OPES – Oslo Papyri Electronic System

Background and Physical Properties

Material:

Papyrus

Connections:

–

Size:

14 x 25.3 cm

Lines:

23

Publication side:

Recto

Palaeographic description:

One hand. Practiced cursive hand with ligatures; minor corrections. Black ink. Medium pen.

State of preservation:

Medium brown papyrus. Kollesis: 6.2 cm from the left edge. Upper and lower parts of the sheet broken off. Left edge cut straight. Left margin ca. 2 cm. Preserved but damaged right edge. A few letters from line ends are damaged. Some vertical cracks and loosely attached fragments. Ink stains and marks on the back.

Content

Date:

Second half of the Ist century CE

Origin:

Behnasa (ancient Oxyrhynchus), Egypt

Language:

Greek

Genre:

Documentary

Author:

Unknown

Title / Type of text:

Receipt for settlement of a loan after husband's death / Document

Content:

A receipt issued by a widow (with the concurrence of her guardian), her minor children and her brother-in-law, to N.N., daughter of Harpochration. Asklepiades, the now deceased husband of N.N., had pawned ornaments of gold. The widow Tan.…is (whose husband also had the name Asklepiades) has paid the expenses of the burial and recovered the pawn, against receiving 572 drachmas, which has been repaid to her through the Serapeum bank out of the total sum recovered by selling off what Asklepliades had left, a sum amounting to at least 2060 drachmas.

Subjects:

Receipt Loan Widow Minors Funeral Expenses Serapeum bank Repayment Pawn

Named people:

Asklepiades Sarapion Ptolemaios son of Asklepiades Ammonios son of Ammonios Harpochration?

Named places:

Serapeum in the city of Oxyrhynchus

English translation:

"… Asklepiades [… with the said woman’s guardian], her brother … Sarapion and the brother of Asklepiades, her former, now deceased husband and father of the mentioned minors, Ptolemaios son of Asklepiades of the of the same city [... to N.N. daughter of Har]pochration, greetings. We acknowledge that Tan[…] has received from you, with the concurrence of the above mentioned Ptolemaios, through the bank of Ammonios son of Ammonios at the Serapeum in the city of Oxyrhynchus … the money by me through the aforementioned Ptolemaios on the funeral arrangements and wrapping up of the body of your husband Asklepiades and, as discharge of debt owed by Asklepiades, as a full payment hand to hand and a redemption of a golden ornament weighing eight quarters (?), which is now with me, making a total of five hundred and seventy-two silver drachmas … from that which is sold by me under the supervision of Ptolemaios, which was left behind by your husband Asklepiades of gold and utensils and other leftovers, at two thousand and sixty drachmas … that of Asklepiades …" (translation by Gina Othelie Green)

Provenance:

Cairo, Egypt

Acquisition:

Purchased through the British Museum (box V (A)19A, see Bell’s report) from Maurice Nahman.

Acquisition year:

1923

Editions

• Eitrem, S. and Amundsen, L., P.Oslo III, 1936, pp. 194-196 (no. 130)

Further Literature

Catalogues

TM 25909

Discussions

• Schuman, V. B. (1940). [Rev.] Papyri Osloenses III. Classical Philology, 35.2, p. 214 (correction to ll. 8, 10, 13-14) (cf. BL III, p. 127 on l. 14).
• Hagedorn, D. (1973). Ὀξυρύγχων πόλις und ἡ Ὀξυρυγχιτῶν πόλις. ZPE, 12 , p. 281, n. 17. (cf. BL VII, p. 125) (correction to ll. 9-10).
• Bogaert, R. (1994). Trapezitica Aegyptiaca: Recueil des recherches sur la banque en Égypte Gréco-romaine. Pap.Flor. XXV, p. 83 (and n. 36)