  Philodemus’ philosophical works are exceptional in being known to us entirely from papyri copied during his lifetime or, at the latest, in the century after his death, which are, accordingly, excellent qua records of what Philodemus actually wrote. Most scribal errors in them were corrected at an early stage, and despite the usual obstacles to be encountered in texts on papyrus, (such as the absence of word-breaks and of a standard, comprehensive system of punctuation, and the arrangement of text continuously, in columns, rather than by chapters or sections), the result is a clean and intelligible text—where it can be read. Sadly, there is much that cannot be read (see Section 2.2.4).