, 1817)
Discovery It was noted by traveller
Thomas d'Arcos in 1631 in his correspondence with
Nicolas-Claude Fabri de Peiresc; however this was not published at the time and was unknown to the explorers in the early 19th century. It was rediscovered in 1815 by Count Borgia, and published by
Friedrich Münter in 1821,
Jean Emile Humbert in 1821, and
Hendrik Arent Hamaker in 1828. Munter wrote that: "On the right side it is Punic, or Mauritanian, because I find letters that seem alien to the Punic Alphabet, as far as we know it up to now; on the left are the letters of which a sample is given here. The right side is best preserved." In 1842, Sir
Thomas Reade, the
British consul in
Tunis, ordered the removal of this inscription from the Mausoleum, which in the process seriously damaged the monument. Recognising the importance of the bilingual inscription in decoding the
Libyan language, Reade had it dispatched to London for the 'benefit of
science'. Reade demolished the entire wall in which the inscription was embedded, leaving the stone blocks that framed it litter the ground around the mausoleum. Two of Reade's compatriots, Bruce and Catherwood, had taken accurate drawings of the building prior to the removal, although Catherwood described it as Phoenician.
Description The Mausoleum of Ateban was built in the second century BC by the inhabitants of Dougga in remembrance of an important prince or dignitary of
Numidia. Some have conjectured that it was built for
Massinissa, King of Numidia. A
limestone frieze with bilingual script was installed on the
podium of the
mausoleum. The left half of the inscription was engraved in the
Punic language, the other half in the
Numidian language. The bilingual nature of the inscription made it possible for scholars to decode the ancient
Libyco-Berber script, which was written
right-to-left.
Translation A modern
translation of the
inscription indicates that the tomb was dedicated to Ateban, the son of Iepmatath, the son of Palu. Other names cited in the inscription, both
Punic and Libyan names (and even possibly a
Syrian or
Jewish name), refer to the
monument's architect and the representatives of different professions involved in its construction. ==Temple (Massinissa) inscription==