Monday, October 31, 2022
Epitaph of Quintus Caelius and Camidia Aphrodisia
Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum X 5371 = Carmina Latina Epigraphica 118 = Inscriptiones Latinae Selectae 7734 (lnteramna, Republican era):
There is a translation of the inscription in Brian K. Harvey, Roman Lives: Ancient Roman Life as Illustrated by Latin Inscriptions, corr. ed. (Indianapolis: Focus Publishing, 2015), p. 172 (with his notes):
On the epitaph see Alfredo Mario Morelli, "Di alcuni carmi epigrafici in senari giambici nel Latium Adiectum," in Heikki Solin, ed., Le Epigrafi della Valle di Comino. Atti del quattordicesimo convegno epigrafico cominese. Atina - Palazzo Ducale, 27-28 maggio 2017 ([San Donato Val di Comino]: Associazione "Genesi", 2018), pp. 111-121, and Gregory Bucher, "We all die, so have a drink while you can," Συγγράμματα (February 18, 2022).
There is a complete misunderstanding of the epitaph in Judson Allen Tolman Jr., A Study of the Sepulchral Inscriptions in Buecheler's Carmina Epigraphica Latina (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1910), p. 96:
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Vivit Q(uintus) Caelius Sp(uri) f(ilius) Vivi(us) architectus navalis, vivit uxor Camidia M(arci) l(iberta) Aprhodisia.Photograph of the stone:
Hospes resiste et nisi molestust, perlege.
noli stomachare. suadeo, caldum bibas.
moriundust. vale.
He lives: Quintus Caelius Vivius(?), son of Spurius,1 naval architect.2 She lives: his wife, Camidia Aphrodisia, freedwoman of Marcus. Friend, stop and read unless it is annoying (to stop). Do not be irritated. I ask that you drink a hot beverage. It is the kind of thing that passes away.3 Goodbye.But caldum isn't just "a hot beverage," but rather vinum cum aqua calida mixtum, i.e. wine mixed with hot water — see Ernst Diehl, Vulgärlateinische Inschriften (Bonn: A. Marcus und E. Weber, 1910), p. 56 (inscription number 633). And moriundust is "we must die", rather than "it is the kind of thing that passes away". On -ust for -umst or -um est see Manu Leumann, Lateinische Laut- und Formenlehre (Munich: C.H. Beck, 1977), p. 123 (§ 134, 2).
1 Vivius was freeborn, but he married a freedwoman.
2 Vivius designed and built ships.
3 It was quite common on tombstones to encourage the reader to enjoy life in some particular way which the deceased enjoyed, because life was seen as fleeting.
On the epitaph see Alfredo Mario Morelli, "Di alcuni carmi epigrafici in senari giambici nel Latium Adiectum," in Heikki Solin, ed., Le Epigrafi della Valle di Comino. Atti del quattordicesimo convegno epigrafico cominese. Atina - Palazzo Ducale, 27-28 maggio 2017 ([San Donato Val di Comino]: Associazione "Genesi", 2018), pp. 111-121, and Gregory Bucher, "We all die, so have a drink while you can," Συγγράμματα (February 18, 2022).
There is a complete misunderstanding of the epitaph in Judson Allen Tolman Jr., A Study of the Sepulchral Inscriptions in Buecheler's Carmina Epigraphica Latina (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1910), p. 96:
Inscription 118 is peculiar. The reader is advised to drink cold water if reading the monument makes him angry.
