Draft of a petition to the king, probably by Zenon, concerning a dispute with a woman named Arsinoe over a house at Philadelphia that she claimed to have built on a vacant plot. The petitioner asks that the strategos Agenor re-examine the case, since the testimony of his slave Eutychos had failed him, and award him the house if Arsinoe cannot prove her claim.
In English machine translation
[...]
[...] (claiming) to have built (the house), having taken a vacant plot [...]
⟦[...] of the architect Theodoros⟧ and to have spent on the building [...]
[...] at Philadelphia before Agenor the strategos, and Arsinoe neither the [...]
[...] nor that she had built the house, while Eutychos said [...]
[...] the building, and having cast (the responsibility?) for these things onto the builders and the [...]
[...] builder and the man who sold the timber [...]
[...] to have received the price and the wages from Eutychos my slave [...]
[...] having withdrawn concerning this charge, wherefore Agenor, misled, [...]
[...] that these things had been determined by me, writes to Kleitorios ordering him to summon me [...]
[...] O king, to order Agenor the strategos, having examined [...]
[...] that she received the plot from the royal [...]
[...] the bricks and the timber, and to produce the builders as witnesses for her [...]
I too am without witnesses on these matters, so that, having heard again [...]
[...] and if she does not prove it, the house shall be mine, so that I too [...]
[...] he may judge as seems best to him, so that I too through you, O king, may obtain justice.
This is a second draft of the same petition preserved in another Zenon papyrus; the writer revised the closing request to ask for a fresh hearing. The word translated 'charge' (bolē) is uncertain in sense here.
Working translation of the DDbDP edition, made with Claude Opus 5.5 from the edition and the catalogue records shown below (catalogued as Draft of petition to the king). It has not been reviewed by a papyrologist: check the edition before citing. Restorations follow the edition; […] marks lost text and (?) an uncertain reading.