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ARTEFACT IDENTIFIERS

Artefact ID1098
TM IDTM 33702
Findspot (DEChriM ID)30   (al-Ašmūnayn)
ClassTextual
MaterialPapyrus
Writing mediumSheet/roll
Text contentDocumentary
LanguageGreek
Description

P.Lips. I 43; FIRA 3 183: Arbitration by a bishop

Sentence of an arbitration taking place in the entrance of the catholic church under the bishop Plousianos. The quarrel, between "the heirs of Besarion" and Thaesis aeiparthenos, concerns "Christian books" which, according to "the heirs", would have been part of the inheritance and which Thaesis would have appropriated before the division. The judgement arbitration was delivered by the bishop Plousianos as arbitrator in the presence of a town-councellor and of a deacon.

The document is interesting because it illustrates the growing role of church authorities as arbitrators and also for the use of the "title" of aeiparthenos, "ever-virgin", a cult epithet of Mary, denoting women who had in some sense devoted themselves to religious life: see Elm 1989. Other women with the same title in P.Lips. I 60 (first dated attestation in 371) and SB XVI 12620.

Selection criteriaMention of Christian cult officials/institutions, Mention of Christian individuals/communities
Date from300
Date to399
Dating criteria

Note that a bishop Plousianos is known as officiating in Lykopolis in 325-347 (Worp 1994: 286, n. 10 and 302).

Absolute/relative dateRelative date
Archaeological context

Purchased in 1902. The ed. assigns this document to Hermopolis on the grounds that it was acquired together with papyri which certainly came from Hermopolis, but it was possibly written in Lykopolis and transferred later to Hermopolis (see Worp 1994: 286, n. 10 = BL X 95).

Accession number

Leipzig, Universität 8

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Editio princeps

• Mitteis, Ludwig. 1906. Griechische Urkunden der Papyrussammlung zu Leipzig. Leipzig, no. 43.

Other publications

• Arangio-Ruiz, Vincenzo. 1969. Fontes iuris Romani antejustiniani, pars tertia, Negotia. Florence (2nd ed.), no. 183.

• Mitteis, Ludwig. 1912. Grundzüge und Chrestomathie der Papyruskunde, II Bd. Juristischer Teil, II Hälfte Chrestomathie. Leipzig-Berlin, no. 98.

Additional bibliography

• Elm, Susanna. 1989. "An Alleged Book-Theft in Fourth-Century Egypt: P.Lips. 43." In Papers of the 1983 Oxford Patristics Conference. 2. Critica, classica, ascetica, liturgica. Studia Patristica. 18, 2, Leuven, 209-215.

• Rowlandson, Jane. 1998. Women and Society in Graeco-roman Egypt. Cambridge, no. 58.

• Worp, Kl. 1994. "A Checklist of Bishops in Byzantine Egypt (A.D. 325 - c. 750)." Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik 100, 283-318.

• Wipszycka, Ewa. 2009. Moines et communautés monastiques en Egypte, Warsaw, 610.

Authors
Valérie Schram, 2021
Suggested citation
Valérie Schram, 2021, "Artefact ID 1098", 4CARE database - Fourth-Century Christian Archaeological Record of Egypt, https://4care-skos.mf.no/artefacts/1098
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