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A Curse Tablet from Nottinghamshire

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 September 2012

Eric G. Turner
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Extract

This tablet was found on 10th December, 1960, by Mr. Roger Wilson of Thrumpton, Notts, after ploughing had taken place on the lower slope of Red Hill in the parish of Ratcliffe-on-Soar, Notts. Roman pottery, bone counters and other objects have been found on Red Hill, which appears to be a Roman site. It is at the junction of the rivers Trent and Soar (where also Nottinghamshire and Leicestershire meet). The tablet was folded roughly into three when found. The material, discoloured by corrosion and of a browny copper colour, proved on analysis to be essentially lead (in an impure state). Its maximum measurements are 8·4 cm. in height, 5·7 cm. in width. Both sides have been lightly incised, perhaps with a needle, with Latin cursive writing. The hand is regularly formed and clear and shows skill on the part of the scribe. To judge from parallels from Egypt, it should be assigned to the end of the second or the early part of the third century A.D. For the earlier limit compare the receipt P. Lond. 730 (plate in Écriture Latine 26) of A.D. 167; and for the later, P. Oxy. VIII, 1114, a declaration of inheritance of A.D. 237 (plate ibid., pl. 7). Both of these, however, show a slope to the right, whereas in this tablet the slope is to the left in the older manner.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Journal of Roman Studies , Volume 53 , Issue 1-2 , November 1963 , pp. 122 - 124
Copyright
Copyright © Eric G. Turner 1963. Exclusive Licence to Publish: The Society for the Promotion of Roman Studies

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References

1 Information from Mr. B. C. J. Williams, Director of Excavations, Loughborough and District Archaeological Society, who kindly gave permission for publication in the Journal.

2 Cleaning, undertaken several times (last of all through the kindness of Dr. Hodges of the Institute of Archaeology of London University) is not permanent in its effects. The plate was taken by Mr. E. Hitchcock of University College London.

3 Thanks are due to Professor E. D. Hughes and Mr. Robin Clark of University College London, for analysing a sample.

4 cf. Audollent, A., Mélanges Iorga (1933), 31 ff.Google Scholar

5 The lead plate from the amphitheatre of Caerleon, interpreted by Collingwood (Archaeologia LXXVIII, 1928, 158, no. 10) as perhaps a curse on a thief, has been shown by R. Egger, Röm. Antike und frühes Christentum, 281, to be a normal curse against a competitor in the arena. No reason is given for the curse in the leaden defixio from the City of London (London Museum Catal. no. 3, ‘London in Roman Times’ 1930, 51–2, and fig. 7; I am grateful to Professor Sheppard Frere for calling my attention to it).

The essential bibliography is given in Audollent, A.'s great collection, Defixionum Tabellae (Paris, 1904).Google Scholar Some isolated publications since Audollent: Fox, W. Sherwood, The Johns Hopkins Tabellae (AJPhil. XXXIII, 1912, supplement volume).Google Scholar Besnier, M., Rev. Phil., 1920, 5–30.Google Scholar Preisendanz, K., Archiv. für Papyrusforschung IX (1930), 119 ff.Google Scholar; XI (1933), 153 ff.

Various texts from Roman Germany are republished by R. Egger, Röm; Antike und frühes Christentum, esp. 79 ff., 272 ff. cf. also Cormack, J. M. R., ‘A Tabella Defixionis in the Museum of the University of Reading, England,’ HTR XLIV (1951), 25 ff.CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Trumpf, Jürgen, ‘Fluchtafel und Rachepuppe,’ Ath. Mitt, LXXIII (1958), 94 ff.Google Scholar

6 Its whereabouts are unknown, and this guess cannot now be substantiated by information derived from the tablet itself. No. I was found in the hot springs of Aquae Sulis, and springs were a favourite place in which to deposit them. cf. Haverfield, F., VCH Somerset I (1906), 282, 3.Google Scholar

7 The Kelvedon tablet is similar. But could it have had a more specific address on its other side?

8 See Audollent, Defixionum Tabellae p. XXXII, and esp. XXXVII.

9 Fox, W. Sherwood, AJPhil. XXXIII, Supplement 129 (1912), no. 1, e.g. 1. 9Google Scholar, ‘[quare ha]nc uictimam tibi trad[o’ and 1. 17 and frequently, ‘do tibi cap[ut] Ploti Auoniae.’ The use of do in the execration from Caerleon (above, n. 5) is different: a piece of the cursed person's clothing is being given to Nemesis.

10 No. 1 presumably to Sulis Minerva; no. 2 to Nodens; no. 3 to Mercurius and Virtus.

11 There is a very doubtful mention, not invocation, of Ζεύς in Audollent no. 7, 12.

12 For the addition of the prefix deo cf. no. 2, ‘devo Nodenti,’ where devo is no doubt rightly interpreted as for deivo or divo, not as devoveo.

I should like to thank I. A. Richmond, R. P. Wright and the late A. D. Nock for suggestions.