Excursus: Petitions and the �Narratio’ Documents

We have seen the deployment by advocates of their skills of rhetorical persuasion in speeches in the courts of Egypt, and raised the question, prompted by their similarity to that other common category of documents in the papyri, the petitions,^[294] whether or how far the same people produced both.

We begin by examining some cases (which include some documents already described above).

1. P.Ryl. 269, second century AD. The editors describe this text as a �declaration’, but it reads like a draft of a speech, e.g. line 7 ten synegoroumenen, and was surely, in any event, drawn up by or for an advocate.

2. P.Tebt. 297, c. AD 123, is part of an advocate’s speech, not particularly �rhetorical’ but a straight, though complicated, narratio. It is likely that this speech was actually delivered, though what we have may be notes for the advocate.

3. P.Oxy. 237 (= No. 19 above), latest AD 186. We have already asked, above, who is likely to have assembled this large dossier.

4. SB 5693, AD 186, is either a speech in a law-suit or a petition: it �rings’ like the litigant in person.

5. P.Mich. (vi) 426, c. AD 199-200. This is a petition, but reads just like an advocate’s speech, with a brief, emotional exordium and an appeal to the magnificence of the epistrategos before embarking on the tale of woe. There are a number of similar items in its vicinity.

6. P.Oxy. 899 (= No. 23 above), AD 200, another large dossier, is a petition, but with strong rhetorical features.

7.P.Mert. 26 (= No. 31 above), AD 274, is a woman’s petition to the exegetes, but it is presented orally in court by her advocate, who makes a long and emotional appeal in introducing it.

8.P.Oxy. 2343, AD 288, is a petition by a woman who has been endeavouring to get a hearing, and says: �I briefed (edidaxamen) Chrysammon, advocate, from the 2nd of the present month (tou ontos menos).’ It seems natural to suppose that the advocate helped her with the petition.

9. SB 9622 (= P.Sakaon 48), AD 343: a marvellously rhetorical petition, as are numerous others in the same archive.^[297]

Having surveyed the interface between advocates’ speeches and petitions, we turn to the �Narratio’ texts. Those that have so far turned up are all �late’, i.e. of the fourth century, and they have the following other characteristics in common: each begins with a symbol of a kind of capital �N’ with a vertical stroke through it; each has a wide left-hand margin given over to what seems like an abbreviated, note-form version of the main text; and over certain proper names and other items there are �overlinings’.^[298] The documents as a group were originally taken to be advocates’ written speeches, which they would study, �get up’, and deliver in court.

P.Princ. 119, c. AD 325, goes by the rhetorical book. It has an exordium'. �Those who interfere with other people’s property and

111. Advocacy in the papyri: the under-exploited source 115 attempt to indict them are hated by the laws and hated by (misousi men...

P.Col. VII 174 has similar features - and, incidentally, similar subject-matter. In his legal commentary upon it^[299] Schiller raised some difficulties about the view that it was an advocate’s written speech with marginal notes as an aide- memoire: oral argument, he said, was often interrupted by judges, so a written formal brief would have been more hindrance than help; notes of possible points to argue might sensibly be jotted in a margin, but cui bono a potted version of the same material, i.e. the narratiol And thirdly, how, on the standard view, are the �overlinings’ to be accounted for? Schiller concluded that the �Narratio’ documents were not speeches at all, but the preliminary written statements that had, in post-classical Roman procedure, to be submitted to the authorities, who, if they agreed that there was a �case to answer’, would furnish the defendant with a copy.^[300] The marginalia were, on that view, notes by a bureau officer for presentation to the magistrate to assist his decision whether to proceed.

About that hypothesis also there are difficulties.^[301] The papyrus Schiller was commenting on begins with the words �We speak (.legomen) on behalf of Sambathion’ and refers to hoi synegoroumenoi, and P.Princ. 119 begins �You speak on behalf of Dionysios’: those would be very odd ways of opening a denuntiatio litis.^[302] Secondly, P.Col. VII 174 has in line 8 hoi kleronomoi hestekasin �the heirs are present’, and the margin begins with hoi b(oethoumenoi) �the clients’ and has at line 40 deometha �we request’. And on the verso of the papyrus there is a label saying hyper Sambathionos apo komes Keramidos Horeion rhetor �on behalf of Sambathion from Ker amis village, Horeion rhetor’.

