For Egypt, the age of Muʿāwiya (which may be taken to include the short reigns of his son and grandson, so 660–684) has attracted relatively little attention. It lacks the excitement of the conquest, where papyrus documents illuminate the establishment of the new Muslim regime, and it is far less well documented than the early eighth century, when the enormous archive of Aphrodito supports detailed analysis of many aspects of society and economy.Footnote ¹ Yet this period has produced more information than has generally been noticed, and presents an image of Egypt in the generation after the conquest, however incomplete the record may be. In fact, the material treated here constitutes by far the largest body of contemporary evidence in any source for the reign of Muʿāwiya.Footnote ² The potential of these documents for illuminating the period is considerable, but they are rarely if ever cited in works dealing with Islamic history.Footnote ³ Their evidence allows the effectiveness of Muʿāwiya's regime in Egypt to be seen, reflects degrees of continuity and change, and offers valuable comparative material for understanding the administration of the entire Muslim realm.

By the time Muʿāwiya became caliph, Egypt had been under Arab control for almost twenty years, and typically Islamic institutions had been established.Footnote ⁴ The country was ruled by a governor (wālī or amīr in Arabic, symboulos in Greek) directly appointed by the Caliph and given broad powers. He controlled the entire administration from his headquarters in Fusṭāṭ and was especially concerned with the finances. His main subordinates were the ṣāḥib al-shurṭa in charge of the police, and the chief judge or qāḍī. Both of these were usually named from the leading local families of Arab settlers; the posts were sometimes combined. The governor commanded the only armed force in the country, the Arab troops settled primarily in Fusṭāṭ, who formed a ruling military elite. They were enrolled on the official register, the dīwān, which entitled them to a salary and supplies drawn from the revenues of Egypt.

The governor headed a vast and hierarchic administration that regulated the civilian life of the native population. It maintained many aspects of the Byzantine system.Footnote ⁵ Immediately below the governor were the heads of the five provinces or eparchies into which Egypt had traditionally been divided; they were called dux or amīr (doux or amirās in Greek), and had full control of the finances in their provinces.Footnote ⁶ They in turn passed on orders to the local worthies, the pagarchs, who administered Egypt's fifty or sixty cities and their territories. They were the most important officials at a local level, and the ones who have left the most abundant documentation. The cities had their municipal officials and councils, while the villages were run by a headman usually called meizōn. Initiative came from above; lower ranks carried out instructions.

Apart from the names and campaigns of the governors, and the identification of some of their main associates, the sources reveal remarkably little about the history of Egypt in this period.Footnote ⁷ The country underwent a period of turmoil that started in 656 with a revolt stimulated by increased taxation at a time when the growing army of occupation was making further demands on local resources. Protestors sent to Medina wound up murdering the caliph ʿUthmān, beginning troubles that lasted two years until Muʿāwiya (then governor of Syria in revolt against the caliph ʿAlī) sent in Egypt's original conqueror ʿAmr ibn al-ʿAṣ who restored order in the summer of 658. According to the usually reliable Armenian chronicler Sebeos, the army in Egypt, consisting of 15,000 men, had joined forces with the Byzantine emperor and actually converted to Christianity, an event that finds no corroboration in other sources.Footnote ⁸ In any case, ʿAmr ruled the country successfully, and with considerable independence and privilege, until his death in March 664. As a result of his services in securing Syria and Palestine for Muʿāwiya's cause, he was allowed to keep the revenue of Egypt for himself, after paying the troops and covering the costs of administration. At his death he supposedly left seventy sacks of gold coins which his sons were reluctant to take; Muʿāwiya, however, showed no such hesitation. ʿAmr's son ʿAbd Allāh succeeded him for a few weeks, but Muʿāwiya rapidly appointed his own brother ʿUtba, who died the following February. His successor, ʿUqba ibn Āmir, only held office for two years (665–667). Finally, the caliph chose a local worthy, Maslama ibn Mukhallad, who ruled the country until 682. This was generally a stable and prosperous time, when the resources of the country were devoted to the ongoing jihad against Byzantium that culminated in the siege of Constantinople in 674–678. Maslama moved to Alexandria in 680, appointing the qāḍī as his representative to control the capital. While he was there he learned of the death of Muʿāwiya and was instrumental in ensuring recognition of Yazīd as caliph. He returned to Fusṭāṭ at the end of 680 and died there in April 682.

Since the documentary evidence is abundant and worth discussing in detail, this study will appear in two parts, the first discussing a single papyrus archive and limited other information about Upper Egypt, while the second will treat Middle Egypt together with the two great cities, Fusṭāṭ and Alexandria.

By far the richest source for this period is the extensive archive of Flavius Papas, pagarch of Apollonos Ano in the southernmost reaches of the Thebaid in Upper Egypt. The city, now called Edfu and the site of a magnificent temple, lies some 800 kilometres south of Fusṭāṭ, a journey of several weeks by boat, but much faster by land along the post road used in the period under discussion. It was occupied by forces sent by ʿAmr ibn al-ʿAṣ soon after the conquest of Babylon (Fusṭāṭ) in 641.Footnote ⁹

The archive consists of 107 documents in Greek of which the great majority have useful contexts, as well as a smaller number of documents in Coptic, mostly fragmentary and published only in summary.Footnote ¹⁰ All were found in a large jar, and constitute the personal archive of Flavius Papas, head of the local administration. The majority are official documents and the rest private documents and accounts. They were excavated in what may have been Papas’ office or house, and appear to have been thrown together at the time of his death.Footnote ¹¹

The Greek texts were first published in admirable detail by Roger Rémondon in 1953.Footnote ¹² They attracted relatively little attention for thirty years because they were dated to the early eighth century, a period dominated by the vast and immensely detailed papyri from Aphrodito, for which they seemed only to offer supplementary and confirmatory information.Footnote ¹³ In 1982, however, J. Gascou and K. A. Worp showed that they were in fact at least thirty years earlier than suspected, making them the prime source for a period that had seemed poorly known.

