During the time of Persian rule in Egypt, Jewish soldiers were stationed in Elephantine, a military post on the Nile. Historians have since recovered papyrus documents from that location, known as the Elephantine papyri, which provide information on all sorts of everyday social and economic matters, including marriage, divorce, property, slavery, and borrowing money. The text below is an agreement by a Jewish father regarding a house he had given to his daughter, probably as part of her dowry. It was written in Aramaic, the language of business in the Persian Empire.

On the 21st of Chisleu, that is the 1st of Mesore, year 6 of King Artaxerxes,* Mahseiah b. Yedoniah, a Jew of Elephantine, of the detachment of Haumadata, said to Jezaniah b. Uriah of the said detachment as follows: There is the site of 1 house belonging to me, west of the house belonging to you, which I have given to your wife, my daughter Mibtahiah, and in respect of which I have written her a deed. The measurements of the house in question are 8 cubits and a handbreadth by 11, by the measuring-rod.† Now do I, Mahseiah, say to you, Build and equip that site … and dwell thereon with your wife. But you may not sell that house or give it as a present to others; only your children by my daughter Mibtahiah shall have power over it after you two. If tomorrow or some other day you build upon this land, and then my daughter divorces you and leaves you, she shall have no power to take it or give it to others; only your children by Mibtahiah shall have power over it, in return for the work which you shall have done. If, on the other hand, she recovers from you [in other words, if Jezaniah divorces her], she [may] take half the house, and [the] othe[r] half shall be at your disposal in return for the building which you will have done on that house. And again as to that half, your children by Mibtahiah shall have power over it after you. If tomorrow or another day I should institute suit or process against you and say I did not give you this land to build on and did not draw up this deed for you, I shall give you a sum of 10 karshin by royal weight, at the rate of 2 R to the ten, and no suit or process shall lie. This deed was written by ‘Atharshuri b. Nabuzeribni in the fortress of Syene at the dictation of Mahseiah.

Witnesses hereto (signatures)

*This is the date of the document. Chisleu was a month in the Hebrew calendar, Mesore a seasonal period in the Egyptian calendar. Artaxerxes is most likely Artaxerxes I, king of Persia from 465 to 424 B.C.E., which means the year this agreement was drafted was 459 B.C.E.

†A cubit was the length of a forearm, roughly 20 inches; the house site was thus about 15 by 18 feet.

Source: James B. Pritchard, ed., Ancient Near Eastern Texts Relating to the Old Testament: Third Edition with Supplement. © 1950, 1955, 1969, renewed 1978 by Princeton University Press. Reprinted by permission of Princeton University Press.

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