pothos.org

Thanks, but I can only aspire to be a honorary Danaus!

First, there is no such thing as "capitalization" in ancient inscriptions; there was no distinction between "upper" and "lower" case. That's Byzantine and later. The inscription reads AMYNTOR GERONTOS MAKEDON, so you can't make anything out of it being capitalized. That's a modern convention, and misleading. Second, I first heard about this inscription from Argyro Tataki herself when I visited her in Athens in late 1997, while she was working on the final edits for her book. She's the one who said it meant Amyntor, (son) of the Elder (Amyntor), of Macedon. Check her book on inscriptions, please. This is her area, I'm going with her analysis: Macedonians Abroad, Meletemata 26, Athens, 1998, pg. 238 #128.

I still think it's entirely possible it's a younger brother of Hephaistion, but as I noted at the time, this is just a possibility, far from a certainty. Other people tend to give more weight to my theories sometimes than I do. ;> As for the son being named for the father (rather than grandfather), it does happen: the famous orator Demosthenes, son of Demosthenes is one of the better-known examples.

I'm currently working on an article that takes a look at inscriptions/other since 1997 (when I conducted my original research), to see where we are now in terms of the frequency of the names, and where they appear (geographically).

Thanks for the update. Maybe you could let us know when it is published.

Not that I know anything about the subject, but I did notice that the name 'Hephaestion' appears to have been quite popular amongst the descendants of the Greek soldier settled in Egypt, with examples surviving from the 2nd cent. BC up to the 4th cent. AD, although it's difficult to make generalisations based on what's available online.

Will do, Alexias. I'm quite curious about where these names appear, and I'm currently doing a map-label for areas Mygdonia, Thessaly, et al., north. Although the region of the Black Sea, is largely Greek, and mostly divorced from Macedonia. I'm not just looking at Hephaistion, either, but all names that reference Hephaistos (plus, Amyntor, of course).

It will be a while before it's published (if at all), but will let folks know. I'm trying to see where the evidence leads me without preconceptions. I came back to it after 15 years, due to accidentally stumbling on some new (exciting) evidence. So I want to see what the current state of archaeology had unearthed prosopographically since I last looked c. 1997/8.