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Monumentum

Graffito on the sacred nitre

Greek ritual graffito scratched on wall plaster in the Mithraeum of Dura-Europos, mentioning the “fiery exhalation” and the “sacred nitre” of the Magi.
 
The New Mithraeum
23 May 2026

TNMM 838 ↔ CIMRM 68

Scratched above the preceding No.

πυρωτὸν ἄσθμα / τὸ καὶ μάγοις ἢ νίτρον ὅσ(ο)ίω(ν).

CIMRM II 68

Read: πυρωτὸν ἄσθμα τὸ καὶ μάγοις ἢ νίτρον ὅσ(ο)ίω(ν). Cf. C. M. Edsman, Ignis Divinus, Lund 1949, 221.

Main inscription

πυρωτὸν ἄσθμα τὸ καὶ μάγοις ἢ νίτρον ὅσ(ο)ίω(ν).
the fiery exhalation, which the Magi also call the sacred nitre.

References

Report, No. 865.

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