Flavia Licciardello (University of Bologna)
Epigraphic poetry is usually anonymous and inscribed Greek epigrams are no exception. In a few cases, however, authors of epigrams left their signature on the stone. Santin’s (2009) pioneering study on the topic only focused on signatures of poets for funerary epigrams, which are all dated from the 2nd century BC onwards. Yet the earliest examples of signatures are from the 4th century BC and are not found in sepulchral contexts; rather, they accompany epigrams engraved on dedications (so-called dedicatory epigrams). The aim of this paper is to highlight the function and features of such signatures, dated between the 4th and the 2nd centuries BC, i.e. from a crucial moment for the development of epigrams as an authorial genre, when epigrams flourished and started to be circulated in books, alongside their author’s name (Garulli 2019). Within the recent broader debate on anonymity and authorship in ancient literature (e.g. Geue 2019, Berardi et al. 2020), such signatures cast further light on the birth of the concept of an individualized authorial epigrammatic voice – a concept that would soon be further elaborated in the earliest authorial collections of epigrams (Gutzwiller 1998).
After illustrating the chronological and geographical distribution of the ten examples of signatures that I have collected, the analysis of selected cases shows that the acknowledgement of authorship in epigraphic contexts is associated with specific functions, such as the wish to highlight the poetic skills of the dedicator. For example, in IThesp. 274 the dedicator, and author of the epigram, makes an implicit comparison between his epigram and Hesiod’s poetry. In other cases the signature speaks to a specific readership, as in Arbinas’ dedications (CEG 888 and 889) where the signatures of the Greek seer and paidotribes address Greek readers and stress the hellenisation of the Lycian king. As for the identities of these authors, the analysis confirms that even in this era of increasing poetic professionalism, the cases in which dedicators themselves composed the text were not rare. In IG IX 2 637 the signature of a professional poet is used to highlight the message conveyed in the epigram, i.e. that the dedication is a pious investment of the two dedicators’ wealth, which included the expenses for hiring a poet. On the other hand, in the aforementioned IThesp. 274, the dedicator proudly highlights that he, Hesiod’s admirer, composed the verses accompanying his well-suited dedication to the Muses. Lastly, the lexicon employed by the authors to refer to their work conveys significant information on how epigrams were perceived and offers an important source for the ancient terminology associated with this genre. The terms employed are consistent with other contemporary sources: the poetic endeavor is indicated through a reference to the meter used (ἐλεγεῖον or ἔπη), since the word ἐπίγραμμα had not yet established itself as the terminus technicus for the genre.
As a challenge to the traditional categories of anonymous inscribed and authorial book epigrams, early signed epigrams are therefore a long-neglected but essential source for our understanding of the genre.