Setting the Desert on Fire: How Rome linked Britain and the Arab world

Setting the Desert on Fire 'blog ^ | Friday, December 12, 2008 | James Barr

[SunkenCiv]

We spent a few hours deciphering Roman inscriptions when I studied Latin at school, but unfortunately not long enough for any of what I learnt to stick. Which is a pity for they yield a lot of information. When I spotted the elegantly-lettered tombstone of Cautronius, a standard-bearer of the Italian troop [I think], when I visited Lebanon last year, I thought it worthy of a photograph.*

An inscription I saw in a museum in St Albans a while ago points to some interesting linkages across the Roman world, and hints at a tragic love story. It is dedicated to Regina, and reads:

D[is] M[anibus] Regina Liberta et Coniuge Barates Palmyrenus Natione Catuallauna An[nomum] XXX

To the spirits of the departed and to Regina his freedwoman and wife, a Catavellaunian by tribe, aged 30 Barates of Palmyra set this up.

Barates, a Syrian from the eastern edge of Rome's empire found himself posted to its North-West Frontier. For the gravestone of his wife was found at Arbeia Roman Fort near South Shields, on Hadrian's Wall, where Barates served. Regina's tribe, the Catavellauni came from the area around St Albans.

As the almost tangible warmth of a photograph I took several years ago in Palmyra shows, South Shields is a long way off.

[SunkenCiv]

The grave stone of Cautronius, a troop standard bearer, at Tyre, southern Lebanon

*The inscription mentions something about a "falca" -- which appears to mean a scythe or sickle. Any help with translation gratefully received...

[SunkenCiv]

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[patton]

“His wife”

[GeronL]

interesting!

[SunkenCiv]

Thanks GeronL. The page popped up in a search I did thanks to Old Student. :’)

[JoeProBono]

Arbeia Roman Fort stands on The Lawe, South Shields, there are extensive excavations of the site which housed a garrison of Roman soldiers and granaries to supply Hadrian’s Wall.

[Fiddlstix]

Please check your FReepmail

[bboop]

Isn’t ‘ius’ ‘his’?? ... Does that help?

[bboop]

Isn’t ‘ius’ ‘his’?? ... Does that help?

[dog breath]

Love is where you find it, the heart cares not of birth or origins. It must of been an interesting relationship much like the brides our servicemen find in many lands. I worked with a woman once who being brought back to the United States not knowing English sat for hours holding her baby trying to figure out the language from watching Sesame Street on the TV. It is good to know people tried to make things work back then as they do now.

[SunkenCiv]

Thanks dog breath.

[SunkenCiv]

Thanks Fiddlstix.

[colorado tanker]

Wow. There’s a big, big difference between the Syrian desert and Yorkshire!

[SunkenCiv]

:’)