ISic004516: Mason's mark (sigma) from the Ionic temple at Syracuse
No image available
- ID
- ISic004516
- Status
- draft
- Language
- Ancient Greek
- Object type
- block
- Text type
- mason's mark
Edition
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Apparatus criticus
- Text after photograph (Guzzardi 2012, 150 fig. 5)
Physical description
Support
- Description
- No data
- Object type
- block
- Object condition
- complete
- Dimensions
Material
- Description
- limestone
Inscription
- Layout
- No data
- Text condition
- complete
- Technique
- chiselled
- Pigment
- No data
- Lettering
The sign is interpreted by Guzzardi as probably an archaic sigma, although a mu with diverging legs cannot be excluded.
- Letter heights
- Line 1: mm
- Interlinear heights
Provenance
- Place of origin
- Syracusae
- Provenance found
- Found in situ on the exposed surface of a limestone block in the second course of a three-course masonry structure within the perimeter of the cella of the Ionic temple, beneath the municipal building east of Palazzo Vermexio, Ortygia, Syracuse
- Map
Current location
- Place
- Siracusa,
- Repository
- Ionic temple
- Autopsy
- None
Date
Late 6th to early 5th century BCE (525 BCE - 475 BCE)- Evidence
- No data
Text type
commentary
The mark is incised on a block in the second course of a three-course masonry structure within the perimeter of the cella. Guzzardi prefers to identify it as an archaic sigma, while acknowledging that it could instead be a mu with diverging legs. The block remained in situ. The stratigraphic sequence associates the structure with the construction of the cella in the late sixth or early fifth century BCE. Guzzardi interprets comparable signs on blocks from the temple as setting-out marks used to guide their positioning and orientation.
Bibliography
- Digital editions
- TM: -
- EDR: -
- EDH: -
- EDCS: -
- PHI: -
- Printed editions
- Lorenzo Guzzardi, ‘Le Recenti Esplorazioni Di Scavo Presso Il Tempio Ionico in Ortigia’, Archivio Storico Siracusano 47, no. IV (2012): 131–76, at 145–151, 150 fig. 5; 174 n. 61
Citation and editorial status
- Editor
- Jonathan Prag
- Principal contributor
- Valentina Mignosa
- Contributors
- Last revision
- 7/31/2026
- License
- Commons CC-BY 4.0