Coptic Egypt
By Carol Downer
Sponsored by the British Egyptian Society
1
Coptic Writing (UC71106
& 71107)
10
1
9
11
12
2
2
Coptic Shoes
(UC28337), Socks
(UC16766) & Belt.
3
Lahun / Kahun Case
8
4
Tombstones from Koptos
(UC14770, 14772)
14
10
5
Tombstone of Thomas
the Presbyter (UC32762)
6
Tombstone (UC16624)
3
7
Tombstone (UC14471)
13
15
7
6
4
5
8
Fragment of black
steatite bowl (UC2451)
9
Fragments of vessels
showing saints
(UC19480, 19481 &
19482)
10
Bead Cases 28 – 30
11
Fragments of vessels
showing natural scenes
12
Menas Flasks
(UC19516-8)
13
Glass vessels
14
Combs
15
Musical Instruments
It is frequently suggested that Ancient Egypt reached its demise long
before what is now called the Coptic Period. However, this trail
emphasises the continuity of culture and ideas from Pharaonic and
Graeco-Roman into Christian Egypt, as well as the obvious change
and innovation which occurred, particularly in religious affairs.
Margaret Murray long ago wrote ‘the Coptic period is the Cinderella
of Egyptological Studies’ (Ancient Egypt and the Near East 1935) It is
to be hoped that, with the renewed interest in Late Antiquity across
all disciplines, this attitude may be changing.
What does the word ‘Coptic’ mean to us? The word Copt is derived
from the Greek ‘Aigyptios’ via the Arabic Qibti. The original Greek
may itself be a corruption of ḥwt ka Ptah, the name of one of Ptah’s
Memphite shrines, meaning the ‘house of the spirit of Ptah’. When
the Arabs invaded the country in the 7th century AD, they called
Egypt ‘dar al-Qibt’ or ‘home of the Egyptians’. At that point the
Egyptian people were Christian and so the name became associated
with Egyptian Christianity and the Coptic Orthodox Church in
particular. Originally the word simply meant Egyptian, and later
became associated with its Christian people, their culture, liturgy, art,
and language. To the Copts themselves, their name implies their own
direct continuity with the pharaonic peoples.
Early History
The Coptic script and language after its development early in our era
continued in use by the Christian population at least till the 13th
century, despite the coming of Islam and the gradual adoption of
Arabic. There were at least five main dialects and various subdialects of the language making about fourteen in all. The Sahidic or
southern dialect of the language was the classical one, widely used
in all areas and periods, but the northern Memphitic or Bohairic
dialect was that adopted by the Coptic Church.
This dialect is still used in the Church’s Liturgy today. Some families
and local areas have endeavoured not to let the language die by
using it in their homes and shops, both in Egypt and abroad.
Nowadays there is also an international effort to modernise the
language and to create new vocabulary. Coptic is the last stage of
Ancient Egyptian, written in Greek script with six or seven borrowed
demotic Egyptian letters, the classical dialect borrowing only six
letters, whilst Bohairic found the need for seven letters
(http://www.digitalegypt.ucl.ac.uk/writing/coptic.html). Bohairic is still
used in the liturgy of the Coptic Church today.
Page 2 of 16
After Alexander the Great’s conquest of Egypt at the end of the fourth
century BC and the establishment of the Macedonian Greek
administration under his successors, the Ptolemies, there was an
obvious need to communicate with the indigenous peoples. There
had been Greeks in Egypt for many centuries before that, first as
traders and workers, and then as settlers, with colonies such as
Naucratis in the Delta founded in the mid-7th century BC. However,
the first extant attempts at writing Egyptian in Greek letters can be
found only from the 2nd century BC. Even when the Romans gained
control of Egypt after Octavian’s victory over Antony and Cleopatra at
Actium in 31BC, Greek continued to be used for administrative
purposes.
From the 1st and 2nd centuries AD we find examples of ‘Old Coptic’,
the vernacular written in the Greek alphabet, with borrowed demotic
Egyptian letters. As this was initially used for non-Christian purposes,
mainly in the realm of popular religion, in order to invoke a plethora
of deities for health or protection whose names had to be written
accurately lest their help not be forthcoming, far more Egyptian
letters were needed than those that became standard later. We
possess one or two invocations from this early period, but many later
amulets and objects of daily life reflect a melting-pot of beliefs. In
addition, despite the coming of Christianity, people still had recourse
to magic, and used prayers that resembled the ancient ones even if
the names now included those of the archangels. The Petrie
Museum possesses a skull possibly from as late as the 7th century
AD inscribed in Coptic, calling upon gods, angels and spirits from
pagan, Jewish and Christian beliefs, including Sabaoth and the
archangel Michael, always extremely popular in invocations
(Montserrat, 2000: 23). Unfortunately it is too delicate to display.
