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1 Links to publications of the work of the Dakhleh Oasis Project at Mut el-Kharab, including the recent excavations conducted by Colin Hope, may be found at http://arts.monash.edu.au /archaeology/excavations/dakhleh/mut-el-kharab/index.php.
2 These include 198, 278, 280, 305, 306 (in abnormal Hieratic), 315, 378, 384 conv., 385, 389–393, 422, 427 and 428.
3 Information from Colin Hope.
4 Many are not readable or are only partially legible. To preserve the integrity of the archaeological record we have included even the illegible here. We have found that some texts have become intelligible only when parallels were found in a later season.
5 Only coins and ostraka offer sufficiently precise evidence for dating the stratigraphy at Amheida. Pottery cannot be dated exactly enough to help in this respect.
6 Given that the instances of use of Galerius’ posthumous count as regnal years (rather than as indiction numbers) are all Arsinoite, identifying any numbers higher than 19 (the year at Galerius’ death) as belonging to him seems most unlikely.
7 For the date of O.Kellis 24, see line 3n.
8 As Klaas Worp points out to us, the combination of year 87 with indiction 9 in O.Dor. 2 = SB 20.14919 is possible only if the years of Constantius are the base; no other plausible emperor’s year 87 would coincide with indiction 9. (There are problems of reading in this ostrakon, but the chronological data are not in doubt.)
9 Room 3 belongs to a different house, to the south of B1; it has therefore been omitted from the discussion of the stratigraphy of B1.
10 See Raffaella Cribiore, Paola Davoli, and David M. Ratzan, “A Teacher’s dipinto from Trimithis (Dakhleh Oasis),” Journal of Roman Archaeology 21 (2008) 170–92.
11 To this one case add the apparently unnamed hydreuma appearing in a Trimithis ostrakon from the 2008 season, inv. 13205, not published herein, which records payment of one animal ὑπ(ὲρ) ὑδρ(εύματος) ἱερατικ( ). A search of the Duke Databank does not return any other attestations of this phrase.
12 See, e.g., the references collected in Index VI(b) to P.Kellis 1.
13 D. Bonneau, Le Régime administratif de l’eau du Nil dans l’Égypte grecque, romaine et byzantine (Leiden 1993) 61.
14 G. Wagner, Les oasis d’Égypte à l’époque grecque, romaine et byzantine, d’après les documents grecs (Cairo 1987) 279–83.
15 Wagner, Les oasis, 163. This toponym has also appeared in an ostrakon from Ain el-Gedida, an Arabic name that reproduces the Coptic one. It is far from certain that there was only one place with this name in the Dakhla Oasis, however.
16 Hydrological Pso names appear elsewhere in Egypt; cf. the mêchanê Pso in P.Oxy. 34.2724.
17 Anthony J. Mills and Klaas A. Worp, “Four Greek Ostraka from Deir el-Hagar,” ZPE 146 (2004) 155–58.
18 The same toponym appears in an unpublished ostrakon from Ain es-Sabil found in 2009.
19 The Trimithis ostraka from the 2008 season, not published in this volume, produce a considerable number of references a man named Serenos. Many, perhaps all, of these likely concern the same man here, the head of the house.
20 Gelasios is not a common name in the Oases or in Egypt generally; cf. Onomasticon Oasiticum for references in the Kellis papyri. P.Kellis 1.16, a “business note” directing the Kellis Gelasios to deliver four artabas of dates, is comparable in context to the appearances of our Gelasios in Trimithis and may well refer to the same person. But two of the other instances (P.Kellis 1.29 and SB 18.13852) refer to a former logistes and an exaktor respectively, perhaps too high status to be the same man.
21 See D. W. Rathbone, Economic Rationalism and Rural Society in Third-Century A.D. Egypt (Cambridge 1991) 71–82.
23 As he might also be in the unpublished Trimithis ostrakon inv. 13009, from the 2008 season, where Serenos’s name is perhaps to be restored.
24 There is no reason to suppose that the well would not have been in use consistently throughout the year. If expenses ran to 10 solidi, net income would have been 42 solidi. At a 10 percent rate of return, the capital value would be 420 solidi, or 5 5/6 pounds. Most accounts of ancient agricultural investment assume rates of return lower than 10 percent, which would yield a correspondingly higher capital value.
