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Document Details : Title: Cursing in the Chamber Tombs at Roman Kenchreai Subtitle: Contested Space and Elite Competition Author(s): RIFE, Joseph L. , FARAONE, Christopher A. Journal: Ancient Society Volume: 54 Date: 2024 Pages: 241-289 DOI: 10.2143/AS.54.0.3293602 Abstract : Important new evidence for cursing during the Early to Middle Roman periods has come to light at the port-town of Kenchreai near Corinth. Chamber tombs in the cemetery north of the harbor have produced three inscribed lead tablets, one inscribed lead canister, and associated deposits from funerary ritual. The texts in different hands variously contain personal names, formulaic language, anatomical terminology, divine invocations, a few unusual words, and charakteres. These remains show the innovative application of different magical practices in the context of elite burial at one cosmopolitan, provincial community: prayers for justice written legibly and left open for reading; and a binding curse, composed by a scribe after a handbook, left at an altar with a canister probably for an effigy. |
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