Fifty-six new texts from Oxyrhynchus are edited here in the long-established categories of Theological texts (3), New literary texts (2), Known literary texts (27), Subliterary texts (5, principally Graeco-Latin glossaries) and Documentary texts (19). Fifteen of the texts can be examined in the plates. It is a pleasure to see the first-fruits of the Ancient Lives project: 5156 was identified and linked to a roll containing Plutarch's Quaestiones Convivales 4. The standard of editing is very high and obvious lapses are rare. I will give a brief survey of the new materials and their value, commenting on their treatment along the way.
The volume opens with a parchment of Psalm 90 LXX that shares its corruptions, wild orthography and non-standard morphology (πόδον for πόδα) with P. Oxy. XVI 1928. 5128 contains Exodus 34.6–7 and Susanna 35a LXX (42 Theodotion), but neither matches any known Greek version. It may represent a collection of testimonia, a homily or a prose hymn on the subject of divine omniscience and justice. The claim that this is a ‘Christian text’, rather than a Jewish one, is not substantiated: there is no theological basis to exclude Jewish origins. The conjunction (noted by the editor) of the same passages in ps.-Athanasius suggests a Christian origin, but the case can be reinforced. Susanna is not cited in Jewish Greek texts (according to the TLG: the first mention of Susanna is in Clement of Alexandria and this passage was first quoted by Origen). The use of a papyrus codex in the third or fourth century supports a Christian origin, but inconclusively (see C.H. Roberts and T.C. Skeat, The Birth of the Codex [1983], pp. 58–61). 5129 (parts of six lines) is the first ancient witness to the First Apology of Justin Martyr.
5130 gives an extract from Alcidamas' Praise of Poverty quoted with perfect orthography (but one exceptional syllabification), with no hiatus and with the expected cretic clausulae. 5131 contains parts of 28 consecutive lines (some lyric) from a tragedy. Rare vocabulary items and the presence of ‘Athamas’ to indicate change of speaker suggest Euripides' Ino.
The largest category is Known literary texts: Aristophanes (1), Isocrates (15, which will contribute to a forthcoming OCT), Demosthenes (5) and Plutarch's Moralia (6). The Plutarch papyri (second or third century) indicate that his works circulated in Egypt within a century of his life and bring the number of papyrological witnesses to fourteen. These editions generally consist of one or a few fragments (but 5140 consists of 36) that contain a considerable number of consecutive lines, but only a handful preserve more than a small part of each of those lines. By collating the text that is still legible and reconstructing the nature of an entire roll or codex, the commentators demonstrate how much even such damaged witnesses can tell us about palaeography, book production and circulation, and the transmission of texts. These papyri well illustrate the various kinds of corruption that occur. They supply new readings (some unlikely, but some of interest) and corroborate conjectures and variants known from the indirect tradition.
The first subliterary text (5159) provides the earliest example of a schema for tetrasyllabic feet that was common in Latin and Greek metrical treatises, but differs from that of Hephaestion. Various metra are illustrated using personal names, some of which are not the conventional examples:
ϕρọδείτη (for the usual Ἀρχιμήδης or Εὐρυμήδης) was perhaps deliberately spelled with <ει> to reflect the long vowel (other instances of <ει> for long iota [regular in 5162] are noted elsewhere in this volume, but are not discussed further). The illustration of the first dochmius (κ
βερνήτ
) is curious: it is not the standard example (Ἀριστείδης), it is completely unparalleled in other treatises and it departs from the tradition of illustration through personal names. (The editors did not explicitly confirm that LGPN does not report *Κυβερνήτης. Κύβερνις is the only related name reported in LGPN I [1x], IIa [4x] and Va [1x].)
5160 – a commentary on a comedy (perhaps Eupolis' Goats) – refers to several Hellenistic scholars. Its ‘leisurely pace’ means that there are few lemmata from the play itself. The papyrus describes one phrase as ‘Euripidean’. Although it has a few tragic parallels, none are in Euripides, as the editors note.
