DOI Heft:
Nr. 3-4
DOI Artikel:Bell, Harold Idris: Some private letters of the roman period: from the London Collection
DOI Seite / Zitierlink: https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.12361#0215
h. i. bell
comparison with our total stock of papyrus letters, is by now not inconsiderable, but
an addition to thera is always welcome. It is for this reasbn that I determined to
publish here two or three letters of a rather more personal kind which the British
Muséum bas acquired in the course of the last décade. Volume VI of the Muséum
Catalogue is not likely to appear for at least two or three years, and it is very possible
that, for reasons of space, the letters and private documents of the Roman period will
bave to be left over to the following volume; hence a preliminary publication of thèse
letters seems advisable.
I bave edited thèse documents in the way now almost uni versai, with accents,
breathings and punctuation marks. Suppléments of my own are marked, as usual, by
square brackets, letters omitted in the original but supplied by me by the signs < >,
deletions by double brackets [[ ]], superfluous letters by braces { \. I have given trans-
lations, partly because tbey render an elaborate commentary unnecessary, partly for
the convenience of any readers who may be unfamiliar with the often indiffèrent
Greek and awkward constructions of the Graeco-Egyptian letter-writers. I should
add that my transcripts of Nos. 3 and 4 have had the benefit of a revision by Prof.
Grenfell, whose contributions are acknowledged in the critical notes by the letter G.
1. A Schoolboy's Letter Home.
Letters from or to schoolboys or alluding to the éducation of children, though
not of course numerous, are less rare than might perhaps have been expected; and
some of thein are certainly among the most interesting of the papy ri yet found. The
présent letter, which is from a boy sent, in accordance with a not uncommon custom,
to.a teacher living at a distance, may fairly claim to rank among the more noteworthy
spécimens of its class. It appears that the boy's father was expected to visit the
schoolmaster, who, for some reason left unexplained, could not or would not begin his
instruction till the father's arrivai; and accordingly Thonis, burning with zeal for the
acquisition of knowledge, urges his father to hasten his coming. This enthusiasm for
study may seem to the modem schoolboy more than a little inhuman; but, as if to
remind us that boys could be boys even in ancient Egypt, Thonis makes a bid for the
sympathy of even tbe most unwilling scholar in his postscript : avr),uove'j<3-aT:s tïiv repurce-
ptSûov fj|j«!>v. It is true that pigeons, then as now, were very commonly kept in Egypt
for économie reasons, but in this case it seems certain that Thonis's pigeons were
something more to him than mere "poultry".
The letter is not a long one; yet it is not, I think, fanciful to read in it some
manifestation of a living personality ; to find in this schoolboy, with his eagerness for
comparison with our total stock of papyrus letters, is by now not inconsiderable, but
an addition to thera is always welcome. It is for this reasbn that I determined to
publish here two or three letters of a rather more personal kind which the British
Muséum bas acquired in the course of the last décade. Volume VI of the Muséum
Catalogue is not likely to appear for at least two or three years, and it is very possible
that, for reasons of space, the letters and private documents of the Roman period will
bave to be left over to the following volume; hence a preliminary publication of thèse
letters seems advisable.
I bave edited thèse documents in the way now almost uni versai, with accents,
breathings and punctuation marks. Suppléments of my own are marked, as usual, by
square brackets, letters omitted in the original but supplied by me by the signs < >,
deletions by double brackets [[ ]], superfluous letters by braces { \. I have given trans-
lations, partly because tbey render an elaborate commentary unnecessary, partly for
the convenience of any readers who may be unfamiliar with the often indiffèrent
Greek and awkward constructions of the Graeco-Egyptian letter-writers. I should
add that my transcripts of Nos. 3 and 4 have had the benefit of a revision by Prof.
Grenfell, whose contributions are acknowledged in the critical notes by the letter G.
1. A Schoolboy's Letter Home.
Letters from or to schoolboys or alluding to the éducation of children, though
not of course numerous, are less rare than might perhaps have been expected; and
some of thein are certainly among the most interesting of the papy ri yet found. The
présent letter, which is from a boy sent, in accordance with a not uncommon custom,
to.a teacher living at a distance, may fairly claim to rank among the more noteworthy
spécimens of its class. It appears that the boy's father was expected to visit the
schoolmaster, who, for some reason left unexplained, could not or would not begin his
instruction till the father's arrivai; and accordingly Thonis, burning with zeal for the
acquisition of knowledge, urges his father to hasten his coming. This enthusiasm for
study may seem to the modem schoolboy more than a little inhuman; but, as if to
remind us that boys could be boys even in ancient Egypt, Thonis makes a bid for the
sympathy of even tbe most unwilling scholar in his postscript : avr),uove'j<3-aT:s tïiv repurce-
ptSûov fj|j«!>v. It is true that pigeons, then as now, were very commonly kept in Egypt
for économie reasons, but in this case it seems certain that Thonis's pigeons were
something more to him than mere "poultry".
The letter is not a long one; yet it is not, I think, fanciful to read in it some
manifestation of a living personality ; to find in this schoolboy, with his eagerness for