The House of Ptolemy Annex:
Egypt After the Ptolemies
Egypt Under Roman Rule -- Culture

Bibliographic Notes on: Culture [ Work in Process 29 May 2000]

Greco-Roman Egypt and its Culture

The Literate in Greco-Roman Times: [ Papyri ] [ Literature ]

Papyri and Papyrology

• --- Checklist Of Editions Of Greek And Latin Papyri, Ostraca And Tablets
  Last revised 30 Nov 2000. By: John F. Oates, Roger S. Bagnall, Klaas A. Worp, Joshua D. Sosin, Sarah J. Clackson, Terry G. Wilfong, Alexandra A. O'Brien
  © American Society of Papyrologists; reprinted with permission.
  This is the Beta Version of the new, expanded Checklist. The authors have added Coptic and Demotic material in an effort to make a more comprehensive guide to the papyrological evidence.
  
  The primary purpose of the Checklist of Editions of Greek, Latin, Demotic and Coptic Papyri, Ostraca and Tablets is to provide for scholars and librarians a ready bibliography of all monographic volumes, both current and out-of-print, of Greek, Latin, Demotic and Coptic texts on papyrus, parchment, ostraca or wood tablets. Texts published in periodicals as journal articles are normally excluded; Greek texts are regularly republished in successive volumes of Sammelbuch griechischer Urkunden aus Ägypten (SB), the volumes of which are included. A Sammelbuch (SB Kopt.) has now begun the republication of Coptic texts.
  
  
  Many volumes containing documentary texts publish literary and subliterary texts as well, and such volumes are of course included, together with volumes of the same series that are exclusively literary. No systematic attempt to include all exclusively literary and subliterary volumes has been made. Supplementary material - Corpora, Instrumenta, Series, etc. - has been added as seemed appropriate.
  
  
  The fourth printed edition of the Checklist (Bulletin of the American Society of Papyrologists Supplement No. 7, 1992) was revised and corrected as of 20 Mar 1992. Preceding it in printed form were the third edition, closed in November 1984 (BASP Supplement No. 4, 1985); the second edition, closed on 30 Jun 1978 (BASP Supplement No. 1, 1978); and the first edition, published as BASP XI no. 1 (1974). For an account of the origin and development of the Checklist, the reader is referred to the succession of Prefaces printed in the Third Edition, pp. vii-xiii. An electronic version of the Checklist, complete to 30 Jun 1996, can be found on Packard Humanities Institute CDROM no. 7.
• --- Duke University Libraries Online Catalogue of Papyri
  Literary papyri, Subliterary papyri (magical texts etc.), Documentary papyri
• --- The Yale Papyrus Collection (P.CtYBR inv.) Catalog Introduction
  Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University Catalog Introduction
  by Stephen Emmel, 1993, with Additions by Ruth Duttenhofer, 1996. [Last updated: 31 Jan 2000].
  
  
  Here is a direct link to search the collection.
• The 'New Papyrology' and Ancient Social History
  by: James G. Keenan (Loyola University of Chicago)
  in: The Ancient History Bulletin 5.5-6 (1991) 159-169.
• --- From the Sands of The Sahara Ancient Kellis and Its Texts (Online Catalog)
  Monash University Excavations at Ismant el-Kharab Dakhleh Oasis, Egypt
  An Exhibition of Photographs from the Department of Classics and Archaeology and Material from the Monash University Library Rare Books Collection 30 Jul-2 Oct 1998
  Exhibition Catalogue by Colin A. Hope, Senior lecturer, Department of Classics and Archaeology. Exhibition Curator Richard Overell, Rare Books Librarian.
  In 1988 two almost perfectly preserved, wooden books (codices) were found abandoned in the kitchen of a fourth-century house at the site of Ismant el-Kharab, ancient Kellis, in the Dakhleh Oasis of Egypt. Between 1991 and 1992 others were found in a neighbouring house plus thousands of fragments of ancient texts written upon papyrus; annually since then more have been discovered. The first finds were made by a small team led by the writer; since then this group has expanded to become a group of some twenty international researchers whose work has been organised through the Department of Classics and Archaeology at Monash University since 1991. This exhibition presents a summary of the major discoveries; in presenting this review I wish to acknowledge the contribution made by of all members of the Ismant el-Kharab team and my other colleagues of the Dakhleh Oasis Project.
• --- Egyptian Stelae in Field Museum of Natural History: Roman (pp 70-76)
  By Thomas, George Allen. Egyptian Stelae in Field Museum of Natural History
  Chicago: Field Museum of Natural History, 1936.
  Field Museum of Natural History: Anthropological Series; Vol. XXIV, No. 1 (PJ1511.F45A4).
  From EOS (Electronic Open Stacks), the University of Chicago Library's home for image-based texts.

