This volume is the result of a dossier for the Habilitation à Diriger des Recherches entitled Thasos dans l'Empire Romain, defended at the École Pratique des Hautes Études on 18 November 2017. It is part of the general project for the publication of a Corpus des Inscriptions de Thasos (CITh). This is the outcome of a collaboration between the French School of Athens and the Ephorate of Antiquities of Kavala-Thasos.
The completed corpus of inscriptions will consist of seven volumes: (i) lists of archons and theories; (ii) inscriptions from the archaic period and the fifth century bce; (iii) public inscriptions from the fourth century and the Hellenistic period; (iv) inscriptions concerning cults and private inscriptions from the fourth century bce and the Hellenistic period; (v) the present volume; (vi) inscriptions concerning cults and private inscriptions from the Roman period; (vii) Christian and Byzantine inscriptions. F.'s aim is to produce a critical edition, commentary and illustration of all the inscriptions of Thasos covered in this volume, to bring out the scholarly interest of each inscription and to summarise previous bibliography.
The book begins with a foreword, bibliographical references and abbreviations. In the preamble F. provides an overview of the history of Thasos during the period of Roman hegemony (second century bce – fourth century ce); i.e., the overview begins with the Third Macedonian War and ends with the Severan period, going through the war against Mithridates, the Roman civil wars, the Julio-Claudian period, the Flavian period and the Antonine period. This is followed by a brief three-page introduction, in which F. presents the state of the documentation and the editing principles.
The corpus includes all the stone inscriptions kept in Thasos, at the Louvre Museum, the Museums of Athens, Kavala and Abdera. These inscriptions are edited and categorised according to their content as following: (i) acts and letters of Roman magistrates and emperors; (ii) decrees of the city of Thasos (honorary decrees, decrees of a regulatory nature); (iii) honorary inscriptions (for Roman magistrates and patrons; for emperors and members of the imperial family; for foreigners; for Thasians); (iv) dedications for emperors or members of the imperial family; (v) dedications of Thasian magistrates and dignitaries (dedications of an edilitary nature; dedications of magistrates’ journeys; various dedications and lists); (vi) edilitary dedications of benefactors; (vii) documents discovered outside the island of Thasos; (viii) documents of uncertain provenance.
The corpus of inscriptions is presented in chronological order. The commentary for each item is organised in the same way: each text is followed by an illustration, a new photograph, a translation, except for the fragmentary documents, a critical apparatus, which signals new readings or proposals only if they differ significantly from previous editions, and a commentary that aims to bring out the historical interest of the document, the establishment of the text as well as the historical, institutional, topographical and prosopographic aspects.
The catalogue is followed by three appendices. Appendix 1 deals with the palaeography of the Thasian inscriptions of the Roman period. Appendices 2 and 3 contain respectively an index of persons and an index of places and ethnic names, divinities, sanctuaries, festivals, Thasian institutions and institutions of other cities as well as Greek and Latin words. The volume ends with concordances, a table of stemmata and a table of contents.
F. provides an invaluable piece of scholarly work, which is the result of long-term research of high scientific quality. The volume is highly recommended for its usefulness: it highlights the most important stages of the history of the island of Thasos, its integration into the Roman Empire as well as the institutional and social transformations resulting from it.
