Nota Bene - University of Chicago

6 For this one taught me trustworthy texts
7 To Rome he sent me to look upon a kingdom
8 and to see a queen, golden-stoled, golden-sandaled
9 and I saw a people there, having a resplendent seal
10 and I saw the Syrian plain and all the towns, Nisibis
11 and the Euphrates having traversed. Everywhere I had co-? 93
12 having Paul ? 94 ... Faith everywhere was leading the way
13 and served up food everywhere, fish from a fountain
14 utterly huge and pure, which a holy virgin grasped
15 and she freely distributed this to friends to eat at all times
16 having good wine/Christ-wine, 95 giving it mixed, with bread.
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93 “συνο[ der Stein, συνομηγυ� ρους die Handschriften, συνο[δι�την Preger (im Kritischen Apparat), συνο[δι�τας
Paton, συνο[μι�λους Lightfoot und die russische Übersetzung, συνο[μαι�μους] Grégoire” (Merkelback,
“Grabepigramm,” 127; he translates the line: “Überall hatte ich als Begleiter (?) den Paulus ---“).
94 The literary traditions read ε�σωθεν, “within.”
95 The word play here on “useful” and “Christ” is an old Christian pun going back at least in literary sources
to Paul’s letter to Philemon 11. The synonymy is confirmed by the spelling in many of the famous “Christians for
Christians” burial inscriptions in Asia Minor, in which the spelling Χρηστιανο� ς is more common than Χριστιανο� ς (see
Gary J. Johnson, Early-Christian Epitaphs from Anatolia [Texts and Translations 35; Early Christian Literature Series
8; Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1995] 46 n.5 and many examples [including the plate on p. xiii).