The Journal of Juristic Papyrology vol. li ( 2021 ), pp. 1–26 Joshua Allbright THE RHETORIC OF AIKIA IN PETITIONS FROM ROMAN EGYPT* O n 26 Hathyr, 248 ce, Aurelios Sarapion, an octogenarian Arab archer from the village of Philadephia was the victim of a violent attack. 1 When a soldier named Iulios allegedly stole a piglet from Aure- lios’ daughter, Aurelios naturally tried to get it back, asking the soldier to swear an oath that he did not take the piglet. Instead, he was met with a savage beating by the soldier in broad daylight, right in the middle of the village in front of a number of witnesses, among whom were a procurator and other Arab archers, who saved Aurelios from what he was sure would be a very painful death. While the circumstances of Aurelios’ case are unique, the instance of violence is not; there are hundreds of extant peti- tions detailing violence suffered by the inhabitants of towns and cities in Egypt. But the way Aurelios Sarapion (or perhaps his scribe) describes the act of violence warrants some attention. While this petition uses the noun βρι in its opening, the act of violence is described later on with the phrase πληγα με κσατο, ‘he brutalized me with blows’. The verb used here, ακζεσθαι (sometimes ακζειν), is a relatively rare verb in ancient Greek texts; yet we see a marked uptick in its usage in petitions * I am grateful to Christelle Fischer -Bovet and James Hua for their helpful comments and suggestions on earlier drafts of this paper, as well as the anonymous reviewer and edi- tors of JJurP. 1 SB IV 7464. A fuller discussion of this petition follows below.