slab was otherwise usually plain. another form was the [greek: bomos] or altar, sometimes square, oftener circular, and varying widely in size. tombstones were either [greek: stelai] (often enriched beneath the pediment with simple groups in relief, commemorative of the deceased), or [greek: kiones], pillars, of different size and design, or sarcophagi plain and ornamental. to these must be added statue-bases of every kind, often inscribed, not only with the names and honours of individuals, but also with decrees and other documents. all these forms were intended to stand by themselves in the open air. but it was also common to inscribe state documents upon the surface of the walls of a temple, or other public building. thus the antae and external face of the walls of the pronaos of the temple of athena polias at priene were covered with copies of the awards made concerning the lands disputed between samos and priene (see _gk. inscr. in brit. mus._ iii. s 1); similarly the walls of the artemisium at ephesus contained a number of decrees (_ibid._ iii. s 2), and the _proscenium_ of the odeum was lined with crustae, or "marble-veneering," under 1 in. thick, inscribed with copies of letters from hadrian, antoninus and other emperors to the ephesian people (_ibid._ p. 151). the workmanship and appearance of inscriptions varied considerably according to the period of artistic development. the letters incised with the chisel upon the wall or the [greek: stele] were painted in with red or blue pigment, which is often traceable upon newly unearthed inscriptions. when thucydides, in quoting the epigram of peisistratus the younger (vi. 54), says "it may still be read [greek: amydrois grammasi]," he must refer to the fading of the colour; for the inscription was brought to light in 1877 with the letters as fresh as when they were first chiselled (see kumanudes in [greek: athenaion], vi. 149; _i.g._ suppl. to vol. i. p. 41). the greeks found no inconvenience, as we should, in the bulkiness of inscriptions as a means of keeping public records. on the contrary they made every temple a muniment room; and while the innumerable [greek: stelai], _hermae_, bases and altars served to adorn the city, it must also have encouraged and educated the sense of patriotism for the citizen to move continually among the records of the past. the history of a greek city was literally written upon her stones. the primary value of an inscription lay in its documentary evidence (so euripides, _suppl._ 1202, fol.). in this way they are continually cited and put in evidence by the orators (e.g. see demosth. _fals. leg._ 428; aeschin. _in ctes._ s 75). but the greek historians also were not slow to recognize their importance. herodotus often cites them (iv. 88, 90, 91, v. 58 sq., vii. 228); and in his account of the victory of plataea he had his eye upon the tripod-inscription (ix. 81; cf. thuc. i. 132). thucydides's use of inscriptions is illustrated by v. 18 fol., 23, 47, 77, vi. 54, 59. polybius used them still more. in later greece, when men's thoughts were thrown back upon the past, regular collections of inscriptions began to be made by such writers as philochorus (300 b.c.), polemon (2nd century b.c., called [greek: stelokopas] for his devotion to inscriptions), aristodemus, craterus of macedon, and many others. at the revival of learning, the study of inscriptions revived with the renewed interest in greek literature. cyriac of ancona, early in the 15th century, copied a vast number of inscriptions during his travels in greece and asia minor; his ms. collections were deposited in the barberini library at rome, and have been used by other scholars. (see _bull. corr. hellen._ i.; larfeld in muller's _handbuch_ 1.^2, p. 368 f.; ziebarth, "de ant. inscript. syllogis" in _ephem. epigr._ ix.). succeeding generations of travellers and scholars continued to collect and edit, and englishmen in both capacities did much for this study. thus early in the 19th century the store of known greek inscriptions had so far accumulated that the time had come for a comprehensive survey of the whole subject. and it was the work of one great scholar, augustus boeckh, to raise greek epigraphy into a science. at the request of the academy of berlin he undertook to arrange and edit all the known inscriptions in one systematic work, and vol. i. of the _corpus inscriptionum graecarum_ was published in 1828, vol. ii. in 1833. he lived to see the work completed, although other scholars were called in to help him to execute his great design; vol. iii., by franz, appeared in 1853; vol. iv., by kirchhoff, in 1856.[35] the work is a masterpiece of lucid arrangement and profound learning, of untiring industry and brilliant generalization. out of the publication of the _corpus_ there grew up a new school of students, who devoted themselves to discovering and editing new texts, and working up epigraphical results into monographs upon the many-sided history of greece. in the _corpus_ boeckh had settled for ever the methods of greek epigraphy; and in his _staatshaushaltung der athener_ (3rd ed. of vols. i. ii. by frankel, 1886; well known to english readers from sir g. c. lewis's translation, _the public economy of athens_, 2nd ed., 1842) he had given a palmary specimen of the application of epigraphy to historical studies. at the same time franz drew up a valuable introduction to the study of inscriptions in his _elementa epigraphices graecae_ (1840). meanwhile the liberation of greece and increasing facilities for visiting the levant combined to encourage the growth of the subject, which has been advanced by the labours of many scholars, and chiefly ludwig ross, leake, pittakys, rangabe, le bas and later by meier, sauppe, kirchhoff, kumanudes, waddington, kohler, dittenberger, homolle, haussoullier, wilhelm and others. together with the development of this school of writers, there has gone on a systematic exploration of some of the most famous sites of antiquity, with the result of exhuming vast numbers of inscriptions. to mention only some of the most important: cyrene, rhodes, cos, cnidus, halicarnassus, miletus, priene, ephesus, magnesia on the maeander, pergamum, delos, thera, athens, eleusis, epidaurus, olympia, delphi, dodona, sparta, have been explored or excavated by the austrians, english, french, germans and greeks. german, french, british, austrian and american institutes have been established at athens, to a great extent engaged in the study of inscriptions. from every part of the greek world copies of inscriptions are brought home by the students of these institutes and by other travellers. and still the work proceeds at a rapid rate. for indeed the yield of inscriptions is practically inexhaustible: each island, every city, was a separate centre of corporate life, and it is significant to note that in the island of calymnos alone c. t. newton collected over one hundred inscriptions, many of them of considerable interest. the result of this has been that boeckh's great work, though it never can be superseded, yet has ceased to be what its name implies. the four volumes of the _c.i.g._ contain about 10,000 inscriptions. but the number of greek inscriptions now known is probably more than three or four times as great. many of these are only to be found published in the scattered literature of dissertations, or in greek, german and other periodicals. but several comprehensive collections have been attempted, among which (omitting those dealing with more limited districts of the greek world) the following may be named:--rangabe, _antiquites helleniques_ (2 vols., 1842-1855); le bas-waddington, _voyage archeologique, inscriptions_ (3 vols., 1847-1876, incomplete); newton, hicks and hirschfeld, _greek inscriptions in the british museum_ (parts i.-iv.); and above all the _inscriptiones graecae_, a corpus undertaken by the berlin academy (absorbing the _corpus inscr. attic._ and other similar collections). of this work six complete volumes and parts of others have appeared (by 1906) representing attica, argolis, megaris, boeotia, phocis, locris, aetolia, acarnania, ionian islands, aegean islands (exc. delos), sicily, italy and western europe; they are edited by kirchhoff, kohler, dittenberger, frankel, hiller von gaertringen, kaibel and others. of a similar austrian publication dealing with asia minor (_tituli asiae minoris_) only the first part (lycian inscriptions) has appeared. of general selections of inscriptions on a smaller scale it is necessary to mention: dittenberger, _sylloge inscriptionum graec._ (2nd ed., 1898-1901, 3 vols.); the same, _orientis graeci inscr. selectae_ (2 vols., 1903-1905); hicks, _greek historical inscriptions_ (1st ed., 1882; 2nd ed., 1901); michel, _recueil d'inscriptions grecques_ (1900); roberts and gardner, _introd. to gk. epigraphy_ (2 vols., 1887-1905); rohl, _inscr. gr. antiquissimae_ (1882), and _imagines inscriptionum_ (2nd ed., 1898). oldest greek inscriptions. the oldest extant greek inscriptions appear to date from the middle of the 7th century b.c. during the excavations at olympia a number of fragments of very ancient inscriptions were found (see _olympia, textband_ v.); and other very early inscriptions from various places, as thera and crete, have been published (see rohl, _op. cit._). but what is wanted is a sufficient number of very early inscriptions of fixed date. one such exists upon the leg of a colossal egyptian statue at abu-simbel on the upper nile, where certain greek mercenaries in the service of king psammetichus recorded their names, as having explored the river up to the second cataract (_c.i.g._ 5126; rohl, 482; hicks^2, 3). even if psammetichus ii. is meant, the inscription dates between 594 and 589 b.c. another, but later, instance is to be found in the fragmentary inscriptions on the columns dedicated by croesus in the ephesian temple (c. 550 b.c.; _gk. inscr. in the brit. mus._ 518). documents earlier than the persian war are not very frequent; but after that period the stream of greek inscriptions goes on, generally increasing in volume, down to late byzantine times. greek inscriptions may most conveniently be classified under the following heads: (1) those which illustrate political history; (2) those connected with religion; (3) those of a private character. political inscriptions. 1. foremost among the inscriptions which illustrate greek history and politics are the _decrees_ of senate and people ([greek: psephismata boules, ekklesias], &c.) upon every subject which could concern the interests of the state. these abound from every part of greece. it is true that a large number of them are honorary, i.e. merely decrees granting to strangers, who have done service to the particular city, public honours (crowns, statues, citizenship and other privileges). one of these privileges was the _proxenia_, an honour, which entailed on the recipient the burthen of protecting the citizens of the state which granted it when they came to his city. but the importance of an honorary decree depends upon the individual and the services to which it refers. and even the mere headings and datings of the decrees from various states afford curious and valuable information upon the names and titles of the local magistrates, the names of months and other details. on the formulae, see swoboda, _die gr. volksbeschlusse_ (1890). droysen in his _hellenismus_ (1877-1878) has shown how the history of alexander and his successors is illustrated by contemporary [greek: psephimata]. and when the student of athenian politics of the 5th and 4th centuries turns to the 1st and 2nd volumes of the _i.g._, he may wonder at the abundance of material before him; it is like turning over the minutes of the athenian parliament. one example out of many must suffice--no. 17 in _i.g._ ii. pt. 1 (hicks^2, 101) is the famous decree of the archonship of nausinicus (378 b.c.) concerning the reconstruction of the athenian confederacy. the terms of admission to the league occupy the face of the marble; at the bottom and on the left edge are inscribed the names of states which had already joined. inscribed _laws_ ([greek: nomoi]) occur with tolerable frequency. the following are examples:--a citation of a law of draco's from the [greek: protos axon] of solon's laws (_i.g._ i. 61; cf. dittenberger, _syll._^2 52); the civil codes of gortyna (5th century, dareste, &c., _inscr. jurid. gr._ i. 352 ff.); a reassessment of the tribute payable by the athenian allies in 425 b.c. (_i.g._ i. 37; kohler _urkunden und untersuchungen zur geschichte des delisch-attischen bundes_, 1870, p. 63; hicks^2, 64); a law passed by the amphictyonic council at delphi, 380 b.c. (boeckh, _c.i.g._ 1688; _i.g._ ii. 545); law concerning athenian weights and measures (boeckh, _staatshaushaltung_^3, ii. 318; _i.g._ ii. 476); the futile sumptuary law of diocletian concerning the maximum prices for all articles sold throughout the empire (mommsen-blumner, _der maximaltarif des diocletian_, 1893). for a collection of such legal documents, see dareste, haussoullier and reinach, _recueil des inscr. juridiques gr._ (1891-1898). besides the inscribed _treaties_ previously referred to, we may instance the following: between athens and chalcis in euboea, 446 b.c. (_i.g._ suppl. to vol. i. 27a); between athens and rhegium, 433 b.c. (hicks^2, 51); between athens and leontini, dated the same day as the preceding (_ibid._ 52); between athens and boeotia, 395 b.c. (_ibid._ 84); between athens and chalcis, 377 b.c. (_ibid._ 102); between athens and sparta, 271 b.c. (_i.g._ ii. no. 332); between hermias of atarneus and the ionian erythrae, about 350 b.c. (hicks^2 138); treaties in the local dialect between the eleans and the heraeans, 6th century (_olympia inschr._ 9), and between various cities of crete, 3rd century b.c. (_c.i.g._ 2554-2556; _griech. dial. inschr._ 5039-5041, 5075). egger's _etudes historiques sur les traites publics chez les grecs et chez les romains_ (paris, 1866) embraces a good many of these documents; see also r. von scala, _die staatsvertrage des altertums_, pt. i. (1898). the international relation of greek cities is further illustrated by _awards_ of disputed lands, delivered by a third city called in ([greek: ekkletos polis]) to arbitrate between the contending states, e.g. rhodian award as between samos and priene (_gk. inscr. in brit. mus._ 405; dittenberger, _syll._^2 315); milesian between messanians and spartans, discovered at olympia (_ibid._ 314; see tac. _ann._ iv. 43); and many others. akin to these are decrees in honour of judges called in from a neutral city to try suits between citizens which were complicated by political partisanship (see _c.i.g._ no. 2349b, with boeckh's remarks; _i.g._ xii. 722). on the general subject, e. sonne, _de arbitris extends_ (1888). _letters_ from kings are frequent; as from darius i. to the satrap gadates, with reference to the shrine of apollo at magnesia (hicks^2, 20); from alexander the great to the chians (_ibid._ 158); from lysimachus to the samians (_c.i.g._ 2254; hicks^1, 152); from antigonus i. directing the transfer of the population of lebedus to teos (dittenberger, _syll._^2 177); from the same to the scepsians (dittenberger, _or. gr. inscr. sel._ 5), letters from roman emperors are commoner still; such as dittenberger, _syll._^2 350, 356, 373, 384-388, 404. the internal administration of greek towns is illustrated by the minute and complete lists of the treasures in the parthenon of the time of the peloponnesian war (boeckh, _staatshaush_.