They noted a couple of peculiarities of the published Papas archive – that it was entirely in Greek, as opposed to the bilingual Aphrodito documents, and that it seemed to show a more hierarchical relation between the governing authorities, perhaps closer to the Byzantine tradition, and differing notably from the free communication between the pagarch of Aphrodito and the governor in Fusṭāṭ. They refined their arguments by examining documents that offered comparative material for dating (the entire archive of Papas, when it bears dates at all, employs only indictions).Footnote ¹⁴ The first document in the archive, P. Apoll. 1, for example, which refers to taxes of indiction II, names an amīr Ouoeith, who also appears in SB III 7240, where he is mentioned as having governed the Thebaid. Gascou and Worp showed that that document was to be dated 17.x.697, and that P. Apoll. 1 was therefore earlier than had been supposed, dating to 658/9, 673/4 or 688/9. P. Apoll. 2, of 6 January ind. VI, mentions a governor ʿAbd Allāh, who must be ʿAbd Allāh ibn Saʿd (648) or ʿAbd Allāh ibn ʿAbd al-Malik (708); there seemed no certain criterion for preferring one or the other. The key document was the undated P. Apoll. 9, one of a group of letters [11–18]Footnote ¹⁵ from the notary Helladios; most of the dated letters are of an indiction IV. 9 quotes the order of an amīr Jordanes, who also appears in P. Mert. II.100, a document previously dated to 699, but now with certainty assigned to 669. Consequently, the dated letters from Helladios are most probably of 660/1 or 675/6, with the rest written a bit earlier or later.

Other indications of chronology are more general: 15, from Helladios, mentions the collection of tribute from the Blemmyes, necessarily later than 652, when the governor ʿAbd Allāh ibn Saʿd made a treaty with these Nubians after failing to conquer them.Footnote ¹⁶ This supports, but does not help to specify, the chronology of this group of letters. If mention of the ergasia of Babylon refers to shipyards, as seems probable, 29 should date from 674 or later, the time when the shipyard was founded.Footnote ¹⁷ That might suggest a date in the 670s for the whole dossier of the notary Elias, 26–32.

Flavius Papas was part of a land-owning aristocracy that dominated the middle and upper – but not the highest – ranks of the Egyptian ruling class in the decades after the Arab conquest.Footnote ¹⁸ He was the son of Liberios, plausibly identified with a pagarch of Apollonos who was in office in 649.Footnote ¹⁹ Close relationships, and passing of office from father to son, are not unparalleled in this close-knit world.Footnote ²⁰ When his father was pagarch, it seems that Papas was dioiketes, “administrator”, of Apollonos [3] – that is, he held a subordinate position, perhaps in charge of a district of the pagarchy, or administrator of a class of land.Footnote ²¹

Papas therefore seems to have started his career as assistant to his father, in a position where he dealt with the requisitions of the central authorities – the amīr in the Thebaid and the governor in Fusṭāṭ. He evidently occupied a post of some responsibility, for he was summoned in this period to Fusṭāṭ to regulate the accounts [6].Footnote ²² His time in office cannot be closely defined. If he succeeded his father directly, he might have become pagarch in the 650s. The letter that mentions the amīr Jordanes (discussed above) shows Papas in office as early as 660 or as late as 676. So far, there is no way to tell how long he ruled the pagarchy. The example of Arsinoe (where conditions may have been different) indicates a fairly rapid turnover of pagarchs, with few lasting more than ten years; twenty years in office would be a rarity.Footnote ²³ It therefore seems safest to see Papas as presiding over Apollonos in the 660s and/or 670s. In any case, he was an official in the time of Muʿāwiya.

Papas seems to have had an undistinguished local career, with no unambiguous indication of rising through the hierarchy. Letters of indictions IV and V (660–2 or 675–7) from the notarios Helladios (11–13, 17) give Papas the middle-rank title of megaloprepestatos, “most magnificent”. This was a carryover from Byzantine times, when the highest employees of the state were classified in three grades, lamprotatos (Latin clarissimus), peribleptos (spectabilis) and illustrios (illustris).Footnote ²⁴ The first two denoted governors of provinces, high army commanders and leaders of the bureaucracy, while the highest, illustris, was reserved for senators and the ministers of government, who formed an inner aristocracy. Promotion to higher grades came only through holding the appropriate office or by a grant from the emperor. As a further recognition of their importance, officials also received honorary titles, of which megaloprepestatos (magnificentissimus) and the highest endoxotatos (gloriosissimus) were the privilege of senators. Already by the sixth century, however, a process of inflation had deprived most of these ranks and titles of their substance, with lamprotatos and peribleptos becoming largely honorary (though illoustrios still commanded respect) and the designation megaloprepestatos spreading to lower ranks. By Papas’ day, peribleptos and megaloprepestatos denoted middle-ranking officials like pagarchs, while illoustrios and endoxotatos were reserved for the top members of the hierarchy. Although the mechanism by which these titles were awarded after the Arab conquest is unknown, they continued to have a real, if degraded, meaning.

The notary Theodore, writing in ind. VIII and IX (664–6 or 679–81), calls Papas both megaloprepestatos [21 ind. IX] and peribleptos [20 22 24 25, ind. VIII and IX], usually adding ta panta times axios, “worthy of respect in every way”. The notary Elias, one of whose letters is dated ind. XI [27: 667/8 or 682/3] more consistently uses peribleptos. Footnote ²⁵ The notary Kollouthos adds the title komes, “count” [49], while Papas’ colleague the pagarch of Latopolis [37–40] and the lower ranking Pesynthios [42, 45], use this together with politeuomenos (member of the class that ran the municipalities) to address him, always employing megaloprepestatos. Their letters are all undated. Kollouthos also calls Papas pater and refers to his patrike despoteia [50]. Whether this indicates that Papas also held the municipal office of pater poleos, or was simply the subject of respect from a (younger) colleague is not evident.Footnote ²⁶ It is hard to see any clear indication of progress here, unless the title peribleptos represents a higher prestige, gained around ind. IX. In any case, Papas is in no way comparable to pagarchs like Theodorakios or Johannes of Arsinoe who rose from being megaloprepestatos to endoxotatos illoustrios.Footnote ²⁷ Nor did he have a glorious career like Fl. Atias, who from pagarch of Arsinoe became eukleestatos doux, then doux (provincial governor) of the combined province of Arcadia and Thebais.Footnote ²⁸

