E00160: Greek private letter, from Oxyrhynchos (Middle Egypt) concerned with greetings and the transport of goods, providing a list of five saints to be invoked on the sender’s behalf: *John (presumably either the Baptist, S00020, or the Apostle and Evangelist, S00042), *Euphemia (martyr of Chalcedon, S00017), *Menas (soldier and martyr of Abu Mena, S00073), *Peter (the Apostle, S00036), and *Ioulianos (probably the martyr of Cilicia, S00305), datable to the 4th/5th c.

P.Oxy. 56.3862 i

The document is a letter from Philoxenos to his parents and uncle, from Oxyrhynchos, 4th/5th century, in which the sender of the letter asks the addressees to pray to various saints.

lines 25–28: εὔξεστε(*) περὶ μ  ̣  ̣   ̣  ̣  ̣  ̣ τ̣ο̣ῦ̣ ἁ̣γ̣ί̣ο̣υ̣ Ἰ(*)ωάννου καὶ τῆς ἁγίας Εὐφημίας καὶ τοῦ ἁγίου Μηνᾶ καὶ τοῦ ἁγίου Π̣έτ̣ρ̣ου καὶ τοῦ ἁγίο̣υ̣ Ἰ(*)ου̣λ̣ι̣α̣νοῦ

'Pray (for me? through?) Saint John and Saint Euphemia and Saint Menas and Saint Peter and Saint Julianus.'

A full record of the text with images is available at: http://papyri.info/ddbdp/p.oxy;56;3862

Text and translation: M. G. Sirivianou.