![\"papyrus\"](\"https:\/\/th-thumbnailer.cdn-si-edu.com\/OFtTa8pgSjUx34aPzPW8-L5R9sc=\/1000x750\/filters:no_upscale():focal(1440x1248:1441x1249)\/https:\/\/tf-cmsv2-smithsonianmag-media.s3.amazonaws.com\/filer_public\/24\/b4\/24b4db8c-05db-4971-bca4-8136fd2b482a\/forgery-and-fiscal-fra-1.jpeg\")
The papyrus dates back to between 129 and 132 C.E. Back in 2014, a researcher from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem<\/a> rediscovered an ancient papyrus while organizing a storeroom in the Israel Antiquities Authority<\/a>\u2019s Dead Sea Scrolls<\/a> Unit. Once found in the Judean Desert<\/a>, the document\u2019s script had previously been classified as Nabataean<\/a>\u2014an ancient Aramaic language\u2014but papyrus expert Hannah Cotton<\/a> knew better.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen I saw it marked \u2018Nabataean,\u2019 I exclaimed, \u2018It\u2019s Greek to me!\u2019\u201d the researcher says in a statement<\/a> by the university.<\/p>\n Cotton and a team of experts spent the next decade deciphering the 133-line text, and their findings were recently published in the journal Tyche<\/em><\/a>. Turns out, the document is the longest Greek papyrus ever found in the Judean Desert, and its newly translated content is particularly unique: a Roman lawyer\u2019s detailed notes about the trial of two men accused of tax fraud.<\/p>\n \u201cThis is the best-documented Roman court case from Judaea, apart from the trial of Jesus,\u201d says study coauthor Avner Ecker<\/a>, a historian at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, in the statement.<\/p>\n Per the study, the papyrus was likely written on the \u201ceve of the Bar Kokhba Revolt<\/a>,\u201d a second-century Jewish uprising against Roman rule. The Roman Empire had colonized Judea<\/a>\u2014the southern part of ancient Palestine\u2014some 200 years earlier<\/a>. By 132 C.E., various Roman incursions upon Jewish life, including bans on religious practices, had taken their toll: The dwindling population of Jews in Palestine revolted. The rebellion, led by a man named Bar Kokhba<\/a>, was crushed by the Romans in 135 C.E., and Jews were subsequently banned from Jerusalem.<\/p>\n The newly translated papyrus was written after Roman Emperor Hadrian<\/a>\u2019s visit to Judea around 130 C.E. and before the Bar Kokhba Revolt, per the study. It details Rome\u2019s case against two individuals\u2014Gadalias and Saulos\u2014accused of forging documentation about selling and freeing slaves to bypass paying Roman taxes.<\/p>\n \u201cForgery and tax fraud carried severe penalties under Roman law, including hard labor or even capital punishment,\u201d says study coauthor Anna Dolganov<\/a>, a papyrus expert at the Austrian Academy of Sciences<\/a>, in the statement.<\/p>\n The papyrus was written in \u201cvibrant and direct\u201d language by a strategizing prosecutor, advising another lawyer about pieces of evidence and anticipating objections, per the statement. The document also contains a \u201crapidly drafted transcript of the judicial hearing itself.\u201d<\/p>\n As Dolganov says in the statement, \u201cThis papyrus is extraordinary because it provides direct insight into trial preparations in this part of the Roman Empire.\u201d<\/p>\n Significant portions of the document are missing, making conclusions about the trial\u2019s participants difficult to draw. Still, the researchers write that the prosecutors were likely \u201cfunctionaries of the Roman fiscal administration\u201d and suggest the defendants were Jews. The papyrus also makes mention of \u201can informer who denounced the defendants to Roman authorities.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n Israel Antiquities Authority<\/span>
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