Papas was an aristocrat and landowner, whose estate (he may have had several) produced wheat, barley, wine and meat.Footnote ²⁹ There were donkeys and camels, for whom a stable (kamēlōn) was under construction [63, 98, cf. 101], as well as horses (their groom appears in 45). Part of the grain was set aside for maintaining peasants, workers and animals, and for a bakery and transport; but the majority of the expenses in this account [98] went to the church.Footnote ³⁰ Vegetables were supplied to a waggoner, a carpenter, a camel driver, a grain-sifter (koskineutes), and the church; they were also used for seed [99]. Papas had an agent, pistikos, who handled the money to be paid to the Mauroi and for yokes (?) and torches [87] and employees who were called (and called themselves) douloi “slaves” [79, 68, cf. 63] – but apparently not in a literal sense: for that these documents use the term andrapoda.Footnote ³¹ His wife, Sara, had her own accounts which she used for charity [87, cf. 63] Papas leased out some of his land to a manufacturer of oil (elaiourgos) who employed his own workers and animals; owner and lessee each provided half the seed for planting [75]. Since this document was included in Papas’ archive, it presumably related to his property. The case of another lease (P. Mert I.49) is not so clear: the public authorities (demosios logos) lease the eighth part of an estate for one year to a party who will provide his own animals and equipment for sowing, harvesting and threshing, and pay the substantial sum of 31¼ gold nomismata as well as 31¼ artabas of barley. In this case, the term used for the leasing party, demosios logos, probably indicates that this was a lease of state land whose supervision fell to Papas.Footnote ³² In any case, Papas was a substantial landowner, part of an aristocracy whose dominance of the local economy and political office had increased considerably during the late sixth century, but whose fate in the turmoil of the seventh has remained obscure.Footnote ³³

The archive of Papas is exceptional in that it contains a variety of correspondence. Other large documentary collections of the first century of Islamic rule are more one-sided. The correspondence in the most abundant and famous, from Aphrodito, consists of letters from the governor to the administrator of the village; likewise, a mid-eighth century archive of Arabic documents comprises the correspondence between a pagarch and his subordinate.Footnote ³⁴ The papyri relating to Athanasius, pagarch of Hermopolis at the time of the Arab conquest, will be of real interest, but they are not yet published, while the much smaller dossier of Flavius Atias, dux of Arcadia and the Thebaid at the end of the seventh century, consists of very short items like receipts and requisitions.Footnote ³⁵

Papas’ archive reveals his relations with his superiors, his subordinates and especially his equals. Much of it consists of letters to him from notarioi, secretaries of higher officials, and in at least one case from a fellow pagarch. They evidently all belong to the same educated elite, and employ the same flowery language of courtly politeness.Footnote ³⁶ Notaries address Papas in such terms as “my God-guarded master and brother” [15], “your admirable and honorable Friendship” [22, 24] “my brother admirable in all ways” [28, 32]. When inequity is involved, however, the tone changes and the inferior grovels before his higher-ranking correspondent. Thus, Papas addressing the amīr [10], refers to Apollonos as “the slave city of my lord” and Pesynthios, a lower-ranking colleague to Papas: “by this letter I bow down and kiss the revered feet of your God-guarded Power [42]”.Footnote ³⁷ An unnamed employee of the doux, writing in Coptic, signs off addressing “the footstool of your feet”.Footnote ³⁸ On the other hand, Papas’ father can address him in singularly blunt terms: “all you write is false” [61].

Such language reflects a well-established hierarchical society, with a common traditional education shared by the Christian elite that held all but the highest posts. Those were occupied by Muslims. At the apex was the governor (symboulos) in Fusṭāṭ, who never communicates directly with the head of this remote city of Upper Egypt, but his orders are passed on. In 648, a message arrived under the governor's seal with money for supplies and at an uncertain date, an official (perhaps the notarios Theodore), transmitted orders from the (unnamed) paneuphemos symboulos for naval supplies [106]. Although the governor rarely appears, his will lies behind many if not most orders, and any transaction that mentions Babylon necessarily involved the governor. When caulkers for the fleet [9], workers for the workshops [29], slaves [51] or requisitioned goods [21] are requested for Babylon or reported arriving there, it can only be because the central administration made the demand. The governor does not appear because his orders were communicated to the amīr, who passed them on through their own secretaries. Papas had no need to deal directly with the symboulos.

Other leaders of the new foreign ruling class – the qāḍī, the religious judge, or the ṣāḥib al-shurta, head of the police, also never appear, for their business was essentially with their fellow Muslims, of whom the great majority were settled in Fusṭāṭ. The caliph's government is even more remote, but can make its presence felt, as when the “Saracens of the amirās tōn pistōn” (i.e. Commander of the Faithful, translating the caliph's title amīr al-mu'minīn) bring a message to the pagarch of neighbouring Latopolis dealing with compulsory purchases [37].

Much more important for local affairs was the next below the governor in this chain of command, the doux or amīr of the Thebaid, based in Antinoe, some 550 kilometres to the north, but often travelling on tours of inspection.Footnote ³⁹ Even he rarely corresponds with Papas, and then mostly in connection with personnel matters: Soubeeit [7] orders Papas to detain the bearer of the letter, and in PSI Congr. XI.14 wants a legal dispute about a debt resolved expeditiously because the man involved is the amīr's fisherman and he has need of him. An unnamed amīr, probably writing in the 640s, summoned Papas to Fusṭāṭ to audit his accounts. Two of the holders of this office appear to have been Arabs – Soubeeit and Ouoeith [1] – but the name of Jordanes, who presided in the late 660s suggests that he was a Christian. It seems that most of the amīr's correspondence was in Greek, but his office also employed scribes who could write in Coptic.Footnote ⁴⁰ Amīrs may have met or corresponded with Papas only rarely, but they certainly made their presence felt. The pagarch received their orders which could be expressed in firm, threatening or intimidating terms. Jordanes, addressing all the pagarchs of the Thebaid, threatens huge fines if they fail to carry out his orders or – even worse – “we won't accept his property in lieu of his life” [9]. Other messages, brought by subordinates, convey the ineluctable orders of the amīr, who knew what was happening locally and sometimes intervened directly, as in the case of two deceased men, their widows and their Christian slaves [51].

