DCLP

Introduction

Medical prescriptions for eye-salves. P.U.Tor. inv. F 0812v is a fragment of papyrus (12.2x13.8 cm), broken on all sides, containing parts of five medical prescriptions penned against the fibres on the back of a list of names. The item originally came as two detached pieces, but examination of the fibre pattern, surviving traces and content on both sides revealed that they could be united materially to form a single fragment. A kollesis is visible on the recto. Two columns of text survive incompletely. Of the first, there remains a section of the right-hand half, containing some of the doses for two recipes; of the second, a part of the left-hand half with a nearly complete list of the drugs for three others. The titles of four of the prescriptions are also in part preserved and span the width of the columns. The largish, rounded, legible semi-cursive hand of the papyrus points unambiguously to the 2nd in. cent. AD. The text of the prescriptions is arranged in columns consisting of two facing lists (a list of the ingredients on the left and a list of the corresponding amounts on the right). Orthography seems to have been more than usually correct.

(This papyrus has been digitally edited by Margherita Centenari 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 (J. Lundon, GMP II 4).)

Apparatus

Notes

• i.1.

  First prescription. The surviving portions of ll. 1-4 preserve the doses for the last four ingredients of the prescription. The trace of ink on the left of the column is compatible both with a portion of sigma or upsilon; in all likelihood, it is part of the last letter of an ingredient in the genitive case, probably a mineral.

• 2.

  The sign also occurring in ll. 3-4 consists of a largish equiteral triangle with a curving stroke attached to its lower left-hand corner; it seems to be a variant form of the symbol for τετρώβολον.

• 3.

  To the lower right of the symbol there is a thick oblique stroke of ink to which is hard to assign a meaning.

• 4.

  Water, as the final component of the recipe, seems (exceptionally) to have been omitted since a dose is given. The relatively high amount of the ingredient, and its position, indicate a binding agent; one distinct possibility is κόμμι.

• 5.

  Second prescription, made up of a two-line heading (ll. 5-6), running on continuously to the ends, and indication of the doses for the first two ingredients (ll. 7-8). For [διά]ζ̣σμυρν̣α see Gal. Meth.med. 14.9 (10, 1020.3–5 K); Gal. Comp.med.sec.loc. 4.7 (12, 746.10 K); Aët. 7.30 (CMG 8.2, 276.1–2 Oliv.); Aët. 7.112 (CMG 8.2, 377.16–8 Oliv.).

• 6.

  This line probably contained instructions concerning the frequency of application of the salves. The letters are written perceptibly smaller and more closely to one another than elsewhere in the text, causing a slight deformation of the signs in a few cases. For δὶς διὰ δέκα see Gal. Comp.med.sec.loc. 1.1 (12, 407.4–5 K); Gal. Comp.med.sec.loc. 5.1 (12, 806.16–807.4 K); Gal. Comp.per gen. 6.2 (13, 878.15–8 K).

• ii.1.

  Third prescription. The position of substantial traces, too far to the right of the ends of the ingredients in the following lines to belong to an ingredient and too close to be an amount, strongly suggests that the line contained a title.

• 4.

  For ζ̣μ̣ύρνης see PSI 10.1180, passim

• 8.

  Fourth prescription. Lines 8-14 preserve a substantial portion of the heading (line 8, consisting of the name of the recipe and a statement of its applications) and the following six ingredients of a recipe for an eye-salve (ll. 9-14). For πρὸς δι[αθέσεις] see Gal. Comp.med.sec.loc. 4.6 (12, 730.2 K); Gal. Comp.med.sec.loc. 4.7 (12, 755.11, 763.10, 764.13 K).

• 11.

  Apparently accidental ink on upper edge of hole about a letter's distance from upsilon.

• 15.

  Fifth prescription. In ll. 15-20 survive most of the title (made up of a substantivized colour adjective accompanied by a statement of application) and the list of the names of five ingredients. If the recipe called for six ingredients and water was the last, then the word ὕδωρ probably occupied the lost line 21.