Papyrus Oxyrhynchus 236 (P. Oxy. 236 or P. Oxy. II 236) consists of three fragments concerning Ptolemy Neos Dionysus (Auletes), written in

Greek Greek may refer to: Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor of all kno ...

. They were discovered in

Oxyrhynchus Oxyrhynchus ( ; , ; ; ), also known by its modern name Al-Bahnasa (), is a city in Middle Egypt located about 160 km south-southwest of Cairo in Minya Governorate. It is also an important archaeological site. Since the late 19th century, t ...

. The manuscript was written on

papyrus Papyrus ( ) is a material similar to thick paper that was used in ancient times as a writing surface. It was made from the pith of the papyrus plant, ''Cyperus papyrus'', a wetland sedge. ''Papyrus'' (plural: ''papyri'' or ''papyruses'') can a ...

in the form of a sheet. It is dated to the 1st century BC. Currently it is housed in

The British Library The British Library is the national library of the United Kingdom. Based in London, it is one of the largest libraries in the world, with an estimated collection of between 170 and 200 million items from multiple countries. As a legal deposit li ...

.P. Oxy. 236
at the Oxyrhynchus Online

Description

This is one of the earliest papyri found at Oxyrhynchus. It describes the form of the royal titles during the reign of Ptolemy Auletes, whose name in 1899 had not been found on a papyrus before. The first of the three fragments is written in an almost

uncial Uncial is a majuscule script (written entirely in capital letters) commonly used from the 4th to 8th centuries AD by Latin and Greek scribes. Uncial letters were used to write Greek and Latin, as well as Gothic, and are the current style for ...

hand, while the other two are more

cursive Cursive (also known as joined-up writing) is any style of penmanship in which characters are written joined in a flowing manner, generally for the purpose of making writing faster, in contrast to block letters. It varies in functionality and m ...

. The measurements of the fragments are 43 by 62 mm, 42 by 71 mm, and 52 by 46 mm respectively. It was discovered by Grenfell and

Hunt Hunting is the Human activity, human practice of seeking, pursuing, capturing, and killing wildlife or feral animals. The most common reasons for humans to hunt are to obtain the animal's body for meat and useful animal products (fur/hide (sk ...

in 1897 in Oxyrhynchus. The text was published by Grenfell and Hunt in 1899.

References

236 __NOTOC__ Year 236 ( CCXXXVI) was a leap year starting on Friday of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Verus and Africanus (or, less frequently, year 989 ''Ab urbe condita''). The denomination 23 ...

1st-century BC manuscripts {{OxyrhynchusGR-stub

Description

See also

References