P.Oxy 2163
A few miles from the Nile in central Egypt, at the end of the 19th century, the remains of the ancient city of Oxyrhynchos were found. The city had its golden age in the period between Alexander the Great's conquest of Egypt in 342 B.C. and the end of the Roman period in the 4th century. With its canals connecting to the Nile, the city was an important trading post and served as a link to the Libyan oases. During the 7th century, the canal system was sanded over and the city slowly fell into oblivion.
In 1896, during excavations still going on today, a large ancient rubbish heap was found with over 400,000 papyrus fragments. Everything from everyday texts such as diaries, letters, horoscopes, procurement lists, drawings, court records, circus programs, certificates, and contracts of all kinds were found. Apocryphal and biblical texts as well as poems by Alkman and Sappho were also found in the rubbish heap along with texts by Plato, Homer, Simonides, Menandros, Euclid, Hesiod, and countless fragments by unknown authors from throughout the ancient period. The interpretation of all these small pieces has been going on since the 1930s and has so far resulted in over 80 large volumes in the Oxyrhynchus Papyri series published by Oxford University. Among the papyrus fragments are two that are thought to belong to Aeschylus' long-lost breakthrough play The Myrmidons, P.Oxy 2163 and P.Oxy 2265. For our upcoming exhibition PARABOLER, the translators Jan Stolpe and Lars-Håkan Svensson took on the task of translating these and all other fragments that can be connected to Aeschylus' play.
Each image in the exhibition takes its title from a found text fragment.
Karl Dunér januari 2023
Foto edit: Sören Vilks
blacksmith, Gunnar Linden, Tobias Martin
Pigmentprint on 300gr acid free cotton paper, Sven Westerlund PRODIG,
P.Oxy 2163