^3 vol. ii.); public accounts of athenian expenditure (_ibid._); records of the athenian navy in the 4th century, forming vol. iii. of the 1840 ed. of the same work. to the same category belong the so-called athenian tribute-lists, which are really lists of the quota (of the tribute paid by the athenian allies) which was due to the treasury of athena ([greek: aparchai te theo mua apo talantou]). being arranged according to the tributary cities, they throw much light on the constitution of the athenian empire at the time (_i.g._ i. 226-272 and suppl. p. 71 f.; kohler, _urkunden und untersuchungen zur gesch. des attisch-delischen seebundes_ 1870; boeckh, _staatshaush_.^3 ii. 332-498). the management of public lands and mines is specially illustrated from inscriptions (boeckh, _op. cit._ vol. i. passim); and the political constitution of different cities often receives light from inscriptions which cannot be gained elsewhere (e.g. see the document from cyzicus, _c.i.g._ 3665, and boeckh's note, or that from mytilene, dittenberger, _or. gr. inscr._ 2, and the inscriptions from ephesus, gk. _inscr. in brit. mus._ pt. iii. s 2). inscriptions in honour of kings and emperors are very common. the _marmor ancyranum_ (ed. mommsen,^2 1883) has already been mentioned; but an earlier example is the _monumentum adulitanum_ (from abyssinia, _c.i.g._ 5127a); dittenberger, (_inscr. or. gr._ 54) reciting the achievements of ptolemy iii. euergetes i. offerings in temples ([greek: anathemata]) are often of great historical value, e.g. the dedications on the columns of croesus at ephesus mentioned above; gelo's dedication at delphi, 479 b.c. (hicks^2 16); the helmet of hiero, now in the british museum, dedicated at olympia after his victory over the etruscans, 474 b.c. (_c.i.g._ 16; hicks^2 22); and the bronze base of the golden tripod dedicated at delphi after the victory of plataea, and carried off to constantinople by constantine (dethier and mordtmann, _epigraphik von byzantion_, 1874; hicks^2 19). religious inscriptions. 2. the religion of greece in its external aspects is the subject of a great number of inscriptions (good selections in dittenberger, _syll._^2 550-816, and michel 669-1330). the following are a few specimens. (1) institution of festivals, with elaborate ritual directions: see sauppe, _die mysterieninschrift aus andania_ (1860); dittenberger, _syll._^2 653, and the singular document from the ephesian theatre in _gk. inscr. in brit. mus._ 481; the following also relate to festivals--_c.i.g._ 1845, 2360, 2715, 3059, 3599, 3641b; dittenberger, _syll._^2 634 (the lesser panathenaea) and _or. gr. inscr._ 383 (law of antiochus i. of commagene). (2) laws defining the appointment, duties or perquisites of the priesthood: dittenberger, _syll._^2 601; boeckh, _staatshaush_. ii. 109 seq. (3) curious calendar of sacrifices from myconus: dittenberger, _syll._^2 615. (4) fragment of augury rules, ephesus, 6th century b.c.: _ibid._ 801. (5) leases of [greek: temene] and sacred lands (see dareste, &c., _inscr. jur. gr._ ii. s 19 and commentary). (6) imprecations written on lead, and placed in tombs or in temples: wunsch, _i.g._ iii. app.; audollent, _defixionum tabellae_ (1904). (7) oracles are referred to _i.g._ xii. 248; michel 840-856. (8) among the inscriptions from delphi few are more curious than those relating to the enfranchisement of slaves under the form of sale to a god (see _gr. dial. inschr._ nos. 1684-2342); for enfranchisement-inscriptions of various kinds, dareste, &c., _inscr. jur. gr._ s xxx. (9) cures effected in the asclepieum at epidaurus (dittenberger, _syll._^2 802-805). (10) inventories, &c., of treasures in temples: michel 811-828, 832, 833, &c. (11) inscriptions relating to dramatic representations at public festivals: a. wilhelm, _urkunden dramatischer auffuhrungen in athen_ (vienna, 1906). this catalogue might be enlarged indefinitely. private inscriptions. 3. there remain a large number of inscriptions of a more strictly private character. the famous parian marble (_i.g._ xii. 444) falls under this head; it was a system of chronology drawn up, perhaps by a schoolmaster, in the 3rd century b.c. the excessive devotion of the later greeks to athletic and other competitions at festivals is revealed by the numerous dedications made by victorious competitors who record their successes (see michel 915-960; dittenberger, _syll._^2 683 f.). the dedications and honorary inscriptions relating to the ephebi of later athens (which occupy half of _i.g._ iii. pt. 1), dreary as they seem, have yet thrown a curious light upon the academic life of roman athens (see a. dumont, _essai sur l'ephebie attique_; reinach, _traite_, pp. 408-418; roberts and gardner ii. 145); and from these and similar late inscriptions the attempt has been made to construct _fasti_ of the later archons (von schoffer in pauly-wissowa, _realencyklopadie, s.v._ "archontes"; w. s. ferguson in _cornell studies_, x. the sepulchral monuments have been beautifully illustrated in stackelberg's _graber der hellenen_; for the attic stelae see conze, _die attischen grabreliefs_ (1893 ff.). some of the most interesting epitaphs in the _c.i.g._ are from aphrodisias and smyrna. kumanudes's collection of attic epitaphs has been mentioned above; see also gutscher, _die attischen grabschr._ (1889); they yield a good deal of information about the attic demes, and some of them are of high importance, e.g. the epitaph on the slain in the year 458 b.c. (dittenberger, _syll._^2 9), and on those who fell in the hellespont, c. 440 b.c. (hicks^2 46). for the metrical inscriptions see kaibel, _epigrammata graeca_ (1878). closely connected with sepulchral inscriptions is the famous "will of epicteta" (_i.g._ xii. 330). it was also customary at athens for lands mortgaged to be indicated by boundary-stones inscribed with the names of mortgagor and mortgagee, and the amount (_i.g._ ii. 1103-1153; dareste, &c., _inscr. jur._ i. pp. 107-142); other [greek: oroi] are common enough. the names of sculptors inscribed on the bases of statues have been collected by e. lowy (_inschriften gr. bildhauer_, 1885). in most cases the artists are unknown to fame. among the exceptions are the names of pythagoras of rhegium, whom we now know to have been a native of samos (lowy 23, 24); pyrrhus, who made the statue of athena hygieia dedicated by pericles (plut. _per._ 13; lowy 53); polyclitus the younger (lowy 90 f.), paeonius of mende, who sculptured the marble nike at olympia (lowy 49); praxiteles (lowy 76), &c. study of dialects. the bearing of inscriptions upon the study of dialects is very obvious. a handy selection has been made by cauer (_delectus inscr._ gr. 2nd ed., leipzig, 1883) of the principal inscriptions illustrating this subject, and a complete collection is in course of publication (collitz and others, _sammlung der griechischen dialekt-inschriften_, gottingen, 1884 ff.). see also r. meister, _die griech. dialekte_ (1882-1889), and o. hoffman, _die griech. dialekte_ (1891-1898). the grammar of attic inscriptions is treated by meisterhans, _grammatik der att. inschr._ (3rd ed. by schwyzer, 1900). date of inscriptions. the date of inscriptions is determined partly by the internal evidence of the subject, persons, and events treated of, and the character of the dialect and language. but the most important evidence is the form of the letters and style of execution. for the attic inscriptions the development from the earliest times to about a.d. 500 is elaborately treated by larfeld, _handbuch der att. inschr._ (1902). bk. ii. much of the evidence is of a kind difficult to appreciate from a mere description. yet--besides the [greek: boustrophedon] writing of many early documents--we may mention the contrast between the stiff, angular characters which prevailed before 500 or 450 b.c. and the graceful yet simple forms of the periclean age. this development was part of the general movement of the time. inscriptions of this period are usually written [greek: stotchedon], i.e. the letters are in line vertically as well as horizontally. from the archonship of eucleides (403 b.c.) onwards the athenians officially adopted the fuller alphabet which had obtained in ionia since the 6th century. before 403 b.c. [zeta] and [psi] were expressed in attic inscriptions by [chi][sigma] and [phi][sigma], while [epsilon] did duty for [eta], [epsilon], and sometimes [epsilon][iota], [omicron] for [omicron], [omicron][upsilon], and [omega]--[eta] being used only for the aspirate. there is, however, occasional use of the ionic alphabet in attica, even in official inscriptions, as early as the middle of the 5th century. the macedonian period betrays a falling off in neatness and firmness of execution--the letters being usually small and scratchy, excepting in inscriptions relating to great personages, when the characters are often very large and handsome. in the 2nd century came in the regular use of _apices_ as an ornament of letters. these tendencies increased during the period of roman dominion in greece, and gradually, especially in asia minor, the _iota adscriptum_ was dropped. the greek characters of the augustan age indicate a period of restoration; they are uniformly clear, handsome, and adorned with _apices_. the lunate epsilon and sigma ([epsilon], c) establish themselves in this period; so does the square form [square c], and the cursive [omega] is also occasionally found. the inscriptions of hadrian's time show a tendency to eclectic imitation of the classical lettering. but from the period of the antonines (when we find a good many pretty inscriptions) the writing grows more coarse and clumsy until byzantine times, when the forms appear barbarous indeed beside an inscription of the augustan or even antonine age. collections of marbles. the finest collections of inscribed greek marbles are of course at athens. there are also good collections, public and private, at smyrna and constantinople. the british museum contains the best collection out of athens (see the publication mentioned above); the louvre contains a good many (edited by frohner, _les inscriptions grecques du musee du louvre_, 1865); the oxford collection is very valuable, and fairly large; and there are some valuable inscriptions also at cambridge. bibliography.--the following essays give good outlines of the whole subject:--boeckh, _c.i.g._, preface to vol i.; c. t. newton, _essays on art and archaeology_ (1880), pp. 95, 209; s. reinach, _traite d'epigraphie grecque_ (paris, 1885). besides the works already quoted the following should be mentioned:--boeckh's _kleine schriften_; michaelis, _der parthenon_; waddington, _fastes des provinces asiatiques_, part i. (1872), and _memoire sur la chronologie de la vie du rheteur aristide_; kirchhoff, _studien zur geschichte des griechischen alphabets_ (4th ed., 1887); schubert, _de proxenia_ (leipzig, 1881); monceaux, _les proxenies gr._ (paris, 1886); latyshev, _inscr. ant. orae septentr. ponti euxini gr. et lat._ (2 vols., st petersburg, 1885-1890); bechtel, _inschriften des ionischen dialekts_ (gottingen, 1887); paton and hicks, _inscriptions of cos_ (oxford, 1891); frankel and others, _inschriften von pergamon_ (2 vols., berlin 1890-1895); comparetti, _le leggi di gortyna_, &c. (_monum. antichi_, iii., 1893); e. hoffmann, _sylloge epigrammatum graec._ (halle a. s., 1893); o. kern, _inschriften von magnesia am maeander_ (berlin, 1900); s. chabert, _histoire sommaire des etudes d'epigraphie grecque_ (paris, 1906); hackl, _merkantile inschr. auf attischen vasen (munch, arch stud._, 1909); wilhelm, _beitrage zur griech. inschriftenkunde_ (vienna, 1909). (e. l. h.; g. f. h.*) iv. latin inscriptions i. latin or roman inscriptions (by which general name are designated, in classical archaeology, all non-literary remains of the latin language, with the exception of coins, letters and journals) fall into two distinct classes, viz. (1) those which were written upon other objects of various kinds, to denote their peculiar purpose, and in this way have been preserved along with them; and (2) those which themselves are the objects, written, to be durable, as a rule, on metal or stone. the first class is that of _inscriptions_ in the stricter sense of the word (styled by the romans _tituli_, by the germans _aufschriften_); the second is that of instruments or charters, public and private (styled by the romans first _leges_, afterwards _instrumenta_ or _tabulae_, and by the germans _urkunden_). no ancient latin authors have professedly collected and explained or handed down to us roman inscriptions. some of the orators and historians, such as cicero, livy, pliny the elder, and suetonius among the latins, and polybius, dionysius of halicarnassus and josephus among the greeks, occasionally mention inscriptions of high historical interest. a few grammarians, as, for example, varro, verrius flaccus and valerius probus of berytus, quote ancient words or _formulae_ from them, or explain the abbreviations used in them. juridical instruments, laws, constitutions of emperors, _senatus consulta_ and the like appear in the various collections of roman jurisprudence. inscriptions (in the wider sense, as we shall henceforth call them without regard to the distinction which has been drawn) have been found in nearly every centre of ancient roman life, but, like many other remains of antiquity, only seldom in their original sites. the great mass of them has to be sought for in the large european museums of ancient art, and in the smaller local collections of ancient remains which occur nearly everywhere in the european provinces of the former roman empire as well as in the north of africa, and also here and there in asia minor. only those copies of inscriptions are to be received with full confidence which are furnished by experienced and well-equipped scholars, or which have been made with the help of mechanical methods (casts, photographs, moist and dry rubbings), not always applicable with equal success, but depending on the position and the state of preservation of the monuments.[36] from the first revival of classical learning in the carolingian age attention was paid anew, by pilgrims to rome and other places worth visiting, to epigraphic monuments also. in the time of the renaissance, from the end of the 14th century downwards, some of the leading italian scholars, like poggio and signorili, and the antiquarian traveller cyriacus of ancona, collected inscriptions, greek and latin.[37] in the 15th century large collections of the inscriptions of all countries, or of limited districts, were made by giovanni marcanova, fra felice feliciano, fra michele ferrarino, fra giocondo the architect of verona, marino sanudo the venetian polyhistor, and others. at the end of the 15th and the beginning of the 16th, the first printed collections can be recorded (spreti's for ravenna, 1489; peutinger's for augsburg, 1508; huttich's for mainz, 1520; francesco degli albertini's for rome, printed in 1521 by jacopo mazochi), while during the same century a long list of epigraphic travellers, like pighius, rambertus and accursius, or antiquarian collectors, like sigonius, panvinius, antonius augustinus with his collaborators ursinus and metellus, and many others, were busy in augmenting the stock of epigraphic monuments. the series of printed epigraphic _corpora_ begins with that of apianus (ingolstadt, 1534), the only one arranged in geographical order, and is continued in those of smetius (1558, but edited only after the author's death by justus lipsius, 1588), gruter (with joseph scaliger's _indices_, 1603, and re-edited by graevius, 1707), gudius (about 1660, edited by hessel, 1731), reinesius (1682), fabretti (1699), gori (1726), doni (1731), muratori (1739), maffei (1749), donati (1765-1775). these collections, manuscript and printed, will never altogether lose their value, as great numbers of inscriptions known to the ancient collectors have since been lost or destroyed. but, inasmuch as even towards the beginning of the 15th century, as well as afterwards, especially from the 16th down to a very recent period, all sorts of inaccuracies, interpolations and even downright falsifications, found their way into the _corpora_, these can be employed only with the greatest caution. modern critical research in the field of epigraphy began with the detection of those forgeries (especially of the very extensive and skilful ones of pirro ligorio, the architect to the house of este) by maffei, olivieri and marini. the last-named scholar opens a new era of truly critical and scientific handling of roman inscriptions (especially in his standard work on the _atti dei fratelli arvali_, rome, 1795); his disciple and successor, count bartolomeo borghesi (who died at san marino in 1860), may be rightly called the founder of the modern science of roman epigraphy.