Collection Papyrologica Leodiensia 6

Signes dans les textes,

textes sur les signes
Érudition, lecture et écriture
dans le monde gréco-romain

Actes du colloque international

(Liège, 6–7 septembre 2013)

Textes rassemblés et édités par

Gabriel NOCCHI MACEDO et Maria Chiara SCAPPATICCIO

Presses Universitaires de Liège

2017
 Signs of Learning in Greek Documents:
the Case of spiritus asper*

Rodney AST
Ruprecht-Karls-Universität Heidelberg
Institut für Papyrologie

In 2006, while excavating the site of Amheida (ancient Trimithis) in Egypt’s

Dakhleh Oasis, archeologists uncovered verses painted on the wall of a room in a
large house built on top of an earlier Roman bath complex1. The house, which
dates to around the mid-fourth century, has been dubbed the ‘villa of Serenos’
after the city-councillor by that name who is attested in ostraka found there2. The
room in which the verses were discovered was probably part of a school
connected to the house. The dipinto comprises five partially preserved columns
and parts of at least eight epigrams separated by headings. The ink is red, which
offers nice contrast when viewed against the white plaster that the letters were
written on. The verses are those of a teacher of rhetoric exhorting his students to
study hard with the aim of reaching the pinnacle of rhetorical wisdom (ῥητορικὴ
σοφίη)3.
The educational level is quite advanced, and formal features of the writing
are striking, particularly the many lectional, or prosodic, signs (I use the two
terms interchangeably). There are accents and breathings, middle and high dots,
diplai, apostrophes, and diaereses. The signs suggest an interest on the

* In the course of my research into lectional signs I have become indebted to a number of people. I
wish first of all to thank the organizers and participants of the Liège conference for their
generosity and insightful comments. A version of this paper was also presented at a conference
on scribal practice organized by Rachel Yuen-Collingridge, Malcolm Choat, Jennifer Cromwell
and Korshi Dosoo at the University of Macquarie in September 2013, and I am grateful to
participants of it for their suggestions. Roger Bagnall kindly gave me permission to reproduce
photos of Amheida material, and Helen Enders provided much needed assistance in gathering
data pertaining to lectional signs. Finally, I express my gratitude to the University of
Heidelberg’s Sonderforschungsbereich 933, Materiale Textkulturen, which is funded by the
Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft, for their support of my research.
1. The Amheida Project (www.amheida.org) is run by Roger Bagnall, Director of the Institute
for the Study of the Ancient World at New York University; P. Davoli (University of Salento)
is the project’s archaeological director.
2. See the introductory chapters of O.Trim. I and II.
3. CRIBIORE – DAVOLI – RATZAN (2008).
144 RODNEY AST

composer’s part in illustrating correct composition4. While such marks are not
unusual in literary papyri of the Roman period5, the particular context in which
they were found, in effect on a schoolroom blackboard, is so explicitly
pedagogical that it drives home the point better than the average literary papyrus
with lectional signs does that learning things like accents and breathings was a
classroom activity associated with an advanced education. The context becomes
even more interesting when one looks at how this type of education is mirrored
not in other literary texts, but in everyday writings. The aim of this paper is to
take some initial steps in this direction, investigating how educational principles
found ‘real world’ application, specifically in documentary papyri from Egypt.
This study is not a linguistic one, and thus does not seek to explain in linguistic
terms what prosodic signs preserved on papyrus can tell us about Greek
phonetics or other linguistic phenomena. Rather, its primary concern is with the
cultural significance of prosodic signs in everyday texts.

Image 1. DIPINTO. Cols. I and II of Schoolroom Dipinto from Amheida

(ancient Trimithis), Dakhleh Oasis, Egypt.
At Amheida, one need not look very far for additional evidence of everyday
use of prosodic signs. Six years after the dipinto was unearthed, the team made a
very minor discovery not far from the school that bears on the dipinto in a way
that may not be immediately obvious. This time it was not sensational verses on a
wall, but an unassuming Greek ostrakon with a simple order for the delivery of

4. CRIBIORE – DAVOLI – RATZAN (2008): 189.

5. TURNER – PARSONS (1987²): 11; GALLO (1986): 90.
 SIGNS OF LEARNING IN GREEK DOCUMENTS 145

one moion of chaff addressed by a certain Theotimos to a man named Makarios.

The ostrakon (O.Trim. II 532), which is roughly contemporary with the dipinto,
was found below walls in the southern part of a church in Area 2.3 of the site and
is dated to 3 December 3626. The delivery order is in a typical cursive hand and
line 5 contains a spiritus asper over the epsilon of ἕν. Here is the text as it appears
in O.Trim. II.
τῷ ἀ̣γ̣απητῷ υἱῷ
Μακαρίῳ Θεότιμος
χαίρεν. πέμ̣ψο̣ ν̣ εἰς
4 Τρίμιθιν ἀχύρου μώ̣ι-
ον ἓν τοῖς ὀφφ(ικιαλίοις) Ὡρίωνι̣
καὶ Τιθοῆτι. Χοίακ ζ̅
ς̅ ἰνδικ(τίωνος). ἐρρῶσθ̣αί
8 σε εὔχ̣ομαι.
3 l. χαίρειν 5 ἑν ostr 6 χοϊακ ostr
To my beloved son Makarios, Theotimos (sends) greetings. Send to
Trimithis one moion of chaff for the officiales Horion and Tithoes. Choiak 7,
6th indiction. I pray for your health.