Literature and Writings

• --- From Papyri to King James: The Transmission of the English Bible (Exhibit: University of Michigan, Harlan Hatcher Graduate Library)
  The exhibition highlights a rare collection of documents tracing the development of the Bible from ancient Egyptian manuscripts to the modern printed book on display at the Harlan Hatcher Graduate Library. The exhibit includes two papyrus documents: P. Mich. Inv. 263 Libellus. AD 250 and P. Mich. Inv. 6238. Epistles of Paul circa A.D. 200. spread across nations, peoples, and languages.
• --- The Corpus Hermeticum
  The Corpus Hermeticum are the core documents of the Hermetic tradition. Dating from early in the Christian era, they were mistakenly dated to a much earlier period by Church officials (and everyone else) up until the 15th century. Because of this, they were allowed to survive and we seen as an early precursor to what was to be Christianity. We know today that they were, in fact, from the early Christian era, and came out of the turbulent religious seas of Hellenic Egypt. These are all taken from Mead's translations, which are in the public domain.
• --- Dio of Prusa
  Dio of Prusa was a Bithynian orator who, in a public speech, made in Alexandria, probably in the reign of Vespasian, went so far as to describe Egypt as a sort of 'appendage' of the city, which was probably making some concession to his audience's viewpoint.

Art and Architechture in Greco-Roman Times: [ Art ] and [ Architecture ]

• --- Nilotic Mosaic from the "Cave of the Sortes"
  Sanctuary of Fortuna at Praeneste - Floor decoration. 1st century BCE. Museo Archeologico Nazionale - Palestrina
  other poor-quality photos at URL http://www.usc.edu/dept/finearts/hs/roman/Week3B/pc246.jpg ( Click on the image to see a full-sized enlargement of the image.)
• --- Funerary Cartonnage of a Lady of Means
  Egyptian: Roman, Imperial Period, 1st Century CE
  Made of linen, painted and gilded gesso, with various inlays. Size: 22 3/4 inches (57.8 cm) high.
  From the Brooklyn Museum of Art: Egyptian, Classical, and Ancient Middle Eastern Art
• --- Mummy portrait with cartonnage case
  Probably from the Faiyum, Roman Imperial Period (90-100 CE). This entry in includes a RealPlayer audio file description of the item. From the exhibition "Splendors of Ancient Egypt" formerly at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, USA (22 Sep 1996 - 30 Mar 1997). See URL http://130.80.29.3/content/interactive/voyager/egypt/tour/index.html where Ptolemaic and Greco-Roman items are interspersed throughout the exhibit.
• --- Mummy Portrait of a Woman
  Attributed to the Isidora Master. Encaustic and gilt on a wooden panel wrapped in linen. Fayum, Egypt, (100 - 125 CE). From the J. Paul Getty Museum collection of antiquities.
• --- Head and Torso of a Roman Emperor, probably Nero
  Greco-Roman Period, reign of Nero, AD 54-68 (Marble), Musée du Louvre E 27418.
  From The Cleveland Musem of Art: Pharaohs Exhibition (base page at URL http://www.clemusart.com/

