I was listening to the news this morning and this quirky thought came into my head. I'm sure there's many of those in there.
Anyway. Is there a resource that has collected "news items" from antiquity? You know, a compendium of advertisements for the long ago past.
Something like, "Rufus and Tenium have just opened a fruit shop in the lower quarter of the city. Items such as fresh figs, tomatoes and leeks from the Orient now available."
mm.
Smiling, but exactly how did you imagine those newsheets might work (prior to presses). An army of copyists, with stacks of papyri? And in the bazaar .... who would notice?
Actually, if you visit Ephasus in Turkey, you can view more informal adverts of the less socially-acceptable kind. But for a flavor closer to your idea, writings from Elephantine, Moulton & Milligan snippets, and of course the Chicago Assyrian Dictionary quickly come to mind for commercial communications.
There’s some books about ancient papyri and graffiti that might fit that
WIN 10 i7 9750H, RTX 2060, 16GB RAM, 1TB SSD | iPad Air 3Verbum 9 Ultimate
I'd also look for graffiti. I think in Pompei there where some advertisements. At least a menu from a taberna.