Tuesday, July 31, 2007
Physicians Are "Science Professionals"
At least that's what the IDiots say [Medical Doctors a Fast Growing Segment of Darwin Doubting Science Professionals].
Who knew? I suppose we shouldn't be surprised if they think an M.D. degree makes you a "science professional." After all, these are some of the same people who think the Earth is only 10,000 years old.
UPDATE: Turns out that many of these medical doctors are actually dentists [Dentists Against Darwin]. Sheesh!
Monday, July 30, 2007
Your View of Evolution
The poll for August asks you to identify the person who comes closest to representing your view of evolution. Check out the left hand margin.
70% of Sandwalk Readers are Atheists
According to the latest poll (see left hand margin) 70% of Sandwalk readers are atheists (PZ would be proud.). 12% are agnostics—I guess Wilkins and Catshark figured out how to vote multiple times. Only 14% are believers. I wish there were more believers, it would make for more lively discussions.
Six of you are uncertain. Why?
This Afternoon at the 25th International Papyrological Congress
More interesting papers this afternoon I have to miss.
Session HISTORY III (Chair Jennifer Sheridan-Moss)
14.00 PM (2pm) Maria Rosaria Falivene
Greek Anthologies on Papyrus and Their Readers in Early Ptolemaic Egypt
I shall argue for the common origin of a number of selections of poems on papyrus dating from the mid- third century BC. This assumption, if accepted, leads to further considerations on the nature and circulation of Greek books in the Egyptian hinterland at this time. Who were the editors, compilers, readers and owners of these anthologies?
HERCULANENSIA III (David Armstrong Chair)
Maria Clara Cavalieri
Per una nuova edizione dell’Index Stoicorum di Filodemo (P.Herc. 1018)
La comunicazione ha lo scopo di divulgare una serie di risultati scaturiti dallo studio autoptico del P.Herc. 1018, contenente il libro della Rassegna dei filosofi di Filodemo dedicato alla scuola stoica. Il papiro, che viene fatto risalire su base paleografica alla fine del I sec. a.C.-inizio del I sec. d.C., nel corso dell’eruzione vesuviana del 79 d.C. subì un notevole schiacciamento nella parte inferiore, circostanza che comportò, al momento del successivo srotolamento, eseguito nel 1808 con la macchina di A. Piaggio, la perdita pressoché completa della metà inferiore delle 79 colonne superstiti e la perdita completa della prima parte del rotolo, ove erano verosimilmente il titolo iniziale e sicuramente le prime colonne del testo. La revisione dell’originale, nonostante le cattive condizioni complessive in cui esso ci è pervenuto, dovute anche ad irregolarità stratigrafiche, ha consentito di migliorare in alcuni punti il testo rispetto alle precedenti edizioni di D. Comparetti (1875), A. Traversa (1952), T. Dorandi (1994). Inoltre, un’attenta analisi della problematica bibliologica e paleografica del volumen ha permesso per la prima volta di ricostruire quello che verosimilmente era il rotolo prima della catastrofe vesuviana. Questo aspetto era stato quasi del tutto trascurato nelle pur benemerite edizioni precedenti.
PAP. AND EGYPT. III (Terry Wilfong Chair)
Hans Foerster
The Coptic Papyri of the Doresse Collection in the Vatican Library
The aim of the presentation is to give a short introduction to the Coptic papyri of the Doresse Collection. A group of Greek and Coptic texts were given to the Biblioteca Vaticana by Jean Doresse. Most of the texts of both language-groups are from Aphrodito (Kom Isqaw). The Greek texts of this collection are published, the Coptic texts, still unpublished, have already been a topic of scholarly discussion. The aim of a three year research-grant of the Austrian “Wissenschaftsfonds” (FWF) is to prepare a publication of these texts. The project started in January 2007. Thus, preliminary results of the work on the texts will be discussed.
14.20 PM
Session HISTORY III (Chair Jennifer Sheridan-Moss)
María Jesús Albarrán Martínez
A Nun’s Dispute with Her Mother in the Late Sixth Century
P.Lond. V 1731, dated AD 585 in Syene, is a document in which a woman named Aurelia Tsone explains that she received a sum of money from her mother, Aurelia Tapia. She had claimed this money as her own and engaged in an economic dispute with her mother. Aurelia Tsone is a nun with the monastic title monache. She belongs to this family, and her claim is one of the many legal and financial documents in the Patermouthis archive. Most of the documents in this archive are transactions and legal or economic disputes, dated between AD 493 and 613, concerning the family of Kako, who is married to Patermuthis. As the document suggests, Tsone is a nun with independent social, familial and economic relationships. What is the monastic type that she represents? Does Tsone represent the urban ascetic type? If this is the case, it could indicate that the female urban ascetic model continues to exist in late sixth century Egypt.
HERCULANENSIA III (David Armstrong Chair)
Robert N. Gaines
P.Herc. 1423: The Case of the Missing Column
The standard text of P.Herc. 1423 (Phld., Rh. 4; Sudhaus 1892) poses a problem: the text contains nineteen columns, whereas the papyrus clearly comprises twenty. Collation of the text against the papyrus immediately suggests the location of the disparity. Sudhaus’ columns I-III and V-XIX correspond to papyrus columns 1-3 and 6-20; accordingly, the difficulty arises in the relation of Sudhaus’ column IV with the papyrus columns 4-5. When the contents of papyrus columns 4 and 5 are examined, it becomes evident that Sudhaus column IV merges a large sovrapposto on papyrus column 4 with the remains of papyrus column 5. The column restoration created by this merger is right-minded. However, it is accompanied by two troublesome mistakes: reconstituted papyrus column 5 has been numbered IV, and papyrus column 4–apart from the sovrapposto–has been entirely ignored. This paper explains Sudhaus’ omission of P.Herc. 1423, column 4, with reference to the history of the text and the various textual responsibilities carried out in the “Officina dei Papiri Ercolanesi” by disegnatori Giovan Battista Malesci and Rafaele Biondi and interpreti Giuseppe Genovesi and Giustino Quadrari. Within this history, it becomes clear that Sudhaus derived his text from Quadrari (1855) and that Quadrari’s text was based on faulty evidence–due to a sequence of events set in motion by Biondi and Genovesi in 1852. New papyrological texts are proposed for P.Herc. 1423, columns 4 and 5.
PAP. AND EGYPT. III (Terry Wilfong Chair)
Jennifer Cromwell
Aristophanes Son of Johannes: an 8th Century Bilingual Scribe?
Aristophanes son of Johannes, an 8th century Coptic scribe from Jeme (on the Theban west bank in Upper Egypt) wrote 28 papyri texts and a large number of ostraca which survive. This paper will focus on his papyri. These fall into the following categories: sales, settlements, donations and receipts. The documents contain a large proportion of Greek words, a standard feature of Coptic legal texts of this period. The Greek vocabulary used falls primarily into two categories: nouns and verbs (other categories will not be addressed here). These are not employed using Greek syntax: the nouns do not appear in their declined forms and verbs are written in their Greek infinitival form, but in standard Coptic verbal constructions. There are, however, formulaic elements that appear with both Greek vocabulary and syntax. These regularly occur in three situations: the opening formulae, the repetition of the price and the scribal notation. Not only is Greek syntax employed, but the palaeography of these sections is markedly different from that of the standard Coptic sections. The papyrus with the designation British Library Or. 4664, a tax receipt published as P.Bal. 134, most strikingly illustrates the differences between Aristophanes’ Greek and Coptic scripts. 12 Using these criteria, in conjunction with the socio-historic context in which Aristophanes operated, this paper will examine the extent to which he can be classified as a bilingual scribe.
14.40 PM Session HISTORY III (Chair Jennifer Sheridan-Moss)
Jean-Luc Fournet
Les tribulations d’un pétitionnaire égyptien à Constantinople. Révision de P.Cair. Masp. III 67352
La révision du P.Cair. Masp. III 67352 m'a permis de remettre cette pétition sous son vrai jour: adressée à l'empereur Justinien, elle date d'un des séjours faits par Dioscore d'Aphrodité à la capitale pour défendre les affaires de son village (548/549 ou 551). À travers ce texte se dessine par bribes tout un milieu d'Égyptiens de Thébaïde venus à Constantinople pétitionner et s'entraidant le temps que durait leur séjour, long et sans doute difficile, à la capitale. La révision de ce texte sera aussi l'occasion de présenter les travaux récemment achevés ou en cours touchant aux archives de Dioscore, notamment la banque des images des papyrus d'Aphrodité qui est terminée.
HERCULANENSIA III (David Armstrong Chair)
W. Benjamin Henry
A New Edition of P.Herc. 1050 (Philodemus, On Death iv)
P.Herc. 1050 is one of the most important texts to have emerged from Herculaneum, and the rhetorical tour de force of the closing columns is among Philodemus’ most impressive pieces of writing. But the only complete edition, that of Domenico Bassi in Volumina Herculanensia III.1, published in 1914, has long been in need of replacement. Bassi conscientiously reported the proposals of earlier scholars, but he was unable to advance matters much himself, and in his reports of the Oxford apographs, he depended on the engravings, which often led him astray. The most frequently cited edition, that of Taco Kuiper in his 1925 dissertation, is not only incomplete but also disfigured by the incorporation of a large number of restorations incompatible with the traces and spaces in the papyrus. Kuiper also fails to indicate where the text that he takes over from Bassi incorporates conjectural emendations of earlier scholars, and he prints doubtfully read letters without the sublinear dots that Bassi had provided. Since 1925, only partial editions have appeared, the most important being those by Marcello Gigante in his Ricerche Filodemee (Naples, 19832) of the opening and closing columns. In this paper I shall illustrate some of the progress that has been achieved in establishing the text of the treatise with the aid of high-quality digital images of the papyrus (produced by MSI) and apographs.
PAP. AND EGYPT. III (Terry Wilfong Chair)
Jennifer Taylor Westerfeld
The Vocabulary of Sacred Space in Documentary Papyri from Late Antique
In Christian literature from late antique Egypt, authors used a wide array of terms to describe the sacred spaces of their pagan predecessors and contemporaries, so that a “temple” in one text might become in the next a “place of making sacrifices to Satan and worshipping and fearing him.” The vocabulary used for Christian sacred space shows a similar range and flexibility; at times authors clearly sought to differentiate themselves and their holy places from those of the pagans, while at other times they seemed to accept overlap and ambiguity in their choice of terminology. This paper will consider the other side of the page, as it were: the vocabulary used for sacred space when it appears, not in literature, but in the documentary papyri of late antique Egypt. Drawing on Greek and Coptic sources such as wills, leases, and deeds of sale, it will be possible to assess the basic working vocabulary of sacred space used in business and legal contexts; this vocabulary can then be compared with the descriptions of space which appear in literary sources. Such a comparative analysis will add greater nuance to our understanding of the position sacred space, pagan and Christian, occupied in the thought-world of the early Egyptian Christians, an understanding which, at present, remains heavily based on literary evidence.
15.00 PM Session HISTORY III (Chair Jennifer Sheridan-Moss)
Mark Depauw
Quantifying Language Shifts in Egypt (800 BC – AD 800) on the Basis of Trismegistos
The interdisciplinary research platform “Trismegistos” (www.trismegistos.org), developed by the project “Multilingualism and Multiculturalism in Graeco-Roman Egypt” (Cologne) in cooperation with the K. U. Leuven, aims to bring together metadata about all published texts dating between the early 25th Dynasty and the disappearance of Coptic as a legal language in the 2nd millennium AD. Although some epigraphic lacunae remain to be filled, for papyri the set of metadata is practically complete and the platform now allows us to quantify the preservation of documents in the various languages and scripts of Egypt (Greek, Demotic, hieratic, hieroglyphic, Aramaic, Coptic, Arabic, etc.). The first results of a study of language variation over the course of about 2000 years will be presented, and problems with the interpretation of these data will be discussed.
HERCULANENSIA III (David Armstrong Chair)
Jeffrey Fish
Philodemus’ On the Good King: Political Protreptic or Homeric Scholarship?
Philodemus sees his way of reading Homer in De bono rege secundum Homerum as part of a program which he mentions in the final column of the treatise (col. 43 Dorandi). Although it is the most frequently quoted passage in the treatise, the text of the passage has undergone significant change. Since Olivieri’s 1909 edition, it had been thought that epanorthosin was followed by dynasteiôn “the correction of dynasties”, a reading which led several scholars to speculate that the passage could be particularly relevant to Piso as an ally of a dynast, Julius Caesar, and which in general led to a reading of the treatise primarily concerned with political protreptic. My rereading of this passage has shown that there is not room for Olivieri’s reading. Moreover, new discoveries in other parts of the papyrus also show that Philodemus conceived of his work primarily as a piece of Homeric scholarship
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Coffee Break
1400 Chemistry 1640 Chemistry 1300 Chemistry
15.40 PM Session HISTORY IV (Chair Ann E. Hanson)
Benjamin Kelly
Petitions, Litigation and Feud in Roman Egypt
The Roman petitions complaining about alleged wrongs mostly claim, either explicitly or implicitly, that their senders wanted their disputes to be resolved. It is usually assumed in the modern literature that this was indeed the goal of petitioners and litigants. But in a fascinating group of cases, bouts of litigation display many of the features that anthropologists have identified as characteristic of feud. They were of long duration, and the parties launched repeated attacks and counter-attacks on each other – often concerning new grievances unrelated to the original dispute. As with feuds, these disputing relationships tended to exist between groups (especially family groups), rather than just between individuals. This paper takes a selection of cases, including the conflict between Satabous and Nestnephis, the “Drusilla-Prozess”, and the petition of Dionysia, and interprets them in light of a feuding paradigm. It concludes that we need to recognize that legal institutions had more complex functions and uses than mere dispute resolution.
LITERARY PAPYRI (Tim Renner Chair)
Timothy Renner
The Nile Waters, the Sky, and Capricorn: A New Greek Fragment of Geography or Mythography
P.Mich.inv. 1599 contains on its front the lower half of a column of previously unattested Greek prose in a decorated but somewhat irregularly executed book hand which appears to have been written in approximately the first century BCE. The text of the Michigan papyrus seems to have formed part of a continuous work of geography, history, or mythography—with such a small section of text preserved, it is hard to be sure which—that is represented also by fragmentary columns on either side. The first portion of the text preserved in the papyrus, which seems to require us to supply an omitted word or two, but the general sense of which is clear, draws either a parallel or a causal connection between the “recovery” (anakomide) of waters from the sky on the one hand and the flow of the Nile on the other. This is reminiscent of the kind of discussion that we find in Herodotus 2.20-27 concerning possible explanations for the annual flooding of the river, but the Herodotean explanation is only one of several (cf. D. Bonneau, La crue du Nil [1964] 176-193) that could be compatible with the approach taken by our papyrus. Further, and unlike Herodotus, the second section of the papyrus states that on the basis of the previously cited facts, certain individuals speak in obscure terms of the force (energeia) of Aigokeros and tell stories of this god’s change in form. Although the relationship of the zodiacal sign Aigokeros/Aigipan = Capricorn to the rhythm of the Nile’s rise and fall that is intended by this author requires investigation, the probable allusion to the transformation of Aigokeros into a constellation touches upon a theme which can be traced back to Eratosthenes’ Katasterismoi a few generations earlier. In addition to aiming at an improved understanding of the language and the thought of the Greek text of the passage, this paper explores contexts and parallels for this type of discussion and for the combination of scientific and myth-related ideas contained in it, with a special eye to assessing the importance of the papyrus for the history of geography and mythography near the close of the Hellenistic period.
