People who know me know that my favorite papyrus collection is the one at the University of Michigan. And it's not necessarily because of the papyri in their collection. The people who are involved in the collection are remarkable: the archivists, collection managers, curators, conservationists, and so on. I have edited quite a few Michigan papyri (and am working on several currently) and the assistance I have received has been second to none. When I was beginning to enter the field of papyrology as an editor of texts, Prof. Arthur Verhoogt was especially helpful to me in securing reservations, providing high-resolution photographs, and formal letters of reservation.    

I am excited to announce here his forthcoming book on the history of the Michigan Papyrus Collection, due out this fall: 

Discarded, Discovered, Collected: The University of Michigan Papyrus Collection (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2017).

I think the cover photo is perfect: these are some of the various boxes and containers (e.g., a Kodak film box!) in which the papyri were transported from across the Atlantic in the early twentieth century. Here is the description from the publisher's website:

Description
Discarded, Discovered, Collected: The University of Michigan Papyrus Collection provides an accessible introduction to the University’s collection of papyri and related ancient materials, the widest and deepest resource of its kind in the Western hemisphere. The collection was founded in the early part of the 20th century by University of Michigan Professor of Classics Francis W. Kelsey. His original intention was to create a set of artifacts that would be useful in teaching students more directly about the ancient world, at a time when trips to ancient sites were much harder to arrange.

Jointly administered by the University of Michigan’s Department of Classical Studies and its Library, the collection has garnered significant interest beyond scholarly circles and now sees several hundred visitors each year. Of particular note among the collection’s holdings are sixty pages of the earliest known copy of the Epistles of St. Paul, which are often featured on tours of the collection by groups from religious institutions.

Arthur Verhoogt, one of the current stewards of the University of Michigan Papyrology Collection, provides clear, insightful information in an appealing style that will attract general readers and scholars alike. Extensively illustrated with some of the collection’s more spectacular pieces, this volume describes what the collection is, what kinds of ancient texts it contains, and how it has developed from Francis Kelsey’s day to the present. Additionally, Verhoogt describes in detail how people who study papyri carry out their work, and how papyri contribute to our understanding of various aspects of the ancient Greco-Roman world. Translations of the ancient texts are presented so that the reader can experience some of the excitement that comes with reading original documents from many centuries ago.

Publication made possible in part through the support of Virginia and William Dawson.

Arthur Verhoogt is Professor of Papyrology and Greek and Arthur F. Thurnau Professor at the University of Michigan.

​In the latest volume of the Oxyrhynchus Papyri series, Brent Landau and T.C. Hoklotubbe provide the edition of a fifth/sixth century papyrus (P.Oxy. 81.5260), which preserves a variant of a Christian hymn known from several Greek patristic sources. The title to their entry is, “Hymn of the Cross: Amulet?”
 
Each line of the fragment begins with a standalone staurogram (the combination of the Greek letters tau and rho) representing the word “cross” (this is highly unusual), followed by a descriptive phrase. Here is an example from column 2:

I here want to draw attention to the fact that a variant of this “cross hymn” is found in another, earlier Greek papyrus fragment housed at Michigan. The papyrus, P.Mich. inv. 1628 (LDAB 195), was published in 1984 by Nancy Priest, who drew parallels with the text of Alexander Monachus’ De inventione sanctae crucis (see PG 87:4073). Neither the Michigan papyrus nor the text of Alexander are mentioned by the authors of the new Oxyrhynchus fragment, so a couple noteworthy observations can be made. 

In the Michigan fragment, the word “cross” (σταυρός) begins each line and is abbreviated all but two times as σταυρ, with an oblique stroke written through the letter rho (see image at right). It just so happens that this stroke combined with the letter rho resembles a staurogram, which stands alone at the beginning of each line in the Oxyrhynchus fragment. One might be tempted to argue that the scribe created the staurogram in this way intentionally, although this oblique stroke is a typical marker of abbreviation (in fact, he/she uses it as such in l. 16 for another word. So, we cannot be too sure.
 
