VC·1.1

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Inscription
Reading in transliteration:	finis / campo·quem / dedit·acisius / argantocomateṛ / ecus·comunem / deis·et·hominib / us·ita·uti·lapidẹṣ / IIII·statuti·sunt
Reading in original script:
Object:	VC·1 Vercelli (boundary stone) (Inscriptions: VC·1.1, VC·1.2)
Position:	top, front
Orientation:	0°
Direction of writing:	dextroverse
Script:	Latin script
Letter height:	5–8 cm1.969 in <br />3.15 in <br />
Number of letters:	90
Number of words:	15
Number of lines:	8
Workmanship:	carved
Condition:	complete, damaged
Archaeological culture:	Late Republican [from object]
Date of inscription:	shortly before the middle of 1st century BC [from object]
Type:	dedicatory
Language:	Latin
Meaning:	'border to the field which Acisius Argantocomaterecus gave common to gods and men as how the four stones are put up'
Alternative sigla:	Tibiletti Bruno 1981: 34 RIG: E-2 Solinas 1995: 141 a Morandi 2004: 100 1–8
Sources:	Morandi 2004: 589 f. no. 100

Images

Inscriptions VC·1.1 and VC·1.2 from Morandi

Stela VC·1 Vercelli with inscriptions VC·1.1 and VC·1.2 from Morandi

Stela VC·1 Vercelli with inscriptions VC·1.1 and VC·1.2

Commentary

First published in Baldacci 1978.

Images in Baldacci 1978: fig. 1 (photo), Tibiletti Bruno 1977: tav. I and II (photos), Lejeune 1977: 590, fig. 3 (photo) and 591, fig. 4 (drawing), Lejeune 1988: 28, fig. 14 (photo) and 29, fig. 15 (drawing), Gambari 2011b: 61, fig. 2 (drawing) and 62, fig. 3 (photo).

The alphabetically and linguistically Latin part of the Vercelli bilingua is inscribed in eight lines of large letters (though their height decreases after the third line) on the upper part of the stela. Taking up three times as much space as the vernacular VC·1.2, it was evidently primary, but the increasingly economical spacing shows that the addition of the Celtic part was planned from the beginning (Tibiletti Bruno 1977: 356). The Latin part was carved with a different instrument (wider, deeper and more rounded); Baldacci 1978: 336 f. and Tibiletti Bruno 1977: 356 also assume a different hand, which is doubted by Lejeune 1977: 589. The first word finis is emphasised by taking up a line on its own and being somewhat offset to the left. Ligatures are employed liberally, two line breaks do not respect word or indeed syllable borders. According to Lejeune 1988: 31, no separators are visible after ita, uti and statuti.

finis in combination with the dative (campo) is somewhat irregular (Baldacci, Lejeune), possibly due to being the result of a translation from Gaulish; Lejeune considers the possibility that the first word is a plural finīs (see VC·1.2 on his reading of a corresponding plural atoś in the Celtic part). Gambari 2011b: 49 f. finis quem campo dedit, i.e. subject is the border, in correspondence with atom; the border as an area for common use of the adjacent owners; inscription is lex loci (at the access point), while four termini mark the corners of the campus; 56 f. Roman comparandum from Pino Torinese. Similarly De Bernardo Stempel 2011b: 71.

On the precise meaning and function of the inscription see the discussion by Baldacci 1978: 339–344, who concludes that the campus sponsored by Acisius was not an area for official activities (similar to the Campus Martius in Rome), since any reference to public bodies is absent, but a Gaulish nemeton, the phrase dei et homines referring to the indigeneous religious community and its deities (and ancestors, spirits, etc.) rather than any Roman legal unit (municipium, ciuitas uel sim.). (More recently and differently Maganzani 2012.) Baldacci compares inscriptions from northern Italy which record dedications to the Mothers and the inhabitants of a vicus, e.g. CIL V 5716 matronis et vicanis (Cornate), V 56716 matronis et adganais (Cantú), V 5227 matronis et geniis ausuciatium (Ossuccio) (though in these examples the respective homines may be named as beneficiaries rather than recipients). (Lejeune 1977: 591 f. takes the Latin phrase comunem deis et hominibus to be a translation of the Celtic teuoχtoni(o)n, s. further VC·1.2 on his interpretation of the text based on the Gaulish part.) As observed by Baldacci (p. 339), the reference to the border of the campus and the fact that the word finis is emphasised indicates that the stela is one of the four termini, whether all of them were similarly inscribed being unclear. Baldacci suspects that a further inscription detailing the lex loci – the regulations for the use of the campus – existed in addition to the termini (cf. Tibiletti Bruno 1976: 106 f.). See also Lejeune 1988: 31.

The name of the dedicant – akisios arkatokomaterekos in the vernacular text – has only been gently Latinised by the replacement of the ending -(i)os with -(i)us. Baldacci 1978: 344–346, observing that the evidently rich and eminent Acisius should be expected to have borne a Roman name – certainly after 49 BC, and also in the Roman colony (89–49 BC), where he would have been a magistrate – suggests that the use of the vernacular name form in the present context (as suggested above) is intentional, highlighting Acisius' ancient nobility and tribal status. See, however, VC·1.2 on the nature of the two-part name.

Baldacci 1978: 337 f., based on the letter forms and the Classical Latin phonetics (only open and uti instead of ut being somewhat archaic, cf. also Lejeune 1977: 593, 1988: 31), dates the inscription to the second half of the 1^st c. BC, i.e. after the Lex Roscia, which granted citizenship to the inhabitants of Gallia Transpadana in 49 BC; he implies that the precedence of the Latin text indicates that Latin was already the official language of Vercelli. Lejeune 1988: 26 f., noting the early onset of Romanisation in the area and the absence of a Latin binomen, vaguely tends toward a somewhat higher dating.

• Tibiletti Bruno 1981: pp. 192-196, n.34
• RIG: pp. 26-37, E-2
• Pisani 1979: pp. 49-53
• Prosdocimi 1991: pp. 293-300
• Lejeune & Briquel 1991: n.296
• Solinas 1995: pp. 381-382, n.141
• Lambert 1994: pp. 76-80
• Motta 1995: pp. 128, 129

Bibliography

Baldacci 1978	Paolo Baldacci, "Una bilingue latino-gallica di Vercelli", Atti dell'Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei 32 (1977 [1978]), 335–347.
CIL	Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences and Humanities, Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum. (17 volumes, various supplements)
De Bernardo Stempel 2011b	Patrizia de Bernardo Stempel, "Il testo pregallico della stele di Vercelli nel contesto delle lingue celtiche. Con un'appendice sull'indicativo passato nel verbo celtico continentale", in: Gisella Cantino Wataghin (ed.), Finem dare. Il confine, tra sacro, profano e immaginario. A margine della stele bilingue del Museo Leone di Vercelli. Atti del Convegno Internazionale, Vercelli, cripta di S. Andrea, 22–24 maggio 2008, Vercelli: Edizioni Mercurio 2011, 67–80.
Gambari 2011b	Filippo Maria Gambari, "Per una lettura "protostorica" della bilingue di Vercelli", in: Gisella Cantino Wataghin (ed.), Finem dare. Il confine, tra sacro, profano e immaginario. A margine della stele bilingue del Museo Leone di Vercelli. Atti del Convegno Internazionale, Vercelli, cripta di S. Andrea, 22–24 maggio 2008, Vercelli: Edizioni Mercurio 2011, 47–65.