Latin inscriptions [in Arabia]

So far, twenty-two inscribed documents written in Latin have been discovered in the Arabian Peninsula, all in western areas. Most of them come from north-western Arabia, mainly ancient Hegra, while a small percentage of them come from south-western Arabia, mainly from Farasān al-kubra Island. All of them are linked to the activities of the Roman army there in the 2nd century and the first decades of the 3rd century CE.

In the East, Greek was the main language of the Roman Empire, while Latin was only the official language of the administration and the army. Thus, Greek inscriptions are generally much more frequent than Latin inscriptions. The great majority of the Arabian Peninsula never came under Roman rule. The only regions which came under Roman rule were: the Wādī Sirḥān and at least part of the Jawf of northern Arabia (including in any case Dūmat al-Jandal), the Ḥismah and the Northern Ḥijāz in the second and part of the third centuries CE, and at least some islands of the Red Sea, even quite far south, in the second century. There, the inscriptions are in Latin, due to Roman military presence (see Rome [and Arabia]). Almost all of them were discovered in the first two decades of the 21st century. Greek inscriptions are present, but are much less frequent than in the Levant in the Roman and subsequent periods, and are more scattered throughout the Peninsula, especially in the islands of the Gulf, where Greek was used for inscriptions as early as the Seleucid period.

Yemen

The only Latin text found outside Roman-managed territories is a fragment of a bilingual Greek and Latin inscription discovered in the 1970s in Barāqish, in Yemen (Costa 1977). It mentions only, “Publius Cornelius ... /eques m...”, cavalryman or member of the Roman equestrian order, although it was suggested that eques does not mean cavalryman but is a personal name, a cognomen (Demougin 1980). It could be a funerary stele, associated with the Roman expedition in 25 BCE (see Aelius Gallus) to south-western Arabia, which ended at Maʾrib, south of Barāqish.

Farasān archipelago

Also in south-western Arabia, but in the Red Sea, on the main island of the Farasān archipelago, two military inscriptions, one complete and one fragmentary, were discovered by the local poet and professor I. Miftaḥ in the 2000s (Villeneuve 2004, 2006, 2007, 2008; Bukharin 2006; Speidel 2007). The complete one (Fig. 1) is a dedication, inscribed in 144 CE under Antoninus Pius, of a probable fort by the men of a detachment of troops of the 2nd legion Traiana Fortis (based near Alexandria, in Roman Egypt), under the authority of a prefect of the port of Ferresan (Farasān) and of Pontus Herculis, Sea of Hercules, a probable name for the Southern Red Sea. The fragmentary one seems to indicate the presence of other troops, from the 6th legion Ferrata, and a connection with the Roman province of Arabia. The 2022 season of excavations by a Saudi-French team (dir. S. Marion de Procé & M. al-Mālkī) of the Roman fort in Quṣār, on the island, produced additional evidence: a small fragmentary altar with an ex-voto by a member of the 5th cohort, probably of the 6th Ferrata, and a potsherd with a few Latin letters incised before firing. The evidence from Farasān is unequivocal: at least part of the Southern Red Sea was Roman for at least a few decades of the 2nd century CE.

Northwest Arabia

Ḥismah

In the Ḥismah, to the extreme northwest of the Peninsula, the multiperiod site of al-Badʿ, yielded a fragment — only a few letters — of a Latin monumental dedication to one or two or several emperors (Parr et al. 1972: pl. 17; reading in Villeneuve 2021), when it was explored in the 1960s. This suggested a Roman military presence, which was confirmed in 2017 by the discovery of a small fragment of a bronze sheet with incised Latin words (Villeneuve 2021), during the Saudi-French project (dir. G. Charloux and S. Saḥlah). The inscription was part of a Roman military diploma, i.e., an official document granting rights to retired members of Roman auxiliary military troops (Fig. 2). It dates to 142 CE, 37 years after the Roman annexation of the Nabataean kingdom. The diploma shows that at least eight auxiliary units, one of meharists (dromedarii), one of cavalrymen, and six of pedestrians, were on duty at that time in the whole of the Roman province of Arabia, in addition to the 3rd legion Cyrenaica. This amounted to nearly 10,000 men garrisoned in the provincial capital Bosra (modern Syria). As Roman military diplomas only concern the troops of auxiliary corps, it is not surprising that the 3rd legion is not mentioned in the diploma of al-Badʿ, even though it was present in the city.

