altar
Description
Altar found just outside of the Antonine Wall fort of Westerwood.
SILVANUS [ET]/ QUADRVIS CA[E]LESTIB.SACR/ VIBIA PACATA/ FL.VERECV[ND]I/ C LEG.VI.VIC/ CUM SVIS/ V.S.L.M
Sacred to the Silvanae Quadriviae Caelestes: Vibia Pacata, wife of Flavius Verecundus, centurion of the Sixth Legion Victrix, with her family willingly and deservedly fulfilled her vow.
It is dedicated to local deities - those of the woodland and the junction of four roads. Vibia Pacata is a North African name and so it seems that Flavius probably served in the army in that region before being transferred to the Antonine Wall.
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Object detail
“Sacred to the Silvanae Quadriviae Caelestes: Vibia Pacata, wife of Flavius Verecundus, centurion of the Sixth Legion Victrix, with her family willingly and deservedly fulfilled her vow”.
It is dedicated to local deities - those of the woodland and the junction of four roads. Vibia Pacata is a North African name and so it seems that Flavius probably served in the army in that region before being transferred to the Antonine Wall.
SILVANIS [ET
QVADRVIS CA[E
LESTIB.SACR
VIBIA PACATA
FL.VERECVNDI
> LEG VI VIC
CVM SVIS
VSLM
The letter P in the fourth line and F in the 5th line seem reasonably certain, granted the style of lettering; the F in line 5, in particular, comes out clearly as a ghost-letter in the edge of the break.
The dedication smacks of Pannonia: cf Domaszewski, Abhandlungen zur romischen Religion, 1909, 78f., pointing out that the association of the Quadriviae with the Silvanae is characteristic of Pannonia (examples of this conjunction are CIL III 4441 = ILS 3574, Carnuntum; III 13475 and 14089, ibidem; III 13497 = ILS 3575, Vindobona); so are the Silvanae (as opposed to Silvanus), though they also occur on a North Italian text (CIL V 3303 = ILS 3571, Verona).
The centuraion therefore may well be identical with the T. Falvius Verecundus, from Claudia Savaria, centurion of Leg. XIIII Gemina Martia Victrix, who dedicated an altar to Mithras at Carnuntum, its station (CIL III 4416), transferred thence to Leg. VI Victrix in Britain.
Vibia Pacata, his wife, may well be of Panonnian origin also; note that Lucco Treni filius, Dobunnus, to whom the diploma CIL XVI 49 of 12 January 105 was issued, serving in Pannonia married a Pannonian woman, Tutula Breuci filia, Azala, and one of their daughters was given the name Pacata. Centurions were allowed to marry, from the time of Augustus on, and it was proper Roman custom to indicate the relationship of wife to husband by putting the husband's name in the genitive after that of the wife, without the noun uxor.
I should hestitate to attempt a dating of the inscription on the style of lettering; the military documents of the 2nd and 3rd centuries alike use this semi-cursive style. But it might perhpas be worth while to admit the possibity of an early 3rd century date: compare the Severan altar of A. Cluentius Habitus at Carrawburgh, and the altar of AD 211 from Carnuntum, CIL III 4441 = ILS 3574, dedicated "Silvanab. et quadribis Aug." by a veteran of Leg XIIII Gemina.
27 June 1963 E.B."
[Presumably Eric Birley]
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