Diogenes, head of the nomarchia (nomarches) Willy

1
Diogenes, head of the nomarchia (nomarches)
ArchID 68. Version 2 (2013)
Willy Clarysse
Place
Date
Language
Material
Number of
texts
Type
Collections
Find/Acquisitio
n
Arsinoites (Fayum), meris of Polemon
256-250 BC
Greek and billingual (Demotic with Greek abstracts)
Papyrus
39 certain, 1 uncertain
Official archive
Paris, Sorbonne
Extracted from mummy cartonnage found by Jouguet at Ghoran in 1901/1902
Bibliography
O. MONTEVECCHI, La papirologia, Milano, 19882, p. 249 no. 5a.
S. HÉRAL, L’administration du Fayoum d’après les papyrus grecs et démotiques de Ghoran
(Mémoire de maîtrise), unpubl. diss., 1989
S. HÉRAL, ‘Archives bilingues de nomarques dans les Papyrus de Ghôran’, in J.H. JOHNSON
(ed.), Life in a Multi-Cultural Society: Egypt from Cambyses to Constantine and beyond
(Studies in Ancient Oriental Civilization 51), Chicago, 1992, p. 149-157
Description
In 1901-1902, Jouguet found about one hundred mummies with cartonnage in the cemetery of
the Fayum village Ghoran, north of the Gharaq Basin. One cartonnage (excavation no. 157160) contained scraps of at least 34 papyri,1 all dated to the same year, which have been
grouped under the heading ‘the archive of Diogenes nomarches’. Two texts for which no
archaeological records are available (Rech. Pap. 4 (1967), p. 100 and 105) belong to this group.
All 36 texts are kept in the Sorbonne and most texts from the single mummy are published by
JOUGUET in P. Lille Gr. I (1928), by CADELL in P. Sorb. I (1966) (Greek texts) and by SOTTAS
in P. Lille Dem. I (1921) (Demotic and bilingual texts).2 Héral, who studied the papyri from
Ghoran, signals five unpublished texts concerning Diogenes, which either come from other
Ghoran mummies or do not have excavation numbers.3
Though all 36 published texts belong to the same cartonnage and Diogenes is mentioned in all
but four of them, only eleven bilingual declarations of small livestock and the Greek letter P.
Sorb. I 22 are addressed to him (incoming documents).4 These Demotic declarations under oath
are double documents and a Greek abstract is added below every preserved scriptura exterior.
Twenty texts were written by Diogenes (outgoing documents): P. Sorb. I 19 is a letter from
Diogenes, ordering Lysippos to give two jars (keramia) of first quality wine to Phanesis; P.
1
Excavation numbers 157-160 refer to papyri from a single mummy, see Héral 1989, p. 57.
P. Sorb. inv. 96 (= P. Lille Dem. I 18) + 1248 is published by de Cenival in Enchoria 8.2 (1978), p. 2. A reedition
of the bilingual and Demotic texts by Vleeming is forthcoming.
3
Greek: P. Sorb. inv. 298, 571; Demotic: P. Sorb. inv. 1294, 1397, 1398. See Héral 1992, p.156. More information
on three of these unpublished papyri is provided in Héral 1989, p. 57-58: P. Sorb. inv. 298 is an order for payment
in kind, similar to the other orders for payments in the archive and P. Sorb. inv. 1294 and 1398 are declarations of
small livestock addressed to Diogenes.
4
P. Lille dem. I 12-17, 19-20, P. Lille dem. I 18 + Enchoria 8.2 (1978) p. 2, Rech. Pap. 4 (1967), p. 100 and 105.
2
Diogenes, head of the nomarchia (nomarches)
2
Lille Gr. I 39-47 and 49-50, and P. Sorb. I 23-30 are orders by Diogenes to Thrasymedes to
pay substantial amounts of grain as loan to farmers.5 The loans covered working expenses to
bring land into cultivation and had to be repaid by the farmers together with the rent in the
following year. Three further texts (P. Lille Gr. I 51-52 and P. Sorb. I 31) do not directly
concern Diogenes, but show the next step in the bureaucratic chain: Thrasymedes orders his
subordinate Herakleitos to deliver the loan to the farmers. A last text originating from the same
mummy cartonnage, P. Sorb. I 21, does not concern Diogenes nor his subordinate
Thrasymedes and is uncertain. It is a receipt by Demeas, agent of Philiskos, to three tax
farmers of wool (Archibios, Ores and Phaminis). Archibios may recur in P. Lille Gr. I 22, 2, a
text of the archive.
