Notes to Funerary Inscription for Victorina

Di Manes, m. pl.

the collective spirits of the dead, the divine spirits. DM is a common abbreviation for the dedication of a funerary monument to the spirits of the dead and thus is in the dative case. These letters or the words they stand for are regularly found at the head of funerary inscriptions dating from the end of the 1st century BCE through the 2nd century CE.

Iulia, -ae f.

Julia is the proper name of women born into the gens Iulia. Victorina appears to have inherited the nomen gentilicium from her father. The name of the deceased is either in the dative case as the dedicatee of the inscription, or the genitive as the possessor of the DM.

Victorina, -ae f.

The dead girl's cognomen.

menses, menses m.

month. Both annis and mensibus are ablatives of time following vixit. Some inscriptions included days as well.

Saturninus, -i m.

The cognomen of Victorina's father is found during the Republic and the Empire. There was a centurian named Gaius Iulius Saturninus who came from Chios and served under the Flavians in a unit of Spaniards in Egypt, but no firm connection can be made.

Lucilia, -ae f.

Lucilia is the proper name of women born into the gens Lucilia; Victorina's mother's cognomen is Procula.

parens, -entis m./f.

parent. It is in the nominative plural, in apposition with Saturninus and Procula, who are the subjects of the verb fecerunt.

dulcis, -e

sweet, lovely, dear, kind. The adjective is in the superlative degree. It modifies filiae; both are in the dative case, in apposition with Iuliae Victorinae.

[hoc monumentum]

this phrase normally follows the verb of dedication (fecit/fecerunt) in funerary inscriptions. Monumentum is the regular word for a Roman tombstone. Sometimes the entire formula is omitted as unnecessary or for lack of space or money.

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