the attic stelai - The American School of Classical Studies at Athens

THE ATTIC STELAI 309
was earlier restored in the editio princeps as [dpyvi]ptov apyoV K - -],1 and this
reading was retained in our Part I 2 The second thought of the present writer, however,
is that he would hesitate to accept the restoration.
Meritt noted as a parallel for his restoration that in Pausanias III, 12, 3, a'pyvpos
was modified by argos. Similarly, one might have cited passages in which argos is
used with the same meaning and is applied to lead, bronze, and iron.3 But our entry
occurs following a series of pithaknai and preceding a rather lengtlhy list of roof tiles.
A reference to uncoined silver seems out of place.
The adjective argos can be applied to certain types of manufactured objects which
are left ' unfinished ' or to certain objects or tools which are ' idle.' In architecture,
the word means 'blank.' For example, the uncarved moulding or the block without
anathyrosis is so termed in the Erechtheion building inscriptions.4 Liddell-Scott-Jones
lists examples of the ' undressed ' hide, wheat ' unprepared for eating,' the ' unpolished
' stone, land 'lying fallow,' and Xpw4,uara 'yielding no return.' In Josephus
the stone which is ' unwrought ' is argos.5 Since our inscription is not stoichedon
(although 3 T2-4 letters seem likely for the lacuna before the rho), and nouns in
-ptov are numerous (see Buck and Petersen, Reverse Index, pp. 94-108), the author
is not prepared to offer a substitute restoration. In keeping with the sequence of jars,
one might suggest aJp,6pwov, XEKaptov,6 or possibly Xovr'ptov. On the whole, however,
the item seems too elusive.
2. /3aOp0'vtka (V, 33). Base of a thymiaterion or censer. All the letters of this
word, which is new in Greek lexicography, are preserved with the exception of the
first. In Part I no effort was made to identify the object which it names. It may now
be suggested that the word is compounded from f3a(pov, 'base, pedestal,' and Ovio,g,
'thyme' or Ovik6s,7 and refers to the base of a thymiaterion. For the formation of the
word, comparison may be made, for example, with E61Tv,uov. K. Wigand in his apparently
exhaustive study of the thymiaterion in Bonner Jahrbilcher, CXXII, 1912,
pp. 1-97, gives illustrations of terracotta bases from Greek sources (pp. 41-42). Since
our item follows a terracotta object and is in turn followed by a vase, it is reasonable
to infer that it too was of terracotta.
3. 8E&-pq (II, 151). Bundle, package. For the etymology cf. Boisacq, Dictionnaire4,
s.v. 8E'w I. Athenaeus quotes a fragment from Semos of Delos to the
'B. D. Meritt, Hesperia, VII, 1938, p. 81.
2 Hesperia, XXII, 1953, p. 282.
3 See the references in Thesaurus Graecae Linguae.
4 See G. P. Stevens, Erechtheum, pp. 315 and 316 with references.
5Ap., I, 198.
6 Pollux (X, 87) specifically associates lekos with our Stelai, and the item lekarion (X, 86) is
mentioned in the sentence which follows a reference to confiscated lists.
' For the derivation of OvAuaJ, etc., from Ovjuo's, see Boisacq, Dictionnaire4, s.vv. Ov/o"s and Ov4Los.