Temple of Narmouthis: House of the ostraca Katelijn

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Temple of Narmouthis: House of the ostraca
ArchID 534. Version 1 (2012)
Katelijn Vandorpe and Herbert Verreth
Place
Date
Language
Material
Number of texts
Type
Collections
Find/Acquisition
Bibliography
Arsinoites (Fayum), meris of Polemon, Narmouthis
About AD 150-225
Greek, Demotic and bilingual Greek-Demotic
Ostraca
About 1481, only 507 of them published or described
Temple archive
Cairo, Egyptian Museum; part of the ostraca were kept in Kom Aushim, Karanis Museum, but are now moved
to Cairo, Egyptian Museum
Found during Italian excavations in 1938 and in 2006 in Medinet Madi (Narmouthis)
For more bibliography till 2006, see the website
http://www.egittologia.unipi.it/pisaegypt/BibMedinet.htm.
A. VOGLIANO, ‘Rapporto preliminare della IVa campagna di scavo a Madînet Mâdi (R.
Università di Milano.)’, ASAE 38 (1938), p. 533-549.
E. BRESCIANI / S. PERNIGOTTI / M.C. BETRÓ, Ostraka demotici da Narmuti I (nn. 1-33),
Pisa, 1983 [O. Narm. Dem. I].
R. PINTAUDI / P.J. SIJPESTEIJN, ‘Ostraka di contenuto scolastico provenienti da Narmuthis’,
ZPE 76 (1989), p. 85-92.
R. PINTAUDI / P.J. SIJPESTEIJN, Ostraka greci da Narmuthis (OGN I), Pisa, 1993 [O. Narm.
Gr. I].
P. GALLO, Ostraca demotici e ieratici dall'archivio bilingue di Narmouthis II (nn. 34-99),
Pisa, 1997 [O. Narm. Dem. II].
A. MENCHETTI, ‘Esercizi scolastici in demotico da Medinet Madi’, EVO 22-23 (1999-2000),
p. 137-153.
G. MESSERI / R. PINTAUDI, ‘Ostraca greci da Narmuthis’, CdE 77 (2002), p. 209-237.
K.-Th. ZAUZICH, ‘Ostrakon Medinet Madi 332 (= ODN 20) - eine Schülerbeschimpfung’,
Enchoria 28 (2002-2003), p. 175.
A. MENCHETTI, ‘Esercizi scolastici in demotico da Medinet Madi (II)’, EVO 26 (2003), p.
23-31.
A. MENCHETTI, ‘Quando Adriano venne in Egitto. Un nuovo testo demotico sul viaggio
dell'imperatore’, EVO 27 (2004), p. 27-31.
A. MENCHETTI, ‘Words in Cipher in the Ostraka from Medinet Madi’, EVO 28 (2005), p.
237-243.
A. MENCHETTI, Ostraka demotici e bilingui a Narmouthis, Pisa, 2005 [O. Narm. Dem. III].
A. MENCHETTI, ‘La devozione e il culto per le divinità di Narmuthis. La testimonianza degli
ostraka da Medinet Madi (OMM)’, in S. PERNIGOTTI / M. ZECCHI (eds.), Il coccodrillo e il
cobra. Aspetti dell'universo religioso egiziano nel Fayyum e altrove. Atti del colloquio,
Bologna - 20/21 aprile 2005, Imola, 2006, p. 59-72.
A. MENCHETTI, ‘L'annona per il viaggio in Egitto di Antonino (Marco Aurelio) in un testo
demotico da Medinet Madi’, EVO 29 (2006), p. 113-119.
Temple of Narmouthis: House of the ostraca
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S. GIANNOTTI / Ch. GORINI, ‘Esercizi scolastici in demotico da Medinet Madi (III). ODN
194; 197; 208-216’, EVO 29 (2006), p. 121-139.
M. ROSS, ‘An introduction to the horoscopic ostraca of Medînet Mâdi’, EVO 29 (2006), p.
147-180.
R.S. BAGNALL, ‘Reflections on the Greek of the Narmouthis Ostraka’, in M. CAPASSO / P.
DAVOLI (eds.), New archaeological and papyrological researches on the
Fayyum: proceedings of the international meeting of Egyptology and Papyrology, Lecce,
June 8th-10th, 2005 = Papyrologica Lupiensia 14 (2005), Galatina, 2007, p. 13-21.
A. MENCHETTI, ‘Il paesaggio visto da Narmuthis. Testimonianze documentarie’, in S.
PERNIGOTTI / M. ZECCHI (eds.), La terra, gli uomini e gli dèi. Atti del secondo colloquio,
Bologna - 22/23 maggio 2006, Imola, 2007, p. 135-150.
A. MENCHETTI / R. PINTAUDI, ‘Ostraka greci e bilingui da Narmuthis’, CdE 82 (2007), p.
227-280.
