Oscan Tablet

It is, along with the Tabula Bantina and the Abellano Boundary Stone from Avella, one of the most important inscriptions extant in the long extinct Oscan language.

Discovery

This small bronze tablet, attached to an iron chain, was discovered on the banks of the river Sagrus at Fonte di Romito, between Capracotta and Agnone in 1848. It was purchased from the dealer Alessandro Castellani by the British Museum in 1873.

Inscription

Inscribed on both sides, the tablet chronicles a series of dedications to different deities or supernatural beings. The front side has 25 lines and describes the sacred place where religious ceremonies in honour of the goddess Ceres took place. It also explains that every year during the Floralia festival worshipers were expected to offer sacrifices to four different gods and that that every other year a special ceremony was held at the sanctuary's altar. The other side of the tablet (with 23 lines) lists 17 different divinities that the local Samnite population were at any one stage devoted to. It also states that only those paying regular dues would be admitted to the sanctuary.

Oscan language

Oscan is an extinct Indo-European language of southern Italy. The language is also the namesake of the language group to which it belonged. As a member of the Italic languages, Oscan is therefore a sister language to Latin and Umbrian.

Oscan was spoken by a number of tribes, including the Samnites, the Aurunci (Ausones), and the Sidicini. The latter two tribes were often grouped under the name "Osci". The Oscan group is part of the Osco-Umbrian or Sabellic family, and includes the Oscan language and three variants (Hernican, Marrucinian and Paelignian) known only from inscriptions left by the Hernici, Marrucini and Paeligni, minor tribes of eastern central Italy. The language was spoken from approximately 500 BC to AD 100.

Evidence

Oscan is known from inscriptions dating as far back as the 5th century BC. The most important Oscan inscriptions are the Tabula Bantina, the Oscan Tablet or Tabula Osca and the Cippus Abellanus.

General characteristics

Oscan had much in common with Latin, though there are also many striking differences, and many common word-groups in Latin were absent or represented by entirely different forms. For example, Latin volo, velle, volui, and other such forms from the Proto-Indo-European root *wel ('to will') were represented by words derived from *gher ('to desire'): Oscan herest ('he shall want, he shall desire', English cognate 'yearn') as opposed to Latin vult (id.). Latin locus (place) was absent and represented by the hapax slaagid (place), which Italian linguist Alberto Manco has recently referred to a local surviving toponym.