Evidence ID
E00790Saint Name
George, martyr in Nicomedia or Diospolis, ob. c. 303 : S00259Type of Evidence
Inscriptions - GraffitiEvidence not before
400Evidence not after
600Activity not before
400Activity not after
600Place of Evidence - Region
Asia MinorPlace of Evidence - City, village, etc
EphesusPlace of evidence - City name in other Language(s)
Ephesus
Nicomedia
Νικομήδεια
Nikomēdeia
Izmit
Πραίνετος
Prainetos
NicomediaCult activities - Non Liturgical Practices and Customs
Prayer/supplication/invocationCult Activities - Protagonists in Cult and Narratives
Other lay individuals/ people
CrowdsSource
Graffito scratched on the statue base edited in I. Ephesos 526, found in Ephesos (western Asia Minor), on the Embolos street.Discussion
The graffito offers us an invocation of the God of the martyr *George. He is asked to support one of the factions, presumably a circus faction (literally 'to rouse their spirits'). This kind of invocation cannot be dated with any certainty, but must be late antique since provincial circus factions disappear in the seventh century. There is a very similar inscription, this time invoking the God of the *Archangels, from the area of Kibyra in Caria, western Asia Minor (see E00844). Alan Cameron argues, unconvincingly, for a dating of this second inscription to the reign of Phocas (602-610).Bibliography
Edition:
Roueché, Ch., "Interpreting the signs: anonymity and concealment in Late Antique inscriptions", in: H. Amirav, B. ter Haar Romeny (eds.), From Rome to Constantinople. Studies in Honour of Averil Cameron (Leuven; Dudley, MA: Peeters, 2007), 221-234.
Reference works:
Bulletin épigraphique (2009), 619.
Supplementum Epigraphicum Graecum 57, 1119; 58, 1330.
For similar invocations see:
Cameron, Al., Circus Factions. Blues and Greens at Rome and Byzantium (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1976), 2, 148-149.