The gospel of St. Matthew Ch.2 tells us that the Holy Family sought
refuge from Herod in Egypt and that Jesus spent his very early years
there. The places where they are said to have stayed have become
sites of pilgrimage and great devotion. The Apostle Mark is believed
to have brought the Christian Gospel to Egypt, and to have been
martyred there in 68 AD. Traditionally, St. Mark’s first convert was an
Alexandrian shoemaker and Apollos, a citizen of Alexandria, is
mentioned in Acts Ch.18. There is a tradition too that St. Peter may
have visited Egypt. It is at the end of the 2nd century, with the bishop
Demetrius, that we are on firmer ground as regards evidence.
Around this time the famous Catechetical School, perhaps intended
to supplant the ancient Museum, or university, was founded in
Alexandria. Names associated with the School in the early days are
Pantaenus, Clement of Alexandria, and Origen.
Page 3 of 16
Books and Manuscripts
The earliest attested New Testament text in Greek, part of St. John’s
Gospel, the Rylands Papyrus from Bahasna in Middle Egypt, is
usually dated to the late 1st or early 2nd century AD. From the 3rd
century, there were apparently copies of books of both the Old and
New Testament in the Upper Egyptian dialect. Budge’s Coptic Biblical
Texts in the Dialect of Upper Egypt (BM 1912) is a manuscript of at
latest mid-fourth century, and is perhaps the earliest papyrus Codex
containing translations of books of the Old and New Testaments into
Sahidic, suggesting that the texts from which they were copied were
earlier still. It contains Deuteronomy, Jonah, Acts and the Apocalypse
of John. The Petrie Museum has a number of manuscript fragments,
including several that are probably from Deir Balyzeh (see below).
UC 71006 is a
fragment of
parchment leaf
with parts of two
columns of Coptic
from a sixthcentury Biblical
manuscript
preserving part of
the Book of Kings.
Later came hagiographic texts, lectionaries, homilies and spiritual
treatises, too, which eventually found their way into many collections.
The monasteries themselves had remarkable libraries, signs of which
may still be found archaeologically. On all four walls of a room to the
north of the apse of the great church in the White Monastery, there were
traces of the titles of books, sometimes with the number of copies, from
which Crum concluded that this was the monastery library. Many of the
original manuscripts from this and other libraries may have been
destroyed, but some were hidden in antiquity and rediscovered in
modern times, subsequently finding their way into collections all over
the world and many into the Coptic Patriarchate in Cairo (Lehnert and
Landrock, 2000).
The numerous
fragments of
Coptic
manuscripts
which Petrie
retrieved from the
clearance of Deir
Balyzeh, south of
Rifeh, were widely
distributed, but
the Petrie has
some examples of
manuscripts, such
as this one
pictured.
Page 4 of 16
The online entry on ‘Groups of books in Coptic Egypt’
(http://www.digitalegypt.ucl.ac.uk/writing/library/coptic.html) shows
the great variety of finds, including a papyrus brought back by Petrie
from the Fayyum and now in the British Library which seems to
record a list of at least 105 books, mainly Coptic but with some
Greek, to which someone says he has added diacritical marks. Crum
(1893) thought the list was the inventory of part of a library, for which
he could only find one parallel at the time. The manuscripts seem to
have been inscribed on leather material and papyrus paper. The
Scriptoria of the Hamuli monastery in the Fayyum, from which many
of the Pierpont Morgan manuscripts came, ceased functioning about
the mid-tenth century; the latest dated colophon was in 946.
1 Examples of Coptic writing on ostraca.
Pottery Room, Pottery Case 37, middle shelf.
Many thousands of inscribed ostraca survive from ancient Egypt of
which the Petrie holds a considerable number of Coptic examples, a
few of which are on display. These give us insight into the
preoccupations of monastic settlements and their surrounds. The two
selected here have the advantage of being short
UC 71106 (Crum Varia Coptica, no. 57) is a note about a tailor’s
payment. ‘Staurogram: Concerning the garment you have made for
me, I have paid you six measures, which makes a gold termesion
(tremis)’. Sadly, there is no mention of the type of garment indicated
here. Many examples of garments from the Coptic period do survive,
however, but obviously vary depending on context. At the Monastery
of Epiphanius near Thebes, monks’ burial garments were found. In
this area near Thebes, too, many of the ostraca and papyri edited
and indexed by Crum (1921) were also found, relating to many
varied aspects of everyday life.
