EPITAPH OF OPSIUS SEVERUS, ROME (?) Alison E. Cooley AEC/ASHL ANChandler.3.46.xml Oxford Ashmolean Museum ANChandler.3.46 AshLI 45

A plain stele of white marble (0.311 0.205 0.04). The rear surface has been smoothed. It currently consists of four conjoining fragments, in a modern mount, with some damage around the edges. There is a small hole in the top surface.

The text is roughly centred on each line. There are interpuncts in lines 1-2.

0.029 (line 1); 0.025 (line 2); 0.025 (lines 3-7); 0.024 (line 8). It is of unknown provenance, but probably originates from Rome. possibly second century AD (use of DM formula and tria nomina). It was first recorded in Oxford by Prideaux as part of the Arundel Collection, which was given to the University of Oxford by Henry Howard, Earl of Arundel, in 1667 (Prideaux 1676). The Arundel marbles were first displayed in the ‘Garden of Antiquities’ outside the new Sheldonian Theatre from 1668/9 (Sturdy and Moorcraft 1999). The inscriptions were subsequently transferred indoors in 1715 to ‘The Marble School’, an upper gallery in the Bodleian Quadrangle. In 1749, they were transferred downstairs to the ground floor in the former School of Moral Philosophy, and at some point then ended up in the basement of the (Old) Ashmolean Museum on Broad Street (now the Museum of the History of Science) (Munby 2013). The Ashmolean Museum in its current location was built behind the University Galleries, was opened in 1894, and finally the University Galleries and Ashmolean were amalgamated by statute in 1908. It is currently in a storeroom. Photograph
dis manibus Publio Opsio Severo fecit Arria Marcellina coniugi optimo

To the spirits of the dead. To Publius Opsius Severus. Arria Marcellina set this up for her excellent husband.

This is a fairly conventional commemoration of a husband by his wife.

Prideaux (1676) p.105, no.45; Maittaire (1732) p.38, no.78; Chandler (1763) p.134, no.46; CIL VI.3 no.23540 [Hübner] (1886).

Online: EDCS-13300734 [accessed 10/12/14].

Chandler R. 1763 Marmora Oxoniensia Oxford Clarendon Press Maittaire M. 1732, 2nd edn. Marmorum, Arundellianorum, Seldenianorum, Aliorumque Academiae Oxoniensi Donatorum London William Bowyer Munby J. 2013 A rare collection: Oxford museums past and present Excalibur: Essays on Antiquity and the History of Collecting in Honour of Arthur MacGregor H. Wiegel and M. Vickers Oxford BAR Int. ser. 2512 75-85 Prideaux H. 1676 Marmora Oxoniensia ex Arundellianis, Seldenianis aliisque conflata Oxford Sturdy D. and N. Moorcraft 1999 Christopher Wren and Oxford’s garden of antiquities Minvera 10.1 25-28