RELIGION AND MAGIC (Chair Robert Daniel)
Renata-Gabriela Tatomir
Interdisciplinary Aspects Concerning the Connotations of a Cnsj.t
Often the Egyptian word nsj.t is related to an illness –“epilepsy”. The interpretation “epilepsy” was proposed by Bendix Ebbell, in “Die aegyptischen Krankheitsnamen” (ZÄS 62 [1927] 13-20). The word nsj.t is discussed also in the Grundriss der Medizin der alten Ägypter, vol. I - IX, Berlin, 1954- 1973, and according to this source nsj.t is an illness caused by bad demons (or by exterior demonic influences). It is said that the illness is located “in the stomach” or “in a man” and it probably enters the body through the eyes. Nonetheless the Egyptian sources refer also to two words: nsj (M) and nsjt (F), their translation being related to the suggested meanings “Krankheitsdämon”, and respectively, “Krankheitsdämonin”. From these considerations should we understand that nsj/nsj.t is a couple of opposed concepts related to the medical/psychological field, rather to the religious one? In this respect, while discussing about ancient Egyptian knowledge, a question arises: where medical science ends and where religion begins? The emphasis of my paper will lie in the offering of some interdisciplinary connotations for the word nsj.t, from the medical/religious interdisciplinary perspective. Examples will be provided from the Papyri Ebers, Hearst, Berlin 3038 and Chester Beatty VI.
16.00 PM Session HISTORY IV (Chair Ann E. Hanson)
Ari Bryen
The Village is Watching: Visibility and Violence in Petitions from Roman Egypt
Petitioners complaining about violence in Roman Egypt exploited the language of visibility and publicity in their complaints to legal authorities. This paper addresses a number of features that petitioners highlight with some degree of frequency: wounds on exposed parts of the body (faces, hands, legs), the lasting visibility of these wounds (signaled by the use of the verb fainesthai and its derivatives), as well as on other important instances in which the consequences of violence would be available for public view (such as the tearing or stripping of clothes, which is almost always done in public). This paper investigates the rhetoric of legal complaints and tries to understand petitioners as individuals engaging with their legal system as part of a face saving ritual. I argue that while the emphasis on visible wounds certainly has an evidentiary component, we should not neglect the symbolic consequences for an individual of having on his or her body lasting marks of violence. These marks would potentially expose one’s private defeat to public notice and, of course, comment. The potentially compromising situation that this could create made rapid recourse to legal authorities critical, especially as a public demonstration that one would not take one’s injuries passively.
LITERARY PAPYRI (Tim Renner Chair)
Daniela Colomo
Antinoos’ Mystery in a New Fragment from the Leipzig Collection
In this paper I present an unpublished papyrus fragment–P.Lips. inv. 1454–containing a puzzling composition which seems to be linked to Antinoos’ myth, in particular to the motif of Antinoos’ flower. This motif, which goes back to the poet Pankrates, appears in verses and prose works preserved on papyrus. I try to establish the relationship between these compositions and the unpublished fragment, pointing out the interpretative difficulties of the new text.
RELIGION AND MAGIC (Chair Robert Daniel)
Gil Haviv Renberg
Incubation at the Memphis Sarapeum
This paper will examine the questions of whether incubation was practiced at the Memphis Sarapeum and, if so, who engaged in it and which gods were consulted by those doing so. The Sarapeum complex featured not only the temple of Sarapis, but also temples of other gods and sacred animal necropoleis that likewise functioned as cult sites. A broad range of Greek and Demotic sources–including papyri, ostraka, inscriptions and graffiti–clearly indicates the importance of dreams to sanctuary officials and ordinary worshipers alike, but the evidence for incubation is far more complex than has previously been recognized. By reevaluating these sources, it can be shown that some repeatedly cited texts turn out not to be evidence for incubation, while others have been only partly appreciated or even misunderstood. Overall, the evidence that visitors to the Sarapeum could solicit dreams from Sarapis is flimsy at best, and assumptions that this occurred is partly based on the role of incubation at some of his other cult sites. While sources such as the Hor Archive and a recent graffito referring to an incubation chamber reveal that incubation was indeed practiced at the Sarapeum, it cannot be demonstrated that Sarapis was routinely consulted in this manner – and instead, it appears that incubation in the cult of Sarapis, which is well attested elsewhere, developed at Alexandria, where the god worshiped as Osorapis at Memphis became the Hellenized god worshiped beyond the land of Egypt.
16.20 PM Session HISTORY IV (Chair Ann E. Hanson)
Isabella Andorlini
Egypt and the Medicinal Use of Papyrus According to Soranus and Other Physicians
In his account of the manufacture of papyrus in Natural History xiii. 72, Pliny makes no mention of its medical application among the miscellaneous uses popular in the Egyptian chora. He does, however, refer to the reputation of medicinal ash obtained from burning papyrus in a number of other places (NH xxi. 84; xxiv. 88; xxviii. 214; xxix. 106; xxxiv. 170). Ancient doctors too prized the medicinal application of both 2 the plant and the paper made from it (e.g. PSI 1180 A.ii.11; iii.7). The employment of papyrus in a therapeutic context is discussed by Naphtali Lewis (Papyrus in Classical Antiquity [1974] 31, 97), who draws on Egyptian, Greek and Arabic evidence. The present contribution focuses on the additional information supplied by the Gynecology of Soranus, the distinguished Roman physician who studied in Alexandria in the first and second centuries AD. Soranus’ original comparison of the uterus layers with the arrangement of fibers in papyrus layers will be illustrated. Medical sources also provide evidence of learned doctors who made their way to Alexandria, often considered the cradle of advanced medical education. It will be shown how physicians visiting Alexandria and Egypt were likely to gain firsthand experience both in the anatomical schools and in the headquarters of the papyrus industry, where medical scholars and practitioners became acquainted with the usefulness of papyrus in treatment and healing.
LITERARY PAPYRI (Tim Renner Chair)
Cornelia Eva Römer
News from Jannes and Jambres
In his account of the manufacture of papyrus in Natural History xiii. 72, Pliny makes no mention of its medical application among the miscellaneous uses popular in the Egyptian chora. He does, however, refer to the reputation of medicinal ash obtained from burning papyrus in a number of other places (NH xxi. 84; xxiv. 88; xxviii. 214; xxix. 106; xxxiv. 170). Ancient doctors too prized the medicinal application of both 2 the plant and the paper made from it (e.g. PSI 1180 A.ii.11; iii.7). The employment of papyrus in a therapeutic context is discussed by Naphtali Lewis (Papyrus in Classical Antiquity [1974] 31, 97), who draws on Egyptian, Greek and Arabic evidence. The present contribution focuses on the additional information supplied by the Gynecology of Soranus, the distinguished Roman physician who studied in Alexandria in the first and second centuries AD. Soranus’ original comparison of the uterus layers with the arrangement of fibers in papyrus layers will be illustrated. Medical sources also provide evidence of learned doctors who made their way to Alexandria, often considered the cradle of advanced medical education. It will be shown how physicians visiting Alexandria and Egypt were likely to gain firsthand experience both in the anatomical schools and in the headquarters of the papyrus industry, where medical scholars and practitioners became acquainted with the usefulness of papyrus in treatment and healing.
RELIGION AND MAGIC (Chair Robert Daniel)
Malcolm Choat
Anatolios the Archiprophetes
Better known as a friend of Theophanes, well-to-do scion of early fourth-century Hermopolis Magna and traveler to Antioch, Anatolios (who writes P.Herm. 2-3 and SB XII 10803) is one of our last known holders of the office of “Chief Prophet”. Through him (and, really, only through him), Theophanes is linked with “Hermetic” circles in Hermopolis, and with late antique Egyptian “paganism”, which his archive is held to embody. But despite the frequency with which he is cited in passing, what do we know about Anatolios? Where did he live? Of where was he chief prophet? What was his relationship to Theophanes? Why did Theophanes carry his letters? Did Theophanes, in fact, carry his letters? The first full monograph on Theophanes (John Matthews, The Journey of Theophanes, 2006), and inspection of the papyri of the archive of Theophanes in the John Rylands Library, invite consideration of these and other questions, and reflection on the place of Anatolios and his fellow worshippers of the “old gods” in the social circle of Theophanes.
16.40 PM Session HISTORY IV (Chair Ann E. Hanson)
Sabine R. Huebner
Therapeuteria Reconsidered
In Greece and Rome, a female stood at the center of attention of her family and the outside world only at two occasions, at her marriage and at her funeral. Therefore a feast celebrated in the honor of a minor girl, recorded in three papyri, all from third-century Oxyrhynchus (P.Oxy. Hels. 50.17; P.Oxy. LXVI 4542; 4543) seems rather odd at first sight. From these papyri we learn that this feast, the so-called therapeuteria, was a family get-together to which relatives, neighbors and friends were invited. As the editors of P.Oxy. LXVI remark, the girls for whom the feast was celebrated were apparently still minors and yet unmarried since they lived at home. However, no convincing explanation has been advanced so far that would sufficiently explain this custom. The term therapeuteria itself is derived presumably from therapeuo, and the editors suggest that it might have designated “a place for therapeusis” and assign it a religious, ritual or medical context. In any case, it becomes clear that we have to look for a specific event that took place in a girl’s life before she reached puberty. Evidence on girls’ lives in Graeco-Roman Egypt is scarce; girls lived at home and were trained by their mothers and prepared for their future lives as wives and daughters-in- law. However, evidence from ancient ethnographic reports, medical texts, early Islamic sources and comparative evidence from modern Egypt, offer highly interesting parallels and a new interpretation of this feast, which would explain it as an indigenous tradition cultivated already for several millennia in this region.
LITERARY PAPYRI (Tim Renner Chair)
Nele Baplu, Marc Huys, and Thomas Schmidt
The Syllabic Word Lists in P.Bouriant 1 Reconsidered
The syllabic word lists in the famous school papyrus P.Bouriant 1, edited more than a century ago by P. Jouguet and P. Perdrizet, have not been the subject of a detailed discussion since then, although important remarks on the readings and on the choice of the words were published by J. Bingen and A. Blanchard. However, several similar word lists have been published during the last century, including that in P.Monts. Roca I, recently published by S. Torallas Tovar and K.A. Worp. These new word lists provide important comparative material. Therefore, on the basis of our inspection of the original papyrus and of digital images, we have prepared a re-edition of the word list, containing some new text restorations along with a line-by-line commentary. In this paper, we will present the most important conclusions of this re- examination, in particular the reasons for word selection and word order and their relation to similar papyrus word lists and to the occurrence of the same words in other texts of scholarly nature, such as lexica or commentaries. Finally we try to specify the practical, didactic, grammatical and literary function of each word.
RELIGION AND MAGIC (Chair Robert Daniel)
Theodore S. de Bruyn
Christian Amulets with Biblical Inscriptions: a Catalogue in Progress This paper will report on an aspect of a project to prepare a catalogue of edited Greek formularies and amulets (papyri, ostraca, lamellae, tabulae) containing Christian motifs and dating from the second to the eighth centuries CE. The catalogue is preliminary to a study of the incorporation of Christian liturgical sequences into Greek formularies and amulets. Scholars have differed in their criteria for identifying Greek formularies and amulets containing Christian motifs. Van Haelst’s catalogue of Jewish and Christian papyri included amulets consisting of prayers, acclamations, or citations from the Bible or the Christian liturgy (Catalogue des papyrus littéraires juifs et chrétiens, 1976, 414), whereas these were excluded from the more recent compilations of Brashear (ANRW II.18.5, 1995, 3492-3; cf. 3480 n.486) and Daniel and Maltomini (Supplementum Magicum I, 1991, ix). Both approaches have their merits. While the latter focuses on unique or specific features of magical texts, the former is more inclusive of the entire range of materials with Christian motifs that were used as amulets. This paper will (1) review criteria used to identify papyri inscribed with one or more biblical passages as amulets (e.g., evidence that the papyrus was folded or tied, evidence that the papyrus did not form part of a larger roll or codex, etc.); (2) present an up-to-date list of edited papyri inscribed with biblical passages and deemed to be amulets by their editors or commentators; and (3) discuss doubtful or problematic cases.
17.00 PM Session HISTORY IV (Chair Ann E. Hanson)
Hélène Cuvigny
Du côté de chez Zeus
This paper will provide an overview of the inscriptions and ostraca found during the two first excavation campaigns at the praesidium of Dios on the Koptos-Berenike road
RELIGION AND MAGIC (Chair Robert Daniel)
José-Antonio Fernández-Delgado and Francisca Pordomingo
Thèmes et modèles d’exercices scolaires sur papyrus
Nous allons considérer d'abord des papyrus scolaires qui prouvent que nous avons un matériel de professeur, qui pouvait être utilisé pour l’élaboration d'exercices progymnasmatiques. D’autres papyrus présentent ce qui pourrait être des exercices déjà plus élaborés, lesquels auraient pu servir de modèles à la dictée ou à la copie dans les niveaux inférieurs de l’enseignement; quelquefois le modèle est constitué par de simples énoncés. L’analyse est donc faite dans l’optique du maître et elle met en évidence la réutilisation des modèles scolaires dans des buts divers et le fait que dans de nombreuses écoles le maître était le seul responsable de l’enseignement aux différents niveaux, introduisant même les élèves à l’étude de la rhétorique. La paléographie, en particulier, et les caractéristiques bibliologiques montrent que le maître est l’auteur du texte original et de la copie. Mais certaines copies maladroites, typiques d’un élève débutant, laissent deviner la présence d’un exercice d’un niveau supérieur, qui transparaît derrière le type de texte et d'autres caractéristiques textuelles.
Session HISTORY III (Chair Jennifer Sheridan-Moss)
14.00 PM (2pm) Maria Rosaria Falivene
Greek Anthologies on Papyrus and Their Readers in Early Ptolemaic Egypt
I shall argue for the common origin of a number of selections of poems on papyrus dating from the mid- third century BC. This assumption, if accepted, leads to further considerations on the nature and circulation of Greek books in the Egyptian hinterland at this time. Who were the editors, compilers, readers and owners of these anthologies?
