Graffiti, produced by an inmate of an ancient Roman prison in Corinth, Greece, had a chilling message for captors, an archaeologist revealed this week.
Some of the graffiti in the Greek language, which was found on the prison floor, renders a prayer for their captors for all to see: “Lord, make them die an awful death.”
Matthew Larsen, an archaeologist at the University of Copenhagen, who studied the ancient site, identified the site as a prison by comparing excavation records and examining the graffiti on the floor, concluding that the remains are 1,600 years old.
The site, first uncovered in 1901, contained jugs, lamps, and a small bathroom in what might have been a guard’s quarters.
Writing in the journal Hesperia, the journal of the American School of Classical Studies at Athens, Larsen reveals that all the etched words were found within the confines of the cracks on the floor.
This led him to the conclusion that the slabs hadn’t been moved to the site from previous use, meaning that all that graffiti marked onto the floor was done in place, while the site served as a prison.
Graffiti in the ancient prison of Greece
A reading of the Greek-written graffiti in the cracks of the floor shows whoever was locked up was not too happy about it.
The anguish is evident in the ancient graffiti authors’ writing. Some of the pleas read: “May the fortune of those who suffer in this lawless place prevail. Lord, do not show mercy on the one who threw us in here.”
Another etched plea says: “Godbearer, repay [punishment given by] Marinos, the one who threw us in here and made us spend winter.” Larsen surmises the winters were especially rough on the prisoners.
This particular prison is likely from a time the Roman Empire had control of Corinth. That didn’t lead to a healthy relationship between the Roman rulers and the Greek prisoners. Larsen told Live Science it exasperated the difficult existence in the prison. “You get a sense that they’re in a very dark space,” he said, “that they cannot be given a hearing.”
While life was dreary—and full of desire for vengeance—some prisoners were making the best of a bad situation. One inscription praised the “fortune of the beautiful girls who love the unmarried men” and other locations featured game boards that would have given the prisoners something to do when not inscribing vindictive threats against those who put them in the cheerless confines.
In 146 BC, the Romans defeated the Corinthians at the Battle of Corinth. Taking this victory as a starting point, Rome soon controlled all of Greece. Declaring Corinth the capital of Roman Greece in 44 BC, Julius Caesar ordered his people to rebuild the city and its famous fountain.
Before the Roman conquest, there were no prisons as we know them today in ancient Greece. There were only temporary detention centers as criminals were either fined, exiled, or executed.
The concept of incarceration as a form of punishment wasn’t as prevalent as it is in modern times. Instead, penalties focused more on retribution and deterrence rather than rehabilitation.
Related: Ancient Corinth’s Port Pushed Back by at Least Five Centuries
