Two
fragments of a diptych, containing a letter which presents problems of reading
and interpretation. What is legible is only a small part of the text at the
beginning of the main part of the letter and, if ueni (line 2)
is to be taken as an imperative, the writer is instructing someone to come to
Vindolanda in connection with a numeratio. The hand in which
the text is written bears some similarity to that of [291], [248] etc., but
since the latter come from the household of Brocchus and Severa, it can hardly
be the same hand (note, too, that it uses interpunct more consistently). The
name of the sender, on the reverse, which suggests that the letter is not a
draft or copy, is certainly not Brocchus. If it is Cerialis, as it seems to be,
it is not easy to explain how a letter from him (a) ended up at Vindolanda and
(b) was addressed to someone from his own cohort (see notes to ii.2 and back 2).
Of the four lines on the right-hand portion, the first is so abraded as to be
illegible for all practical purposes; the other three could well be written by
the same hand as [225]-[32], which we have
identified as the hand of Cerialis. The message seems to be dated at the end
(line ii.4) and this may be explained by the supposition that Cerialis was
instructing someone to return to Vindolanda at short notice. In short, it is
possible that we have a letter from Cerialis perhaps to a centurion of his own
cohort, absent but not too far away, instructing him to return for some
official duty; and that the letter was brought back to Vindolanda by its
recipient and deposited there.