HERCULANENSIA III (David Armstrong Chair)
Maria Clara Cavalieri
Per una nuova edizione dell’Index Stoicorum di Filodemo (P.Herc. 1018)
La comunicazione ha lo scopo di divulgare una serie di risultati scaturiti dallo studio autoptico del P.Herc. 1018, contenente il libro della Rassegna dei filosofi di Filodemo dedicato alla scuola stoica. Il papiro, che viene fatto risalire su base paleografica alla fine del I sec. a.C.-inizio del I sec. d.C., nel corso dell’eruzione vesuviana del 79 d.C. subì un notevole schiacciamento nella parte inferiore, circostanza che comportò, al momento del successivo srotolamento, eseguito nel 1808 con la macchina di A. Piaggio, la perdita pressoché completa della metà inferiore delle 79 colonne superstiti e la perdita completa della prima parte del rotolo, ove erano verosimilmente il titolo iniziale e sicuramente le prime colonne del testo. La revisione dell’originale, nonostante le cattive condizioni complessive in cui esso ci è pervenuto, dovute anche ad irregolarità stratigrafiche, ha consentito di migliorare in alcuni punti il testo rispetto alle precedenti edizioni di D. Comparetti (1875), A. Traversa (1952), T. Dorandi (1994). Inoltre, un’attenta analisi della problematica bibliologica e paleografica del volumen ha permesso per la prima volta di ricostruire quello che verosimilmente era il rotolo prima della catastrofe vesuviana. Questo aspetto era stato quasi del tutto trascurato nelle pur benemerite edizioni precedenti.
PAP. AND EGYPT. III (Terry Wilfong Chair)
Hans Foerster
The Coptic Papyri of the Doresse Collection in the Vatican Library
The aim of the presentation is to give a short introduction to the Coptic papyri of the Doresse Collection. A group of Greek and Coptic texts were given to the Biblioteca Vaticana by Jean Doresse. Most of the texts of both language-groups are from Aphrodito (Kom Isqaw). The Greek texts of this collection are published, the Coptic texts, still unpublished, have already been a topic of scholarly discussion. The aim of a three year research-grant of the Austrian “Wissenschaftsfonds” (FWF) is to prepare a publication of these texts. The project started in January 2007. Thus, preliminary results of the work on the texts will be discussed.
14.20 PM
Session HISTORY III (Chair Jennifer Sheridan-Moss)
María Jesús Albarrán Martínez
A Nun’s Dispute with Her Mother in the Late Sixth Century
P.Lond. V 1731, dated AD 585 in Syene, is a document in which a woman named Aurelia Tsone explains that she received a sum of money from her mother, Aurelia Tapia. She had claimed this money as her own and engaged in an economic dispute with her mother. Aurelia Tsone is a nun with the monastic title monache. She belongs to this family, and her claim is one of the many legal and financial documents in the Patermouthis archive. Most of the documents in this archive are transactions and legal or economic disputes, dated between AD 493 and 613, concerning the family of Kako, who is married to Patermuthis. As the document suggests, Tsone is a nun with independent social, familial and economic relationships. What is the monastic type that she represents? Does Tsone represent the urban ascetic type? If this is the case, it could indicate that the female urban ascetic model continues to exist in late sixth century Egypt.
HERCULANENSIA III (David Armstrong Chair)
Robert N. Gaines
P.Herc. 1423: The Case of the Missing Column
The standard text of P.Herc. 1423 (Phld., Rh. 4; Sudhaus 1892) poses a problem: the text contains nineteen columns, whereas the papyrus clearly comprises twenty. Collation of the text against the papyrus immediately suggests the location of the disparity. Sudhaus’ columns I-III and V-XIX correspond to papyrus columns 1-3 and 6-20; accordingly, the difficulty arises in the relation of Sudhaus’ column IV with the papyrus columns 4-5. When the contents of papyrus columns 4 and 5 are examined, it becomes evident that Sudhaus column IV merges a large sovrapposto on papyrus column 4 with the remains of papyrus column 5. The column restoration created by this merger is right-minded. However, it is accompanied by two troublesome mistakes: reconstituted papyrus column 5 has been numbered IV, and papyrus column 4–apart from the sovrapposto–has been entirely ignored. This paper explains Sudhaus’ omission of P.Herc. 1423, column 4, with reference to the history of the text and the various textual responsibilities carried out in the “Officina dei Papiri Ercolanesi” by disegnatori Giovan Battista Malesci and Rafaele Biondi and interpreti Giuseppe Genovesi and Giustino Quadrari. Within this history, it becomes clear that Sudhaus derived his text from Quadrari (1855) and that Quadrari’s text was based on faulty evidence–due to a sequence of events set in motion by Biondi and Genovesi in 1852. New papyrological texts are proposed for P.Herc. 1423, columns 4 and 5.
PAP. AND EGYPT. III (Terry Wilfong Chair)
Jennifer Cromwell
Aristophanes Son of Johannes: an 8th Century Bilingual Scribe?
Aristophanes son of Johannes, an 8th century Coptic scribe from Jeme (on the Theban west bank in Upper Egypt) wrote 28 papyri texts and a large number of ostraca which survive. This paper will focus on his papyri. These fall into the following categories: sales, settlements, donations and receipts. The documents contain a large proportion of Greek words, a standard feature of Coptic legal texts of this period. The Greek vocabulary used falls primarily into two categories: nouns and verbs (other categories will not be addressed here). These are not employed using Greek syntax: the nouns do not appear in their declined forms and verbs are written in their Greek infinitival form, but in standard Coptic verbal constructions. There are, however, formulaic elements that appear with both Greek vocabulary and syntax. These regularly occur in three situations: the opening formulae, the repetition of the price and the scribal notation. Not only is Greek syntax employed, but the palaeography of these sections is markedly different from that of the standard Coptic sections. The papyrus with the designation British Library Or. 4664, a tax receipt published as P.Bal. 134, most strikingly illustrates the differences between Aristophanes’ Greek and Coptic scripts. 12 Using these criteria, in conjunction with the socio-historic context in which Aristophanes operated, this paper will examine the extent to which he can be classified as a bilingual scribe.
14.40 PM Session HISTORY III (Chair Jennifer Sheridan-Moss)
Jean-Luc Fournet
Les tribulations d’un pétitionnaire égyptien à Constantinople. Révision de P.Cair. Masp. III 67352
La révision du P.Cair. Masp. III 67352 m'a permis de remettre cette pétition sous son vrai jour: adressée à l'empereur Justinien, elle date d'un des séjours faits par Dioscore d'Aphrodité à la capitale pour défendre les affaires de son village (548/549 ou 551). À travers ce texte se dessine par bribes tout un milieu d'Égyptiens de Thébaïde venus à Constantinople pétitionner et s'entraidant le temps que durait leur séjour, long et sans doute difficile, à la capitale. La révision de ce texte sera aussi l'occasion de présenter les travaux récemment achevés ou en cours touchant aux archives de Dioscore, notamment la banque des images des papyrus d'Aphrodité qui est terminée.
HERCULANENSIA III (David Armstrong Chair)
W. Benjamin Henry
A New Edition of P.Herc. 1050 (Philodemus, On Death iv)
P.Herc. 1050 is one of the most important texts to have emerged from Herculaneum, and the rhetorical tour de force of the closing columns is among Philodemus’ most impressive pieces of writing. But the only complete edition, that of Domenico Bassi in Volumina Herculanensia III.1, published in 1914, has long been in need of replacement. Bassi conscientiously reported the proposals of earlier scholars, but he was unable to advance matters much himself, and in his reports of the Oxford apographs, he depended on the engravings, which often led him astray. The most frequently cited edition, that of Taco Kuiper in his 1925 dissertation, is not only incomplete but also disfigured by the incorporation of a large number of restorations incompatible with the traces and spaces in the papyrus. Kuiper also fails to indicate where the text that he takes over from Bassi incorporates conjectural emendations of earlier scholars, and he prints doubtfully read letters without the sublinear dots that Bassi had provided. Since 1925, only partial editions have appeared, the most important being those by Marcello Gigante in his Ricerche Filodemee (Naples, 19832) of the opening and closing columns. In this paper I shall illustrate some of the progress that has been achieved in establishing the text of the treatise with the aid of high-quality digital images of the papyrus (produced by MSI) and apographs.
PAP. AND EGYPT. III (Terry Wilfong Chair)
Jennifer Taylor Westerfeld
The Vocabulary of Sacred Space in Documentary Papyri from Late Antique
In Christian literature from late antique Egypt, authors used a wide array of terms to describe the sacred spaces of their pagan predecessors and contemporaries, so that a “temple” in one text might become in the next a “place of making sacrifices to Satan and worshipping and fearing him.” The vocabulary used for Christian sacred space shows a similar range and flexibility; at times authors clearly sought to differentiate themselves and their holy places from those of the pagans, while at other times they seemed to accept overlap and ambiguity in their choice of terminology. This paper will consider the other side of the page, as it were: the vocabulary used for sacred space when it appears, not in literature, but in the documentary papyri of late antique Egypt. Drawing on Greek and Coptic sources such as wills, leases, and deeds of sale, it will be possible to assess the basic working vocabulary of sacred space used in business and legal contexts; this vocabulary can then be compared with the descriptions of space which appear in literary sources. Such a comparative analysis will add greater nuance to our understanding of the position sacred space, pagan and Christian, occupied in the thought-world of the early Egyptian Christians, an understanding which, at present, remains heavily based on literary evidence.
15.00 PM Session HISTORY III (Chair Jennifer Sheridan-Moss)
Mark Depauw
Quantifying Language Shifts in Egypt (800 BC – AD 800) on the Basis of Trismegistos
The interdisciplinary research platform “Trismegistos” (www.trismegistos.org), developed by the project “Multilingualism and Multiculturalism in Graeco-Roman Egypt” (Cologne) in cooperation with the K. U. Leuven, aims to bring together metadata about all published texts dating between the early 25th Dynasty and the disappearance of Coptic as a legal language in the 2nd millennium AD. Although some epigraphic lacunae remain to be filled, for papyri the set of metadata is practically complete and the platform now allows us to quantify the preservation of documents in the various languages and scripts of Egypt (Greek, Demotic, hieratic, hieroglyphic, Aramaic, Coptic, Arabic, etc.). The first results of a study of language variation over the course of about 2000 years will be presented, and problems with the interpretation of these data will be discussed.
HERCULANENSIA III (David Armstrong Chair)
Jeffrey Fish
Philodemus’ On the Good King: Political Protreptic or Homeric Scholarship?
Philodemus sees his way of reading Homer in De bono rege secundum Homerum as part of a program which he mentions in the final column of the treatise (col. 43 Dorandi). Although it is the most frequently quoted passage in the treatise, the text of the passage has undergone significant change. Since Olivieri’s 1909 edition, it had been thought that epanorthosin was followed by dynasteiôn “the correction of dynasties”, a reading which led several scholars to speculate that the passage could be particularly relevant to Piso as an ally of a dynast, Julius Caesar, and which in general led to a reading of the treatise primarily concerned with political protreptic. My rereading of this passage has shown that there is not room for Olivieri’s reading. Moreover, new discoveries in other parts of the papyrus also show that Philodemus conceived of his work primarily as a piece of Homeric scholarship
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Coffee Break
1400 Chemistry 1640 Chemistry 1300 Chemistry
15.40 PM Session HISTORY IV (Chair Ann E. Hanson)
Benjamin Kelly
Petitions, Litigation and Feud in Roman Egypt
The Roman petitions complaining about alleged wrongs mostly claim, either explicitly or implicitly, that their senders wanted their disputes to be resolved. It is usually assumed in the modern literature that this was indeed the goal of petitioners and litigants. But in a fascinating group of cases, bouts of litigation display many of the features that anthropologists have identified as characteristic of feud. They were of long duration, and the parties launched repeated attacks and counter-attacks on each other – often concerning new grievances unrelated to the original dispute. As with feuds, these disputing relationships tended to exist between groups (especially family groups), rather than just between individuals. This paper takes a selection of cases, including the conflict between Satabous and Nestnephis, the “Drusilla-Prozess”, and the petition of Dionysia, and interprets them in light of a feuding paradigm. It concludes that we need to recognize that legal institutions had more complex functions and uses than mere dispute resolution.
LITERARY PAPYRI (Tim Renner Chair)
Timothy Renner
The Nile Waters, the Sky, and Capricorn: A New Greek Fragment of Geography or Mythography
P.Mich.inv. 1599 contains on its front the lower half of a column of previously unattested Greek prose in a decorated but somewhat irregularly executed book hand which appears to have been written in approximately the first century BCE. The text of the Michigan papyrus seems to have formed part of a continuous work of geography, history, or mythography—with such a small section of text preserved, it is hard to be sure which—that is represented also by fragmentary columns on either side. The first portion of the text preserved in the papyrus, which seems to require us to supply an omitted word or two, but the general sense of which is clear, draws either a parallel or a causal connection between the “recovery” (anakomide) of waters from the sky on the one hand and the flow of the Nile on the other. This is reminiscent of the kind of discussion that we find in Herodotus 2.20-27 concerning possible explanations for the annual flooding of the river, but the Herodotean explanation is only one of several (cf. D. Bonneau, La crue du Nil [1964] 176-193) that could be compatible with the approach taken by our papyrus. Further, and unlike Herodotus, the second section of the papyrus states that on the basis of the previously cited facts, certain individuals speak in obscure terms of the force (energeia) of Aigokeros and tell stories of this god’s change in form. Although the relationship of the zodiacal sign Aigokeros/Aigipan = Capricorn to the rhythm of the Nile’s rise and fall that is intended by this author requires investigation, the probable allusion to the transformation of Aigokeros into a constellation touches upon a theme which can be traced back to Eratosthenes’ Katasterismoi a few generations earlier. In addition to aiming at an improved understanding of the language and the thought of the Greek text of the passage, this paper explores contexts and parallels for this type of discussion and for the combination of scientific and myth-related ideas contained in it, with a special eye to assessing the importance of the papyrus for the history of geography and mythography near the close of the Hellenistic period.
