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One text, 2 sources · Trismegistos-Text 36260

Fragment of a letter of supplication to the landowner Dorotheos TM 36260unbekanntVI

The same ancient text or artifact as recorded by 2 records across 2 independent projects, recognised as one entity by its TM-Text identifier. View on Trismegistos →

Fragment of a sixth-century begging letter addressed in elaborate flattering language to Dorotheos, the writer's landowner. The writer, ill with dysentery, bedridden and unable to work, with small children, asks his master to extend a hand of justice and help.

In English machine translation

[verso] […] to the good master and benefactor of mankind […] […] most loving of the poor, magnificent […] […] to Dorotheos, my landowner […] […] your illustrious […] […] may he guard your […] […] of the most illustrious and thrice-longed-for […] […] 'from whose tongue flowed speech sweeter than honey' for the longest time […] […] flourishing again, to obtain all that you desire […] […] in manners and seasons. For what then, master […] […] and a work of all-goodness of the […] […] great […] of the Lord God and King of all […] […] to stretch out to me a hand of justice and piety (?) […] […] I happen to be suffering ill-treatment along with your slaves […] […] I happen to be lying in bed (with) dysenteric spasms […] […] pains, without letup (?); being altogether […] […] with my infant children, because without work (?) […] […] from the hands of idleness, so that God […] [recto] […] I will present (?) to you always, and on many occasions […] […] †

The line about speech 'sweeter than honey' quotes Homer (Iliad 1.249, on Nestor). 'Landowner' renders geouchos, the term for a great estate holder in late antique Egypt.

Working translation of the DDbDP edition, made with Claude Opus 5.5 from the edition and the catalogue records shown below (catalogued as Fragment eines Bittbriefes). It has not been reviewed by a papyrologist: check the edition before citing. Restorations follow the edition; […] marks lost text and (?) an uncertain reading.

DDbDP-text Full record →

p.berl.brash.19

Papyri.info — DDbDP (Duke Databank of Documentary Papyri) — text · VI

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