Your Day in the Ancient Greek World
September 5
September 5 in ancient Greece is represented in our source-audited archive by 2 verified records spanning 104 BC to AD 77. Together, the entries below connect this calendar date with different moments in the ancient Greek world through historical and documentary evidence.
Across the centuries
On This Day
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104 BC
Life on This Day
A Priest Buys a Share of a Grain Field
On September 5, 104 BC, Totoes bought a one-ninth share of a grain-producing plot near the Memnoneia for 4,000 drachmas. The seller was Pikos, son of Psenminis. The transaction survives in the Greek papyrus PSI IX 1025 from the archive of Totoes and Tatehathyris. Three days later, the transfer tax was paid. The document gives us an unusually precise glimpse of land ownership, agriculture and taxation in Ptolemaic Egypt.
Sources
Primary evidence
- PSI IX 1025 (TM 5577)
Modern scholarship
- Trismegistos Archive 248, Totoes and Tatehathyris
Public links
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AD 77
Life on This Day
Pilots Take State Grain Under Military Escort
On September 5, AD 77, three pilots issued a Greek receipt acknowledging that they had taken a shipment of wheat from public granary officials in the Oxyrhynchite region. The grain travelled under the protection of Claudius Celer, a soldier of the Second Legion who was on board as escort. The papyrus, P.Oxy. II 276, preserves a small but vivid piece of the machinery that moved Egyptian grain through the Roman imperial supply system.
Sources
Primary evidence
- P.Oxy. II 276
Modern scholarship
- Modern studies of Flavian Egypt and Roman military administration in papyrological evidence
Public links