Paul C. Berry's account of obtaining a new image in 1995 is quite doubtful and has not been confirmed by anyone with the requisite scientific expertise. J G Cook (who, it should be noted, substantially agrees to the probability that the inscription indeed read cHRISTIANos or cHRISTIANi - as do I) has commented, in an article:
Berry– somehow (given his vague description of the methodology used)– produced an
image of the word Christianos, although it has to be approached with extreme caution (see
Figure 4: Paul Berry’s alleged image of Christianos from atrium of VII.11.11; southwest wall;
used by permission).71 To my knowledge, no one has forensically analysed Berry’s image,
which is not a photograph in the normal sense of the word. One reason caution has to be
exercised is that Berry’s image does not cohere with that of Kiessling but with that of de
Rossi. The lambda shape is missing (which both Kiessling and de Rossi recorded in their
transcriptions), and the ligature that Kiessling recorded (immediately before the I at the
end of the word in question) is also missing. Varone writes,
No trace of coal can be found on the wall, and I highly doubt that Paul Berry could
ever have photographed any traces of the inscription with a high magnification
microscope. The air, the wind, and the rains have carried away in a hundred and
fifty years of history every last trace of coal. Also. On which wall of the atrium
was the inscription read? And again. On what part of the wall? Everything eludes
us, and there is unfortunately no tool whatsoever that can help us go back in time
and retrieve the data.72
Even more confusing is the fact that Berry included two images of the inscription: one
which he identified as seen‘at the time of the first wall cleaning’ (Plate 9), which corre-
sponds precisely to the transcription of Kiessling, and the second (Plate 10) which he
identified as the letters‘seen at the time of the second wall cleaning’ which correspond
precisely with the transcription of de Rossi.73 However, there is no evidence of two wall
cleanings in any of the original literature.
Paul Berry died in 2018, so there is no possibility of any further clarifications on his
part. Varone’s scepticism is well justified. Camodeca’s comment is also appropriate,
Berry is the only one who has attempted to document at least the word Christiani; this is
the ground I am familiar with, and the only one that allows scientific discussion; the
problem is that it leaves the method and result of the investigation in doubt. Those
who wish to prove something a priori believe they have proved it in the end. It
would take a new investigation done without thesis to prove and with the refined
means now available; if it was readable (as Berry states) still in 1995 it should still be
readable today. But, as I have already said, even the confirmation of the word would
not be an extraordinary fact: that in 79 the Christiani were known in Pompeii cannot
be surprising; quite different is the question of understanding the entire graffito…
What can be easily observed is how closely it adheres to only
one word as found in
one of the existing sketches, making it very easy to understand as simply a derivative fraud. A completely unimpressive effort to manufacture something newly observed out of something already published, not in the field but with the photographer's tools in his study.
To the extent that this sketchy and likely fraudulent 1995 account provides no real new data and shows a willingness towards invention, mentioning it here does more to cast doubt, than anything else. In that regard, Berry's alleged 1995 image is contemptible, even and especially for those who would rather see a careful investigation than presumptive dismissal.
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Peter Kirby
Post by
Peter Kirby » Fri Aug 07, 2026 7:33 pm
I accessed Cook's article here, but it is behind a paywall or university access.
Christianos in CIL iv, 679: The Possibility of an Image - Volume 70 Issue 2
www.cambridge.org
Published in New Testament Studies (2024), 70, 204–219.
