Abstract
Philippus Arabs ruled the Roman world for five years, A.D. 244 to 249. It is an obscure reign, even for the period: the Augustan History offers no life of Philip, the other literary sources are scanty and dubious. The political historian might turn, like Gibbon, to general criteria—‘the knowledge of human nature, and of the sure operation of its fierce and unrestrained passions’. For economics and administration nothing will serve but more evidence. It seems worthwhile, therefore, to assemble the papyrus documents which reflect Philip's régime in Egypt; and to ask whether any coherent picture emerges from them.This enterprise has its own dangers. The documents from Egypt represent chance finds, on a few sites, in the remoter half of the country. They are oppressively numerous, yet negligible in comparison with the bulk now lost. They allow vivid glimpses of administration at work, but for the most part at the lower levels and in individual cases. Chance survival, local particularism and official incompetence play a large part.
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