Jawf

The same legion is known in Dūmat al-Jandal, in the northern Jawf. At some stage between 161 and 165 CE, or 177 and 180, or 197 and 211, a centurion of the legion offered an altar as ex-voto to “IOMH” — Jupiter Optimus Maximus, the main god of the Roman official religion, and Hammon, the same deity and god of the 3rd legion — and to Sanctus Sulmus, a local god (Speidel 1977: 694; Kennedy 1982: 190, inscr. n° 39; Bowersock 1983: pl. 14; s.n. L’année épigraphique 2001, n° 1979).

Hegra / Madāʾin Ṣāliḥ area

The unit of dromedarii near Hegra, a major city of the Northern Ḥijāz, considered to be close to the southern border of Roman Arabia, is much more substantially documented. On a cliff of Qubūr al-Jundī, a few kilometres to the south of the city, a single Latin graffito is engraved among a series of Greek graffiti (Euting 1885: 13, n° 48; Huber 1891: 408; Seyrig 1941: 220; Graf 1988: 195; Gatier 2018: 44-45, n° 40). It reads BENE SIT / TITUS / A ME (“May Titus be well. By me”).

In Hegra, soldiers of the 3rd legion are attested by many second-and-early-third-century-CE Latin inscriptions discovered during Saudi excavations in 2003 (dir. D. al-Ṭalḥī) and Saudi-French excavations, 2008-2023 (dir. L. Nehmé, D. al-Ṭalḥī and F. Villeneuve, and then M. al-Mūsa and L. Nehmé).

Close to the main sanctuary near the centre of the ancient city, a complete 10-line monumental dedication was reused in the masonry of a domestic unit. It documents the renovation (restitutio) of a ruined monument, operated by the troops of the 3rd legion headed by two centurions at the expense of the city of Hegra, under the supervision of the chief of the city (primus civitatis), ʿAmr son of Ḥayan (Amro Haianis) (al-Talhi & al-Daire 2005). This is dated to the reign of Marcus Aurelius between AD 175 and 177. The nature of the restored monument is uncertain, since only its last three letters, — LVM, are readable; it is either vallum, the city wall, or templum, the sanctuary. The proximity of the temple supports the templum hypothesis although it is surprising that no deity is mentioned in the text.

Inside the sanctuary, a reused stone revealed during the excavations bears a small tabula ansata in relief with a short three-line dedication, by a possible Roman officer, to IOM Damascenus, the Jupiter of Damascus, thus indicating that the dedicant came from Damascus (Gazagne 2021). In addition, an extremely incomplete and fragmented inscription on a thin stone plate, six lines at least, is a dedication to a holy goddess and maybe the holy genius of an auxiliary corpse (of cavalry men or meharists: ala?) (Gazagne 2021: 39, fig. 7).

In the intra muros Area 9 on the south-western part of Hegra, a small altar was discovered on the present-day surface. Its inscribed face shows that it was an ex-voto by a soldier of the 3rd legion to IOM “Herculis” (sic) (Nehmé 2022: 15).

The Roman military fort in the city on the southern part of the city wall yielded two Latin documents. The first is an 11-line complete ex-voto, written on the face of a large reused altar (Fiema et al. 2020: text n°15: 195–197). Between 213 and 217 CE, an imperial freedman acting as assistant administrator, on duty at Hegra, expresses his thanks to the immortal gods and goddesses, particularly Fortuna Redux and Mars Conservator, and to the genius of the altar. The second is written on the top edge of a broken reused half stone basin, with a sacrificial iron dagger inside. It is a dedication to IOM H(ammon), the god of the 3rd legion, by a freedman of a centurion of the legion (Fiema 2022: 101–102).