RELIGION AND MAGIC (Chair Robert Daniel)
Renata-Gabriela Tatomir
Interdisciplinary Aspects Concerning the Connotations of a Cnsj.t
Often the Egyptian word nsj.t is related to an illness –“epilepsy”. The interpretation “epilepsy” was proposed by Bendix Ebbell, in “Die aegyptischen Krankheitsnamen” (ZÄS 62 [1927] 13-20). The word nsj.t is discussed also in the Grundriss der Medizin der alten Ägypter, vol. I - IX, Berlin, 1954- 1973, and according to this source nsj.t is an illness caused by bad demons (or by exterior demonic influences). It is said that the illness is located “in the stomach” or “in a man” and it probably enters the body through the eyes. Nonetheless the Egyptian sources refer also to two words: nsj (M) and nsjt (F), their translation being related to the suggested meanings “Krankheitsdämon”, and respectively, “Krankheitsdämonin”. From these considerations should we understand that nsj/nsj.t is a couple of opposed concepts related to the medical/psychological field, rather to the religious one? In this respect, while discussing about ancient Egyptian knowledge, a question arises: where medical science ends and where religion begins? The emphasis of my paper will lie in the offering of some interdisciplinary connotations for the word nsj.t, from the medical/religious interdisciplinary perspective. Examples will be provided from the Papyri Ebers, Hearst, Berlin 3038 and Chester Beatty VI.
16.00 PM Session HISTORY IV (Chair Ann E. Hanson)
Ari Bryen
The Village is Watching: Visibility and Violence in Petitions from Roman Egypt
Petitioners complaining about violence in Roman Egypt exploited the language of visibility and publicity in their complaints to legal authorities. This paper addresses a number of features that petitioners highlight with some degree of frequency: wounds on exposed parts of the body (faces, hands, legs), the lasting visibility of these wounds (signaled by the use of the verb fainesthai and its derivatives), as well as on other important instances in which the consequences of violence would be available for public view (such as the tearing or stripping of clothes, which is almost always done in public). This paper investigates the rhetoric of legal complaints and tries to understand petitioners as individuals engaging with their legal system as part of a face saving ritual. I argue that while the emphasis on visible wounds certainly has an evidentiary component, we should not neglect the symbolic consequences for an individual of having on his or her body lasting marks of violence. These marks would potentially expose one’s private defeat to public notice and, of course, comment. The potentially compromising situation that this could create made rapid recourse to legal authorities critical, especially as a public demonstration that one would not take one’s injuries passively.
LITERARY PAPYRI (Tim Renner Chair)
Daniela Colomo
Antinoos’ Mystery in a New Fragment from the Leipzig Collection
In this paper I present an unpublished papyrus fragment–P.Lips. inv. 1454–containing a puzzling composition which seems to be linked to Antinoos’ myth, in particular to the motif of Antinoos’ flower. This motif, which goes back to the poet Pankrates, appears in verses and prose works preserved on papyrus. I try to establish the relationship between these compositions and the unpublished fragment, pointing out the interpretative difficulties of the new text.
RELIGION AND MAGIC (Chair Robert Daniel)
Gil Haviv Renberg
Incubation at the Memphis Sarapeum
This paper will examine the questions of whether incubation was practiced at the Memphis Sarapeum and, if so, who engaged in it and which gods were consulted by those doing so. The Sarapeum complex featured not only the temple of Sarapis, but also temples of other gods and sacred animal necropoleis that likewise functioned as cult sites. A broad range of Greek and Demotic sources–including papyri, ostraka, inscriptions and graffiti–clearly indicates the importance of dreams to sanctuary officials and ordinary worshipers alike, but the evidence for incubation is far more complex than has previously been recognized. By reevaluating these sources, it can be shown that some repeatedly cited texts turn out not to be evidence for incubation, while others have been only partly appreciated or even misunderstood. Overall, the evidence that visitors to the Sarapeum could solicit dreams from Sarapis is flimsy at best, and assumptions that this occurred is partly based on the role of incubation at some of his other cult sites. While sources such as the Hor Archive and a recent graffito referring to an incubation chamber reveal that incubation was indeed practiced at the Sarapeum, it cannot be demonstrated that Sarapis was routinely consulted in this manner – and instead, it appears that incubation in the cult of Sarapis, which is well attested elsewhere, developed at Alexandria, where the god worshiped as Osorapis at Memphis became the Hellenized god worshiped beyond the land of Egypt.
16.20 PM Session HISTORY IV (Chair Ann E. Hanson)
Isabella Andorlini
Egypt and the Medicinal Use of Papyrus According to Soranus and Other Physicians
In his account of the manufacture of papyrus in Natural History xiii. 72, Pliny makes no mention of its medical application among the miscellaneous uses popular in the Egyptian chora. He does, however, refer to the reputation of medicinal ash obtained from burning papyrus in a number of other places (NH xxi. 84; xxiv. 88; xxviii. 214; xxix. 106; xxxiv. 170). Ancient doctors too prized the medicinal application of both 2 the plant and the paper made from it (e.g. PSI 1180 A.ii.11; iii.7). The employment of papyrus in a therapeutic context is discussed by Naphtali Lewis (Papyrus in Classical Antiquity [1974] 31, 97), who draws on Egyptian, Greek and Arabic evidence. The present contribution focuses on the additional information supplied by the Gynecology of Soranus, the distinguished Roman physician who studied in Alexandria in the first and second centuries AD. Soranus’ original comparison of the uterus layers with the arrangement of fibers in papyrus layers will be illustrated. Medical sources also provide evidence of learned doctors who made their way to Alexandria, often considered the cradle of advanced medical education. It will be shown how physicians visiting Alexandria and Egypt were likely to gain firsthand experience both in the anatomical schools and in the headquarters of the papyrus industry, where medical scholars and practitioners became acquainted with the usefulness of papyrus in treatment and healing.
LITERARY PAPYRI (Tim Renner Chair)
Cornelia Eva Römer
News from Jannes and Jambres
In his account of the manufacture of papyrus in Natural History xiii. 72, Pliny makes no mention of its medical application among the miscellaneous uses popular in the Egyptian chora. He does, however, refer to the reputation of medicinal ash obtained from burning papyrus in a number of other places (NH xxi. 84; xxiv. 88; xxviii. 214; xxix. 106; xxxiv. 170). Ancient doctors too prized the medicinal application of both 2 the plant and the paper made from it (e.g. PSI 1180 A.ii.11; iii.7). The employment of papyrus in a therapeutic context is discussed by Naphtali Lewis (Papyrus in Classical Antiquity [1974] 31, 97), who draws on Egyptian, Greek and Arabic evidence. The present contribution focuses on the additional information supplied by the Gynecology of Soranus, the distinguished Roman physician who studied in Alexandria in the first and second centuries AD. Soranus’ original comparison of the uterus layers with the arrangement of fibers in papyrus layers will be illustrated. Medical sources also provide evidence of learned doctors who made their way to Alexandria, often considered the cradle of advanced medical education. It will be shown how physicians visiting Alexandria and Egypt were likely to gain firsthand experience both in the anatomical schools and in the headquarters of the papyrus industry, where medical scholars and practitioners became acquainted with the usefulness of papyrus in treatment and healing.
RELIGION AND MAGIC (Chair Robert Daniel)
Malcolm Choat
Anatolios the Archiprophetes
Better known as a friend of Theophanes, well-to-do scion of early fourth-century Hermopolis Magna and traveler to Antioch, Anatolios (who writes P.Herm. 2-3 and SB XII 10803) is one of our last known holders of the office of “Chief Prophet”. Through him (and, really, only through him), Theophanes is linked with “Hermetic” circles in Hermopolis, and with late antique Egyptian “paganism”, which his archive is held to embody. But despite the frequency with which he is cited in passing, what do we know about Anatolios? Where did he live? Of where was he chief prophet? What was his relationship to Theophanes? Why did Theophanes carry his letters? Did Theophanes, in fact, carry his letters? The first full monograph on Theophanes (John Matthews, The Journey of Theophanes, 2006), and inspection of the papyri of the archive of Theophanes in the John Rylands Library, invite consideration of these and other questions, and reflection on the place of Anatolios and his fellow worshippers of the “old gods” in the social circle of Theophanes.
16.40 PM Session HISTORY IV (Chair Ann E. Hanson)
Sabine R. Huebner
Therapeuteria Reconsidered
In Greece and Rome, a female stood at the center of attention of her family and the outside world only at two occasions, at her marriage and at her funeral. Therefore a feast celebrated in the honor of a minor girl, recorded in three papyri, all from third-century Oxyrhynchus (P.Oxy. Hels. 50.17; P.Oxy. LXVI 4542; 4543) seems rather odd at first sight. From these papyri we learn that this feast, the so-called therapeuteria, was a family get-together to which relatives, neighbors and friends were invited. As the editors of P.Oxy. LXVI remark, the girls for whom the feast was celebrated were apparently still minors and yet unmarried since they lived at home. However, no convincing explanation has been advanced so far that would sufficiently explain this custom. The term therapeuteria itself is derived presumably from therapeuo, and the editors suggest that it might have designated “a place for therapeusis” and assign it a religious, ritual or medical context. In any case, it becomes clear that we have to look for a specific event that took place in a girl’s life before she reached puberty. Evidence on girls’ lives in Graeco-Roman Egypt is scarce; girls lived at home and were trained by their mothers and prepared for their future lives as wives and daughters-in- law. However, evidence from ancient ethnographic reports, medical texts, early Islamic sources and comparative evidence from modern Egypt, offer highly interesting parallels and a new interpretation of this feast, which would explain it as an indigenous tradition cultivated already for several millennia in this region.
LITERARY PAPYRI (Tim Renner Chair)
Nele Baplu, Marc Huys, and Thomas Schmidt
The Syllabic Word Lists in P.Bouriant 1 Reconsidered
The syllabic word lists in the famous school papyrus P.Bouriant 1, edited more than a century ago by P. Jouguet and P. Perdrizet, have not been the subject of a detailed discussion since then, although important remarks on the readings and on the choice of the words were published by J. Bingen and A. Blanchard. However, several similar word lists have been published during the last century, including that in P.Monts. Roca I, recently published by S. Torallas Tovar and K.A. Worp. These new word lists provide important comparative material. Therefore, on the basis of our inspection of the original papyrus and of digital images, we have prepared a re-edition of the word list, containing some new text restorations along with a line-by-line commentary. In this paper, we will present the most important conclusions of this re- examination, in particular the reasons for word selection and word order and their relation to similar papyrus word lists and to the occurrence of the same words in other texts of scholarly nature, such as lexica or commentaries. Finally we try to specify the practical, didactic, grammatical and literary function of each word.
RELIGION AND MAGIC (Chair Robert Daniel)
Theodore S. de Bruyn
Christian Amulets with Biblical Inscriptions: a Catalogue in Progress This paper will report on an aspect of a project to prepare a catalogue of edited Greek formularies and amulets (papyri, ostraca, lamellae, tabulae) containing Christian motifs and dating from the second to the eighth centuries CE. The catalogue is preliminary to a study of the incorporation of Christian liturgical sequences into Greek formularies and amulets. Scholars have differed in their criteria for identifying Greek formularies and amulets containing Christian motifs. Van Haelst’s catalogue of Jewish and Christian papyri included amulets consisting of prayers, acclamations, or citations from the Bible or the Christian liturgy (Catalogue des papyrus littéraires juifs et chrétiens, 1976, 414), whereas these were excluded from the more recent compilations of Brashear (ANRW II.18.5, 1995, 3492-3; cf. 3480 n.486) and Daniel and Maltomini (Supplementum Magicum I, 1991, ix). Both approaches have their merits. While the latter focuses on unique or specific features of magical texts, the former is more inclusive of the entire range of materials with Christian motifs that were used as amulets. This paper will (1) review criteria used to identify papyri inscribed with one or more biblical passages as amulets (e.g., evidence that the papyrus was folded or tied, evidence that the papyrus did not form part of a larger roll or codex, etc.); (2) present an up-to-date list of edited papyri inscribed with biblical passages and deemed to be amulets by their editors or commentators; and (3) discuss doubtful or problematic cases.
17.00 PM Session HISTORY IV (Chair Ann E. Hanson)
Hélène Cuvigny
Du côté de chez Zeus
This paper will provide an overview of the inscriptions and ostraca found during the two first excavation campaigns at the praesidium of Dios on the Koptos-Berenike road
RELIGION AND MAGIC (Chair Robert Daniel)
José-Antonio Fernández-Delgado and Francisca Pordomingo
Thèmes et modèles d’exercices scolaires sur papyrus
Nous allons considérer d'abord des papyrus scolaires qui prouvent que nous avons un matériel de professeur, qui pouvait être utilisé pour l’élaboration d'exercices progymnasmatiques. D’autres papyrus présentent ce qui pourrait être des exercices déjà plus élaborés, lesquels auraient pu servir de modèles à la dictée ou à la copie dans les niveaux inférieurs de l’enseignement; quelquefois le modèle est constitué par de simples énoncés. L’analyse est donc faite dans l’optique du maître et elle met en évidence la réutilisation des modèles scolaires dans des buts divers et le fait que dans de nombreuses écoles le maître était le seul responsable de l’enseignement aux différents niveaux, introduisant même les élèves à l’étude de la rhétorique. La paléographie, en particulier, et les caractéristiques bibliologiques montrent que le maître est l’auteur du texte original et de la copie. Mais certaines copies maladroites, typiques d’un élève débutant, laissent deviner la présence d’un exercice d’un niveau supérieur, qui transparaît derrière le type de texte et d'autres caractéristiques textuelles.
Another Bad Review of The Edge of Evolution
PZ Myers draws attention to another review of Michael Behe's new book The Edge of Evolution [Behe gets another thumbs-down]. This review is published in the July issue Discover magazine [The Simplistic Manifesto]. The author is Cory S. Powell. I disagree with PZ. This is not a good review. Actually, it's a very bad review. Like many of the published reviews of The Edge of Evolution the author seems to have been reading a far different book than the one I read. Powell says,
To reach this conclusion, Behe makes a number of invalid assumptions about how molecules evolve and interact. He alleges that, because many functional adaptations require multiple changes in proteins, two or more mutations must occur together at the same time in the same gene and only rarely can several mutations "sequentially add to each other to improve an organism’s chances of survival." But in fact natural selection does work on transitional forms, as molecules and traits evolve stepwise. Stepwise evolution has been well documented; one good instance of this is the emergence of color vision. Mutations add up little by little, leading to major changes to proteins over time.The essence of Behe's argument is not that it's impossible to evolve a double mutation if each one is beneficial. The whole point of the book is that stepwise evolution requires that each step is beneficial. The evidence, according to Behe, shows that many cases involving double mutations involve intermediates that are disadvantagous. Thus, the double mutant had to arise in a single step and this is highly unlikely.
Behe isn't always as clear as he should be but he does make it perfectly clear that he accepts the mechanism that Powell describes. Thus, Powells' criticism is inappropriate and this makes it a bad review. Apparently Powell didn't read the section on the evolution of antifreeze proteins in fish (pp. 77-81) where Behe describes each of the many steps that lead to the modern antifreeze proteins.