25 For tiphagia see Bagnall, Thanheiser, and Worp, ZPE 122 (1998) 173–88, with response at O.Douch 5.535 (continuing to argue for a connection with cereals), and further speculation at O.Kellis 1.92. See also 30, 34, 42 and 301 herein. In the ration accounts 63 and 65–68, tiphagia always appear with loaves (ἄρτ(οι)) in the same ratio of 1:1.
26 P.Kellis 1.26, a fragmentary report of judicial proceedings, and P.Kellis 1.71, a private letter.
27 Nikokles also appears in the unpublished Trimithis ostrakon inv. 13086, from the 2008 season.
28 Cf. O.Douch 5 634, an order to furnish 1.5 λ̣ί̣θ̣ι̣ν̣ of cotton. In the note, Wagner remarks, “C’est la seule fois que la mesure cotonnière est écrite en toutes lettres: ce serait donc le lithion, diminutif rarissime de lithos (LSJ 1048, s.v.), clairement une unité pondérale standard, et non une mesure volumétrique.” Regrettably, there is no plate to allow the reader to check this proposed text, of which every letter is dotted, and to verify whether the reading of the second iota is in fact compelling.
29 Most of the contents of this section first appeared in somewhat different form in R. S. Bagnall and G. R. Ruffini, “Civic Life in Fourth-Century Trimithis: Two Ostraka from the 2004 Excavations,” ZPE 149 (2004) 143–52.
30 A graffito in the temple area found in 2005 was written by Horigenes son of Ioannes.
31 We (like J. D. Thomas, cf. BL 11.100) accept the interpretation of the text by R. P. Salomons quoted in the first edition but not accepted by the editor.
32 This is a patronymic on a jar sealing in O.Kellis 198. A Serenos in the Kharga Oasis appears in O.Waqf. 15, where an identification with a Serenos in O.Douch 107 is proposed.
33 First published in Aegyptus 63 (1983) 149–50, with discussion of the identification of Mothis.
34 There are other papyri in the collection of the Università Cattolica di Milano from the Dakhla Oasis, acquired in 1968 (see SB 16 12229 and 24 15903; cf. also 15902? and K.A. Worp, Tyche 15 [2000] 189–90). Around the same time the University of Genova and Duke University also acquired papyri from Kellis on the antiquities market. One of the Duke papyri is published by J. F. Oates in BASP 25 (1988) 129–35, and several more appeared in the memorial volume for P. J. Sijpesteijn as P.Sijp. 11a–c. P.Genova 1.20 and 21 are from Kellis; the first of these is republished with one of the Milanese fragments in P.Genova 2 Appendix.
35 Restore perhaps ἐν τοῖ]ς (suggestion of Klaas Worp).
36 A. K. Bowman, Town Councils of Roman Egypt (Toronto 1971) 83–87, 110, 112, 114.
37 Bowman (above, n. 36) 86.
38 Bowman (above, n. 36) 37.
39 Bowman (above, n. 36) 12.
40 N. Lewis, The Compulsory Public Services of Roman Egypt2 (Pap.Flor. 28, 1997) 86. For bibliography on the office, Lewis (p. 42) cites his article in JJP 2 (1948) 53–57 and J. Lallemand, L’administration civile de l’Égypte (Brussels 1964) 131–34.
41 Trimithis ostraka inv. 13004 and 13014, both found in Room 22 of Area 2.1.
42 For the office of the exactor, see J.D. Thomas CdE 34 (1959) 124–40.
43 Lines 3–8, trans. by eds.: τὸ κελευσ[θὲ]ν | ὑπὸ τῆς θείας κ[αὶ ο]ὐρανίου αὐτ̣[ῶν τύ]χης τῶν | δεσποτῶν ἡμ[ῶν] βασιλέων πάντ[ας] τοὺς ξένους | τοὺς εὑρισκωμένους ἐν ταῖς κώμαις .ρις[.].υ̣φε̣ς κα̣τ̣ὰ | [ἀ]νδρ̣εῖ̣[ον λ]ό̣γον πρὸ σ[ε]ισμοῦ ἐπανεγκῖ̣ν τῷ ἱερωτάτῳ | ταμι[εί]ῳ πρὸς φόλλὶ̣ς πέντε. The editors cite P.Apoll.Ano. 9 for an eighth-century parallel to the use of xenoi to refer to fugitives. On fugitives in fourth-century villages see D. Rathbone, “Villages and Patronage in Fourth-Century Egypt: The Case of P.Ross.Georg. 3.8,” BASP 45 (2008) 189-207.
