La perduta epigrafe sepolcrale per Anna, moglie di Sinopites, nobildonna costantinopolitana al séguito di Carlotta di Lusignano

This article offers a new edition of a now-lost Greek verse epitaph, which was formerly preserved in St Peter’s Basilica. The inscription commemorated a noblewoman from Constantinople, named Anna, wife of Sinopites, who was buried in St Peter’s by her son Demetrios, beside her mistress, Queen Charlotte of Lusignan (1444-1487), Queen of Cyprus from 1458 to 1464. Anna had accompanied Charlotte to Rome, where she died, after the queen had been deprived of her throne. The text of the inscription, reported by Tiberio Alfarano (1525-1596) in his De Basilicae Vaticanae antiquissima et nova structura (1582), is preserved through two epigraphic collections nearly contemporary with Alfarano’s work: Vat. lat. 5241 (1566-1567) and Par. gr. 3067 (ca. 1583). By the first half of the seventeenth century, however, the inscription appears to have already been lost. The present study provides a new diplomatic and critical edition of the text with commentary, presents a metrical analysis of the epigram – identified here for the first time as a verse inscription –, and discusses the historical and prosopographical context of the individuals and events mentioned therein.