The Demotic bodies of the declarations of small livestock are all dated to Pachons of Egyptian
year 34 = Macedonian year 35 of Ptolemy II, i.e. June 22 - July 21 251 BC. Diogenes' orders
for payments in the archive are dated in year 35 of Ptolemaios II by Egyptian months, ranging
from Thoth to Tybi: in all probability, the Greek orders of payment sent by Diogenes are dated
according to Macedonian years and Egyptian months.
The only dated texts not written in the 35th Macedonian year are P. Sorb. I 19 (30th year), a
letter from Diogenes to Lysippos, and P. Sorb. I 21 (34th year), a receipt which has in fact little
or nothing to do with Diogenes.
All texts come from the same cartonnage and nearly all are double documents dated in one and
the same year. They come therefore from a single archive. Whether Thrasymedes or Diogenes
kept this archive, remains uncertain. That the declarations of small livestock (addressed to the
nomarches Diogenes) would have ended up in Thrasymedes' archive, seems unlikely. On the
other hand, one wonders how double documents sent by Diogenes to Thrasymedes could have
remained in or returned to Diogenes' archive. Thrasymedes usually put a short docket on the
back of orders sent to him, containing the name of the farmer who received the loan,
sometimes also the reason and the amount.
Diogenes (Pros. Ptol. I + VIII 882) certainly recurs in one text outside the archive (P. Petrie III
42 g (8)) and perhaps also in PSI IV 359. All dated references to the nomarches Diogenes
belong to June 22 - July 21 251 BC.6 Thrasymedes' title is nowhere preserved.7 Herakleitos,
Thrasymedes' subordinate, may be at the head of the granary (sitologos).8
Diogenes' orders for payments do not only concern seed loans, but they cover working
5
All orders contain the same formula: ‘Diogenes to Thrasymedes, greetings. Give order to measure out to NN as
loan X artabas of grain’.
6
In Pros. Ptol. VIII 882 Diogenes' nomarchia is dated 258-250 BC, following E. Seider, Beiträge zur
Ptolemäischen Verwaltungsgeschichte: Der Nomarches der Dioiketes Apollonios, Heidelberg, 1938, p. 42 who
gives the earliest attestation of Diogenes' nomarchy from the undated (!) P. Petrie III 42 g (8). P. Sorb. I 19 is
indeed dated to 256 BC (Héral 1992, p. 156), but Diogenes is not called nomarches in this papyrus. It is possible
that Diogenes in PSI IV 359 (251 BC, May 9), a text from the Zenon archive, is the nomarches Diogenes from this
archive, but this is unproven.
7
Cadell, in P. Sorb. I, 1966, p. 87 suggested that he was a toparches, but as shown by W. Clarysse, ‘Nomarchs and
toparchs in the third century Fayum’, in M. Capasso (ed.), Archeologia e papiri nel Fayyum, Atti del convegno
Internazionale, Siracuse, 1997, p. 69-76, the toparchic structure came only ten years later in the Fayum.
8
Cadell, in P. Sorb. I, 1966, p. 87.
Diogenes, head of the nomarchia (nomarches)
3
expenses (δάνειον εἰς κάτεργον). They may therefore refer to the irrigation projects developed
under Ptolemy II.9 The receivers of the loans come from different villages in or near the
Polemon meris (see App.).
Archive
texts
P. Lille Gr. I 39-52; P. Lille Dem. I 12-20; P. Sorb. I 19, 22-31; Enchoria 8.2 (1978), p. 2 (= P.
Lille Dem. I 18); Life in a multi-cultural society, 1992, p. 156 (inv. 298, 571, 1294, 1398); Rech.
Pap. 4 (1967), p. 100-104 (inv. 2301; the Greek summary also in SB X 10452); p. 105 (inv.
1397+1294 b); uncertain: P. Sorb. I 21.
Text types
Declarations of small livestock (11), letter (1), orders for payments (24) = incoming (12) and
outgoing (24) documents.
Appendix
Map of the Fayum indicating the extent of Diogenes' jurisdiction by a broken line
The extent is deduced from the villages mentioned in Diogenes' orders for payment of loans to
Thrasymedes. See P. Sorb. III, 2011, p. 54 (copyright Willy Clarysse).
1 = Nomarchia of
Aristarchos
2 = Nomarchia of
Diogenes
9
P. Lille Gr. I, 1928, p. 196-197.
Diogenes, head of the nomarchia (nomarches)