• --- The Roman temple of Isis and Mut at Shenhur
  Egyptian projects of the archaeology department at the Katholieke Universiteit (K. U.) Leuven.
  The late J. Quaegebeur participated between 1971 and 1992 in several projects of the Committee for Belgian Excavations in Egypt, in the Theban necropolis and at Elkab. From 1992 until his untimely death in August 1995 he was acting director of a Belgo-French mission at Shenhur (midway between Thebes and Coptos), the site of a well-preserved Roman temple with adjacent Roman and Coptic settlements. J. Quaegebeur's successor (H. Willems) will continue his work. The Shenhur project will provide the Egyptology department of the K. U. Leuven for years to come with an archaeological and epigraphical project of its own.
• --- Roman Ruins at Dendera
  Painted Raised Relief of Bes; The Temple of Hathor; The Divine Triad of Dendera
• --- Temple of Dendur (Early Roman period, about 15 BCE)
  Made of Aeolian sandstone; length of gateway and temple 82 ft (25 m)
  This Egyptian monument, originally erected in Nubia, would have been completely submerged as a result of the construction of Egypt's Aswan High Dam, begun in 1960. Instead the temple was given to the United States in recognition of the American contribution to the international campaign to save the ancient Nubian monuments. Click on image for enlargement.
  (From The Metropolitan Museum of Art: Egyptian Art).

Sciences and Mathematics in Greco-Roman Egypt

• --- Ptolemy, the Man (Claudius Ptolemaeus)
  Ptolemy (aka Claudius Ptolemaeus, Ptolomaeus, Klaudios Ptolemaios, Ptolemeus) lived in Alexandria (in Egypt) from approx. 87 -150 CE. Very little is known about his personal life. He was an astronomer, mathemetician and geographer. He codified the Greek geocentric view of the universe, and rationalized the apparent motions of the planets as they were known in his time.
• --- Geography of Claudius Ptolemy
  This is, as occasionally modified by Bill Thayer (the web site author), a transcript of a Dover edition, first published in 1991, itself an unabridged republication of a public domain work, originally published in 1932 by The New York Public Library, NY, USA in an edition limited to 250 copies, with the title Geography of Claudius Ptolemy.
• --- Ptolemy's Geography: The Science of the Earth's Surface
  Scans of pages from various Medieval and Renaissance editions of the Geography from the Vatican Library web site section on Greek Mathematics and its Modern Heirs. Additional pages are scattered through the rest of the online exhibit along with those from Euclid, Archimedes, Appolonius, Papus and others.
• --- Hero of Alexandria (fl/ 62 CE): Pneumatics [Full Text] [At Steam Engine Library]
  The Pneumatics Of Hero Of Alexandria From The Original Greek Translated For And Edited By Bennet Woodcroft Professor Of Machinery In University College, London (1851)
  Text conversion and html by Peter Hark and Dan Sonneborn (Dec 1996)

Snapshots of Daily Life in Greco-Roman Times

• --- Traditions of Magic in Late Antiquity (Exhibit: University of Michigan Library)
  The exhibition presents some of the materials in the University of Michigan's collections which might prove useful in any discussion of magic and its practitioners in the Mediterranean basin and the Near East from the 1st to the 7th centuries AD, a period which saw the magical traditions of several different cultures coalesce and merge into an unprecedented form of international, and even multicultural magical praxis, with its own rituals, symbols, and words of power. Mainly Egyptian including Gnostic charms.
  Copyright © 1996 The Kelsey Museum of Archaeology, University of Michigan. All rights reserved.
• --- Portals of Eternity (Exhibit: Kelsey Museum online)
  The exhibition presents what is currently known about the town, the cemetery, and the people of Terenouthis in Roman times.
  Copyright © 1996 The Kelsey Museum of Archaeology, University of Michigan. All rights reserved.
• --- 148. Marriage and inheritance. Alexandria, 2nd cent. AD (Berlin papyrus 1210. Tr. J.G. Winter. G)
  The idiologus, the chief financial officer of Roman Egypt, administered the imperial account, which consisted of funds acquired form means of than taxation (fines and confiscations, for example). The papyrus from which these extracts are taken contains a summary of the rules by which the idiologus carried out his duties. This document reveals fiscal oppressions not only of women but of an entire province. This is a selection from Women's Life in Greece and Rome, see below.
• --- 249. Exposure of a female child. Oxyrhynchus, Egypt, 1 B.C. (Oxyrhynchus papyrus 744. G)
  A letter from a husband to his wife directing her not to raise her baby if it is female. Exposed children were left to be raised by others or to die. This is a selection from Women's Life in Greece and Rome, see below.
• --- 381. Two contracts for the services of wet nurses for slave children. Alexandria, 13 B.C. (BGU 4.1106, 1107. G)
  The contracts appear to favour the slave-owners over the resident aliens who have been engaged to nurse their foundling slave babies. In the first contract, the foundling is specifically female (cf. no. 249), but in the second the sex of the child is not specified. Although repetitions in the phraseology indicate that such contracts were standard, the stiff penalties and exact specifications suggest that in previous instances both the slave-owners and wet nurses had failed to keep their part of the bargain. This is a selection from Women's Life in Greece and Rome, see below.

