DVC 2384B

Question from a Private Consultation concerning a Payment

Description: Ex Lamella DVC 2383-2388
Dialect: NW Doric
Alphabet: TBD; Depends on view of 𐅂 (Use of acrophonic numeral system?)

Date: TBD: mid-fifth to early fourth, based on confusion of epsilon for eta

Findspot: Sanctuary of Zeus, 1935
Original location: Dodona
Last recorded location: Museum of Ioannina, M835

Bibliography: DVC 2384B

Edition: Eidinow/DOL

Text constituted from: DVC (facsimile)

Diplomatic Text

ΕΜ𐅂ΑΠΟΔΩ

Edition

A: ἐ͂ Μ𐅂(?) ἀποδῶ;
vel
B: ἐ͂ μὴ̣ ἀποδῶ;

Apparatus

1: 1. E for e long open. || Μ 𐅂 = μὴ̣ DVC. Could the heta be archaic eta with missing hasta?

French translation

A: Si je dois payer 101 drachmas.

vel

B: Si je ne dois pas payer.

English translation

A: If I must pay 101 drachmas.

vel

B: Whether I do not need to pay.

Commentary

General remarks: The text preserves a private inquiry by an individual asking about the requirement to pay a sum of money. The verb ἀποδῶ is used in literary sources with numbers to indicate a lack or requirement, see Thuc. 2.13; and in epigraphic sources to indicate a requirement to pay a sum of money or its equivalent (e.g., IG II² 2499).

The use of epsilon for long open e in the interrogative is archaic. (It could be accounted for by the slippage between letters when the Ionic script was introduced into Attica (late fifth/early fourth centuries), found more usually in private than public texts; see Threatte i: 159.)

𐅂 could be an incomplete rendering of heta (as it seems to be taken by DVC); it is not the spiritus asper (as in LOD 75). In the context given by the verb (transactions), it could be the symbol for a single drachma [used in Attica, Delphi and Thespiae, Naxos, Ceos, Delos, where the sign is sometimes prefixed to a sum of money–is this the Attic system?]. If this is so, then the mu symbol = mna = 100 dr.

ἀποδῶ: 2nd aor. subj. Other examples of use of the verb ἀποδῶ, as suggested by DVC see general chart on p. $$$.