Epitaph for Tychemos Jonathan Prag Jonathan Prag John Fell OUP Research Fund ERC Advanced Grant no.885040 Jonathan Prag original data collection and editing Marta Fogagnolo editing, translation and commentary James Cummings conversion to EpiDoc James Chartrand site construction and encoding Valeria Vitale editing of geo data Michael Metcalfe museum data collection Alex Antoniou EpiDoc editing and English translation Simona Stoyanova standardisation of template and tidying up encoding system automated or batch processes I.Sicily ISic001370 492983 39101750 140875 316280 http://sicily.classics.ox.ac.uk/inscription/ISic001370 10.5281/zenodo.4353561 Licensed under a Creative Commons-Attribution 4.0 licence. Italy Sicily Catania Museo Civico di Catania 271 Ancient Greek

Marble plaque with rounded corners, set in plaster in modern times.

marble plaque 18.5 21 1-5 chiselled Rubrication

Lunate Ε (oft confused with Σ) and Σ, cursive Μ and Ω, A with straight bar (l. 1) and broken bar (l. 5). A vertical stroke divides ἔτη from the numeral. Presence of guide-lines, a Christogram and a cross.

Lines 1-9 10-20 Interlineation line 1 to 2 not recorded Catina Catania 37.49223, 15.07041 4th century CE Found in 1720 (1724 according to Muratori) “ante aream coenobii S. Mariae Annunciatae”. Observed by Amico in Museo San Nicolò l’Arena, later by Korhonen in Magazzino del Cortile, Collezione dei Benedettini (formerly sala VI 79). None

Encoded following the latest EpiDoc guidelines

Taxonomies for ISicily controlled values

ISicily glyphs authority list

Julian Calendar

 English Italian Ancient Greek Latin Hebrew Phoenician Punic Oscan Elymian Sikel Sikan funerary James Cummings autogenerated EpiDoc output from database Alex Antoniou Epidoc editing and English translation Simona Stoyanova normalised Unicode Simona Stoyanova updated list of languages Simona Stoyanova added EDCS numbers Simona Stoyanova restructured bibliography Updated Zenodo DOI renumbered files, uris and references Marta Fogagnolo revised the text encoding, added dimensions, translations and commentary I.Sicily with the permission of the Assessorato Regionale dei Beni Culturali e dell’Identità Siciliana - Dipartimento dei Beni Culturali e dell’Identità Siciliana I.Sicily with the permission of the Assessorato Regionale dei Beni Culturali e dell’Identità Siciliana - Dipartimento dei Beni Culturali e dell’Identità Siciliana
Ἐτελεύτησεν Τύχημος τῇ πρ ὸ δεκαπέντε καλανδῶν Ἰενουαρίων ζήσας ἒτη π καλὸν βίον ζήσας ἠγόρασεν ἑαυτῷ καὶ τοῖς ἠδίοις ☧ +
Text based on photograph lapis: Τύχημος (i.e. Τύχιμος); Ferrua: Εὐτυχήμος (i.e. Εὐθυδήμος); Amico: Τύχηλλος Kirchhoff: Ἰ[α]νυαρίων; Kaibel, Wessel, Korhonen: Ἰενυαρίων Wessel and Korhonen read two Christograms

Tychemos died 15 days before the Kalends of January, having lived 80 years. Having lived a good life, he purchased this (tomb) for him and his relatives.

Tychemos è morto 15 giorni prima delle Calende di gennaio, avendo vissuto 80 anni. Avendo vissuto una bella vita, acquistò questo (sepolcro) per lui e i suoi.

This Christian epitaph does not present the ἐνθάδε κεῖται formula, but directly the date of death expressed by the aorist of τελευτάω and the age of the deceased with the participle ζήσας. This is followed by the indication of the purchase of the tomb (with the aorist of ἀγοράζω) by the deceased, for him and his descendants (ἠδίοις is an hypercorrection): for the reference to the descendants in pagan and Christian epitaphs in Catania, see IG 14.563 = ISic001382, SEG XVII 440 = ISic001628. On καλὸν βίον ζήσας/βιώσας, see also IGUR 2.626. The name of the deceased, Τύχημος (probably Τύχιμος), is not otherwise attested; Ferrua’s reading is palaeographically improbable (furthermore, Εὐτύχημος is not attested in imperial age, see BCH 45 (1921) p. 19 III, 101 from Kythera, 3rd cent. BCE), as well as Leclercq’s reading Τύχηλλος.

Note that the text has been badly overpainted in early modern times, leading to several misleading letter forms (e.g. initial epsilon as sigma)

Amico 1741 269 no.13 https://biblio.inscriptiones.org/epig10002186 Ferrara 1829 371 nο. 2 https://biblio.inscriptiones.org/epig10002005 14.0551 https://biblio.inscriptiones.org/epig10001072 200 https://biblio.inscriptiones.org/epig10000028 4.9485 https://biblio.inscriptiones.org/epig10001252 853 https://biblio.inscriptiones.org/epig10000394 Ferrua 1938 69 https://biblio.inscriptiones.org/epig10002004 Ferrua 1989 117 no.445 https://biblio.inscriptiones.org/epig10001995