[38] orelli's handy collection of roman inscriptions (2 vols., zurich, 1828) is a first attempt to make accessible to a larger scientific public the results of the researches of marini and his successors; but it was not completed, (and thoroughly corrected) until nearly thirty years later, by henzen (orelli, iii., with the indispensable _indices_, zurich, 1856), who, with mommsen and de rossi, carried out the plan of a universal _corpus inscriptionum latinarum_, previously projected by maffei (1732), by kellermann and sarti (1832), with borghesi's help, and by letronne and egger (1843). after the appearance of mommsen's _inscriptiones regni neapolitani latinae_ (leipzig, 1852) and his _inscriptiones confoederationis helveticae latinae_ (vol. x. of the publications of the zurich antiquarian society, 1854), the publication of the _c.i.l._ , following the similar work of the greek inscriptions, was undertaken by the royal academy of sciences of berlin. this work, in which the previous literature is fully described and utilized, consists of the following parts:--vol. i., _inscriptiones antiquissimae ad c. caesaris mortem_ (1863; 2nd ed., part i., 1893); ritschl's _priscae latinitatis monumenta epigraphica_ (berlin, 1862, fol.) form the graphic illustration to vol. i., giving all extant monuments of the republican epoch (with five _supplementa_, bonn, 1862-1865; r. garrucci's _sylloge inscriptionum latinarum aevi romanae reipublicae usque ad c. iulium caesarem plenissima_, 2 vols., turin, 1875-1877, must be used with caution); vol. ii., _inscr. hispaniae_ (1869; with supplement, 1892); vol. iii., _inscr. asiae, provinciarum europae graecarum, illyrici_ (1873; with supplements and index, 1889-1902); vol. iv., _inscr. parietariae pompeianae herculanenses stabianae_ (the scratched and painted inscriptions chiefly of pompeii) (1871; with supplement, part i., 1898; part ii., 1909); vol. v., _inscr. galliae cisalpinae_ (1872-1877; with suppl., et. pais, _c.i.l. suppl. italica_); vol. vi., _inscr. urbis romae_ (1876-1902; with supplement, 1902); vol. vii., _inscr. britanniae_ (1873); vol. viii., _inscr. africae_ (1881; with supplement, 1891-1894, 1904); vol. ix., _inscr. calabriae, apuliae, samnii, sabinorum, piceni_ (1883); vol. x., _inscr. bruttiorum, lucaniae, campaniae, siciliae, sardiniae_ (1883); vol. xi., _inscr. aemiliae, umbriae, etruriae_ (1888; part ii., 1901 sqq.); vol. xii., _inscr. galliae narbonensis_ (1888); vol. xiii., _inscr. trium galliarum et duarum germaniarum_ (1899 sqq.; part ii., 1905 sqq.); vol. xiv., _inscr. latii antiqui_; vol. xv., _inscr. laterum_ (1891; part ii., i. [_vasa, lucernae, fistulae_], 1899). the arrangement observed in the _corpus_ is the geographical (as in apianus); within the single towns the order of subjects (_tituli sacri_, _magistratuum_, _privatorum_, &c., as in smetius) is followed, with some few exceptions, where the monuments are so numerous (as in the _forum_ of rome and at pompeii and lambaesis) that they can be assigned to their original places. running supplements to the _c.i.l._ are given in the _ephemeris epigraphica, corporis inscr. latinarum supplementum_ (berlin, 1872 sqq.); and the new discoveries of each year are recorded in cagnat's _l'annee epigraphique_. the inscriptions in the other italian dialects have been published by conway, _italic dialects_ (cambridge, 1897); cf. vol. ii. of von planta, _grammatik der oskisch-umbrischen dialekte_ (strassburg, 1897). a corpus of the etruscan inscriptions was begun in 1893 by pauli and is now nearly complete. the inscriptions of the veneti, a n. italian people of the illyrian stock, will be found in vol. iii. of pauli, _altitalische forschungen_ (leipzig, 1891). for the christian inscriptions see de rossi's _inscr. christianae urbis romae septimo saeculo antiquiores_, vol. i. (rome, 1857), vol. ii. (1888); the _inscriptions chretiennes de la gaule of le blant_ (2 vols., paris, 1857-1865; new edition, 1892); the _altchristliche inschriften der rheinlande_ of kraus (1890); the _christliche inschriften der schweiz vom iv.-ix. jahrhundert_ of egli (1895); and the _inscr. hispaniae christianae and inscr. britanniae christianae_ of hubner (berlin, 1871, 1876). as splendidly illustrated works on the latin inscriptions of some districts alphonse de boissieu's _inscriptions antiques de lyon_ (lyons, 1846-1854), ch. robert's _epigraphie romaine de la moselle_ (paris, 1875), and j. c. bruce's _lapidarium septentrionale_ (london and newcastle, 1875) can be recommended. besides the above-mentioned orelli-henzen collection, g. wilmanns's _exempla inscriptionum latinarum_ (2 vols, berlin, 1873, with copious indexes), and dessau's _inscriptiones latinae selectae_ (vol. i., 1892; vol. ii., 1903; ii., 1906) give a general synopsis of the materials. inscriptions of interest to students of history are collected in rushforth's _latin historical inscriptions_ (oxford, 1893); leroux, _revue des publications epigraphiques relatives a l'antiquite romaine_, records those which bear on antiquities. of other works may be mentioned ruggiero, _dizionario epigrafico di antichita romane_ (1886); olcott, _thesaurus linguae latinae epigraphicae_ (1904 sqq.). ii. information regarding the forms of letters used on roman inscriptions will be found under the articles latin language, palaeography and writing (cf. hubner, _exempla scripturae_ _epigraphicae latinae_, 1895). the forms of the single letters vary not inconsiderably according to the material of the monuments, their age and their origin. carefully cut letters, especially when on a large scale, naturally differ from those scratched or painted on walls by non-professional hands, or hewn on rocks by soldiers; and small incised (or dotted) letters on metal or ivory and bone, and those painted on earthenware, or impressed on it or on glass before burning, are also necessarily of a different character. the letters, ordinarily drawn with _minium_ on the monument before being cut (and also often painted, after having been cut, with the same colour), sometimes have been painted with a brush, and thence receive a peculiar form. to save space, on coins first and afterwards in inscriptions also, two or three or even more letters were joined, especially at the end of the lines, to a _nexus_ or a _ligatura_. this system of compendious writing, very rare in the republican epoch, and slowly extending itself during the 1st century, became rather frequent in the 2nd and 3rd, especially in spain and africa. there is no constant system in these _nexus litterarum_, but generally the rule is observed that no substantial element of a single letter is to be counted for twice (thus e.g. [cross] is _it_ or _ti_, not _titi_). numerals are usually distinguished from letters in the ancient period, down to the end of the republic, by a stroke drawn through them, as in ++vir, _duo(m) vir(om)_ ++s _duo semis_ (_sestertius_), [d with line-through] 500; it was afterwards put above them, as in iivir, xvir, i[1111]ivir, _duovir_, _decemvir_, _sevir_.[39] the direction of the writing is in the very oldest inscriptions from right to left and from left to right in alternate lines, an arrangement technically called [greek: boustrophedon] (d. comparetti, _iscrizione arcaica del foro romano_, florence, 1900; h. jordan, _hermes_, vol. xv. p. 5, 1880), and in the sabellic inscriptions similar arrangements are not infrequent. in all others it is from left to right. each word is separated from the other by a sign of interpunction, which is not wanted, therefore, at the end of lines or of the whole text. exceptions to this rule occur only in the later period (from the 2nd century downwards), and sometimes under special conditions, as when abridged words form the end of the line. here and there even the different syllables of each word are separated by interpunction. the interpunction is formed by a single dot (except in some very ancient inscriptions, such as the recently found forum inscription of the regal period and those of pisaurum, where, as in greek and other italian monuments, three dots [:.] are used). according to the technical skill of the different periods in stone-cutting this dot is in some very ancient inscriptions quadrangular, or similar to an oblique cross (x), or oblong (as a bold stroke), but, as a rule, triangular, and never circular. this triangular dot changes, by ornamentation, into a hook [symbol] or a leaf [symbol]; the ivy-leaf-shaped dot is especially frequent in inscriptions from about the 2nd century downwards. the dot is always placed at the middle height of the letters, not, as now, at the foot of the line. in large texts of instruments the interpunction is often omitted; in the later period it is often entirely wanting; and in short texts, in the disposition of the lines, in the varying sizes of the letters employed, in the division of words at the end of the lines, &c., certain rules are observed, which cannot be detailed here. in some instances older inscriptions have been cancelled and more recent ones substituted (e.g. on milestones), especially in the case of the _damnatio memoriae_ (in cases of high treason), in consequence of which the names of consuls and emperors are often cancelled; but in modern times also inscriptions have been deliberately destroyed or lost ones restored. for understanding the texts of the inscriptions an accurate knowledge of the system of abbreviations used in them is necessary (see cagnat, _cours d'epigraphie latine_, 3rd ed., 1898). these are almost invariably _litterae singulares_; that is to say, the initial letter is employed for the entire word (in all its grammatical forms), or if one initial, as belonging to more than one word, is not sufficiently clear, the first two or even the first three letters are employed; rarely more than three. abbreviations in the true sense of the word (by dropping some letters at the end) are to be found, in the older period, only at the end of lines, and not frequently. in the later period some instances of them have been observed. the _litterae singulares_, as valerius probus taught, are either generally employed (_usus generalis_) in all classes of written documents (and so in literature also), as, for instance, those of the individual names (the _praenomina_), the names of days and feasts (_kal._ for _kalendae_), and those of the chief magistrates (_cos._ for _consul_) and the like; or they belong chiefly (but not exclusively) to certain classes of documents, such as those used in juridical acts (_l._ for _lex_, _h._ for _heres_, _s. d. m._ for _sine dolo malo_, and so on), in sepulchral inscriptions (_h. s. e._, _hic situs est_) or in dedicatory inscriptions (_v. s. l. m._, _votum solvit libens merito_), &c.[40] it may be observed here that the _praenomina_ are, as a rule, always written in the universally known abbreviations (in the few instances where they are written in full it is a consequence of greek influence or of peculiar circumstances). the _gentilicia_ in -_ius_ are abridged, in the republican period, in -_i_ (in the nominative, perhaps for -_is_). in the always abbreviated indications of ancestors or patrons (in the case of slaves and freedmen), as _c.f._, _gai filius_, _m.l._, _marci libertus_ (_s._ for _servus_ is not frequent), the feminine gender is sometimes indicated by inversion of the letters. thus [symbol]. _l._ (or _lib._) or w (an inverted m) _l._ designates a _mulieris libertus_; [symbol] and [symbol] are used for _filia_, _pupilla_. on the _tribus_ and their abbreviations, and on the so-called military _tribus_ (which are names of colonies collocated, for the sake of symmetry, at the place usually occupied, in the nomenclature, by the _tribus_), and on the other indications of origin used in the designation of individuals, the indexes to the above-named works give sufficient information; on the geographical distribution of the _tribus_ see grotefend's _imperium romanum tributim descriptum_ (hanover, 1863). for the abbreviations of official charges, urban and municipal, and, in the imperial period, civil and military (to which, beginning with the 4th century, some christian designations are to be added), see also the explanations given in the indexes. among these abbreviations the first instances are to be found of the indication of the plural number by doubling the last letter; thus _augg._, _caess._, _coss._, _dd._ _nn._ (_domini nostri_), are used from the 3rd century downwards (see de rossi's preface to the _inscriptiones christ. urbis romae_) to distinguish them from _aug., caes._, as designating the singular. in the later period, a dot or a stroke over the abridged word, like that upon numerals, here and there indicates the abbreviation. iii.--1. among the inscriptions in the stricter sense (the _tituli_), perhaps the oldest, and certainly the most frequent, are the _sepulchral inscriptions_ (_tituli sepulcrales_). of the different forms of roman tombs, partly depending upon the difference between burial and cremation, which were in use side by side, a very complete account is given in marquardt's _handbuch der romischen altertumer_ (vol. vii. part i., leipzig, 1879, p. 330 seq.). the most ancient examples are those of a _sepulcretum_ at praeneste (_c.i.l._ i. 74, 165, 1501 _a-d_; _ephem. epigr._ i. 25-131; wil. 153); the oldest of these contain nothing but the name of the deceased in the nominative; those of more recent date give it in the genitive. the oldest and simplest form remained always in use down to christian times; it is that used on the large tectonic monuments of the augustan age (e.g. that of caecilia metella, _c.i.l._ vi. 1274) and in the _mausolea_ of most of the emperors, and is still frequent in the _tituli_ of the large _columbaria_ of the same age (_c.i.l._ vi. part ii.). it was early succeeded by the lists of names, given also in the nominative, when more than one individual, either dead or alive, were to be indicated as sharers of a tomb. to distinguish the members still alive, a _v_ (_vivit_, _vivos_, _vivi_) was prefixed to their names (e.g. _c.i.l._ i. 1020, 1195, 1271); the deceased were sometimes marked by the [greek: theta] _nigrum_ (_c.i.l._ i. 1032; wil. 158; see also _c.i.l._ vi. 10251 seq.). only the names in the nominative are shown, too, on the _sarcophagi_ of the _turpleii_ and _fourii_ at tusculum (_c.i.l._ i. 65-72; wil. 152), and in the oldest inscriptions on those of the _scipiones_, painted with _minium_ (_c.i.l._ i. 29; wil. 537), to which were added afterwards the insignia of the _magistratus curules_ (_c.i.l._ i. 31; wil. 538) and the poetical _elogia_. of a somewhat different kind are the inscriptions scratched without much care on very simple earthen vessels which belonged to a _sepulcretum_ of the lower class, situated outside the _porta capena_ at rome, on the appian road, near the old church of san cesario (_c.i.l._ i. 882-1005, 1539, 1539 _a-d_ = _c.i.l._ vi. 8211-8397; wil. 176); they can be ascribed to the period of the gracchi. on these _ollae_, besides the name of the deceased, also for the most part in the nominative, but on the more recent in the genitive, the date of a day, probably that of the death, is noted; here and there _obit_ (or _o._) is added. about the same epoch, at the beginning of the 6th century, along with the growing taste for tectonic ornamentation of the tombs in the greek style, poetical epigrams were added to the simple sepulchral _titulus_, especially amongst the half-greek middle class rapidly increasing in rome and italy; saturnian (_c.i.l._ i. 1006), iambic (1007-1010) and dactylic (1011) verses become more and more frequent in epitaphs (see buecheler, _anthologia latina_, ii.). in prose also short designations of the mental qualities of the deceased (_homo bonus_, _misericors_, _amans pauperum_, or _uxor frugi_, _bona_, _pudica_ and the like), short dialogues with the passer-by (originally borrowed from greek poetry), as _vale salve_, _salvus ire_, _vale et tu_, _te rogo praeteriens dicas_ "_sit tibi terra levis_," &c. (wil. 180), then indications of his condition in his lifetime, chiefly among the greek tradesmen and workmen, e.g. _lanius de colle viminale_ (_c.i.l._ i. 1011), _margaritarius de sacra via_ (1027) and the like, and some formulae, such as _ossa hic sita sunt_, _heic cubat_, _heic situs est_ (in republican times mostly written in full, not abridged) were added (j. church "zur phraseologie der lat. grabinschriften" in _arch. lat. lexikogr._ 12. 