Text deliberately erased in antiquity of which no trace now remains on the stone or papyrus, and which cannot be restored by the editor.

• TEI definition: del ; EpiDoc-specific customization: del
• TEI definition: gap ; EpiDoc-specific customization: gap

Two different TEI tags are used to indicate erased and un-restored text: the del element indicates the editor's assertion than the text was purposefully erased by an ancient hand (rather than, say, damaged by accident, weather or modern activity); the gap element indicates more objectively that whatever text or other decoration was originally inscribed on this surface is no longer evident at all.

Characters erased in antiquity and completely lost should therefore be tagged using the del element (if appropriate assigning to the rend attribue a value, most likely "erasure"). A gap element should be placed inside the del, to indicate that the erased text is not restored, and will be given a reason, unit, and either quantity or extent attributes, as usual.

Panciera 1991 V.3: [[[...]]] or [[[^c.7]]] or [[[---]]]

Sosin 2011: ⟦[ - ca.? - ]⟧