A Pastoral Epistle of the Seventh Century Concerning the Eucharist (Pap. Berlin P. 11346) (2012) (original) (raw)
Related papers
H. Cadell, W. Clarysse, and K. Robic, Papyrus de la Sorbonne (P.Sorb. III nos. 70–144)
Bulletin of the American Society of Papyrologists , 2013
n os 70-144). Papyrologica Parisina [1]. Paris: Presses de l'université Paris-Sorbonne, 2011. xxiv + 189 pages + 11 plates +1 CD-ROM. ISBN 978-2-84050-726-0. The third volume of P.Sorb. contains texts from the Ptolemaic period only. The three editors each sign for one of three third century BC archives: Hélène Cadell (re-)edits a small set ("dossier") of private documents related to one Zenodoros, a Cyrenaean and lochagos from the Oxyrhynchite nome (70-74); Willy Clarysse (re-)edits a larger batch ("archives") of documents mostly addressed to (occasionally from) the lower-level nomarch Aristarchos (75-102); and Kenokka Robic (re-)edits the largest batch ("archives") of texts, mostly petitions and letters associated with the epistates Demetrios (103-144). The texts are fully illustrated on the accompanying CD-ROM, which also contains a searchable version of the text (slightly "off " compared to the printed text). The best pieces are also illustrated on the color foldouts at the back. The endpapers illustrate 77.3-9. The edition of the sometimes difficult texts maintains a high standard throughout. There is no indication in the texts when the papyrus breaks off, and this information has to be gleaned from the descriptions or the illustrations. There is an occasional typographical glitch: when the editor inserts a line number (5, 10, etc.) or an arrow indicating the direction of the fibres (→,↓), the text sometimes indents (not so on the papyrus). The lengthy introduction to texts 70-74 is largely devoted (pp. 4-21) to a discussion of the regnal years of Ptolemy II and the co-regency with his son (268/7-260-59 BC). 71, mentioning a kanephoros of Arsinoe II, is from 268/7, and P.Bryce dem., mentioning another, could be from 269/8, allowing Arsinoe's death to occur in 270, as traditionally held. 70 (270 BC) is the sale of Argyris, a Syrian slave woman aged 40, in Oxyrhynchus. The buyer is Zenodoros; the seller is a resident alien (parepidemos) from Libya, Simon. 71 is a loan of fodder (chortos) by Zenodoros to another Cyrenaean, Polyanthes. The debtor will return 1.5 times as much fodder to the horse stable of Zenodoros in Takona in the Oxyrhynchite nome. Of this sixwitness contract both scriptura exterior and scriptura interior are preserved. 72 (266/5) re-edits P.Sorb. 1.14, a receipt for a sizeable amount of rent in kind paid by Zenodoros for a kleros owned by another soldier, from Asine. 73 (after 266) re-edits P.Sorb. 1.15, another six-witness contract mentioning a lease of a kleros. 74 (270-266) is a six-witness contract of lease. The note on the back (τὸ ἥμυσυ τῆς συγ-|[γ]ρ̣ α̣ φ̣ ῆ̣ ς. Σήσαμος) is explained in n. 84 (p. 44) as if the text was written twice on the same papyrus, which was then cut in half, one half for Zenodoros, one of the contracting parties, the other for an official responsible
The library of the Villa of the Papyri at Herculaneum, the only ancient library which has survived into the modern era, preserves a unique heritage of philosophical texts not transmitted by the medieval tradition. It contains more than 1800 papyri carbonized by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 AD and brought to light during the Bourbon excavations in the 18th century. During the eruption, many rolls were seriously damaged or broken in several pieces: each part of the same roll has been stored – and in some cases opened – separately from the others. This is one of the reasons why in the Officina dei Papiri in the Biblioteca Nazionale of Naples it is possible to find fragments stored with a different inventory number which belong to the same original roll. PHerc. 89/1383 is a case of this kind: as Gianluca Del Mastro has recently discovered, these two papyri are respectively the upper and the lower part of the same roll, broken roughly in the middle. A systematic study of both papyri – that remain so far unpublished due to their poor state of conservation – is required to determine the correct order of the fragments in the roll and to examine the content of the work. Actually, due to its carbonized state, during the unrolling different layers of papyrus remained attached to each other: this makes it necessary to distinguish sovrapposti and sottoposti (pieces layered above or below) from the main layer in order to virtually place them in their original position in the roll. This speech aims to show some preliminary results of the work in progress on this new text, in which a new reading of the final subscriptio confirms that the author is the Epicurean philosopher Philodemus of Gadara. Thanks to an accurate stratigraphical analysis of the fragments, some textual sequences are now readable and they will be able to clarify the theological argument of the treatise, by revealing important points of contact with the other religious works by Philodemus.