a complex donation. But only seldom are the objects donated mentioned, because
they could be seen at the time when the monument was dedicated and they became
part of the inventory of the sanctuary, or were represented by the building inscrip-
tion of the temple (or parts of it). Inscriptions like the altar (ILS3039) dedicated
to Iuppiter paganicusby a public slave of the municipium Asisinatiumare more of
an exception than the rule. He mentioned that he not only dedicated the altar, but
also aedem cum porticibus a solo sua pec(unia) fecit item mensam(other examples:
ILS5453– 4, 5457– 9, 5461). These problems are aggravated by a certain tendency
in the first collections of inscriptions to conserve only the text of an inscription
and not to refer to the (archaeological) characteristics of the stone itself (see for
example ILS3876 –7; in the case of only one of these dedicated objects was the
object given explicitly named). The worth of the object donated is also mentioned
rarely, whether by indicating the sum spent (ILS5460) or the weight of the metal
used (ILS3192).
It was apparently a new phenomenon of imperial times – to be more precise,
probably of the decades between c. 160 and 230 (see Derks 1998: 90) – that the
adherents of a certain cult dedicated to the god venerated altars and other inscribed
monumental objects of stone in huge numbers. As a consequence we can observe
in certain sanctuaries hundreds of similar inscribed dedications. This phenomenon
is known at least in all regions of the western provinces of the empire. In the sanc-
tuaries of the Matronaeat Pesch and Morken-Harff in the Rhineland respectively
more than two hundred dedications to these gods were found (e.g. Eck 2004: 497).
In northern Spain at Monte de Facho almost one hundred very similar stelae,
dedicated to a Deus Lar Berobreus(otherwise unknown), were found (Schattner and
Suárez Otero 2004) and at Thignica in Africa Proconsularis about three hundred
votive stelae(CIL8.14912–15199). Of course, even in these cases not all adherents of
a certain god dedicated such an inscribed monument, and probably not even a major
part of them did so. But the sheer number of such monuments and the manner
in which these rural sanctuaries were dominated by inscribed monuments are very
impressive – with regard to the interest in scripts and inscribed monuments in these
rural contexts and with regard to the degree to which these monuments were part
of the rituals of veneration.
In the cases where araewere dedicated, we find apparently a new understanding
of the concept of the altar. Until then the adherents of a certain god or goddess
had used the altar erected at the time of the founding of the sanctuary to burn incense
or immolate the parts of the sacrificed animal destined for the god (e.g. ILS112,
4907). But now at least many of the dedicators did not use an altar erected by another
person but preferred their personal one (1,034 from 1,773 “dedicatory inscriptions”
from Germania Superior are araeor fragments of such monuments: Spickermann
2003: 14, 17; for the Greek inscriptions see Naumann 1933: 70). As a result, the
sanctuary was filled up with araeto such an extent that new ones blocked the way
to the older ones. We can observe this phenomenon especially well in the so-called
Benefiziarierstationen, as for example Osterburken, Sirmium, and above all
Obernburg (Schallmayer et al. 1990: 145–75; Mirkovic 1994; Steidl 2005). In these
cases, apparently a major percentage of these soldiers (certainly more than 10 percent,
Inscriptions 183