UC 71107 in the same case relates to a consignment of wine and is
in the same hand and Middle Egyptian dialect as others in a group
(Nos. 500-510) once belonging to Petrie and published by Crum in
Coptic Ostraca (1902). Several of these mention a certain Thomas
the deacon giving orders for skeue (of wine) to be given to various
people or sent to different places, in one case at least to the area of
Oxyrhynchus, much further north. No. 502, displayed here, mentions
his giving two skeue to Peti (though this may not be a name but only
mean ‘the person who comes’) and to a certain Isaac, and a quantity
of grapes too. In Crum’s view, although this group of ostraca appears
to have been found near Thebes, it may have originated elsewhere.
Page 5 of 16
Textiles
2 The Coptic Socks of c.400-500 AD, UC 16766.
Main Room, Hawara Case, right-hand side towards the bottom.
These socks became well-known through the project which the
museum ran in 2009-10 to recreate Ancient Egyptian two-toed socks
(Booth 2011) using ancient techniques and providing a pattern to
help others make them. Also look out for the shoes (UC28337) and
belt (UC280881). They are well worth a visit as are the many other
small objects of daily life in the same and the adjacent case.
Examples of embroidery are exceptionally bright and give insight into
the fine craftsmanship of the period. The Petrie’s own pieces are too
delicate to display, but the following photographs give an indication,
while the Victoria and Albert Museum has an extensive collection for
further study, showing the continuity of classical motifs with its ‘loves
and cupids’ (male and female putti figures), rural scenes with men
hunting and fishing, and Christian scenes with military saints. The
religious significance of Dionysus in scenes of grape-harvest and of
other classical deities was probably lost, since such depictions were
evidently not thought unsuitable for the predominantly Christian
population. Designs may have been influenced from elsewhere since
at the port of Berenice, for instance, an example of Chinese
embroidery was found in an imported consignment.
Fragments
of Coptic
Textiles
UC6994
and
UC6993.
Page 6 of 16
UC6992
and
UC6991.
Monasticism
The origins of monasticism are mysterious but it seems likely that
even in New Testament times some chose to live celibate lives,
though not necessarily apart from their families. The Alexandrian
Jewish philosopher, Philo, describes a strange group called the
Therapeutae who lived a communal life near L. Mareotis, which
Eusebius, the Church historian, was convinced was an early form of
Christian monastic community. The Essenes, too, perhaps the
people of Qumran and of the Dead Sea Scrolls, were once thought to
have lived a monastic life, though latest explorations suggest
Qumran was more like a university, whilst a re-reading of Philo
makes Eusebius’ proposition about the Therapeutae seem dubious in
the light of our present knowledge. St. Antony is famed as the father
of monasticism, but he was born into a world where people were
already living a life of prayer in or near their villages. He organised
those who gathered round him into small communities, but in due
course himself withdrew deep into the desert to live a more solitary
life, only occasionally visiting his followers to give them support. He
also went to the Wadi Natrun to encourage new foundations there.
In time the Egyptian monks made the ‘desert a city’ as St Athanasius
says. From the Bohairic and Greek Lives of Pachomius, UC 59490,
founder of Coenobitic monasticism, it seems that the Egyptian monks
themselves believed they were in the desert tradition of Elijah, Elisha
and John the Baptist, and thus probably wore a goatskin as part of
their habit (cf. Hebrews 12). The author of the Historia Monachorum
in Aegypto, an account of the visit of seven monks from Palestine to
the monasteries of Egypt in 394 AD, tells us that the bishop of
Oxyrhynchus believed there were by then 10,000 monks, and twice
as many nuns, under his jurisdiction. The visitors generally found a
varied situation, with the monks in the Wadi Natrun and elsewhere
living a semi-eremetic life, and others a more or less autonomous life,
while at the Pachomian monasteries they lived together in community.
Page 7 of 16
With all these great heroes and heroines of the desert, for there were
also women’s foundations and famous female ascetics like St.
Syncletica, it is no wonder that Egypt became a centre for pilgrimage
to living saints. In the fourth to the fifth centuries there were also
great religious writers such as Pachomius himself, and his followers,
and St. Paul of Tamma, as well as Shenoute, founder of the White
Monastery (http://www.digitalegypt.ucl.ac.uk/athribis/monastery.html)
and those who collected and wrote down the reminiscences of the
Sayings of the Desert Fathers (Apophthegmata Patrum). Many
Coptic objects of daily life from Athribis are displayed on this web-site.
