Rav Pappa's Ten Sons (article preview)

At a siyum at the end of a Talmudic masechet, a common practice is to recite the ten “sons of Pappa”. There are חנינא בר פפא, רמי בר פפא, נחמן בר פפא, אחאי בר פפא, אבא מרי בר פפא, רפרם בר פפא, רכיש בר פפא, סורחב בר פפא, אדא בר פפא, דרו בר פפא. A common, though mistaken explanation is that these are all brothers, the sons of the famous Rav Pappa, student of Rava, and that when he made a siyum, he would invite them. Rav Hai Gaon explains how this isn’t true. Several were of earlier different scholastic generations, so weren’t the sons of fifth-generation Rav Pappa.

This becomes relevant in our sugya, on Bava Kamma 80b. There are three statements: (a) The court sounds the alarm on Shabbat over a breakout of sores; (b) a door that is locked will not be opened quickly; and (c) with regard to one who purchases a house in Eretz Yisrael, one writes a bill of sale for this transaction even on Shabbat. The attribution, or citation chain, of these three statements aren’t clear. Our gemara has three versions. Labeling Amoraim, we have (A) Rav Acha bar Pappa, (B) Rav Abba bar Pappa, (C) Rav Adda bar Pappa, (D) Rabbi Chiyya bar Pappa, and (E) Rabbi Chanina bar Pappa. The gemara has A cites B cites C; or alternatively B cites D cites A; or alternatively B cites A cites E. Some manuscripts have different versions, so Vatican 116 merges the middle and final alternative into D citing E, and Escorial has the first as A cites B and the last as B cites Rabbi Chanina (not bar Pappa). 

Vatican 116 manuscript, Bava Kamma 80b

The Bar Pappa Biographies

What do we know about these five?