Laudator Temporis Acti

Reinhold Merkelbach and Josef Stauber, Steinepigramme aus dem griechischen Osten, Bd. 2: Die Nordküste Kleinasiens (Marmarasee und Pontos) (Munich: K.G. Saur, 2001), p. 205:


This also appears in Friedrich Karl Dörner, ed., Tituli Bithyniae linguis Graeca et Latina conscripti: Paeninsula Bithynica praeter Calchedonem, Nicomedia et Ager Nicomedensis cum septemtrionali meridianoque litore Sinus Astaceni et cum Lacu Sumonensi (Vienna: Academia Scientiarum Austriaca, 1978 = Tituli Asiae Minoris, Vol. IV, Fasc. 1), number 109 (non vidi).

Here is the Greek, with an English translation:

[¯˘˘ ¯˘˘ ¯˘μ' ὁρᾶτ]ε νέκυν, παροδεῖται.
[οὔν]ομά μοι παγανὸν Ἀπολλώ[νι]ς ἐκλήθην,
οὗ πατρὶς Ἀπά[μι]α, νῦν δὲ Νικομηδείας με [γ]αῖᾳ
πρὸς δάπεδον κατέχει με μίτος καὶ νήματα Μοιρῶν.
ὀκτάκι νεικήσας τὸν ἐν σταδίοισιν ἀγῶναν,
τῇ δ' ἐνάτῃ πυγμῇ τὸ πεπρωμένον ὧδε ἀπέδωκε.
παῖζε, γέλα, παροδεῖτα, εἰδὼς ὅτι καὶ σὲ θανεῖν δεῖ.

Ἀλεξάνδρια ἡ σύμβιος αὐτοῦ ἐκ τῶν αὐτοῦ τὸ μνημεῖον ἀνέστησα μνείας χάριν· εἰ δέ τις τὸν βωμὸν τολμήσει καταστρέψε, δώσει προστείμου τῷ φίσκῳ (δην.) βφ'.

O passersby, you see me, a corpse.
For my civilian name I was called Apolloni(o)s.
My fatherland was Apameia, but now in the land of Nikomedeia
the thread and yarn of the Fates hold me fast in the earth.
Having won the contest in the amphitheater eight times,
in the ninth fight destiny delivered me over to this place.
Play, laugh, o passerby, knowing that you too must die.

Alexandria, his wife, with his earnings set up this memorial for the sake of remembrance. If anyone dares to disturb the tomb, he will pay a fine of 2500 denarii to the treasury.