1. In correspondence from the field, Grenfell indicates the location from which his letter has been posted. His correspondence from the Oxyrhynchus excavation is thus labelled "Beni-Mazar" (the location of the closest postal facilities) and not "Behnesa." Here Grenfell gives two locations, possibly because he was uncertain whether the first had postal service. "Kafr Meir" presumably corresponds to Kafr 'Amira, ca. 8 km southwest from Grenfell and Hunt's campsite at ar-Rūbīyāt (so Google Maps; consulted November 2016). "Edwa" is al-'Idwa, ca. 14.5 km southwest of Rüblyät; though its post office seems to have been constructed only in 1905 (cf. W. Garstin, Report upon the Administration of the Public Works Department in Egypt for 1905 [Cairo 1906] 108), its presence on a rail line suggests access of some sort to mail service. Garstin writes of the post office as "available for other villages."

2. "Excavations," 1900-1901 (n. 3) 4, gives the start of the season as 17 December 1900, corroborating Grenfell's calculation here.

3. Cf. "Excavations," 1900-1901 (n. 3) 4-5, which mentions four cemeteries (three for humans, one for crocodiles). In his letter to Smyly, Grenfell is presumably referring to the "numerous well-tombs of the early Ptolemaic period" (p. 4) and the cemetery "[n]ear the town on the north-west ... of a later period (second or first century B.C.)" (p. 5). In the EEF report, it is only in connection with the first of these nekropoleis that mummies are counted; the tombs there had "one or more chambers, each containing sometimes one or two, often five to ten." For all four cemeteries, see further M. Capasso and P. Davoli, eds., Soknopaiou Nesos Project I (2003-2009) (Pisa 2012) 16 (noting also p. 11). Smyly 's Hellenistic interests may account for Grenfell's silence about the other work that was undertaken at or near the site; see "Excavations," 1900-1901 (n. 3) 5-6.

4. Cf. "Excavations," 1900-1901 (n. 3) 6-7, which does not state the number of mummies (only that they were "numerous") and reads more positively. The EEF report indicates that the cemetery in question is near "Manashinshâneh" ("perhaps [ancient] Tanis," p. 6); for this location and further discussion, see P. Davoli, L'archeologia urbana nel Fayyum di età ellenistica e romana (Naples 1998) 165, and K. Muhlestein and B. Jensen, "The Mummy Portraits of Fag el-Gamous," Studia Antiqua 12 (2013) 54-56. Note also J.G. Keenan, "Deserted Villages: From the Ancient to the Medieval Fayydm," BASP 40 (2003) 138 (on Old Shāna and New Shāna). Hunt's packing list (n. 8) curiously makes no mention of "Manashinshâneh"; it may be that the objects recovered there are subsumed in the "Rubayyat" listing. "Fourth": Grenfell is counting sites with Ptolemaic nekropoleis, not individual cemeteries.

5. "Excavations," 1900-1901 (n. 3) 7, indicates that Grenfell and Hunt worked only one additional cemetery (the Roman one at ar-RūbIyāt).

6. For these logistical difficulties, cf. A.E.R. Boak (ed.), Soknopaiou Nesos: The University of Michigan Excavations at Dime in 1931-32 (Ann Arbor 1935).

7. "7 miles": An oblique reference, presumably, to Grenfell and Hunt's work at "Yâkûta" (MedTnet Qûta), concerning which see "Excavations," 1900-1901 (n. 3) 6. For the site, (inaccurately) described by Grenfell and Hunt as "six miles west from the lake," see Davoli (n. 19) 325-327.

8. Hunt's illness unsurprisingly goes unmentioned in "Excavations," 1900-1901 (n. 3). Less than a year earlier he had "caught the influenza" in Cairo (24 April 1900 letter from B.P. Grenfell to E.J. Goodspeed, Edgar J. Goodspeed papers, box 4, folder 9, Special Collections Research Center, University of Chicago).

9. "16 miles": Cf. "Excavations," 1900-1901 (n. 3) 4. Presumably Grenfell is referring to a land journey around the east end of the Birket Qārūn.

10. "Excavations," 1900-1901 (n. 3) 6, gives the distance as "[a]bout five miles."

11. By way of comparison, the maximum number of workmen at Bahnasā during Grenfell and Hunt's first season there was 110; cf. Grenfell, "Oxyrhynchus and its papyri" (n. 3) 7. Grenfell no doubt means "Bedouin" when he speaks of "Arabs"; for the employment of Bedouin and fallāhīn on excavations, cf. S. Quirke, Hidden Hands: Egyptian Workforces in Petrie Excavation Archives, 1880-1924 (London 2010) 91-92.

12. Grenfell' s use of physical violence would seem to stand in contrast to his mentor Petrie 's practice; see M.S. Drower, Flinders Petrie: A Life in Archaeology, 2nd ed. (Madison 1995) 180-181. Drower (p. 430) credits Petrie with revolutionizing "the attitude of an excavator towards his workmen, by insisting on supervising them personally, and substituting for the kurbash [hippopotamus-hide whip] a sympathetic and personal relationship and a system of rewards for care and vigilance."