215 sqq.). the habit of recording the measurement of the sepulchre, on the sepulchral _cippus_, by such formulae as _locus patet in fronte pedes tot_, _in agro_ (or _in via_, or _retro_) _pedes tot_, seems not to be older than the augustan age (_c.i.l._ i. 1021, with mommsen's note; wil. 188). about the same time also the epitaphs more frequently state how long the deceased lived, which was formerly added only on certain occasions (e.g. in the case of a premature death), and mostly in poetical form. the worship of the _dei manes_, though undoubtedly very ancient, is not alluded to in the sepulchral inscriptions themselves until the close of the republic. here and there, in this period, the tomb is designated as a (_locus_) _deum maanium_ (e.g. at hispellum, _c.i.l._ i. 1410); or, it is said, as on a _cippus_ from corduba in spain (_c.i.l._ ii. 2255; wil. 218), _c. sentio sat_(_urnino_) _co(n)s(ule)_--that is, in the year 19 b.c.--_dei manes receperunt abulliam n(umerii) l(ibertam) nigellam_. in the augustan age the _titulus sepulcralis_ begins to be confounded with the _titulus sacer_; it adopts the form of a dedication _deis manibus_, offered to the _dei manes_ (or _dei inferi manes_, the _dei parentum_ being the _manes_ of the parents) of the deceased (see orel. 4351; wil. 217-228). this formula, afterwards so common, is still very rare at the end of the republic, and is usually written in full, while in later times it is employed, both simply and in many varied forms (as _dis manibus sacrum_, or _d. m. et memoriae_, _d. m. et genio_, or _memoriae aeternae_, _paci et quieti_, _quieti aeternae_, _somno aeternali_ and so on; wil. 246), in thousands of monuments. by similar degrees the _titulus sepulcralis_ adopts many of the elements of the _titulus honorarius_ (the indication of the _cursus honorum_, of the military charges, &c., as e.g. in the inscription of cn. calpurnius piso, _c.i.l._ i. 598 = vi. 1276, wil. 1105, on the pyramid of cestius, _c.i.l._ vi. 1374, and on the monument at ponte lucano of ti. plautius silvanus aelianus, consul a.d. 74, orel. 750, wil. 1145 and many others), of the _tituli operum publicorum_ (e.g. _monumentum fecit_, _sibi et suis_, &c.), and of the _instrumenta_. testaments (like those of dasumius of the year a.d. 109.--_c.i.l._ vi. 10229; wil. 314; and t. flavius syntrophus--_c.i.l._ vi. 10239; henz. 7321; wil. 313), or parts of them (like that on the tomb of a gaul of the tribe of the lingones, belonging to vespasian's time, wil. 315), funeral orations (as those on turia--_c.i.l._ vi. 1527; _notizie degli scavi_ (1898), p. 412; hirschfeld, _wiener studien bormannheft_, p. 283; fowler, _classical review_, xix. 261; on murdia--_c.i.l._ vi. 10230; orel. 4860; rudorff, _abhandlungen der konigl. akademie der wissenschaften zu berlin_ (1868), p. 217 seq.; and that of hadrian on the elder matidia, found at tivoli--mommsen in the same _abhandlungen_ (1863), p. 483 seq; dehner, _laudatio matidiae_, neuwied (1891), numerous statements relating to the conservation and the employment of the monuments (_c.i.l._ vi. 10249; wil. 287-290), to their remaining within the family of the deceased--from which came the frequent formula "_h(oc) m(onumentum) h(eredem) n(on) s(equetur)_" and the like (wil. 280; cf. hor. sat. i. 8. 13),--and relating to the annual celebration of _parentalia_ (wil. 305 seq.), down to the not uncommon prohibition of violation or profanation of the monument _noli violare_, &c., with many other particulars (on which the index of wil. p. 678 seq. may be consulted), form the text of the sepulchral inscriptions of the later epoch from augustus downwards. the thoroughly pagan sentiment _non fui non sum non curo_, or _n. f. n. s. n. c._, is common, apparently a translation of the greek [greek: ouk emen, egenomen ouk esomai ou melei moi]. another type of epitaph, much affected by the poorer classes (like our "affliction sore" &c.), is: _noli dolere mater eventum meum, properavit aetas, hoc voluit fatus_ (sic) _mihi_ (lier, "topica carminum sepulcralium latinorum" in _philologus_, 62. 445 sqq.). to these are to be added many local peculiarities of provinces (as spain and africa), districts (as the much-disputed _sub ascia dedicare_ of the stones of lyons and other parts of gaul), and towns, of which a full account cannot be given here. 2. of the _dedicatory inscriptions_ (or _tituli sacri_), the oldest known are the short indications painted (along with representations of winged _genii_, in the latest style of graeco-italian vase painting), with white colour on black earthen vessels, by which those vessels (_pocula_) are declared to be destined for the worship, public or private, of a certain divinity (_c.i.l._ i. 43-50; _ephem. epigr._ i. 5-6; wil. 2827 a-i); they give the name of the god, as that of the possessor, in the genitive (e.g. _saeturni pocolom_, _lavernai pocolom_). the proper form of the dedication, the simple dative of the name of a divinity and often nothing else (as _apolenei_, _fide_, _junone_, &c., which are all datives), is shown on the very primitive altars found in a sacred wood near pisaurum (_c.i.l._ i. 167-180; wil. 1-14); but also the name of the dedicants (_matrona_, _matrona pisaurese_, which are nomin. plur.) and the formulae of the offering (_dono dedrot_ or _dedro_, _donu dat_, where _dono_ and _donu_ are accus.) are already added to them. this most simple form (the verb in the perfect or in the present) never disappeared entirely; it occurs not infrequently also in the later periods. nor did the dative alone, without any verb or formula, go entirely out of use (see _c.i.l._ i. 630; wil. 36; _c.i.l._ i. 814 = vi. 96; orel. 1850; wil. 32; _c.i.l._ i. 1153; henz. 5789; wil. 1775). but at an early date the verb _donum dare_ and some synonyms (like _donum portare_, _ferre_, _mancupio dare_, _parare_) were felt to be insufficient to express the dedicator's good-will and his sense of the justice of the dedication, which accordingly were indicated in the expanded formula _dono dedet lub(e)s mereto_ (_c.i.l._ i. 183, cf. p. 555; wil. 21; _c.i.l._ i. 190; wil. 22), or, with omission of the verb, _dono mere(to) lib(e)s_ (_c.i.l._ i. 182). the dative case and this formula, completely or partially employed (for _merito_ alone is also used, as _c.i.l._ i. 562, cf. _ephem. epigr._ ii. 353, wil. 29), remained in solemn use. to _lubens_ (or _libens_) was added _laetus_ (so in catullus 31. 4), and, if a vow preceded the dedication, _votum solvit_ (or _voto condemnatus dedit_; see _c.i.l._ i. 1175; henz. 5733; wil. 142, and _c.i.l._ ii. 1044); so, but not before the time of augustus (see _c.i.l._ i. 1462 = iii. 1772), the solemn formula of the dedicatory inscriptions of the later period, _v. s. l. m._ or _v. s. l. l. m._, arose. to the same effect, and of equally ancient origin with the solemn words _dare_ and _donum dare_, the word _sacrum_ (or other forms of it, as _sacra [ara]_), conjoined with the name of a divinity in the dative, indicates a gift to it (e.g. _c.i.l._ i. 814; wil. 32; _c.i.l._ i. 1200-1201; wil. 33 _a_ _b_); the same form is to be found also in the later period (e.g. _c.i.l._ i. 1124; henz. 5624-5637), and gave the model for the numerous sepulchral inscriptions with _dis manibus sacrum_ mentioned before. _sacrum_ combined with a genitive very seldom occurs (orel. 1824; wil. 34); _ara_ is found more frequently (as _ara neptuni_ and _ara ventorum_, orel. 1340). dedications were frequently the results of vows; so victorious soldiers (such as l. mummius, the conqueror of corinth--_c.i.l._ i. 541 seq.; orel. 563; wil. 27), and prosperous merchants (e.g. the brothers vertuleii--_c.i.l._ i. 1175; henz. 5733; wil. 142) vow a tenth part of their booty (_de praedad_, as is said on the basis erected by one of the fourii of tusculum--_c.i.l._ i. 63, 64; henz. 5674; wil. 18) or gain, and out of this dedicate a gift to hercules or other divinities (see also _c.i.l._ i. 1503; wil. 24; _c.i.l._ 1113; wil. 43). again, what one man had vowed, and had begun to erect, is, by his will, executed after his death by others (as the _propylum cereris et proserpinae_ on the eleusinian temple, which appius claudius pulcher, cicero's well-known predecessor in the cilician proconsulate, began--_c.i.l._ i. 619 = iii. 347; wil. 31); or the statue that an _aedilis_ vowed is erected by himself as _duovir_ (_c.i.l._ iii. 500; henz. 5684); what slaves had promised they fulfil as freedmen (_c.i.l._ 1233, _servos vovit liber solvit_; _c.i.l._ 816, wil. 51, "_ser(vos) vov(it) leibert(us) solv(it)_"), and so on. the different acts into which an offering, according to the circumstantially detailed roman ritual, is to be divided (the _consecratio_ being fulfilled only by the solemn _dedicatio_) are also specified on dedicatory inscriptions (see for instance, _consacrare_ or _consecrare_, orel. 2503, and henz. 6124, 6128; for _dedicare_, _c.i.l._ i. 1159, henz. 7024, wil. 1782, and compare catullus's _hunc lucum tibi dedico consecroque priape_; for _dicare_ see the _aara leege albana dicata_ to vediovis by the _genteiles iuliei_, _c.i.l._ i. 807, orel. 1287, wil. 101). not exactly dedicatory, but only mentioning the origin of the gift, are the inscriptions on the pedestals of offerings ([greek: anathemata], _donaria_) out of the booty, like those of m. claudius marcellus from enna (_c.i.l._ i. 530; wil. 25, "_hinnad cepit_") or of m. fulvius nobilior, the friend of the poet ennius, from aetolia (_c.i.l._ i. 534; orel. 562; wil. 26 a, and _bullettino dell' instituto_, 1869, p. 8; _c.i.l._ vi. 1307; wil. 26 b, "_aetolia cepit_" and "_ambracia cepit_"); they contain only the name of the dedicator, not that of the divinity. of the similar offerings of l. mummius, already mentioned, two only are preserved in their original poetical form, the roman in saturnian verses of a _carmen triumphale_ (_c.i.l._ i. 541; orel. 563; wil. 27 _a_) and that found at reate in dactylic hexameters (_c.i.l._ i. 542; wil. 27 _b_); the rest of them contain only the name of the dedicant and the dative of the community to which they were destined (_c.i.l._ i. and wil. _l.c._). of a peculiar form is the very ancient inscription on a bronze tablet, now at munich, probably from rome, where two _aidiles_, whose names are given at the beginning as in the other _donaria_, "_vicesma(m) parti(m)_ or _[ex] vicesma_ _parti apalones_ (that is, _apollinis_) _dederi_ (that is, _dedere_)" (_c.i.l._ i. 187; orel. 1433). many, but not substantial, varieties arise, when old offerings are restored (e.g. _c.i.l._ i. 638, 632 = orel. 2135, and wil. 48; _c.i.l._ i. 803; henz. 5669, 6122); or the source of the offering (e.g. _de stipe_, _c.i.l._ i. 1105; henz. 5633 a; _ex reditu pecuniae_, _ex patrimonio suo_, _ex ludis_, _de munere gladiatorio_, and so on); or the motive (_ex jusso_, _ex imperio_, _ex visu_, _ex oraculo_, _monitu_, _viso moniti_, _somnio admonitus_ and the like), or the person or object, for which the offering was made (_c.i.l._ i. 188, _pro poplod_; _ephem. epigr._ ii. 208, _pro trebibos_, in the british museum; _pro se_, _pro salute_, _in honorem domus divinae_, &c.), are indicated; or, as in the _tituli operum publicorum_, the order of a magistrate (_de senati sententia_, _c.i.l._ i. 560 = vi. 1306; orel. 5351; i. 632 = vi. 110; orel. 2135; wil. 48; _decurionum decreto_, &c.), and the magistrates or private persons executing or controlling the work, the place where and the time when it was erected, are added. on all these details the indexes, especially that of wil. (ii. 675), give further information. the objects themselves which are offered or erected begin to be named only in the later period just as in the _tituli operum publicorum_ ("_basim donum dant_," _c.i.l._ i. 1167; "_signum basim_," _c.i.l._ i. 1154; "_aram_," _c.i.l._ i. 1468; orel. 1466; wil. 52; _c.i.l._ i. 1109; wil. 54); in the later period this custom becomes more frequent. it is hardly necessary to observe that all kinds of offerings have very frequently also been adorned with poetry; these _carmina dedicatoria_ are given by buecheler, _anthologia latina_, ii.; cf. wil. 142-151. 3. statues to mortals, whether living or after their death (but not on their tombs), with _honorary inscriptions_ (_tituli honorarii_), were introduced into the roman republic after the greek model and only at a comparatively late date. one of the oldest inscriptions of this class comes from greek soil and is itself greek in form, with the name in the accusative governed by some (suppressed) verb like "honoured" (_c.i.l._ i. 533; wil. 649), "_italicei l. cornelium scipionem_ (i.e. _asiagenum_) _honoris caussa_," lost and of not quite certain reading, belonging to 561 a.u.c. (193 b.c.); the same form (in the accusative) appears in other (latin or latin and greek) inscriptions from greece (_c.i.l._ i. 596 = iii. 532; wil. 1103; _c.i.l._ iii. 365, 7240; compare also _c.i.l._ i. 587, 588; orel. 3036). the noble house of the scipios introduced the use of poetical _elogia_ in the ancient form of the _carmina triumphalia_ in saturnian verses (from the 6th century in elegiac distichs). they were added to the short _tituli_, painted only with _minium_ on the sarcophagi, giving the name of the deceased (in the nominative) and his curulian offices (exclusively), which were copied perhaps from the well-known _imagines_ preserved in the _atrium_ of the house (_c.i.l._ i. 29 sq; orel. 550 sq.; wil. 537 sq., and elsewhere). they hold, by their contents, an intermediate place between the sepulchral inscriptions, to which they belong properly, and the honorary ones, and therefore are rightly styled _elogia_. what the scipios did thus privately for themselves was in other cases done publicly at a period nearly as early. the first instance preserved of such a usage, of which pliny the elder speaks (_hist. nat._ xxxiv. s 17 sq.), is the celebrated _columna rostrata_ of c. duilius, of which only a copy exists, made in or before the time of the emperor claudius (_c.i.l._ i. 195 = vi. 1300; orel. 549; wil. 609). then follow the _elogia_ inscribed at the base of public works like the _arcus fabianus_ (_c.i.l._ i. 606, 607 and 278, elog. i.-iii. = vi. 1303, 1304; wil. 610), or of statues by their descendants, as those belonging to a _sacrarium domus augustae_ (_c.i.l._ i. elog. iv.-vi. = _c.i.l._ vi. 1310, 1311) and others belonging to men celebrated in politics or in letters, as scipio, hortensius, cicero, &c., and found in rome either on marble tablets (_c.i.l._ i. vii.-xii. = _c.i.l._ vi. 1312, 1279, 1283, 1271, 1273; wil. 611-613) or on busts (_c.i.l._ i. xv.