INSCRIPTIONS. 



INSCRIPTIONS. 



894 



chose such materials as were least subject to destruction namely, 

 stone or metal. The stone most commonly used was marble cut in 

 slabs, but sometimes inscriptions were engraved upon a flat surface of 

 the unhewn rock. The most common metal was brass or bronze, though 

 we have instances also of lead, tin, and gold being used. If we believe 

 the accounts of the ancients, inscriptions were made even in the mythical 

 ages (Herod., v. 59, &c. ; Pausan., viii. 14, 4; ix. 11, 1); but such 

 inscriptions existing in later times were probably forgeries, and we can- 

 not suppose that inscriptions were made until the art of writing was 

 pretty generally known. 



We shall here pass over the arrow-headed inscriptions of Assyria 

 [CUNEIFORM CHARACTERS], the hieroglyphics of Egypt [HIERO- 

 GLYPHICS], and the inscriptions of Etruria, Lycia, and other countries, 

 and confine ourselves to those written in Greek and Latin. 



Greek Jntcripttom. The earliest Greek inscriptions which we may 

 safely take to have been genuine, but all of which have perished, were 

 the lists of the victors in the Olympian games (Paus., iii. 21, 1 ; v. 4, 

 6, &c,), the records of the musical contests at Sicyon (Plutarch, ' De 

 Mus.,' 3, 8), and the chronicle of the priestesses of Hera at Argos. The 

 earliest among the extant inscriptions do not seem to have been made 

 much before the year B.C. 580. 



All inscriptions are composed either in prose or verse, but prose 

 inscriptions form by far the greater number. The prose of the public 

 documents is usually stiff, and their style is not unlike that of official 

 documents of our own tune. All Greek inscriptions are written in 

 capital letters, and without any punctuation or separation of the 

 several words, which often renders it difficult to read and understand 

 them properly. Some of the earliest inscriptions are written, like the 

 Hebrew, from the right to the left ; others varied their lines, the first 

 being written from the left to the right, and the next from the 

 right to the left. In this manner, which is called Boustrophedon 

 (/3oWT(>o<>n)Sii'), the laws of Solon were written, and some specimens 

 are still extant. The method of later times was to write, like our- 

 selves, from the left to the right. But besides these general distinc- 

 tions, there occur a great variety, and some modifications of writing 

 which are the result of mere fancy. Another important point which 

 it is necessary to know before attempting to read Greek, and more 

 especially Roman, inscriptions, are the abbreviations of names and 

 words (*igla), which have been described and explained in several 

 works, such as Nioolai, 'De Siglia Veterum,' Lugdun. 1703, 4 to; 

 Maflei, ' De Gnecoruui Siglis Lapidariis,' Verona, 1746 ; E. Corsini, 

 ' Notio Gnecorum,' Florence, 1749, fol. ; Placentinus, ' De Siglis Vete- 

 rum Gnccoruni,' Rome, 1757, 4to ; but the best work on the subject 

 is Franz, ' Elementa Epigraphices Graecse,' Berlin, 1840, 4to, which is 

 at the same time a complete introduction to the study of Greek 

 inscriptions. 



Public or state documents were exhibited in Greece in certain places 

 of great publicity, as the Acropolis at Athens, and sometimes whule 

 walls were set apart for the purpose of receiving marble or metal slabs 

 with inscriptions. Market-places and temples likewise served as reposi- 

 tories for inscriptions. When it was intended that an inscription 

 should be understood by two different nations, it was written in the 

 languages of both (intcriptionet bilinguet), as in Greek and Assyrian 

 (Herod., iv. 87), Greek and Phoenician (Gesenius, ' Monum. Phocnic.,' i., 

 p. 93, &c.), Greek and Latin, Greek and Lycian (Grotefend, in the 

 ' Transactions of the Royal Society,' iii. 2, p. 317, &c.), and Greek and 

 Egyptian, as on the Rosetta stone in the British Museum. 



