Notitia Dignitatum

[Renatus]

As an example, take a look at the pattern of the Tertia Diocletiana Thebaeorum. The two figures of the imago were drawn well enough onto the vellum, but the subsequent inking has turned them into two vertical lines, looking rather like the numeral "II" instead of the two figures clearly shown in all the other MS copies (and leading to whoever reconstructed the pattern for Wikipedia Commons to assume it was a miss-enumerated "III" for Tertia!).

You have the advantage of me in that I assume that, in your extensive study of the Notitia, you have been able to study sources not available to me. However, examining the M2/W image of this shield online, I see no indication of the two figures drawn beneath the two lines that you mention. I do not seek to dispute the interpretation of the various copyists that two figures were originally depicted but it has to be said that, in the images in the Oxford and Paris copies online, these figures are barely recognisable as such. In fact, were it not that they seem to have legs, one would have some difficulty in making out what they represent. Perhaps the deterioration of the Spirensis before the making of the tracings leading to M2/W, which I postulated in the post cited above, could account for the discrepancy.