Some new Syriac inscriptions and archaeological finds from Edessa and Sumatar Harabesi

Abstract

During a journey in the Near East I spent some days in Urfa, the ancient Edessa, in the south-east of Turkey, and from there I visited Sumatar Harabesi in the Tektek mountains on 27 and 29 January 1971. The object was to study all known Syriac inscriptions in Urfa and its surroundings, which date from the first three centuries of our era, in situ for their republication in a small corpus. In Sumatar Harabesi my attention was primarily directed upon the inscriptions published by Segal, all situated upon the so-called Central Mount, clearly an ancient cult site. I also visited the cave with bas-reliefs and inscriptions discovered by Pognon. It is now inhabited by a Bedouin family, but in spite of the inconveniences caused by this circumstance, it was possible to read the inscriptions, blackened as they were, by the light of a pocket torch and an oil-lamp, and it was impressive to observe once more how able an epigrapher this French consul was.