Image 2. OSTRAKON. O.Trim. II 532 (3 Dec. 362). Delivery order with spiritus asper
visible in line 5 over the numeral ἕν.

6. The year is derived from the indiction and therefore not entirely certain.
146 RODNEY AST

The breathing mark somewhat resembles the letter ‛L’. It is meant to

distinguish the numeral ἕν from the preposition ἐν. Viewed in isolation, it is
hardly very remarkable, but in the broader context of Greek writing practice it
raises interesting questions about the use of lectional signs in everyday texts; for
here we are not in the literary sphere as we were with the dipinto. To what extent
then did the training that taught students of Greek letters to be aware of accents
and breathings in literary texts carry over to documents such as receipts, letters,
petitions, contracts, etc.? This question is at the heart of the following analysis,
which places special emphasis on one prosodic sign, the spiritus asper.
It has become almost commonplace to say that some prosodic signs, such as
rough breathing marks, are rare in documentary papyri. In a publication as recent
as P.Oxy. LXXV 5054, the editor of a private letter containing a spiritus asper
states in the introduction to the text: “The scribe’s rough breathing mark at the
beginning of line 13 has few parallels in documentary papyri”. The accuracy of
this statement depends on how one defines the word ‛few’: while not as common
as diaeresis, rough breathings are found in more than a handful of documents. In
fact, they are among the most frequently encountered prosodic signs in
documents after the diaeresis and apostrophe, and much more common than the
lenis7. The use of lectional signs in documentary papyri has not been wholly
disregarded in scholarly literature. The best discussion of the subject to date is a
paper that Jean-Luc Fournet delivered at the International Papyrological
Congress in Copenhagen in 19928. His argument was preliminary and based
largely on the sixth-century archive of papers belonging to the landowner,
lawyer, and poet Dioscorus of Aphrodito. Briefly stated, Fournet’s conclusion
was that by this late period the signs were not infrequently employed to show off
scribes’ learning. Thus, according to him, marks tend to appear in the most
literary types of documentary texts, namely petitions and letters9. Fournet also
notes that by Dioscorus’ time these marks no longer seem to have served the
purpose of avoiding ambiguity, as they had a couple centuries earlier.
Fournet is right to underscore the elevated style that prosodic signs are often
associated with. Mastery of them came with more advanced education, so it is
not surprising that they tend to be found in documents that might be
characterized as more literary than others. Still, if we take a slightly broader view
of the evidence, we get a somewhat more nuanced picture. We find, for example,
in the sixth-century Patermouthis archive that some notaries did comprehend the
significance of the signs and used them to avoid ambiguity, while others did not

7. In literary texts, too, smooth breathing is less frequently marked than rough, TURNER – PARSONS
(1987²): 11; LAUM (1928): 365-366.
8. FOURNET (1994).
9. R. Luiselli addresses the subject of lectional signs in papyrus letters where he argues that the
marks tend to be used in letters that occupy a fairly high paleographic and linguistic register,
LUISELLI (1999): 42 and App. A.
 SIGNS OF LEARNING IN GREEK DOCUMENTS 147

differentiate among them (more on this below). Overall, my initial impression is

that prosodic signs get used correctly over the entire period witnessed by
documentary papyri. This alone does not mean that those who employed them
were not on occasion simply showing off, but it does suggest a degree of
continuity in the basic understanding of the original purpose of the signs.
Sometimes certain marks do get confused, at least graphically, but if any
complaint about their use can be lodged, it is that they are employed in what can
seem like a capricious manner, something noted in Turner – Parsons also about
literary papyri10. It can be difficult in some cases to say why a particular word
was thought to warrant a prosodic mark while another or even the same word
elsewhere in a single text was not.
PROSODIC SIGNS IN THEORY AND PRACTICE
In order to better understand documentary practice, it is useful first to look at
tendencies in literary and so-called paraliterary texts where lectional signs were
more common. A large body of papyri survives that attests the employment of
prosodic signs in literature. Because of the preponderance of these literary
sources, interest in them has often concentrated on the history of the scholarship
of classical literature. The general consensus has been that prosodic signs (and
here I leave out punctuation) were a product of the work of Alexandrian scholars.
Papyrological evidence bears this out to some extent, or at least does not
contradict it. Prosodic marks are absent from the earliest literary papyri. They
begin appearing first in the second century BC and are most commonly
encountered in the Roman period and primarily in poetic texts11.
Certainly by the mid- to late Roman period, differences in accents and
breathings had to be learned; they were no longer heard because of phonetic
changes that the language had undergone. By this time as well, the term
‛prosody’ had extended its meaning to cover the very symbols that indicated
these phonetic features12. A preoccupation with retaining knowledge of prosodic
signs can be observed in different sources, especially grammatical treatises. From
the second through the fourth or fifth centuries there was a surge in interest
among grammarians in defining and explaining prosodic signs, which is