Seven Latin inscriptions were reused in important places in the masonry of the Roman main gate of Hegra (south-eastern gate), built in the very late 2nd century CE, in addition to a reused Greek painted inscription and to a slightly later series of Greek military graffiti written on the walls of the gate during its use (Fiema et al. 2020: texts n°1–2: 180–184, and 5–9: 187–192). The reused stones with painted or incised Latin inscriptions are small. Originally, they were probably inserted in an ex-voto wall, either as part of an independent military shrine (not rediscovered), or in addition to the Nabataean gate preceding the Roman one.

In the foundations, two inscriptions are painted on a stone placed upside down (Fig. 3): two soldiers called stationarii give thanks to the genius of the gate and honour “our IOM Hammon”, the emperors, the goddess Minuthis, the genius of the legion, the governor and officers (probably dated to 168–9 CE); two other stationarii honour IOM Hammon, the governor, and the centurion in charge of a detachment (vexillatio) of the legion (date quite probably 169–175 CE).

An angle stone decorated with an eagle bearing the bust of Hammon has four inscriptions, three of which are in Latin. One is painted, almost erased: two soldiers, on duty at the gate, give thanks to IOMH and to the genius of the centuria of Proculus. Incised over the previous one is a much-abbreviated dedication by three stationarii (probably) of the legion to “our IOMH”. On the other face of the stone: two soldiers, with mention of their centuriae, give thanks to “our Hammon” because bene exivimus (“we accomplished well our mission”).

An inscription is reused in a doorjamb of a gate tower. Two stationarii at the gate give thanks to IOM Hammon “of the legion”, and mention their centuriae in the 8th and 9th cohorts of the legion and their commander, a centurion.

Finally, a much erased document bears only: I]OMH LEG III.

All the Hegra gate inscriptions are from groups of two or three soldiers presenting ex-votos to Jupiter Optimus Maximus Hammon, god of the 3rd legion, sometimes honouring the emperor(s), the governor, their chiefs, various military genii (of the legion, the centuria, the gate), and in one case a particular goddess, Minuthis. The latter refers to “Isis of Menuthis”, a place near Nicopolis, the original camp of that legion in Egypt, close to Alexandria. The often-mentioned stationarii were soldiers who were there to control people passing through, e.g., a city gate — here in one case explicitly stationarii ad portam.

al-ʿUlā

Some 15 km further south, near al-ʿUlā, in the rocky Jabal Khurayba, which overlooks the ancient city of Dadan, a very short rock inscription in Latin is carved among hundreds of Semitic inscriptions (al-Nasif 1988: 61, pl. LXVI). It seems to be readable as CYRIII, thus naming the 3rd legion Cyrenaica alone (author’s reading). This type of abbreviated mark is usually used as an official property sign (prata legionis, in the case of a legion), when disseminated on limits or prominent places of an estate. However, that hypothesis still needs to be confirmed by the discovery of other such marks in the vicinity. If this turns out to be the case, it would mean that the southern limit of Roman Arabia inland was not at Qubūr al-Jundī between Hegra and Dadan, as proposed by scholars since the early 20th century, but Dadan.

Chronology

Finally, the chronological range of the currently known Latin inscriptions in the Arabian Peninsula is narrow: from AD 144 to AD 213–217, based on formally dated documents. That range does not represent the complete duration of Roman administration over parts of the Arabian Peninsula: the annexation of the northwest and the Jawf, part of the previous Nabatean kingdom, took place in AD 106 (while the annexation of the Southern Red Sea may have happened in one of the following decades) and it is definitely possible that the Roman imperium continued for some time after the second decade of the 3rd century (again with possible differences between the Jawf, the Northwest and the Red Sea). At any rate, these documents show that the Roman army was still active there in the late Antonine and early Severan periods. And it is important to bear in mind that the geographical distribution of the Latin texts presented here reflects a stage of research (with ongoing excavations at Hegra, focusing notably on its military buildings, and incidental important discoveries in Farasān), rather than a permanent reality.

François Villeneuve

References

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