BZ-24

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Inscription
Transliteration:	osṣuṛie
Original script:
Variant Reading:	osṣup̣ie
Object:	BZ-24 slab (sandstone)
Position:	front
Orientation:	0°
Script:	Latin script
Direction of writing:	sinistroverse
Letter height:	44 cm <br /> – 5.4 cm
Number of letters:	7
Number of lines:	1
Craftsmanship:	engraved
Current condition:	complete, damaged
Archaeological culture:	Roman republican period [from object]
Date of inscription:
Date derived from:
Language:	Raetic
Meaning:	'Ossurie' (PN)
Alternative sigla:	TM 653541
Sources:	Schumacher 2004: 324 ff.

Images

Object BZ-24 slab with inscription BZ-24.

Inscription BZ-24.

Commentary

First published in Buonamici 1932b: 480 f.

Pictures in Mayr 1956: 175 (drawing) and Schumacher 2004: Taf. 14 (photo).

Listed as BZ-I in Schumacher's corpus.

Length 24 cm. Engraved on the upper part of the stela, inside a house-shaped frame together with a wave-like pattern.

The letters are not all equally well legible, some having suffered more by erosion than others. The circle of is clear despite a disturbance in the upper right area, next to which a piece of the stone has broken off. The next letter, a rounded distinctly longer than , is equally unambiguous. To the left of this, an oblique line running parallel to the middle part of is clearly visible, suggesting another . No other reading seems feasible, although the area under the central line is disturbed, and no trace of a line can be made out in the area above it. (The upper part of the preceding is less deeply scratched than the lower curve; if the same was the case with the second , the upper part might indeed be completely gone.) The angle of , the same height as again, is clear. The letter after is problematic: The hasta of a shape like a Raetic , the same height as , is prolonged in the bottom (though heavily eroded in that part) to the height of , prompting Mayr 1956: 175 to read Latin p. The area where the downstroke of a Latin would be is disturbed; what is visible there looks more like a dot which may or may not be intentional. An interpretation of as Etruscoid r is unlikely due to the presence of . The inscription concludes with unambiguous and , both as high as .

The inscription is classified as being written in the Latin script due to most letters displaying decidedly Latin features: Apart from the presence of , is rounded and written twice, and features straight bars. appears to be written with serifs (cp. RN-1). The epigraphically Raetic features of the inscription are the sinistroverse writing and with the upper angle/curve opening against writing direction.

Linguistically, the inscription can be interpreted as a Raetic individual name typically ending in -ie. Schumacher prefers a reading ossurie based on the observation that two names ending in -urie (really only one: φelturie), but none ending in -upie, are documented in the Raetic corpus. The interpretation of the sequence as a name is of course supported by the fact that the stela is identified as a tombstone by ??? – the only proper inscribed grave stela known from the Raetic area. It appears to document the transition between Raetic and Roman culture in the Bozen area, with a person bearing a Raetic name having a tombstone of Southern type erected in their honour. The question remains, why the individual name stands alone without a patronym so frequently attested on movable objects, although the name systems of both Etruscans and Romans were also multipart.

Further references: Lunz 1990: 38 f.

Bibliography

Buonamici 1932b	Giulio Buonamici, "Rivista di epigrafia etrusca 1931–1932", Studi Etruschi 6 (1932), 459–496.
Mayr 1956	Karl M. Mayr, "Räto-römischer Grabstein mit Inschrift aus Maderneid in Eppan", Der Schlern 30 (1956), 175–176.