The amīr's orders are quoted by his secretaries (notarioi) or those of Papas’ immediate superior, the amīr's representative, or topotēretēs, also based in Antinoe, but frequently away supervising local conditions or collecting taxes. The topoteretes seems to correspond to the Byzantine praeses, who never appears in these documents.Footnote ⁴¹ These officials, perhaps Christians (the only one named is called Christopher) are more directly concerned with local affairs.Footnote ⁴² One of them even announces his arrival in Apollonos, on his way to collect tribute from the tribes of the frontier [15]. They are the intermediary between amīr and pagarch, as in the case of the slaves noted above, where the topoteretes had intervened in favour of one of the women [51], and as shown by the topoteretes passing the decree of the amīr [9] to his notary who then communicated it to Papas. The topoteretes would also intervene in local matters, ordering people involved in a legal dispute to be arrested and sent to him [18, 19].Footnote ⁴³

The actual orders, though, were communicated by the ubiquitous notarioi, who plainly belong to the same class as Papas and share common attitudes. Of them, Helladios [9, 11–18] apparently works for the topoteretes (though he also receives orders from the amīr), while Theodore [20–25 and perhaps 106] writes in the name of both the amīr and the topoteretes, probably indicating that both have their headquarters in the same place – Antinoe; Elias [26–32] appears to be the direct subordinate of the amīr. Kollouthos [49–50], on the other hand, is evidently secretary of a neighbouring pagarch. They all write directly to Papas, as do Plato [37–40], pagarch of the neighbouring Latopolis, and Pesynthios [42–46], evidently of inferior rank to Papas. Except for the lowly Pesynthios, they all address Papas in the florid terms of equality, and are anxious that orders from on high be fulfilled. The amīr obviously inspires fear: “learn exactly his [the amīr's] intention because a word coming from his mouth about tax collection must not be disobeyed” [26]; “the implacable order of our lord the amīr” [27]; “I cannot disobey the order of our lords” [40]; Papas seems not to disobey, but to stall: he delays sending the taxes [26, 29] or to perform some requested work [40]; the amīr has to write three times to summon him to Fusṭāṭ [6]; the notarios of the topoteretes writes several times, apparently in vain, to get a list of local fugitives [14].Footnote ⁴⁴

Ultimately, the local officials can only obey orders from on high, however difficult or unreasonable. A letter to Papas from Plato of Latopolis gives a rare glimpse into what may have been a common attitude. He reports that “Saracens of the Commander of the Faithful” had brought a letter from the amīr regarding compulsory purchases. The status of the messengers suggests this was a matter of some importance, in which the amīr had refused any compromise. “Let him taste the water” (apparently an invitation for the amīr to drown in the Nile), writes Plato, “the Devil brought him” [37].Footnote ⁴⁵ Pagarchs at least can help each other out in the face of heavy demands. The same Plato asks Papas to lend him three ship caulkers, as the amīr had requested but Plato could not supply [38]. He also offers [40] to send workers to help Papas deal with another order from the amīr. Kollouthos, the notary of another pagarch, who cannot supply the cloaks requested by the government, asks Papas to provide them, offering to pay [49]. Papas indeed gets to work on them but typically has to be reminded to make haste [50]. Likewise, when Pesynthios is in need of straw for his horses, he asks Papas for a supply and sends a boat to collect it (PSI XIII 1345).Footnote ⁴⁶

As pagarch, Papas was strictly subordinate to higher authorities whose orders he would fulfil, transmit, or delay performing.Footnote ⁴⁷ Most of them involved taxes and requisitions, but Papas also had juridical functions, and may have played a role in the municipal administration, to judge by his qualification as politeuomenos, or member of the curial class which traditionally filled town councils.Footnote ⁴⁸ He could arrest people or send them on to higher authorities [18] and intervened to solve a dispute about a house and taxation [22–24]. Apollonos Ano evidently had a prison, as did the provincial capital [63].Footnote ⁴⁹ For the most part, Papas was acting on orders, but in the case of a sailor who had moved to Latopolis [39], apparently on his own initiative, for his colleague Plato asks him to resolve the matter.Footnote ⁵⁰ Papas could also receive petitions for justice [69], but his relation to the judge, dikastēs, [61] is unknown. In any case, Papas, in his private capacity, dealt with normal legal matters such as leases [57], mortgages [58], or loans against security [66].

Papas headed the local bureaucracy that in Apollonos included an accounting office (logistērion; its boēthos appears in 47), and employed a financial secretary (chartoularios: 25), secretaries (notarioi 57), financial officers (zygostatai 83) and the inevitable tax-collectors (apaitētai 42, 75).Footnote ⁵¹ Papas also employed a messenger (apostolos) and a camel-driver [89]. The daily expenses of his office included allowances of meat, dried fish, vegetables and spices given to low-ranking employees (paidia), sailors, and to the Mauroi [85].

Amīrs, their representatives, pagarchs and notaries are all parts of a hierarchy that had lost little of its Byzantine complexity or love of rank and title. Ranking high is the treasurer, sakellarios, an office held by the amīr Ouoeith [1], who received money paid in to the treasury, sakella. Footnote ⁵² One document [61] mentions a lawyer (scholastikos) who held the high rank of endoxotatos, and presumably served the amīr. Civic officials include the ekdikos or defensor [46], the kouratōr and the members of the class who could serve on the town council, politeuomenoi, among whom Papas is counted. The bishop also had authority in civil affairs [46].Footnote ⁵³ He may have controlled the hospitia (46: a term that could include poorhouses, inns and hospitals).

For tax purposes at least, the population was grouped into corporate bodies [75]. They included the landowners (ktētores) [also 76], councillors (politeuomenoi), sailors, clerics, embroiderers, sellers of vetch (orbaropolai), fishermen, oil producers [also 57], carpenters, potters (of jars and pots), shepherds, paid agricultural workers (misthioi geōrgoi) [also 48, 98], and sowers.Footnote ⁵⁴ The doctor who signed a mortgage [58] may have been an independent operator. Low on the social scale are humble employees called douloi “slaves”, three kinds of bath attendants (perichutēs, balneatōr, kapsarios 97, cf. 41), and actual slaves, (andrapoda 37) specified in 51 as Christian. Slaves were especially owned by Muslim officials, and appear to have been more numerous at Babylon than elsewhere: P. Apoll. Copt. 25 mentions people “in Babylon to serve as a slave”, while the andrapoda of 51 were being confiscated from two deceased Christians and sent to Babylon by order of the amīr. Such slaves could easily be converted to Islam, hence perhaps the condition specified in 66, where a slave is offered as security for a loan, with the provision that he be sold to Christians, presumably to avoid conversion.

