On the recommendation of a friend in Siwa, I found a papyrus preserved in London that I did not know, discovered more than a century ago which bears a "Postcard" sent by a certain Nearchus to his frie
The papyrus dates back to the 1st-2nd century AD. and represents an important document that testifies to the importance that the oracle continued to exercise on the Mediterranean world even in the height of the Roman imperial era.
Unfortunately Nearchus does not tell us anything of what he saw at the oasis also because the document lacks the last lines of text but in any case leaves us an important trace of his passage to be found perhaps still today, that is the names of his friends engraved on the temple wall.
Below is the translation of the part of the text relating to the visit to the Oracle of Amon:
" I went to Libya where Amon chants his oracles to everyone. I have received very promising words and I scratched the names of all my friends on the wall of the sanctuary for eternal memory ... "
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