Due rilievi greci da Catania e il commercio di opere d’arte nella Sicilia tardo-repubblicana

This paper deals with two Greek reliefs found in Catania, an Attic relief with Demeter and Kore (late fifth c. B.C.), and a funerary relief of the late second - early first c. B.C., from Delos or Asia Minor. The Attic relief carries a votive inscription in Dorian dialect, which is possible to date to the second c. B.C., and raises the possibility that it was bought by a Catanaean family to be reoffered in the local sanctuary of Demeter. Traces of erased letters, belonging to an older inscription, seem to confirm such a proposal. The intense relations between Catana, Athens, and Asia Minor in such a period are clearly hinted at by inscriptions found at Oropos and Smyrna, which celebrate Catanaean athletes. In a wider perspective, moreover, the two reliefs, along with several references in Cicero’s De signis and possibly the well known Mahdia shipwreck, strengthen the idea that Sicily played a first-rate role within the trade in works of art during the Late Republic.