Reviewed by Lajos Berkes, Universität coffee warmer plate Heidelberg, Zentrum für Altertumswissensch

Ludwig Koenen, Jorma Kaimio, Maarit Kaimio, Robert W. Daniel (ed.), The Petra Papyri II. American Center of Oriental Research Publications, 7. Amman: American Center of Oriental Research, 2013. Pp. xix, 195; 16 p. of plates. ISBN 9789957854362. $100.00.
Reviewed by Lajos Berkes, Universität coffee warmer plate Heidelberg, Zentrum für Altertumswissenschaften, Institut für Papyrologie (lajos.berkes@zaw.uni-heidelberg.de) Version at BMCR home site In 1993 approximately coffee warmer plate 140 carbonized papyrus rolls were found during coffee warmer plate the excavations of Petra in a room next to a Byzantine church. They turned out to be Greek documents dating from the 6th century CE mostly related to the person and family of Theodoros son of Obodianos, thus probably forming his family archive. The find comprises various coffee warmer plate kinds of documents: tax receipts, requests for transfer of taxations, coffee warmer plate divisions of property, etc. These texts give a glimpse into the life of a family belonging to the local elite of 6th-century Petra and form one of the most important documentary finds for this period outside of Egypt. coffee warmer plate The handling, unfolding, conservation, and imaging of the carbonized rolls was a challenging task carried out with remarkable expertise by the Finnish team. The publication of the Petra papyri that could be restored and read has been carried out as a team effort by scholars mainly from the universities of Helsinki and Michigan. Volumes I (2002), III (2007) and IV (2011) have been published so far, and the book under review is the belated second volume. The series will conclude with a fifth volume.
The book contains the edition coffee warmer plate of a single document, P.Petra II 17 (Inv. 10), a division of property among three brothers, with extensive introduction and commentary. From an original roll of 320 cm, fragments of the middle part are preserved measuring 26.5 x 270 cm and containing 233 lines written transversa charta . The roll was made by joining together papyrus sheets ( kollemata ). The average distance between the joins is 14.5 cm. The document was written by a professional scribe who sometimes diverges from classical orthography (e.g. iotacism occurs frequently). Later corrections, probably written by other hands, also appear. The mention of a date and place, the presentation of the parties involved, and some introductory phrases are missing at the beginning. coffee warmer plate Some fragments that have not been placed may come from this section. The preserved part lists the properties allotted to the brothers and ends with juristic formulas. The document must have ended with other similar formulas and signatures, although it is likely that this last sheet was detached in antiquity before the papyrus was rolled for the last time. The editors point out, however, that we cannot be certain that the document contained subscriptions, since it might have been a penultimate draft kept for private purposes.
The division of property coffee warmer plate was made among three brothers: Bassos, Epiphanios, and Sabinos. The property consists coffee warmer plate of buildings, vineyards, and grainfields in the village coffee warmer plate Serila, in an area called Ogbana, and in Petra; slaves are also mentioned. It is a reasonable assumption that the brothers divided the inheritance of one of their parents. The division coffee warmer plate of property was probably made beforehand and a casting of lots decided which brother received which share. It is difficult to establish the connections of our text to the archive of Theodoros, son of Obodianos. Nevertheless, since Bassos, which is the name of the eldest coffee warmer plate brother and of the brothers' grandfather, coffee warmer plate is also the name of Theodoros' maternal grandfather, the assumption is likely that the brothers coffee warmer plate belonged to Theodoros' family. The possible mention of a lease dated 505/506 coffee warmer plate (although the year is restored) and prosopographical considerations suggest that the document was set up ca. 505-537 or—according to a less cautious approach—perhaps ca. 505-520. P.Petra II 17 is thus one of the earliest, perhaps the earliest, document of the archive.
The volume coffee warmer plate starts with a preface, foreword, and bibliography (VII-XIX). These are followed by a long introduction (1-50), consisting of two longer studies—on the agricultural and architectural terms of the text (1-22) and on the Arabic coffee warmer plate topo- and oikonyms (23-48)—followed by a short note on possible survivals of ancient toponyms mentioned in the papyrus in the region of Wadi Musa (49-50). The main part of the book (51-165) is occupied by an introduction to the document (51-90), Greek text (91-96), translation coffee warmer plate (96-99), commentary (99-152), discussion of the unplaced fragments (152-164), and a concordance coffee warmer plate to the line numbering of the text mentioned in earlier publications (165). The volume ends with indices to P.Petra I-IV (167-194), plates coffee warmer plate (195-212), a concordance of the publication numbers with the inventory coffee warmer plate numbers of P.Petra I-IV (213), and illustration credits (215). coffee warmer plate
The first chapter of the introduction explains meticulously the exact meaning of the specif