AS 3.1

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Inscription
Reading in transliteration:	minimu?uvanikekeivale
Reading in original script:	?
Object:	AS 3.1 Castelnuovo Berardenga (cup)
Position:	outside, wall
Orientation:	0°
Frame:	(left: none, middle: top and bottom, right: none)
Direction of writing:	sinistroverse
Script:	Etruscan script
Letter height:	0.6–0.8 cm0.236 in <br />0.315 in <br />
Number of letters:	21
Number of words:	3
Number of lines:	1
Workmanship:	scratched into leather-hard clay
Condition:	complete, damaged
Archaeological culture:	unknown [from object]
Date of inscription:	second half of 7th c. BC [from object]
Type:	dedicatory
Language:	Etruscan
Meaning:	'Keivale gave me'
Alternative sigla:	none
Sources:	Mangani 1986: 277–279

Commentary

Images in Mangani 1986: 278 (drawing) and tav. XLII.3 (photo).

Inscribed below the rim of the cup between the two handles; well legible despite breaks and surface damage effacing the lambda of muluvanike. Measurements from Mangani 1986: 278, no. 2. Mangani says that the decoration was made before firing, which seems to include the inscription. Cf. the similar inscription AS 3.2 on an identical object from the same grave.

The text is a standard Etruscan dedicatory speaking inscription. The personal name keivale is grammatically Etruscan, but is suggested to be "di origine forse non etrusca" by Mangani 1986: 278 on account of the apparent suffix -al-, which she associates with Raetic, Ligurian and/or Lepontic; see further on the word page.

See also Gambari & Colonna 1988: 154, Colonna 1998: 263, Sassatelli 2008: 338.

• Stephanie A. Layton, Etruscan Bucchero Pottery from Cetamura del Chianti (Gaiole), in Etruscan Studies 12.1 (2009)

Bibliography

Colonna 1998	Giovanni Colonna, "Etruschi sulla via delle Alpi occidentali", in: Liliana Mercando, Marica Venturino Gambari (eds), Archeologia in Piemonte. Volume I: La preistoria, Torino: Soprintendenza per i Beni Archeologici del Piemonte 1998, 261–266.