Three Graeco-Latin glossaries follow, all apparently for use by Greek speakers learning Latin (there is no discussion of what the contexts for this might have been). 5161 gives the singular conjugation of a series of verbs and shows orthographic features typical of non-elite Latin, occasional character-switching from Latin into Greek, and some non-Classical Greek orthography and morphology. 5162 and 5163 are thematic glossaries of nouns and use Greek script for both languages. These glossaries are similar to those in the Hermeneumata, but contain a few novelties (e.g. lists of insects, furniture and iron objects). The transcription of Latin into Greek is discussed in detail. Bilingual inscriptions naming the winds (e.g. IG XIV 1308) could be adduced as comparanda for the lists in 5162.
The documents (5164–5182) are mainly from the Augustan period and the later first century c.e. – a period less well represented in published papyri. As such, many provide the earliest attestation of various features of life in and around Roman Oxyrhynchus: a private bank (5165), a pig tax (5167), ‘imperial and Ptolemaic silver coinage’ (5173) and a customs post (5179), to name a few. There is no explicit statement of how dates have been calculated (see C. Bennett ZPE 142 [2003], 221–40, for the problems of Augustan calendars. I have discussed the precise date of 5164 in an article to be submitted to ZPE). 5171 gives a second appearance of the name Σώκινδρος (otherwise only in O. Edfou III 371), an intriguing formation for which ‘no etymology has been offered’: Κύλινδρος and Μίνδρος, both very rare, are the only names ending in -ινδρος in LGPN (volumes I and IIIa).
These papyri together illuminate the production, circulation and storage of documents. Several texts are linked on prosopographic grounds (with varying degrees of plausibility, as is rightly, although vaguely, indicated: 5164, 5165 and 5166; 5168 and 5171; 5177 and 5178). 5168–5170 exemplifies an uncommon phenomenon in antiquity: the joining of documents of different types. 5168 and 5169, it seems, were written by the same scribe on the same day (neither has a plate). 5177 displays its number in an ancient filing system. 5175, a duplicate of P. Oxy. I 38 (from the Tryphon Archive), enabled the first edition to be corrected.
The volume closes with letters from the second to fourth centuries (5177–5182). Four are complete or very well preserved (two are accompanied by plates; one of which is the verso of the glossary 5161). The commentaries are detailed, evaluate alternative interpretations, cite corroborative and explanatory parallels, and address historical, epistolary and linguistic points. 5178.14 is restored as τὸ ἐν ἑτο[ίμωι, with an admission that ‘the space seems tight’. This phrase makes sense, but is very rare in the papyri (only P. Eleph. 10.7, P. Bour. 11.5–6 and P. Yale I 36.4, all Ptolemaic). Parallels can be adduced from Theocritus (22.61, Epigr. 16.5) and post-Classical prose (e.g. Polybius 2.34.2 and 2 Corinthians 10.6), but collocations with the definite article are very rare (3 Maccabees 5.8 is the closest). 5180.6 features a rare adjective ἀδεξίαστος ‘unreliable’ (first reported in LSJ Rev. Suppl.). This might help to clarify the meaning of the first element of the obscure word δεξιολάβοι (Act. Ap. 23.23) that may refer to paramilitaries. Interpretations focus on the ‘right hand’ (see J.A.L. Lee, A History of New Testament Lexicography [2003], pp. 253–63), but this noun may convey exceptional reliability instead. The discussion of how to supplement 5182.20–1 ([ἀσ]
άζεταί σε Σαραπό- / [δωρος … πάν]
ες κατ’ ὄνομα) concentrates on ways of construing πάν]
ες as a nominative. However, it is plausible that the Classical nominative form πάν]
ες represents an accusative in Roman times (see F.T. Gignac, A Grammar of the Greek Papyri, Volume II: Morphology [1981], pp. 134–5 for contemporary examples of this phenomenon).