S. GIANNOTTI, ‘Istruzioni per un apprendista bibliotecario negli ostraka demotici e bilingui
di Narmuthis’, EVO 30 (2007), p. 117-152.
M. ROSS, ‘A continuation of the horoscopic ostraca of Medînêt Mâdi’, EVO 30 (2007), p.
153-171.
A. MENCHETTI / R. PINTAUDI, ‘Un esempio di isopsefia negli ostraka di Medinet Madi’,
Anal. Pap. 18-20 (2006-2008), p. 107-112
S. GIANNOTTI, ‘Esercizi scolastici in demotico da Medinet Madi (IV)’, EVO 31 (2008), p.
49-57.
F. NAETHER / M. ROSS, ‘Interlude: a series containing a hemerology with lengths of
dayligth’, EVO 31 (2008), p. 59-90.
A. MENCHETTI, Ostraka demotici, greci e bilingui da Narmuthis (O. Narm. IV 189-239),
unpubl. diss. Pisa, 2008 [O. Narm. Dem. IV] (non vidimus).
A. MENCHETTI, ‘Un aperçu des textes astrologiques de Médinet Madi’, in G. WIDMER / D.
DEVAUCHELLE (eds.), Actes du IXe congrès international des études démotiques, Paris, 31
août - 3 septembre 2005 (BdE 147), Paris, 2009, p. 223-241.
M. ROSS, ‘OMM 1010: un document du règne de Septime Sévère’, in G. WIDMER / D.
DEVAUCHELLE (eds.), Actes du IXe congrès international des études démotiques, Paris, 31
août - 3 septembre 2005 (BdE 147), Paris, 2009, p. 299-304.
E. BRESCIANI / S. GIANNOTTI / A. MENCHETTI, ‘Ostraka demotici e bilingui di Narmuthis:
testi miscellanei’, EVO 32 (2009), p. 39-56.
M. ROSS, ‘Further horoscopic ostraca from Medinet Madi’, EVO 32 (2009), p. 61-95.
A. MENCHETTI / R. PINTAUDI, ‘Ostraka greci e bilingui da Narmuthis (II)’, CdE 84 (2009),
p. 201-238.
E. BRESCIANI e.a., Narmouthis 2006. Documents et objets découverts à Medinet Madi en
2006, Pisa, 2010 [P. Narm. 2006].
I.C. RUTHERFORD, ‘Bilingualism in Roman Egypt? Exploring the Archive of Phatres of
Narmuthis’, in T.V. EVANS / D.D. OBBINK (eds.), The language of the papyri, Oxford, 2010,
p. 198-207.
A.I. BLASCO TORRES, Les ostraca bilingues de Narmouthis, unpublished diss. UCL, 2013.
Temple of Narmouthis: House of the ostraca
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Description
The so-called ‘house of the ostraca’ lies against the eastern wall of the temenos of the temple
in Medinet Madi (ancient Narmouthis), which was dedicated to the goddess Thermouthis
(Rnn.t) and the crocodile god Sokonopis (Sbk-Hʿpy). It has four rooms. In 1938 Achille
Vogliano found some 1300 ostraca in room III (ca. 2,5 x 2,5 m), partly kept in two large
vessels, partly thrown against the northern wall. The ostraca in the vessels were apparently
classified in a systematic way, but this order has unfortunately not been recorded. In room
IV, a storehouse for grain, another 250 ostraca were found (P. Narm. 2006, p. 71-73). All
these ostraca are now in the Egyptian Museum in Cairo, where they were labelled OMM 1
to 1555, apparently without distinguishing the two groups. Some ostraca, however, did not
receive an inventory number, while others were labelled from I to at least CCLXVI. After
some fragments have been joined, the actual number of ostraca found in the house is now
1471, but Italian excavations in 2006 yielded (at least) another 10 ostraca from this archive
(P. Narm. 2006 15 till 24). Only about one third of the ostraca have been published (and
often republished) in numerous books and articles. Although the archive is bilingual GreekDemotic (and Hieratic), publications are sometimes limited to one language, using the sigla
OGN for Greek and ODN for Demotic. All these circumstances make it difficult to get a
view on the contents or the composition of the archive.
GIANNOTTI (2007, p. 117 n. 2) assumes that the ostraca were not stocked for archival
reasons, but are rather a group of used shards gathered for future reuse. It is indeed possible
to distinguish individual dossiers or subarchives, but the storage in the vessels, the
exceptional bilingual character of most texts and the numbering of a lot of sherds for later
consultation, all imply that at least the group of 1300 ostraca kept in room III was a real
archive, no doubt related to the temple of Narmouthis: compare VOGLIANO 1938, p. 543:
‘Un nucleo di questi ostraca era disposto in due grossi recipienti d’argilla e si aveva
l’impressione che la loro collocazione – adagiati com’erano l’uno sull’ altro – rispondesse
ad un vero a proprio ordinamento’.
