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N. imperial protospatharios and strategos of Chasanara (?) .... (tenth century)

 
 

Obverse

A griffin, turned to right. Circle of pellets within a double border of dots.

Reverse

Inscription (of five lines?). Border of dots.

νο
Rˊˊσπ
τρτ
νρ
.....

...ανο... β(ασιλικῷ) (πρωτο)σπ[αθαρίῳ καὶ σ]τρατ(ηγῷ) [Χασ]αναρ(ᾶ) ...

Obverse

A griffin, turned to right. Circle of pellets within a double border of dots.

Reverse

Inscription (of five lines?). Border of dots.

νο
Rˊˊσπ
τρτ
νρ
.....

...ανο... β(ασιλικῷ) (πρωτο)σπ[αθαρίῳ καὶ σ]τρατ(ηγῷ) [Χασ]αναρ(ᾶ) ...

Accession number BZS.1951.31.5.1904
Diameter 28.0 mm; field: 22.0 mm
Previous Editions

DO Seals 4, no. 80.1.

Credit Line Harvard Art Museums/Arthur M. Sackler Museum, Bequest of Thomas Whittemore.

Translation

...ανο... βασιλικῷ πρωτοσπαθαρίῳ καὶ στρατηγῷ Χασαναρᾶ ...

...ano..., imperial protospatharios and strategos of Chasanara.

Commentary

Traces of letters from an understrike are observable on the obverse. At the end of the fifth line on the reverse, seemingly μ followed by a lunate letter, either an ε or σ. This could belong to a family name or to a second place-name.

The placename Χασαναρᾶ is attested in the Taktikon of Escorial and seems to be a Greek deformation of the Arabic Hisn ar-Ran, today Siverek, between Samosata and Diyarbekir. It was conquered by the Byzantines after 956 and became the seat of a small strategos before the early seventies of the Xth century. See Listes, 269, l. 7 and 362 and N. Oikonomidès, “Organisation," 291.



Bibliography

  • Catalogue of Byzantine Seals at Dumbarton Oaks and in the Fogg Museum of Art, Vol. 4: The East (Open in Zotero)
  • Les listes de préséance byzantines des IXe et Xe siècles (Open in Zotero)
  • L’organisation de la frontière orientale de Byzance aux Xe-XIe siècles et Le Taktikon de l’Escorial (Open in Zotero)