Abstract
This remarkable volume provides the richest introduction ever offered to one of the most widespread but understudied writing technologies of the ancient world. Like many such categories, ostraca are a somewhat fuzzy set, and the term “ostracon” is often used imprecisely. Properly speaking, the ostracon is a potsherd or, sometimes, a piece of stone, in a secondary use (i.e., not its original purpose) as a writing surface. But various other objects get included from time to time because they do not form a recognized category of their own, and writing on pottery as part of the primary use of a vessel is sometimes distinguished from ostraca as jar inscriptions and sometimes not. Ostraca were for long treated with disdain or positive horror by most papyrologists, but they have increasingly come into their own; and this set of chapters, based on a conference, represents a kind of coming of age of the study of ostraca. Reviewed by: Roger S. Bagnall, Published Online (2022-07-31)Copyright © 2022 by Roger S. Bagnall Article PDF Link: https://jps.library.utoronto.ca/index.php/aestimatio/article/view/39090/29779 Corresponding Author: Roger S. Bagnall,New York UniversityE-Mail: roger.bagnall@nyu.edu
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