La Legio XX Valeria Victrix in Germania Inferior

Tracked down Guido 2009. An interesting read, although I will pass swiftly over the discussion of Numina Divorum Augustorum. Not really my thing and not really sure how much it adds to the various publications of D Fishwick on the subject.

However, III 'La Legio XX Valeria Victrix in Germania Inferior e la datazione dei cognomina' is more to the point. Here in the Aachen stone we have a second dedication from the province in which the legionary cognomina are present. In seeking to date this to after the presence of the legion in the province are we merely falling into a circular argument? By just looking at the inscriptions with no cognomina we prove that the legion didn't have them while in Germany and therefore the inscriptions with cognomina must be later...

Except... it's not just the inscriptions in Germany that are used to argue against the early adoption of Valeria Victrix. The earliest records in Britain likewise omit them [or is some of the same circularity evident here? The building stone from Gloucester must be later because it has VV?].

Part of the problem may lie in changing styles of dedication. Keppie has pointed out [somewhere] that legionary cognomina are rarely included in earlier first century stones, even where we have evidence that the cognomen was already in existence.

And are we comparing like with like? The dedications with VV are a different class of monument. All the others are gravestones from legionary bases (veteran at Nijmegen?) or marks of personal ownership. Expecting the same standards of usage across different classes of document is the weak link in Tomlin’s argument re the Carlisle writing tablet (without VV as late as AD84). Altogether intractable.

Recent Literature

Keeping an eye on publications:

Guido, L. 2009 'I Numina Diuorum Augustorum e la Legio XX Valeria Victrix: una nuova iscrizione da Aquisgrana', Latomus 68, 644-656

My eyes lit up at the words 'nuova iscrizione' but a little investigation establishes that Aquisgrana is in fact the Italian name for Aachen and this is again the dedication by Julia Tiberina, wife of Q Iulius [Fl]avus mentioned herein once or twice. I may have time to get up to the university library when I'm in Nottingham tomorrow...

Addition to legionary roster

Gaius Valerius Pudens

This one passed me by on first reading:

Britannia 40, 2009, 321-2
Inscription on base of jar found at Chester in L1E2 context; jar 'made in a legionary tile-works' - presumably the legionary tile-works at Holt.

G(aius) V[al(erius) G(ai) f(ilius)] Pud[ens] Maceia (tribu)

Inscribed pre-firing. More likely therefore the name of the legionary who made it than necessarily a mark of ownership (although if you were assigned to making pottery, perhaps you'd make sure you got a new set yourself!).

Compare RIB 542 + add. also from Chester:
Dis Man(ibus) L(ucius) Valerius L(ucii filius) [S]ala[r]ia Pud[....]III[...

Roman Altars at Musselburgh - Inveresk

Still waiting for some further information to appear on these. The disovery was reported a few weeks ago now and the press release repeated quite widely. No follow up so far. There is a suggestion that one is a dedication to Jupiter (this would be quite usual at forts in the north and might give us the name of the unit stationed there). But are the altars face down in the photo? A previous altar from the area (RIB 2132) was a dedication to Apollo Grannus by Q. Lusius Sabinianus, imperial procurator, who is also recorded on a second, more fragmentary (and later re-used) altar (RIB 3499). It will be interesting to compare these more recent discoveries.

L'Annee Epigraphique 2006

Made it up to the university library for the first time in quite a while (the deal on library cards for alumni is actually rather better than it used to be. if you can find someone on the desk who recognises a University Association card and knows what that entitles you to... but. wasn't really any harder to sort out than I was expecting).

One of the first ports of call: AE 2006 (which is to say, the most recent volume, published towards the end of last year).

Decent notice and summary of my own thesis publication (which was now as long ago as 2006). Glad they liked the 'imposante bibliographie' (and to discover that the adjective is as complimentary as it seems at first sight...).

AE 2006.864 is notice of the publication of the inscription from Aachen I blogged about February last year (and have amended slightly in that light). There is slightly more to the closing dedicatory formula, but I still think we're missing a verb to go with aedes. More to the point is the proposed identification with the centurion of legio I Minervia, Q. Iulius Flavus, previously attested at Bonn and Cologne (AE 1930.23; CIL XIII 8172). At the proposed late 2nd-early 3rd century date, the Twentieth should not have been anywhere in the vicinity and if Flavus had been serving previously on the Rhine then we either suppose that the dedication was set up after he had received news of the transfer, but before setting off (a solution offered for other 'alien' centurions) or perhaps accept that his family was established on the Rhine and that centurions might go on a long tour of duty without taking them along (whatever conclusions we might come to about the occupation/occupants of centurion's quarters: e.g. Hoffmann in Britannia 1995).