Inscription of Abercius
Home > Other Christian Text Sources > Inscription of Abercius Inscription of Abercius At a Glance Gospel Genre: (5/5) ***** Reliability of Dating: (1/5) * Length of Text: Greek Original Language: Ancient Translations: Modern Translations: English Estimated Range of Dating: 193-216 A.D. Chronological List of Early Christian Writings Discuss this text on the Early Writings forum. Text Quasten's English Translation Resources Catholic Encyclopedia: Inscription of Abercius Catholic Encyclopedia: Early Christian Inscriptions Offsite Links Eucharistic Belief Manifest in the Epitaphs of Abercius and Pectorius Harnack on the Inscription of Abercius (F.C. Conybeare) Books J. Quasten, Patrology Vol.
I (Thomas More 1983 reprint). Recommended Books for the Study of Early Christian Writings Information on Inscription of Abercius J. Quasten writes (Patrology, vol. 1, pp. 171-172): The queen of all ancient Christian inscriptions is the epitaph of Abercius. In 1883 the archeologist W. Ramsay of the University of Aberdeen in Scotland discovered, near Hieropolis in Phrygia Salutaris, two fragments of this inscription, which are now in the Lateran Museum. A year before he had found a Christian epitaph of Alexander, dated 216, which was merely an imitation of the inscription of Abercius. With the help of this epitaph of Alexander and a Greek biography of Abercius from the fourth century published by Boissonade in 1838, it was possible to restore the entire text of the inscription.
It consists of 22 verses, a distichon, and 20 hexameters. In content it is a summary of the life and deeds of Abercius. The text was composed at the end of the second century, certainly before the year 216, the date of the epitaph of Alexander. The author of the inscription is Abercius, Bishop of Hieropolis, who composed it at the age of 72 years. The great event of his life was his journey to Rome, of which he gives an account. The inscription is written in a mystical and symbolical style, according to the discipline of the secret, to conceal its Christian character from the uninitiated. The metaphorical phraseology is responsible for the sharp controversy which followed the discovery of this monument.
Several scholars, like G. Ficker and A. Dietrich, tried to prove that Abercius was not a Christian, but a venerator of the Phrygian goddess Cybele, while A. Harnack called Abercius a syncretist. However, De Rossi, Duchesne, Cumont, Doelger and Abel have successfully demonstrated that the content as well as the language proves beyond doubt its Christian origin. J. Tixeront writes (A Handbook of Patrology, p. 82): The inscription of Abercius. Prof. Ramsay in 1883 discovered a large part of the text of this inscription, together with the funerary cippus which bore it. It is the self-written epitaph, in twenty-two verses, of a certain Abercius, a citizen of Hierapolis in Phrygia. Abercius, in language of simple allegory, declares himself a disciple of the Good Shepherd, speaks of his journeys to Rome and Syria, and mentions Baptism and the Eucharist.
The inscription is certainly Christian and dates from the end of the second century. Abercius is probably the Avircius Marcellus, to whom the anonymous anti-Montanist, mentioned above, had dedicated his work. Msgr. Duchesne thinks he was bishop of Hierapolis. J. B. Lightfoot writes (The Apostolic Fathers, pt. II, vol. I, pp. 498-499): When I still supposed, as was then the universal opinion, that the Abercius of the epitaph was bishop of Hierapolis on the Maeander, I ventured to identify him, as others had done, with the Avircius Marcellus to whom an anonymous writer (Eus. H. E. v. 16) addresses a treatise in an early stage of the Montanist controversy (see Colossians p. 56). This identification becomes still more probable now that he has been shown to belong to Hieropolis of Lesser Phrygia; for this anonymous writer mentions one Zoticus of Otrous as his 'fellow-presbyter' (του συμπÏεσβυτεÏου ημων Zωτικου ΟτÏηνου), and Otrous was only two miles from this Hierapolis.