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The origins and beginning of Imperial cult at Aphrodisias

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 February 2013

J. M. Reynolds
Affiliation:
Newnham College, Cambridge

Extract

Carian Aphrodisias has been known as a rich site since the eighteenth century from the inscriptions copied there by travellers, transcribing especially off blocks re-used in the city-wall. In the twentieth century excavation has very notably increased our information and has made a quite outstanding contribution to the epigraphy of the city since Professor Kenan Erim began to dig there in the early sixties. It is not simply a matter of numbers; the content of these inscriptions is unusually significant in the additions it makes to knowledge of the ancient world.

Publication of the inscriptions so far has concentrated on the Diocletianic texts, while a great series of documents relating to the city's formal relation with Rome is now in press. I offer here some notes on another aspect of that relationship, the early stages of imperial cult at Aphrodisias.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s). Published online by Cambridge University Press 1980

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References

NOTES

1. See particularly the collections of texts in CIG and in Lebas/Waddington, Inscriptions de l'Asie Mineure.

2. There have been two French expeditions (of which the first, directed by P. Gaudin, was very productive of inscriptions; these were squeezed and published from the squeezes by Reinach, Th. in REG 19 (1906))Google Scholar, and an Italian one, whose work was published in Monumenti Antichi 38 (1939)Google Scholar. Professor Erim began to excavate early in the sixties, under the sponsorship of New York University and has been funded very particularly by the generosity of the National Geographic Society.

3. Erim, Kenan and Reynolds, Joyce, JRS 60 (1970) 120f.Google Scholar, 63 (1973) 99f., Erim, Kenan, Reynolds, Joyce and Crawford, Michael, JRS 61 (1971) 171fGoogle Scholar.

4. Joyce Reynolds, Aphrodisias and Rome (forthcoming).

5. Aphrodisias and Rome, document 1.

6. IOSPEX I 402Google Scholar.

7. MDAI(A) 72 (1957) 241fGoogle Scholar.

8. In view of the late date at which the sympolity is first attested (88 B.C.). I have set out the evidence in Aphrodisias and Rome, ch. 1.

9. Aphrodisias and Rome, document 29.

10. On the so-called Zoilus relief; illustration is most easily available in Alföldi, A., Aion in Mérida und Aphrodisias (1979) plate 26Google Scholar.

11. The passage has been discussed by Schilling, R., La Religion romaine de Vénus (1954) 281fGoogle Scholar. and Robert, L., Hellenica 13.213f.Google Scholar, AC 35 (1966) 416, n. 1.Google Scholar

12. Aphrodisias and Rome, documents 2, 3.

13. Ibid., documents 12, 8 ll. 40f., 35.

14. Ibid., documents 7-25.

15. Ibid., document 9.

16. I am grateful to Professor J. M. C. Toynbee and Mr Manfred Bräude for advice.

17. Weinstock, S., Divus Julius (1971) has nothingGoogle Scholar.

18. I owe this information to Michael Crawford, who has collected evidence at RRC 740 n. 1, 743.

19. Aphrodisias and Rome, document 31.

20. Paris, P. and Holleaux, M., BCH 9 (1885) 74f.Google Scholar; Robert, L., Études Anatoliennes (1937) 312fGoogle Scholar.

21. See n. 9.

22. E.g. MAMA VIII. 436, 448Google Scholar. Analogous dedications occur, of course, in other cities.

23. Bang, M., Hermes 54 (1919) 174fGoogle Scholar.

24. Weaver, P. R. C., Familia Caesaris (1972) 49.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

25. Rougé, J., R.Phil.2 43 (1969) 83fGoogle Scholar.

26. Mason, H. J., Greek terms for Roman institutions (1974) s.v.Google Scholar

27. Mitchell, S., JRS 56 (1976) 107Google Scholar, Latin, 1.7, Greek 1.31.

28. See Robert, L., Hellenica 13.176Google Scholar for some.

29. IGR IV. 9Google Scholar, CIL III. 7156, 7157Google Scholar.

30. ILS 8787.

31. For Zoilus see my note in A. Alföldi, loc. cit. in n. 10, 38f.; an extended account is forthcoming in Aphrodisias and Rome. Octavian himself testified to the influence of Zoilus at the time when privileges were given to the city.

32. Robert, L., AC 35 (1966) 417Google Scholar.

33. Fredrich, K., MDAI(A) 22 (1897) 369Google Scholar.

34. Pliny, , Pan. 43.2Google Scholar.

35. Robert, L., BCH 102 (1978) 395fCrossRefGoogle Scholar.

36. Aphrodisias and Rome, documents 17-26.

37. The cult of Arete is attested in an unpublished text in letter forms which look Augustan; for Eleutheria see Reinach, Th., REG 19 (1906) no. 54Google Scholar.

38. K. T. Erim, in a public lecture sponsored by the British Institute in Ankara in London in June 1980.

39. Buckler, W. H., R.Phil.2 38 (1914) 212.Google Scholar

40. Mattingly, H., Coins of the Roman Empire in the British Museum I 91, 195Google Scholar.

41. Simon, Erika, Die Portlandvase (1957), especially pp. 30f.Google Scholar; I owe the reference to Mr Bräude.

42. Inan, Jale and Rosenbaum, Elisabeth, Roman and Early Byzantine portrait sculpture in Asia Minor (1966), especially the introduction, pp. 44fGoogle Scholar.