"Traité d'études byzantines", II : "Les papyrus", André Bataille, Paris 1955 : [recenzja]

SURVEY OF LITERATURE 1953—1955 487

A n d r é B a t a i l l e , Traité ďétudes byzantines I I Les papyrus (Paris, Presses universitaires de France 1955).

The book is composed f r o m 4 c h a p t e r s and 3 appendixes. C h a p t . I — The papyrological d o c u m e n t , I I — T h e i n t e r p r e t a t i o n of t h e papyrological d o c u m e n t , I I I — - T h e collections of t e x t s , I V — T h e great problems: 1. political history, 2. chronology, 3. geography a n d topology, 4. a d m i n i s t r a t i o n , 5. law (p. 51—55), 6. diplomacy (p. 55), 7. a r m y a n d police, 8. economic life, 9. religious life, 10. magic a n d occult sciences, 11. intelectual life, 12. private life. A p p . 1. The Greco-Egyptian m o n t h s , A p p . 2. List of t h e E m p e r o r s , of t h e prefects of E g y p t a n d of t h e p a t r i a r c h s of Alexandria between 297 a n d 641, A p p . 3. Some aspects suggested b y t h e letters of t h e B y z a n t i n e period.

A. G r o h m a n n , Einführung und Chrestomathie zur arabischen Papyruskunde I Bd. Einführung (Monografie Archivu Orien-tálního, P r a h a , 1955).

This f u n d a m e n t a l work is also for t h e j u r i s t of great i m p o r t a n c e . I should like t o d r a w a t t e n t i o n t o C h a p t . 7 p . 107 ff. devoted to diplomatics.

A. S t e i n w e n t e r , Das Recht der koptischen Urkunden ( H a n d -b u c h d. Altertumswissenschaft, 10 A-bt., 4 Teil, I I B d . Mün-chen 1955).

I n his t h o r o u g h s t u d y t h e a u t h o r states t h a t t h e Coptic docu-m e n t a t i o n was n o t an original achievedocu-ment b u t a very conserva-tive c o n t i n u a t i o n of the. Hellenistic a n d Byzantine documents f r o m which it borrowed the basis a n d quite a lot of different clau-ses, simply translated into the Coptic language. I n those docu-m e n t s t h e enchoric law arises n o t only fordocu-mally b u t also substan-tially w h a t is perticularly t h e case w i t h the law, geverning do-mestic relations and the law of inheritance a n d more slightly law governing t r a d e a n d commerce where t h e empire law generally prevailes. The a u t h o r investigates also t h e question how t h e en-choric law could persist t h e period of several h u n d r e d years since in E g y p t there were no documents d r a w n u p in the mother tongue. H e t a k e s two possibilities into consideration: either t h e national