  • Other selections from Women's Life in Greece and Rome by Mary R. Lefkowitz and Maureen B. Fant

Bibliographic Notes:
Greco-Roman Egypt and its Culture

THE LITERATE

• --- (BMCR 97.6.15) Bagnall & Obbink, Columbia Papyri X
  Authors: Roger S Bagnall and Dirk D Obbink, Columbia Papyri X (American Studies in Papyrology, Vol 34).
  American Studies in Papyrology 34. Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1996. Pp. 292. ISBN 0788502751
  Contributors: Jean-Jacques Aubert, Paul J Bodin, Andrew J. Carriker, Raffaella Cribiore, Diana Delia, Jerise Fogel, Georg Fredric Franko, Beth Juhl, Hayim Lapin, Jacqueline Long, Jennifer K Lynn, Bruce E Nielsen, Mark J Petrini, Jonathan Roth, Saundra C Schwartz, Jennifer A Sheridan, Glen L Thompson.
  Reviewed by: Kirsti Copeland, (copeland@princeton.edu) Religion, Princeton University.
  [Bryn Mawr Classical Review provides reviews of books of interest to classisists]
  Order This book from Amazon.com

SNAPSHOTS OF DAILY LIFE IN GRECO-ROMAN TIMES

• --- (BMCR 99.6.13) Rowlandson, ed., Women and Society in Greek and Roman Egypt: A Sourcebook
  by Jane Rowlandson (editor), With the collaboration of Roger Bagnall, Alan Bowman, Willy Clarysse, Ann Ellis Hanson, Deborah Hobson, James Keenan, Peter van Minnen, Dominic Rathbone, Dorothy J. Thompson, and Terry Wilfong. Women and Society in Greek and Roman Egypt: A Sourcebook Published by Cambridge: (Cambridge University Press, 1998), Pp. xxii, 406; 3 maps, 57 illustrations. ISBN 0-521-58212-1 (hb). ISBN 0-521-58815-4 (pb). Reviewed by Joan Burton (Trinity University, San Antonio, Texas, USA)
  Amazon.com provides this information about the book: This book makes available to students and other non-specialists a varied collection of over three hundred translated texts and fifty illustrations relating to women's lives in Greek and Roman Egypt. These are accompanied by an introductory chapter and full explanatory notes. It makes accessible to all those interested in social history, and in particular the lives of women, this extraordinarily rich body of material from the ancient world.
  
  Order This hard back book from Amazon.com ......... OR ........ Order This paperback book from Amazon.com




• --- A Bibliography on Romano-Egyptian Domestic Cult
  From a posting by Dr. Pedar W. Foss in the Romarch Archives; Bibliography is by H. Gottrey, a student at Univ. Michigan (USA) doing her honors thesis on the subject.



• --- Bandits Real and Imagined in Greco-Roman Egypt: A Select Bibliography
  By B.C. McGing.
  This bibliography was compiled by B.C. McGing of Trinity College, Dublin. It was distributed by him at the conference Shifting Frontiers in Late Antiquity II in Columbia, South Carolina, March 13-16 1997, in connection with a paper entitled "Bandits Real and Imagined in Greco-Roman Egypt." It is posted here with his kind permission. Any errors that have crept in are those of the editor.



• --- (BMCR 96.6.1), Hanson, ed., Collected Papers of Naphtali Lewis
  Author: Hanson, Ann Ellis (ed.), On Government and Law in Roman Egypt: Collected Papers of Naphtali Lewis (American Studies in Papyrology, No 33)
  American Studies in Papyrology, 33. Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1995. Pp. xiii + 383. $49.95. ISBN: 0-7885-0146-1
  Reviewed by Clifford Ando -- University of Michigan (cando@umich.edu)
  [Bryn Mawr Classical Review provides reviews of books of interest to classisists]
  Order This book from Amazon.com



• --- (BMCR 95.10.11), Gagos/van Minnen, Settling a Dispute
  Author: Traianos Gagos and Peter van Minnen, Settling a Dispute: Toward a Legal Anthropology of Late Antique Egypt (New Texts from Ancient Cultures 1)
  Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1994. (New Texts from Ancient Cultures 1) Pp. x + 150, 5 plates. $44.50. ISBN 0-472-09590-0 (hb). $24.95. ISBN 0-472-06590-4 (pb).
  
