OPES – Oslo Papyri Electronic System

Background and Physical Properties

Material:

Papyrus

Connections:

–

Size:

12.9 x 11.2 cm.

Lines:

16

Publication side:

Recto (Verso: P.Oslo III 193)

Palaeographic description:

One hand. Fluent, easily legible Roman period cursive with echoes of the chancery style. The scribe leaves short blank spaces to mark syntactical units (ll. 1, 5, 7, 11, 13, 15).

State of preservation:

Medium brown papyrus. Two adjoining fragments of roughly equal dimensions. Extensive surface damage: four vertical breaks (along fold lines?), holes, and (on the right half) abrasion and soiling. Vertical kollesis 1-1,5 cm from the right edge. Upper margin: ca. 1,2 cm. The left, right and lower part of the sheet are broken. One to five letters are lost at line beginnings. Considerable amount of text has been lost to the right as perhaps the right half of the sheet is missing. Black ink. Verso: P.Oslo III 193 and modern repair tape.

Content

Date:

Late IInd/ early IIIrd century CE

Origin:

Antinoopolis, Egypt

Language:

Greek

Genre:

Documentary

Author:

Ammonios (son of?) Aphrodisios

Title / Type of text:

Petition to the senate (boule) of Antinoopolis/ Document

Content:

Petition to the senate (βουλή) of Antinoopolis by Ammonios (son of?) Aphrodisios. The petitioner appeals against his nomination to an unknown liturgy in the Panopolite and asks the council to ask the epistrategos (of the Heptanomia?) to instruct the strategos to take the appropriate action in recognition of his immunity, citing a precedent for the delegation of the case to the strategos.

Subjects:

Petition municipal council immunity citizens of Antinoopolis liturgy Exemption Epistrategos Strategos royal land senate

Named people:

Ammonios Aphrodisios Horion Ammonios Aphrodisios?

Named places:

Pakerke Panopolite nome Antinoopolis

English translation:

To the most excellent senate of the Antinoites, (new Hellenes?), from Ammonios (son of?) Aphrodisios son of Horion ... (according to the decree of the founder) of our city, the deified Hadrian ... lords over land and sea who ... for us ... and shone over (every human) nation. I wished ... (5) at the village of Pakerke in the Panopolite district ... of crown land according to the ... liturgical duties ... here ... although the land is cultivated by ... for the time we agreed upon ... (10) putting our privileges/rights ... and because/when ... he took charge of the matter, he delegated it to the strategos ... will keep quiet about these things but also ... the referral by his excellency the epistrategos ... I (appeal?) to you, most noble (senators), asking ... to the strategos of the Panopolite district ...

Provenance:

Cairo or Fayûm, Egypt

Acquisition:

Purchased by Samson Eitrem

Acquisition year:

1920

Editions

• Eitrem, S.-Amundsen, L., P.Oslo III, 1936, 187-188 (no. 126)

Further Literature

Catalogues

TM 21554

Discussions

• Thomas, J. D. (1982). The epistrategos in Ptolemaic and Roman Egypt. Part 2: The Roman epistrategos Pap. Colon. vol. 6 (pp. 109n. 103, 134 and n. 147, 153, 158n.43 and passim, see index). Opladen.
• Lewis, N. (2000). Judiciary Routines in Roman Egypt, BASP 37, p. 88, 86n. 5