"Tracking Papyrus and Parchment Paths": A New International Project on Coptic Literature

Abstract

The purpose of the new project presented in these pages is to offer an innovative approach to the study of the evolution of Coptic literature and, more specifically, to the corpus of writings produced in Egypt between the third and the late eleventh centuries, and expressed in the different dialects of the Coptic language. Its aim is to provide a new perspective on the cultural landscape of Christian Egypt by interweaving literary, historical, codicological and archaeological data, and producing a series of scholarly tools, till now unavailable, in a digital environment, including an archaeological Atlas of late antique and early mediaeval Coptic literature that will be searchable at different chronological, regional and thematic levels. As part of the above-described research activities and goals, a complete catalogue of the Coptic papyrus codices preserved in the Museo Egizio will be produced, as well as an edition of their titles and scribal subscriptions. The fragmentary codices in question, purchased in Egypt by Bernardino Drovetti in the 1820s, are a unique example of an entire well-preserved late antique institutional library -very likely originally belonging to the cathedral of This/Thinis -reflecting the literary tastes and dogmatic orientations before what can be defined as the ninth-century Coptic book revolution, which significantly changed bookmaking in Christian Egypt. The library of Thi(ni)s is a crucial and transitional instance in the history of Coptic books, which saw on the one hand the creation of new codicological and palaeographical features and on the other the progressive emergence of multiple-text codices.

Black Egyptian inks in Late Antiquity: new insights on their manufacture and use

“…The first cluster of manuscripts forms part of the collection from the Cathedral of Thi(ni)s, nowadays Ǧirǧā, and is preserved at the Museo Egizio in Turin. The library of Thi(ni)s is indeed a crucial and transitional instance in the history of Coptic manuscripts, which saw on the one hand the creation of new codicological and palaeographical features and on the other hand the progressive emergence of multiple-text codices (Buzi 2017;Buzi 2018b). Additionally, the fact that the manuscripts in question have very likely been manufactured in a limited span of time and have been penned by a limited number of copyists, placed the study of the library of Thi(ni)s as a first choice in our corpus.…”

“…Based on an interdisciplinary approach involving philology, codicology, archaeology and digital humanities, the 'PAThs' project joins efforts to investigate the processes of production, dissemination and storage of Coptic literary works in relation to their geographical contexts. Its aim is to provide a range of digital tools where the scattered pieces of relevant information available are studied, collected and geochronologically organised to make them accessible to the professionals working in manuscripts cultures (Buzi 2017). Unfortunately, however, Coptic literary manuscripts rarely contain clear information regarding their chronology or geography.…”

Georeferencing Napoleonic Cartography to reconstruct Ancient Egypt landscapes: methods in comparison and the case of the island of iw-rd in the 16th nomos of Upper Egypt

“…One of the strong points of this project is its multidisciplinary approach that also involves digital humanities. In this perspective PAThs also takes advantage of the Laboratorio di Cartografia Storica of Sapienza University of Rome, coordinated by Julian Bogdani, which focuses on the elaboration of cartographic documentation on Egypt using GIS-based methodologies (Buzi et al 2017;Bogdani 2017, 59-69;Bogdani 2018, 200-210;Bogdani 2019).…”