The Duenos inscription is one of the earliest known Old Latin texts, variously dated from the 7th to the 5th century BC.Osvaldo Sacchi, "Il trivaso del Quirinale", in Revue Interantionale de Droit de l'Antiquité, 2001, p. 277; citing: Attilio Degrassi, Inscriptiones Latinae Liberae Rei Publicae, 1, 1957; Arthur Gordon, "Notes on the Duenos-Vase Inscription in Berlin", California Studies in Classical Antiquity, Vol. 8, 1975, pp. 53–72; Giovanni Colonna, "Duenos", in Studi Etruschi, 47, 1979, pp. 163–172; Brent Vine, "A Note on the Duenos Inscription" , University of California at Los Angeles. It is inscribed on the sides of a kernos, in this case a trio of small globular vases adjoined by three clay struts. It was found by Heinrich Dressel in 1880 in the valley between Quirinale and Viminale (today Via Nazionale) in Rome. The kernos is part of the collection of the Staatliche Museen in Berlin (inventory no. 30894,3).
The inscription is written right-to-left in three units, without spaces to separate words. It is difficult to translate, as some letters are hard to distinguish, particularly since they cannot always be deduced by context. The absence of spaces causes additional difficulty in assigning the letters to the respective words.
Text and translations
There have been many proposed translations advanced by scholars since the discovery of the kernos; by 1983, more than 50 different explanations of the meaning had been put forward.Arthur E. Gordon, Illustrated Introduction to Latin Epigraphy, 1983, p. 77. Due to the lack of a large body of archaic Latin, and the method by which Romans abbreviated their inscriptions, scholars have not been able to produce a single translation that has been accepted by historians as accurate.
Below is the transcription and one of many possible interpretations:S. Warmington, 54 ff.; and H. Eichner, in: Die Sprache, 34, 1988-1990, 207 ff. a. The direct unicase transcription b. Direct transcription, in lowercase, with possible macrons and word breaks c. A speculative interpretation and translation into Classical Latin d. An English gloss (approximate translation/interpretation) of the Classical Latin rendering
Line 1: a. b. iouesāt deivos qoi mēd mitāt, nei tēd endō cosmis vircō siēd c. Jūrat deōs quī mē mittit, nī [ergā tē] comis virgō sit d. 'The person who sends me prays to the gods, lest the girl be not kind towards thee'
Line 2: a. b. as(t) tēd noisi o(p)petoit esiāi pākā riuois c. at tē [... uncertain ...] pācā rīvīs d. 'without thee [...] calm with [these] rivers'
Line 3: a. b. duenos mēd fēced en mānōm (m)einom duenōi nē mēd malo(s) statōd c. Bonus mē fēcit in manum [...] bonō, nē mē malus [clepitō] d. 'A good man made me (in good intention?) for a good man; may I not be stolen by an evil man.'
An interpretation set out by Warmington and Eichner, renders the complete translation as follows, though not with certainty: It is sworn with the gods, whence I'm issued:If a maiden does not smile at you, nor is strongly attracted to you,then soothe her with this fragrance! Someone good has filled me for someone good and well-mannered,and not shall I be obtained by someone bad.
Notes Duenos is an older form of Classical Latin ('good'), just as Classical ('war') is from Old Latin duellum. Some scholars posit Duenos as a proper name, instead of merely an adjective.
Epigraphic note The inscription (CIL I 2nd 2, 4) is scratched along the side of the body of three vases made of dark brown bucchero, connected with each other by short cylindric arms. It is written from right to left spiralling downwards about times. The letters are written upside-down for a reader who looks at the inscription from a level position; this has been explained by Aldo Luigi Prosdocimi as due to the fact that the inscription was meant to be read from above, not from a sideways position. Some letters are written in an archaic fashion that appears influenced by the Greek alphabet.J. E. Sandys, S. G. Campbell, Latin Epigraphy: an Introduction to the study of Latin Inscriptions 1974, p. 40–41. There are signs of corrections in the two or of and and in the of . Three distinct sections are individuated by spaces after and . There are neither spaces delimiting words nor signs of interpunction. The earliest interpunction to appear was syllabic. As it appeared only in the 7th century BC, the inscription should be more ancient.Giuliano Bonfante and Larissa Bonfante, Lingua e cultura degli Etruschi Torino, 1985, p. 63.
The inscription is made up by two distinct parts or sections, the second one beginning with the word . It was found in a favissa (votive deposit). It belongs to the kind known as "speaking inscriptions", widely in use in the Archaic period. Some scholars consider the object to be of good quality and reflecting the high social status of the owner. Others consider it common.
Site of the find
The vase was bought from an antiquarian by Heinrich Dressel shortly after its find. It was discovered in 1880 by workers who were digging to lay the foundation of a building near the newly opened Via Nazionale, in the valley between the Quirinal Hill and the Viminal Hill. More precisely it was found on the south slope of the Quirinal, near the church of San Vitale, Rome. Dressel was told the place was supposed to have been a burial site.Bréal; Gordon.
