Vatican Museums

This epigraph refers to the twenty-eight year-old freedman (libertus) of Trajan, Marcus Ulpius Phaedimus, who died at Selinunte in Cilicia (Gazipşa, Turkey) during the war against the Parthians, on 12 August 117 (Nigro et Aproniano consulibus, a few days after the already deified Trajan (a singular coincidence of time and place, studied by historians especially with regard to the issue of Hadrian’s rise to power). It mentions his offices relating to his responsibility for drinks and the organisation of the imperial table, the main attendant (lictor proximus) of the emperor (the supreme magistrate), and director of the archive of the register of benefits granted by the emperor. In 130, after the necessary permission had been received from the Roman pontiffs and the required atoning sacrifice (piaculum) had been performed, his remains were translated to Rome and buried by Valens Phaedimianus, his collibertus, (he had previously been his slave, as attested by his name, derived from Phaedimus), Hadrian’s wardrobe attendant. There are two other known exemplars of the epigraph.