10. TURNER – PARSONS (1987²): 11.

11. The earliest papyrus with lectional signs in TURNER – PARSONS (1987) is P.Oxy. XV 1790
(= LDAB 2434 = MP3 1237), a fragment of Ibycus from the mid-2nd to the mid 1st c. BC. For
discussion of the topic of ancient accentuation, see LAUM (1928), who is right to stress the
tentative nature of dates assigned to literary texts on the basis of paleography, a point too
often neglected even today (pp. 34-37), as well as MAZZUCCHI (1979), with further
bibliography. Cf. further PFEIFFER (1968): 178-181. Pfeiffer draws an important distinction
between punctuation marks and accents, arguing that the latter do not predate Aristophanes of
Byzantium (ca. 257-180 BC), while the former are employed already in the archaic period. On
early use of punctuation in Greek inscriptions, see in this volume Lougovaya-Ast, pp. 27-42.
12. ALLEN (1973): 3-5; cf. CRIBIORE (1996): 85.
148 RODNEY AST

exemplified by the fourth-century supplement to the earlier grammatical treatise

Τέχνη γραμματική attributed to the second-century BC grammarian Dionysius
Thrax. The supplement identifies 10 prosodic signs: the acute, grave and
circumflex accents, the long and short quantity marks, the spiritus asper and
lenis, the apostrophe, the hyphen, and the (hypo)diastole13. Papyrological
evidence also attests a general interest in grammatical theory in Greco-Roman
Egypt from the second century AD on. There are five witnesses to Dionysius
Thrax that survive; one dates to the second century, the other four to the fourth
and fifth centuries14. In addition to these treatises, we have papyri that are
concerned specifically with prosodic signs. For example, P.Amh. II 21 from the
early fourth century, and thus roughly contemporary with both the supplement to
Dionysius Thrax and the Amheida dipinto, lays out in a crude hand (perhaps that
of a young student) grammatical rules pertaining to, among other things, lectional
signs15. In this text, a distinction is drawn between the 7 properly applied signs
(κυρίως λεγόμεναι), which include 3 accents, 2 marks of quantity, and 2
breathings, and the 3 misused signs (καταχρηστικῶς λεγόμεναι), the hyphen,
apostrophe, and diastole16. Normally, however, this distinction is ignored in our
sources and all ten signs are lumped together, as they are in the supplement and
in an interesting Oxyrhynchus papyrus, P.Oxy. XLIX 3454 (2nd c.), which lists 10
prosodic signs and 3 stops (στιγμαί), and illustrates each type with a drawing of
the respective symbol17.

13. GG i,i, 105.1ff., Προσῳδίαι εἰσὶ δέκα· ὀξεῖα ´, βαρεῖα `, περισπωμένη ῀, μακρά –, βραχεῖα ⏑,
δασεῖα ҅, ψιλή ҆, ἀπόστροφος ’, ὑφέν ͜ , ὑποδιαστολή ⸒. [τούτων εἰσὶν σημεῖα τάδε· ὀξεῖα οἷον
Ζεύς, βαρεῖα οἷον Πὰν, περισπωμένη οἷον πῦρ, μακρὰ οἷον Ἥρᾱ, βραχεῖα οἷον γά̆ρ, δασεῖα
οἷον ῥῆμα, ψιλὴ οἷον ἄρτος, ἀπόστροφος οἷον ὣς ἔφατ’, ὑφὲν ὡς πασι͜ μέλουσα <μ 70>,
ὑποδιαστολὴ «Δία δ’ οὐκ ἔχεν⸒ ἥδυμος ὕπνος» <B 2>]. “There are ten prosodic signs: the
acute ´, grave `, circumflex ῀, long –, short ⏑, rough breathing ҅, soft breathing ҆, apostrophe ’,
hyphen ͜ , hypodiastole⸒. [Here are some examples of them: acute as in Ζεύς, grave as in
Πὰν, circumflex as in πῦρ, long as in Ἥρᾱ, short as in γά̆ρ, rough as in ῥῆμα, soft as in ἄρτος,
an apostrophe as in ὣς ἔφατ’, a hyphen as in πασι͜ μέλουσα, a hypodiastole as in “Δία δ’ οὐκ
ἔχεν⸒ ἥδυμος ὕπνος.”] The hypodiastole is sometimes referred to as the diastole.
14. 2nd c.: P.Bingen 8 (= LDAB 7989 = MP3 1166.1); 4th c.: P.Köln IV 176 (= LDAB 797 = MP3
0345.1 = CRIBIORE 370), P.Rein. II 81 (= LDAB 798 = MP3 0345); 5th c.: WOUTERS (1979):
no. 5 (= PSI I 18 = LDAB 2412 = MP3 0344 + 1207); WOUTERS (1979): no. 4 (= P.Hal. 55A
= LDAB 5969 = MP3 0344.1).
15. WOUTERS (1979): no. 14.
16. It is because of this distinction that Wouters situates P.Amh. II 21 between the work of the
2nd-century grammarians Herodian and Sextus Empiricus, who reckon with only 7 signs, and
that of the late 4th-century bishop, Epiphanios of Salamis, who, similar to the Τέχνη
supplement, takes account of the additional three, see WOUTERS (1979): 196-197, and the
intro to P.Oxy. XLIX 3453.
17. An image of the papyrus can be accessed at http://163.1.169.40/gsdl/collect/POxy/index/assoc/
HASH015d/3ea4823c.dir/POxy.v0049.n3454.a.01.hires.jpg. Cf. also P.Oxy. XLIX 3453, a 2nd or
3rd-century list of prosodic marks that also deals with all 10 signs, (http://163.1.169.40/gsdl/collect/
POxy/index/assoc/HASH014b/3e94823c.dir/POxy.v0049.n3453.a.01.hires.jpg). Cf. too P.Ant. II
68 (4th c.).
 SIGNS OF LEARNING IN GREEK DOCUMENTS 149