Each step would have given the fish some protection against freezing water. Thus, Behe concludes,
Even though we haven't directly observed it, the scenario seems pretty convincing as an example of Darwinian evolution by natural selection. It's convincing because each of the steps is tiny&mdash'no bigger than the step that yielded the sickle cell mutation n humans—and each step is an improvement.The Discovery review points out that complex combinations of mutations can arise in a stepwise manner by standard Darwinian mechanisms. It implies that Behe never thought of this in his book but that's total nonsense. Of course he did. Behe doesn't deny that phenotypes requiring multiple steps can be produced by random mutations, as long as each step is beneficial. The essence of his argument is that it's impossible to generate phenotypes that require multiple random mutations if the intermediates aren't beneficial.
I'm not arguing that Behe is correct. In fact, I'm preparing a series of postings that will challenge some of his ideas. What I'm objecting to is the mischaracterization of Behe's arguments in many of the published reviews. If you're going to criticize Behe then challenge the argument he makes in the book; namely, that most stepwise pathways are impossible because the intermediates are less fit than their parents.
Powell makes another common mistake in his review. He says,
Behe makes another big, related error in the way he interprets how proteins work together. He contends that for even three proteins to evolve in a cooperative association is wildly improbable, "beyond the edge of evolution." Within a protein, five or six amino acids (components of proteins) need to change simultaneously for it to bond with another protein, according to Behe. From this he concludes that it is impossible for proteins’ interaction to evolve, again requiring life to have been programmed for success from the start. Plenty of evidence contradicts this assertion, however. Many proteins within cells interact with other proteins in ways in which only two or three amino acids are critical for binding.Behe admits that you may only need three or four selected changes in order to generate a new binding site (p. 114). He agrees that the evolution of a single binding site is within reach of evolution but the simultaneous generation of two binding sites is beyond the edge of evolution because the probabilities are so low. The point is that there are many complexes that require the interaction of several different proteins and the intermediates—where only two proteins interact—are not beneficial. Refuting Behe's real arguments requires a little more effort than the superficial criticism of arguments that Behe is not making.
Powell continues,
Such simple binding sites can arise frequently in proteins. And such interactions form the networks that regulate all sorts of physiological processes in cells and organisms. Cell biologists and biochemists are increasingly finding that, in truth, protein interactions and networks are easy to evolve. Behe should know this—but he has a long history of alleging evolutionary impossibilities and ignoring the scientific literature.Powell is completely missing the point here. Behe does not deny that such complexes exist, nor does he deny that they evolved in the sense that they arose in organisms whose ancestors didn't have them. Once the mutations occurred, they became fixed in the population by natural selection. Furthermore, Behe does not deny that these networks are "easy to evolve." In fact, they are so "easy to evolve" that they cannot be explained by natural selection acting on random mutations as "Darwinism" requires. Thus, mutations cannot be random.
You don't refute Behe by pointing to examples of evolution by common descent or natural selection; this includes evolution of protein complexes. That's not the point. The point is that "Darwinian" evolution, according to Behe, must require small steps where each step is beneficial and this cannot be demonstrated. Indeed, in many cases the intermediates will likely be detrimental. The conclusion is that multiple mutations have to occur simultaneously as in some drug resistance. For most populations the probability of this happening by random mutation is very small. The fact that it happened is evidence of directed mutation, or so Behe thinks.
In order to show that Behe is wrong you have to demonstrate that his understanding of evolution (i.e., "Darwinism") is wrong and this has led him to false conclusions about probabilities. Many reviewers have failed to do this, possibly because they accept Behe's version of Darwinism.
You can read Michael Behe's responses to his reviewers on the Amazon.com site [Michael Behe's Amazon Blog]. I think it's fair to say that Behe makes some good points (and many bad ones) when he accuses his reviewers of misrepresentation.
Virtual Toronto
Here's a site that combines an interactive map of Toronto with images from selected streets [Toronto Virtual City]. The photograph (left) shows the entrance to my building on the University of Toronto campus. The view is looking north from College St. The satellite view is about two years old. It was taken when the new building was still under construction so the street level image doesn't match the satellite view.
Hmmm ... that reminds me. How come we don't see any more postings where we have to identify a university campus? I forgot which blog that was on.
[Hat Tip: Monado]
Gene Genie #12
Gene Genie #12 has been posted at My Biotech Life [Gene Genie #12 aka The Dozen].
The image is from the article on snpedia [WikiPedia Meets Genetics]. Read about how you can access the personal genome of Jim Watson and Craig Ventor.
Monday's Molecule #37
Today's molecule looks complicated but it has a very simple name. The short common name of this molecule is not sufficient—you have to supply the correct biochemical name that distinguishes this molecule from similar ones found inside all cells. You're more than welcome to supply the complete IUPAC name if you know it. There's an indirect connection between this Monday's Molecule and Wednesday's Nobel Laureate(s).
The reward (free lunch) goes to the person who correctly identifies the molecule and the Nobel Laureate(s). Previous free lunch winners are ineligible for one month from the time they first collected the prize. There's only one (Marc) ineligible candidates for this Wednesday's reward since many recent winners haven't collected their prize. The prize is a free lunch at the Faculty Club.
This Morning (Monday) at the 25th International Papyrological Congress
The vicarious Congress (still in Wichita, can't be there until Thurs.)
Three concurrent sessions this morning:
9 am
HISTORY I (Verhoogt chair)
Christelle Fischer-Bovet
Army and Egyptian Temple Building under the Ptolemies
In this paper, I examine building dedications to Egyptian gods that reveal the interplay between the military and state financing of Egyptian temples. My aim is to bring new insight into the debate by looking at temple constructions by the army. I argue that the King’s involvement was partly made through his army. Officers or soldiers were used as supervisors of temple construction for the Crown and even financed part of it to complement royal and temple funds. A survey of the sources for the Thebaid, the Fayum, and the Delta shows that, with variations in scale and time, the army served as a convenient institutional structure for royal building policy. People with both military and religious offices and officers stationed in garrisons played an essential role. I thus propose a new model of financing Egyptian temples with the army as a source of private and local funding. Three main conclusions emerge. First, the rather late date of our evidence confirms that temple building was increasingly sponsored by private and semi-private funding. Second, soldiers took on a large share of this funding because the temples were used as garrisons in Egypt and not only in the Dodekaschoinos. Third, the formation of a local elite made of Greek and Egyptian soldiers acting for the local gods challenges the idea of professional and ethnic divisions.
HERCULANENSIA I (Janko chair)
Mario Capasso
Per una ricostruzione dell’opera De vitiis di Filodemo
L’opera di Filodemo De vitiis costituisce l’unico tra i grandi trattati dell’epicureo di Gadara del quale non è stata finora tentata un’analitica ricostruzione, che avesse presente aspetti importanti quali: consistenza complessiva dell’opera, successione dei diversi libri, relazione tra l’analisi dei vizi e quella delle virtù, eventuale appartenenza di più papiri a singoli volumina originari. Complessivamente all’opera, che comprendeva almeno dieci libri, in alcuni dei quali l’autore si rivolgeva agli intellettuali augustei Vario Rufo, Virgilio, Quintilio Varo e Plozio Tucca, sono stati attribuiti in momenti diversi oltre 20 papiri; una decina di essi sono stati scritti da una medesima mano, di altri ci sono pervenuti per lo più soltanto disegni. Alcune di queste attribuzioni si sono rivelate sicuramente errate. Uno studio di tutti i materiali ha consentito una più attendibile ricostruzione dell’intera opera, nella quale vengono confermati la posizione iniziale e il ruolo fondamentale dei libri relativi all’adulazione e ai vizi ad essa affini. Soprattutto a questo trattato, da lui composto nella sua maturità, e all’altro, intitolato I modi di vita, Filodemo attribuiva il difficile compito di divulgare l’etica epicurea nella Roma tardo-repubblicana.
PAPYROLOGY AND EGYPT. I (Manning chair)
Rachel Mairs
A Demotic-Greek Ostracon from Aswan, from the Collection of the Brooklyn Museum
This paper will consider an only partially published Demotic-Greek ostrakon (c. first century) from the collection of the Brooklyn Museum. Shelton’s (1992) previous transcription of the Greek portion of the text (P.Brook. 81) highlighted a number of intriguing references to communities and activities typical of Aswan: quarrying, shipping and even the rare term “cataract-dwellers”. Although, for purposes of cataloguing, the two languages of the text have hitherto been considered in isolation, this paper will ask what linguistic and historical information holistic consideration of the Greek and Demotic sections of the text – and of their inter-relationship – might enable us to glean. The questions considered will include: The reasons for the choice of Demotic and of Greek for individual portions of the text; The origin of the names in the text’s second column, posited by Hughes (2005) to be Nubian; The overall purpose of the text, the position of the professional groups to which it refers, and the information contained in it on administrative and economic affairs in contemporary Aswan.
9:20
HISTORY I (Verhoogt chair)
Andrea Jördens
Zur Flucht von Liturgen
Neben der Steuerlast waren es bekanntlich vor allem die Liturgien, die das Phänomen der Anachoresis in der Kaiserzeit zu neuer Blüte gelangen ließen. Während jedoch dem Liturgiewesen im allgemeinen und dem Ernennungsverfahren im besonderen zahlreiche Studien gewidmet sind, wurde der Flucht von Liturgen ungleich weniger Aufmerksamkeit zuteil. Hier soll versucht werden, die Reaktion des Staates auf solche Fälle nachzuzeichnen, in denen Liturgen sich während ihrer Amtsdauer willkürlich den ihnen auferlegten Verpflichtungen entzogen, und damit diese Lücke wenigstens teilweise zu schließen.
HERCULANENSIA I (Janko chair)
Daniel Delattre Du nouveau concernant le
P.Herc. Paris 2
Ce rouleau carbonisé, qui appartenait à la série philodémienne Sur les vices, était consacré aux diverses formes de la calomnie. Ouvert depuis moins de 20 ans, mais de retour à Paris seulement depuis cinq ans, ce rouleau qui n'a pu être déroulé au sens propre, mais écorcé en 283 morceaux de tailles inégales, nécessitera à l'évidence un remontage long et fort délicat. Il commence tout juste à livrer ses premiers secrets, qui seront partagés pour l'occasion.
PAPYROLOGY AND EGYPT. I (Manning chair)
Foy Scalf
Among the collection of the Louvre are six unpublished Demotic funerary papyri dating to the first centuries CE. The texts consist of religious formulae expressing the essentials of Egyptian funerary theology; indeed, they represent the last known funerary papyri prior to the widespread Christianization of Egypt. These papyri belong to a group of Demotic formulaic funerary texts which have too often been ill described as “abbreviated” and it can be shown that these texts were not considered abridgements. Vignettes adorn several Louvre exemplars whose scenes form an overlooked, but important corpus best understood in comparison with Roman Period funerary stelae. Further details of this “genre” are illuminated by the titles contained on the verso of several of the papyri and theories about their usage are confirmed by interesting “instructions” accompanying one of them. Additionally, two of the Louvre papyri show an identical, but unique set of formulae hitherto unknown. This paper will examine the importance of such papyri for the study of Egyptian religious tradition and practice in their role as the last bastion of Egyptian funerary literature.
9:40
HISTORY I (Verhoogt chair)
Peter Arzt-Grabner
“And Tending Neither to Be a Truant nor a Fugitive”: Some Remarks on the Sale of Slaves in Roman Egypt and Other Provinces
In addition to more than 150 documents from Egypt that refer to sales of slaves, papyri and waxed tablets from places as distant as Side in Pamphylia, Alburnus Maior in Dacia Superior, and Ravenna and Herculaneum in Italy illustrate in detail the conditions and rules that had to be followed when it came to selling or buying a slave in the Roman Empire. One particular clause, where the seller guarantees that the slave “is tending neither to be a truant nor a fugitive” is found in contracts from Pamphylia, Dacia Superior, and Herculaneum, but not in one of the many contracts drawn up in Egypt. On the contrary, some documents from Egypt attest that Egyptian slave dealers sometimes explicitly refused to give such guarantees. In this paper, I will present the most important documents, and suggest what might have been the reasons for using such divergent formulae. The contracts from Egypt seem to be a reaction to those from Italy and elsewhere rather than a mere contrast. From this perspective, the complex history of a small formula like the one in question is a very good example for the importance of papyri, ostraca, and tablets from Egypt to illustrate not only Egyptian habits but also the social and cultural history of the entire empire.
HERCULANENSIA I (Janko chair)
Annick Monet
Contribution pour une édition du P.Herc. Paris 2
En 1802, Napoléon Bonaparte, alors premier consul, reçut du roi de Naples Ferdinand IV quatre ou six rouleaux de papyrus carbonisés provenant d’Herculanum. Près de deux cents ans plus tard, deux de ces rouleaux furent confiés à la Biblioteca Nazionale de Naples pour y être ouverts selon la méthode dite d’Oslo. Le P.Herc. Paris 2 est de loin celui qui a le moins souffert du traitement. Il est conservé dorénavant à la bibliothèque de l’Institut de France, à Paris, sous la forme de 283 fragments et doit faire l’objet d’une édition de la part d’une équipe de cinq personnes sous la responsabilité de Daniel Delattre. La présente contribution sera l’occasion de présenter des fragments inédits de ce rouleau nouvellement effeuillé.
PAPYROLOGY AND EGYPT. I (Manning chair)
Monica Signoretti
The Myth of the Sun’s Eye and its Greek Translation
Few ancient texts are known both in the original and in translation. The Greek translation of the Demotic Myth of the Sun’s Eye (Brit. Mus. 274) is an exception. Although both translation and Demotic text (P.Leiden Dem. I 384) are fragmentary, their joint reading leads to a better understanding of the events narrated and suggests reconstructions for damaged passages. The translation is remarkable for the terminology chosen to translate a text dense with unyielding Egyptian concepts and even more for the reformulation for Greek readers of Egyptian ideas and metaphors. When the translation of specific terms seems impossible, the text resorts to mere analogues on the basis of the immediate context: the Demotic srrf is translated as “lion,” and Ra alternatively as Helios and Zeus. The expunction of some passages and the changes undergone by others seem to have been made with the reception of the translation in mind: what was expected to confuse a Greek-speaking reader was omitted. When translating complex concepts, the Greek follows the Demotic “word by word”—or rather “image by image”—with no ambition of rendering less obvious—often theological—references. Most importantly, these choices—negotiated by a translator necessarily proficient in both languages and writing systems—allow us a unique glimpse into ancient biculturalism. In contrast with the interpraetatio graeca imposed on Egyptian culture by outsiders, the choices behind this translation are made by someone who negotiated daily between words, practices, and beliefs of different origin, “Egyptian” and “Greek”.
