The graffito is engraved along the lower edge of a rock surface facing the large plateau
of the Karneia, approximately midway across it, at the point where the rock ends and
the walking surface begins.
Layout
The graffito is retrograde and is engraved horizontally on the rock surface.
Execution: chiselled.
Palaeography
Letters of the archaic alphabet of Thera: Alpha: Regular strokes with an oblique crossbar.
Koppa: Does not feature the elongated internal stroke within the bowl. Iota: Smaller
in size compared to the other letters. Rho: Circular bowl. San: Used for sibilant
sound.
Provenance and Discovery
Place:Archaía Thíra (36.36349, 25.47804)
Date:End of the 7th - beginning of the 6th century BCE
Findspot:«inter Carnei templum et gymnasium»; the editor read the inscriptions again in 1899,
cf. Suppl. p. 291
Coordinates:36.36189, 25.48095
Last recorded location: in situ; Last seen by A. Inglese in 2006 in situ
Edition
Ϙορας̣
Apparatus
Hiller: ϙόρας sive ϙο[ύ]ρας
Commentary
The graffito is written retrograde and located horizontally along the lower edge of
a rock surface that faces the wide Karneia terrace.
It sits roughly midway across the surface where the rock starts to level out. This
part of the rocky outcrop has yielded other archaic graffiti bearing
divine names.
The inscription is approximately 85 cm away from another graffito (n. 582), and although
it remains partly undecipherable, some of the letters are legible,
particularly through rubbing impressions. Legible letters include koppa (noted for
lacking the typical elongated internal stroke within the bowl); iota,
lambda, and san, all within a rectangular frame on the surface of the rock. The upper
edge of the rectangular frame is about 33 cm long, with a 7 cm
vertical line on its right side.
In IG XII 3.371, Hiller’s reading was ϙορής, but in Suppl. 1311 the editor corrected
it to ϙόρας; the letters are confirmed by Inglese's 2006 autopsy.
It should be noted, however, that from the point of view of letter forms, according
to Hiller’s reading, the koppa has the elongated vertical stroke within the bowl,
which for Arena is an indication of greater archaism compared to the koppa without
elongation. In reality, the koppa, as noted, appears to lack the elongation.
Lazzarini highlights that this theonym, together with the mention of Athena in inscription
no. 364 (Ἀθαναίας), is one of the earliest attestations in rock
inscriptions of divine names in the genitive. Dobias-Lalou (2000, p. 227) seems to
believe that the word refers to the same divinity as in inscriptions nos. 350 (d), 354, 355.
As there are no other elements for deciding between the two hypotheses, the accent
mark has not been added.
No other Archaic documents with the form φόρας are attested in Thera.
Funder: CHANGES - Theme 5. Humanities and Cultural Heritage as Laboratories of Innovation
and Creativity, funded by the European Union – NextGenerationEU, Associazione Centro
di Eccellenza DTC
Alessandra Inglese: original data collection and edition
Valentina Mignosa: encoding, editing metadata and geo data, website content creation, HTML transformation,
website design and styling, interactive mapping implementation
Marika Griffo: rubbings digitisation
Simone Lucchetti: rubbings digitisation
Luigi Tessarolo: website construction, design and styling, interactive mapping implementation
Virgilio Costa: methodological and digital consultancy
