KI010+KI017+KI018 (Late Roman-Early Byzantine Christian Greek Epitaph) [permalink]
Type
Inventoried Object
Technique
Back of slab has thick patches of mortar from attachment against rubble strut or support, like Grave 43. Letters are broadly and deeply cut and heights vary considerably with especially tall rhos and short omicrons. Each line drifts drastically upward to right, particularly lines 3–4 near right margin.
Rectangular plaque was displaced during subsequent burial or looting and smashed into irregular pieces from point of impact to lower right. Four joining fragments preserve over half of four lines of Greek text. Stone seems to have had sloping or arched top edge; right edge was uneven. Below last line is wide vacant space that implies format similar to KI013. Slight, sparse abrasion; very slight, sparse encrustation.
Published as
Rife2022e, pp. 1196-1197, 1207-1208, no. 920, fig. 25.5
Late Roman-Early Byzantine (6th-7th century). Dated by context, contents, paleography, material.
Explanation of deposition
Tombstone for cist containing one young adult 34A, one young/middle-aged adult 34B, and one child 34C but displaced during subsequent burial or looting.
Affixed in narrow slit cut into bedrock west of opening, but graverobbers later smashed it and pressed pieces down into cist. Two other fragmentary epitaphs were found in this context (KI012+KI020, KI011), but their format and lettering distinguish them from this one.