CG no. 261

cc 1: <note>HL struggled to read the number. The reading is clear in the new IR photograph. The 20 is made with the same stroke pattern as those on line 3.</note> cc 2: <note>The ד is certain. Had this been a כ one would expect a long descender like that found on other letters.</note> This appears to be a complete ostracon, but HL believes a few numbers are missing from line 3. Traces of two perhaps unintentional strokes appear below the legible text. The hand is skilled and professional. See HL’s commentary regarding the readings she finds difficult. This is one of the few examples of a receipt among the Aramaic ostraca, though it serves as a license to Pelalyah to be in possession of many large rough-cut wooden beams, rather than a receipt for payment. Presumably the wood was marked with the original sellers name or siglum. It is also one of the few ostraca to mention a particular day/date. Note that the date is Egyptian and not Babylonian. One should compare the Ptolemaic and later Demotic and Greek receipts from the island. HL’s observations is worth noting: “Nous avons là certainement le témoin de la comptabilité d'un menuisier, qui n'est évidemment pas celle d'un magasin royal, qui nous aurait davantage éclairé peut-être quant à la date exacte de la livraison dans le siècle” (p. 396).