An essential part of the administrative machinery were the various messengers (usually called grammatēphoroi) who brought the orders of the government to every part of Egypt. In the early years after the conquest, Muslims themselves were employed, called mōagaritai (from the Arabic muhājirūn) “emigrants” the common designation for the conquerors. They appear in documents of the 640s [2, 3], before Papas became pagarch. Later, on one occasion [37], the messengers are specified as Saracens of the Commander of the Faithful – in that case agents of the distant central government, but most of the time, the messengers are called soldiers or stratiōtai. Footnote ⁵⁵ They were usually, if not exclusively, Christians: a soldier Sergius is named twice: in 9 he brings a message from the amīr to the topoteretes, and in 50 will transport cloaks from Apollonos to the pagarchy of Kollouthos. Soldier Enoch 32 (and an anonymous soldier 34) brings messages from Elias; Johannes the son of Constantine [51], who brings Papas a message from the amīr, was presumably also a soldier since he had the authority to arrest the slaves of two deceased men. Likewise, Helladios orders some people arrested and sent with a soldier of Apollonos [18], suggesting that the pagarch, like his superiors, had a military force under his orders. The symmachoi of the amīr [96] were also messengers.Footnote ⁵⁶ In 30, the amīr's notary Elias sends a boukellarios with a message, a reflection of the changed status of this term, which formerly denoted soldiers in the service of great landowners.Footnote ⁵⁷ The Saracen regime, like its predecessors, attached some importance to a postal service: the amīr sent a veredarios [27, cf. 64] to determine the progress of canal building at Latopolis. This term denotes an official messenger of the rapid courier service, called barīd in Arabic and following precedents in the Roman and Persian empires as well as pre-Islamic Arabia. Some sources report that it was established by Muʿāwiya. He may perhaps more probably have reorganized or extended it. In his time, it reached from Syria to Egypt, Iraq, Arabia and the Byzantine Empire. The barīd had another practical use: as well as conveying fast messages, it brought intelligence from the various provinces to the caliph.Footnote ⁵⁸ The veredarios presumably moved by land, but the Nile also served for messages, carried by boats of the grammatēphoroi nautai [55, 23, 24]. The demands of the state reached everywhere, whether in the form of taxes, requisitions, conscription or forced labour. In this, Egypt was following its ancient traditions, maintaining a long-familiar complexity that Papas’ archive well illuminates. Tax collecting was highly organized, involved every level of the government, and generated an enormous amount of paperwork. It manifested a level of organization better known from the somewhat later Aphrodito papyri.Footnote ⁵⁹

The vast fiscal apparatus depended on accurate knowledge of the human and material resources of the country, and careful record keeping. As a first step, the pagarch (and his office) drew up the lists, diastalmoi [78], of all the potential taxpayers in the district, according to the relevant classifications. Individuals (these lists include only men) were classed as onomata, comparable to the Roman capita, presumably for assessment of the poll tax [74, 76]. One list gives names together with amounts paid [80]. Another names people responsible for the analōma, perhaps the tax for local expenses [78, cf. 77]. One document [75] lists corporate bodies, presumably for assessments or requisitions, while another, on a more private scale, deals with “our douloi”, apparently for their obligation for the compulsory purchases the pagarchy has to provide [79]. The government needed to know the agricultural as well as human resources, and for that the land was carefully surveyed. A surviving document, 73, which covers fourteen irrigated properties (mēchanai) reveals the complex methods employed, and suggests that it may have been preliminary to establishing a more comprehensive land register. Something similar seems to have happened in Syria at this time: according to the medieval chronicler Michael the Syrian, who drew on lost early sources, Abū al-Aʿwar, a noted general of Muʿāwiya, counted all the Christian peasants of Syria around 668–670; unlike the Egyptians, they had previously not paid taxes.Footnote ⁶⁰

All this detailed information was sent up to Antinoe, where the amīr and his topoteretes saw to the assessment and collection of taxes and other obligations. The amīr played the central role, with general control of the provincial taxation [37], assigning quotas for the money taxes and goods owed by each community. He issued demand notes for taxes, (entagia, though the term does not appear in this archive), receipts [1] and orders for requisitions, epistalmata [96]. The demands were sent to Papas for transmission to the localities concerned; it was apparently the job of the local authorities to distribute the tax burden among the payers. It seems that the large landowners collected the taxes from their own peasants, which they then turned over to the official tax collectors, apaitētai. Footnote ⁶¹ This is evidently the case of Pesynthios, who sent his “fellow-slave” (his son) to collect poll taxes from the peasants of a village in Papas’ jurisdiction.Footnote ⁶² Likewise 79 that mentions “our douloi” implies a similar system, reminiscent of the Byzantine autopragia, where the large landlords had considerable autonomy in collecting taxes on their own properties.Footnote ⁶³

If there were any problem with the taxes, the pagarch or his staff could be summoned not simply to the amīr, but to the capital, to explain his accounts [6]. For in this, the amīr, however powerful he seemed from the viewpoint of a remote provincial town, was very much the subordinate of the distant governor. In his province, though, it was the amīr who ordered requisitions [10, 20, 96] or compulsory purchase [37] of goods, who drafted men for work on irrigation projects [27], the fleet [28, 38] or the workshops (or shipyards) in the capital [29]. He issued rules about the pay of sailors [28] and concerned himself with strangers and fugitives in the provinces, people evidently trying to escape their obligations [20].

The topoteretes maintained and organized the lists of taxpayers [39] and, as already noted was the intermediary between the amīr and the pagarch. In 46, he intervenes in a dispute about poll tax, requesting a couple to give a guarantee. It was the topoteretes who ordered a boat from Papas, so he could collect tribute from the Blemmydes of the frontier [15, cf. 11, 12]. He also collected taxes from Papas, who on one occasion was ordered to send the gold to Panopolis where the peripatetic topoteretes would collect it [10].

Taxes were assessed in kind and in cash. The former, though of great importance, rarely appear in these documents. The ship that carried state cargoes (of grain paid in as tax) is mentioned once [107], as is a payment in wine: the amīr assessed on Apollonos 2,500 knidia of wine from the estates (ousiakai), which Papas forwarded in two boats, complaining about the serious shortages (panstenōsis) in his city as he sent the goods to the topoteretes [10].Footnote ⁶⁴ The documents also refer to money paid in in lieu of goods that had been requested, a familiar practice, here involving wheat [52], oil [88], iron [86] and scrap iron [88].

