G 40827 recto: Dimensions: 9.4 x 10.8 cm. Date: mid- to late III century BC. Provenance unknown. Fragment of a letter. The content of this fragmentary papyrus may be characterised as a business, administrative or, possibly, private letter concerning inter alia ten slaves or free individuals (somata), the relatively large number of whom tends to suggest a business or administrative relationship between the sender and the recipient. The lack of any expression of personal feelings, courtesy or greetings in the preserved part of the text might also favour such an interpretation but it has to be borne in mind that probably a large part of the sheet has been lost. The probable use of a rush pen (which is more suited to writing Demotic than Greek), the orthographic mistakes in the text (see lines 3, 5-6, 8-9 and, possibly, line 1), the incorrect usage of the imperative after the expression kalos poieses in lines 5-6 and the use of a narrow (and presumably tall) sheet for a letter suggest that the writer of this text was probably a bilingual Egyptian individual, perhaps a professional scribe, who was more familiar with writing Demotic than Greek and who did not bother to change his brush for a kalamos when drawing up this letter in Greek. The conclusion that the writer probably had an Egyptian background is also suggested by the following characteristics of this papyrus. First, the fact that practically the whole width of the column is used for writing the text, leaving virtually no margins. Further, the text seems to have been continued on the verso, rather than a larger sheet being chosen for it (the possibility, however, that the text on the verso was a mere afterthought written as a postscript after the main text cannot, of course, be ruled out). Finally, the fact that the sheet was turned upside down when turning it over and so the writing on the verso is upside down in relation to that on the recto. All these characteristics are common in Demotic letters. The papyrus was published by C. A. La’da as CPR XXVIII 2.