Memorandum [between 261 and 229]
Memorandum about manufacture and dyeing of wool carpets; the dye was made from flowers and women performed this job; Kallippos delivered the wool and Sosos received it
One text, 3 sources · Trismegistos-Text 1826
Memorandum on wool, dyeing and carpet-making, requesting more wool TM 1826Philadelphia? (Arsinoites)261 BCE – 229 BCE
The same ancient text or artifact as recorded by 3 records across 3 independent projects, recognised as one entity by its TM-Text identifier. View on Trismegistos →
A memorandum from a wool workshop, probably at Philadelphia in the Fayum in the mid-3rd century BC, accounting for wool, dye-flowers, soda and payments to women workers. The writer reports that 1 talent of dirty wool from Kallippos yielded 45 minas of clean wool, from which Sosos has a double-sided rug of 30 minas, and asks the addressee to order funds for the women and more wool so the workers are not idle.
In English machine translation
[Column 1]
[…]
[…] … of bronze 20 drachmas 4 obols
[…] expenditure
[…] of this, clean […] … Sosos has
[…] 30 minas of the
[…] 8 drachmas
[…]
[…]
[…] to the (women) additionally measured out […] to the women
[…] of flowers 3 minas
[…] … and of the bundle […] … 2 …
[…] of wool 8 minas
[…] … at 2 obols, total 4 drachmas
[…] … soda
[…] of 4 minas 3 drachmas
[…] Menestratos
[…] 40 minas
[…] 4 obols … […] expenditure […] So please,
if you think fit, give orders
for this to be given to us so that we may pay
the women.
[Column 2]
[…]
these […]
to each 1 mina …
total, which they work up
by themselves, of flowers 3 minas,
and another 3 minas through
hired women.
I have also received from Kallippos of dirty wool
1 talent; of this, loss 15 minas, remainder
of clean 45 minas.
From this Sosos has
1 double-sided rug
weighing 30 minas.
So if you think fit, order Kallippos to give us additional wool
so that we may have work and not be idle.
An amphitapos was a rug or carpet with pile on both sides. The 'flowers' were apparently used as dye material, and the mina here is a unit of weight.
Working translation of the DDbDP edition, made with Claude Opus 5.5 from the edition and the catalogue records shown below (catalogued as Memorandum about Carpetmaking and Dyeing). It has not been reviewed by a papyrologist: check the edition before citing. Restorations follow the edition; […] marks lost text and (?) an uncertain reading.
p.col.4.113
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