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Letter on an ostracon from Serenus, a curator, to Claudius Alexander at the Roman quarry site of Mons Claudianus in the 2nd century AD. After a damaged passage apparently mentioning his weapon, Serenus asks for something to be handed over and complains that the two buckets Isidoros sent arrived broken, so the men are drawing water with pots.
A curator here was a military officer in charge of a station; the addressee may have been a centurion. The word translated 'pots' (gastrai) means round-bellied jars, used as makeshift water vessels.
Working translation of the DDbDP edition, made with Claude Opus 5.5 from the edition and the catalogue records shown below (catalogued as Lettre du curator Serenus à Claudius Alexander [centurion?]). It has not been reviewed by a papyrologist: check the edition before citing. Restorations follow the edition; […] marks lost text and (?) an uncertain reading.
Κλαυδίῳ Ἀλεξάνδρῳ[…] Σερῆνος κουράτωρ[…] χαίρειν. ἐρωτηθεὶς[…] ξεν μοι εξη[…] σται εἰς τὸ τα[…] ὅπλου μου. μελησάτω σοι δέ, κύρειε, δοῦναι αὐτ[…] καὶ περεὶ τῶν κάδων μελησάτω σοι Εἰσειδώρῳ μεταδοῦναι. τοὺς δύο γὰρ οὓς ἔπεμψε, κατεαγότας πέπεμφε καὶ γάστραις ἀντλοῦσιν.
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