DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.4680#0055
App. I. INSCRIPTIONS. 387
of the family to the tomb is not in keeping with the strict old Phrygian
feeling (p. 98), and indicates wider education and freer philosophic
thought: see also no. 231 (which has other traces of difference from the
common Phrygian type) and 380.
Gaius was a lawyer or attorney1, and a man of education (1. 2)2. On
his tomb he inscribes, during his lifetime, a remarkable epitaph in verse,
in which he records something about his own life and sentiments. He
allows his two friends admission to the same grave; and in the lost lines
5-7, he apparently mentioned that they had influenced his thought,' and
now, equal in franchise3 with these two, I, Gaius, as a pure, as a good
man, announce publicly.'' Then he proceeds to give on sides B and C
a statement of his principles, his education, his generosity to his friends
and to all men. The chief interest of this text lies in the question, what
are Gaius's principles. The term ayios, the designation of Roubes as
' servant of the great God,' the fine sentiment of 13-14, might suggest
that he was a Christian. But the general tone of 9 f£ is distinctly that
of Greek philosophy, and 19-20 in particular are of the Epicurean tone;
while 21-23 seem to be the beginning of a sneer at the idea of a Re-
surrection of the dead and the poor fanatics who cling to it4. M. Cumont
writes5 to me,' il me semble meme surprendre dans ce morceau une veritable
polemique contre les idees nouvclles qui se repandaient dans Ventourage du
defunt'; and I agree fully with his view, for in 9-22 the tone seems
pointedly adopted to vie with and surpass, as well as to contradict, the
Christian morality and its point of view.
The term /xeydAoio 8[eov] Oepdiraiv is taken by Dr. Zingerle in Philol.
1894 p. 345 as a proof of Christian origin; and M. Paris refused to admit
the restoration 0[eoC], because it would be a sign of Christianity. Dr.
Zingerle proceeds to state the view that in this tomb a Christian and
a pagan were buried together j and regards the whole as a proof of the
gentle and easy development of religion in Asia Minor, where Hellenism
lived on in Christian garb °. This view seems to me untenable in view
of the general character of the whole epitaph. As Dr. Zingerle recog-
1 A irpuyixariKos of the Gerousia at Waddington's note, Duchesne BCH
Magnesia Mae. (homme d'affaires, inten- 1879 p. 145, Le Blant II p. 406.
dant, gerant, MM. Cousin and Desehamps B I sent him the additional lines of
BCH 1888 pp. 207, 213). the inscr., which are the most decisive.
2 ypapixariKos, in one of my copies, is 6 Wo Hellenismus in christlichem Ge-
tempting. tcande in iceitem Umfange weiterkbte.
:l Holding the same sentiments. That this is true, I am quite agreed
4 References to Hades, and similar with Dr. Zingerle, and we shall see
mythological ideas, as in 23, are not in some examples of the influence of the
themselves inconsistentwith Christianity common philosophical tone in Christian
as expressed in verse, see LW2145 with inscr., no. 354.
D 2
of the family to the tomb is not in keeping with the strict old Phrygian
feeling (p. 98), and indicates wider education and freer philosophic
thought: see also no. 231 (which has other traces of difference from the
common Phrygian type) and 380.
Gaius was a lawyer or attorney1, and a man of education (1. 2)2. On
his tomb he inscribes, during his lifetime, a remarkable epitaph in verse,
in which he records something about his own life and sentiments. He
allows his two friends admission to the same grave; and in the lost lines
5-7, he apparently mentioned that they had influenced his thought,' and
now, equal in franchise3 with these two, I, Gaius, as a pure, as a good
man, announce publicly.'' Then he proceeds to give on sides B and C
a statement of his principles, his education, his generosity to his friends
and to all men. The chief interest of this text lies in the question, what
are Gaius's principles. The term ayios, the designation of Roubes as
' servant of the great God,' the fine sentiment of 13-14, might suggest
that he was a Christian. But the general tone of 9 f£ is distinctly that
of Greek philosophy, and 19-20 in particular are of the Epicurean tone;
while 21-23 seem to be the beginning of a sneer at the idea of a Re-
surrection of the dead and the poor fanatics who cling to it4. M. Cumont
writes5 to me,' il me semble meme surprendre dans ce morceau une veritable
polemique contre les idees nouvclles qui se repandaient dans Ventourage du
defunt'; and I agree fully with his view, for in 9-22 the tone seems
pointedly adopted to vie with and surpass, as well as to contradict, the
Christian morality and its point of view.
The term /xeydAoio 8[eov] Oepdiraiv is taken by Dr. Zingerle in Philol.
1894 p. 345 as a proof of Christian origin; and M. Paris refused to admit
the restoration 0[eoC], because it would be a sign of Christianity. Dr.
Zingerle proceeds to state the view that in this tomb a Christian and
a pagan were buried together j and regards the whole as a proof of the
gentle and easy development of religion in Asia Minor, where Hellenism
lived on in Christian garb °. This view seems to me untenable in view
of the general character of the whole epitaph. As Dr. Zingerle recog-
1 A irpuyixariKos of the Gerousia at Waddington's note, Duchesne BCH
Magnesia Mae. (homme d'affaires, inten- 1879 p. 145, Le Blant II p. 406.
dant, gerant, MM. Cousin and Desehamps B I sent him the additional lines of
BCH 1888 pp. 207, 213). the inscr., which are the most decisive.
2 ypapixariKos, in one of my copies, is 6 Wo Hellenismus in christlichem Ge-
tempting. tcande in iceitem Umfange weiterkbte.
:l Holding the same sentiments. That this is true, I am quite agreed
4 References to Hades, and similar with Dr. Zingerle, and we shall see
mythological ideas, as in 23, are not in some examples of the influence of the
themselves inconsistentwith Christianity common philosophical tone in Christian
as expressed in verse, see LW2145 with inscr., no. 354.
D 2