MA-17

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Inscription
Transliteration:	klevieval·θikinuasua
Original script:
Object:	MA-17 antler (antler)
Position:	front
Script:	North Italic script (Magrè alphabet)
Direction of writing:	mixed
Letter height:	1.41.4 cm <br /> – 1.8 cm
Number of letters:	18
Number of characters:	19
Number of lines:	1
Craftsmanship:	engraved
Current condition:	complete
Date of inscription:	3rd–2nd centuries BC [from object]
Date derived from:	archaeological context [from object]
Language:	Raetic
Meaning:	'Klevie son of Valtiki-*, ?'
Alternative sigla:	PID 237 LIR MA-15 MLR 51
Sources:	Schumacher 2004: 165

Commentary

First published in Pellegrini 1918: 182 (no. 7).

Images in Pellegrini 1918: 182, fig. 14 (drawing), IR (photo tav. XXXIX a = LIR), LIR (drawings), MLR (photos and drawing).

Length 10 cm, starting at the broader end of the antler piece. Faint and damaged by surface abrasion, but the reading is unambiguous. Letter no. 9 is surrounded by additional shortish scratches, which are most probably document of a writing mistake, and unlikely to represent another letter or punctuation mark. The latter was assumed by Whatmough and later scholars, who read klevieva·l·θikinuasua, but 1. the additional scratches in the upper area remain unexplained by this, and 2. Lambda (as well as Rho and Mu) marked with a single inscribed punct is amply attested in the Magrè inscriptions. The writer started writing dextroverse, but turned the object at either the eleventh or the twelfth letter (presumably because he wanted to support his hand on the object), proceeding with sinistroverse letters – cp. MA-13.

Syllabic punctuation is applied correctly. The inscription contains a Raetic name formula (individual name + patronym in -nu). The final sequence asua is difficult to interpret. It is unlikely that the first a belongs to the patronym and represents a genitive suffix -a: first, nominative syntagmata are common in the Magrè inscriptions; second, it would have to be assumed that the genitive marker in the patronym also includes the individual name (on elliptical case marking see The Raetic language). Cp. ]θiχinu also followed by a in MA-20. More likely, asua is an extra word in the genitive. If that should be the case, the genitive is best understood as indicating the benefactive; in other words, asua may indicate that the object was dedicated to a divinity by the name of asu-*.

On the back, at 0.6 cm from the broader end, an arrangement of lines of varying thickness in groups is visible near the upper and lower edges where the cut face is intact (length 2.4 cm), as is the case in almost all the antler votives from Magrè.

Further references: Kretschmer 1932, Vetter 1943: 76, Kretschmer 1943, Pisani 1964: 318 (no. 135a), IR: 253 (sub no. 6), Tibiletti Bruno 1978: 237, Schumacher 1998: 99, Schumacher 2004: 295, 302.

Bibliography

IR	Alberto Mancini, "Iscrizioni retiche", Studi Etruschi 43 (1975), 249–306.
Kretschmer 1932	Paul Kretschmer, "Die Etruskerfrage und die Inschriften von Magrè", in: Axel Nelson (Ed.), Symbolae philologicae O.A. Danielsson Octogenario dicatae, Uppsala: 1932, 134–142.
Kretschmer 1943	Paul Kretschmer, "Die vorgriechischen Sprach- und Volksschichten (Fortsetzung)", Glotta 30 (1943), 84–218.
LIR	Alberto Mancini, Le Iscrizioni Retiche [= Quaderni del dipartimento di linguistica, Università degli studi di Firenze Studi 8–9], Padova: Unipress 2009–10. (2 volumes)