De immunitate mulierum ( DDBDP )

DE IMMUNITATE MULIERUM

Petition to the epistrategos

( AD 180-191 )

P. Tebt. II, 327 = W. Chr. 394 ( Duke Data Bank of Documentary Papyri ).

English translation ( Advanced Papyrological Information System ).

To his highness the epistrategos Vettius Tu..., from Kronous daughter of Zoilos son of Petesouchos, of the village of Tebtunis in the division of Polemon of the Arsinoite nome. A long while ago, my lord, my aforesaid father was selected as a superintendent of confiscated property, and after the appointed term of his office he died without means, leaving nothing at all ; yet ever since the thirteenth year of the deified Aurelius Antoninus demands have wrongfully been made upon me for the government dues payable on behalf of the property. Wherefore, my lord, since it has been ordered that women should be exempt from such burdens, I, being a defenseless woman weighted with many years and in danger of having to leave my home on this account, perforce take refuge with you, begging you now to give orders that the property standing in the name of my father be transferred to ... and to living persons (?) ... Farewell. (2nd hand) Year .., Mesore 10. If there is no hindrance (?) apply to the strategos. To be delivered.

► Bibliography

Grenfell, Hunt & Goodspeed, The Tebtunis Papyri, II, London, 1907, n. 327 ; Vinogradoff, Oxford studies in social and legal history, 1, 1909, pp. 42-43 ; Wilcken, Grundzüge und Chrestomathie der Papyruskunde, Leipzig-Berlin, 1912, Chrest., n. 394 ; Ramsay, The bearing of recent discovery on the trustworthiness of the New Testament, London-New York, 1915, p. 267 ; Abbott & Johnson, Municipal Administration in the Roman Empire, Princeton, 1926, pp. 528-529, n. 179 ; Moulton & Milligan, The vocabulary of the Greek Testament illustrated from the papyri and other non-literary sources, London, 1930, pp. 232, 340 and 457 ; Meecham, The letter of Aristeas : A linguistic study with special reference to the Greek Bible, Manchester, 1935, p. 99 ; Holm, Griechisch- ägyptische Namenstudien, Diss., Uppsala, 1936, pp. 59 and 72 ; Taubenschlag, Archives d'histoire du droit oriental, 2, 1938, p. 310 ; Bell, Egypt, from Alexander the Great to the Arab conquest : A study in the diffusion and decay of Hellenism, Oxford, 1956, p. 142 ; Taubenschlag, Opera minora, II, Warszawa, 1959, p. 373 ; Thomas, The Epistrategos in Ptolemaic and Roman Egypt, II, Opladen, 1982, p. 189 ; Hobson, TAPhA, 113, 1983, pp. 311-321 ; Bureth, ANRW, II, 10, 1, 1988, p. 497 ; Weiss, Der Brief an die Hebräer, Göttingen, 1991, p. 608 ; Tenger, Die Verschuldung im römischen Ägypten (1.-2. Jh. n. Chr.), St. Katharinen, 1993, p. 184 ; Haensch, ZPE, 100, 1994, p. 508 ; Krause, Witwen und Waisen im Römischen Reich, II, Stuttgart, 1994, p. 222 ; Drecoll, Die Liturgien im Römischen Kaiserreich des 3. und 4. Jh. n. Chr., Stuttgart, 1997, p. 48 ; CE, 73, 1998, pp. 121-124 ; Riess, Apuleius und die Räuber : Ein Beitrag zur historischen Kriminalitätsforschung, Stuttgart, 2001, p. 129 ; Dirscherl, Der Gaustratege im römischen Ägypten..., St. Katharinen, 2002, p. 337.

► Source : Papyrus from Tebtynis.