P.OxyOxyrhynchus: A City and its Texts, Virtual Exhibition: Navigation
Question to an oracle: Second or third century AD
In the absence of Auntie Marge’s Problem Page, a person could apply to a temple oracle in the hope of a solution to a personal problem. The usual practice, inherited from Egyptian religion, was to submit a pair of slips like this to the priest, each asking a question, of which the second question would effectively be the negative of the first; one of the two slips would be returned to the petitioner. This example is unique in apparently having the answer nai, ‘yes’, at the foot.
The Oxyrhynchus Papyri vol.L no.3590