Coffee Break - 10am-10:40
10:40
HISTORY II (BOWMAN chair)
Janneke de Jong
What’s in a Title? New Epithets in Third-Century Imperial Titulature
In many papyrus texts Roman imperial titulature occurs, in most cases with the purpose to date the document. As has often been observed, the appearances of the Roman imperial titulature that was employed could vary greatly, from the mentioning of ‘the xth year of our lord’ to ‘the xth year of’ followed by an elaborate series of the names and titles. However, apart from this observation of the variety of use in the Roman imperial titulature, a thorough analysis of its constituting elements has scarcely been attempted. This is striking, since imperial titulature can be considered one of the means by which imperial qualities and virtues could be expressed, in other words as a medium of imperial representation. In this paper, the imperial titulature of the third-century AD will be discussed. In this century, the Roman Empire faced many difficulties, amongst others in the imperial succession. Therefore, it was of utmost importance for emperors to present themselves in a convincing way, which traditionally was based on dynastic, military and divine legitimation. I will argue that the struggle for power is reflected in the use of epithets that for the first time appear in the imperial titulature in third century papyrus texts from Egypt, in which especially an inclination to associate the emperor with the divine can be observed.
HERCULANENSIA II (RISPOLLI chair)
Jürgen Hammerstaedt
Christian Jensen’s and Wolfgang Schmid’s Unpublished Herculanean Papers: a Preliminary Report on the Content and the Relevance of the Material
In February 2007 Dr. Karl August Neuhausen, who recently retired from his position at Bonn University, handed over to me a suitcase containing the papers of his teacher Wolfgang Schmid. The prominent Herculanean scholar had entrusted him with these documents in 1980, shortly before his death. Most of the notes, readings and letters concerning the Herculanean papyri had previously belonged to Christian Jensen, Schmid’s teacher. Schmid had retrieved them during the Second World War from Jensen’s house in Berlin. A will signed by Jensen’s son provides for the storage of these papers in several institutions. One of them is the Papyrus Collection at Cologne University. The work of both Jensen and Schmid achieved a high standard in Herculanean philology. Their proposals and reflections on Herculanean papyri, especially on those parts which are represented only by the Neapolitan and/or Oxonian disegni, are likely to give new impulse to Herculanean research. This paper aims to give a first account of the material, which regards Philodemus’ On Poems, On Piety, and other writings. Moreover, I shall illustrate with some examples the relevance of this material for future editions of and commentaries on Philodemus.
PAPYROLOGY AND EGYPT. I (JOHNSON chair)
Leslie S.B. MacCoull
A Date for P.KRU 105?
This fragmentary document, unfortunately lacking its beginning with any explicit dating information that might have been contained therein, has rightly been viewed as amounting to the foundation charter for the Monastery of St. Phoibammon built into the ancient Deir el-Bahri temple at Thebes. This monastery, a landowner and pilgrimage goal that was interwoven into the economic, social, and religious life of the Thebaid, became a carrier of Egyptian Christian culture that spanned the seventh century conquest and lasted at least into the ninth century. For the first third of the twentieth century Crum and Steinwenter’s dating of the document, and the monastery’s foundation, to the late sixth century prevailed. However, in 1938 Steinwenter changed his mind and opted for the late seventh century (post-conquest), in which he was followed by Till in the 1960s. The later dating seems impossible, however, in view of the explicit mention of “the damages that our lords the Christ-loving kings have defined” in lines 12-13. On a rereading of the papyrus I have concluded that elements of the formulary and prosopography, combined with the legal details and ecclesiastical events in Egypt, yield a date late in the reign of Justin II, specifically to between 576 and 578.
11 am
HISTORY II (BOWMAN chair)
Colin E. P. Adams
Bureaucracy and Power in Diocletian’s Egypt: The World of P.Panop. Beatty
P.Panop. Beatty 1 and 2, dating to AD 298 and 300 respectively, contain some 87 letters and programmata received and issued by the office of the strategos of the Panopolite nome. As such, these long papyri preserve some of our most important evidence for administration in Egypt during a period of transition from the Roman to Late Roman periods. These important documents, however, have not received the attention they deserve. This paper sets out the main themes and questions raised by the two papyri, which are the focus of a forthcoming monograph: the dynamics of the relationship between state and local government, the appointment of liturgists, taxation and requisition (especially in response to Diocletian’s visit to Panopolis in 298), military supply, and communication. Study of these main themes allows for an assessment of, among other things, the efficacy of Roman administration, documentary practice, and the concern of the state in administration displayed through administrative policy and concern for the local population. Finally, bureaucracy being what it is, valuable comparisons in administrative practice and ideology can be made between the nature of administration in the Beatty papyri and modern sociological theory from Weber through to Richard Sennett. The paper shows that such comparison offers a genuinely important way of thinking about Roman bureaucracy; both its nature and ultimately its failure.
HERCULANENSIA II (RISPOLLI chair)
Roger T. Macfarlane
P.Herc. 817 from Facsimiles to MSI: a Case for Practical Illustration of Progress
P.Herc. 817, containing the carmen de bello actiaco, enjoyed its last formal edition in 1958 (Garuti, Bologna), and Immarco published significant new scholarship toward a new edition during the 1980s and 29 1990s (e.g. Pap.Lup. 1 [1992] 241ff.; CErc 19 [1989] 281f.) . Zechini’s (Stuttgart 1987) analysis of the poem’s text is significant, but it does not constitute a scholarly edition. The application of multi-spectral imaging technology makes the text of P.Herc. 817 more accessible than ever before. Enhanced accessibility is not limited to improved legibility—for the BYU-MSI facilitate many aspects of Herculaneum papyrology—but this combines with new scholarly approaches to the carbonized P.Herc. texts to necessitate a new, more definitive edition of P.Herc. 817. My paper will present new readings of the fragmenta of the CDBA, portions never edited by virtue of autopsy—for Garuti and successors worked only with facsimiles (disegni). The paper will be illustrated with multispectral images of the relevant passages, and issues pertaining to the general collection of the Latin papyri from Herculaneum will also be addressed. The resultant edition of P.Herc. 817, toward which this paper aims, will be the first that can be accompanied by trustworthy images for verification, i.e. up to the standards called for nearly 40 years ago by D. Sedley (CErc 3 [1973] 5).
Georg Schmelz
Letter to a Bishop
P.Heid. inv. kopt. 211 (Sahidic Coptic, 6th/7th c.) is a letter from a monastic superior to a bishop: the writer reports about his recovering from an illness and compares this experience with the wonders of the ark of covenant. These allusions do not seem to appear elsewhere in Coptic and Christian Oriental literature and make this text unique. But many grammatical problems and major lacunae turn the reading and understanding of this neatly written letter into a real challenge.
11:20
HISTORY II (BOWMAN chair)
Carolin Arlt
Age Structure and Cultural Bias in Graeco-Egyptian Mummy Labels
About one quarter of all mummy labels from the Roman Period give the age of the deceased. The majority come from the area around Akhmim and date to the second and third centuries CE. This large corpus from one place over just two centuries of Roman rule would seem to present an excellent opportunity for applying quantitative methods of demographic analysis. In this paper, I examine the age pattern that prevails in the mummy labels, separating males and females, and using statistical techniques to interpret the data. Comparing the resulting diagrams with model life tables shows discrepancies that can only be explained by assuming biases in commemoration practices. Males and females in different age groups were disproportionately likely to receive mummy labels. The age distribution that emerges from mummy labels differs surprisingly from tombstones but shows a few similarities to biases noticed in the census declarations. The quantitative analysis of such commemorations raises questions that are important for social and cultural history.
HERCULANENSIA II (RISPOLLI chair)
Aaron K. Olsen
P.Herc. 394: A Test Case for Further Editions of Latin Papyri from Herculaneum
15 years ago, at the 20th International Congress of Papyrology, Knut Kleve called for a renewed focus on the long-neglected Latin portion of the Herculaneum library. However, besides the famous carmen de bello actiaco and three important discoveries by Kleve himself, we still know practically nothing about the contents of these papyri. The application of multi-spectral imaging in recent years allows for a better reading of carbonized papyri than previously possible and gives a new opportunity to re-examine the possibility for editions of the remaining Latin papyri. Del Mastro (CErc 35 [2005]) showed how application of this technology has doubled the number of known Latin papyri in this library. Our test case is P.Herc. 394. Lindsay, in his 1890 survey of the Bodleian facsimiles of the Latin papyri, asserted this papyrus to contain a “panegyric on some emperor, probably Augustus,” basing this reading on the Oxonian facsimile of a fragment since destroyed. In my paper, I review the extraordinary difficulties which stand in the way of an edition, including the disagreement between Oxonian and Neapolitan facsimiles, modern destruction of valuable fragments of text, and the miserable condition of the papyrus. Using multi-spectral images of the papyrus for illustration, I show to where Lindsay’s conjecture about the papyrus’ subject can be refuted, and where strengthened and extended; in my examination I bring Kleve’s call for further research on the Latin papyri up-to-date, and, using the example of this particular text, demonstrate viability for further editions of Latin texts from Herculaneum.
PAPYROLOGY AND EGYPT. I (JOHNSON chair)
Alain Delattre
Nouveaux textes coptes d’Antinoé
Présentation des textes coptes découvertes à Antinoé lors des campagnes de fouilles 2005, 2006 et 2007 (Istituto Papirologico “G. Vitelli” – Università degli Studi di Firenze). On trouve parmi ces nouveaux documents de nombreux textes littéraires et documentaires ainsi qu’une série de billets oraculaires adressés au “Dieu de Saint Collouthos”. Ces derniers éclairent d’un jour nouveau les pratiques oraculaires à l’époque copte et illustrent certaines fonctions du complexe religieux situé dans la nécropole nord d’Antinoé.
LUNCH
Three concurrent sessions this morning:
9 am
HISTORY I (Verhoogt chair)
Christelle Fischer-Bovet
Army and Egyptian Temple Building under the Ptolemies
In this paper, I examine building dedications to Egyptian gods that reveal the interplay between the military and state financing of Egyptian temples. My aim is to bring new insight into the debate by looking at temple constructions by the army. I argue that the King’s involvement was partly made through his army. Officers or soldiers were used as supervisors of temple construction for the Crown and even financed part of it to complement royal and temple funds. A survey of the sources for the Thebaid, the Fayum, and the Delta shows that, with variations in scale and time, the army served as a convenient institutional structure for royal building policy. People with both military and religious offices and officers stationed in garrisons played an essential role. I thus propose a new model of financing Egyptian temples with the army as a source of private and local funding. Three main conclusions emerge. First, the rather late date of our evidence confirms that temple building was increasingly sponsored by private and semi-private funding. Second, soldiers took on a large share of this funding because the temples were used as garrisons in Egypt and not only in the Dodekaschoinos. Third, the formation of a local elite made of Greek and Egyptian soldiers acting for the local gods challenges the idea of professional and ethnic divisions.
HERCULANENSIA I (Janko chair)
Mario Capasso
Per una ricostruzione dell’opera De vitiis di Filodemo
L’opera di Filodemo De vitiis costituisce l’unico tra i grandi trattati dell’epicureo di Gadara del quale non è stata finora tentata un’analitica ricostruzione, che avesse presente aspetti importanti quali: consistenza complessiva dell’opera, successione dei diversi libri, relazione tra l’analisi dei vizi e quella delle virtù, eventuale appartenenza di più papiri a singoli volumina originari. Complessivamente all’opera, che comprendeva almeno dieci libri, in alcuni dei quali l’autore si rivolgeva agli intellettuali augustei Vario Rufo, Virgilio, Quintilio Varo e Plozio Tucca, sono stati attribuiti in momenti diversi oltre 20 papiri; una decina di essi sono stati scritti da una medesima mano, di altri ci sono pervenuti per lo più soltanto disegni. Alcune di queste attribuzioni si sono rivelate sicuramente errate. Uno studio di tutti i materiali ha consentito una più attendibile ricostruzione dell’intera opera, nella quale vengono confermati la posizione iniziale e il ruolo fondamentale dei libri relativi all’adulazione e ai vizi ad essa affini. Soprattutto a questo trattato, da lui composto nella sua maturità, e all’altro, intitolato I modi di vita, Filodemo attribuiva il difficile compito di divulgare l’etica epicurea nella Roma tardo-repubblicana.
PAPYROLOGY AND EGYPT. I (Manning chair)
Rachel Mairs
A Demotic-Greek Ostracon from Aswan, from the Collection of the Brooklyn Museum
This paper will consider an only partially published Demotic-Greek ostrakon (c. first century) from the collection of the Brooklyn Museum. Shelton’s (1992) previous transcription of the Greek portion of the text (P.Brook. 81) highlighted a number of intriguing references to communities and activities typical of Aswan: quarrying, shipping and even the rare term “cataract-dwellers”. Although, for purposes of cataloguing, the two languages of the text have hitherto been considered in isolation, this paper will ask what linguistic and historical information holistic consideration of the Greek and Demotic sections of the text – and of their inter-relationship – might enable us to glean. The questions considered will include: The reasons for the choice of Demotic and of Greek for individual portions of the text; The origin of the names in the text’s second column, posited by Hughes (2005) to be Nubian; The overall purpose of the text, the position of the professional groups to which it refers, and the information contained in it on administrative and economic affairs in contemporary Aswan.
9:20
HISTORY I (Verhoogt chair)
Andrea Jördens
Zur Flucht von Liturgen
Neben der Steuerlast waren es bekanntlich vor allem die Liturgien, die das Phänomen der Anachoresis in der Kaiserzeit zu neuer Blüte gelangen ließen. Während jedoch dem Liturgiewesen im allgemeinen und dem Ernennungsverfahren im besonderen zahlreiche Studien gewidmet sind, wurde der Flucht von Liturgen ungleich weniger Aufmerksamkeit zuteil. Hier soll versucht werden, die Reaktion des Staates auf solche Fälle nachzuzeichnen, in denen Liturgen sich während ihrer Amtsdauer willkürlich den ihnen auferlegten Verpflichtungen entzogen, und damit diese Lücke wenigstens teilweise zu schließen.
HERCULANENSIA I (Janko chair)
Daniel Delattre Du nouveau concernant le
P.Herc. Paris 2
Ce rouleau carbonisé, qui appartenait à la série philodémienne Sur les vices, était consacré aux diverses formes de la calomnie. Ouvert depuis moins de 20 ans, mais de retour à Paris seulement depuis cinq ans, ce rouleau qui n'a pu être déroulé au sens propre, mais écorcé en 283 morceaux de tailles inégales, nécessitera à l'évidence un remontage long et fort délicat. Il commence tout juste à livrer ses premiers secrets, qui seront partagés pour l'occasion.
