7 Feb 2011

Rex Wallace's misreading of a Rhaetic inscription

In his blog entry New Raetic Inscription concerning a Rhaetic inscription in bronze, American Etruscanist Rex Wallace repeats an incorrect transcription a total of four times despite having posted a clear photo in the same entry showing otherwise. His error has gone weeks without correction. I mark his mistakes in red in the caption below:

The photo shows clearly the proper reading in the last line (read right to left below): avaσuerasi (σ = san, a plain /s/, while s = sigma, pronounced /ʃ/). No 'r' there anywhere. The mistake can't be a keyboard-related typo either.


How might a published Etruscanist manage to analyse an inscription without ever looking at the photo immediately available to him? It doesn't seem like just the usual careless faux-pas. But then perhaps he just switched to decaf. (Arrrggh!! The dreaded decaf! Oh how I hate thee!) At any rate, in a following post I'll discuss my own thoughts on its meaning using a more accurate transcription.

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