People and places mentioned in select Zenon papyri

Authors
Lena Tambs
Maintainers
Formats
other
Nodes
279
Edges
514
Years
-263-259
Access
|
Added
2025-04-17

Of the included networks (listed below), this entry describes 'Tambs_3partite_casestudy.gexf'.

--> The file 'Tambs_3partite_casestudy.gexf' holds a directed 3-partite network model of people and places mentioned in 36 dated texts from the earliest phase of the Zenon archive. Network size: 279 nodes (36 texts,184 individuals, 59 places) connected by 514 edges (attestations).

In addition, the following networks are found in the repository:

--> Two smaller models, presenting filtered or restructured subsets of the network data behind the 3-partite network (above), that show different ways attributes revealing that people 'were in' places can be modelled:

  • 'Tambs_2partite_inplace.gexf' is a directed 2-partite network of people-in-texts. The network is a subset of the core component of the 3-partite network ('Tambs_3partite_casestudy.gexf'), filtered to only show people and texts active in at least one edge signalling that a person 'was in' a place (Network size: 27 nodes [7 texts, 20 individuals] connected by 47 edges [attestations].
  • 'Tambs_2partite_persons-in-places.gexf' is a weighted directed 2-partite network of people-in-places. The network is based on data contained in the previous model ('Tambs_2partite_inplace.gexf'), but reorganised so people are now linked directly to the places they are revealed to have been in (Network size: 28 nodes [8 places, 20 individuals] connected by 24 weighted edges [in place]. Import strategy: sum.

--> 'Tambs_2partite_whole.gexf' is a directed 2-partite network of people attested in texts assigned to the Zenon archive (263-229 BCE). The model represents network data extracted from Trismegistos (lists of people attested in 1845 texts) in 2021. Network size: 5,831 nodes (1845 texts, 3986 individuals) connected by 11222 edges (attestations).

--> Four network representations of a single text, representing four approaches to translating ancient papyri into network models.

  • 'Tambs_3partite_TM665.gexf' is a directed 3-partite network of people and places mentioned in TM_665 (Network size: 39 nodes [1 text, 25 individuals, 13 places] connected by 65 edges [attestations].
  • 'Tambs_2partite_TM665.gexf' is a directed 2-partite network of people mentioned in TM_665 (Network size: 26 nodes [1 text, 25 individuals] connected by 44 edges [attestations].
  • 'Tambs_1partite_collapsed_TM665. gexf' is a 1-partite network projection of people mentioned together in TM_665 (Network size: 25 nodes [25 individuals] connected by 300 edges [co-attestation].
  • 'Tambs_1partite_TM665. gexf' is a mixed multiplex 1-partite network of interpersonal relations revealed by TM_665 (Network size: 25 nodes [25 individuals] connected by 56 edges [39 social, 17 economic].
Tags
ancient_archive
co-attestation
k-partite
papyri
ptolemaic
Modern Countries and Continents
Egypt
Structure
Directionality
directed
Weighted
no
Hypergraph
no
Longitudinal
no
Multigraph
yes
Multilayer
no
Multipartile
-
Probabilistic
no
Self Loops
no
Signed
no
Spatial
no
Canonical Citation
Tambs, L. (2025) ‘People and Things on the Move (supplementary material)’. Zenodo. DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.13963730.
Funding
The research presented in the article the dataset relates to was carried out under the Centre of Excellence in Ancient Near Eastern Empires (ANEE), funded by the Research Council of Finland (decision no. 352747). The larger Zenon project is now supported by the Kone Foundation. The study was published open access with support from ANEE (Research Council of Finland, decision no. 352748).
Data Publisher
Zenodo
Network Topics
economic
mobility
social
Node Topics
person
place
text
Edge Topics
attestation
Node Attributes
accessibility
archive_id
century
collection
copy
date
document_subtype
document_type
inventory
language
latitude
longitude
material
node_type
notes
occupation
possible_cross-ident.
provenance(written)
region
relation_to_archive
sex
sigla
subject_matter
timeslot(s)
Edge Attributes
agency
certainty
characteristics
cultural_identity
from(place)
greek_title
in(place)
label
language
line
notes
occupational_role
origin
role
tm_action
to(place)
type
where_in_text
Uncertainties
Nodes
-
Edges
-
Node Attributes
-
Edge Attributes
-
Statistics
Avg. Clustering Coefficient
-
Avg. In Degree
-
Avg. Out Degree
-
Construction

To build these networks, the following steps were taken:

  • lists of people attested in Zenon papyri from the online Trismegistos databases (https://www.trismegistos.org/) were extracted with F. Alvares Freire's “attestation per document” python webscraper (www.github.com/fernandaalvaf/Attestation-per-Document.) in 2021
  • the outputs were cleaned and relevant information integrated into the project's relational database (MS Access)
  • next, the ancient texts were read and text publications consulted for the purpose of extending and enriching the dataset through methods of close reading and literature review.
  • for modelling the networks, relevant data were queried, exported and imported to Gephi (https://gephi.org/) for network analysis and visualisation
Sources

- Trismegistos: https://www.trismegistos.org/

- Text publications of the 36 texts that make up the case study

Source Types
ancient_archive
online_platform
publication
research
Add. Comments

Whereas various networks are presented in the repository (see description above), network characteristics here describe the 3-partite network of people and places mentioned in the 36 texts from the Zenon archive that made up the case study (i.e. model 'Tambs_3partite_casestudy', visualised as 'Tambs_Fig4').

Images

16