The money taxes, khrysika dēmosia, are very much in evidence. They were collected in instalments, katabolai, twice a year [19, 26, with note p. 67]. After the tax demands were received, the local collectors went out to extract them for the population, turning them over to the zygostates, who paid them in to Papas. The money arrived in moneybags, apokombia, from which Papas deducted a sum for local expenses [82, 83] before forwarding them to the topoteretes. Some of this was paid out to embroiderers and carpenters or used to buy bread for the sailors of the fleet.Footnote ⁶⁵ Papas also administered a logisma, or account for extraordinary expenses, on which the government could draw [52].

The dēmosia were primarily a land tax, but the poll tax, called diagraphon [39, 42] or andrismos [24] is very much in evidence.Footnote ⁶⁶ It was assessed on all males over the age of fourteen, who were evaluated as onomata [74, 76], apparently a fiscal unit corresponding to the roman capita, in which an individual might be assessed as more or less than a caput according to his ability to pay. The topoteretes maintained the lists of those subjected to the poll tax [39: katagraphē tou diagraphou].

Complicated questions about the poll tax arose when taxpayers moved, whether legally or not. Pesynthios consulted Papas about a case involving the taxes of peasants of Papas residing in Pesynthios’ jurisdiction and vice versa [42–46]. When the wife of one of them was threatened with arrest in Apollonos because of her husband's poll tax liability, Pesynthios asked Papas to send her back to her husband, who resided (or was working) in Pesynthios’ territory. The solution apparently was to keep him on the tax register of Apollonos and, at the suggestion of the topoteretes, to make him give a personal guarantee before the local authorities [46, presuming this obscure letter deals with the same couple]. Similarly, a sailor moved from Apollonos to Latopolis where Papas had him arrested [39]. He complained to Plato (the pagarch of Latopolis) who left the decision to Papas, providing that Christopher (apparently the topoteretes) had not changed the sailor's tax registration from one city to the other. The question involved his diagraphon – his poll tax, and once again the topoteretes who kept the provincial registers was involved.

Taxes were not the only burden on the population which, as of old, was subject to forced labour. Some of this involved a permanent need, work on irrigation canals. The notarios of neighbouring Latopolis wrote urgently to Papas requesting him to send workers for his canal, for the amīr had ordered the work to be finished quickly, to such an extent that the notarios had had to drop everything, send one of his notaries to supervise the work, and urgently request extra labourers from Papas, as well as Papas’ own appearance, to make sure the work was completed. The urgency was not only to carry out the will of the amīr, but to make sure the workers returned home in time to pay their taxes [26, 27]. There is no evidence that these workers were paid, but an account [88] that mentions payment to those who were working in Maximianopolis suggests that Papas had sent workers to the quarries there, and that they were receiving a salary. Workers conscripted for shipbuilding and the fleet will be considered below.

The pagarch was also responsible for some services. The topoteretes required a boat [11, 12] for which the materials would be furnished, to be built, evidently for government service.Footnote ⁶⁷ This involved accumulating materials and mobilizing a local workforce. On another occasion [15], the notarios Helladios, who had reached Latopolis, requested that a fishing boat be put at his disposal the next day when he arrived at Apollonos, so that he could use it to go to the frontier and collect tribute from the Blemmydes. Such boats were not necessarily pressed into service as two slightly obscure letters [31, 32] reveal. Here, the notarios Elias has hired a boat that now needed repairs, for which the notary would supply the wood. The boat's owner delayed the work so he could stay at home, in a village of Papas’ pagarchy. Elias therefore requested Papas to make sure the work was finished and the boat delivered.

Like this service, the state also paid for the goods it required. One of the earliest documents of the dossier [2] of 648, accompanied 22½ solidi sent by a mōagaritēs under the seal of the governor ʿAbd Allāh, as payment for three months' supply of cows’ and goats’ milk. The author of an undated anonymous document [107] sends Papas three nomismata to buy firewood and send it on to him; the money came from philoi in Babylon, perhaps officers of the Treasury. He also requests (apparently as a personal favour) some charcoal for the coming winter. An early document [3], probably of the 640s, suggests that the mōagaritēs who brought the letter simply demanded a quantity of firewood (cf. 4, apparently in the same hand, a request for wood or firewood). Firewood was in constant demand [33, 36, 93, 95] especially for the forges at the shipyards of Babylon, as attested in the Aphrodito archive. Compulsory purchases could also pose a problem, for the pagarch had to find the goods and buy them at a price that corresponded with what the state paid. Plato of Latopolis expressed his disgust [37] at such an order from the amīr, whose importance can be judged by the fact that it was brought by four Saracens of the caliph himself, who refused to make any concession.

Requisitions of goods further added to the local burdens. Prominent among them was the rouzikon or rizq, an essential part of the supply system for the Muslim military imposed on the non-Muslim population.Footnote ⁶⁸ It was an entitlement for the Muslims by right of conquest and encompassed a range of products. The rizq was collected in Egypt from the very beginning, at the time of the conquest of Babylon by ʿAmr ibn al-ʿAṣ. He assessed a poll-tax of two dinars on every adult male, and a subsistence allowance for the Muslims of wheat, honey, oil and vinegar. These goods would be stored in and issued from a special warehouse, the dār al-rizq. He took a census of the Muslims, each of whom was to receive from the Egyptian population every year a long woollen robe (for which a Coptic robe could be substituted), an upper cloak or burnoose, a turban, trousers and shoes.Footnote ⁶⁹ These demands were approved by the caliph ʿUmar, but already had a precedent from the time of the Prophet, who imposed a tribute of 2,000 robes on the Christians of Najran in the Yemen.Footnote ⁷⁰

Notable among these obligations, and most difficult to procure, were the long woollen gowns, called in these documents gonakhia and specified as highly embroidered.Footnote ⁷¹ They seem to have been especially valued, for when Muʿāwiya asked ʿAmr ibn al-ʿAṣ how he should deal with anyone who captured or beheaded his enemies, ʿAmr responded that he should be like the Emperor and “offer him wealth and some of the garments of Egypt”.Footnote ⁷² On one occasion, a neighbouring pagarch (quite likely of Latopolis) had been ordered to supply gonakhia for the rizq but for some reason was unable; his notary wrote to Papas asking him to provide them, against payment [29, 30]. Because of the importance of this obligation, embroiderers were treated with care: when Plato, pagarch of Latopolis, attempted to send two of them to Babylon to fill his quota of conscripted labourers, the amīr sent them back [38]. Embroiderers were important enough to form a category of taxpayers [75, cf. above] and one account records payment to an embroiderer in the same context as issue of bread for the sailors [83]. Another document [94] lists seasoning, dried fish and cheese to be issued to the camel drivers. Such goods were presumably paid out of the storehouses of the rouzikon, whose contents are illuminated by 93, a list of products which have been identified as the contents of a state storehouse. They include old wine, salt, nuts, vinegar, garum, meat, cheese, honey, pigeons, boiled down wine and dates. In addition, there was wine, salt, saltpeter, torches, saffron, firewood, and mustard to be delivered to the boat of Aaron, who may have been a pistikos or supply agent of the government.Footnote ⁷³

