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An Epigram on Apollonius of Tyana1

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 October 2013

C. P. Jones
C. P. Jones
Affiliation:
University of Toronto
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Extract

An inscription of major importance, now in the New Museum of Adana, contains an epigram on Apollonius of Tyana. Almost simultaneously, a preliminary text has been provided by E. L. Bowie, and a full publication with discussion and photograph by G. Dagron and J. Marcillet- Jaubert. I offer here a text, translation, and commentary, and look for a historical and cultural setting.

The inscription is cut on a single large block, now damaged on the left, which originally served as an architrave or lintel. The photograph (PLATE Ib) makes detailed comment on the palaeography superfluous: but it is worth noting the sign of punctuation (:) after ἐπώνυμος and of elision (∾) after τὸ δ᾿; the leaf filling the vacant space at the end of line 4; and generally the very affected script, notably the rho shaped like a shepherd's crook, the complicated xi and the lyre-shaped omega. This strange lettering makes it more than usually hazardous to date the inscription from this feature alone. A date in the third or fourth century seems roughly right, and would accord with the content of the epigram.

Type
Notes
Information
The Journal of Hellenic Studies , Volume 100 , 1980 , pp. 190 - 194
Copyright
Copyright © The Society for the Promotion of Hellenic Studies 1980

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References

2 Bowie, E. L. in Aufstieg und Niedergang der röm. Welt xvi 2 (Berlin/New York 1978) 1687–8Google Scholar (henceforth ‘Bowie’); Dagron, G. and Marcillet-Jaubert, J., Türk Tarih Kurumu Belleten xlii (1978) 402–5Google Scholar (henceforth ‘Dagron-Jaubert’).

3 For the critical and punctuation marks used in inscriptions see W., Larfeld, Griechische Epigraphik 3 (Munich 1914) 301–5Google Scholar, M., Guarducci, Epigrafia Greca i (Rome 1967) 391–7Google Scholar. The same omega in IG x 2.1 551 (Thessalonica), which C. Edson dates ‘ante med. s. iv p.’.

4 Dagron-Jaubert (405) incline to a date after 217 (the terminus post quern of Philostratus' Life, cf. VA i 3) and before ‘la christianisation de l'empire’. If by the latter they mean the reign of Constantine, this is surely too early.

5 Bowie 1688, Dagron-Jaubert 404. The latter report that other stones in the Adana Museum are precisely from Aegaeae/Ayas.

6 Philostr. VA i 3, 7–12. On Aegaeae, Robert, , JSav 1973Google Scholar 170–211, esp. 184–204 on the Asklepieion and Apollonius' stay there. On Maximus, Bowie 1684–5.

7 VA i 7; vi 34,43.

8 Robert, in L'éepigramme grecque, Entr. Hardt xiv (Geneva 1968) 206–7Google Scholar.

9 Thus Bowie 1688, Dagron-Jaubert 404.

10 IG X 2.1 541; the words βραβεῖα and πόνων show that he was an athlete, though Edson ad loc. prefers to consider him a gladiator. Another heavy athlete was surnamed ‘Camel’, Robert (n. 8) 199–201.

11 GVI 1934; on the provenance, Robert, , Gnomon xli (1959) 19Google Scholar (Op. min. iii 1658).

12 A full edition now in Bernand, A., Inscriptions métriques de ľÉgypte gréco-romaine, Ann. litt, de l'Univ. de Besançon xcviii (Paris 1969) no. 26CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Bernand misses the sense of ἐπώνυμος, and assumes that the man was called ‘Pallas.’

13 Coins of Tyana invariably show Τυανέων before the gift of colonial status in 212/13, κολωνίας Τυάνων thereafter. Ruge, , RE xiv (1943)Google Scholar 1640, rightly reads Τυάνων in place of Τυανῶν in an epigram published by Jacopi, G. (GVI 381Google Scholar follows jacopi).

14 Generally, LSJ s.v. ϕάος II, OLD s.v. lumen 6 d, s.v. lux 11 b. Lucr. iii 1 ff., ‘e tenebris tantis tarn clarum extollere lumen / qui primus potuisti, inlustrans commoda vitae,…’.