-xix. = _c.i.l._ vi. 1327, 1295, 1320, 1309, 1325, 1326; wil. 618-621; see also _c.i.l._ i. 40 = vi. 1280; wil. 1101; and _c.i.l._ i. 631 = vi. 1278; i. 640 = vi. 1323, vi. 1321, 1322, where _t. quincti_ seems to be the nominative), and in divers other places (_c.i.l._ i. xiii., xiv.; wil. 614, 615). this custom seems to have been resumed by augustus (suet. _aug._ 31) with a political and patriotic aim, praised by the poet horace (_od._ iv. 8. 13, "_incisa notis marmora publicis, per quae spiritus et vita redit bonis post mortem ducibus_"); for he adorned his _forum_ with the statues of celebrated men from aeneas and romulus downwards (_c.i.l._ i. xxiv., xxv., xxvii., xxxii. = _c.i.l._ vi. 1272, 1308, 1315, 1318; wil. 625, 626, 627, 632), and other towns followed his example (so pompeii, _c.i.l._ i. xx., xxii. = wil. 622, 623; lavinium, _c.i.l._ i. xxi.; wil. 617; arretium, _c.i.l._ i. xxiii., xxviii., xxix., xxx., xxxi., xxxiii., xxxiv. = wil. 624, 625, 629-633). all these _elogia_ are written in the nominative. in the same way in the colonies statues seem to have been erected to their founders or other eminent men, as in aquileia (_c.i.l._ i. 538 = v. 873; wil. 650; compare also _c.i.l._ v. 862; orel. 3827) and luna (_c.i.l._ i. 539 = wil. 651). but along with this primitive and genuine form of the _titulus honorarius_ another form of it, equivalent to the dedicatory inscription, with the name of the person honoured in the dative, begins to prevail from the age of sulla onwards. for the oldest examples of this form seem to be the inscriptions on statues dedicated to the dictator at rome (_c.i.l._ i. 584 = vi. 1297; orel. 567; wil. 1102_a_) and at other places (caieta and clusium, _c.i.l._ i. 585, 586; wil. 1102_b_, _c_), in which the whole set of honours and offices is not enumerated as in the _elogia_, but only the _honores praesentes_; compare also the inscription belonging to about the same date, of a _quaestor urbanus_ (_c.i.l._ i. 636). within the greek provinces also, at the same period, this form is adopted (_c.i.l._ i. 595 = iii. 531; henz. 5294; wil. 1104). similar dedications were offered to pompey the great (at auximum and clusium, _c.i.l._ i. 615, 616; orel. 574; wil. 1107) and to his legate l. afranius (at bologna, but erected by the citizens of the spanish colony valentia, _c.i.l._ i. 601; henz. 5127; wil. 1106). they are succeeded by the statues raised to caesar (at bovianum, _c.i.l._ i. 620; orel. 582; wil. 1108), and, after his death, _iussu populi romani_, in virtue of a special law, at rome (_c.i.l._ i. 626 = vi. 872; orel. 586; wil. 877). with him, as is well known, divine honours begin to be paid to the _princeps_, even during life. in this same form other historical persons of high merit also begin to be honoured by posterity, as, for example, scipio the elder at saguntum (_c.i.l._ ii. 3836; wil. 653), marius at cereatae marianae, the place which bears his name (_c.i.l._ x. 5782; wil. 654). of statues erected by the community of a municipium to a private person, that of l. popillius flaccus at ferentinum seems to be the oldest example (_c.i.l._ i. 1164; wil. 655, and his note). in rome, augustus and his successors in this way permitted the erection of statues, especially to _triumphatores_, in the new _fora_, including that of augustus (_c.i.l._ vi. 1386; orel. 3187; wil. 634; _c.i.l._ vi. 1444; henz. 5448; wil. 635) and that of trajan (_c.i.l._ vi. 1377; henz. 5478; wil. 636; vi. 1549; henz. 5477; wil. 639; iv. 1549; orel. 1386; wil. 637; _c.i.l._ 1565, 1566; wil. 640); and this custom lasted to a late period (_c.i.l._ vi. 1599; henz. 3574; wil. 638), as is shown by the statues of symmachus the orator (_c.i.l._ vi. 1698, 1699; orel. 1186, 1187; wil. 641), claudian the poet (_c.i.l._ vi. 1710; orel. 1182; wil. 642), nicomachus flavianus (_c.i.l._ vi. 1782, 1783; orel. 1188; henz. 5593; wil. 645, 645a), and many other eminent men down to stilicho (_c.i.l._ vi. 1730, 1731; orel. 1133, 1134; wil. 648, 648a), who died in the year 408. in similar forms are conceived the exceedingly numerous dedications to the emperors and their families, in which the names and titles, according to the different historical periods, are exhibited, in the main with the greatest regularity. they are specified in detailed indexes by henzen and wilmanns, as well as in each volume of the _corpus_. in the provinces, of course, the usages of the capital were speedily imitated. perhaps the oldest example of a _titulus honorarius_ in the form of an _elogium_ (but in the dative), with the full _cursus honorum_ of the person honoured, is a _bilinguis_ from athens, of the augustan age (_c.i.l._ iii. 551; henz. 6456a; wil. 1122); the honours are here enumerated in chronological order, beginning with the lowest; in other instances the highest is placed first, and the others follow in order.[41] in the older examples the formula "_honoris causa_," or _virtutis ergo_ (_hermes_, vi., 1871, p. 6), is added at the end, as in an inscription of mytilene belonging to the consul of the year 723 a.u.c., i.e. 31 b.c. (_c.i.l._ iii. 455; orel. 4111; wil. 1104b); the same, abbreviated (h.c.), occurs on an inscription of about the same age from cirta in africa (_c.i.l._ viii. 7099; wil. 2384). shortly afterwards the honour of a statue became as common in the roman _municipia_ as it was in athens and other greek cities in the later period. each province furnishes numerous examples, partly with peculiar formulae, on which the indexes of wilmanns (pp. 673, 696 sq.) may be consulted. special mention may be made of the numerous honorary inscriptions belonging to _aurigae_, _histriones_ and _gladiatores_; for those found in rome see _c.i.l._ vi. 10,044-10,210. he who erects a temple or a public building, or constructs a road, a bridge, an aqueduct or the like, by inscribing his name on the work, honours himself, and, as permission to do so has to be given by the public authorities, is also honoured by the community. therefore the _tituli operum publicorum_, though in form only short official statements (at least in the older period) of the origin of the work, without any further indications as to its character and purpose, partake of the style of the older honorary inscriptions. of the ancient and almost universally employed method of erecting public buildings by means of the _locatio censoria_ one monument has preserved some traces (_ephem. epigr._ ii. 199). the oldest instance of this class is that commemorating the restoration of the temple of the capitoline jupiter, begun, after its destruction by fire in the year 671 (83 b.c.), by sulla and continued five years later by the well-known orator and poet q. lutatius catulus, but completed only about twenty years afterwards. here, after the name of catulus in the nominative and the indication of the single parts of the building (as, for example, _substructionem et tabularium_), follows the solemn formula _de s(enati) s(ententia) faciundum coeravit eidemque probavit_ (_c.i.l._ i. 592 = vi. 1314; orel. 31, 3267; wil. 700). with the same formula the praetor calpurnius piso frugi (of about the same period) dedicated an unknown building (_c.i.l._ i. 594 = vi. 1275), restored afterwards by trajan. on a work executed by the _collegium tribunorum plebis_ (_c.i.l._ i. 593 = vi. 1299; wil. 787), perhaps the public streets within the town, the sum employed for it is also inscribed. precisely similar is the oldest inscription of one of the bridges of rome, the _ponte dei quattro capi_, still preserved, though partly restored, on its original site, which commemorates its builder, the tribune of the year 692 (62 b.c.), l. fabricius (_c.i.l._ i. 600 = vi. 1305; orel. 50; wil. 788); it was restored by the consuls of the year 733 (21 b.c.).[42] on privately erected buildings the founder after his name puts a simple _fecit_ (as also on sepulchral inscriptions); so, possibly, did pompey, when he dedicated his theatre as a temple of venus victrix and, on cicero's clever advice, as varro and tiro had it from cicero himself, inscribed on it cos. tert (not _tertium_ or _tertio_) (see gellius, _noct. att._ x. 1). so agrippa, when he dedicated his pantheon in the year 727 (27 b.c.), inscribed on it only the words _m. agrippa, l. f. cos. tertium fecit_ (_c.i.l._ vi. 896; orel. 34; wil. 731), as all who visit the eternal city know. of municipal examples it will be sufficient to name those of the majestic temple of cora (_c.i.l._ i. 1149-1150; wil. 722, 723), of ferentinum, with the measurements of the foundation (_c.i.l._ i. 1161-1163; wil. 708), of the walls and towers at aeclanum (_c.i.l._ i. 1230; orel. 566; henz. 6583; wil. 699), of the theatre, amphitheatre, baths and other structures at pompeii (_c.i.l._ i. 1246, 1247, 1251, 1252; orel. 2416, 3294; henz. 6153; will. 730, 1899-1901). at aletrium a munificent citizen gives an enumeration of a number of works executed by him in the period of the gracchi, in his native town ("_haec quae infera scripta sunt de senatu sententia facienda coiravit_," _c.i.l._ i. 1166; orel. 3892; wil. 706); and, more than a century later, the same is done at cartima, a small spanish town near malaga, by a rich woman (_c.i.l._ ii. 1956; wil. 746). military works, executed by soldiers, especially frequent in the danubian provinces, africa, germany and britain, give, in this way, manifold and circumstantial information as to the military administration of the romans. on a column found near the bridge over the minho at aquae flaviae, the modern chaves in northern portugal, ten communities inscribed their names, probably as contributors to the work, with those of the emperors (vespasian and his sons), the imperial legate of the province, the legate of the legion stationed in spain, the imperial _procurator_, and the name of the legion itself (_c.i.l._ ii. 2477; wil. 803); and similarly, with the name of trajan, on the famous bridge over the tagus at alcantara, in spanish estremadura, the names of the _municipia provinciae lusitaniae stipe conlata quae opus pontis perfecerunt_ are inscribed (_c.i.l._ ii. 759-762; orel. 161, 162; wil. 804). as in some of the already-mentioned inscriptions of public works the measurements of the work to which they refer (especially, as may be supposed, in the case of works of great extent, such as walls of towns or lines of fortification, like the walls of hadrian and antoninus pius in britain) are indicated, so it early became a custom in the roman republic to note on _milestones_ the name of the founder of the road and, especially at the extremities of it and near large towns, the distances. so in the _val di diana_ in lucania p. popillius laenas, the consul of the year 622 (132 b.c.), at the end of a road built by him, set up the _miliarium popilianum_ (_c.i.l._ i. 551; orel. 3308; wil. 797), which is a general elogium to himself, in which he speaks in the first person (_viam fecei ab regio ad capuam_, &c.). one of the single _miliaria_ set up by him is also preserved (_c.i.l._ i. 550; henz. 7174 _d_; wil. 808), which contains only his name and the number of miles. in the same brief style are conceived the other not very frequent republican miliaria found in italy (_c.i.l._ i. 535-537; henz. 5348; wil. 567; _c.i.l._ i. 540; henz. 5350, 6226; wil. 807; _c.i.l._ i. 558, 559; henz. 5353; wil. 808; _c.i.l._ i. 561; henz. 5180; wil. 811; _c.i.l._ i. 633; wil. 812) down to the time of augustus (_c.i.l._ x. 6895, 6897, 6899; wil. 813), and also the even more rare specimens from the provinces (from asia--_c.i.l._ i. 557 = iii. 479, wil. 826, _c.i.l._ i. 622 = iii. 462, wil. 827; from spain--_c.i.l._ i. 1484-1486 = ii. 4920-4925, 4956, wil. 828, 829). augustus inscribed on each milestone on his road across spain "_a baete et jano augusto ad oceanum_" (e.g. _c.i.l._ ii. 4701; wil. 832), claudius on those of a road in upper italy founded by his father drusus "_viam claudiam augustam quam drusus pater alpibus bello patefactis derexserat munit ab altino (or a flumine pado) ad flumen danuvium_" (_c.i.l._ v. 8002, 8003; orel. 648, 708; henz, 5400; wil. 818). the later milestones vary greatly in form, but all contain most precious materials for ancient geography and topography; in the volumes of the _corpus_ they are taken together under the special head _viae publicae_ (and here and there _privatae_) at the end of each chapter. a similar character, resulting from the combination of a mere authentic record with the peculiar form of the honorary inscription, belongs to the kindred classes of _inscriptions of the aqueducts_ and of the different _boundary-stones_. the large dedicatory inscriptions of the celebrated aqueducts[43] of rome (as the aquae marcia, tepula and julia, _c.i.l._ vi. 1244-1246, orel. 51-53, wil. 765; the virgo, _c.i.l._ vi. 1252, orel. 703, wil. 763; the claudia, &c., _c.i.l._ vi. 1256-1258. orel. 54-56, wil. 764) have quite the character of honorary inscriptions, while the various _cippi terminales_, which mark the ground belonging to the aqueduct, show the greatest analogy to the milestones (e.g. _c.i.l._ vi. 1243 a-g; henz. 6635, 6636; wil. 775-779). the other italian and provincial varieties cannot be specified here. of boundary-stones, or _cippi terminales_, some very ancient specimens have been preserved. to the age preceding the second punic war belong two, found at venusia and erected by municipal magistrates (_c.i.l._ i. 185, 186; orel. 3527, 3528; wil. 863); they give a short relation of a decree, by which certain localities were declared to be sacred or public ("_aut sacrom aut poublicom locom ese_"). then follow the _cippi gracchani_, by which gaius gracchus and his two colleagues, as _tres viri agris iudicandis adsignandis_, measured the _ager campanus_, for its division among the plebs. they contain the names of the _tres viri_ in the nominative, and in addition, on the top, the lines and angles of the _cardo_ and _decumanus_, according to the rules of the _agrimensores_, or the boundary lines between the _ager publicus_ and _privatus_ (_c.i.l._ i. 552-556; henz. 6464; wil. 859-861). from the age of sulla we still have various boundary-stones giving the line of demarcation between different communities (between fanum and pisaurum--_c.i.l._ i. 583, orel. 570, wil. 861; between ateste, vicetia and patavium--_c.i.l._ i. 547-549, orel. 3110, henz. 5114, 5115, wil. 865, 866). to the town of rome belong the _termini ripae tiberis_ (_c.i.l._ i. 608-614 = vi. 1234 _a-l_), beginning in the augustan age, and the _termini of the pomoerium_ of claudius and vespasian as censors, and of the _collegium augurum_ under hadrian (_c.i.l._ vi. 1231-1233; orel. 710, 811; wil. 843, 844), while others, of the consuls of the year a.d. 4 (_c.i.l._ vi. 1263; orel. 3260; wil. 856), of augustus (_c.i.l._ vi. 1265; henz. 6455; wil. 852), &c., show the boundary between the _ager publicus_ and _privatus_. with similar objects boundary-stones were erected by the emperors, or, under their authority, by magistrates, mostly military, in the rest of italy also (as in capua--_c.i.l._ x. 3825, orel. 3683, wil. 858; at pompeii--_c.i.l._ x. 1018, wil. 864) and in the provinces (as in syria--_c.i.l._ iii. 183; and macedonia--_c.i.l._ iii. 594; in dalmatia--_c.i.l._ iii. 2883; in africa-- _c.i.l._ viii. 7084-7090, 8211, 8268, 10,803, 10,838, wil. 869, 870; in spain--_c.i.l._ ii. 2349, 2916, wil. 871--where the _pratum_ of a legion is divided from the territory of a _municipium_; in gaul--wil. 867; in germany, in the column found at miltenberg on the main, _bonner jahrbucher_, vol. lxiv., 1878, p. 46, &c.). private grounds (_pedaturae_) were unfrequently marked off by terminal _cippi_. to this class of _tituli_ must be added also the curious inscriptions incised upon the steps of roman circuses, theatres and amphitheatres (see hubner, _annali dell' instituto archeologico_, vol. xxviii., 1856, p. 52 sq., and vol. xxxi., 1859, p. 122 sq.), as, for instance, upon those of the coliseo at rome (_c.i.l._ vi., 1796, 1-37; compare r. lanciani, _bullettino archeologico municipale_, 1881). 