A Greek or Macedonian at the margins

At the end of his 'Palamedes at Baglan' (Journal of Afghan Studies 3 & 4 [1982] 77-78), P.M. Fraser referred to 'an outstanding example' of 'that company of Greek travellers and journeying artisans of a later date who kept alive the contacts between the Hellenic Middle East and Central Asia, north of the Hindu Kush'. (Palamedes occurs in the genitive in the inscription under discussion: Παλαμήδου was treated by Fraser as Παλαμήδου<ς>.)


This individual is mentioned by Claudius Ptolemaeus, Geographia I.11.6 (not i.11.7, as Fraser cites):

Μάην γάρ φησί τινα τὸν καὶ Τιτιανὸν, ἄνδρα Μακεδόνα

καὶ ἐκ πατρὸς ἔμπορον, συγγράψασθαι τὴν ἀνα-

μέτρησιν οὐδ’ αὐτὸν ἐπελθόντα, διαπεμψάμενον

δέ τινας πρὸς τοὺς Σῆρας.

'For he claims that a certain Maes (also known as Titianos), who was a Macedonian man and a trader because of his father, reported the distance, not because he had gone there in person, but because he had sent some people on expeditions to the Chinese.'

LGPN IV (Macedonia Thrace, Northern Shores of the Black Sea) reports eight other bearers of this name. Ptolemy's is the only bearer reported by the TLG.

See also the two bearers of this name in the bilingual inscription, OGIS 375.