Geography and Administration in Egypt (332 BCE–642 CE)

This article outlines the administrative geography of Egypt under the Graeco-Macedonian regime and as it evolved over the next millennium. This information comes from papyri and ostraca—sources that differ from the material evidence of archaeological finds yet are not so distant from these as literary evidence often is. What makes papyrological texts so informative is their being on the same timescale as the actors involved: their speaking, as it were, in everyday words. There are some downsides as well. Mahaffy's observation applies most aptly to the difficulties we encounter when trying to reconstruct the administrative framework of Graeco-Roman Egypt and having to deal with the intricacies of a territory and its management as it evolved over time and under changing regimes.