Abstract
This article is the publication of an inscribed altar or pedestal coming from the ancient port of Fos-sur-Mer. After its discovery, probably in the late 1970s, in the Saint-Gervais cove (either in the so-called “ necropolis” area, or in the space taken up by the dredging works for the marina), it had been left in the Notre-Dame chapel in Fos. Since then, it has oddly remained unpublished. Despite the considerable degradations of the text due to water and lithophaga, the analysis of the inscription has allowed us to reestablish the dedication of a gift to the tutelary deity and ( ?) to the Genius of the negotiantes subaediani by a person who should have worked as a nauclerus corporatus. In this respect, this inscription can be considered as exceptional : why, in Fos, in the territory of the ancient colony of Arles, has one expressed oneself as nauclerus and not as nauicularius ? Did the naucleri and the nauicularii belong to the same corpus ? Insofar as the trading milieu of ancient Arles is still poorly understood, another equally remarkable characteristic concerns the identity of the dedicatees : this inscription is the first mention of an association of negotiantes subaediani in Arles. This benefaction is interpreted as a gift that emphasized and reinforced business relationships between two complementary professions.
Published Version
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