4. we now come to the last class of _tituli_, viz. those which in the _corpus_ are arranged, at the end of each volume, under the head of _instrumentum_. by this very comprehensive term are designated objects which vary greatly among themselves, but which are of such a character as not to fall within any of the classes of _tituli_ described before, or the class of the _instrumenta_ in the proper sense of that word,--the laws, &c. the _tituli_ of the _instrumentum_ embrace movable objects, destined for public and private use, and illustrate almost every side of the life of the ancient romans. as systematic treatment of them is hardly possible, a simple enumeration only of their different classes can be given, without citing special examples. the first species of them is metrological, comprehending the inscriptions on measures and weights. the gold and silver plate used in the best roman houses was also always marked with a note of its weight,--as is seen, for instance, on the different objects belonging to the hildesheim find (see _hermes_, iii., 1868, p. 469 sq.; _philologus_, xxviii., 1869, p. 369), the corbridge _lanx_ in northumberland house (_c.i.l._ vii. 1268) and many others. a second species is formed by the _tesserae_, tokens or marks, mostly in bronze, bone and ivory, but also earthen, of which the most interesting are the so-called _tesserae gladiatoriae_, little staves of bone with holes at the top, and with names of slaves or freedmen and consular dates upon them, the relation of which to the _munera gladiatoria_ is by no means certain (see _c.i.l._ i. 717 sq., and _hermes_, xxi. p. 266; _rhein. mus._ xli. p. 517; xlii. p. 122; _berl. phil. woch._, 1888, p. 24). the other circular _tesserae_ (the so-called _tesserae theatrales_) of ivory or bone, with emblems and short inscriptions, partly greek and latin, used to be attributed to the _ludi scaenici_ (see henzen, _annali dell' instituto archeologico_, vol. xx., 1848, p. 273 sq., and vol. xxii., 1850, p. 357 sq.) and to other _ludi_; but this account has been questioned (huelsen, _bullett. dell' instituto_, 1896, p. 227). a third species is that of inscriptions carved, inscribed, painted or stamped upon various materials, raw or manufactured, for trade or household use. such are, to begin with, the most solid and heavy, the inscriptions carved or painted on masses of stone, mostly columns, in the quarries, and preserved either on the rocks themselves in the quarries or on the roughly hewn blocks transported to the roman _emporium_ on the tiber bank. curious specimens of the first kind are preserved in lebanon, and in the north of england, near hadrian's wall and elsewhere; on the second may be consulted a learned treatise by padre l. bruzza ("iscrizioni dei marmi grezzi," in the _annali dell' instituto archeologico_, vol. xlii., 1870, pp. 106-204). of a kindred character are the inscriptions, mostly stamped or engraved in the mould, of pigs of silver, bronze and lead (and pewter), found in the roman mines in spain and england (see hubner, "romische bleigruben in britannien," in _rheinisches museum fur philologie_, vol. xi., 1857, p. 347 sq., and _c.i.l._ vii. 220 sq.; a. way, _archaeological journal_, vol. xvi., 1859, p. 23, and vol. xxiii., 1866, p. 63). a fourth species of _tituli_ of this class is strictly related to the military institutions of the roman empire. many of the weapons are marked with the names of the bearer and of the military corps to which he belonged,--so, for example, the buckles of their shields (see hubner, "romische schildbuckel," in _archaologisch-epigraphische mitteilungen aus osterreich_, vol. ii., 1878, p. 105 sq.; by far the best extant specimen is the umbo of a legionary soldier of the eighth legion found in the tyne near south shields, _c.i.l._ vii. 495), and sometimes the swords, as that of tiberius from mainz (now in the british museum, see _bonner winckelmannsprogramm_ of 1848). the leaden _glandes_ used by the _funditores_, the slingers, in the roman army bear curious historical inscriptions (see _c.i.l._ i. 642 sq., _ephem. epigr._ vi. and, on the question of the authenticity of many of them, zangemeister, _c.i.l._ ix., 35* sqq.). special mention must be made also of the leaden seals or marks (_bullae_), evidently of military origin (perhaps to be borne by the soldiers as a countersign), which have been found in many parts of england (_c.i.l._ vii. 1269; _ephem. epigr._ iii. 144, 318, iv. 209, vii. 346). of the highest interest are the manifold productions of the roman tile and brick kilns (_c.i.l._ xv. _inscriptiones laterum_; cf. descemet in the _bibliotheque des ecoles francaises_, vol. xv.). next to the tiles with consular dates made at veleia (_c.i.l._ i. 777 sqq.), those signed with the name of legions or other military corps, and employed in the various military buildings of these, are especially worthy of mention; they form an important chapter in every geographical part of the _corpus_. but private persons, too, especially the rich landed proprietors, and afterwards the emperors and their kinsmen, kept large _figulinae_, and their manufactures--tiles of every description and other earthenware--were spread over the roman empire (dressel, _untersuchungen uber die chronologie der ziegelstempel der gens domitia_, 1888; _c.i.l._ xv.). the different sorts of earthen vessels and lamps, the fragments of which are found in great quantities wherever roman settlements occurred, are arranged at the end of each volume of the _corpus_ and are collected in vol. xv part ii. p. i. on the maker's marks on earthenware, see habert, _la poterie antique parlante_ (1893); dragendorf, "terra sigillata," in _bonn. jahrbuch._ xcvi. 18. on roman lamps and their inscriptions the accurate catalogue of the vienna collection by kenner ("dicantiken thonlampen des k. k. munz- und antiken-cabinetes und der k. k. ambraser sammlung," in the _archiv fur kunde osterreichischer geschichtsquellen_, vol. xx., vienna, 1858) may be consulted with advantage. the chief deposit of earthenware fragments, the _monte testaccio_ in rome, has been explored by dressel ("ricerche sul monte testaccio," in the _annali dell' instituto archeologico_, vol. i., 1878, p. 118-192). inscriptions are found on various classes of vessels, painted (as the consular dates on the large _dolia_ for wine, oil, &c., see schone, _c.i.l._ iv. 171 sq., and _ephem. epigr._ i. 160 sq.), stamped on the clay when still wet or in the mould, and scratched in the clay when dry, like those on the walls of ancient buildings in pompeii, rome and other places of antiquity. like the corresponding greek ware, they contain chiefly names of the makers or the merchants or the owners, and can be treated in a satisfactory manner only when brought together in one large collection (_c.i.l._ xv. part ii.), inasmuch as, besides being made in many local potteries, they were exported principally from some places in italy (e.g. arezzo) and spain, in nearly every direction throughout northern and western europe, the countries outside the roman frontiers not excluded. vessels and utensils of glass and of metal (gold, silver and especially bronze) were also exported from italy on a large scale, as is being more and more readily recognized even by those antiquaries who formerly were wont to assume a local origin for all bronze finds made in the north of europe. these utensils, ornaments and other objects made of precious metals (such as cups, spoons, mirrors, _fibulae_, rings, gems), not unfrequently bear latin inscriptions. on the very ancient silver and bronze caskets, for holding valuable articles of the female toilet, which have been found at praeneste, are inscribed, in addition to the names of the artist and of the donor, occurring once, the names of the persons in the mythical representations engraved upon them (_c.i.l._ i. 54-60, 1500, 1501; jordan, _kritische beitrage zur geschichte der lateinischen sprache_, berlin, 1879, p. 3 sq.). in the ancient well of the _aquae apollinares_, near vicarello in tuscany, three silver cups have been found with circumstantial itineraries "_a gades_ (sic) _usque romam_" engraved upon them, evidently gifts to the divinity of the bath for recovered health presented by travellers from the remote city named (henzen 5210). similar is the rudge cup, found in wiltshire and preserved at alnwick castle, which contains, engraved in bronze, an itinerary along some roman stations in the north of england (_c.i.l._ vii. 1291). the inscriptions of the hildesheim silver find and others of a similar character have been already mentioned; and many examples might be enumerated besides. on the ancient glass ware and the inscriptions on it the splendid works of deville (_histoire de l'art de la verrerie dans l'antiquite_, paris, 1873) and froehner (_la verrerie antique, description de la collection charvet_, paris, 1879) may be consulted; on the christian glasses that of garrucci (_vetri ornati di figure in oro trovati_ _nei cimiteri dei cristiani primitivi di roma_, rome, 1858); on the makers' marks on bronze objects, mowat, _marques de bronziers sur objets trouves ou rapportes en france_ (1884) (extracted from _bulletin epigraphique_, 1883-1884). the last species of _tituli_ is formed by the stamps themselves with which the inscriptions on many of the objects already named are produced. they are mostly of bronze, and contain names; but it is not easy to say what sort of objects were marked with them, as scarcely any article stamped with a still existing stamp has been found. amongst the materials stamped leather also is to be mentioned. one class only of stamps differs widely from the rest,--the oculists' stamps, engraved mostly on steatite (or similar stones), and containing remedies against diseases of the eyes, to be stamped on the glass bowls in which such remedies were sold, or on the medicaments themselves (see grotefend, _die stempel der romischen augenarzte gesammelt und erklart_ (gottingen, 1867); de villefosse and thedenat, _cachets d'oculistes romains_ (1882); esperandieu, _recueil des cachets d'oculistes romains_ (1894). iv. the other great class of inscriptions above referred to, the _instrumenta_ or _leges_, the laws, deeds, &c., preserved generally on metal and stone, from the nature of the case have to be considered chiefly with regard to their contents; their form is not regulated by such constant rules as that of the _tituli_, so far as may be inferred from the state of completeness in which they have been preserved. the rules for each special class therefore, though, generally speaking, maintained--as was to be expected of roman institutions--with remarkable steadiness from the earliest times down to a late period, must be based upon a comprehensive view of all the examples, including those preserved by ancient writers, and not in the monumental form. these documents are, as a rule, incised on bronze plates (only some private acts are preserved on wood and lead), and therefore have their peculiar form of writing, abbreviation, interpunction, &c., as has been already explained. the older roman laws are now collected, in trustworthy texts, in the _corpus_, vol. i.; of the documents belonging to the later period a very comprehensive _sylloge_ is given in c. g. bruns's _fontes juris romani antiqui_. 1. among the earliest occasions for committing to writing agreements, which may be supposed to have been originally verbal only, must certainly be reckoned international transactions (_leges foederis or foedera_). at the head of the prose records written in the latin language we find the treaties of alliance of tullus hostilius with the sabini (dionysius halic. iii. 33), of servius tullius with the latini (dionysius iv. 26; festus p. 169; this was, partly, at the same time, as will afterwards appear, the oldest document of the sacred class), of the second tarquinius with gabii (dionysius iv. 58; festus, _epit._ p. 56). they are followed, in the oldest republican period, by the celebrated _foedera_ with carthage; by the pacts of sp. cassius vecellinus with the latini of the year 261 (493 b.c.), which cicero seems to have seen still in the _forum_ behind the _rostra_, written on a bronze column (_pro balbo_, 23, 53; see also livy ii. 33; festus p. 166; and mommsen's _romische forschungen_, ii. 153 sq.); and by the _foedus ardeatinum_ of 310 (444 b.c.) mentioned by livy (iv. 7). of all these documents nothing has been preserved in an authentic form, save some few words quoted from them by the ancient grammarians. of one _foedus_ only is there a fragment still in existence, relating to the oscan _civitas libera_ bantia (_c.i.l._ i. 197); it contains the _clausula_ of the _foedus_, which was written in latin and in oscan (see apulia). on account of this peculiar circumstance, the document gave occasion to klenze, and afterwards to mommsen, to resume (for the sake of roman jurisprudence, in the first instance) inquiry into the oscan and other italian dialects. some other roman _foedera_ are preserved only in greek, e.g. that with the jews of the year 594 (160 b.c.)(josephus, _ant._ xii. 6. 10). some others, made with the same nation between 610 and 615 (144 and 139 b.c.) (jos. _ant._ xiii. 5. 6 and 7. 8), are mentioned in an abridged form only, or given in that of a _senatus consultum_, to which they must formally be ascribed. amongst the _foedera_ may be reckoned also the curious oath, sworn, perhaps, according to a general rule obtaining for all _civitates foederatae_, by the citizens of a lusitanian _oppidum_, aritium, to gaius caesar on his accession to the throne in a.d. 37 (_c.i.l._ ii. 172; wil. 2839). closely related to the _foedera_ are the pacts between communities and private individuals, respecting _patronatus_ or _hospitium_ (_tabulae patronatus et hospitii_), also, when in small portable form, _tesserae hospitales_; cf. plautus, _poen._ 1047, of which many specimens from the end of the republic down to a late period of the empire have been preserved (see gazzera, _memorie dell' academia di torino_, vol. xxxv., 1831, p. 1 sq., and mommsen, _romische forschungen_, i. 341 sq.). of the numerous examples scattered through the different volumes of the _corpus_ may be quoted the _tessera fundana_, containing the pact of hospitality between the community of fundi and a certain ti. claudius (who cannot, with certainty, be identified), the oldest hitherto known, in the form of a bronze fish (_c.i.l._ i. 532; henz. 7000; wil. 2849); the _tabula_ of the _pagus gurzensium_ in africa, delivering the patronate to l. domitius ahenobarbus, nero's grandfather, in 742 (12 b.c.), in the afterwards solemn form of a _tabella fastigata_, to be fixed in the _atrium_ of the person honoured (orel. 3693; wil. 2850); that of the _civitas pallantina_ with a _peregrinus_ named _acces licirni_ of the year 752 (2 b.c.) (_ephem. epigr._ i. 141; _hermes_, v., 1871, p. 371 seq.); that of _lacilbula_, in spain, with one q. marius balbus, of a.d. 5 (_c.i.l._ ii. 1393); that of the _bocchoritani_ on the island of majorca, of a.d. 6 (_c.i.l._ ii. 3695; wil. 2851); the four relating to c. silius aviola, dating from a.d. 27 to 28, all found at brescia (_c.i.l._ v. 4919-4922); that of the _colonia julia aug. legionis vii. tupusuctu_, in africa, with the imperial legate q. julius secundus, of a.d. 55 (_c.i.l._ viii. 8837; wil. 2851); that of two _gentilitates_, the _desonci_ and _tridiavi_, of the _gens_ of the _zoelae_, in spain, now in the museum of berlin, which contains an older act of the year 27, and another more recent of the year a.d. 127 (_c.i.l._ ii. 2633; orel. 156); that of the _respublica pompelonensis_ (pampeluna in spain) of a.d. 185 (_c.i.l._ ii. 2960; wil. 2854); that of the _segisamonenses_, in spain, of a.d. 239, now in the museum at burgos (_ephem. epigr._ ii. 322); that of the _fabri subidiani_ (i.e. subaediani, qui sub aede consistunt) of cordova, of a.d. 348 (_c.i.l._ ii. 2211; wil. 2861); and, in addition to many others, those found together at rome, on the site of the palace of q. aradius valerius proculus, and belonging to him and other members of his family, from divers african cities and executed in a.d. 321 and 322 (_c.i.l._ vi. 1684-1688; orel. 1079, 3058). 