P.Vindob.Gr. inv. no. 39757 has two columns side by side. The right-hand one begins with the �N’ symbol followed by the words legeis hyper Askleipiadou �you speak on behalf of Asklepiades’, and proceeds to a full narratio of the case of a petitioner allegedly burdened with taxable land that is not his - a situation we have met before. The tone drips with pathos: �He was formerly one of the nobs (ton periblepton), but since Fate brings changes to everybody it turns out that he has now come to penury... he has no house nor slave nor anything else.’ Proper names are �overlined’. The writing in the left-hand column at one or two points encroaches on the space of the right-hand one: the editors deduce that it was written second. It, too, comprises a narratio, in about half the length of the other, but beginning at, so to speak, the opposite end, i.e. with the sob-stuff. This time the petitioner is called ho b(oethoumenos). The proper names are �overlined’ in this version, too, but so are some other phrases; the editors say �Horizontal lines seem to be used to mark sections’, but that is not very easy to make out.

It might well be added that one cannot easily see why these documents, if they were litis denuntiationes, should begin with the word �N(arratio)’ - but for the fact that not all scholars are satisfied that that is what the symbol stands for. Bagnall^[303] argued that it represents not �N(arratio)’ but �N(omikos)’, and that these texts are memoranda got up by a nomikos for use by an advocate, the left-hand version with notes being added by the latter; but that hardly accounts for the rhetorical element in the left-hand as well as the right-hand version. Lewis argued that the symbol must stand for a letter �N’ plus an �I’, saying that Youtie, in remarks published posthumously, proposed to treat it as �NI(ke)’, but suggesting, for his own part, not �NT but �IN’.^[304] He was, however, hesitant, and could not confidently satisfy the question what word �IN’ was an abbreviation of.

111. Advocacy in the papyri: the under-exploited source 117 date; it records a dialogue between an advocate and the governor of the Thebaid, not a narratio, but the advocate is referred to with a symbol that looks like a Greek letter �Pi’ with an oblique stroke through it, for which its editor suggests P(arakletos) �advocate’.

For the nature and purpose of the �Narratio’ documents (though not for the solution of the abbreviation) there is an as yet un-canvassed alternative; but we should first take cog­nisance of the other two texts belonging to the group.

P.Lips. 41 recto (= M. Chr. 300) is a narratio with a tiny peroratio on moral lines - about he tou gamou harmonia �the harmony of marriage’ - and a reference to he nun boethumene �my present (female) client’.

P.Thead. 16 has the phrase legeis hyper and refers to �us’ and �our village’ in rhetorical-sentimental terms.

Let it now be suggested that the legeis hyper... phrase gives a clue to interpretation. What would briefing an advocate consist of? It might involve a long, careful colloquy between client and advocate and elaborate preparation;²⁴⁰ on the other hand it might be very summary if the advocate was taking up the client’s case on the spot, and comprise an appropriate narratio composed by someone and given to the advocate as his brief, with space for him to make some quick mnemonics. One can well conceive how an advocate presented with such a document might feel that he must not look as if he was other than in full command of his case, and so must make sure of names, sizes of estates, and such like: he must not seem to be just reading it out. We may, in fact, be in the presence of a late revival of a kind of logography. Now, the â€?logographic’ element in these texts suggests that they were composed not just for but by advocates; and we have seen advocates working in pairs or even teams, and have thought, perhaps, to observe the relation of senior and junior partner.²⁴¹ That leads in the direction of supposing that what we have here are speeches written by a senior, experienced advocate for a younger colleague to deliver.²⁴² The hypothesis²⁴³

²⁴⁰ See Quint.

²⁴¹ Pliny, Ep. II14,3; VI23, 2, and see p. 129, below.

²⁴² It has been observed that all the â€?Narratio’ texts to date are on the side of the plaintifPpetitioner. That may, however, be due to chance.

²⁴³ Which, though it would rule out â€?N(omikos)’ for the mysterious symbol, fails to establish with certainty what it did stand for. â€?N(otatum)’? would accord well with the other feature observed several times in the material, how advocates sometimes do not seem to know anything about the circumstances beyond the confines of the brief. What they were wanted for was to give a professional presentation of a case and ensure that no stone of argument should be left unturned. And as for the cases in which the parties are to be found pleading on their own account, it is very possible that, like their classical Greek forbears, they had bought advice or an actual speech; and who better placed than an advocate to supply that? Perhaps logography, like advocacy itself, never died.^[305]