A petition from an Oxyrhynchite, son of Eudaimon, to the prefect Subatianus Aquila, complaining that the district scribe Apollonios had nominated him to two compulsory public services (liturgies) at once, contrary to an imperial ruling of Severus and Caracalla, which is quoted at the start. A second fragment preserves excerpts of court proceedings from year 9 of Severus before Laetus in a similar case involving a donkey-driver.
In English machine translation
[Fragment A]
Emperor Caesar Lucius Septimius Severus Pius Pertinax Augustus Arabicus Adiabenicus Parthicus Maximus and Emperor Caesar Marcus Aurelius Antoninus Pius Augustus to Aelius Primus. If […] proof (?) […] to have happened, the governor of the province will see to it that you are released from the other (liturgy). Posted at Memphis in the stoa of the Sarapeum on the fifth day before the Ides of December.
To Subatianus Aquila, prefect of Egypt,
from […] son of Eudaimon, from Oxyrhynchus city. Our lords the invincible Emperors Severus and Antoninus, having shone upon their own Egypt, among the other benefits which they bestowed upon us also ordered this to the governor of the province, that no one should be nominated to two liturgies at the same time. […] Apollonios, the amphodogrammateus of the same city, nominated me to two liturgies in the present […] year, and this although I had not even completed the years […]. Having therefore set out first the divine (rulings) concerning […] our […] concerning […] to hear me against him […]
[…]
[…]
[Fragment B]
[…]
[…] year 9 of Severus […]
[…] came forward and said: 'I am a donkey-driver, and the scribes […] now you are held in two liturgies.' Heron replied: '[…] of the village.' Laetus said: 'The second liturgy is the water-carrying (?) […] to the scribe of the city […] performs the donkey-driving liturgy […] knowing (?) therefore that he was a donkey-driver, how did you summon him to the […]' […] after other things Laetus said to Herakleides and […]: 'How many […]' […] and having deliberated with those in the council he ordered Herakleides and […] being scribe of the city the same […]
[…]
[…] for three […]
[…]
An amphodogrammateus was the scribe of a city quarter responsible for nominating residents to liturgies, unpaid compulsory public services. The imperial rescript was posted at the Memphis Sarapeum, probably during the emperors' visit to Egypt in AD 199/200.
Working translation of the DDbDP edition, made with Claude Opus 5.5 from the edition and the catalogue records shown below (catalogued as Petition to the Prefect Concerning a Liturgy). It has not been reviewed by a papyrologist: check the edition before citing. Restorations follow the edition; […] marks lost text and (?) an uncertain reading.