2. hardly inferior in antiquity, and of superior value, are the remains of laws in the stricter sense of the word (_leges_ and _plebiscita_), preserved to us in the originals, although unfortunately only in fragments more or less extensive. of those laws the oldest and most important are the _lex acilia_ (for so it is in all probability to be styled) _repetundarum_ of the year 631 (_c.i.l._ i. 198), which is incised on a bronze table about 2 metres broad, in 90 lines of about 200 to 240 letters each, and therefore extremely inconvenient to read, and the _lex agraria_ of 643 (111 b.c.), written on the reverse of the table of the acilia, abrogated shortly afterwards (_c.i.l._ i. 200); this is the third of the celebrated laws of c. gracchus bearing upon the division of public lands. then follow the _lex cornelia de viginti quaestoribus_, a fragment of sulla's legislation, the eighth table only, of the whole set, being preserved (_c.i.l._ i. 202); the _plebiscitum de thermensibus_, on the autonomy of termessus in pisidia, proposed by the _tribuni plebis_, in 682 (72 b.c.), one of four or five large bronze plates (_c.i.l._ i. 204); the _lex rubria de civitate galliae cisalpinae_ of 705 (49 b.c.), written in a new and more convenient form (belonging as it does to caesar's legislation), in two columns, with numbered divisions, being the fourth out of an unknown number of plates (_c.i.l._ i. 205); the _lex julia municipalis_, or, from the place where it was found, the _tabulae heracleenses_ of 709 (45 b.c.), written on the reverse of the much older greek law of that community, preserved partly at naples, partly in the british museum (_c.i.l._ i. 206), also a fragment of caesar's general municipal institutions; it contains a curious passage relating to the public promulgation of laws (v. 15). these are the laws of the roman republic preserved in important fragments; some minor ones (brought together in _c.i.l._ i. 207-211) may be left out of account here. in the imperial age, laws in general were replaced by _senatus consulta_ or by imperial decrees. it was also in the form of a _senatus consultum_ that the _leges de imperio_, on the accession of the emperors, seem to have been promulgated. an example of such a law, preserved in part on a bronze tablet found at rome, is the _lex de imperio vespasiani_ (_c.i.l._ vi. 930; orel. i. 567). there is, besides, one special category of imperial constitutions which continued to be named _leges_, viz. the constitutions given by the emperors to the divers classes of _civitates_, based upon the ancient traditional rules of government applied to rome itself as well as to the _coloniae_ and _municipia_. of this sort of _leges_ some very valuable specimens have come from spanish soil, viz. the _lex coloniae juliae genetivae urbanorum sive ursonis_ (now osuna), given to that colony by caesar in 710 (44 b.c.), but incised, with some alterations, in the time of vespasian, of which three bronze tables out of a much larger number remain (hubner and mommsen, _ephem. epigr._ ii. 150 sq. and 221 sq.); the _lex salpensana_ and the _lex malacitana_, given to these two _municipia_ by domitian, between a.d. 81 and 84, each on a large bronze plate, written respectively in two and in five columns, with the single chapters numbered and rubricated (_c.i.l._ ii. 1963, 1964; compare mommsen, "die stadtrechte der lateinischen gemeinden salpensa und malacca in der provinz baetica," in the _abhandlungen der sachsischen gesellschaft der wissenschaften, philol.-histor. classe_, vol. iii., 1857, p. 363 sq.); the _lex metalli vipascensis_, given, with all probability, by one of the three flavii, as a constitution to a mining district of southern portugal, one bronze plate numbered iii.--three or more, therefore, being lost (see hubner, _ephem. epigr._ iii. 165 sq. and, for a popular account, the _deutsche rundschau_, august 1877, p. 196 sq.). the so-called military diplomas, although in certain respects nearly related to the _leges_ of the later period, are better placed along with the imperial decrees. 3. a third species of official documents is formed by decrees of the senate of rome, of the analogous corporations in the _coloniae_ and _municipia_, and of the divers _collegia_ and _sodalicia_, constituted, as a rule, after a similar fashion and debating in nearly the same way as the roman and the municipal senates. the oldest roman _senatus consulta_ are those translated into the greek language and containing treaties of alliance, as already mentioned. they are preserved either on monuments or by ancient authors, as josephus: e.g. the fragment found at delphi, from the year 568 (186 b.c.), and the _senatus consultum thisbaeum_, from thisbe in boeotia, 584 (170 b.c.) (_ephem. epigr._ i. 278 sq., ii. 102, and joh. schmidt, _zeitschrift der savigny-stiftung_, vol. iii., 1881), those of 616, 619, 621, 649 (138-105 b.c.) (_c. i. graec._ 2905, 2908, ii. 2485, 2737; le bas and waddington iii. 195-198; _annali dell' instituto_, vol. xix. 1847, p. 113; _ephem. epigr._ iv. 213 sq.), and those relating to the jews, dating from 615, 621 and 710 (139, 133 and 44 b.c.) (josephus, _ant._ xiii. 9. 2, xiv. 8. 5 and 10. 9). the two oldest _senatus consulta_ written in latin are also preserved in a more or less complete form only by ancient authors; they are the _sc. de philosophis et rhetoribus_ of 593 (161 b.c.) (gellius, _noct. att._ xv. 11. 1) and that _de hastis martiis_ of 655 (99 b.c.) (gellius iv. 6. 2). the only one belonging to the oldest period preserved in the original latin form, of which only a part exists, together with the greek translation, is the _sc. lutatianum_, relating to asclepiades of clazomenae and his companions, dating from 676 (77 b.c.) (_c.i.l._ i. 203). the rest, belonging to the later epoch from cicero downwards, about twenty in number, are mostly preserved only in an abridged form by ancient writers,--such as cicero, frontinus, macrobius,--or in justinian's _digesta_ (see hubner, _de senatus populique romani actis_, leipzig, 1859, p. 66 sq.); a few exist, however, in a monumental form, complete or in fragments--as the two sc. on the _ludi saeculares_, dating from 17 b.c. and a.d. 47, preserved on a marble slab found at rome (_c.i.l._ vi. 877); the fragments of two sc. in honour of germanicus and the younger drusus, from rome, on bronze tablets (_c.i.l._ vi. 911-912; henz. 5381-5282); the two _sc._ _hosidianum_ and _volusianum_, containing regulations for the demolition and rebuilding of houses in rome, incised on the same bronze plate, found at herculaneum, dating from nero's time, between a.d. 41 and 46 and from 56 (orel. 3115; mommsen, _berichte der sachs. gesellschaft der wissenschaften, philol.-histor. classe_, 1852, p. 272 sq.); and, of a later period, the _sc._ _cassianum_ or _nonianum_ of a.d. 138, containing a market regulation for the _saltus beguensis_ in africa, where it has been found preserved in two examples on stone slabs (_ephem. epigr._ ii. 271 sq., not complete in wil. 2838), and the fragment of that for cyzicus, belonging to the reign of antoninus pius (_ephem. epigr._ iii. 156 sq.). there exists, besides, a chapter of a sc., relating to the _collegia_, inserted in the decree of a _collegium_ at lanuvium, to be mentioned below. of the municipal decrees, of which a greater number is preserved (see hubner, _de sen. populique rom. actis_, p. 71 sq.), only a few of the more important may be mentioned here: the _lex puteolana de parieti faciundo_ of 649 (105 b.c.) (_c.i.l._ i. 577; orel. 3697; wil. 697); the two _decreta_ (or so-called _cenotaphia_) _pisana_ in honour of lucius and gaius caesar, the grandsons of augustus, of a.d. 3 (_c.i.l._ xi. 1420, 1421; orel. 642, 643; wil. 883); the _decretum lanuvinum_ of a.d. 133, containing the regulations of a _collegium funeraticium_, styled _collegium salutare dianae et antinoi_ (orel. 6086; wil. 319); and the _decretum tergestinum_, belonging to the time of antoninus pius (_c.i.l._ v. 532; henz. 7167; wil. 693). there are, however, more than thirty others preserved, some of them, such as those from naples, written in the greek language. of the third speciality, the _decreta collegiorum_, only the _lex collegii aquae_ of the 1st century (marini, _atti de' fratelli arvali_, p. 70; rudorff and mommsen, _zeitschrift fur rechtsgeschichte_, vol. xv., 1850, pp. 203, 345 sq.), and the _lex collegii aesculapii et hygiae_, of 153 (_c.i.l._ vi. 10,234; orel. 2417; wil. 320) need be mentioned here; many more exist. one of them, the _lex collegii jovis cerneni_, dating from a.d. 167, found at alburnus major in dacia, is preserved on the original _tabella cerata_ on which it was written (_c.i.l._ iii. 924; henz. 6087; wil. 321). 4. the fourth species of _instrumenta_ are the decrees, sometimes in the form of letters, of roman and municipal magistrates, and of the emperors and their functionaries, incised, as a rule, on bronze tablets. the oldest decree in the latin language which has been preserved is that of l. aemilius paulus, when praetor in hispania baetica, dating from 189 b.c., for the turris lascutana in southern spain (_c.i.l._ ii. 5041; wil. 2837); of the same date is a greek one of cn. manlius, consul of the year 565, for the heracleenses cariae (le bas and waddington n. 588). then follow the famous _epistula consulum_ (falsely styled _senatus consultum_) _ad teuranos de bacchanalibus_, dated 568 (186 b.c.) (_c.i.l._ i. 196); the sentence of the two minucii, the delegates of the senate, on a dispute concerning the boundaries between the genuates and viturii, 117 b.c. (_c.i.l._ i. 199; orel. 3121; wil. 872); and the _epistula_ of the praetor l. cornelius (perhaps sisenna), the praetor of 676 (78 b.c.) _ad tiburtes_ (_c.i.l._ i. 201). these belong to the republican age. from the imperial period a great many more have come down to us of varying quality. some of them are decrees or constitutions of the emperors themselves. such are the decree of augustus on the aqueduct of venafrum (_c.i.l._ x. 4842; henz. 6428; wil. 784); that of claudius, found in the val di nona, belonging to a.d. 46 (_c.i.l._ v. 5050; wil. 2842); of vespasian for sabora in spain (_c.i.l._ ii. 1423), and for the vanacini in corsica (orel. 4031); of domitian for falerii (orel. 3118); the epistles of hadrian relating to aezani in phrygia, added to a greek decree of avidius quietus (_c.i.l._ iii. 355; henz. 6955), and relating to smyrna, in greek, with a short one of antoninus pius, in latin (_c.i.l._ iii. 411; orel. 3119); the decrees of commodus relating to the _saltus burunitanus_ in africa (_c.i.l._ viii. 10,570; cf. _eph. epigr._ v. 471); of severus and caracalla for tyra (akkerman in moesia), latin and greek (_c.i.l._ iii. 781; henz. 6429); of valerian and gallienus for smyrna, also latin and greek (_c.i.l._ iii. 412); of diocletian _de pretiis rerum venalium_, containing a long list of prices for all kinds of merchandise, preserved in divers copies more or less complete, in latin and greek (_c.i.l._ iii. 801 sq.; compare _ephem. epigr._ iv. 180, and, as similar monuments, the _lex portus_ of cirta, of a.d. 202 wil. 2738, and the fragment of a regulation for the importation of wines into rome, henz. 5089, wil. 2739); and some of the age of constantine, as that relating to hispellum in umbria (henz. 5580; wil. 2843), that of julian found at amorgos (_c.i.l._ iii. 459; henz. 6431), and some others, of which copies exist also in the juridical collections. of two imperial rescripts of a still later age a.d. 413, fragments of the originals, written on papyri, have been found in egypt (see mommsen and jaffe, _jahrbuch des gemeinen deutschen rechts_, vol. vi., 1861, p. 398; hanel, _corpus legum_, p. 281). imperial decrees, granting divers privileges to soldiers, are the _diplomata militaria_ also, mentioned above, incised on two combined bronze tablets in the form of _diptycha_ (l. renier, "recueil de diplomes militaires"; _c.i.l._ iii. 842 sqq., 1955 sqq.; wil. 2862-2869), belonging to nearly all emperors from claudius down to diocletian. though not a decree, yet as a publication going back directly to the emperor, and as being preserved in the monumental form, the speech of the emperor claudius, delivered in the senate, relating to the roman citizenship of the gauls, of which tacitus gives an abstract (_ann._ xi. 23), ought also to be mentioned here; it was engraved on large bronze slabs by the public authority of lugudunum (lyons), where a large fragment of it is still preserved (boissieu, _inscriptions antiques de lyon_, p. 132 sq.). another sort of decrees, relating to a great variety of subjects, has to be mentioned, emanating, not directly from the emperors, but from their functionaries. such are the decree of the proconsul l. helvius agrippa, of the year a.d. 68, on the boundaries of some tribes on the island of sardinia (_c.i.l._ x. 7852; wil. 872 a); that of the prefect of egypt, tiberius julius alexander, written in greek, the same year (_c. i. graec._ 4957); that of c. helvidius priscus, on a similar question relating to histonium, belonging perhaps to the end of the 1st century (wil. 873); that of the legate of trajan, c. avidius nigrinus, found at delphi, in greek and latin (_c.i.l._ iii. 567; orel. 3671; wil. 874); a rescript of claudius quartinus, perhaps the imperial legate of the tarraconensis, of the year a.d. 119, found at pampluna (_c.i.l._ ii. 2959; orel. 4032); the epistle of the _praefecti praetorio_ to the magistrates of saepinum, of about a.d. 166-169 (_c.i.l._ ix. 2438; wil. 2841); the decree of l. novius rufus, another legate of the tarraconensis, who _ex tilia recitavit_, of a.d. 193 (_c.i.l._ ii. 4125; orel. 897; wil. 876); the sentence of alfenius senecio, then subprefect of the _classis praetoria misenensis_, belonging to the beginning of the 3rd century, formerly existing at naples (_c.i.l._ x. 3334); and some others of the 4th and 5th centuries, not requiring specific mention here. quite a collection of epistles of high roman functionaries is found in the celebrated inscription of thorigny (mommsen, _berichte der sachs. gesellschaft der wissenschaften_, 1852, p. 235 sq.). the letter of a provincial functionary, a priest of gallia narbonensis, to the _fabri subaediani_ of narbonne, of the year 149, may also be mentioned (henz. 7215; wil. 696 a). to these must be added the _tabulae alimentariae_, relating to the well-known provision made by trajan for the relief of distress among his subjects, such as that of the ligures baebiani (_c.i.l._ ix. 1455; wil. 2844) and that of veleia near parma (wil. 2845); while evidence of similar institutions is furnished by inscriptions at tarracina, at sicca in africa, and at hispalis in spain (wil. 2846-2848; _c.i.l._ ii. 1174). at the close of this long list of official documents may be mentioned the _libellus_ of the _procurator operum publicorum a columna divi marci_ of the year 193 (_c.i.l._ vi. 1585; orel. 39; wil. 2840) and the _interlocutiones_ of the _praefecti vigilum_ on a lawsuit of the _fullones_ of rome, of a.d. 244, inscribed on an altar of hercules (_c.i.l._ vi. 266; wil. 100). these documents form a most instructive class of _instrumenta_. 