base;
votive offering
- Museum number
- 1896,0201.215
- Description
-
Statuette base of fine quality imported marble with a bi-graphic inscription in alphabetic Greek and Cypro-Syllabic; rectangular block, in two closely joining fragments, with Classical Greek mouldings on cap and base on three sides, the fourth side is broken away; on top of the base is a roughly cut oval depression for the figure, within which is a small rectangular cutting to take a grip; the scripts are carved in shallow but carefully incised characters: the alphabetic inscription is arranged retrograde in two lines on the intact long side; below are twenty-eight characters in Cypro-syllabic text, words separated by simple dots, occupying a single line, running sinistrograde; some chips from the edges of the mouldings and corners, while the back of the base is missing; currently mounted on a modern marble plinth.
- Production date
- 350BC-300BC
- Dimensions
-
Height: 7 centimetres
-
Length: 28 centimetres (max)
-
Width: 16.50 centimetres (surviving)
- $Inscriptions
-
- Curator's comments
- See also Mitford 1971, 62-4, cat. no. 26. The marble head of 'Knidian' Aphrodite (1972, found with the inscription is fully published in Higgs and Kiely 2009, 415-19 and fig. 3. It is unclear if this is from a cult image related or a worshipper but is presumably related to the cult of a female divinity.
Bibliography:
Higgs P. and Kiely T. 2009, 'Four unpublished marble sculptures of Hellenistic date from Cyprus', CCEC 39, 403-424.
Mitford T.B. 1971, The inscriptions of Kourion (Philadelphia 1971).
- Location
- On display (G72/dc2)
- Acquisition date
- 1896
- Department
- Greek and Roman
- Registration number
- 1896,0201.215