Official Correspondence and Declaration, and Petition

Description

On the recto are three columns, the first of which contains a short letter probably from the praefect Fl. Valerius Pompeianus, to the strategus of the Oxyrhynchite nome, reiterating an order. This is followed by a formal declaration made by three municipfunctionaries to the strategus that they had experienced no extortion from Phileas, a former official of Alexandria. On the verso there is a copy of a petition from the prytanis to an unnamed praefect recounting the difficulties that had occurred in filling the post. Of the three eutheniarchs annually required, the order of gymnasiarchs, on whom the nomination appears to have devolved, had designated only two, who could not be persuaded to undertake the burden involved. Efforts to provide for the duties during the remainder of the year having failed, the praefect is asked to intervene and to send instructions to the strategus.