Skip to Content

N. asekretis and judge of Nikopolis (tenth/eleventh century)

 
 

Obverse

Cross on (at least two) steps; Χ on crossing. On either side fleuron rising to the top. Remnants of a circular inscription. No border visible.

δουλ,

Κύριε βοήθει τῷ σῷ δούλ

Reverse

Inscription of four preserved lines. No border visible.

ωασ..
.ιτ,κρ.
.νικοπ
.λεοσ

.....ῳ ἀσηκρῖτις καὶ κριτ Νικοπόλεος

Obverse

Cross on (at least two) steps; Χ on crossing. On either side fleuron rising to the top. Remnants of a circular inscription. No border visible.

δουλ,

Κύριε βοήθει τῷ σῷ δούλ

Reverse

Inscription of four preserved lines. No border visible.

ωασ..
.ιτ,κρ.
.νικοπ
.λεοσ

.....ῳ ἀσηκρῖτις καὶ κριτ Νικοπόλεος

Accession number BZS.1951.31.5.2447
Diameter 19.0 mm
Previous Editions

DO Seals 2, no. 2.4.
Seibt, Nikopolis, no. 10.

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

Translation

Κύριε βοήθει τῷ σῷ δούλῳ .....ῳ ἀσηκρῖτις καὶ κριτῇ Νικοπόλεος.

Lord, help your servant N., asekretis and judge of Nikopolis.

Commentary

Seibt has read the first preserved line of the reverse and the beginning of the second line as: ..ῳ βασιλικῷ βεστίτωριΩ is clearly legible; the second letter is an uncertain Α that could as well be read as an ; the third letter, with its round contour, could be a Σ or an Ε but not as a . We therefore read ἀσηκρῆτις, a title often combined with that of thematic judge (e.g., no. 2.1 above); moreover, the title of imperial vestitor seems to have gone out of fashion by the middle of the 10th century (Listes, 296).

Bibliography

  • 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)
  • Die sphragistischen Quellen zum byzantinischen Thema Nikopolis (Open in Zotero)
  • Les listes de préséance byzantines des IXe et Xe siècles (Open in Zotero)
  • De Administrando Imperio (Open in Zotero)
  • Constantine Porphyrogenitus, De Administrando Imperio (Open in Zotero)
  • Nikopolis und Kephallenia (Open in Zotero)
  • Le Corpus des sceaux de l’empire byzantin (Open in Zotero)
  • Notitiae Episcopatuum Ecclesiae Constantinopolitanae (Open in Zotero)
  • Nikopolis I: Proceedings of the First International Symposium on Nicopolis (Open in Zotero)
  • Hierarchia Ecclesiastica Orientalis: Series episcoporum ecclesiarum christianarum orientalium (Open in Zotero)