A SLAVE’S EPITAPH, ROME(?) Alison E. Cooley AEC/ASHL ANChandler.3.65.xml Oxford Ashmolean Museum ANChandler.3.65 AshLI 64

A stele of white marble (0.56 0.375 0.068) (in a modern mount). The stele contains a relief portrait and inscription within a moulded frame. The top half of the stele (much of which is missing) contains a bust of an individual who may represent the deceased (the facial features are completely missing), which is flanked on either side by a stylised tree (or perhaps branch), whilst a bird is sculpted across the moulding on the right. The left side is missing, so it is not possible to know if another bird formed a symmetrical design opposite it. The top right edge appears to preserve partially a palmette decoration. The rear and sides remain rough. The front surface of the stele is very irregular.

The inscription is inscribed upon the lower part of the stele, beneath the bust, within the moulded frame. There are triangular interpuncts. The engraving of the inscription is variable in quality, although some care has been paid to centring the text on each line, with the letters varying in height and not always being engraved in a straight line, especially in line 5. The letters AS at the end of line 4 are squeezed in together, almost in ligature.

 0.028 (line 1); 0.025 (line 2); 0.023 first letter M, then 0.02 (line 3); 0.02 (lines 4-6); line 5 letters of variable height It probably originated from Rome possibly second or third century AD (DM formula) (Solin 1996: vol. 1 p.80). The epitaph belongs to the Arundel Collection, given to the University of Oxford by Henry Howard, Earl of Arundel, in 1667 (Prideaux 1676). It probably originated from Rome. The Arundel marbles were first displayed in the ‘Garden of Antiquities’ outside the new Sheldonian Theatre from 1668/9 (Sturdy and Moorcraft 1999), and 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. The inscription is currently in a storeroom. Photograph Photograph Photograph: detail
dis manibus Pudentis vixit annis VI menisbus III Iulia Corintias vernae dulcissimae fecit

To the departed spirits of Pudens, who lived for 6 years and 3 months. Iulia Corintias set this up to her sweetest household slave.

IVLIA ACORINTIAS (Prideaux, Maittaire) DVLCISSIMAE (Prideaux, Maittaire)

The decorativeness of this monument, complete with portrait bust, suggests the great affection that could sometimes exist between slave-owner and slave. The term verna is usually interpreted as referring to a slave who was born and brought up within a household (Herrmann-Otto 1994). Such slaves often appear to have been favoured by their owners (see also C3-90 and C3-122).

Prideaux (1676) p.127, no.72; Maittaire (1732) p.39, no.88; Chandler (1763) p.136, no.65; CIL VI.4 fasc.2 no.25203 [Hübner] (1894)

Online: EDCS-13801455 [accessed 12/08/15]

ChandlerR. 1763 Marmora Oxoniensia Oxford Clarendon Press Herrmann-Otto E. 1994 Ex Ancilla Natus Stuttgart Franz Steiner 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 Solin H. 1996 Die stadtrömischen Sklavennamen Stuttgart Steiner Sturdy D. and N. Moorcraft 1999 Christopher Wren and Oxford’s garden of antiquities Minvera 10.1 25-28