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Negev. Zoora. March 22, 346 CE to March 21, 347 CE. Sandstone tombstone, engraved and painted. Epitaph.
Found by local inhabitants in the northwest corner of the Bronze Age, Byzantine and Islamic cemetery in the An Naq neighborhood south of the Wadi al-Hasa, probably in secondary use in later graves.
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Αὐξιβίου ἀ
ποθανού
σης ἐτῶν
Monument of Troila, (daughter) of Auxibios, who died (at the age) of 35 years, in (the) year 241.
The tombstone is chipped and broken at the bottom, though the text is still clearly legible. Many of the letters show remnants of red paint within the engraving. The text includes both an orthographic and a grammatical error, and is recorded in a script which is square apart aside from its round and rhomboid omicrons. The text is engraved and painted red. The author notes that the name Τροείλλα is a solecism (mistake/misspelling) of Τρωΐλα, which itself is the feminine form of the name Τρωΐλος, a hypocoristicon (nickname) for Τρῷος. The inscription provides the year 241 according to the Era of the Province of Arabia, or March 22, 346 CE to March 21, 347 CE, as a date. The tombstone is one of about 700 discovered in Byzantine Zoora. Of these 700, the majority of the Greek inscriptions have been identified as Christian. The age numeral in line 6 is marked by a horizontal bar above the numeral. The year numeral in line 7 is similarly marked. The author suggests that the deceased in Zoor0008 and Zoor0009 were probably sisters based on the language, ages, dates in the inscriptions as well as the fact that both women share the patronymic, Ἀυξιβίος, a name scarcely attested in the region.