The archive of the Hellenized Greek-Egyptian Dionysius shows a comparable pattern in which the household is structured vertically, through close links between brothers, as well as horizontally. Greek fathers in Ptolemaic Egypt at first show a tendency to rear daughters rather than expose them. Despite the appearance of homogeneity in Egyptian administrative documents, she determines, the radical mix of cultures and ethnic backgrounds within this geographical area guarantees that family life under the Ptolemies was complex and far from uniform. Those conversant with the author s earlier work in family and women s history will already know that this book is accessible, engaging, and characteristically sensible-although P. s pardonable desire to clothe the bones of her subjects in real flesh leads her, on occasion, to become unduly speculative, disregarding her own caveat that familial sentiments in Greek culture should not automatically be equated with ours. Those anxious to preserve Zenon s good name could object that actual evidence for biological paternity is at best ambiguous, and that a true only son, even if illegitimate, would arguably have been recognized, adopted, and raised as heir to his father s sizable estate rather than left to fend on his own.
Errors are few.
It also benefits considerably from attention to class difference and from thirty years worth of scholarship on Greek gender protocols. In short, it ought to supplement, rather than replace, Lacey. But even that will not happen until OUP brings out a moderately priced paperback edition. The hardback cost is simply exorbitant for a book with a mere 229 pages of text, three plates, and ten figures.