E02342: Greek inscriptions from the church/martyr shrine (martyrion) of *Theodore (soldier and martyr of Amaseia and Euchaita, S00480) in Gerasa/Jerash, commemorating the foundation of the building in 494, its completion in 496, and praising the universal glory of the saint, whose church superseded earlier pagan cult at the site.
Creators: name: Bryan
Publisher: name: University of Oxford
Year: 2017
Subjects: History

description: Inscription 1: <br><br>The inscription consists of four lines containing a poem of thirteen hexameters., here set out in verse form. It is carved on three moulded lintel blocks from the central west door of the atrium of the church of Theodore (width of the blocks: 1.87 m, 1.87 m, 0.42 m; height of the inscribed field: 0.30 m; letter height 0.05 m). The first block was displaced and found in the modern settlement.<br><br>The most often quoted edition (which is also the one we follow here) is that by Charles B. Welles, published in 1938, but the inscription had long been known before that. It was first recorded by Jules Bertou (a renowned French traveller and one of the founders of the archaeology of south Syria, Jordan and Palestine), during his first journey, and published by him in 1837. Subsequently, the stone was re-published, based on various copies, by a number of editors (it is included, for example in the Corpus Inscriptionum Graecarum and in the Epigrammata graeca ex lapidibus conlecta by Georg Kaibel). For a complete list by 1938, see the edition by Welles. After Welles, the inscription was included in the Steinepigramme aus dem griechischen Osten by Reinhold Merkelbach and Josef Stauber (with no changes), and in a collection of Greek epigrams by Yiannis Meimaris and Nikoleta Makrigianni. The poem was also commented on by Gianfranco Agosti, Charles March, and Francesco Valerio (who offers a new restoration of line 7).<br><br>A photograph was published in 1938, together with Welles' edition, but a better photograph was taken in 1989 by Géza Alföldy and is accessible in the Epigraphic Database Heidelberg (F007989).<br><br>θ̣άμβος ὁμοῦ καὶ θαῦμα παρερχομένοισιν ἐτύχθην· <br>πᾶν γὰρ ἀκοσμίης λέλυτ̣α̣ι ̣νέφος, ἀντι δὲ λήμης <br>τῆς προτέρης πάντη με θεοῦ χάρις ἀμφιβέβηκεν. <br>καί ποτε τετραπόδων | ̣ὁπόσα μογέοντα δαμείη <br>ἐνθάδε ῥιπτομένων ὀδμὴ διεγείρ{ειρ}ετο λυγρή. <br>+ πολλάκι καὶ παριών τις ἑῆς ἐδράξατο ῥινὸς <br>καὶ πνοιῆς πό[θ]ον εἶρξε | ̣κακοσμίην ἀλεείνων. <br>νῦν δὲ δι’ ἀμβροσίοιο πέδου περόωντες ὁδεῖται <br>δεξιτέρην παλάμην σφετέρῳ προσάγουσι μετώπῳ, <br>σταυροῦ τιμήεντο[ς ἐπὶ σφρ]ηγῖδα τελοῦντες. | <br>̣εἰ δ’ ἐθέλεις κ(αὶ) τοῦτο δαήμεναι, ὄφρ’ ἐὺ εἰδῇς, <br>Αἰνείας τόδε κάλλος ἐμοὶ πόρεν ἀξιέραστον <br>πάνσοφος εὐσεβίῃ μεμελημένος ἱεροφάντης. + <br><br>7. πνοιῆς πό[θ]ον Welles, πνοιῆς πό[ρ]ον Valerio || verse 11 is a quotation of Iliad VI 150<br><br>'I have been made a wonder and a marvel at once to passers-by, for all the cloud of unseemliness is dispelled, and instead of the former superstition (leme) the grace of God surrounds me on every side. And once from the four-footed beasts, that toiling died and were here cast out, spread forth a baleful stench, and often would a man going by grip his nose and stop the passage of breath, shunning the foul odour. But now the wayfarers that pass over the scented plain carry their right hand to their brow making the sign of the precious cross. And if thou wilt learn this also, that thou mayst well know it, 'twas Aineias that gave me the beauty, the all-wise priest, practised in piety.'