The necessity of making collections of the most important inscrip- 

 tions, such as contained public decrees, or interesting epigrammatic 

 poems (of which many have found their way into the Greek Anthology), 

 was felt by tlie Greeks themselves. The earliest collection we know of 

 is that of Philochorus, under the title of 'EwiypAtina-ra 'ArrtKii ; his 

 example was followed by Polemon in a work TIffii TUV Kara n<iAtis 

 'Lxi-fpattudruy, and especially by Craterus in the important collection 

 entitled tvuxyar^ Vitf>ian<tTui'. Although public inscriptions were 

 under the protection of the state, and although their violation was 

 severely punished, we nevertheless know of several instances in which 

 they were maliciously or frivolously destroyed or mutilated. In certain 

 cases the state itself ordered the destruction of public documents, as 

 when decrees were annulled or abolished. In times of war and in the 

 destruction of towns innumerable inscriptions must have perished. 

 Athens, as early as the time of the Persian wan, gives us an example 

 of the destruction of public monuments, as pillars, and tombstones 

 with inscriptions, for the purpose of building walls for the protection 

 of the city. Still greater havoc was made by the early Christians 

 among the ancient monuments, which were frequently used as building 

 materials for all kinds of edifices ; and if, in addition to all this, we 

 consider the ravages of tune and the destructive influence of rain and 

 air, it is astonishing to see the immense number of inscriptions that 

 have been preserved down to our own time. 



The first modern writer who conceived the idea of making a collec- 

 tion of ancient inscriptions was Cyriacus of Ancona, who undertook, 

 in 1435, a journey through Italy, Greece, and Asia Minor, and brought 

 back a great number of inscriptions, which he collected in 3 vols. MS., 

 which are still extant in the Barberini Library at Rome, and have 

 often been used by subsequent collectors. After Cyriacus a long time 

 elapsed, during which the attention of the learned was chiefly directed 

 towards Roman inscriptions. Scipio Maffei, and after him J. Carcagui 



and T. M. Raponi, formed the plan of a complete collection of all 

 inscriptions, but none of them were able to carry it into effect, and 

 people were satisfied with books containing such inscriptions as their 

 authors happened to meet with, or thought of particular interest. 

 Works of this kind are : Janus Gruter, ' Inscriptiones Antiquae totius 

 Orbis Roman!,' Heidelberg, 1602, 2 vols. fol. ; ' Marmora Arundeliana' 

 (also called ' Oxoniensia,' containing twenty-nine Greek and ten Latin 

 inscriptions), edited by J. Selden, London, 1628, 4to, by Prideaux, 

 Oxford, 1676, by Maittaire, London, 1732, and by Chandler, Oxford, 

 1763 ; Oct. Falconerius, ' Inscriptiones Athleticae Graecae et Latinae,' 

 Home, 1668, 4to, is the first attempt at a systematic collection; J. 

 Spon, ' Itinerarium in Italiam, Illyricum, Graeciam, et Orientem,' 

 Lugdun., 1678, 3 vols. 8vo; Thorn. Reinesius,' Syntagma Inscriptionum 

 Antiquarum,' Lipsiae, 1682, fol. ; W. Fleetwood, ' Inscriptionum 

 Antiquarum Sylloge,' London, 1691, 8vo ; R. Fabretti, ' Inscriptiones 

 Antiquae,' Rome, 1699 ; A. van Dale, ' Dissertationes Antiquariae et 

 Marmoribus cum Romauis turn Graecis illustrandis inservientes,' 

 Amsterdam, 1702, 8vo; A. F. Gori, ' Inscriptiones Antiquae Graecae 

 et Romanae quae extant in Etruriae Urbibus,' Florence, 1727, 3 vols. 

 fol. ; L. A. Muratori, ' Novus Thesaurus Veterum Inscriptionum,' 

 1739, &c., 4 vols. fol., with a Supplement by S. Donatus, Lucca, 1765, 

 &c., 2 vols. fol. ; E. Corsini, ' Inscriptiones Atticae mine primum e 

 Maffei Schedis editae,' Florence, 1752, 4to. The material collected in 

 these works was greatly enriched by the collections of inscriptions 

 made by travellers, as Pococke, P. M. Paciaudi, Torremuzza, Passionei, 

 Walpole, C. Vidua, and others. With the assistance of these further 

 accessions, F. Osann began, in 1822, his ' Sylloge Inscriptionum 

 Antiquarum Graecarum et Latinarum,' which was completed in ten, 

 fasciculi in folio, 1834; and F. G. Welcker published a smaller collec- 

 tion of metrical inscriptions, ' Sylloge Epigrammatum Graecorum ex 

 Marmoribus et Libris collecta,' Bonn, 1828, 8vo. 



