The Sator Square is a word square containing a Latin palindrome featuring the words SATOR AREPO TENET OPERA ROTAS written in a square so that they may be read top-to-bottom, bottom-to-top, left-to-right, and right-to-left. The earliest known appearance of the square was found in the ruins of Pompeii which was buried in the ash of Mt. Vesuvius in 79 AD. If the Sator Square is read boustrophedon, with a reverse in direction, then the words become SATOR OPERA TENET, with the sequence reversed.[1]
Contents |
One likely translation is "The farmer Arepo has [as] works wheels [a plough]"; that is, the farmer uses his plough as his form of work. Although not a significant sentence, it is grammatical; it can be read up and down, backwards and forwards. C. W. Ceram also reads the square boustrophedon (in alternating directions). But since word order is very free in Latin, the translation is the same.
The word arepo is a hapax legomenon, appearing nowhere else in Latin literature. Most of those who have studied the Sator Square agree that it is a proper name, either an adaptation of a non-Latin word or most likely a name invented specifically for this sentence. Jerome Carcopino thought that it came from a Celtic, specifically Gaulish, word for plough. David Daube argued that it represented a Hebrew or Aramaic rendition of the Greek Αλφα ω, or "Alpha-Omega" (cf. Revelation 1:8) by early Christians. J. Gwyn Griffiths contended that it came, via Alexandria, from the attested Egyptian name Ḥr-Ḥp, which he took to mean "the face of Apis". (For more on these arguments see Griffiths, 1971 passim.) In Cappadocia, in the time of Constantine VII, Porphyrogenitus (913-959), the shepherds of the Nativity story are called SATOR, AREPON, and TENETON, while a Byzantine bible of an earlier period conjures out of the square the baptismal names of the three Magi, ATOR, SATOR, and PERATORAS.
If "arepo" is taken to be in the second declension, the "-o" ending could put the word in the ablative case, giving it a meaning of "by means of [arepus]." Thus, "The sower holds the works and wheels by means of [unknown]."
The oldest known representation of the Sator Square was found in the ruins of Pompeii. Others were found in excavations at Corinium (modern Cirencester in England) and Dura-Europos (in modern Syria). The Corinium example is actually a Rotas Square; its inscription reads ROTAS OPERA TENET AREPO SATOR.
Other Sator Squares are on the wall of the Duomo of Siena and on a memorial.[2]
An example of the Sator Square found in Manchester dating to the 2nd century is considered by some authorities to be one of the earliest pieces of evidence of Christianity in Britain.[3] Like the Corinium square, the Manchester square reads ROTAS OPERA TENET AREPO SATOR. A further example is found in a group of stones located in the grounds of Rivington Church and reads "SATOR AREPO TENET OPERA ROTAS" , the stone is one of a group thought to have come from a local private chapel in Anderton, Lancashire.[4]
An example is found inserted in a wall of the old district of Oppède, in France's Luberon.
There is a Sator Square in the museum at Conimbriga (near Coimbra in Portugal), excavated on the site.
The Benedictine Abbey of St. Peter ad Oratorium, near Capestrano, in Abruzzo, Italy, has a marble square inscription of the Sator Square. An example discovered at the Valvisciolo Abbey, also in central Italy, has the letters forming five concentrical rings, each one divided into five sectors.
There is one known occurrence of the phrase on the rune stone Nä Fv1979;234 from Närke, Sweden, dated to the 14th century. It reads "sator arepo tenet" (untranscribed: "sator ¶ ar(æ)po ¶ tænæt).[5] It also occurs in two inscriptions from Gotland (G 145 M and G 149 M), in both of which the whole palindrome is written.[6]
In the Discworld novels written by Terry Pratchett, Sator Square is the name of a central meeting place in the fictional city of Ankh-Morpork.[7]
In the interactive theater/visual art piece Sleep No More, a Sator Square is scratched in the bottom of an empty drawer in a dresser on the third floor.
Around the central Latin letter Ν (en,) a Greek cross can be made that reads both vertically and horizontally the first two words of the 'Pater Noster' (Pater Noster translates as "Our Father", the first words of the Lord's Prayer), each line is surrounded with A and O which represents the Alpha and Omega.[8] The associations indicate the square may have been a safe, hidden way for early Christians to signal their presence to each other in a city without exposing themselves to persecution. The Sator Square uncovered in Manchester has been interpreted as early evidence for the arrival of Christianity in Britain.
The 'Prayer of the Virgin in Bartos' says that Christ was crucified with five nails, which were named Sator, Arepo, Tenet, Opero and Rotas.[9]
Other authorities believe the Sator Square was Mithraic or Jewish in origin because it is not likely that Pompey had a large Christian population in 79 A.D and the symbolism inferred as Christian and the use of Latin in Christianity is not attested to until later.[10]
The Sator Square is a four-times palindrome, and some people have attributed magical properties to it, considering it one of the broadest magical formulas in the occident. An article on the square from The Saint Louis Medical and Surgical Journal vol. 76, reports that palindromes were viewed as being immune to tampering by the devil, who would become confused by the repetition of the letters, and hence their popularity in magical use.
The square has reportedly been used in folk magic for various purposes, including putting out fires (the spell is "TO EXTINGUISH FIRE WITHOUT WATER" in John George Hohman's Long Lost Friend), removing jinxes and fevers, to protect cattle from witchcraft.[11] and against fatigue when traveling[12] It is sometimes claimed it must be written upon a certain material, or else with a certain type of ink to achieve its magical effect.
