Laudator Temporis Acti

L'Année épigraphique (Année 1901), pp. 50-51, number 183 = Defixionum Tabellae 135 Audollent (pp. 191-193), translation and text in Henk S. Versnel, "καὶ εἴ τι λ[οιπὸν] τῶν μερ[ῶ]ν [ἔσ]ται τοῦ σώματος ὅλ[ο]υ[.. (... and any other part of the entire body there may be ...) An Essay on Anatomical Curses," in Fritz Graf, ed., Ansichten griechischer Rituale. Geburtstags-Symposium für Walter Burkert (Stuttgart: B.G. Teubner, 1998), pp. 216-267 (at 223):

A) Malchio son/slave of Nikon: his eyes, hands, fingers, arms, nails, hair, head, feet, thigh, belly, buttocks, navel, chest, nipples, neck, mouth, cheeks, teeth, lips, chin, eyes, forehead, eyebrows, shoulder-blades, shoulders, sinews, guts, marrow (?), belly, cock, leg, trade, income, health, I do curse in this tablet.

B) Rufa the public slave: her hands, teeth, eyes, arms, belly, breasts, chest, bones, marrow (?), guts, ....., mouth, feet, forehead, nails, fingers, womb, navel, cunt, vulva (?), groins: Rufa the public slave I do curse in this tablet.

A) Malcio Nicones oculos, manus, dicitos, bracias, uncis, capilo, caput, pedes, femus, venter, natis, umlicus, pectus, mamilas, collus, os, bucas, dentes, labias, me[nt]us, oclus, fronte, supercili, scaplas, umerum, nervias, ossu, merilas (?), venter, mentula, crus, quastu, lucru, valetudines, defico in as tabelas.

B) Rufa Pulica, manus, detes, oclos, bracia, venter, mamila, pectus, osu, merilas, venter, .... crus (?) os, pedes, frontes, uncis, dicitos, venter, umlicus, cunus, ulvas (?), ilae, Rufas Pulica de[f]ico in as tabelas.

Image of side A: Image of side B: For the nominatives (Malcio, Rufa) see J.N. Adams, Social Variation and the Latin Language (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013), p. 212:

A curse may begin with a heading consisting of the name of the victim in the nominative, standing outside the syntax of the rest of the tablet.

On the text of side B see Celia Sánchez Natalías, Sylloge of Defixiones from the Roman West, Vol. II (Oxford: BAR Publishing, 2022), pp. 133-134 (Italy, number 51):

The reading of the beginning of B, l. 7 has proven somewhat controversial: while Borsari read quas il(l)ae (B, l. 7, as did I during my autopsy, with an interpunct separating the words), Audollent (and later Gager 1992: no. 80, Solin 1995: 571, Versnel 1998: 223, Urbanová 2019: 428) proposed the reading [v]ulva(m). Furthermore, Cimarosti (2005: 452f., notes 14 and 2) reads quasil(l)a{e}(ria), a reference to the slave's duties, while Kropp (2008: no. 1.4.2/3) reads qua<e>stum. While the latter two readings do not take into account the interpunct that divides the two words, the first proposal, ([v]ulva(m)), is impossible for several reasons. First (and most importantly), it ignores the fact that that same corner is preserved in full, which means that the text is also fully preserved and, consequently, that the reconstruction of [v] is artificial. In addition, the ul that should be following the imaginary [v], presents some palaeographical problems: compare this l with the ones found in the rest of the text (which never have a horizontal stroke on top of the vertical stroke). Thus, the reading quas · il(l)ae (B, l. 7) is secure. That said, it is a matter of debate how quas should be analysed: it could either be taken as qua(e)s[tum] (cf. A, l. 9) or the relative pronoun, though its gender does not agree with the immediate antecedents.