Who was the owner of the archive is unclear. Some ostraca seem to have been gathered by a
priest responsible for school education and for the instruction of new temple personnel, but
another group has been written by the priest Phatres as a private juridical dossier. It is
possible that Phatres was also the keeper of the school ostraca (MESSERI / PINTAUDI 2002, p.
210 & n. 4).
Most of the published texts are written in Demotic (77), Greek (186) or in a remarkable
bilingual mixture of Demotic and Greek (233). In some cases a kind of cryptography is
involved where Greek words are written in Demotic with every letter rendered by its
numerical value (e.g. EVO 32 (2009), p. 43-44 no. 2, l. 2 & 9: pȝ 1 60 10 800 40 1 = pȝ
ἀξίωµα, 'the decree') (MENCHETTI, EVO 28 (2005), p. 237-243). A few ostraca contain
Hieratic words (with Hieroglyphic signs) sometimes with Old Coptic transcriptions (O.
Narm. Dem. I 17; II 34-41, 43). One ostracon shows a drawing (?) of a child on a cup (O.
Narm. Dem. II 42).
The texts date from the second half of the second or the early third century AD (GALLO, O.
Narm. Dem. II, 1997, p. xxxi-liv). Some ostraca refer to events in the first half of the second
Temple of Narmouthis: House of the ostraca
4
century AD, but are no doubt written later. A lot of documents mention regnal years, but it is
not always clear whether the reign of Antoninus Pius, Marcus Aurelius, Commodus or
Septimius Severus is referred to (only ODN 1, 2, 7, 61 and 91 may be dated with certainty to
the reign of Commodus). The subarchive of Phatres is composed after AD 198/199, and
MENCHETTI (Dem. Conf. IX (Paris 2005), 2009, p. 225) argues that some of the horoscopes
were drawn up in AD 203-206. No documents can be certainly dated after AD 206, so the
whole archive was probably brought together ca. AD 198-206.
At least 114 ostraca of the archive can be ascribed to the subarchive of Phatres, son of
Hormeinos, a priestly scribe of the temple of Narmouthis. It contains 7 Greek, 1 Demotic
and 106 bilingual Greek-Demotic documents (cf. O. Narm. Dem. III; MENCHETTI /
PINTAUDI, 2009, p. 203 n. 5). Phatres apparently composed a file on the problems within his
family and with other priests of Narmouthis (going back to year 16 of Traianus, AD
112/113). The ostraca contain notes, drafts and copies of documents, apparently to be used
for the compilation of a document or dossier to be sent to the authorities. They are often
numbered consecutively (from 1 to 154, including a few 'double' numbers, occasionally
redrawn in red ink), with one text sometimes continuing over several ostraca: e.g. the ostraca
O. Narm. Dem. III 155-157 and P. Narm. 2006 15, numbered from 83 to 86, are consecutive
parts of the same petition (cf. P. Narm. 2006, p. 66); e.g. seven ostraca labelled from 'Horos
<1> (?)' to 'Horos 23' contain the copy of a petition with regard to a certain Horos (cf. P.
Narm. 2006, p. 79-80). References to strategos Philoxenos, who was in function in AD 194196 (cf. SB XVIII 13733; O. Narm. Dem. III 176; O. Narm. Dem. III, p. 16 & n. 28 [1504]
descr.), and to year 7 probably of Septimius Severus (AD 198/199) (cf. CdE 77 (2002), p.
232-237 no. 15) provide a terminus post quem for the Phatres subarchive, which was written
ca. AD 198-206 (cf. MENCHETTI, O. Narm. Dem. III, 2005, p. 25).
Another group of ostraca contains instructions for all kind of services in the temple. These
are sometimes considered school texts (see below). GIANNOTTI (EVO 30 (2007), p. 117-152
no. 1-14) thus selected 2 Demotic and 12 bilingual Demotic-Greek ostraca apparently
written by an apprentice 'librarian' who got his training on the job and wrote down possibly for personal use - all kinds of instructions involved with the archiving or copying of
texts. Some of the ostraca are numbered in Greek (from 1 to 16, the last one in red ink),
showing that they were classified for consultation. The instructions are written in Demotic,
but numbers and words were added in Greek by the bilingual scribe. Since none of the
ostraca contains a date, this small subarchive can only roughly be dated ca. AD 150-225.
The major part of the remaining ostraca are considered to originate from a school where
multiple domains were dealt with, like elementary education, literature, astrology, medicine,
magic, etc. (P. Narm. 2006, p. 71-72).