15 AP ix 178=Gow-Page, The Garland of Philip, Antiphilus vi. For the attribution to Nero, Gow-Page ad loc., cf. Jones, C. P., The Roman World of Dio Chrysostom (Cambridge Mass. 1978) 27–8CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

16 Kittel-Friedrich-Bromiley, Theol. Dict. s.v. σβεννύναι A 2; LSJ s.v. κατασβέννυμι; TLL s.v. exstinguo, v. 2 1920, 3 ff., esp. 25–6 (Christian).

17 Thus, rightly, Dagron-Jaubert 403.

18 Dagron-Jaubert (402–3) tentatively suggest [εἴ γε (or καὶ τὸ) βρέ]ϕος, ‘s'il est vrai qu'il fut un authentique enfant de Tyane’. But βρέϕος is a baby, born or unborn, and does not seem to be used metaphorically of a ‘child.’

19 According to the scholiast, this whole line is taken from Euripides' Aeolus, with the exception of the last three words which were οὐχ ἔχω εἰπεῖν (fr. 19 Nauck). Aristophanes has therefore slightly altered the syntax, but not in a way that affects the present point.

20 Lattimore, R., Themes in Greek and Latin Epitaphs (Urbana III. 1942) 28Google Scholar, 34, 313—14. E.g., GVI 861, 1112, 1765, 1775, 1777, 1939, 1971, 1978, 1993.

21 GVI 2040. 7–8. For similar ideas, GVI 1282. 5–6, 1829. 7–8.

22 Nock, A. D., MélU St Joseph Beyrouth xxxvii (1961) 297–308Google Scholar (Essays ii 919 –27). Cf. Peterson, E., RömQuartals xlii (1934) 172–6Google Scholar. For δέχεοθαι similarly used in funerary epigrams, GVI 1774, 1996.

23 GVI 2040. 17–20. For similar assertions of the unreality of death, GVI 1282, MAMA viii 487; cf. Lattimore (n. 20) 40, 49–51.

24 Bowie 1688 and n. 141. I agree with him that οὐδέ is not to be considered. As the third word, Bowie prints Τυανῶν, but for reasons already given Τυάνων is to be preferred.

25 This phrase is both directly quoted by Philostratus (VS i 22, p. 526), and also adapted by him (τάϕος μὲν αὺτῷ Λυκία λέγεται, VS ii 26, p. 615).

26 In the following examples from GVI, those marked by an asterisk show σῶμα as the first word of a line: 1112, 1146, 1753, 1755. *1756, *1758, *1759, 1763, *1766, *1768, 1770, 1772, *1773, *1774, *1776, 1777, 1978. 1996, *2040.

27 GVI 1996. 1–4. Similarly with δέκτο, GVI 1774; with ἔχει, GVI 1755, 1764, SEG xvii 172; with ἀπέδωκεν, GVI 1169.

28 A series of examples in Wilhelm, A., Nachr. Gesell. Wiss. Göttingen 1939, iii 141–2, 149Google Scholar (Akademieschriften iii 73–4. 81).

29 Similarly, GVI 861, 1765, 1971.

30 LSJ s.v. ἐξελαύνω I 4; TLL s.v. expello v 2, 1635, 34 ff., 78 ff.

31 Stephanus, s.v. 1473 C-D, LSJ s.v. ii 2. Thus Dagron-Jaubert 403.

32 Polemo: above, p. 193. Dio's mother: Or. xliv 3. For a senator receiving divine honours at Herculaneum in the first century A.D., Schumacher, L., Chiron vi (1976) 165–84Google Scholar. Cf. also Acts xiv 11–13 (Paul and Barnabas at Lystra).

33 It is not clear whether this refers to imperial envy, such as brought down the descendants of Theophanes of Mytilene (Tac. Arm. vi 18. 2) or to the general dislike that was regularly thought to attend excessive honour. Philostratus' language does not seem to suit divine envy.

34 Lact. div. inst. v 3. 14–15. On this difficult passage, Bowie 1687 Ephesus was one of the cities in which Apollonius was supposed to have died (Philostr., VA viii 30)Google Scholar: this suggests that it claimed to have his tomb.

35 Caracalla: inferred from the combination of Philostr. VA i 5, viii 31, and Cass. Dio lxxvii 18. 4, cf. Bowie 1688. However, Philostratus seems to think that Apollonius had been worshipped at Tyana long since: the locals regarded him as a son of Zeus, (VA i 5–6)Google Scholar, and prayers could be addressed to him (VA viii 31).