More importantly, the Michigan papyrus has textual parallels with the sources cited by Landau and Hoklotubbe: Pseudo-Chrysostom (which, as the authors show, has been attributed to John II, bishop of Jerusalem), Ephrem the Syrian, and John of Damascus.
 
For example, the Michigan fragment shares a few readings with all three patristic sources: σταυρὸς χειμαζομένων [Ps.C: -οντων] λιμήν; σταυρὸς ἐκκλησίας θεμέλιος, σταυρὸς δούλων ἐλευθερία. Other readings in the Michigan fragment are shared with only one or two of the patristic sources but it is clear that all these sources are drawing on a common literary tradition. 
 
These parallels are important for two reasons: dating the composition of the hymn and reconstructing the text of the Michigan fragment.

The Michigan papyrus was dated to the fourth century ("or perhaps a bit later"); the Oxyrhynchus papyrus was dated to the fifth/sixth century. Landau and Hoklotubbe say, “Although 5260 is dated to the fifth/sixth century, the hymn may have originated earlier, at a time when the composition of new hymns was controversial” (p. 12). Given the dating of the Michigan papyrus, we can at least say that variants of the hymn were indeed circulating around a century prior to the composition of the Oxyrhynchus fragment. As Landau and Hoklotubbe demonstrate, the stanzas of this hymn diverge among all sources, both in content and sequence. The hymn probably has earlier origins and was perhaps reshaped by different authors in different locations along the way for various purposes (this was typical of homiletical texts, for example). 
 
Priest did not reference the sources cited by Landau and Hoklotubbe but those sources are incredibly significant because now some lines in the Michigan fragment can be restored with certainty. I am working on a re-edition of P.Mich. inv. 1628 and will try to submit that for publication soon.
 
Finally, it is interesting to note that Priest, Landau, and Hoklotubbe all wonder about the function of their papyri. Priest argued that the Michigan fragment may have served as a hand-list of notes for a sermon on the cross. Landau and Hoklotubbe suggest the Oxyrhynchus fragment could have been designed as an amulet or for liturgical use. It is difficult to say with certainty how these papyri functioned (prayer? homily? amulet? notes? private devotion?) but the question is worth pondering. These papyri, especially the Oxyrhynchus fragment, also raise some interesting questions about the development/use of the staurogram in early Christian artifacts. 

In my last blog post announcing the digitization of the manuscripts from St. Catherine's monastery, I posted an image of Greek Manuscript 212, or GA Lectionary 846, a ninth century Greek liturgical codex containing the Gospels and the Apostolos, written in a sloping "Slavonic uncial" script. I want to make two observations about this manuscript here and then tell you about an exciting research project. 

First, it is a very small codex in dimensions: 14.5 (H) x 11.7 (W) cm. As a disclaimer: I do not study Greek manuscripts that are quite this late, but I do know that most lectionaries were intended for public reading, and so the format is somewhat surprising. Perhaps some of my readers will know just how atypical the dimensions are for Greek lectionaries from this period. 

Second, I noticed that this codex is a palimpsest, meaning that there is an "undertext" that has been wiped/washed away to make space for the "uppertext" which now stands. Scribes typically repurposed majuscule manuscripts for liturgical ones. Take a look at this photo from folio 51, which I have manipulated slightly in order to highlight the palimpsestic features:

The 1994 Kurzgefasste Liste indicates that the undertext may be from the Psalms but there is a question mark there (“l 846: untere Schrift Psalmen (?)”). This script of this undertext is obviously older, perhaps dating to the 7th century.

Significantly, as part of the Sinai Palimpsests Project (SPP), the monastery is using spectral imaging to read, identify, and date erased texts found in palimpsests housed at the monastery, of which Greek 212 is one of more than 160 palimpsests. The results of this project will be significant.

We await to see the full results of this project, but I have a strong feeling that some of the findings will be significant. Some of the incredible discoveries have already been listed on their website. I will update readers on this exciting project as I learn them!