AUB - Berytus Archeological Studies

men represented with a modius on a column or a cushion, as belonging to a lower rank within the clergy, or laymen who, in recognition of some religious benevolence, had received the modius, but without the right to wear it.

To the lack of beard thus distinguishing the Palmyrene priests one might compare the tonsure of the Egyptian Isis priests(²⁸) and, the Phoenician sculptures of unbearded men with similar headdress, probably also priests.( 29 ) But the unbearded "gallï of the Syrian goddess(³⁰) were probably essentially different from the Palmyrene priests, if we are right in claiming this title for the unbearded Palmyrenes with a modius headdress, as one of these is represented with his wife on a relief now in the Ny Carlsberg Glyptothek, Copenhagen.(³¹)

The miniature busts in the center of the modius wreaths, one might be tempted to identify with the divinities worshiped by the persons on whose modii they occur.(³²) But some of them undoubtedly represent miniature modius-busts, and the small busts without modii have nothing to characterize them as representing divinities.(³³) I am, therefore, inclined to regard these wreaths with miniature portraits and the similar ones with central aniconic medallions, both of which also appear on heads of men without modii,(³⁴) as badges of civic distinction given either by the city or by the religious authorities.

Passing on to the question of date: the same technique is employed in executing the eyes of a small number of funerary busts(³⁵) from the second group of Palmyrene sculpture (probably about 150 to 200 A.D. )(³⁶) and also on reliefs from the third group(37) (probably from about 200 until the fall of Palmyra in 272 A.D.). ,38)

28. Cumont, Les religions orientales dans le paganisme romain, Paris 1929, p. 240, n. 76.
29. Cf. Ingholt, Kunstmuseets Aarsskrift, 1930, p. 86-88 and the article by Emir Chehab, infra pl. XI, 2; also the Neirab and Teima steles.
30. Cf. for instance, the relief in Museo Capitolino, Cumont, op. cit. pl. 11, 1.
31. Studier, p. 31-33, 63-64, PS 8 and 38, pl. 111, 1 and XII, I.-Four male funerary busts, all unbearded and decorated with necklaces and earrings might represent "gallï. One is in commerce in Horns, one in the collection of Madame Alfred Sursock, Beirut, one in the Ny Carlsberg Glyptothek, published by Simonsen, Sculptures et inscriptions de Pal myre á la Glyptotèque de Ny Carlsberg Copenhague 1889, p. 42, D23, pl. XVII., an~ one in Damascus, Répertoire, If, nr. 1083.
32. Frederik Poulsen, Tidsskrift for Konstvetenskap, VI, 1921, p. 86-87. Louis Robert, op, cit. p. 262-67, and Fèvrier, La religion des Palmyréniens, Paris 1931, p. 156.
33. Cf. supra note 20, and the portrait medaillons mentioned by Robert, op. cit. 1). 266 n. 3.
34. In two cases the wreath has miniature busts:

Studier, PS 236 and 241, and in the following, a central rosette or medaillon : Studier, PS 9, pl. III, 2- Choix, pl. XXVIII, 12; Studier, PS 176-PS 255, 271, 277, 297 and the bust published in Syria, XI, 1930, p. 243, pl. LXI. On a bearded bust in the Museum of Archeology connected with the American University of Beirut, Porter and Torrey, op. cit. p. 265-66, nr. VIII; Studier, p. 112, PS 196, a wreath with a miniature bust in the center figures to the left of the man represented. For a similar custom among the Nabateans, cf. Dussaud et Macler, Rapport sur une mission scientifique dans les régions désertiques de la Syrie moyenne, p. 719.
35. Studier, PS 416, 446, 447, and 452.
36. Studier, p. 90 and 92.
37. Studier, PS 70-Choix, pl. XXXII, 12; Studier, PS 73-Choix, pl. XXXII, 13; Studier, PS 74-PS 262, 269, 468. Furthermore a bust in the Palmyra museum, and two heads; Studier, PS 501 and 502. Cf. also the interesting relief of Allat from Khirbet el-Sané, Ploix de Rotrou and Seyrig, Syria, XIV, 1933, pl. IV, 1.

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