KARANIS
(Kôm Aushim) Egypt.
About 28
km N of Arsinoë in the Faiyûm, systematic excavation
has revealed remains of an important and active village.
A lintel of the late Ptolemaic temple, dedicated to the
local god Petesuchos and to the crocodile god Pnepherôs,
was inscribed with the cartouche of Nero. The papyri,
ostraca, lamps and other utensils, in addition to the
houses and granaries that the excavation yielded, give us
a clear picture of the Politai, certain nonresident landowners, and their place in the agricultural life of Arsinoite nome during the last phase of the Roman period.
Apparently the site was abandoned by the 5th c. A.D.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
D. Hogarth & B. Grenfell,
Cities of the
Faiyûm, Archaeological Report (1895-96) 14-19; B.
Grenfell et al.,
Faiyûm Towns and Their Papyri, 30-32;
J. G. Milne,
A History of Egypt (1898) 35 and passim
I;
A.E.R. Boak,
Karanis (1931); id. & E. Peterson,
Karanis
(1931); Boak, “Politai as Landholders at Karanis in
the Time of Diocletian and Constantine,”
JEA 40 (1954)
11-14; D. B. Harden,
Roman Glass from Karanis, University of Michigan Studies XLI (1936); H. C. Youtie,
Michigan Papyri VI: Papyri and Ostraca from Karanis
(1944); W. B. Schuman, “Two Unpublished Inscriptions
from Karanis,”
Hesperia 16 (1947) 267-7 1
I; E. M. Husselman, “The Granaries of Karanis,”
TAPA 83 (1952)
25-79
I; L. A. Shier, “Roman Lamps and Lamp Makers
of Egypt,”
AJA 57 (1953) 110-11.
S. SHENOUDA