  Reviewed by Roger S. Bagnall -- Columbia University (bagnall@columbia.edu)
  [Bryn Mawr Classical Review provides reviews of books of interest to classisists]
  Order This book from Amazon.com



• --- (BMCR 95.3.20), Bagnall and Frier, The Demography of Roman Egypt
  Author: Roger S. Bagnall and Bruce W. Frier, The Demography of Roman Egypt (Cambridge Studies in Population, Economy and Society in Past Times, No 23)
  Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994. Pp. 354. $49.95. ISBN 0-521-46123-5
  Reviewed by Tim Parkin -- Victoria University/Wellington NZ (tim.parkin@vuw.ac.nz)
  [Bryn Mawr Classical Review provides reviews of books of interest to classisists]
  See the card catalog description provided by Amazon.com or Order this book from Amazon.com



• --- (BMCR 97.3.37), Rowlandson, Landowners and Tenants in Roman Egypt
  Author: Rowlandson, Jane, Landowners and Tenants in Roman Egypt: The Social Relations of Agriculture in the Oxyrhynchite Nome (Oxford Classical Monographs)
  Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1996. Pp. vii-xiv, 1-384. ISBN 0-19-814735-X. $80.00
  Reviewed by Susan Stephens (Stanford University, CT, USA), susan.stephens@forsythe.stanford.edu
  [Bryn Mawr Classical Review provides reviews of books of interest to classisists]
  Order This book from Amazon.com



• --- (BMCR 96.10.5), Alston, Soldier and Society in Roman Egypt: A Social History.
  Author: Alston, Richard; Title: Soldier and Society in Roman Egypt: A Social History.
  London and New York: Routledge, 1995. Pp. i-viii, 1-263. $59.95. ISBN 0-415-12270-8.
  Reviewed by Susan Stephens, Classics -- Stanford University
  [Bryn Mawr Classical Review provides reviews of books of interest to classisists]
  Order This book from Amazon.com



• --- (BMCR 98.6.10), Montserrat: Sex and Society in Graeco-RomanEgypt
  Montserrat, Dominic, Sex and Society in Graeco-Roman Egypt
  London and New York: Kegan Paul International, 1996. Pp xix, 238; $76.50. ISBN 0-7103-0530-3
  Reviewed by Maryline Parca, Department of the Classics, The University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
  [Bryn Mawr Classical Review provides reviews of books of interest to classisists]
  Order This book from Amazon.com



• --- (BMCR 3.2.17), David G. Martinez, editor, translator and commentator
  Michigan Papyri XVI: A Greek Love Charm from Egypt (P. Mich. 757). American Studies in Papyrology no. 30
  
  Editor: Martinez, David G., translator and commentator
  Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1991. Pp. xiii, 161, One plate. $44.95 ($29.95 with Scholars Press discount). ISBN 1-55540-547-9.
  
  Rev. by S.I. Johnston
  [Bryn Mawr Classical Review provides reviews of books of interest to classisists]
  Order This book from Amazon.com



• --- Ethnicity in Hellenistic Egypt
  
  Edited by P Bilde et al. Eight essays from a 1990 Danish conference. Contributors include: D J Thompson (Language and literacy in early Hellenistic Egypt); J Blomquist (Alexandrian science: the case of Eratosthenes); K Goudriaan (Ethnical strategies in Graeco-Roman Egypt); A Kasher (The civic status of the Jews in Prolemaic Egypt); P Borgen (Philo and the Jews in Alexandria). 210p (Aarhus Univ Press; Dec 1992) ISBN: 8772883596 Hb £19.95
  Order This book from Amazon.com

Articles and Guides to the Coins of Greco-Roman Egypt
(Roman Imperial Coinage of Alexandria)

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