Details

LOT 0131

Roman Bronze Military Diploma For Cilix the Cilician

ISSUED 131 AD

4" (52 grams, 10.5cm).

A section of a military diploma, being the lower right half of the tabella I, reading: "[N]VBIVM CVM VXORIBVS QV[..] / [..]NT CVM EST CIVITAS IIS / CAELIBES ESSENT CVM IIS / [.]VXISSENT DVM TAXAI SIN' in four lines; to the other face, thirteen lines of similar script within incised borders 'ET CONVBIVM CVM / IABVISSENT CVM EST / VI.K. ††BR / RVFINO / TE.PONTIANO / [.] CILICE . [...]OIOPOLI[.] / [.]RI EIVS CILICI / [..] EIVS / VM EX TABVLA AENEA / M VROPO . ITEM / ΛVAM', part of a constitution issued on the 27th of January (ante diem VI kalendas Februarias) 131 AD, while M. Antonius Rufinus and Sergius Octavius Laenas Pontianus were consuls, the diploma was given to a Cilix, a Cilician; he had a wife and a son and was born in a town with name ending in "-polis", since there is no place for the name of the unit and the commander, it is highly possible it is a copy after a constitution issued for one of the praetorian fleets from Ravenna or Misenum; the tabella was thereafter cut for reuse, and new lines on the left margin were added.

Provenance

Property of a European gentleman living in London; acquired in the UK before 1980.

Footnotes

Cilicia was an early Roman province, located on what is today the southern Mediterranean coast of Turkey. Cilicia was annexed to the Roman Empire in 64 BC by Pompey.

CONDITION