Papyrology is the study of ancient literature, correspondence, legal archives, etc., as preserved in manuscripts written on papyrus, the most common form of writing material in the Egyptian, Greek and Roman worlds. Papyrology entails both the translation and interpretation of ancient documents in a variety of languages, as well as the care and preservation of the papyrus originals.

Papyrology as a systematic discipline dates from the 1890s, when large caches of well-preserved papyri were discovered by archaeologists in several locations in Egypt, such as Crocodilopolis (Arsinoe) and Oxyrhynchus. (See Oxyrhynchus Gospels.) Leading centres of papyrology include Oxford University, Heidelberg University, Columbia University, the University of Michigan, the Österreichische Nationalbibliothek, and the University of California, Berkeley. Founders of papyrology were the Viennese orientalist Joseph von Karabacek (Arabic papyrology), ^[1] Wilhelm Schubart (Greek papyrology),^[2] the Austrian antiquarian Theodor Graf who acquired more than 100,000 Greek, Arabic, Coptic and Persian papyri in Egypt, which were bought by the Austrian Archduke Rainer, ^[3] G. F. Tsereteli who published papyri of Russian and Georgian collections, ^[4] Frederic George Kenyon,^[5] Ulrich Wilcken, Bernard Pyne Grenfell, Arthur Surridge Hunt ^[6] and other distinguished scientists.

The collection of pagan, Christian and Arabic papyri in Vienna called the Rainer papyri represents the first large discovery of manuscripts on papyrus found in the Fayum in Egypt. About 1880 a carpet trader in Cairo acquired on behalf of Karabacek over 10,000 papyri and some texts written on linen. Of those over 3000 are written in Arabic. The papyri originated from Kôm Fâris (Krokodílon Pólis) and Ihnasiyyah al-Madinah (Herakleopolis Magna), the textile pages from Kôm al-?Azâma. They were exported to Vienna in 1882, and presented in a public exhibition the following year that caused a sensation. Later the papyri were bought by the Grand Duke Rainer and presented to the Kaiserliche Akademie der Wissenschaften in Vienna.^[7]

Footnotes

1. ↑ Jane Turner, The Dictionary of Art, Grove's Dictionaries, 1996, p.548
2. ↑ The Harvard Theological Review, Harvard Divinity School 1941, p.220
3. ↑ Glenn W. Most, Disciplining Classics: Altertumswissenschaft als Beruf, 2002, p.192
4. ↑ Bobodzhan Gafurovich Gafurov, Yuri Vladimirovich Gankovski?, Fifty Years of Soviet Oriental Studies, Institut narodov Azii (Akademii?a? nauk SSSR) 1968, p.11
5. ↑ Leo Deuel, Testaments of Time: The Search for Lost Manuscripts and Records, Knopf, 1965, p. 335
6. ↑ Oxford Centre for Postgraduate Hebrew Studies, The Journal of Jewish Studies, Jewish Chronicle Publications, 1974, p.420
7. ↑ Jean Anker, Libri: International Library Review, International Federation of Library Associations 1951, p.234

See also

• Leiden Conventions
• Oxyrhynchus
• Greek Magical Papyri
• Elephantine papyri
• Magdalen papyrus
• Nag Hammadi library
• EpiDoc
• Epigraphy
• Writing systems
• Palaeography
• University of Michigan Papyrus Collection

External links

• Places and discovery of papyri
• Introduction to Papyrology
• Columbia University Advanced Papyrological Information System (APIS)
• Duke Databank of Documentary Papyri (DDBDP)
• The University of Michigan Papyrus Collection
• John D. Muccigrosso's Papyrology Homepage
• Ancient Egypt papyrus collection and stories behind each scene
• papyri.info
• Oxyrhynchus Papyri Project
• Leuven Homepage of Papyrus Collections
• Association Internationale de Papyrologues, Links page
• Updates of papyrological publications, compiled from Papy-L et al.

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