PSI I 55 – eine griechische Paraphrase zu D. 2, 14, De Pactis

In 1912 Filippo E. Vassalli published PSI I 55 and partly recon- structed its contents. His editio princeps was subsequently thoroughly checked in 1971 by Wolfgang Wodke, who completed Vassalli’s text; he, moreover, attributed it to the antecessor Stephanus. Here, all earlier readings and conjectures will be examined and partly corrected. The text is seen critically in the light of the publications that have disproved Wodke’s attribution to Stephanus. Besides, some new readings and conjectures are added. The papyrus was a part of a book based on East Roman law teaching in the Greek language. It is a paraphrasis combining two series of lessons on the Digest, an index, and a paragraphai lecture. They are dated between spring of 534 and March of 536 and were taught by an unknown law teacher (in either Beirut or Constantinople). Afterwards, they were used by Stephanus for his paragraphai on the digest. The latter seems to have taught between March 536 and a short time after 542. The unknown law teacher was probably one of the eight addressees of Justinian’s constitution Omnem, who taught at two law schools. Four of those antecessores have already been excluded by other authors. The others have left either no or too few texts. Therefore, the attribution to one of these antecessores is impossible, perhaps except for Anatolius, who taught in Beirut.