Recent work, published in Anatolian Studies and other journals, has drawn attention to the site of Satala, the modern Sadak (in the province of Gümüşhane, district of Kelkit, map Erzincan 116-p). The importance of Satala is self-evident but the impending loss of Samosata, the base of the legio XVI Flavia Firma, has increased the archaeological value of the remaining two legionary centres, Melitene and Satala. It is to be hoped that further work at Sadak will augment the four texts presented here.

The following inscriptions were recorded in Sadak village in 1981, at the house of Ahmet Yegin, who had brought them from a field across the valley to the north of the village outside the area of the Roman fortress. On the testimony of the owner and the other villagers, all the gravestones came from the same ancient cemetery and were found in situ. No others have since come to light (by 31. xii. 1982).

Almost everyone interested in the classical topography of Asia Minor is acquainted with the name of Leake. To Ramsay (1890, 51) he was “the greatest of modern topographers”. But few will know more than that he was a scholar to be reckoned with when attempting to locate classical sites or reconstruct ancient topographies. This paper outlines his career and his work on Asia Minor.

Colonel Leake (Plate II a), as he was generally known during the last 47 years of his life, was born in Bolton Row, off Bolton Street, Piccadilly, on 14 January, 1777. The family name was actually Martin-Leake. It was adopted by William's great-grandfather, Captain Stephen Martin, in 1721 after he had inherited much of the property of his life-long friend, brother-in-law and commander, Sir John Leake (1656–1720), Rear-Admiral of Great Britain (Markham 1895). William's grandfather, after a spell in the Navy Office, became a herald (1727) and finally (1754) Garter King of Arms. Stephen Martin Leake, in fact, was one of the great holders of that office. Not only did he save the College of Arms from foundering, but he also launched it on a major phase of revival. He was a considerable heraldic scholar, as well (Noble 1805, 408–14; Wagner 1967, 380–406). Garter's second son, and William's father, was John Martin Leake (1739–1836).

A second season of survey work at Sagalassus and Cremna in Pisidia was started on 2 July and continued until 12 August 1986. This was the most recent instalment of a project to carry out detailed archaeological and architectural studies of the surviving remains of the Graeco–Roman cities of this region. Between 1982 and 1984 we had worked at the Roman colony of Pisidian Antioch, and a final report is nearing completion. In 1985, we began at Cremna, another Roman colony, with the intention of complementing the excavation of the site carried out in the early 1970s by a team from Istanbul University led by Professor Jale İnan, and also spent a few days of preliminary reconnaissance at the metropolis of Roman Pisidia, Sagalassus (see AS. XXXVI, 1986, 8–10). All the field work has been funded by the British Academy, the British Institute of Archaeology at Ankara, the Roman Society, and the Craven Committee of Oxford University. In 1986 the team worked at Sagalassus until 24 July, thereafter we were at Cremna. The participants were Dr. Stephen Mitchell, Dr. Marc Waelkens, Dr. Gregory Horsley, Dr. Edwin Owens, Mr. Robin Fursdon (chief surveyor), Roger Bruton, Mark Critchley, Helen Thackray (student surveyors), Roger and Miranda McKearney.

In July 1985, the opportunity was afforded to participate in a Surface Survey at the Roman Colony of Cremna in Pisidia. Coincidentally, 1985 marked the centenary of the visit there by the first traveller to publish a still useful site plan.

One building only has been excavated at Cremna (Pl. VII, a). As a result of the discovery by local villagers of several statues during illegal digging at the site, a team led by Professor Jale İnan of the University of Istanbul fully cleared this building in a short season during 1970. Professor İnan has provided an admirable preliminary report of the building and of the ten statues, and Professor Bean undertook publication of the inscriptions found in the building, mostly statue bases and mostly in Greek. Bean had to work from copies, squeezes and photographs: some improvements to his versions are offered below. Because his publication of these texts appeared while SEG was in abeyance, they were picked up only by J. and L. Robert in Bulletin épigraphique. So although there is no inscription here of outstanding individual importance it seemed worthwhile to republish them all here in a more accurate form and with more detailed information. There are three texts not published by Bean (nos. 3, 4 and 9 below). Fuller texts than those given by him have been provided in two cases (nos. 7 and 8 below).