Given the obvious interest that existed in grammatical and prosodic theory, it
is hardly surprising to find prosodic signs in texts originating in school contexts.
Significantly, they do not usually appear in elementary exercises such as
syllabaries, which constituted the initial building blocks of Greek literacy18. They
are rather encountered in what are generally regarded as more advanced
exercises. Examples include a remarkable number of wood tablets with passages
from Homer’s Iliad that are marked up with accents, breathings, and punctuation,
all from the third/fourth through the sixth century19. While these exercises are not
without mistakes, most of them show a high level of proficiency, suggesting that
some might even have served as teachers’ models20. At this more advanced level,
students learned to make distinctions in the prosody of words. The set of prosodic
signs that they applied was part of a system that taught them to appreciate what
G. Nagy terms the ‘melodic contour’ of verses21. Although prosodic signs were
not an obligatory component of written communications, the knowledge that
students gained of them in their study of Greek literature would occasionally
present itself later, outside the classroom.
Having been schooled in the employment of accents and other lectional
signs, a professional writer used them whenever they were deemed appropriate,
and not only when copying literature. This is hardly surprising, if we consider
that the copyist of literary texts and the professional clerk were, in many cases,
products of the same kind of schooling. We have evidence, in fact, that one and

18. An apparent exception is P.Bour. 1 (= CRIBIORE 393 = LDAB 2744 = MP3 2643), a 4th-century
school text containing syllabic word-lists, gnomai, chreiai of Diogenes, and part of the prologue to
Babrius’ Fables that preserves lectional signs in some passsages. While the leaves might have been
copied by a student (so CRIBIORE [1996]: 276, and HUYS – BAPLU [2009]: 29-30), we cannot rule
out the possibility that they are in the hand of a teacher and were even originally part of a
‛textbook’. Another word list with lectional signs, possibly including two aspirates (see Fr. 1 →,
col. II, 7 and 8), is MS. Bruxelles, Bibliothèque Royale de Belgique IV 590, part of a 6th-century
papyrus codex written in a practiced hand, published in SELDESLACHTS – WOUTERS (1993).
19. I am aware of the following examples: Iliad V (plus scholia), see RAFFAELLI (1990), with
plates 1-2 (CRIBIORE 340 = LDAB 2094 = MP3 740.1; 2nd c. [Raffaelli] 3rd/4th c. [Cribiore]); a
tablet dated to the 3rd or 4th c. with verses from Il. II (BKT V 1.6 = CRIBIORE 296 = LDAB
2095 = MP3 636+637); T.Varie 79.6, 7 (= CRIBIORE 313 = LDAB 2216 = MP3 797.11) with
lines of Il. VII; T.Alexandria G.R. 28759 (4th/5th c.) (= CRIBIORE 342 = LDAB 2139 = MP3
1190.2), a tablet containing excerpts from Il. X as well as scholia minora, see RIAD –
SCHWARTZ (1968). A less competent hand than the previous examples is at work in a 5th-
century tablet with verses from Il. I (T.Brit.Libr. inv. G 1906.10-20.2 = CRIBIORE 310 =
LDAB 179 = MP3 611), see CRIBIORE (1993).
20. Of the above-mentioned tablets, Cribiore identifies nos. 296, 313 (hand 1), 340 (at least the
scholia), and perhaps hand 2 in 342 as the work of teachers, see CRIBIORE (1996): ad loc.
21. NAGY (2000): 14-20; also available at http://chs.harvard.edu/wa/pageR?tn=ArticleWrapper&
bdc=12&mn=4903 (accessed 30.07.2014). The system is seen in other 1st and 2nd-century
literary (primarily verse) papyri; for more on this, see MAZZUCCHI (1979). Some of the
difficulties inherent in the study of accentuation are explored in MOORE – BLUNT (1978).
150 RODNEY AST

the same writer could be responsible for both literary and documentary texts22.
The sharp distinction that is often drawn in papyrology between the worlds of
literature and documents is a modern contrivance that does not do justice to the
historical reality23. Professional boundaries were much blurrier in antiquity.
Just how blurry these boundaries could be is illustrated very nicely by two
texts, again from the Dakhleh Oasis, one literary, the other documentary. In
January 1988, in the kitchen of a house at the site of ancient Kellis, two wooden
polyptychs were discovered lying together. One was an agricultural account book
dating to the second half of the fourth century, the other a wooden codex
containing three orations of Isocrates24. At least part of the Isocrates codex was
written, in my opinion, in the same hand as the account book25, and it includes a
number of prosodic signs, the most common being the spiritus asper, diaeresis,
and apostrophe. The hands (the editors identify 3, although it is not always easy
to tell them apart) are not bookhands and the codex is no deluxe edition. The
script is cursive, and the whole thing might have been a copy belonging to a
schoolmaster26. Although the texts are not without infelicities, the overall quality
of the writing is not bad27. The ‛mistakes’ are in large part consistent with
linguistic norms of the period. It is clear, too, that the lectional signs were not
employed as part of an exercise in applied prosodic theory, as they were in the
Homeric texts mentioned above. On the contrary, they exhibit a typically
documentary character. Spiritus asper, for example, accompanies the kinds of
words (relative pronouns, articles, adverbs, etc.) that, as we shall see, it does also
in documents. There are examples in the codex where prosodic marks are clearly
used in order to avoid ambiguity (e.g., ἁυται in 4r, l. 83, and ὠν ὁιον for ὢν οἷον
in 4v, l. 139), but also cases where the potential for confusion does not seem
particularly high (cf. μεθ’ ὡν in 5r, l. 143, υφ ὡν in 8v, l. 265). Modern observers
might not be in the best position, however, to say what did or did not confuse the
average literate person in antiquity. The fact that the signs are used fairly
consistently suggests that they were considered to aid clear expression.
If we turn to the account book, we see the same advanced training looming
in the background. While the writer knew how to employ various prosodic signs