36 In his last sentence, Philostratus talks of‘sanctuaries’ built by ‘kings’ (VA viii 31); the plural is usually thought to be used for the singular (I unfortunately translated ‘a shrine’ in the Penguin edn [1970]), but may rather suggest that Caracalla had been anticipated by another emperor.

37 Generally, de Labriolle, P., La réaction païenne (Paris 1934)Google Scholar esp. 311–14, and now Petzke, G., Die Traditionen über Apollonius von Tyana und das Neue Testament (Leiden 1970) 5–10Google Scholar.

38 Porph. adv. Chr. (Harnack, A., ADAW Berlin 1916 i)Google Scholar nos 4. 60, 63. However, the attribution of 60 and 63 to Porphyry is not quite certain.

39 Scott, W. and Ferguson, A. S., Hermetica iv (Oxford 1936) 227–9Google Scholar; Erbse, H., Fragmente griechischer Theosophien, Hamb. Arb. zur Altertumswiss. iv (Hamburg 1941) 177Google Scholar sect. 44. Μαζακέων probably replaces the expected Καππαδόκων because of the undesirable connotations of ‘Cappadocian’: cf. Robert, , Op. min. iv 392–3Google Scholar. For the rare form Τυήνη, Georg. Cypr. 1380 ed. Gelzer, le Quien, M., Oriens Christianus i (Paris 1740) 399Google Scholar sect. xii (Ruge, RE xiv [1940] 1632).

40 On the date. Nock, , REA xxx (1928) 285Google Scholar (Essays i 164). For fragment of Porphyry in the Tübingen Theosophy, Nock, ibid. 280–7 (Essays i 160–6); Robert, , CRAI 1968 584, 590, 1971 604Google Scholar. Another oracle in the same collection (Erbse [n. 39] 176 sect. 37), also recorded by Lactantius and ascribed to Didyma, (div. inst. vii 13. 4–5)Google Scholar, closely resembles the oracular statement of Apollonius in VA viii 31: cf. Wolff, G., Porphyrii de philosophia ex oraculis haurienda (Berlin 1856) 92–3Google Scholar, 178, and (on the Didymean origin) Robert, , CRAI 1968 590Google Scholar.

41 Eus. Hierocl. 2 (Migne, PG xxii 800Google Scholar B; Philostr. VA, Loeb edn ii 488). On Hierocles' work generally, Labriolle (n. 37) 306–14; on his career, Barnes, T. D., HSCP lxxx (1976) 239–52Google Scholar.

42 Lact., Div. Inst. v 3.14Google Scholar (see above).

43 It is to this point that Eusebius' reply is mainly directed.

44 VS 2.1.4 (Loeb p. 346); the reference is presumably to VA i 9.

45 VS 23.1.8 (Loeb p. 542).

46 Sid. ep. viii 3.1. On the problems of this passage, Schwartz, J., Bonn. Hist.-Aug. Coll. 1975/1976 (Bonn 1978) 191–3Google Scholar.

47 Alföldi, A., Die Kontorniaten (Budapest 1943) 74–6Google Scholar; cf. now A. and Alföldi, E., Die Koutortniat-Medaillons i (Berlin 1976) 32Google Scholar.

48 HA Alex. 29.2. On this passage see now Schwartz (n. 46) 187–190.

49 For an imitation of Caracalla by Alexander in Tarsus, Ziegler, R., JfNG xxvii (1977) 40–2Google Scholar.

50 Syme, R., Ammianus and the Historia Augusta (Oxford 1968) 138Google Scholar.

51 Cf. Hierocles quoted by Eusebius, θεοῖς κεχαρισμένον ἂνδρα (above, n. 41).

52 Compare the portraits of the aged Apollonius in the sanctuary at Tyana, Philostr. VA viii 29.

53 Hartke, W., Klio Beih. xlv (1940) 18–19Google Scholar, 33–4, 37, cf. Syme (n. 50) 111.

54 Compare the not dissimilar Neoplatonic inscription GVI 1283. with the discussion of Boyancé, P., Le culte des Muses (Paris 1937) 284–91Google Scholar (Bull. 1938 574); I plan to argue elsewhere that the inscription published by Ramsay, W. M., CR xxxiii (1919) 2Google Scholar, is Neoplatonic and not Christian as usually assumed. Cf. also MAMA viii 487, with Robert's, discussion, Hellenica xiii (1965) 170–1Google Scholar.