<br><br>Text: I. Gersa, no. 299. Translation: A.H.M. Jones in Crowfoot 1929, 21-22, lightly adapted.<br><br>Inscription 2: <br><br>The inscription consists of four lines containing a poem of seven hexameters, here set out in verse form, and a dating formula in prose, beginning in the second half of the penultimate line. It is carved on four lintel blocks from the central west door of the church of Theodore, but facing the interior of the church (W. 3.55 m; H. of the inscribed field 0.30 m; letter height 0.05 m). The right-hand half of the lintel is weathered and scarcely legible. <br><br>As in the case of the previous inscription, the most often quoted edition is that by Charles B. Welles. The present stone, however, was first recorded somewhat later than the poem of Aineias. It was first published (only fragments B and D) in 1853 by August Böckh from a copy by Friedrich Dieterici, a German orientalist and Arabist who carried out extensive surveys of the region shortly before 1850. Consequently, the inscription appears in the Corpus Inscriptionum Graecarum and in the Epigrammata graeca ex lapidibus conlecta in an incomplete form. Fragment C was first published in 1885 by Claude Reignier Conder in the Palestine Exploration Fund Quarterly Statement, and fragment A in 1928 by A.H.M. Jones in the same journal. The newly recovered fragments proved that the hypothetical restorations suggested by scholars based on the incomplete text, were all incorrect. As for newer publications: the inscription features in the Steinepigramme aus dem griechischen Osten and Ἔρνος κύδιμον Παλαιστινῆς γαίης by Meimaris and Makrigianni.<br><br>A photograph of the left-hand fragment was published in 1926 by A.H.M. Jones, and a complete one in 1938, together with Welles' edition. A better photograph was taken in 1989 by Martin Spannagel and is published in the Epigraphic Database Heidelberg (F007990). <br><br>+ ἄχραντο[ς] δόμος εἰμὶ ἀεθλοφόρου Θεοδώρου, <br>μάρτυρος ἀθανάτου, θεοειδέος οὗ κλέος ἔπτη <br>ἐν χθονὶ κ(αὶ) πόντῳ | καὶ τέρμασιν Ὠκεανοῖο. <br>σῶμα γὰρ ἐν γαίῃ, ψυχὴ δ’ εἰς οὐρανὸν εὐρύν, <br>ἀγγελικῆς μετὰ πότμον ἀεὶ μετέχουσα χορείης. <br>ἕρκος | ἀλεξίκακ[ο]ν τελέθει κἀγήραον ἕρμα <br>ἄστει καὶ ναέτῃσι καὶ ἐσσομένοισι πολίταις. <br><br>+ χάριτι τοῦ θ(εο)ῦ ἐθεμελιώθη | τὸ ἅγιο[ν μα]ρτύριον μη(νὶ) Δίῳ τῆς v γʹ ἰνδ(ικτιῶνος) κ(αὶ) ἀνῆλθεν τὰ ὑπέ[ρ]θυρα ἐν μη(νὶ) Δίῳ τῆς εʹ [ἰν]δ(ικτιῶνος) τοῦ θνφʹ ἔτ(ους). <br><br>'I am the undefiled house of victorious Theodore, immortal and godlike martyr, whose fame has flown o'er land and sea and the bounds of ocean. For his body is in the earth, but his soul after his doom sped to the broad heaven, where it for ever joins in the angelic choirs and abides an unageing defence and barrier against ill for the town and the dwellers therein and its citizens yet to be. By the grace of God the foundation of the holy martyrion was laid in the month Dios, in the 3rd indiction and the lintel went up in the month of Dios in the 5th indiction in the year 559.'<br><br>Text: I. Gerasa, no. 300. Translation: A.H.M. Jones in Crowfoot 1929, 22.