AIUK3 no. 2 Relief from top of a decree

Relief from top of a decree

AIUK 3 (Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge) no. 2 Date: ca. 350-325 BC

Athena [The People?] Me[ne]laos (?)^[1] Relief

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Greek text

References:

AIUK 3 (Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge) no. 2 (Translated text) (AIUK) (AIO)

SEG 68.50

Budde and Nicholls no. 27

Lawton pp. 18-19

Translation by: Stephen Lambert

AIO Images: 1 2 3

Monument type: Stele

Inscription type: Relief from top of a decree

Findspot: “In remains of ancient city of Sigeion” (Clarke), but probably in fact from Athens (Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge GR.13.1865)

Transliterations on Places on

[1] A video about this inscription is available on the AIO Youtube channel.

This relief, from the top of a decree the main text of which is no longer preserved, is datable on stylistic grounds to about the third quarter of the fourth century BC. It was first edited by E. D. Clarke, a Cambridge figure who travelled to Greece, Europe and the Eastern Mediterranean in 1800 and 1801, and who published it along with other inscriptions found on this expedition, in 1809. Clarke claimed he had discovered the relief in Sigeion in the Troad, but there are several problems with this, not least that no other inscribed decrees of Sigeion from this period are known, and Clarke’s claims for the provenance of several other inscriptions are demonstrably incorrect. The style of the relief, and the presence of the goddess Athena on it are indicative rather of Athenian origin, and I suggest in AIUK 3 (Cambridge), section 1, that Clarke had muddled his records and this was actually one of the inscriptions he found on the Athenian leg of his tour. The first figure on the relief is Athena, the label for the second does not survive, but it may have been the personification of Demos (“the People”), who is also probably depicted in the relief on the top of the famous anti-tyranny law of 336/5 BC, IG II³ 1, 320. The label above the third figure, in military dress, is partially preserved, and on the basis that the relief is from Sigeion, was ingeniously restored by Budde and Nicholls in 1964 as “[Pro]te[s]ilaos”, a Greek hero of the Trojan War who was the first to set foot on Trojan soil and paid for his courage with his life. However, the name might alternatively be read as “Me[ne]laos”, mythical king of Sparta in the Trojan War (a conflict in which Athens and Sparta had been allied), and the decree might date to 331 BC, at which time Athens came very close to joining in an anti-Macedonian revolt led by the Spartan king Agis ([Plut.] Mor. 818E). In the event Athens did not join the revolt, and Agis was defeated by Alexander of Macedon’s deputy in Europe, Antipater, at Megalopolis the following year; but it is quite plausible that Athens passed a decree (e.g. perhaps one honouring Spartan envoys) in the context of Athenian diplomacy with Sparta at this time, and Sparta would appropriately have been represented on such a decree by the figure of Menelaos (a figure who, as "Meneleōs Archegetes" (Menelaos the Founder or Leader or Pioneer) was apparently recipient of cult in ca. 400-350 BC in the deme on the east coast of Attica, Phegaia, alongside cult of "Herakles Archegetes" and of the Dioskouroi (IG II² 1932, 11-14, cf. R. Parker, Polytheism, 71 and Humphreys, Kinship, 885).

Added: 3 Sep 2018
Updated: 22 Feb 2024
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