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Introduction

Medical recipe (P.Oxy. LXXIV 4976). This piece (6 x 6.5 cm) preserves on verso seven short lines of text written against the fibers; recto contains scant remains of two columns of a document. The papyrus had been folded vertically in three, approximately equally, and was pre-cut to accommodate the text on the back. The upper margin is greater than the interlinear spaces, and the writing has been compressed towards the right margin to ensure that it would fit. There are two paragraphoi , the first between ll. 3-4, and the second on a level with line 5, presumably to distinguish the fourth ingredient, which is the first to occupy two lines. The text is probably complete and preserves a single medical recipe, unusually lacking a title or any indication as to its application (see e.g. SB XIV 12074 and P.Sijp. 6 ). It would have produced a highly acrid compound, and the closest parallels among surviving pharmacological compilations suggest that it may have been intended for the treatment of intestinal worms in general, or for the tapeworm (πλατεῖα ἕλμινς) in particular (cf. Paul. IV 57.13; [Dsc.] Eup . II 68.2). The text is copied in a somewhat angular informal hand assignable to the late 2nd or 3rd cent. AD. Alternative quantities have been added below ll. 1 and 2, perhaps by a second hand; they are very rare in medical recipes on papyrus: P. Princ. III 155 is the only other example published to date.

(This papyrus has been digitally edited by Luca Iori as part of the Project "DIGMEDTEXT - Online Humanities Scholarship: A Digital Medical Library based on Ancient Texts" (ERC-AdG-2013, Grant Agreement no. 339828) funded by the European Research Council at the University of Parma (Principal Investigator: Prof. Isabella Andorlini). The digital edition is mostly based on the previous edition (D. Leith, P.Oxy. LXXIV 4976). Revised by Nicola Reggiani in the framework of the PRIN 2017 Project "Greek and Latin Literary Papyri from Graeco-Roman and Late Antique Fayum (4th BC – 7th AD): Texts, Contexts, Readers" funded by the Italian Ministry of Research (P.I. Prof. Lucio Del Corso, University of Cassino; Local Research Unit at the University of Parma, coordinator: Prof. Nicola Reggiani).)

Notes

• 1.

  The variant genitive form πτερίδος is more commonly attested as πτέρεως, but is used also in Theophrastus and Dioscorides.

• 2.

  The use of scammony (δακρυδίου) in this recipe may have as a purgative (cf. Dsc. 4.170.3-4 [2, 319 W]), to expel the remaining acrid ingredients before they could cause harm.

• 1a, 2a.

  The alternative amounts here are written small, squeezed between the lines. The abbreviation for τριώβολον curves sharply downwards at its end, in marked contrast to the upwardly curving final movement in the example at 2. Delta is also somewhat differently formed. These discrepancies can perhaps be explained by the more confined space, and there is no discernible difference in the colour of the ink, but it seems quite possible that a second hand was responsible. Alternatives were presumably meant to offer a version or versions of varying potency, perhaps to be tailored to different levels in the severity of the condition. Note that they are proportionally based on the original amounts, in the first case dividing by two, in the second multiplying by three.

• 6-7.

  The medicinal use of νίτρον, sodium carbonate, is well attested, but the form of the mineral qualified by the adjective Ἑλληνικόν is very rare. Its only attestations are in PUG 2.62.11and P.Ct.YBR inv. 1443 fr.C, ll. 4 and 6.