22. Cf. the Kellis texts discussed below. Dioscorus of Aphrodito is probably the best known
individual whose hand can be seen at work in both literary and documentary texts; see, above
all, FOURNET (1999), DEL CORSO (2008), and Trismegistos Archives, http://www.trismegistos.
org/arch/detail.php?tm=72.
23. FOURNET (1994): 418.
24. The account is KAB = P.Kell. IV 96; the Isocrates codex was edited in WORP – RIJKSBARON
(1997).
25. This idea was also entertained by Bagnall, KAB, p. 21.
26. This is the view taken by the editors as well, WORP – RIJKSBARON (1997): 28.
27. For analysis of the infelicities, see WORP – RIJKSBARON (1997): 31-48. The many examples of
iotacism are reminiscent of documents.
 SIGNS OF LEARNING IN GREEK DOCUMENTS 151

in the part of the Isocrates codex that he transcribed28, he kept them to a

minimum in the account, using spiritus asper, mainly with the relative pronoun
ὧν, as well as diaeresis and the apostrophe, the latter inserted after foreign nouns
to indicate that they were indeclinable. His account of income and expenditures
of course served a different purpose from the Isocrates codex, and as is common
with such accounts, the entries are laconic, with many terms abbreviated. In other
words, the clerk does not write in the extended prose typical of a classical
oration. Thus, it is rather surprising that lectional signs get used at all, especially
the spiritus asper. The best explanation for this is that the signs were part of a
well-educated person’s basic repertoire, and he employed them when he felt that
the context called for their use, regardless of the text’s genre.

SPIRITUS ASPER
Not all prosodic signs were used with equal frequency. The diaeresis, both
organic and inorganic29, is ubiquitous, particularly in the late Roman and
Byzantine periods. Next in frequency is probably the apostrophe, which is
employed at the ends of foreign words and between certain double consonants
(e.g, γ’γ, τ’τ)30. Less common, but still not rare, is the spiritus asper, and it is on
this sign that I will focus the remaining discussion. The rough breathing mark
was a convention introduced in order to signal an aspirated vowel. One reason for
employing it in documents was to avoid confusion with graphically similar words
(ἐν and ἕν, ἤ and ἡ, etc.). Early instances of the symbol tend to look like the left
half of a capital ‛H’. The same shape appears also in cursive form, sometimes
resembling a tilde31. Examples from later periods, especially the third century on,
look like a capital ‛L’ or modern rough breathing mark ( ῾ ); when tilted
counterclockwise, they can even pass for a short quantity mark.

28. Hand 3 looks most like the hand of KAB, and is responsible for most of the breathing marks
in the texts.
29. Organic diaeresis distinguishes two adjacent vowels that do not constitute a diphthong, while
inorganic, which is very common in late antique papyri, signals above all an initial vowel,
usually upsilon or iota but sometimes eta, or a final vowel that has been marked for emphasis,
see TURNER – PARSONS (1987²): 10.
30. FOURNET (1994): 418-419.
31. Cf. Chr. Wilck. 251.6, 7 (image available at http://digitalassets.lib.berkeley.edu/apis/ucb/
images/AP00755aA.jpg).
152 RODNEY AST

Fig. 1. SHAPES OF ASPER. Three most common forms of the spiritus asper.

While examples in Fig. 1 constitute the most common forms, other shapes
are found where one would expect an asper, and it is sometimes difficult to tell if
a different prosodic sign was actually intended, such as diaeresis. This is
especially challenging with initial upsilon. Still, it is probably best to allow for
some variation beyond these three forms of the sign and to judge individual cases
on their own merits. A third-century petition from Syria, P.Bostra 1 (= SB
XXVIII 17044), offers a good example of the heterogeneity of representations of
the symbol: written in a single hand, the papyrus preserves at least three signs
that the editor views as different types of spiritus asper, all of which appear
above letters that should be aspirated. One type resembles a raised dot (l. 9); the
other looks like a backslash or grave-like stroke (ll. 10, 24, and possibly 16); the
final, and most frequent, sign is similar to the L-shaped mark illustrated above in
Figure 1 (ll. 5, 11-14, 21, and 26)32.
The chronological distribution of documents that attest the spiritus asper is
wide, although the heaviest concentration is in the later Roman and Byzantine
periods. The two earliest known examples, each the sole representative of the
century in which it appears, are in documents dated to 99 BC (BGU III 999,
col. II, 4) and AD 11 (CPR XV 3.7, pl. 3), both contracts of sale. The earliest of
these comes from Pathyris in Upper Egypt. Although the shape of the symbol is
unusual, the original editor interpreted it to be a spiritus asper. Written in the same
hand as the rest of the document, the sign appears only over eta in the word ἥμισυ.

