Roger S. Bagnall - Reading Papyri, Writing Ancient History

Since its first publication in 1995, Reading Papyri, Writing Ancient History has proved to be an invaluable resource for students of the ancient world looking to integrate papyrological evidence into their research. In the quarter century since its publication, changes in the research environment have affected papyrology like other fields. Although the core philological methods of the field remain in place, the field has increasingly embraced languages other than Greek and Latin, with considerable impact on the Hellenistic and Late Antique periods. Digital tools have increased the ease and speed of access, with profound effects on research choices, and digital imaging and materiality studies have brought questions about the physical form of written materials to the fore.

In this fully revised new edition, Bagnall adds to the previous analysis a portrait of how the use of papyri for historical research has developed during recent decades. Updated with the latest research and insights from the author, the volume guides historians in how to use these scattered and often badly damaged documents, and to interpret them in order to create a full and diverse picture of ancient society and culture.

This second edition of Reading Papyri, Writing Ancient History continues to offer students and researchers of the ancient world a critical resource in navigating how to use these ancient texts in their research.

Roger S. Bagnall is Jay Professor of Greek and Latin and Professor of History, emeritus, at Columbia University, USA, and Professor of Ancient History and Leon Levy Director, emeritus, at the Institute for the Study of the Ancient World, New York University, USA. His other publications include Egypt in Late Antiquity (1993), The Demography of Roman Egypt (1994), and Everyday Writing in the Graeco-Roman East (2011).

APPROACHING THE ANCIENT WORLD

The sources for the study of the Greek and Roman world are diffuse, diverse, and often complex, and special training is needed in order to use them to the best advantage in constructing a historical picture. The books in this series provide an introduction to the problems and methods involved in the study of ancient history. The topics covered range from the use of literary sources for Greek history and for Roman history, through numismatics, epigraphy, and dirt archaeology, to the use of legal evidence and of art and artefacts in chronology.

Literary Texts and the Roman Historian

David Potter

Cuneiform Texts and the Writing of History

Marc Van De Mieroop

Archaeology and the Bible

John Laughlin

Literary Texts and the Greek Historian

Christopher Pelling

Epigraphic Evidence

Ancient History from Inscriptions

John Bodel

The Archaeology of Mesopotamia

Theories and Approaches

Roger Matthews

Theories, Models and Concepts in Ancient History

Neville Morley

Roman Archaeology for Historians

Ray Laurence

Reading Papyri, Writing Ancient History

Second edition

Roger S. Bagnall

For more information on this series, visit: https://www.routledge.com/classicalstudies/series/SE0153

Second edition published 2020

by Routledge

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2020 Roger S. Bagnall

The right of Roger S. Bagnall to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers.

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First edition published by Routledge 1995

British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Bagnall, Roger S., author.

Title: Reading papyri, writing ancient history / Roger S. Bagnall.

Description: Second edition. | Abingdon, Oxon; New York, NY : Routledge, 2019. |Series: Approaching the ancient world | Includes bibliographical references and indexes.

Identifiers: LCCN 2019008076 (print) | LCCN 2019012107 (ebook) | ISBN 9781351214582 (ebook) | ISBN 9781351214575 (web pdf) | ISBN 9781351214551 (mobi/kindle) | ISBN 9781351214568 (epub) | ISBN 9780815379911 (hardback : alk. paper)| ISBN 9780815379928 (pbk. : alk. paper) | ISBN 9781351214582 (ebk.)

Subjects: LCSH: History, Ancient--Historiography. | History, Ancient--Sources. | Manuscripts (Papyri) | Paleography.

Classification: LCC D56 (ebook) | LCC D56 .B34 2019 (print) |DDC 930.072--dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019008076

ISBN: 978-0-8153-7991-1 (hbk)

ISBN: 978-0-8153-7992-8 (pbk)

ISBN: 978-1-351-21458-2 (ebk)

As the preface to the first edition of this book indicates, it grew out of my experience over many years of working with papyri as historical documents, but it reflected particularly the methodological concerns that had been central to my work on Egypt in Late Antiquity (1993). These had crystallized in my mind in the process of writing that book, which was nearing conclusion when Richard Stoneman invited me to write a short book about the use of papyri as evidence for ancient history. The quantitative interests that play a significant role here (chapter 5) also find an echo in The Demography of Roman Egypt (1994), a product of the same period in my life, even though most of the quantification in that book was the work of my co-author, Bruce Frier.

The book was generally well received by reviewers, but a few of the more thoughtful reviews suggested possible improvements or directions that I might have taken. (A list of reviews known to me is given at the end of this preface.) I have tried as far as possible to take these into account in this second edition, but my disbelief in the value of high-level theory remains intact. And my conviction that the writing of history requires a diversity of gifts and thus of historians (chapter 8) means that, although I am conscious that I have left aside some subjects and approaches others might wish to see given prominence, this is only the natural result of my own limitations, not of disdain for their potential interest.

In the preface to the first edition, I noted the generally rather unreflective climate of papyrology, in which the usability and uses of the evidence of the documents are taken for granted. That passage is probably the most quoted part of the book. The climate has certainly changed in various ways, including substantive contributions to the broader issues of history-writing by Todd Hickey and Peter van Minnen, on which I have drawn.