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Arsavir dioiketes of Miletos (ninth century)

 
 

Obverse

Cruciform invocational monogram (type II or V); in the quarters: τ-σ|δ-.. Wreath border.

Θεοτόκε βοήθει τῷ σῷ δού[λῳ]

Reverse

Inscription of four lines. Wreath border:

+ρσ
.ηριοι
.ιτημη
..τ.

Ἀρσα[β]ὴρ διοι[κ]ιτῇ Μη[λή]του

Obverse

Cruciform invocational monogram (type II or V); in the quarters: τ-σ|δ-.. Wreath border.

Θεοτόκε βοήθει τῷ σῷ δού[λῳ]

Reverse

Inscription of four lines. Wreath border:

+ρσ
.ηριοι
.ιτημη
..τ.

Ἀρσα[β]ὴρ διοι[κ]ιτῇ Μη[λή]του

Accession number BZS.1955.1.688
Diameter 26.0 mm
Previous Editions

DO Seals 3, no. 26.1.

Zacos-Veglery, no. 1731(B) (misread as Μιτυλήνης).

Translation

Θεοτόκε βοήθει τῷ σῷ δούλῳ Ἀρσαβὴρ διοικιτῇ Μηλήτου.

Mother of God, help your servant Arsavir, dioiketes of Miletos.

Commentary

Zacos-Veglery identified a contemporary Arsavir who was dioiketes of Mitylene and of Stavroupolis (DO Seals 2, no. 51.1 and 66.2).

This famous ancient city kept its name well into the ninth century when it still constituted the center of a fiscal delimitation (διοίκησις); but the city was enclosed inside fortifications, mainly in the old theater, and took a new name, Palatia (modern Balat), derived from its spectacular antiquities. It was a bishopric as early as the fourth century, became an archbishopric by 538, and then a metropolis in the twelfth century. See Laurent, Corpus V/1, 543; Brandes, Städte, 89-92; ODB II, 1372-73.

Bibliography

  • Catalogue of Byzantine Seals at Dumbarton Oaks and at the Fogg Museum of Art, Vol. 3: West, Northwest, and Central Asia Minor and the Orient (Open in Zotero)
  • Le Corpus des sceaux de l’empire byzantin (Open in Zotero)
  • Die Städte Kleinasiens im 7. und 8. Jahrhundert (Open in Zotero)
  • Catalogue of the Byzantine Seals at Dumbarton Oaks and at the Fogg Museum of Art, Vol. 2: South of the Balkans, the Islands, South of Asia Minor (Open in Zotero)