Preface
In my dissertation, published as a monograph twenty years ago, I studied and tried to explain the language, structure, and application of a single documentary genre, the Greek marriage document, as evidenced in papyri from Ptolemaic and Roman Egypt. I submitted the book for publication in Schwabing in the summer of 2003. As was my wont, several days later I visited the Leopold Wenger Institute, where the then-newly elected head, Professor Alfons Bürge, greeted me. After his gracious welcome, Professor Bürge suggested that I should now broaden my horizons by undertaking a survey of the entire scope of formulations in Greek legal documents from Egypt in their entirety. Since I usually do as told (the best way to secure a long-lasting marriage), I complied. By then, I had already come to the conclusion that while excellent monographs on select legal documents were in hand, never had an attempt been made to gain a comprehensive overview of the language and structure of the legal document as a whole.
In 2007, courtesy of the Israel Science Foundation, I created the databank that was later named Synallagma, through which I was able to collect legal documents from Ptolemaic, Roman, and Byzantine Egypt and analyse their structure. Continuing to gather these data over the many years that followed, I gradually established the intricate typology that is introduced in this book. I thought it especially important not just to present the types of clauses that appear on papyri in Ptolemaic, Roman and Byzantine Egypt—this work had already been sporadically undertaken in earlier publications—but also, and perhaps mostly, to show how the text of the clause varied regionally and diachronically. In some cases, as in the extensive discussion of the hypographe or the capacity clause, this much more extensive analysis would allow the reader to extract additional material. In addition, by having completed the work across the entire corpus of documents, I am now able to recognize various tectonic undercurrents that I intend to analyse in detail elsewhere.
This is not the end of the road. It is, however, a point of time at which I would like to express my gratitude to friends, colleagues, and teachers who have accompanied me along the lengthy path I have followed thus far: Ranon Katzoff of Bar-Ilan University, who first introduced me to the field of legal papyrology and has remained a close and kind friend ever since; Tiziana Chiusi, who first ushered me into the Leopold Wenger Institute and Dieter Nörr, a great man of unparalleled vision, hospitality, and kindness, to whom I owe a huge debt. It was in Munich that I first met Guido Pfeiffer, Wolfgang Kaiser, Hans-Dieter Spengler, and Johannes Platschek, who have remained close friends ever since. During my stay in Munich, I also made the acquaintance of Gerhard Thür and Eva Jakab, with whom I have stayed close to this day.
During the same period, I also paid recurrent visits to Marburg, where I had the honour and pleasure of working with Hans-Albert Rupprecht, whose enduring encouragement, friendship, and support I will always remember. No other scholar in my lifetime (I did not have the good fortune to know Hans-Julius Wolff personally) has contributed more to the study of legal papyrology than has Rupprecht, especially insofar as the subject matter of this book is concerned. In Marburg, I first met Andrea Jördens, who has remained a close friend ever since. I would also like to thank Roger S. Bagnall and Michele Faraguna for their support. Michele Faraguna was once my associate in developing the Synallagma; he undertook the analysis of the epigraphically attested material. I consciously avoided treating these data in this book, hoping that Michele or some other specialist in Greek epigraphy and history will finish the job.
I also wish to mention others without whom this book could not have been published: my close friend Athina Dimopoulou, as well as Carolin Arlt, and Rachel Stroumsa, who worked on the development of the Synallagma databank at various stages; Bernhard Palme, Markus Resel, and Sven Tost, who have always been attentive to all my needs and were kind enough to discuss various questions about text, translation, and contents; Nathan Carlig, who carefully and diligently guided me through the stages of preparing this manuscript; Jean François Gerkens, the chief editor of the RIDA; and the scientific board of the periodical and the anonymous readers for their stimulating comments.
Gratitude is also owed to the Faculty of the Humanities, the School of Cultural Studies, and the Berg Foundation Institute for Law and History at Tel Aviv University for their generous financial support of the editing of this book. Finally, I thank my language editor, Naftali Greenwood, for his diligence and care.
A lesson that I have managed to learn during my relatively long life is that family is everything. Only now, when I have grown-up children of my own, have I acquired the sense of gratification that one may get from the accomplishments of one’s offspring and realized how my past accomplishments caused my parents true joy. My mother is now in deep dementia, an accursed malady from which she will probably never recover. My father, however, is in good physical and mental health. The news of the long-protracted and -expected completion of this project has given him immense happiness. My own family is now a generation old. I am blessed to have a wife who was able to give me a safe haven, a home to return to. It is to Shani, the love of my life, to my parents, and to my children, Omri, Yoav, and Nimrod, that this work is dedicated.