-
Some 76 ostraca have been labelled school texts or writing exercises, although this
identification does not always seems adequate. They involve the alphabet, vocabulary,
transcriptions from Hieratic into Old Coptic or Greek, names of gods, isopsephisms,
mathematics, numerical tables, a medical prescription (?), recipes (?), instructions for
behaviour ('sententiae'), the beginning of a narrative concerning the Egyptian voyage of
emperor Hadrianus.
Temple of Narmouthis: House of the ostraca
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More than 67 ostraca deal with (notes for) horoscopes and birth notes, and 5 others with
astrology and hemerology. The date of birth of the person for whom the horoscope is
cast (the earliest one probably in AD 124), provides a terminus post quem for the date
when the ostracon was actually written. These texts show that at least some priests in the
temple were involved with horoscopes and astrology.
A large group of some 250 ostraca contains all kinds of notes, lists of names or items, drafts
for petitions, accounts, labels e.a., that have not yet been assigned to a specific group of texts
(for the so-called name ostraca, see ArchID 536). No doubt the publication of the 900
remaining ostraca will shed more light on the composition of this intriguing archive.
Archive texts
Acme 8.2 (1955), p. 79-80 [1049, 1230, 1292] descr.; Anal. Pap. 18 - 20 (2006-2008), p.
107-112; ANRW II 37.1 p. 525 no. 128 descr.; CdE 77 (2002), p. 213-237 no. 1-15; CdE 82
(2007), p. 230-259 no. 1-26; p. 243 n. 32 [27, 724]; CdE 84 (2009), p. 203 n. 5 descr.; p.
205-222 no. 27-48; p. 224-225 no. 1; p. 225 no. 5; Dem. Conf. IX (Paris 2005) p. 224 n. 11
[331, 460, IX] descr.; p. 226 n. 21 [445] descr.; p. 227-236 no. 13; ELDAMATY / TRAD (eds.),
Egyptian museum collections around the world 1 p. 164-168 no. 5; Enchoria 28 (20022003), p. 175; EVO 22 - 23 (1999-2000), p. 142-146 no. ODN 189-192; EVO 26 (2003), p.
24-29 no. 1-5; EVO 27 (2004), p. 27; EVO 28 (2005), p. 238-239; p. 239; EVO 29 (2006), p.
113; p. 122-134 no. ODN 208-216; p. 158-176; EVO 30 (2007), p. 119-140 no. 1-15; p. 155169; EVO 31 (2008), p. 50-55 no. 4; p. 59-64; EVO 32 (2009), p. 39 descr.; p. 40 n. 7 descr.;
p. 41-52 no. 1-10; p. 61-91; Fs. Lüddeckens p. 141-143 [1060, 1154]; O. Narm. Dem. I 1-33;
O. Narm. Dem. II 34-99; p. lxiv [835] descr.; O. Narm. Dem. III 100-188; p. 16 & n. 28
descr.; O. Narm. Dem. IV 189-239 [unpublished thesis]; O. Narm. Gr. I 1-131; P. Narm.
2006 15-24; p. 68; p. 69 [696]; PERNIGOTTI / ZECCHI (eds.), La terra, gli uomini e gli dèi p.
138 n. 8 descr.; p. 142-148 no. 7; PERNIGOTTI / ZECCHI (eds.), Il coccodrillo e il cobra p. 65
no. 1104 [ODN 203]; p. 66 no. 1191 [ODN 205]; p. 66 no. 985 [ODN 204]; SB XVIII
13730; 13731 + O. Narm. Dem. II p. xlvii-xlix [758] fig. 6; 13732-13734; SB XX 1419014195; SB XXII 15287-15296; SB XXVI 16370-16413;
uncertain: P. Narm. 2006 141-147: it is not clear whether these texts belong to the House of
the Ostraca or to the House of Anoubis, see ArchID 536 (P. Narm. 2006, p. 73).
Subarchive of Phatres: CdE 77 (2002), p. 232-237 no. 15; CdE 82 (2007), p. 248-255 no.
20-25; CdE 84 (2009), p. 203 n. 5 descr.; p. 205-212 no. 27-30; EVO 32 (2009), p. 45-46 no.
4-5; O. Narm. Dem. III 100-188; p. 16 & n. 28 descr.; P. Narm. 2006 15, 16, 24;
PERNIGOTTI / ZECCHI (eds.), Il coccodrillo e il cobra p. 65 no. 1104 [ODN 203]; p. 66 no.
1191 [ODN 205]; p. 66 no. 985 [ODN 204]; SB XVIII 13730; 13731 + O. Narm. Dem. II p.
xlvii-xlix [758] fig. 6; 13732-13734;
Subarchive of an apprentice librarian: EVO 30 (2007), p. 117-152 no. 1-14.
Text types
Horoscopes; school texts; notes and drafts for a petition, lists, accounts, labels = outgoing
and internal documents.
Temple of Narmouthis: House of the ostraca