Early Christian Books in Egypt

In Early Christian Books in Egypt, New York University papyrologist Roger Bagnall argues that a significant proportion of what has been written over the last 100 years relating to the early editions of Christian texts discovered in Roman Egypt has been inaccurate.

His book is made up of four chapters, each representing a lecture given by the author at Paris' École Pratique des Hautes Études. It is presented in a relaxed writing style which is very easy to read. However the book is still of an academic nature, and the reader would benefit from being familiar with Coptic Egypt, as well as some of the documents discussed.

The first chapter gives an overview of the problem with the dating of early Christian writing, concluding that while most Christian papyri are published, there are very few, if any, examples which can be dated securely to the second century AD. Some have attributed this to the lottery of archaeological recovery, although the author Roger Bagnall argues that this silence is more likely a reflection of the small-scale spread of Christianity among Egyptians, with the number able to write or own books even more marginal.

Pinpointing Dates

The second chapter looks at two specific case studies where the dating has been under question; volume 69 of the Oxyrhynchus Papyri, and the other regarding the earliest known gospel fragments on papyrus. Bagnall spends the first part of this chapter critiquing the research of Thiede regarding these gospel fragments. The question of chronology is problematic in any aspect of the archaeological discipline, and this is particularly apparent when these fragments are being dated on archaeological context and handwriting analysis alone, meaning high and low chronologies are derived for each fragment. He also questions whether these fragments all originated under a single codex or were simply written by the same scribe.

The chapter on book production is particularly interesting, with discussions on the cost of bibles during the third and fourth centuries. A full Bible cost an average man six months' income, and therefore was out of financial reach of most of the population other than the churches and monasteries themselves. The expense of producing a book meant that parchment and papyrus was often recycled and reused; worn out fragments of text were used to fill the bindings of the codices. This makes dating particularly difficult as the papyrus or parchment is often older than the text. Other such interesting nuggets included in this chapter demonstrate things have not changed much – the legal documentation cost double the price of any other scribal service.

The Codex

The final chapter looks at the development and spread of the codex form of book, which is often thought to have been introduced by the Christians. Bagnall examines the evidence and shows that although the codices were used for full copies of the Bible, some Christian texts were still written on rolls. He discusses numerous codices of a non-religious nature dated to the second and third centuries – a time when Christianity in Egypt did not have the numbers or influence on Egypt to introduce the codex. He brings the argument neatly back to the first chapter, and the problems with the dating of the texts (without accurate dating, we are unable to clearly identify when the codex was introduced and whether Christianity in Egypt was strong enough to have been instrumental in its spread).

This book was well written, intelligent and cleverly argued; I can see it becoming the “instant and major classic in the field” that its back cover predicts.

Next: Find out about the renovation of Egypt's earliest Coptic Christian monastery in a Heritage Key video below:

Video: Deir Mar Antonios, The Coptic Monastery of Saint Anthony