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Brooklyn Museum — Egyptian, Classical, Ancient Near Eastern Art · document

Aramaic Adoption Contract

Source of record: Brooklyn Museum — Egyptian, Classical, Ancient Near Eastern Art — catalogued by the holding institution. View the original record →

Description

Object Label: This document originates in the archive of Ananiah and Tamut, members of a Jewish family living on Elephantine Island in the fifth century B.C.. This contract allows a man named Uriah to adopt a boy named Jedaniah and thus free him from slavery. Adoption was one legal method used to free slaves in ancient Egypt. Catalogue description: Culture Aramaic Caption: Aramaic. Aramaic Adoption Contract, October 22, 416 B.C.E.. Papyrus, ink, 47.218.96a: Largest Fragment #1: 13/16 × 1 3/4 in. (2 × 4.5 cm) 47.218.96a: Largest Fragment #2: 1 × 1 3/16 in. (2.5 × 3 cm) a: Small Box of Fragments: 1 3/4 x 4 1/16 x 4 1/16 in. (4.5 x 10.3 x 10.3 cm) b: Glass: 15 1/2 x 17 1/16 in. (39.3 x 43.3 cm) b: Object: 11 5/8 x 13 3/4 in. (29.5 x 35 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Bequest of Theodora Wilbour from the collection of her father, Charles Edwin Wilbour, 47.218.96a-b. (Photo: Brooklyn Museum)

AI image analysis GPT-4o-2024-08-06

Machine-generated from the object's image on May 2026. Not curatorial; treat deities, names, and signs below as the model's best reading, not authority.

An ancient papyrus fragment containing text written in a cursive script.

This is an image of a framed papyrus fragment featuring multiple horizontal lines of text. The script is a cursive form, possibly Greek or Demotic, indicating a document of potentially administrative or literary nature. The papyrus is mounted in a protective case, showing signs of wear and damage along the edges, with some parts missing.

hieroglyphic only Ptolemaic fragmentary
Materials papyruswood (frame)
Visible text "unknown"

Connections

Found at Elephantine
Materials PapyrusWood (Frame)

Cross-references (2)

  • BKM-Accession 47.218.96a-b tier-2
  • BKM-Object 3489 tier-2
About this record's data
  • From the source institution — accession, description, dimensions, and dating are as catalogued by Brooklyn Museum — Egyptian, Classical, Ancient Near Eastern Art.
  • AI-inferred — the image-analysis panel (deities, names, signs) is machine-generated and may be wrong.
  • Approximate location — most map points are plotted at the site centroid, not the exact findspot.
  • Inferred links — cross-references marked with a match method other than explicit-source-field were matched by us, not stated by the source.