M. Vierros, Bilingual Notaries in Hellenistic Egypt.

Bilingual Notaries in Hellenistic Egypt:  A study of Greek as a second language Series: Collectanea Hellenistica    Authors: Marja VIERROS  Abstract:  In the Upper Egyptian town Pathyris nearly twenty bilingual family archives have been found, dating to the second and first centuries BCE. They contain different types of documents, but contracts play an important role. Most of the Greek contracts were written by notaries (agoranomoi), whose native language was Egyptian. This study describes the language contact situation in Hellenistic Egypt in general and in Pathyris in particular. Notarial offices and scribal families in Upper Egypt are also discussed. The main focus of the study is a thorough phonological and morpho-syntactic analysis of the Greek language of the bilingual notaries. With the help of handwriting analysis, we get close to studying idiolects. Some of the notaries had more transfer features from their first language than others. Especially a notary called Hermias used creative strategies to avoid certain Greek structures and his Greek seems to present a learner's interlanguage with first and second language structures intertwining.

CONTENTS

Preface 11 List of Figures and Tables 13 Abbreviations and Glosses 14 Map of Ptolemaic Egypt 16

CHAPTER 1. INTRODUCTION … 17

1.1 Subject and Structure of the Study …  17 

1.2 Material  … 19 

1.2.1 Notarial Corpus  … 19 

1.2.2 Archives of Pathyris  … 21 

1.3 Linguistics and Papyri – Methods and Terminology …  22 

1.4 Earlier Studies  … 25

CHAPTER 2. LINGUISTIC LANDSCAPE OF HELLENISTIC EGYPT  … 29

2.1 Greek and Egyptian 2 … 9 

2.2 The Bilingual Literate Elite  … 35 

2.3 Languages and Ethnicity  … 39

2.3.1 Ethnics  … 40 

2.3.2 Onomastics  … 45 

2.4 Mixed Marriages and Bilingual Families  … 49 

2.5 Conclusion  …  52

CHAPTER 3. LANGUAGE USE IN THE PATHYRITE AREA  … 55

3.1 Historical and Administrative Setting …  56 

3.2 Language Choice …  57 

3.3 Evidence from the Archives  … 60

• 3.3.1  Correspondence of Soldiers  … 60 
• 3.3.2  Archive of Peteharsemtheus, Son of Panobchounis  … 62 
• 3.3.3  Archive of Horos, Son of Nechouthes  … 64 
• 3.3.4  Archive of Dryton, Apollonia and their Descendants  … 66 
• 3.3.5  Archive of Pelaias, Son of Eunous alias Nechouthes  … 68 
• 3.3.6  Lawsuit Archive  … 69 
• 3.3.7  Archives of the Temple and of the Priest Harsiesis,
  Son of Schotes  … 70 

3.4 Conclusion  … 70

CHAPTER 4. NOTARIES AT WORK  … 73

4.1 Agoranomic Documents  … 74 

4.1.1 Formats and Elements …  74 

4.1.2 Name of the Agoranomos  … 76 

4.1.3 Contract Proper  … 77 

4.1.4 Signature of the Notary  … 78

4.1.5 Registration  … 79

• 4.2  Agoranomic Offices in the Thebaid  … 81 
• 4.2.1  Offices and Careers of the Notaries in Krokodilon Polis
  and Pathyris  … 82 
• 4.2.2  The Office in Diospolis Megale  … 86 
• 4.2.3  The Office in the Memnoneia  … 87 
• 4.2.4  The Office in Hermonthis  … 87 
• 4.2.5  Offices with Less Evidence  … 88 
• 4.2.6 Agoranomion Xenikon  … 89 
• 4.3  Authorship – Who Wrote the Agoranomic Documents?  … 90 
• 4.3.1  Hands and Authorship  … 91 
• 4.3.2  Formulaic Differences  … 97 
• 4.3.3  Copies  … 98 
• 4.4  Egyptian Background of the Notaries  … 100 
• 4.4.1  The Family of the Agoranomoi: Asklepiades, Areios,
  Ammonios and Hermias  … 101 
• 4.4.2  Learning the Profession …  104 
• 4.5  Conclusion  … 105 

CHAPTER 5. PHONOLOGY AND RELATED ISSUES  … 107

• 5.1  Vowels 109 5.1.1 /i/, /ẹ/ and /e/ …  110 
• 5.1.2 Front vs. Middle and Back Vowels …  113 
• 5.1.3 Rounded Back Vowels 〈ο〉 ~ 〈ω〉 ~ 〈ου〉  … 114 
• 5.2  Consonants  … 116 
• 5.3  Priests and Priestesses in the Dating Formula: 〈ε〉 ~ 〈ει〉 in
  Prevocalic Position  … 118 

5.4 Iota Adscriptum and Word Final 〈ς〉  … 121 

5.4.1 Prepositional Phrase: Optional Use of the Iota Adscriptum …  123 

5.4.2 Penalty Clause  … 125 

5.4.3 Iota Adscriptum in Verbal Forms  … 126 

5.4.4 Pronouns 127 5.4.5 Iota Adscriptum within a Word …  128

5.4.6 Names and Titles: Absent and Hypercorrect Iota Adscripta
and Word Final Sigmas  … 128 

5.5 Conclusion  … 136

CHAPTER 6. MORPHOSYNTAX – USE OF CASES  … 139

6.1 Phrase Initial Inflection  … 140 

6.1.1 Personal Names as Phrase Initial Elements  … 141 

6.1.2 Pronouns, Articles and Participles as Phrase Initial Elements …  143 

6.1.3 Physical Description  … 145 

6.1.4 Use of the Accusative in a Phrase Final Position  … 146

6.2 Predominant Nominative …  147 

6.2.1 Nominative+Accusative with Infinitive  … 148 

6.2.2 Guardian Clause  … 152 

6.2.3 Participles  … 154

6.3 Price – Accusative or Genitive?  … 155

6.4 Similar Endings in Different Declensions  … 158 

6.4.1 Second and Third Declensions  … 158 

6.4.2 Irregular Inflection: ἡ γυνή 165 

6.4.3 Ending in –-ης  … 167

6.5 Inflection of Names  … 167 

6.6 Conclusion  … 173

CHAPTER 7. SYNTACTIC TRANSFER FROM L1  … 177

7.1 Relative Clause Construction  … 177 

7.1.1 Warranty Clause  … 178 

7.1.2 ... which he himself bought... 191 

7.1.3 Neighbors  … 192

7.2 Filiation and the Definite Article in the Genitive Plural  … 195 

7.2.1 Presentation of the Phenomenon  … 195 

7.2.2 Interpretation  … 200

7.3 Object in Sales – Accusatives and Genitives  … 204 

7.3.1 Alternatives for Presenting the Sold Item in Sale Contracts  … 204 

7.3.2 Confusions between the Accusatives and the Genitives  … 207 

7.3.3 Parts and Shares – Parallels in Demotic …  213 

7.3.4 More Participles in the Same Clause …  215 

7.3.5 Donations and Apostasia  … 220

7.4 Conclusion 221 CHAPTER 8. GENERAL CONCLUSIONS  … 225

APPENDIX A. Corpus Concordances  … 231 

Document Concordance …  232 

Editorial Concordance  … 237 

List of Photographs and Loci Exemplorum …  241

APPENDIX B. Genealogy of the Family of the Agoranomoi …  245 

APPENDIX C. Structure of the Agoranomic Contract and Three Samples  … 247 

APPENDIX D. Document Groups: Scribal Practices and Variation  … 261

Bibliographical Abbreviations  … 265

General Index … 283