Papyrus
By: Richard Parkinson & Stephen Quirke; with contributions by Ute Wartenberg & Bridget Leach
Contributors: Quirke, Stephen.; Wartenberg, Ute.; Leach, Bridget.
Edition: First University of Texas Press edition
Series: Egyptian Bookshelf
Publisher: University of Texas Press
Published: 1995
Place of publication: Austin, TX, USA
Language: eng
Format: Paperback
Number of pages: 96
ISBN-13: 9780292765634
Copyright date: 1995
Subjects: Papyrus (The plant)
Description: One of the most remarkable inventions of ancient Egypt was the making of "paper" from the papyrus plant. As early as 3000 B.C. sheets and rolls of papyrus provided an ideal surface for writing with a reed pen and pigments of carbon and red ocher. Egyptian scribes used papyrus for legal and administrative records, letters about business and personal life, as well as for literary texts and compendia of knowledge.

Religious hymns and litanies were recorded, as were the great collections of formulae to secure life after death, the Books of the Dead. The authors examine the methods of making and conserving papyrus, the various scripts written on it, the writing practices of the scribes, and the different uses of papyrus under the Pharaohs and their successors, the Ptolemies and the Roman emperors.

Egypt has preserved much Greek literature and administrative writings, and papyrus remained the writing material of the Mediterranean world until it was eclipsed in the ninth century A.D. by cloth paper from the Orient, ending a tradition that had lasted four thousand years.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (p. 88-89) and index.
Table of contents: title: Acknowledgements
pagenum: 7; label: Chapter 1
title: Natural History and Manufacture
pagenum: 9; label: Chapter 2
title: Practical Usage
pagenum: 24; label: Chapter 3
title: Contents and Storage
pagenum: 49; label: Chapter 4
title: Usage and Survival outside Pharaonic Egypt
pagenum: 65; title: Chronological Table
pagenum: 85; title: Citations
pagenum: 86; title: Bibliography
pagenum: 88; title: Papyri in the British Museum
pagenum: 91; title: Index
pagenum: 94