Your Day in the Ancient Greek World
October 3
October 3 in ancient Greece is represented in our source-audited archive by one verified record dated AD 87. The entry below connects this calendar date with its surviving historical evidence and context.
Across the centuries
On This Day
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AD 87
Life on This Day
A Land Lease Is Written on the Back of an Iliad Roll
On October 3, AD 87, a land lease was drawn up at Euhemeria on the reverse of a papyrus roll that carried text from Homer’s Iliad. The contract turns an extraordinary surviving object into evidence for two very different kinds of ancient writing: canonical Greek poetry on one side and an everyday property transaction on the other.
Sources
Primary evidence
- British Library Papyrus 1873(7), TM 113039; Iliad roll with lease on verso
Modern scholarship
- British Library Archives and Manuscripts catalogue
Public links