But in the meantime the Berlin Academy had formed the plan of 

 publishing a complete collection of all the known Greek inscriptions, 

 of which A. Boeckh undertook the editorship. This great work bears 

 the title, ' Corpus Inscriptionum Graecarum,' is in three huge folios 

 (Berlin, 1828-53), and is by far the most complete collection of Greek 

 inscriptions extant. They are arranged according to the countries and 

 localities in which they were found ; and in each particular where it is 

 feasible, as in those of Athens, Boeckh has judiciously classified them 

 into ten sections : 1. Acta senatus et populi, universitatum et 

 eollegiorum ; 2. Tabulae Magistratuum ; 3. Tituli Militares ; 4. Magis- 

 tratuum Catalog! ; 5. Agonistica et Gymnastica ; 6. Honores Impera- 

 torum et aliorum ex douio Augusta et decreta imperatoria ; 7. Tituli 

 Honorarii ; 8. Donariorum Tituli et Operum Publicorum ; 9. Ordo 

 Sacrorum, Termini, Defixiones Magicae, Supellex varia; 10. Monu- 

 menta privata, maxime sepulchralia. It is partly owing to the influence 

 which Boeckh's ' Corpus Inscriptionum ' exercised upon the scholars 

 of our time, and partly to the political condition of Greece, that since 

 the publication of the first volume of Boeckh's work a prodigious 

 number of inscriptions have been brought to light by travellers, which 

 were before unknown ; all published up to 1852 have been incorporated 

 in the ' Corpus Inscriptionum.' The principal among these subsequent 

 works are : Ph. Lebas, ' Inscriptions Grecques et Latines recueilles en 

 Grece,' Paris, 1835, &c. ; Jaussen, ' Musei Lugduuo-Batavi Inscriptions 

 Graecae et Latinae,' Lugdun. Bat., 1842, 4to; L. Ross, ' Inscriptiones 

 Graecae ineditae,' Naupliae, 1834-45, 4to ; H. N. Ulrichs, ' Reisen 

 und Forschungen in Griechenland,' Bremen, 1840, 8vo ; L. Stephaui, 

 ' Reisen durch einige Gegenden des nordlichen Grieehenlands,' Leipzig, 

 1 843, 8vo ; E. Curtius, ' Inscriptiones Atticae nuper repertae duodecim,' 

 Berlin, 1843, 8vo ; C. Keil, 'Sylloge Inscriptionum Boeoticarum,' Lips. 

 1847, 4to ; the travels of Colonel Leake, Fellowes, and Hamilton : the 

 work of Mr. Hamilton contains a large number of inscriptions from Asia 

 Minor ; and Letronne, ' Recueil des Inscriptions Grecques et Latinas de 

 1'Egypte,' 2 vols., Paris, 1842-48, 4to; and the Philological Journals of 

 Germany, France, and England. 



Latin Inscription*. These are not less numerous than those of 

 Greece, and are found in great numbers at Rome, in Italy, and all the 

 countries which were once subject to Rome. They embraced the 

 same variety of subjects as the inscriptions in Greece, and if only the 

 principal ones had been preserved the early constitution of Rome 

 would be comparatively clear, whereas now there are a vast number of 

 questions to which we can only answer by conjectures. Some of the 

 Roman writers have, it is true, made use of the most important 

 inscriptions for the early history of Rome, but not by any means to 

 that extent which we could wish. The attention of Roman writers 

 does not appear to have been so much directed towards this source of 

 information as that of the Greeks, for there is no instance of any col- 

 lection having ever been made by the Romans themselves, although 

 some of their inscriptions were of the very highest importance in a 

 constitutional as well as legal point of view. At the time of the over- 

 throw of the Western Empire thousands of inscriptions must have 

 perished, especially those engraved on metal, as the material excited 

 the avarice of the Barbarians. But a great number was still preserved 

 in Rome and Italy, which attracted the attention of the learned even in 

 the early part of the middle ages. 



The oldest collection of inscriptions found at Rome exists in the 

 monastery of Einsiedeln : it is written on parchment, and probably 

 belongs to the 10th or llth century. It is printed in Mabilloii 



