Mandate of Ammon to Faustinus concerning his late brother's slaves in Alexandria TM 23633Panopolis348 CE

Aurelius Ammon son of Petearbeschinis, scholastikos, from Panopolis in the Thebaid, to Aurelius Faustinus, fellow citizen and friend, former magistrate and councillor of the same city, greetings. Since I happen to be busy for the present, having a most urgent matter now in hand, and since the season of cultivation at the same time prevents me from setting out on a journey, taking care for the present that our land should not remain unsown and so expose me to the public levies, I instruct you by this my written mandate to take my place for the time being. For I have heard that someone has suddenly appeared from outside and is attempting, by force or by fraud, to seize the slaves in Alexandria belonging to my brother Harpokration, as though they were now without an owner and as though he had died without heirs. I therefore instruct you to inform my lord the most distinguished prefect of Egypt, Flavius Nestorius, about this: that there exists a brother of the late Harpokration, of the same father and the same mother, his lawful heir, Ammon by name, who also bears the burdens of his few affairs in the Thebaid, and these having become waste land, the laws compelling him of necessity to take charge of them because of the public taxes. This mandate, written by me in my own hand, I hand over to you, valid and binding, so that you may be able lawfully to plead on my behalf in the court and either recover the slaves or request that they be kept under the care of the office until the court obtains exact proof on my arrival.