PAPYROLOGY AND EGYPT. I (Manning chair)
Foy Scalf
Among the collection of the Louvre are six unpublished Demotic funerary papyri dating to the first centuries CE. The texts consist of religious formulae expressing the essentials of Egyptian funerary theology; indeed, they represent the last known funerary papyri prior to the widespread Christianization of Egypt. These papyri belong to a group of Demotic formulaic funerary texts which have too often been ill described as “abbreviated” and it can be shown that these texts were not considered abridgements. Vignettes adorn several Louvre exemplars whose scenes form an overlooked, but important corpus best understood in comparison with Roman Period funerary stelae. Further details of this “genre” are illuminated by the titles contained on the verso of several of the papyri and theories about their usage are confirmed by interesting “instructions” accompanying one of them. Additionally, two of the Louvre papyri show an identical, but unique set of formulae hitherto unknown. This paper will examine the importance of such papyri for the study of Egyptian religious tradition and practice in their role as the last bastion of Egyptian funerary literature.
9:40
HISTORY I (Verhoogt chair)
Peter Arzt-Grabner
“And Tending Neither to Be a Truant nor a Fugitive”: Some Remarks on the Sale of Slaves in Roman Egypt and Other Provinces
In addition to more than 150 documents from Egypt that refer to sales of slaves, papyri and waxed tablets from places as distant as Side in Pamphylia, Alburnus Maior in Dacia Superior, and Ravenna and Herculaneum in Italy illustrate in detail the conditions and rules that had to be followed when it came to selling or buying a slave in the Roman Empire. One particular clause, where the seller guarantees that the slave “is tending neither to be a truant nor a fugitive” is found in contracts from Pamphylia, Dacia Superior, and Herculaneum, but not in one of the many contracts drawn up in Egypt. On the contrary, some documents from Egypt attest that Egyptian slave dealers sometimes explicitly refused to give such guarantees. In this paper, I will present the most important documents, and suggest what might have been the reasons for using such divergent formulae. The contracts from Egypt seem to be a reaction to those from Italy and elsewhere rather than a mere contrast. From this perspective, the complex history of a small formula like the one in question is a very good example for the importance of papyri, ostraca, and tablets from Egypt to illustrate not only Egyptian habits but also the social and cultural history of the entire empire.
HERCULANENSIA I (Janko chair)
Annick Monet
Contribution pour une édition du P.Herc. Paris 2
En 1802, Napoléon Bonaparte, alors premier consul, reçut du roi de Naples Ferdinand IV quatre ou six rouleaux de papyrus carbonisés provenant d’Herculanum. Près de deux cents ans plus tard, deux de ces rouleaux furent confiés à la Biblioteca Nazionale de Naples pour y être ouverts selon la méthode dite d’Oslo. Le P.Herc. Paris 2 est de loin celui qui a le moins souffert du traitement. Il est conservé dorénavant à la bibliothèque de l’Institut de France, à Paris, sous la forme de 283 fragments et doit faire l’objet d’une édition de la part d’une équipe de cinq personnes sous la responsabilité de Daniel Delattre. La présente contribution sera l’occasion de présenter des fragments inédits de ce rouleau nouvellement effeuillé.
PAPYROLOGY AND EGYPT. I (Manning chair)
Monica Signoretti
The Myth of the Sun’s Eye and its Greek Translation
Few ancient texts are known both in the original and in translation. The Greek translation of the Demotic Myth of the Sun’s Eye (Brit. Mus. 274) is an exception. Although both translation and Demotic text (P.Leiden Dem. I 384) are fragmentary, their joint reading leads to a better understanding of the events narrated and suggests reconstructions for damaged passages. The translation is remarkable for the terminology chosen to translate a text dense with unyielding Egyptian concepts and even more for the reformulation for Greek readers of Egyptian ideas and metaphors. When the translation of specific terms seems impossible, the text resorts to mere analogues on the basis of the immediate context: the Demotic srrf is translated as “lion,” and Ra alternatively as Helios and Zeus. The expunction of some passages and the changes undergone by others seem to have been made with the reception of the translation in mind: what was expected to confuse a Greek-speaking reader was omitted. When translating complex concepts, the Greek follows the Demotic “word by word”—or rather “image by image”—with no ambition of rendering less obvious—often theological—references. Most importantly, these choices—negotiated by a translator necessarily proficient in both languages and writing systems—allow us a unique glimpse into ancient biculturalism. In contrast with the interpraetatio graeca imposed on Egyptian culture by outsiders, the choices behind this translation are made by someone who negotiated daily between words, practices, and beliefs of different origin, “Egyptian” and “Greek”.
Coffee Break - 10am-10:40
10:40
HISTORY II (BOWMAN chair)
Janneke de Jong
What’s in a Title? New Epithets in Third-Century Imperial Titulature
In many papyrus texts Roman imperial titulature occurs, in most cases with the purpose to date the document. As has often been observed, the appearances of the Roman imperial titulature that was employed could vary greatly, from the mentioning of ‘the xth year of our lord’ to ‘the xth year of’ followed by an elaborate series of the names and titles. However, apart from this observation of the variety of use in the Roman imperial titulature, a thorough analysis of its constituting elements has scarcely been attempted. This is striking, since imperial titulature can be considered one of the means by which imperial qualities and virtues could be expressed, in other words as a medium of imperial representation. In this paper, the imperial titulature of the third-century AD will be discussed. In this century, the Roman Empire faced many difficulties, amongst others in the imperial succession. Therefore, it was of utmost importance for emperors to present themselves in a convincing way, which traditionally was based on dynastic, military and divine legitimation. I will argue that the struggle for power is reflected in the use of epithets that for the first time appear in the imperial titulature in third century papyrus texts from Egypt, in which especially an inclination to associate the emperor with the divine can be observed.
HERCULANENSIA II (RISPOLLI chair)
Jürgen Hammerstaedt
Christian Jensen’s and Wolfgang Schmid’s Unpublished Herculanean Papers: a Preliminary Report on the Content and the Relevance of the Material
In February 2007 Dr. Karl August Neuhausen, who recently retired from his position at Bonn University, handed over to me a suitcase containing the papers of his teacher Wolfgang Schmid. The prominent Herculanean scholar had entrusted him with these documents in 1980, shortly before his death. Most of the notes, readings and letters concerning the Herculanean papyri had previously belonged to Christian Jensen, Schmid’s teacher. Schmid had retrieved them during the Second World War from Jensen’s house in Berlin. A will signed by Jensen’s son provides for the storage of these papers in several institutions. One of them is the Papyrus Collection at Cologne University. The work of both Jensen and Schmid achieved a high standard in Herculanean philology. Their proposals and reflections on Herculanean papyri, especially on those parts which are represented only by the Neapolitan and/or Oxonian disegni, are likely to give new impulse to Herculanean research. This paper aims to give a first account of the material, which regards Philodemus’ On Poems, On Piety, and other writings. Moreover, I shall illustrate with some examples the relevance of this material for future editions of and commentaries on Philodemus.
PAPYROLOGY AND EGYPT. I (JOHNSON chair)
Leslie S.B. MacCoull
A Date for P.KRU 105?
This fragmentary document, unfortunately lacking its beginning with any explicit dating information that might have been contained therein, has rightly been viewed as amounting to the foundation charter for the Monastery of St. Phoibammon built into the ancient Deir el-Bahri temple at Thebes. This monastery, a landowner and pilgrimage goal that was interwoven into the economic, social, and religious life of the Thebaid, became a carrier of Egyptian Christian culture that spanned the seventh century conquest and lasted at least into the ninth century. For the first third of the twentieth century Crum and Steinwenter’s dating of the document, and the monastery’s foundation, to the late sixth century prevailed. However, in 1938 Steinwenter changed his mind and opted for the late seventh century (post-conquest), in which he was followed by Till in the 1960s. The later dating seems impossible, however, in view of the explicit mention of “the damages that our lords the Christ-loving kings have defined” in lines 12-13. On a rereading of the papyrus I have concluded that elements of the formulary and prosopography, combined with the legal details and ecclesiastical events in Egypt, yield a date late in the reign of Justin II, specifically to between 576 and 578.
11 am
HISTORY II (BOWMAN chair)
Colin E. P. Adams
Bureaucracy and Power in Diocletian’s Egypt: The World of P.Panop. Beatty
P.Panop. Beatty 1 and 2, dating to AD 298 and 300 respectively, contain some 87 letters and programmata received and issued by the office of the strategos of the Panopolite nome. As such, these long papyri preserve some of our most important evidence for administration in Egypt during a period of transition from the Roman to Late Roman periods. These important documents, however, have not received the attention they deserve. This paper sets out the main themes and questions raised by the two papyri, which are the focus of a forthcoming monograph: the dynamics of the relationship between state and local government, the appointment of liturgists, taxation and requisition (especially in response to Diocletian’s visit to Panopolis in 298), military supply, and communication. Study of these main themes allows for an assessment of, among other things, the efficacy of Roman administration, documentary practice, and the concern of the state in administration displayed through administrative policy and concern for the local population. Finally, bureaucracy being what it is, valuable comparisons in administrative practice and ideology can be made between the nature of administration in the Beatty papyri and modern sociological theory from Weber through to Richard Sennett. The paper shows that such comparison offers a genuinely important way of thinking about Roman bureaucracy; both its nature and ultimately its failure.
HERCULANENSIA II (RISPOLLI chair)
Roger T. Macfarlane
P.Herc. 817 from Facsimiles to MSI: a Case for Practical Illustration of Progress
P.Herc. 817, containing the carmen de bello actiaco, enjoyed its last formal edition in 1958 (Garuti, Bologna), and Immarco published significant new scholarship toward a new edition during the 1980s and 29 1990s (e.g. Pap.Lup. 1 [1992] 241ff.; CErc 19 [1989] 281f.) . Zechini’s (Stuttgart 1987) analysis of the poem’s text is significant, but it does not constitute a scholarly edition. The application of multi-spectral imaging technology makes the text of P.Herc. 817 more accessible than ever before. Enhanced accessibility is not limited to improved legibility—for the BYU-MSI facilitate many aspects of Herculaneum papyrology—but this combines with new scholarly approaches to the carbonized P.Herc. texts to necessitate a new, more definitive edition of P.Herc. 817. My paper will present new readings of the fragmenta of the CDBA, portions never edited by virtue of autopsy—for Garuti and successors worked only with facsimiles (disegni). The paper will be illustrated with multispectral images of the relevant passages, and issues pertaining to the general collection of the Latin papyri from Herculaneum will also be addressed. The resultant edition of P.Herc. 817, toward which this paper aims, will be the first that can be accompanied by trustworthy images for verification, i.e. up to the standards called for nearly 40 years ago by D. Sedley (CErc 3 [1973] 5).
Georg Schmelz
Letter to a Bishop
P.Heid. inv. kopt. 211 (Sahidic Coptic, 6th/7th c.) is a letter from a monastic superior to a bishop: the writer reports about his recovering from an illness and compares this experience with the wonders of the ark of covenant. These allusions do not seem to appear elsewhere in Coptic and Christian Oriental literature and make this text unique. But many grammatical problems and major lacunae turn the reading and understanding of this neatly written letter into a real challenge.
11:20
HISTORY II (BOWMAN chair)
Carolin Arlt
Age Structure and Cultural Bias in Graeco-Egyptian Mummy Labels
About one quarter of all mummy labels from the Roman Period give the age of the deceased. The majority come from the area around Akhmim and date to the second and third centuries CE. This large corpus from one place over just two centuries of Roman rule would seem to present an excellent opportunity for applying quantitative methods of demographic analysis. In this paper, I examine the age pattern that prevails in the mummy labels, separating males and females, and using statistical techniques to interpret the data. Comparing the resulting diagrams with model life tables shows discrepancies that can only be explained by assuming biases in commemoration practices. Males and females in different age groups were disproportionately likely to receive mummy labels. The age distribution that emerges from mummy labels differs surprisingly from tombstones but shows a few similarities to biases noticed in the census declarations. The quantitative analysis of such commemorations raises questions that are important for social and cultural history.
HERCULANENSIA II (RISPOLLI chair)
Aaron K. Olsen
P.Herc. 394: A Test Case for Further Editions of Latin Papyri from Herculaneum
15 years ago, at the 20th International Congress of Papyrology, Knut Kleve called for a renewed focus on the long-neglected Latin portion of the Herculaneum library. However, besides the famous carmen de bello actiaco and three important discoveries by Kleve himself, we still know practically nothing about the contents of these papyri. The application of multi-spectral imaging in recent years allows for a better reading of carbonized papyri than previously possible and gives a new opportunity to re-examine the possibility for editions of the remaining Latin papyri. Del Mastro (CErc 35 [2005]) showed how application of this technology has doubled the number of known Latin papyri in this library. Our test case is P.Herc. 394. Lindsay, in his 1890 survey of the Bodleian facsimiles of the Latin papyri, asserted this papyrus to contain a “panegyric on some emperor, probably Augustus,” basing this reading on the Oxonian facsimile of a fragment since destroyed. In my paper, I review the extraordinary difficulties which stand in the way of an edition, including the disagreement between Oxonian and Neapolitan facsimiles, modern destruction of valuable fragments of text, and the miserable condition of the papyrus. Using multi-spectral images of the papyrus for illustration, I show to where Lindsay’s conjecture about the papyrus’ subject can be refuted, and where strengthened and extended; in my examination I bring Kleve’s call for further research on the Latin papyri up-to-date, and, using the example of this particular text, demonstrate viability for further editions of Latin texts from Herculaneum.
PAPYROLOGY AND EGYPT. I (JOHNSON chair)
Alain Delattre
Nouveaux textes coptes d’Antinoé
Présentation des textes coptes découvertes à Antinoé lors des campagnes de fouilles 2005, 2006 et 2007 (Istituto Papirologico “G. Vitelli” – Università degli Studi di Firenze). On trouve parmi ces nouveaux documents de nombreux textes littéraires et documentaires ainsi qu’une série de billets oraculaires adressés au “Dieu de Saint Collouthos”. Ces derniers éclairent d’un jour nouveau les pratiques oraculaires à l’époque copte et illustrent certaines fonctions du complexe religieux situé dans la nécropole nord d’Antinoé.
LUNCH
Sunday, July 29, 2007
Canadian Dinosaur Coins
The Royal Canadian Mint has dinosaur coins for sale. Here's a picture of the first one. It shows a fossil Parasaurolophus, a crested, duck-billed species from Alberta.Future coins will depict Triceratops (2009); Tyrannosaurus rex (2009); and Dromaeosaurus (2010). The face value of the coins is $4 (CDN)—that's currently about $3.80 in US currency but it will be about $4.60 by the time the last coin is issued unless the US dollar stops falling. (Getting out of Iraq would help.)
Only 20,000 coins are being minted. The finish on the "fossil" image is impossible to reproduce exactly so each coin will be slightly different in tone and color. You can buy them for $39.95 (CDN).
