OPES – Oslo Papyri Electronic System

Background and Physical Properties

Material:

Papyrus

Connections:

–

Size:

20.6 x 8.7 cm.

Lines:

32

Publication side:

Recto, the Verso is blank

Palaeographic description:

The handwriting shows the style of a professional scribe, a clear, even, upright cursive

State of preservation:

–

Content

Date:

IIIrd century A.D.

Origin:

Oxyrhynchos, Oxyrhynchite nome, province of Egypt

Language:

Greek

Genre:

Documentary

Author:

Aurelius A[-], alias Aphynchis

Title / Type of text:

Petition

Content:

Petition to the police from Aurelius A..., also called Aphynchis, with a complaint of having been treated with insolence and assaulted by a certain Didyme, wife of Agathos Daimon, the cook

Subjects:

Petition Complaint Assault Police Profession

Named people:

Aurelius A, alias Aphynchis Aurelius Alexander, police Didyme, wife of Agathos Daimon Agathos Daimon, husband of Didyme, mageiros

Named places:

Oxyrhynchus Oxyrhynchite nome

English translation:

To Aurelius Alexander, of the police magistrates, from Aurelius A[---] alias Aphynchis, former exhibitor of games in the city of the Oxyrhynchites. 'Yesterday evening a certain Didyme, the wife of Agathos Daimon, the cook, passing my house and finding me standing there with our family, treated us with insolence, using speakable and unspeakable expressions - a woman abundantly furnished with the utmost shamelessness and effrontery. Thereupon, when I stopped her, advising her to keep off from us, she leapt upon me, and, being distracted in her senses, even stretched out her hands and smote me, and railed furiously at some of my daughter's sons, whom I called to witness, and not only at them, but even at one of the officials of our city who was present.'Having suffered so much, I, the victim of the assault, deliver to you this petition, asking you to give orders that she shall be brought before you, so that I may experience your beneficence toward all men. Farewell.'

Provenance:

Oxyrhynchos, Oxyrhynchite nome, province of Egypt

Acquisition:

Purchased 1934 from Maurice Nahman, Cairo

Acquisition year:

–

Editions

• Eitrem S-Amundsen L, JEA 40, 1954, 30-32
  SB: VI 9421

Further Literature

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