Archaeologist Filippo Coarelli has advanced the hypothesis that the object might have been placed in the votive deposit of one of the temples of goddess Fortuna dedicated by king Servius Tullius, perhaps the one known as Fortuna Publica or Citerior, i.e. located on the side of the Quirinal near to Rome. Her festival recurred on the nonae of April (April 5).Filippo Coarelli Il Foro Boario p. 289 ff.; Plutarch Quaest. Romanae 74 and De Fortuna Romana 10 However, June 11, the festival day of the Matralia, which was originally devoted to Mater Matuta, was also the day of the Fortuna Virgo, ritually associated with the passage of girls from adolescence into adulthood and married life.Arnobius Adversus Nationes II 67; Aurelius Augustinus De Civitate Dei IV 11; Ovid Fasti VI 221; Mario Torelli Lavinio e Roma. Riti iniziatici tra archeologia e storia 1984, p. 53 ff. and 117 ff.; Giovanni Colonna "Duenos" in Studi Etruschi 47 (1979) p. 168; Robert E. A. Palmer "Roman shrines of female chastity from the struggle of chastity to the papacy of Innocent I" in Rivista Storica dell'Antichità 4 (1974) p. 129 ff. (also available as a monograph from the publisher Pàtron) who thinks the sanctuary of the votive deposit should be that of a Fortuna Bona Dea much more ancient than the Εύελπις and of purely Roman tradition. Kurt Latte Römische Religionsgeschichte Munich, 1960, p. 228 ff. excludes the name of Bona Dea as a translation of a Greek theonym.
For another scholar, the site of the find was in Trastevere but near the valley between the Viminale and Quirinale.Giovanni Colonna, "Duenos", in Studi Etruschi, 47, 1979, pp. 163–172.
Overview of the linguistic research The antiquity of the document is generally acknowledged. The language shows archaic characters in morphology, phonetics and syntax. The absence of u after q would testify to its greater antiquity comparatively to the inscription of the cippus of the Forum, also known as Lapis Niger (CIL I 1).G. Pennisi "Il tri-vaso di Duenos" in Studi Latini e Italiani 1992 p. 14.
First section For the sake of convenience of interpretation, the text is usually divided into two sections, the first one containing the first two units and ending with . The two sections show a relative syntactic and semantic independence.
Many attempts have been made at deciphering the text.
In the 1950s the inscription had been interpreted mainly on the basis of (and in relation to) the supposed function of the vases, considered either as containers for a love philter or of beauty products: the text would then mockingly threaten the owner about his behaviour towards the vase itself or try to attract a potential buyer.Emilio Peruzzi "L'iscrizione di Duenos " in La Parola del Passato 13 (1958) p. 328 ff.: the author supposes the object is a love toy and the inscription would be a playful warning to the owner not turn down the object itself, i.e. "he who turns me upside down (mitat) prays the gods that the girl should not give you her favours lest you want to be satisfied through the workings of Tuteria": Tuteria would then be a proper name and the object the work of an enchantress that exercised her magic art to get the lost lover back for a female customer of hers; E. Gjerstad "The Duenos vase" in Kung. Vitt. och Antikvitets Akademiens Handlingen (1959) pp. 133–143 supposed the object were a container for beauty products and interpreted the text as: "Iurat deos qui me mittit: 'Ne in te comis virgo sit asted, nisi ope utens ei pacari vis'. Bonus me fecit in bonum atque bono, ne me malus dato!", i.e. " 'Thy girl shall not be amiable to thee, unless thou befriend her by using (my) assistance' Good man has made me for a good purpose and for the benefit of a good man; may not a bad man present me!" This is the so-called erotic line of interpretation which found supporters until the 1980s.Filippo Coarelli, Il Foro Boario, 1988, p. 289 ff. Tuteria = Tutela would be a theonym, i.e. one of the many personifications of Fortuna, perhaps the Τύχη Εύελπις of the vicus Longus: the meaning of the text would be that of a girl forced to be complacent for the effect of the moderating intervention of a deity in whose sanctuary the vase was dedicated. T. Bolelli. "De antiquissima inscriptione quae Dueni nuncupatur annotationes", in Cipriano, Di Giovine, and Mancini (eds.) Miscellanea di studi linguistici in onore di W. Belardi. 1 (1984) pp. 207–214: "Swears for the gods he who sells me that, if the girl is not nice towards you, at least she shall remain with you (i.e. you shall not lose her) lest you want make peace (with her) through the workings of Tuteria (an enchantress)."
During the 1960s Georges Dumézil proposed a new line of thought in the interpreting of the text. He remarked the inconsistency of the previous interpretations both with the solemnity of the opening formula ("Iovesat deivos qoi med mitat": 'He swears for the gods who sends /delivers me') and with the site of the find. Dumézil's interpretation was: "If it happens that the girl is not nice to you/ has no easy relationship with you ("nei ted endo cosmis virco sied" = "ne in te (=erga te) comis virgo sit"), we shall have the obligation of bringing her and you into good harmony, accord, agreement ("asted noisi ... pakari vois"="at sit nobis ... pacari vobis"). The transmission of the object would be expressed by the words qoi med mitat. The story mirrored in the text would thus depict a custom deeply rooted in Roman society that is described by Plautus in the scene of the Menaechmi in which the tutor of the virgo or his representatives formally give a suretyship about her attitude towards a man.Georges Dumézil, "La deuxième ligne de l' "inscription de Duenos" in Latomus 102 1969, pp. 244-255; id. Idées romaines, Paris, 1969, pp. 12–28; It. tr. p. 25.In fact this line of interpretation, based on the reading of toiteisai as related to tutela (ward, guardianship) either as a noun (ope tutelae) or an adjective tuteria (ope tuteria = ope tutoria), had already been proposed in 1934 by philologist and literary critic Antonino Pagliaro, who interpreted the segment as meaning: 'unless [noisi = nisi] you will [vois from volo 'I want'] consider yourself satisfied by the exercise of the marital potestas'. He understood ope tuteria as referring to the potestas exercised by the husband through the manus maritalis, which would be equated to a sort of ward, tutela. Cf. "La cosiddetta iscrizione di Dueno" in Atene e Roma 3:2, 1934, pp. 162–175.