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Sabas (?) monk and bishop of Alabanda (ninth/tenth century)

 
 

Obverse

Vague outline of a winged figure standing in profile at right; probably an Annunciation scene, but with the Archangel standing on the side where the Virgin customarily appears. No sigla visible. Border of dots.

Reverse

Inscription of five lines. Border of dots.

....
ΟΗΘΕΙΣ..
ΜΟΝΧΕ..
ΣΚΟΠ,Λ
ΝΔΝ

[Θ(εοτό)κε β]οήθει Σά[βᾳ] μοναχῷ (καὶ) ἐ[πι]σκόπ(ῳ) Ἀλαβάνδων

Obverse

Vague outline of a winged figure standing in profile at right; probably an Annunciation scene, but with the Archangel standing on the side where the Virgin customarily appears. No sigla visible. Border of dots.

Reverse

Inscription of five lines. Border of dots.

....
ΟΗΘΕΙΣ..
ΜΟΝΧΕ..
ΣΚΟΠ,Λ
ΝΔΝ

[Θ(εοτό)κε β]οήθει Σά[βᾳ] μοναχῷ (καὶ) ἐ[πι]σκόπ(ῳ) Ἀλαβάνδων

Accession number BZS.1951.31.5.840
Diameter 28.0 mm
Previous Editions

DO Seals 2, no. 60.1. See also Laurent, Corpus V/1, no. 521 (proposing an interpretation of the scene on the obverse).

Credit Line Harvard Art Museums/Arthur M. Sackler Museum, Bequest of Thomas Whittemore.

Translation

Θεοτόκε βοήθει Σάβᾳ μοναχῷ καὶ ἐπισκόπῳ Ἀλαβάνδων.

Theotokos, help Sabas, monk and bishop of Alabanda.

Commentary

The reading of the owner's name is provisional. In the second line of the reverse, the name clearly begins with the letter Σ, followed by a letter formed with slanting sides, no doubt the letter Α. So we are halfway there, but the following letters are lost and must be inferred until confirmed or restored by a better preserved parallel.

Alabanda (modern Arabhisar), located south of the Meander River, was a suffragan bishopric of Stauroupolis of Caria (first bishop attested in 451). It appears in all notitiae until the thirteenth century. See Laurent, Corpus V/1, 382-83; Fedalto, 192; Robert, Amyzon, 17; Zgusta, 56.

Bibliography

  • Catalogue of the Byzantine Seals at Dumbarton Oaks and at the Fogg Museum of Art, Vol. 2: South of the Balkans, the Islands, South of Asia Minor (Open in Zotero)
  • Le Corpus des sceaux de l’empire byzantin (Open in Zotero)
  • Hierarchia Ecclesiastica Orientalis: Series episcoporum ecclesiarum christianarum orientalium (Open in Zotero)
  • Fouilles d’Amyzon en Carie (Open in Zotero)
  • Kleinasiatische Ortsnamen (Open in Zotero)