The herald κηρυκίνῃ Job in Roman Egypt

Document Type : Original Article

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Pharaohs Higher Institute of Tourism and Hotels

Abstract

The job of the herald was one of the local administration jobs in Egypt in the Roman era. In every city or village there was a herald or heralds, depending on the size of each place. Papyrus documents indicated the participation of women with men in this work, and the same linguistic dictionaries recorded that the word herald κηρυκίνῃ is originally Κηρύκαινα, which is a feminine word
Also, the function of herald or informer was practiced by some in private and not affiliated with the state administration, which increased the number of heralds, which made them gather in a group or union in Egypt in the Roman era. Even if the papyrus documents that mention the name or word of the herald are few, this does not mean that they do not exist, but rather their presence is widespread in all places, both at the general level of the state and privately for individuals, due to the need for them. We also find a multiplicity of their tasks. Some of them call out what the administration wants to inform people, some of them call fugitives or those wanted by justice, mentioning their descriptions to everyone, and a third works as a private caller searching for a person about what was lost or stolen from him. Hence the importance of clarifying that function that links the administration and the people or between the people and each other, which served as local media for every region in Roman Egypt.

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