A remote mountainous region of Lydia, rarely visited and hardly known to history, contains antiquities which form the subject of the present study. This was an area where classical culture was slow to penetrate, but when it did take root, it produced a remarkable number of inscriptions which are comprised in an exemplary modern corpus. The inscriptions illustrate conditions in Hellenistic and especially Roman times, with only an occasional glimpse into later ages. Their relative abundance has made the country better known to epigraphists than others, but remains of a different kind, worthy of a closer examination, also exist. Some of these are Hellenistic, but most are late, reaching far beyond the bounds of classical Antiquity, yet by their nature illustrating the change and decline which that culture underwent in this corner of Lydia.

The excavations at Gordion have produced extensive material to be added to the epigraphical record of central Anatolia. Included in this are 187 Phrygian texts written in the epichoric script of Gordion, which have recently been published by Claude Brixhe and Michel Lejeune, and a large body of pottery marks, numerical texts, and other non-verbal graffiti, which has been studied by the present author. There is in addition a quantity of epigraphical material from the Hellenistic levels at Gordion not discussed in these two works. While their individual character is quite varied, these Hellenistic texts have in common the fact that all were written in Greek script. Eleven of them consist of words or short phrases in the Greek language, while the remainder are owners' marks, i.e., names or abbreviations of names. These texts shed light on several aspects of the site during the Hellenistic period. They help document the decline of both Phrygian script and language in the settlement. They also suggest probable shifts of population during the late fourth and third centuries B.C. through the increasing use of common Greek proper names and the occurrence of Celtic names. In general, they provide a glimpse of the impact of the Greek presence on the local Phrygian populace during the fourth and third centuries B.C.

The present study incorporates the results of work which I did on the KULULU lead strips in Ankara in the spring of 1978. There by the kind permission of Professor Tahsin Özgüç I was enabled to examine all the lead strips thoroughly. The texts presented here are based on tracings of collated photographs of the strips made at that time. I am most grateful to Professor Özgüç for his help and encouragement.

The manuscript of this article was submitted to Belleten for publication in 1979, but due to unforeseen circumstances has remained unpublished until the present. It has therefore been decided to publish it in the present form without further delay. Since the original submission of the manuscript to Belleten, however, two major contributions on the KULULU lead strips have appeared:

(1) Sargon Erdem: “Le strisce di piombo di KULULU” (Studia Mediterranea Piero Meriggi dicata (ed. O. Carruba; Pavia, 1979), 143–164);

(2) Piero Meriggi and Massimo Poetto: “Note alle strisce di piombo di KULULU” (Investigationes Philologicae et Comparativae: GS für Heinz Kronasser (ed. E. Neu; Wiesbaden, 1982), 97–115).

Mitwirkend am Sturz des hethitischen Großreichs am Beginn des 12.Jhs. v.Chr. brach ein kriegerischer, thrakischer Volksstamm fünfzig Jahre vor der Regierung des Tiglatplesers I in die Geschichte Altanatoliens am oberen Tigris ein; dann schweigen die Quellen mehrere Jahrhunderte, bis diese “Muschki-Leute” mit ihrem Heerführer “Mita” in den assyrischen Annalen diesmal gegen Sargon II und im Kerngebiet von Hatti, zwischen dem Halys- und Sangariosbogen, als eine starke politische Einheit wieder auftauchen. Sie nannten sich Phryger; und genauso wie ihre Geschichte liegt fast für fünf Jahrhunderte auch ihre Kunst, die unter den blühenden Hochkulturen Altanatoliens einen besonderen Platz einnimmt, noch im Dunkeln. Dennoch ist eine derartig plötzliche Wiedererscheinung eines Volkes als eine den Urartäern im Osten ebenbürtige Großmacht Anatoliens und im Höhepunkt ihres kulturellen Lebens ohne Vergangenheit nicht faßbar; so dürfte die Groß-Phrygien schaffende Treibkraft nicht nur politisch sondern auch archäologisch in den “dunklen Jahrhunderten” vom 12. bis zum 8.Jh. v.Chr. im schöpferisch fruchtbaren Boden ihrer neuen Heimat verwurzelt gewesen sein, denn sie haben aus ihrem alten balkanischen Herkunftland nichts Eigenständiges mitgebracht, was der Entstehung und späteren Entwicklung der phrygischen Kunst zugrunde liegen konnte.