stratigraphy. The locations of objects were not recorded. Apart from the fact that an object came from the site with other objects, no other information exists regarding it. Whether it was in situ or not in situ is of little concern. Even the date an object was excavated is now uncertain. Many objects are missing, as the region, the site and the museum have endured a century and a half of history, including war and occupation. As the North-Picene language is a unique case of such kind of language (it has no known relatives), and the origin of the inscriptions is not well established, showing also epigraphic divergences according to the dating assumed, there are authors considering that such stelae could be forgeries. The fragment of most certain date (not very certain) is located in the Museo Oliveriano, Pesaro. One number associated with it is PID 344. It was excavated 1860, 1863 or 1895 from a tomb of the Servici Cemetery. It records two one-word lines, transcribed variously as ]lúpeś, ]mreceert or ]-UPE ś, ]Mresveat. The archaeological date is that of the site as a whole, somewhere in the window 800–650 BCE. The style of the alphabet suggests the end of the 7th and the beginning of the 6th centuries BCE. The most likely date, therefore, would be about 650 BCE, the end of the Novilara window. It was a time of Italic and Etruscan wars and warrior kings during the Roman Kingdom, as martial scenes on other stelae and the presence of weapons in nearly all graves of males suggest. The only long inscription known to date is incised on a stone often called "the Novilara Stele". It is located in the Museo L. Pigorini, Rome, with the number PID 343. It begins mimniś erút ..... The decorations: spirals, wheel, herring bone and zig-zag patterns, are similar to those of the others. The reverse side features hunting and battle scenes. It and the nautical Novilara Stele were acquired out of context probably in 1889 in the vicinity of Novilara; they are generally believed to have been taken from there and to be of the same date. Sample text The best-known North Picene inscription is on the stele from Novilara (now in the Museo Preistorico Pigorini, Rome), dated to approximately the 6th century BCE: mimniś erút gaareśtadeś rotnem úvlin partenúś polem iśairon tet śút tratneši krúviś tenag trút ipiem rotneš