CO·69

edit with form

Inscription
Reading in transliteration:	k r?op
Reading in original script:	?
Object:	CO·69 Ossuccio (bowl)
Position:	foot, outside
Direction of writing:	ambiguous
Script:	North Italic script (Lepontic alphabet)
Number of letters:	5
Workmanship:	scratched after firing
Condition:	complete
Archaeological culture:	Golasecca III A 2 [from object]
Date of inscription:	second half of 5th c. BC [from object]
Type:	unknown
Language:	perhaps Celtic
Meaning:	unknown
Alternative sigla:	Whatmough 1933 (PID): 279 Solinas 1995: 64 Morandi 2004: 145
Sources:	Morandi 2004: 618 f. no. 145

Images

Drawing of CO·69 Ossuccio with inscription CO·69 from Bertolone 1957

Drawing of inscription CO·69 from Morandi

Drawing of inscription CO·69 from Solinas

Commentary

First published in Giussani 1917-8: 3–14.

Images in Giussani 1917-8: 8 (photo), Bertolone 1957: tav. 38.1 (drawing), De Marinis 1981: tav. 49.2, Solinas 1995: 343 (drawing), Morandi 2004: 621, fig. 19.145 (drawing).

Inscribed on the outside foot of the patera; due to the misaligned letters and conflicting orientation of letters, various readings have been suggested. Giussani (acc. to Whatmough) read sinistroverse potrk (in which rho and the offset kappa are retrograde), while Whatmough PID: 97, no. 279 (after autopsy) prefered dextroverse k·riop with retrograde pi on the basis of the comparison with TI·15 k riop (with more clearly offset kappa and no retrograde letters). Whatmough considered the traces around his iota as accidental, and saw a possible punct between the bars of kappa. De Marinis 1981: 118, no. 2 similarly read k ruop (with inverted upsilon?). Gambari & Colonna 1986: 163, no. 11, introduced the notion that the sequence was inscribed "in tre gruppi distinti di lettere, scritti rotando il vaso in senso orario", viz. sinistroverse po/k/ru – thus also Solinas; Morandi gives simply pokru. See also Motta 2000: 210.

Bertolone 1957: 64 mentions another possible inscription on the rim.

Bibliography

Bertolone 1957	Mario Bertolone, "Ancora sulla ceramica del Golasecca III A", Sibrium 3 (1956–1957), 55–71.
De Marinis 1981	Raffaele De Marinis, "Il periodo Golasecca III A in Lombardia", Studi Archeologici 1 (1981), 41–299.
Gambari & Colonna 1988	Filippo Maria Gambari, Giovanni Colonna, "Il bicchiere con iscrizione arcaica da Castelletto Ticino e l'adozione della scrittura nell'Italia nord-occidentale", Studi Etruschi 54 (1986 [1988]), 119–164.