How many people know what "D.G. Regina" stands for? (Hint: it's not an atheist slogan.)
The OUT Campaign
RichardDawkin.net has started something called the The OUT Campaign. The goal is to encourage all non-believers (atheists) to come out of the closet and make their rejection of religious superstition known. You're supposed to use the red "A" as a symbol to declare that you are an atheist. Several bloggers have put it on their website.I do not believe in God. I am an atheist. However, the fact that I don't believe in something is often the only thing I have in common with other atheists. It seems a bit silly to form a club based only on what you don't believe in. It would be like having a club for everyone who doesn't believe in Bigfoot, or Santa Claus.
So, while I am happy to announce my preference for rationalism over superstition and proud to be an atheist. I won't be joining any organization based on a negative. I am a proud member of Skeptics Canada and The Centre for Inquiry, Toronto because they stand for something positive.
[Hat Tip: PZ Myers]
Today at the 25th International Congress of Papyrology
Registration and Congress Check-in
3 – 6 PM
Michigan League: Concourse
6 PM
Michigan League: Mendelssohn Theatre
Opening Ceremony of the 25th International Congress of Papyrology
7.30 PM
Reception
(Michigan League)
(I can't get there until Thursday, sadly.)
3 – 6 PM
Michigan League: Concourse
6 PM
Michigan League: Mendelssohn Theatre
Opening Ceremony of the 25th International Congress of Papyrology
7.30 PM
Reception
(Michigan League)
(I can't get there until Thursday, sadly.)
Friday, July 27, 2007
The Aliens Are Coming
Friday's Urban Legend: False
 | The following email message is going the rounds. ALIENS ARE COMING TO ABDUCT ALL THE GOOD LOOKING AND SEXY PEOPLE. YOU WILL BE SAFE, I'M JUST EMAILING TO SAY GOODBYE. We know it's false because I'm still here. |
Thursday, July 26, 2007
Theme: Deoxyribonucleic Acid (DNA)
THEMEDeoxyribonucleic Acid (DNA)
- Wellcome Trust Images
- A Strange Molecule
- Monday's Molecule #35 (ethidium)
- DNA Is a Polynucleotide
- Tautomers of Adenine, Cytosine, Guanine, and Thymine
- Nucleotides Can Adopt Many Different Conformations
- Nobel Laureates: Francis Crick, James Watson, and Maurice Wilkins
- The Chemical Structure of Double-Stranded DNA
- The Three-Dimensional Structure of DNA
- The Story of DNA (Part 1) Where Rosalind Franklin Teaches Jim and Francis Something about Basic Chemistry
- Ethidium Bromide Binds to DNA
- Rosalind Franklin Announces the Death of the Helix
- Nobel Laureates 1962
- The Story of DNA (Part 2)Where Jim and Francis Discover the Secret of Life
- DNA With Parallel Strands
- Measuring Stacking Interactions
- Are You as Smart as a Third Year University Student?
- Rosalind Franklin's Birthday
- The Watson & Crick Nature Paper (1953)
- The Franklin & Gosling Nature Paper (1953)
- The Wilkins, Stokes and Wilson Nature paper (1953)
- Ethidium Bromide Is a Dangerous Chemical
- Jim Watson on the Discovery of the Double Helix
- DNA Tatoo
- DNA Polymerase I and the Synthesis of Okazaki Fragments
- Play the DNA Double Helix Game
The Wilkins, Stokes and Wilson Nature paper (1953)
Wilkins published his work on the structure of DNA in the same issue of Nature as the Watson & Crick paper and the Franklin & Gosling paper. The coauthors on the wilkins paper were A.R. Stokes and H.R. Wilson. They were reunited in 1993 on the 40th anniversary of the publication as shown in the photo. (From left to right: Raymond Gosling, Herbert Wilson, Maurice Wilkins and Alec Stokes.)A copy of the Wilkins, Stokes and Wilson paper is here.
The title of the paper "Molecular Structure of Deoxypentose Nucleic Acids" indicates that this is a paper that will discuss details and experimental results. This is a paper that emphasizes the similarities between X-ray diffraction patterns of DNA fibres from calf thymus, wheat germ, herring sperm, human, and T2 bacteriophage. They also look at DNA in vivo by examining intact sperm heads, bacteriophage, and animal viruses. The authors conclude that all these DNA have the same general structure and that it is consistent with the model proposed by Watson & Crick.
The Franklin & Gosling Nature paper (1953)
Rosalind Franklin and Raymond Gosling published their results on the structure of DNA in a Nature paper that immediately followed the famous Watson & Crick paper [The Watson & Crick Nature Paper (1953)]. Franklin had completed the manuscript before traveling up to Cambridge to see the Watson & Crick model of DNA but she was able to make changes to her paper before submitting it in early April 1953. A PDF of the paper as it appeared in the journal is here and the original manuscript is here.The title of the paper, "Molecular Configuration in Sodium Thymonucleate," gives us a clue to why this paper has been ignored and the Watson & Crick paper gets all the attention. The Franklin & Gosling paper is full of obscure references and equations and it's significance can only be recognized because of the paper that preceded it in the April 25th, 1953 issue of Nature. The writing style is ponderous and it does not convey any of the sense of excitement found in the Watson & Crick paper [see April 25, 1953: Three papers, three Lessons].
Franklin and Gosling conclude that DNA is "probably helical," the phosphate groups lie on the outside, and there are probably two strands. They state,Thus our general ideas are not inconsistent with the model proposed by Watson and Crick in the preceding communication.As is the case in the Watson & Crick paper, papers in the same issue of the journal are not specifically referenced. If you follow the link to the typed manuscript (above) you can see that this sentence was inserted by hand.
Franklin & Gosling acknowledge their colleagues at the end of the paper in the same manner we saw in the Watson & Crick paper.
We are grateful to Prof. J.T. Randall for his interest and to Drs. F.H.C. Crick, A.R. Stokes, and M.H.F. Wilkins for discussion.
The Watson & Crick Nature Paper (1953)
Watson & Crick submitted their paper on the structure of DNA to the journal Nature on April 2, 1953. It was published in the April 25th issue—a remarkably rapid publication even for that time. A PDF of the paper as it appeared in the journal is here. The original typed manuscript is here.Now that we've learned about the structure of DNA and it's history [Theme: DNA] we're in a position to work through this seminal paper line-by-line. Let's begin with the title and the opening sentence.
A Structure for Deoxyribose Nucleic AcidThe name of this important molecule is now deoxyribonucleic acid but in 1953 there was no standard nomenclature so Watson & Crick used a common name.
We wish to suggest a structure for the salt of deoxyribose nucleic acid (D.N.A.). This structure has novel features which are of considerable biological interest.
The first sentence is a classic understatement and you can be sure that it's written by Crick and not Watson.
A structure for nucleic acid has already been proposed by Pauling and Corey1. They kindly made their manuscript available to us in advance of publication. Their model consists of three intertwined chains, with the phosphates near the fibre axis, and the bases on the outside. In our opinion, this structure is unsatisfactory for two reasons:At the time they wrote the paper, Pauling had not seen their model so Watson & Crick were not certain that he would agree with them. (See Linus Pauling's notes taken during the meeting with Watson & Crick on April 8, 1953.) They were obliged to insert some commentary about competing ideas concerning the structure of DNA, especially the Pauling & Cory model that had just been published several weeks earlier in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (USA) [Pauling & Cory, 1953]. (The three-stranded structure of DNA from the Pauling & Cory paper is shown above.)(1) We believe that the material which gives the X-ray diagrams is the salt, not the free acid. Without the acidic hydrogen atoms it is not clear what forces would hold the structure together, especially as the negatively charged phosphates near the axis will repel each other.
(2) Some of the van der Waals distances appear to be too small.
No doubt Watson & Crick were delighted to be able to correct the famous Linus Pauling. The idea that Pauling might have got the structure wrong because of simple mistakes like packing charged molecules together and not allowing for proper van der Waals distances was too tempting to omit.
Another three-chain structure has also been suggested by Fraser (in the press). In his model the phosphates are on the outside and the bases on the inside, linked together by hydrogen bonds. This structure as described is rather ill-defined, and for this reason we shall not comment on it.Bruce Fraser published a brief note where he took issue with the Pauling & Cory paper but, as Watson and Crick note, the proposed structure is not described in any detail. There are no figures. The Fraser manuscript is here].
We wish to put forward a radically different structure for the salt of deoxyribose nucleic acid. This structure has two helical chains each coiled round the same axis (see diagram). We have made the usual chemical assumptions, namely, that each chain consists of phosphate diester groups joining beta-D-deoxyribofuranose residues with 3',5' linkages. The two chains (but not their bases) are related by a dyad perpendicular to the fibre axis. Both chains follow right-handed helices, but owing to the dyad the sequences of the atoms in the two chains run in opposite directions. Each chain loosely resembles Furberg's2 model No. 1; that is, the bases are on the inside of the helix and the phosphates on the outside. The configuration of the sugar and the atoms near it is close to Furberg's "standard configuration," the sugar being roughly perpendicular to the attached base. There is a residue on each every 3.4 A. in the z-direction. We have assumed an angle of 36° between adjacent residues in the same chain, so that the structure repeats after 10 residues on each chain, that is, after 34 A. The distance of a phosphorus atom from the fibre axis is 10 A. As the phosphates are on the outside, cations have easy access to them.Everything important about the structure of DNA is contained in this paragraph except for the base pairs. Note how important it was to confirm that the nucleotide conformation is similar to that which Furberg saw in the structure of cytidylate.
The important points about the backbone chains are that there are only two of them, that they form a regular helix, and the chains run in opposite directions. Recall that it was Crick who recognized the the chains had to be anti-parallel and nobody else, including Franklin and Wilkins, had thought of this.
The structure is an open one, and its water content is rather high. At lower water contents we would expect the bases to tilt so that the structure could become more compact.This is an oblique reference to the A form of DNA that Rosalind Franklin was working on. The A form is somewhat dehydrated and the helix is more compact. Just as Watson & Crick predict, the bases are tilted in the A form.
The novel feature of the structure is the manner in which the two chains are held together by the purine and pyrimidine bases. The planes of the bases are perpendicular to the fibre axis. They are joined together in pairs, a single base from one chain being hydroden-bonded to a single base from the other chain, so that the two lie side by side with identical z-coordinates. One of the pair must be a purine and the other a pyrimidine for bonding to occur. The hydrogen bonds are made as follows: purine position 1 to pyrimidine position 1; purine position 6 to pyrimidine position.
If it is assumed that the bases only occur in the structure in the most plausible tautomeric forms (that is, with the keto rather than the enol configurations) it is found that only specific pairs of bases can bond together. These pairs are: adenine (purine) with thymine (pyrimidine), and guanine (purine) with cytosine (pyrimidine).
The pairing of A with T and G with C to form base pairs in the middle of the helix is the most important part of the proposed structure. It could not have been determined from the X-ray diffraction data. It could only be deduced by model building. Note that Watson & Crick emphasize the correct tautomeric forms of the bases since most of the textbooks of the day showed the incorrect forms.In other words, if an adenine forms one member of a pair, on either chain, then on these assumptions the other member must be thymine; similarly for guanine and cytosine. The sequence of bases on a single chain does not appear to be restricted in any way. However, if only specific pairs of bases can be formed, it follows that if the sequence of bases on one chain is given, then the sequence on the other chain is automatically determined.This is the idea of complementarity that was very much in the air among the insiders. It's an entirely theoretical idea but the fact that the structure conformed made it all that much more elegant a solution. The "beauty" of the structure derives in large part from the fact that it explains so much.
It has been found experimentally3,4 that the ratio of the amounts of adenine to thymine, and the ratio of guanine to cytosine, are always very close to unity for deoxyribose nucleic acid.This is a reference to the Chargaff ratios.
It is probably impossible to build this structure with a ribose sugar in place of the deoxyribose, as the extra oxygen atom would make too close a van der Waals contact.An insight that proved to be correct. The Watson & Crick structure explains one more thing that none of the other structures could explain.
The previously published X-ray data5,6 on deoxyribose nucleic acid are insufficient for a rigorous test of our structure. So far as we can tell, it is roughly compatible with the experimental data, but it must be regarded as unproved until it has been checked against more exact results. Some of these are given in the following communications. We were not aware of the details of the results presented there when we devised our structure, which rests mainly though not entirely on published experimental data and stereochemical arguments.Watson & Crick know full well that their structure is compatible with published data from Astbury (ref. 5) and Wilkins & Randall (ref. 6). They also know that some of the key features of their model, such as base pairing, cannot be verified by X-ray crystallographic data from DNA
They make reference to the accompanying papers by Franklin & Gosling and by Wilkins, Stokes, and Wilson ("following communications"). This was a standard way of referring to papers that were in press but Watson & Crick have been criticized for not mentioning the authors by name, especially Rosalind Franklin and Maurice Wilkins.
The last sentence has been widely interpreted as somewhat disingenuous. Of course they were aware of the results, including many of the details that had not been published (see below). A great deal of the structure of the backbones was informed by the results from Franklin's unpublished X-ray images of B-DNA. It would have been much better if Watson & Crick had stated here—as a personal communication—that they had received information from Wilkins and Franklin.
It has not escaped our notice that the specific pairing we have postulated immediately suggests a possible copying mechanism for the genetic material.Another very famous sentence from the paper and another classic example of understatement. Watson & Crick follow up on this with another Nature paper that describes how DNA replication should work. The fact that an obvious mechanism of replicating DNA is apparent from looking at the structure is another example of its beauty and elegance. These were the sorts of thing that made the structure so appealing to those who were working on these problems. On the other hand, they meant nothing to most biologists, many of whom were not inclined to believe the Watson & Crick structure when it was first published. Remember that for most biologists this was the first time they were confronted with the idea that DNA was important. Watson & Crick had know for years that DNA was the secret of life but the rest of the world still thought DNA was unimportant.
Full details of the structure, including the conditions assumed in building it, together with a set of coordinates for the atoms, will be published elsewhereThe "details" were published in The Proceeding of the Royal Society in January, 1954.
We are much indebted to Dr. Jerry Donohue for constant advice and criticism, especially on interatomic distances. We have also been stimulated by a knowledge of the general nature of the unpublished experimental results and ideas of Dr. M. H. F. Wilkins, Dr. R. E. Franklin and their co-workers at King’s College, London. One of us (J. D. W.) has been aided by a fellowship from the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis.One of the myths that has grown up about the discovery of the double helix is that Watson & Crick never acknowledged Franklin and Wilkins. This myth is due, in part, to the fact that Wilkins and Franklin are not mentioned in the body of the paper where it would have been appropriate (see above). However, they are clearly mentioned in the acknowledgments even though the reference seems to contradict their earlier statement about being unaware of unpublished results.
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