The Archaeology of the Epigrams from the Tabulae Iliacae: Adaptation, Allusion, Alteration*)

Abstract The epigrams and other metrical texts inscribed on the Tabulae Iliacae document an active engagement with the prior poetic tradition on the part of the artisans of these early Imperial reliefs, who adapt and reshape earlier texts in order to create for their Roman clientele a novel version of Greek myth and history. I reconsider the texts of three groups of inscriptions and argue for their significance to the history of Greek epigram. The Tabula Chigi (IG 14.1296) transmits two elegiac couplets that employ dialectal variation to characterize the speech of Alexander the Great; a metrical irregularity reveals how the couplets were adapted to their inscriptional context. Variations in the two metrical signatures of Theodorus, the creator of the Tabulae (IG 14.1284; SEG 14.626), reveal a nuanced attempt to characterize his relationship with his avowed poetic source, Homer. Verse summaries of the Iliad on the Tabula Sarti (IG 14.1286) have been misunderstood because the sole surviving image of the tablet has been misread: a new edition shows the summaries’ close adaptation of Homer and uncovers the rationale for their unusual meter (anapestic tetrameter catalectic). An appendix discusses the whereabouts of the Tabula Chigi, which is currently lost.

Affiliations: 1: Vanderbilt University, Department of Classical Studies PMB 0092, 230 Appleton Place, Nashville, Tennessee 37203 USA david.e.petrain@vanderbilt.edu