These documents also reveal a major effort of the government, to which a substantial part of the taxes and requisitions were evidently devoted: the fleet. Orders for men and materials came from on high, and took priority over local needs. In one letter to Papas [106], a notarios – probably Theodore – reports that the symboulos himself, the governor in Babylon, had given orders to use every means to send sailors with their equipment and food supplies. The governor was eager that the sailors be assembled and sent on in all haste, and wrote ordering that their equipment and food supplies be provided from the taxes. The amīr also sent orders specifying that a litra of bread and an artaba of wheat for each sailor be delivered to pistikoi, who would make sure that it reached its destination intact. The tone, the haste and the demands show that this represents preparation for a major naval expedition, a kourson of the kind well known from the documents of Aphrodito, written a generation or more later.

Requisitions for the fleet were routine and provoked great hardship locally. On one occasion [28], the notary Elias informed Papas of a problem that had arisen regarding sailors who had been called up for service in the fleet from the pagarchies of Panopolis, Antaeopolis and Apollonopolis. It seems that the locals had paid substitutes to go in their place. The question arose about who should receive the pay the government normally issued to the sailors. The matter was referred to the amīr who ruled that only the people actually going to sea – eis tēn thalassan – should be paid. In other words, a naval expedition was being planned, and the locals had no desire to serve on the sea, far from home. The same document shows that the sailors’ pay came from the money taxes, dēmosia khrysika.

Going to sea was not the only problem, for ships had to be built as well as manned, and for that the shipyard of Babylon required workers. Skilled workers like carpenters [30] and caulkers [9, 38] were especially needed. They were routinely conscripted from the pagarchies, however remote. As usual, the orders came from on high. When the amīr learned how many men were required for the ergasia of Babylon, he sent round a circular specifying the quota for each pagarchy [29].Footnote ⁷⁴ In Papas’ case, it was three, but the notary Elias specifically warned him not to try to substitute unskilled workers for the needed specialists. This caused a real problem, for caulkers were hard to find and were needed locally. When Plato, pagarch of the neighbouring Latopolis, had to fill a quota of five caulkers [38] he sent five men, but three were rejected because one was in charge of a commissary (presumably for storing goods paid in as tax) and the others were embroiderers – all workers the government wanted to have stay in their place carrying out work it deemed useful. Plato therefore wrote to Papas asking him to lend him five caulkers, promising to take care of their expenses himself.

The naval demands were liked even less by the conscripted workers. As noted, some paid substitutes to go to sea in their place, but a more common response was to run away, to move to a different pagarchy where they might escape notice. This stirred a strong response from the authorities. The amīr Jordanes, who presided around 670, wrote an angry letter to all the pagarchs of the Thebaid:

Helladios, who forwarded the order, urged Papas to arrest any fugitive caulkers and send them on in a boat, in handcuffs (xylomangana).

Caulkers, of course, were not the only people who ran away. Fugitive taxpayers were also a serious problem, and had been since the very beginning of the Arab administration when the introduction of the new poll tax raised the fear that people would make serious efforts to avoid it.Footnote ⁷⁶ This certainly happened in Papas’ district, for the topoteretes had to write him more than once demanding a list of all strangers (who would necessarily include tax fugitives) in his pagarchy, on whom a tax or fine of three nomismata was to be assessed [13, 14].

The fleet demanded more than people. In fact, war at sea involved mobilizing a significant part of the resources of Egypt – materials for shipbuilding, supplies and equipment for the fleet, food and supplies for the sailors.Footnote ⁷⁷ All this is much better known from the Aphrodito papyri, a generation later than the Papas documents, but these papyri give enough information to indicate that such a wide-ranging economic and military organization was already in place.

As the governor's decree noted, sailors had to bring their own equipment and provisions, to be supplied by the pagarchy (their salaries were paid from the general taxation: 28: ek tou dēmosiou). Consequently one of Papas’ accounts [83] mentions money paid out to a deacon to buy bread for the sailors of the fleet, to be issued, as in the governor's document, by a pistikos; while [30] mentions boiled-down wine apparently for the same purpose.Footnote ⁷⁸ Another lists products issued by the local storehouse [96]; they include 54 artaba of bread for 18 caulkers (that is, they, like the sailors, were to bring their provisions with them) and vinegar for Clysma, the naval station and shipyard on the Red Sea.Footnote ⁷⁹

Goods for shipbuilding were in constant demand, both in the form of raw material and finished products. Acacia wood was especially valued for its ability to stick together when wet: in 11, Helladios reports sending some to Papas, who in turn was to send his agent to a certain Aristophanes, evidently a specialist, who would select pieces suitable for making the pegs used to attach rams to the front of the ships. The Coptic texts give further examples of demand for acacia both from Papas and from a churchman.Footnote ⁸⁰ They also show that entire keels and masts, as well as ropes and anchor-cables, were being demanded.Footnote ⁸¹ In 20, the amīr, via the notarios Theodore, sent out an order for psellia to Papas whose pagarchy's quota was 120. Theodore duly received them [21] and sent them on to Babylon – that is, they were a requisition of the central government. The terms used, psellia and podopsellia, at first seem to refer to bracelets and anklets, but more probably they indicate equipment for the fighters of the fleet, respectively armbands (or fittings or clamps for artillery) and greaves.Footnote ⁸² Skins were another demand, one which Papas was chastized for being slow to fulfil [diphthera 29; cf. the dermata rouzikou of 94 – to be issued to a Saracen, Abū Yezid – and 95]. They too had a use for the fleet, as padding to protect the ships against fire or ramming.Footnote ⁸³