13. Beyond bringing warmer temperatures, April is also the usual month of the khamsīn. Grenfell refers to this hot, dusty wind by its Italian name (sirocco) in letter TCD-042.

14. Grenfell was back in Oxford on 4 May 1901 (IE TCD MS 4323, no. 46).

15. A reference to P.Amh. II, the preface of which acknowledges Smyly, not Mahaffy, for "many valuable suggestions on the Ptolemaic texts" (p. v). For John Pentland Mahaffy (1839-1919), see W.B. Stanford and R.B. McDowell, Mahaffy: A Biography of an Anglo-Irishman (London 1971). "The Press": Oxford University Press.

16. "The crocodiles": A reference to the Ptolemaic papyri recovered from the Tebtunis crocodile mummies; these texts would be published in P.Tebt. I (1902), a volume for which Smyly would receive equal editorial credit alongside Grenfell and Hunt. P.Amh. II, which bears a 1901 date on its title page, appeared late in that year; in the 17 January 1902 edition of the (London) Times it is listed among the "New Books and New Editions" (p. 10).

17. A reference to crocodile papyri from the Tebtunis excavation that had been sent to Smyly. Smyly may have replied to Grenfell's query, for letter TCD-046, 5 May 1901, expresses regret that Smyly's "crocodiles" are not "more interesting."

18. For Jouguet, see, e.g., G. Husson, "Pierre Jouguet (1869-1949)," in Hermae: Scholars and Scholarship in Papyrology 1 (Pisa 2007) 143-152, and A. Merlin, "Notice sur la vie et les travaux de M. Pierre Jouguet, membre de l'Académie," Comptes rendus des séances de V Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres 94 (1950) 392-406. The cemetery "about six miles away" - Google Maps (consulted 16 November 2016) indicates that the distance is actually about 6 km - was Kõm Medinet GuTān. Jouguet, "Fouilles du Fayoum: Rapport sur les fouilles de Médinet-Mâ'di et Médinet-Ghôran," BCH 25 (1901) 384-385, describes the impetus for his "change of venue" as follows: "Le nazir d'une esbeh voisine m'avait apporté les débris d'un sarcophage et un fragment de cartonnage en papyrus, où par une déchirure on lisait quelques mots d'un document grec. Il était clair qu'ils provenaient d'un cimetière de la région. Il fallait donc avant tout découvrir ce cimetière et l'arracher aux pillards. Des bédouins qui travaillaient à la fouille me conduisirent presque aussitôt à Médinet-Ghôran."

19. 34 Cf. Jouguet (n. 33) 380-381, n. 1 (end), "[J]e n'oublierai jamais les journées heu- reuses passées chez eux [Grenfell and Hunt] à Kôm-Oushim [where Grenfell and Hunt started their season; cf. p. 1 of the letter], ni les conversations, par lesquelles ils m'initiaient amicalement à leurs recherches." It seems odd that Husson (n. 33) makes no mention of the relationship.

20. 35 Jouguet was born in Bessèges in the Gard département; see, e.g., Merlin (n. 33) 393. Its other implications aside, Grenfell's judgment here would seem to be rash: Jouguet would later occupy a "place eminente au sein des papyrologues fondateurs" and be honored in the same breath as Hunt (Husson [n. 33] 148).

21. The 50th year of Ptolemy VIII Euergetes II was 121/120 BC.

22. Jouguet would retain control of these papyri, which are currently divided between Paris and Cairo; see the website of the Institut de papyrologie de la Sorbonne, which notes, "[L]e fonds Jouguet contient aussi des documents provenant d'El-Lahoun (Ptolémaïs Hormou) confiés pour étude par G. Maspero, dont une partie fut rendue, après étude, à l'Egypte avec quelques documents provenant de Ghoran et Magdôla," (accessed 17 November 2016). See also P.Lille I, p. 2. Smyly, however, would end up being involved in the publication of some of them: The introduction to P. Lille 1 states, "[N]ous sommes tout particulièrement obligés à M. J. Gilbart Smyly, professeur à l'Université de Dublin; pendant un séjour à Lille, il a revu une grande partie des originaux et nous a fait profiter de son expérience, de sa science et de sa méthode avec une libéralité dont je lui garde un affectueuse gratitude" (p. 5). None of the published texts date to the 50th year of Euergetes II (in this regard note also W. Clarysse and H. Hauben, "Ten Ptolemaic Granary Receipts from Pyrrheia," ZPE 89 [1991] 47-68

23. Cf. "Excavations," 1900-1901 (n. 3) 7, "The first instalment of our finds, which are now all at Oxford pending a subsequent division with the Gizeh Museum, will probably form the annual volume of the Graeco-Roman Branch for 1902-3." Grenfell's "1903" is echoed in a letter to Smyly of 5 May 1901 (TCD-046). In the event, he and Hunt would not publish any of the papyri from their 1900/1901 excavations. According to TCD-046, the number of good or fair "papyrus mummies" recovered during the season was about 30, "besides pieces of many others."

24. TCD-046, sent by Grenfell from Oxford and dated 5 May 1901, reiterates the impossibility of a Dublin visit, at least before autumn. It does, however, indicate that Smyly was planning to come to Oxford that July (he would in fact appear in August; cf., e.g., TCD-071).