32. I thank Jean Gascou for bringing this papyrus to my attention. Cf. also P.Euphrates 1, where
in several places (ll. 15, 19, 20bis) a circumflex-like stroke appears to signal aspiration. The
fact the stroke is written above an initial upsilon in three of these instances might suggest that
it should be interpreted as a diaeresis, which when written quickly can take the shape of a
circumflex. Yet, in line 20 the same mark is set above the article ὁ, indicating that at least
there it was a sign of aspiration.
 SIGNS OF LEARNING IN GREEK DOCUMENTS 153

It is hard not to wonder why the scribe inserted it here and not in other places
where it would also have been appropriate, e.g., above the relative pronoun ὧν33. In
dealing with signs like these, one quickly realizes that finding a satisfactory
explanation for their absence is not always possible and probably should not be our
goal; it is more important to try to make sense of their presence. Furthermore, the
expectation that prosodic signs should be employed consistently may be the
product of an anachronistic view of correct writing practice.
Approximately one hundred documents have been identified so far preser-
ving at least one aspiration mark, some of them multiple. This is necessarily an
underestimate, since editors do not always record these marks, and even when
they do, databases and interested readers do not always pick up on them. In the
second century, we find a marked increase over the preceding century in the
number of documents with rough breathings34. For the third, fourth, and sixth
centuries the numbers are fairly constant, with 20 to 30 documents each35. Of
these, the third- and fourth-century evidence shows the most diversity, while the
sixth- is dominated by two archives, those of Dioscorus and Patermouthis36. That

33. In an email from 2.09.13, F. Reiter, former custodian of the Berlin collection, says about the
BGU papyrus, “The spiritus seems real. But why here (and nowhere else)?”
34. Examples include BGU III 895.13 (138-161); Chr.Wilck. 251.6, 7 (161-169); CPR I 139.14
(2nd c.); P.David 14.15 (2nd c.); P.Fay. 38.5 (2nd/3rd c.); P.Oslo II 43.2 (140-141); P.Oxy. III
471.6 (2nd c.); XX 2265.4 (120-123); LXXV 5054.13 (2nd c.).
35. For the 3rd c., see, e.g., CPR I 46.8 (215-216); V 4.3, 14 (ca. 237-238); P.Bostra (= SB XVIII
17044) 1.5, 9-14, 16, 21, 24, 28 (29.05.260); P.Coll. Youtie II 66.8, 31, 32 (238, Jan.-March);
73.13 (27.08.287); P.Corn. 12.15, 19, 20 (25.06-24.07.283); P.Euphrates 1, passim
(38.08.245); P.Flor. II 186.4 (28.12.259); II 252.3 (14.11.257); O.Kellis 61.2 (3rd/4th c.); 96.10
(3rd/4th c.); P.Lond. III 1158.3 bis (11.12.226); P.Oxy. I 122.4, 8, 12 (late 3rd/4th c.); VII
1055.6 (11.06.235 or 267); XIV 1765.5 (3rd c.); XXXIV 2711.7 (271); XLV 3243.9 (214-
215); LV 3812.6 (late 3rd c.); P.Rain. Cent. 71.29 (3rd c.); SB XVIII 13775.12 (241-242); SPP
V 72.6 (25.02-26.03.267); 82.11 (267-268). For the 4th c. we have, e.g., Chr. Wilck. 130.6, 12
(350-400); CPR XVIIa.11, 8 (320); P.Ammon. II 37.8, 14, 15 (9-13.12.348); P.Herm. 2.4, 10,
12, 20 (ca. 317-323); 3.5 (ca. 317-323); 5.8, 11 (ca. 317-323); 6.3, 4, 6, 8, 11, 12, 15, 17-20,
24 (ca. 317-323); 7.8 (after 381); P.Kell. I 23.8 (353); 63.14 (1st half of 4th c.); 72.21, 47 (mid
4th c.); KAB (= P.Kell. IV 96) 10, 571, 1092, 1165, 1388, 1578 (361-364 or 376-379); P.Oxy.
XXXIV 2729.39 (mid 4th c.); P.Panop. 14.8, 28 (4th c.); 21.13, 18, 21 (26.05.315); 27.5, 11
(26.04-25.05.326); 30.35, 36 (5.08.332); P.Ryl. IV 624.3, 5, 11, 16, 17, 27bis, 29 (early
4th c.). Examples from the 6th c. include P.Cair. Masp. I 67001.11 (28.12.514); 67077.16, 18
(6th c.); 67110.14 (25.07.565); II 67151.248, 252, 262 (15.11.570); 67155.17, 18 (566-573);
67200.3 (6th c.); III 67295 fol.I.11bis, 20, 27bis, 28, fol. II.2, 9, 10, fol. III.8, 10, 14, 16 (2nd
half of 6th c.); 67325 fol IVr.8, 14 (5.04.585); 67328 fol. II.16 (14.07.521); P.Fouad. 86.2
(6th c.); P.Lond. V 1677.11, 36 (ca. 568-570); 1708.42 (1.05-30.04.567-568); 1722.32 (7-
15.03.530); P.Münch. I 1.4, 7, 17, 28, 54 (11.03.574); 2.18 (1.05-6.10.578); 6.84 (7.06.583);
11.5, 8, 17, 44, 45, 53-56, 61 (7.10.586); 12.22, 35, 40 (13.08-12.08.590-591); 13.25, 39bis,
52quinquies, 53sexies, 54ter, 67 (18.01.594); 14.67(ter), 69, 70, 75, 80, 83, 89, 90
(15.02.594); P.Naqlun I 12.1 (mid 6th c.); II 27.2, 6bis (6th c.); P.Oxy. XVI 1865.9 (6th/7th c.)
36. For the Dioscorus archive, see above notes 8 and 22. Information about the Patermouthis
archive is available at http://www.trismegistos.org/arch/detail.php?tm=37.
154 RODNEY AST