The demands of the fleet were enormous and fell especially heavily on Egypt, which had a long tradition of shipbuilding and producing fleets and sailors. It was Muʿāwiya who organized the first Arab fleet.Footnote ⁸⁴ According to tradition, he proposed building a fleet to the caliph Umar, but the caliph rejected his plan, probably believing that the state was already stretched to its limit. When Muʿāwiya's cousin ʿUthmān succeeded in 648, however, the situation changed as the latter embraced the naval plan with enthusiasm. Its first result was a successful attack on Cyprus in 649, which devastated the country, amassed huge quantities of loot, and brought back thousands of captives (a contemporary inscription fantastically claims 120,000).Footnote ⁸⁵ An Egyptian contingent from Alexandria, commanded by the governor ʿAbd Allāh ibn Saʿd, was actively engaged. Cyprus suffered another major raid in 653, as did Crete, Cos and Rhodes (where the Arabs established a base).Footnote ⁸⁶ Egyptian ships are not mentioned specifically on these occasions, but they played a major role the next year in the greatest expedition of the period when a huge fleet, manned by fighters from the entire empire and with warships outfitted in Alexandria and the coastal region, set out against Constantinople.Footnote ⁸⁷ They reached Chalcedon, opposite the Byzantine capital, only to be destroyed by a storm. The Byzantines, taking advantage of the catastrophe, counter-attacked in the following year, 655, in an expedition whose importance is revealed by its being led by the emperor Constans II in person. It met the Arab fleet at Phoenix on the south-west coast of Asia Minor, only to suffer a resounding defeat. In this expedition, which culminated in what the Arab sources call the Battle of the Masts, ʿAbd Allāh ibn Saʿd commanded the fleet, whose sailors were Egyptians while the fighters were Arabs.Footnote ⁸⁸

These great battles, which consumed enormous resources of men and material, exhausted both sides, and the civil war that soon followed brought a temporary stop to naval expeditions. Once Muʿāwiya was firmly established in power, however, the fight at sea resumed with a vengeance. Naval expeditions against Byzantium are attested for 664, 668, 669 and 670, with Egyptian participation noted for 664, 668 and 669.Footnote ⁸⁹ The war was not all one-sided, for the Byzantines aimed to weaken Egypt, whose resources and fleet posed a constant danger. In 665, Muʿāwiya is reported to have sent an army into Egypt to destroy Byzantine forces there, killing 5,000 of them.Footnote ⁹⁰ The circumstances are unknown, but presumably involved a landing on the coast, as in 673, when the Byzantines occupied the town of Paralos.Footnote ⁹¹ One consequence of this coastal vulnerability was the establishment of the major naval arsenal at Fusṭāṭ, far safer from attack than Alexandria, whose population was in any case of dubious loyalty. These hostilities culminated in the second Arab expedition against Constantinople, which set out in 674, established a base at Cyzicus on the Sea of Marmara, and continued its attacks during three seasons. There was a final raid in 678 or 679.Footnote ⁹² Since the governor's letter [106] is undated, it cannot be associated with any particular raid, but the angry denunciation of fleeing caulkers by the amīr Jordanes [9] would suit the great expedition against Constantinople, for he was quite probably in office at that time.

All these demands, in addition to the regular taxes and requisitions, caused grave problems for the pagarchs, whose complaints may have had some substance. Papas refers to the great distress, panstenōsis, of his district when writing to the topoteretes [10] and his colleague Plato, with whom he had to co-operate on irrigation works in Latopolis, sympathetically acknowledges the distress and shortage of manpower that afflict Papas [26].

The Greek texts of this archive are concerned almost exclusively with civil matters, whether public or private, and give no hint of the importance of the church in the life of the people. Only the Coptic documents mention the “brothers” – i.e. monks, and show that the monastic communities raised cattle and improved their land.Footnote ⁹³ The partially excavated remains of Apollonos put the church in perspective by uncovering a substantial monastery, apparently built in the late sixth century, adjacent to the western wall of the city.Footnote ⁹⁴ This might have been the monastery of Abba Kyros, mentioned in SB I.5114 of the early seventh century. When the church was built, the wall was no longer in use (the monastery covered part of it and reused some of its bricks), and the main defences were confined to the central citadel at the highest point of the settlement, where reinforced fortifications and a two-storey building were uncovered.

One of the main functions of Apollonos in the Byzantine period – attested as late as the end of the sixth century – had been as a garrison, but its military role, if any, after the Arab conquest is invisible in these documents.Footnote ⁹⁵

Ecclesiastical life of a different sort flourished in Upper Egypt, where monasticism remained an intrinsic part of the country's life. Late in the sixth century, Apa Abraham, bishop of Hermonthis, founded a monastery dedicated to St. Phoibammon in a remote location above the Nile.Footnote ⁹⁶ When the Patriarch asked him to move to a more convenient site, he chose the abandoned Temple of Hatshepsut (now called Deir al-Bahri) near the town of Djeme, the ancient Thebes. His testament, which survives in Greek (a language the bishop did not know), reveals a characteristic of this church, that the monastery and its lands were the personal possession of the abbot.Footnote ⁹⁷ The will specifies that the monastery and everything in it – clothing, books, wood and pottery household utensils – as well as all movable property and real estate be left to the priest Victor to do with as he would, maintaining the church of its revenues and caring for the poor. No one else, especially members of Abraham's family, had any claim whatsoever. The will was drawn up in strict legal terms, reminiscent of Ammianus Marcellinus’ famous characterization of the Egyptians as being litigious in the extreme.Footnote ⁹⁸

The monastery thrived. Victor left it to Peter (his will is dated 634) who in turn willed it to Jacob, in a document in Coptic dated to 660 or 675.Footnote ⁹⁹ In similar legalistic terms, Peter provides for the future of the monastery, with clauses punishing violators of the will with a fine of a pound of gold. Jacob's will, written about 695, has also survived, listing among the monastery's property gold, silver, brass, clothes and books, as well as animals, trees, cisterns and fields, with buildings at the monastery, in the kastron of Thebes and the city, Hermonthis. In other words, the monastery was prospering through the reign of Muʿāwiya, as it continued to do through the eighth century. Other documents relating to the monastery are probably of Peter's time, but none are dated. In one of them, for example, a certain Elias, son of Solomon, committed himself to take care of the camels he had rented from the monastery, a hint of its manifold economic activities.Footnote ¹⁰⁰