OPES – Oslo Papyri Electronic System

Background and Physical Properties

Material:

Papyrus

Connections:

–

Size:

23 x 8.5 cm.

Lines:

23

Publication side:

Recto, the Verso is blank

Palaeographic description:

The text is written in a rounded cursive; the lines are slanting upwards to the right.

State of preservation:

A medium brown papyrus. The sheet has a rift in the upper and lower centre, but is otherwise well preserved. The rift may have been caused by a weakness along a kollesis, or by a folding at the centre of the column. The left margin is 1.5 cm, on the right the text runs to the end of the sheet, the upper margin is 2 cm, and the lower 4 cm.

Content

Date:

June 11, 70 A.D.

Origin:

Oxyrhynchos, Oxyrhynchite nome, province of Egypt

Language:

Greek

Genre:

Documentary

Author:

Ophelas(?), son of Thoonis

Title / Type of text:

Registration of an apprentice

Content:

A formal request from a father for registration of his minor son into the list of apprentices.

Subjects:

Request Apprenticeship Weaver Textile Trade Boy Under age

Named people:

Philiskos, eklemptor gerdion Ophelas(?), son of Thoonis and grandson of Nech... Pachois, son of Ophelas(?) Isas, son of Thoteus and grandson of IsasSarapion Caesar Vespasianus Augustus, emperor

Named places:

Oxyrhynchos Thoeris square, quarter of the city of Oxyrhynchos Teumenouthis (Temgenouthis), quarter of the city of Oxyrhynchos

English translation:

To Philiskos, farmer of the tax on weaving, from Ophelas(?), son of Thoonis, grandson of Nech..., from the Teumenouthis quarter. I wish, from the present month Hathyr, in the second year of Imperator Caesar Vespasianus Augustus, to apprentice my son Pachois, a minor, to the master weaver Isas, son of Thoteus, grandson of Isas, from the quarter of the Thoeris Square, so that he may learn the art of weaving, and (I wish) to pay the tax paid by persons of the same category for the same current second year, eight silver drachmae. I therefore ask that my son be registered in the list of apprentices as is fitting. Farewell. (2nd hand) I, Sarapion, have affixed my signature. ... eight drachmae. The second year of Imperator Caesar Vespasianus Augustus, Payni 17.

Provenance:

Unknown place, province of Egypt

Acquisition:

Purchased from M.Nahman, Cairo, Sept. 1934

Acquisition year:

–

Editions

• Forselv IL, SO 73, 1998, 116-124, picture: p.121
  SB: XXIV 16186
  ▾ Corrections:

  • Reiter F, APF 48 (2002) p. 128-131
  • Bergamasco M, Studi di egittologia e di papirologia 1 (2004) p. 31-35

Further Literature

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