5. many documents, as may be supposed, were connected with religious worship, public and private. the oldest _lex templi_, which continued in force until a comparatively late period, was the regulation given by servius tullius to the temple of diana on the aventine, after the conclusion of the federal pact with the latini, noticed above. mention is made of this ancient law as still in force in two later documents of a similar character, viz. the dedication of an altar to augustus by the plebs of narbo in southern france, of a.d. 764, but existing only, at narbonne, in a copy, made perhaps in the 2nd century (_c.i.l._ xii. 4333; orel. 2489; wil. 104), and that of an altar of jupiter, dedicated at salonae in dalmatia in a.d. 137, still existing in part at padua (_c.i.l._ iii. 1933; orel. 2490; wil. 163). another _lex fani_ still existing is that of a temple of jupiter liber at furfo, a _vicus_ of southern italy, of the year 696 (58 b.c.), but copied, in vernacular language, from an older original (_c.i.l._ i. 603; orel. 2488; wil. 105; compare jordan in _hermes_, vol. vii., 1872, pp. 201 sq.). the lists of objects belonging to some sanctuaries or to the ornaments of statues are curious, such as those of the _diana nemorensis_ at nemi (henz. _hermes_, vol. vi., 1871, pp. 8 sq.), and of a statue of isis in spain (hubner, _hermes_, vol. i., 1866, pp. 345 sq.; compare _c.i.l._ ii. 2060, 3386, orel. 2510, wil. 210), and two _synopses_ from a temple at cirta in africa (wil. 2736, 2737). the _sortes_ given by divinities may also be mentioned (see _c.i.l._ i. 267 sq.; wil. 2822). to a temple also, though in itself of a secular character, belonged a monument of the highest historical importance, viz. the _index rerum a se gestarum_, incised on bronze slabs, copies of which augustus ordered to be placed, in latin and greek, where required, in the numerous augustea erected to himself in company with the dea roma. this is known as the _monumentum ancyranum_, because it is at angora in asia minor that the best preserved copy of it, in greek and latin, exists; but fragments remain of other copies from other localities (see _c.i.l._ iii. 779 sq., and the special editions of mommsen, berlin, 1865, and bergk, gottingen, 1873). among the inscriptions relating to sacred buildings must also be reckoned the numerous fragments of roman calendars, or _fasti anni juliani_, found at rome and other places, which have been arranged and fully explained by mommsen (_c.i.l._ i., 2nd ed., part ii.; compare for those found in rome, _c.i.l._ vi. 2294-2306). local, provincial or municipal _calendaria_ have likewise been found (as the _feriale cumanum_, _c.i.l._ i. part ii. p. 229, and the _capuanum_, _c.i.l._ x. 3792). many other large monumental inscriptions bear some relation, more or less strict, to sacred or public buildings. along with the official calendar exhibited on the walls of the residence of the _pontifex maximus_, the list of the eponymous magistrates, inscribed by the order of augustus on large marble slabs, was publicly shown--the _fasti consulares_, the reconstruction and illustration of which formed the life-work of borghesi. these have been collected, down to the death of augustus, by henzen, and compared with the additional written testimonies, by mommsen, in the _corpus_ (vol. i., 2nd ed., part ii.), along with the _acta triumphorum_ and other minor fragments of fasti found in various italian communities, while the _fasti sacerdotum publicorum populi romani_, together with the _tabula feriarum latinarum_, are given in the volume devoted exclusively to the monuments of rome (vol. vi. 441 sq.; compare _hermes_, vol. v., 1870, p. 379, and _ephem. epigr._ ii. 93, iii. 74, 205 sq.). documents of the same kind, as, for example, the _album ordinis thamugadensis_ from africa (_c.i.l._ viii. 2403, 17903), and a considerable mass of military lists (_latercula_, of which those belonging to the garrison of the metropolis are brought together in _c.i.l._ vi. 651 sq.), are given on many dedicatory and honorary monuments, chiefly from lambaesis in africa (_c.i.l._ viii.). as those documents, though having only a partial claim to be ranked with the sacred ones, derive, like many other dedicatory monuments, their origin and form from that class, so also the protocols (_acta_), which, from augustus downwards, seem to have been preserved in the case of all important _collegia magistratuum_, now survive only from one of the largest and most distinguished _collegia sacerdotum_, in the _acta collegii fratrum arvalium_, to which marini first drew the attention of epigraphists; they form one of the most important masses of epigraphic monuments preserved to us in the latin language (see _c.i.l._ vi. 459 sq., _ephem. epigr._ ii. 211 sq., and henzen's _acta fratrum arvalium_, berlin, 1874). 6. another species of instruments is formed by private documents. they have been incidentally preserved (inserted, for instance, into sepulchral and honorary inscriptions), in the later period not unfrequently in monumental form, as the testaments, given partly or in full, mentioned above (viz. that of dasumius and the gaul, _c.i.l._ vi. 10229, wil. 314, 315, and some _capita testamentorum_ or _codicilli_, as that of m. meconius leo found at poetelia--_c.i.l._ x. 113, 114; orel. 3677, 3678; wil. 696), and the donations, such as those of t. flavius syntrophus (_c.i.l._ vi. 10239; wil. 313), of t. flavius artemidorus (wil. 310), of statia irene and julia monime (_c.i.l._ vi. 10231, 10247; wil. 311, 318). of a peculiar description is the _pactum fiduciae_, found in spain, engraved on a bronze tablet, and belonging, in all probability, to the 1st century (_c.i.l._ ii. 5042), which seems to be a formulary. other documents relating to private affairs exist in their original form, written on _tabellae ceratae_. those found together in a mining district of dacia have been arranged and explained by mommsen and zangemeister (_c.i.l._ iii. 291 sq., with facsimiles); those found at pompeii in 1875, containing receipts of the banker l. caecilius jucundus, have been published in _c.i.l._ iv. (suppl.). these documents are written in cursive letters; and so mostly, too, are some other curious private monuments, belonging partly to the sacred inscriptions--the _defixiones_ (cf. tac. _ann._ ii. 69), imprecations directed against persons suspected of theft or other offences, who, according to a very ancient superstition, were in this way believed to be delivered to punishment through the god to whom the _defixio_ was directed. the numerous greek and latin (and even oscan) examples of this usage have been brought together by audollent, _defixionum tabellae quotquot innotuerunt tam in graecis orientis quam in totius occidentis partibus praeter atticas_ (paris, 1904); compare _c.i.l._ i. 818-820, _c.i.l._ vii. 140). only a few of them are incised on stone (as that to the _dea ataecina_ from spain, _c.i.l._ ii. 462); for the most part they are written, in cursive letters, or in very debased capitals, on small bronze or lead tablets (so _c.i.l._ i. 818, 819; henz. 6114, 6115; wil. 2747, 2748), to be laid in the tombs of the "defixi," or deposited in the sanctuaries of some divinity. 7. many of the private documents just alluded to have not a monumental character similar to that of the other inscriptions in the wider sense of the word, as they are written on materials not very durable, such as wood and lead--in the majority of cases, in cursive characters; but, nevertheless, they cannot be classed as literature. as a last species, therefore, of _instrumenta_, there remain some documents, public and private, which similarly lack the strict monumental character, but still are to be reckoned among inscriptions. these are the inscriptions painted or scratched (_graffiti_) on the walls of the buildings of ancient towns, like pompeii, where, as was to be expected, most of them have been preserved, those from other ancient cities buried by the eruptions of vesuvius and from rome being very small in number. all the various classes of these inscriptions--public and private advertisements, citations for the municipal elections, and private scribblings of the most diverse (and sometimes most indecent) character, one partly collected by chr. wordsworth (_inscriptiones pompeianae_, &c., london, 1837, 1846)--are now arranged by zangemeister in the _corpus_, vol. iv. with supplement (some specimens in wil. 1951 sq.), whence their peculiar palaeographic and epigraphic rules may be learned. and, lastly, as related to some of these advertisements, though widely differing from them in age and character, may be mentioned the so-called _diptycha consularia_, monuments, in the first instance, of the still very respectable skill in this branch of sculpture to be found at this late period. they are carved-ivory tablets, in the form of _pugillaria_, and seem to have been invitations to the solemnities connected with the accession of high magistrates, especially to the spectacles of the circus and amphitheatre; for they contain, along with representations of such spectacles, the names, and often the portraits, of high functionaries, mostly of the 5th and 6th centuries. since gori's well-known work on this class of monuments (_thesaurus veterum diptychorum_, &c., 3 vols., florence, 1759) no comprehensive collection of them has been published, but a full list is given by h. de villefosse in the _gazette archeologique_ of 1884; as specimens see _c.i.l._ ii. 2699, and v. 8120, 1-9. bibliography.--as a "textbook" of roman epigraphy r. cagnat, _cours d'epigraphie latine_ (3rd ed., paris, 1898, with supplement, 1904) can be heartily recommended. but students must be warned against zell's _handbuch der romischen epigraphik_ (2 vols., heidelberg, 1850-1852), an unsatisfactory work which is open to serious criticism. j. c. egbert's _introduction to the study of latin inscriptions_ (1896) is designed for american and english students. for christian inscriptions le blant's _manuel d'epigraphie chretienne d'apres les marbres de la gaule_ (paris, 1869) may still be consulted with advantage. (e. hu.; w. m. l.) footnotes: [1] see winckler in schrader's _keilinschr. bibl._ v. (berlin, &c., 1896). [2] a nearly complete text has been made from these with the help of a squeeze taken before its destruction. see the handbooks mentioned below. [3] published with other fragments in the _jew. quart. review_, xvi. 1. [4] _zeitsch. f. aegypt. spr._ (1879). these were the first specimens found. see also erman and krebs, _aus den papyrus d. kgl. mus._ p. 290 (berlin, 1899). [5] _mittheilungen ... rainer_, i. 38 (wien, 1886). [6] those in france were collected by schwab in _nouvelles archives_, xii. 3. see also chwolson, _corpus inscr. hebr._ (st petersburg, 1882). [7] these have been collected by j. h. stevenson, _babyl. and assyr. contracts_ (new york, 1902). a more complete collection has been prepared by professor a. t. clay. [8] for the literature see kalinka, _tituli lyciae_, no. 152 (vienna, 1901). [9] _repertoire d'epigr. sem._, no. 438. [10] so bacher in _j. q. r._ xix. 441. [11] in _mem. acad. inscr._ 1^(re) ser. xi. 297. see also _rep. d'epigr. sem._, for some smaller fragments, nos. 244-248. [12] sayce and cowley, _aramaic papyri_ (london, 1906). [13] sachau, "drei aram. papyrusurkunden" _abh. d. kgl. preuss. akad._ (berlin, 1907). [14] see _p.s.b.a._ (1907), p. 260. [15] see lidzbarski, _ephemeris_, ii. 247. [16] _j.q.r._ xvi. 7. [17] ed. e. o. winstedt (cambr. 1909), p. 154. [18] a view revived by c. forster, even after beer, in _the israelitish authorship of the sinaitic inscriptions_ (london, 1856) and other works. [19] the cross and other christian symbols often found with the inscriptions have been added later by pilgrims.--_c.i.s._ ii. 1, p. 352. [20] _reise in syrien_ (leipzig, 1883). [21] _inscriptions sem. de la syrie, &c._ i. (paris, 1907). [22] j. h. mordtmann, "beitr. zur minaischen epigraphik," in _semitistische studien_, 12 (weimar, 1897). [23] in bent's _sacred city of the ethiopians_ (london, 1893). [24] _revue semitique_ (1901). [25] _journ. as._ x., xvii., xix. [26] _zur entzifferung d. safa-inschr._ (leipzig, 1901). [27] it may be remarked that there are about twelve different views regarding the date of kanishka and the origin of the vikrama era. some writers hold that kanishka began to reign in a.d. 78: one writer would place his initial date about a.d. 123: others would place it in a.d. 278. the view maintained by the present writer was held at one time by sir a. cunningham; and, as some others have already begun to recognize, evidence is now steadily accumulating in support of the correctness of it. [28] the legends on coins form part of numismatics, though closely connected with inscriptions. [29] the amphorae which conveyed the wine and other products of various localities have imprinted on their handles the name of the magistrate and other marks of the place and date. large collections have been made of them, and they repay inquiry. see dumont, _inscriptions ceramiques_ (1872); paul becker, _henkelinschriften_ (leipzig, pt. i. 1862, pt. ii. 1863); hiller v. gaertringen, _i.g._ xii. 1065-1441. [30] e.g. treaty between elis and the heraeans, about 550-500 b.c., from olympia (boeckh, _c.i.g._ 11, hicks, 29, and others in dittenberger-purgold, _inschr. v. olympia_, 1-43); a similar bronze treaty from the locri ozolae (dittenberger, _i.g._ ix. 334); bronze plate from dodona, recording the victory of athens over the lacedaemonians in a sea-fight, probably 429 b.c. (dittenberger, _syll._ 2. 30). [31] see wunsch _i.g._ iii., app.; audollent, _defixionum tabellae_ (1904). [32] see karapanos, _dodone et ses ruines_; hoffman, gr. _dial. inschr._ 1558-1598. [33] what was done by themistocles under stress of public necessity (thucyd. i. 93) was done by others with less justification elsewhere; and from byzantine times onward greek temples and inscriptions were found convenient quarries. [34] it appears from cicero, _de legibus_, ii. 26, 27, that the size of athenian gravestones was limited by law. [35] an index to the four volumes was long wanting; it was at length completed and appeared in 1877. [36] see e. hubner, _uber mechanische copieen von inschriften_ (berlin, 1881). [37] compare de rossi, _bullettino dell' instituto archeologico_ (1871), p. 1 sq. [38] his works have been published by the french government in several volumes 4to (paris, 1862 sqq.). [39] for other details of numerical notation, fractions, &c., see the manuals of metrology. [40] on the system of roman nomenclature and the abbreviations employed in it see cagnat's textbook, and for more detail mommsen in _romische forschungen_, i. 1 seq., and in _hermes_, iii. (1869), p. 70, w. schulze, _zur geschichte lateinischen eigennamen_ (berlin, 1904); on the _cognomina_ (but only those occurring in ancient literature), ellendt, _de cognomine et agnomine romano_ (konigsberg, 1853), and on the local _cognomina_ of the roman patriciate, mommsen, _rom. forsch_, ii. 290 seq.; on the _nomina gentilicia_, hubner (_ephem. epigr._ ii. 25 seq.). the indexes to orelli, wilmanns, and the volumes of the _corpus_ may also be consulted. [41] this observation, applied to a large number of monuments, gave rise to many of the splendid epigraphical labours of borghesi (see e.g. his dissertation upon the inscription of the consul l. burbuleius, _[oe]uvres_, iv. 103 sq.). [42] the character of an _elogium_ is assumed in a special way by the inscriptions on triumphal arches, such as that of augustus on the arch of susa in piedmont, dating from the year 745 (9 b.c.) (_c.i.l._ v. 7231; orel. 626), and the similar one on the _tropaea augusti_ (_la turbia_) (_c.i.l._ v. 7817) of the year 747 (7 b.c.), which pliny also (_hist. nat._ iii. s 136) records, and those of the other emperors at rome, of which only that of claudius, the conqueror of britain (_c.i.l._ vi. 920, 921; orel. 715; wil. 899), with the statues of himself and his family, need be mentioned. [43] see the important work of r. lanciani, _commentari di frontino intorno le acque e gli acquedotti, &c._ (rome, 1880).