44 It is to be translated, “Valerius Herculanus to Serenos, praepositus pagi of Trimithis, greetings. You require without good reason that people coming from the city of the Mothites be made subject against their will to provision of camels and beasts.” As J. D. Thomas remarks (JEA 84 [1998] 262), it is a reprimand.
45 P.Kellis 1 G. 49.
46 It may be added that there is one published mention of a Mothite nome, in P.Sijp. 11b, dated to 350 or 351, and presumably coming from Kellis (cf. above, n. 34; the village name is only partly preserved). In that instance, however, [τῆς μεγάλης] Ὀάσεως is added after the nome name. Another instance occurs in an unpublished papyrus from Kellis.
47 J.H.F. Dijkstra and K.A. Worp, ZPE 155 (2006) 183–87, with P.Kellis I G. 49 (304) in which a certain Piperismi is described as apo Trimitheitôn poleôs.
48 For Mothis, see P.Kellis 1, p. 124. The place appears in Trimithis texts so far only in the unpublished inv. 13085, 13090, and 13232, from the 2008 season.
49 This building and its environs will be published in a forthcoming volume of Amheida, edited by Anna L. Boozer.
50 See M. Choat, Belief and Cult in Fourth-Century Papyri (Turnhout 2006) 57–73.
51 KAB 49–50.
52 This count includes patronymics. The Bekis listed without a patronymic may be one of the others appearing herein. Likewise for the Psais and Horos appearing without patronymics. Psen[ may be a Psenamounis from elsewhere in these texts. Psenamounis son of Pa[ may be Psenamounis son of Pathotes.
53 Perhaps add Plout( ) (Ploutammon?).
54 One is tempted to suppose this a translation of the Egyptian name Ἀβωκ (NB Dem. 96), but this name has not to date appeared in any documents from the Great Oasis.
55 Most of the entries in the Kellis account book are for a single marion. The two largest, for 33 maria and 20 maria, appear in lines 916 and 1700 respectively.
56 A. C. Johnson and L. C. West, Byzantine Egypt: Economic Studies (Princeton 1949) 241–42, discussing SPP 20.94 = P.Charite 14 (326–327 CE?). Worp’s commentary to the re-edition in P.Charite follows Johnson and West on prosthêkê.
57 The phrase also appears in a series of eighth-century tax receipt ostraka, O.Petr. 464, 465 and 467.
58 It is regrettable that the onomastic appendix of Guy Wagner’s thesis on the oases, which was not included in his Les oasis (1987), has never been published. It would now of course be much out of date, given the mass of material from Kellis, but it would have been of great use. Fortunately, the compilation of onomastica for the Kharga and Dakhla Oases by Robert Salomons and Klaas Worp have made it relatively easy for us to check occurrences of names outside Trimithis. The Onomasticon Oasiticum is available online at http://www.media.leidenuniv.nl/legacy/onomas_final.pdf..
59 On the likelihood of local onomastic particularism manifest in rare names, see G. R. Ruffini, “The Commonality of Rare Names in Byzantine Egypt,” ZPE 158 (2006) 213–25.
60 See also discussion above at pp. 53–54.
61 O.Kellis 30.1 and 30.6.
62 Citing J. Quaegebeur, “Tithoes, dieu oraculaire,” Enchoria 7 (1977) 103–08 at 104; reference to Tutu in this context seems entirely plausible.
63 Cf. P.Kellis 5, p. 40, for the suggestion that this is a shortened version of Ἀπόλλων.
64 We do not intend to suggest any particular ethnic or linguistic origin with this classification, which includes names we cannot confidently place in one of the above categories; some of these are certainly theophoric. For discussion of the onomastic peculiarities of the Oases see Wagner, Les Oasis 242–249.
65 See KAB, p. 69, n. 37.
66 Douch: O.Douch 3.225 and 5.521; Small Oasis: P.Oxy. 60.4071 (other Oxyrhynchos instances may also reflect connections with Bahariya); El-Arag: SB 10.10551; Siwa: P.Oxy. 43.3126. Note also instances in P.Marm., perhaps influenced by Siwa. See the discussion by Wagner, Les oasis, 231–32 and 334–35 (on the cult), who calls the god “une divinité spécifique de tout le désert occidental de l’Egypte.” Wagner also suggests that Παλάμμων (now also attested several times at Kellis) might be the same name with interchange of liquids. We are doubtful that this is correct.