there are few attestations from the fifth may simply reflect the fact that fewer
documents survive from that century37. I therefore perceive fairly constant use of
spiritus asper in the later Roman period, that is, from the third to the sixth
century, and this is consistent with the survival patterns for the grammatical
manuals and school exercises concerned with prosodic signs discussed above.
While one might expect that spiritus asper would be used to alert the reader
to cases of aspiration in rare or unusual words, quite the opposite is actually the
case. By far the most common terms that are aspirated are relative pronouns (e.g.,
ὅς, οὗ, ᾧ, ὅν, ὧν, οἷς, οὕς, ἧς, ἥν, ἅ), as we see in documents from throughout the
period under consideration. In addition, articles (ὁ, ἡ, οἱ), adverbs such as ὡς, and
cardinal numbers, especially ἕν and on a couple of occasions ἕξ, can bear a rough
breathing mark38. Adjectives, nouns, and verbs are also found with the sign, but
they are the exception39. Proper nouns are only rarely aspirated40. Interestingly,
the adjective ὅλος receives the rough breathing mark in more than one document
(P.Cair. Masp. I 67077.11 and 67110.14). When recalling the verses from
Amheida, where the same word is aspirated, one might wonder if it was a
standard term in exercises concerning correct breathings, although the chance
that it could be confused in documentary texts with the word for the ink of the
cuttlefish, ὀλός, seems remote. Be that as it may, the preponderance of aspirated
relative pronouns implies that with certain common words the breathing mark
could aid reading.

VARIED COMPETENCE: THE EXAMPLES OF VIKTOR AND MARKOS

Some writers employed rough breathing marks correctly, while others appear to
have snoozed during their lessons on lectional signs. Archival documents like
those from the Patermouthis archive are a good source of material for comparing
the competence of different writers. Numerous individuals, whose names are
often known to us from their signatures, are at work and their employment of
prosodic signs is not uniform. These people were not simply copying them from
models, but depended on their own understanding of how and when to use them.
As is human nature, some had a better grasp than others. To illustrate this point, I

37. Some 5th-century cases are BGU XII 2164.9 (13.12.494); P.Münch. I 16.17, 22, 26, 38 (end of
5th c.); SPP XX 121.14 (6.07.439).
38. As an aside, I note that in Attic Greek inscriptions, too, the same types of words tend to be
marked with the spiritus asper. The earliest inscriptional examples from Attica date to the
1st c. AD, and the sign is most common in metrical texts. For examples, see THREATTE (1980):
97-98. I thank J. Lougovaya for bringing this to my attention.
39. Cf., e.g., ὕδωρ in P.Herm. 2.12 (317-323)—the editor brackets the first letter of the word,
[ὕ]δωρ, but it should be noted that the aspirate is clearly visible in the published photograph,
thus read ὕ̣δωρ. ἱερέως has spiritus asper over iota in P.Coll. Youtie II 73.13 (27.08.289).
40. I have noted two instances, both proper names, in 4th-century documents, Ηὑ (KAB = P.Kell.
IV 96.10) and Ἁνου (P.Oxy. XXXIV 2729.39).
 SIGNS OF LEARNING IN GREEK DOCUMENTS 155

will compare a document written by Viktor, son of Petros, in the year 574
(P.Münch. I 1), with one recorded by Markos, son of Apa Dios, twelve years
later, in 586 (P.Münch. I 11). Unlike the original editors, I am confident that the
person who penned the body of each document also signed off on it, after
witnesses had added their own signatures as well41. What is striking about
Viktor’s writing (P.Münch. I 1) is his highly differentiated use of lectional signs,
as is visible in the photo at the back of the volume (Plates 1 and 2)42. Among
these signs, we find overstrokes above foreign names, diaeresis, spiritus asper,
and spiritus lenis. The last two are of particular interest. Viktor sets the rough
breathing mark above the articles οἱ and ὁ in, for example, lines 4, 7, 17, 28, and
54. The basic form that he uses is typical of late examples, resembling the
spiritus in the Amheida ostrakon discussed above (see especially line 17, ὁ
προλεχθεις; Figure 2 below). For spiritus lenis, he uses a completely different
sign. It looks like an upside-down ‘t’ and appears consistently above the
disjunctive conjunction ἤ (see lines 36, 37, 39, 40, 41ter, and Figure 2 below).
Spiritus lenis is quite rare in documents, its function here being to distinguish the
conjunction from the article ἡ. The manifest difference in graphic representations
suggests that Viktor fully understood the purpose of each sign.
The same cannot be said of Markos. He authored several documents in the
archive (nos. 3, 10, and 11), and judging from his use of lectional signs, one can
suppose that either he did not have full command of the signs or he simply did not
care to make fine distinctions. Spiritus asper and lenis are both rendered with a
backwards tick resembling a grave accent (Figure 2)43. A similar tick is placed
above initial upsilon, as in the words ὑπέρ and ὑπογράφοντα (see, e.g., I 11.6)44,
letters that Viktor marked with a two-dot diaeresis (cf. ὑπολειφθείσης and
ὑποθέσεως in I 1.34 and 48, respectively). Markos, on the other hand, consistently
uses the two-dot diaeresis only with the letter iota.45 From the general lack of

