Il monumento di Iasos per i basileis di Caria

Abstract

The monument from Iasos for the basileis of Caria. This paper presents the formal publication of the two remaining inscribed blocks belonging to the rectilinear base of a bronze dynastic group from Iasos. The monument has been already presented and discussed in other seats. Of the two blocks, one is preserved in Iasos, the other in Istanbul. As for the first, it was brought to light by the Italian Archaeological Expedition in Iasos in 2005. It had been reused during the imperial age in a room of the West stoa of the agora. On the front is a fourth-century BC epigram honouring the basileis, the satrap Idrieus and another member of the Hecatomnid family, whose name had been erased. The second block lies in the garden of the Istanbul Archaeological Museums, where many inscriptions from Iasos were brought to in 1887. It is the last on the right of a multipiece base, and a fourth-century inscription Αβα Υσσαλδωμου is carved on its front. The Museum inventory registers the block as ‘of unknown provenance’ (Istanbul inv. 3274), and as such it was published by L. Robert in Sinuri. He rightly recognized in Aba an otherwise unknown sister of Hekatomnos, the father of Maussollus and of the other satraps of the dynasty. Robert did not mention another inscription on the very damaged right short side of the stone, an honorary inscription for a well-known athlete from Iasos, Ti. Flavius Metrobios, who won the dolichos in the first Capitoline Games (86 AD). The stone in Istanbul comes therefore from Iasos. The size, mouldings, and other details of the two blocks show that they originally belonged to the same large monument in honour of the Hecatomnids. The paper consists of two parts. N. Masturzo illustrates, for the first time in detail, its monumental features. Different possible restitutions of the monument, as a four or as a six statues group, are proposed. M. Nafissi revises his previous reading of the epigram carved on the block in Iasos and offers an overview of the historical significance of the epigram and monument. The epigram is the first known contemporary document in Caria to call the Hecatomnids basileis. Its wording seems to imply that the monument was placed in a cultic context. Aba’s presence on the monument strongly suggests that Hecatomnos married his own sister, as Maussollus and Idrieus did later. nmasturz@unito.it, massimo.nafissi@unipg.it