OPES – Oslo Papyri Electronic System

Background and Physical Properties

Material:

Papyrus

Connections:

–

Size:

7 x 18 cm.

Lines:

29

Publication side:

Verso

Palaeographic description:

–

State of preservation:

–

Content

Date:

Early IInd century A.D.

Origin:

Unknown place, province of Egypt

Language:

Greek

Genre:

Documentary

Author:

–

Title / Type of text:

Private letter

Content:

Letter concerning everyday petty worries.

Subjects:

Letter Food Fruit

Named people:

Ptolema Theodous Euthenias Tamystha

Named places:

–

English translation:

(Two lines missing) ... Write to me about tuition for my studies and my brother's, in order that I can be informed and relieved from anxiety. Know that I do not consume (all) the bread, it is they who (all the time) devour threefold as much as I do, even if you have little fuel. I greet my mother Ptolema and my brothers and Theudous (for Theodous) and everyone in the household. Through Euthenias I have sent you ten eggs and two pomegranates. And, if you want more eggs, you have to tell me - for I have others. Please indicate the arrears [of your?/my? debt (the balance of your?/my? account].I greet Tamystha and her children. I pray that you are of good health. Tybi 25.

Provenance:

Unknown place, province of Egypt

Acquisition:

Bought from Muhammad Abdullah (Fayûm) in 1928 (part of the joint purchase with Columbia, Michigan, Princeton universities and British Museum).

Acquisition year:

–

Editions

• Eitrem S-Amundsen L, P.Oslo III, 1936, 153

Further Literature

Cribiore R, Gymnastics of the mind (2001), p. 116-117

• Skarsouli, E. (2023). Honigsüsse und lastende Worte. Studien zur Äuserung von Emotionen durch metaphorischen Sprachgebrauch im Altgriechischen. Brill-Schöningh. On the metaphorical use of ἀναψύχω ll. 10-11; see pp. 73-74.