41. The editors consistently fail to see in the notarial signatures the hands responsible for the
main bodies of the texts, but this is not the place to address this topic in detail. It is helpful,
however, to look at P.Münch. I 2, an anomaly that in my view proves the rule. There, very
little space is left between the body of the document and the closing signature, both of which
are in the same hand (something acknowledged by the editors). The reason for this is that the
notary, whose name is Flavius Makarios Isakios (see line 22), also signed for his illiterate
witnesses, as he states in lines 20f. In other cases, such as P.Münch. I 1 and I 11, one hand
writes the body of the document; space is then left for the signatures of witnesses or their
surrogates; finally, the original hand signs off on the document.
42. The editors believe that the various ticks and loops that appear above words all serve the same
purpose, to distinguish single letters or individual vocal units, such as οὗ, as distinct words,
P.Münch. I, p. 19.
43. See οὺ for the relative pronoun οὗ (l. ἧς) in l. 17, ὴ for ἡ in l. 5 and 8, and ὴ for the disjunctive
conjunction ἤ in l. 44, 45, 53-56, and 61.
44. Sometimes these ticks look more like single dots, see for an example line 68—ὑπέρ and
ὑπογράφοντος; only over ὑπογραφῆς in the same line is diaeresis rendered with two dots.
45. Examples are seen in lines 7, 17, 41, and 45.
156 RODNEY AST

distinction among his prosodic signs one might wonder if for Markos they were
little more than decoration. I doubt that this was the case, however, since his use of
them cannot be described as wholly arbitrary. In any event, Viktor shows us that
individuals were capable of executing prosodic signs in an accurate and
differentiated way. And this raises an important point: mastery of lectional signs
was something very individual, and probably dependent on a variety of factors,
such as education, attention to detail, and concern for convention.

Viktor, P.Münch. I 1 (11 March 574) Markos, P.Münch. I 11 (7 October 586)

l. 17, aspirated omicron = article ὁ l. 5, aspirated eta = article ἡ

l. 40, unaspirated eta = disjunctive l. 56, unaspirated eta = disjunctive

conj. ἤ conj. ἤ

Fig. 2. Comparison of the forms of spiritus asper in P.Münch. I 1 and I 11.

Since, as seen in school exercises such as the dipinto from Amheida,

advanced education included training in the employment of prosodic signs, it is
plausible that better educated individuals were more attentive to such
conventions. Professionally, those with this sort of training were likelier to get
positions in official capacities that required them to draft legal documents like
petitions and contracts, the kinds of texts encountered in the Dioscorus and
Patermouthis archives46. On a personal level, this same training could influence
private correspondence, which sometimes shows not only stronger command of
the written language but also greater awareness of features such as prosodic
signs. An extreme example of this is a letter, P.Herm. 6, from the fourth-century
Theophanes archive addressed from a certain Besodoros to Theophanes, a high-
ranking civil servant who worked for the prefect of Egypt. In it we find the whole
spectrum of lectional signs, including punctuation (high, middle and low dots),
accentuation (acute and circumflex), rough breathings, iota adscript and diaeresis.
In this respect, it resembles a literary papyrus more than a document. Thus it
provides almost an inversion of what we saw above, the copyist who treated a
literary piece (the Isocrates codex) in a more documentary manner. But even

46. Some examples of petitions containing spiritus asper are P.Ammon. II 37.8, 14, 15 (9-
13.12.348); P.Coll. Youtie II 66.8, 31, 32 (01-03.258); P.Euphrates 1.20 (28.08.245); P.Kell. I
23.8; P.Lond. V 1677.11, 36 (568-570); P.Oxy. XXXIV 2711.7 (271); P.Panop. 27.11 (26.04-
25.05.326). For instances of aspirated words in contracts of sale, see, e.g., the 6th-century texts
P.Münch. I 11.5, 8, 17; 12.40; 13.25; other contracts that have them include P.Cair.Masp. II
67155.17, 18 (566-573); P.Panop. 21.13, 18, 21 (26.05.315); PSI III 241.13, 14 (3rd c.); SPP
XX 121.14 (6.07.439).
 SIGNS OF LEARNING IN GREEK DOCUMENTS 157

more mundane texts, such as receipts and accounts, could include lectional signs:
the delivery order for chaff from Amheida is but one example47. On the whole,
these documents show how the interest in prosodic signs witnessed in
grammatical treatises, annotated literary texts, and advanced school exercises
spilled over into the realm of everyday texts, where, depending on the genre and
purpose of the documents they were transcribing, writers found occasional
practical use for their training in προσῳδίαι.

47. Others are receipts such as O.Kellis 61.2 (3rd/4th c.), CPR I 46.8 (215-216) and O.Bir Shawish
15.6 (22.10.397 or 412?); two very different kinds of accounts with aspirated words, both
from Kellis, are the Kellis Account Book (P.Kell. IV 96), line 10 and passim, and O.Kell.
96.10 (3rd/4th c.). At present, I am unaware of ostraka dated after the 4th century that preserve
rough breathing marks.