Flinders Petrie worked at several monastic sites which are
represented in the Museum, including Deir Balyzeh near Rifeh in
1907, but seems to have collected only surface finds. There are
many objects of daily life from 3 Lahun (Kahun) too, which may
have come from the monastery at the site or the cemeteries,
although sadly Petrie did not record details of the monastic buildings
there either.
Petrie remarked that it was hard to decide whether some objects
should be dated to the Middle Kingdom or later periods, which is
worth bearing in mind when looking at such inventions as the socalled rat-trap (UC16773) in the Kahun case. Many such objects
must indeed have altered little over the millennia.
C.C.Walter published an innovative book on Monastic Archaeology in
1974, and Peter Grossman has done much careful recording of
architectural details at many monastic sites. In addition, there have
been the amazing projects of preservation and restoration of wallpaintings at various monasteries carried out by the American
Research Centre in Egypt with funding from the United States
Agency for International Development, and managed by Michael
Jones. These have produced volumes such as Monastic Visions
(Bolman 2003) about St. Antony’s Monastery and The Cave Church
of Paul the Hermit (Lyster 2008) on St. Paul’s Monastery. The team is
at present also finishing work at the Red Monastery, where
remarkable early wall paintings have been uncovered, and have
worked at the White Monastery, where Stephen Davis is now active.
4 Monumental Tombstones
Stonework: Statuary IC16 Middle and lower shelves.
The case contains a series of tombstones from Koptos: nos. 14770,
14771, 14772, 14773..
UC14773 mentions one Apa Victor (Victor was a very famous military
martyr in the third or fourth century, and so the name Victor became
extremely popular from then on).
Page 8 of 16
UC16798
This particular
stone may be a
shop-ready
piece as it is
prepared as
though for
inscription,
though still
blank. It is
noted here
because of the
confronted
birds which
were a very
frequent device
in the Near East
and continued
to be used into
the Byzantine
period and
beyond.
M581 Doves, though they are actually
labelled ‘eagles’.
The hero between two beasts can be traced to the predynastic period in
Egypt and Egyptian art with its reversible script incorporated into
monumental design round doorways has always favoured such
confrontation. It is also popular in Coptic manuscripts: M581 (from the
Morgan Library in NY, originally found at Hamouli in the Fayyum), for
instance, has doves facing each other on the headpiece (see above).
Compare this image
of a splendid 9th
century BC pendant
from Knossos,
incorporating a
‘cross’ design with
pairs of birds in
upper and lower
quadrants, next to an
8th century BC quiver
with the ‘master of
the beasts’ design.
From John Boardman
(1999), The Greeks
Overseas.
Page 9 of 16
Jill Kamil (2002: 163-4) has argued that the Holy Spirit in the form of
a dove at Christ’s baptism is an Egyptian ba bird in origin, since she
claims this is the only religion where one would find a bird in
connection with spirit. In fact we do find the raven and then the dove
with the olive branch in Genesis 8, 6-12, perhaps expressing
reconciliation after the flood, and in Gen.1,1 the ruah or spirit of God
hovering over the waters, so that the two ideas might very easily be
linked.
5 UC32762 commemorates Thomas the Presbyter. The inscription
probably reads “Jesus Christ. The Grace of God. The day of making
mourning for our blessed brother Thomas, the priest. He went to his
rest on 26 Khoiak in the first indiction [Byzantine calenrical cycle].
6 Several other of the Petrie Coptic tombstones are inscribed, one
belonging to Plemshpse or Plemshes UC16625, one to Wenobe the
chosen, another, UC16624, to a monk and deacon called Origen. In
some cases the design is strangely stylised and oriental-looking, like
the bearded Christ or orans figure in 7 UC14471. Comparable in
style to this is a lion’s head in the store of the BM, perhaps from the
Monastery of Apa Jeremias, though attributed to Hagr Edfu, which is
very similar to the lion head, UC75643, though even more stylised.
Crosses and Conches
In Treasures of Coptic Art in the Coptic Museum 2007, Gawdat
Gabra illustrates the tombstone of one Petros, dated to the sixth
century, Inv. No. 7730, with a central staurogram in the upper register
below a pediment, flanked by the crux ansata on both sides, with a
boat in the lower half having its sail in the form of a chi rho or
christogram, the oldest Christian symbol. Three forms of cross or
Christian symbol are thus used at once. The boat itself was used in
funerary contexts in pharaonic times, so also displays continuity. A
depiction of the Virgin Mary in the BM shows her with the crux ansata
in one hand and a traditional cross in the other: perhaps the artist
was attempting to make the same point about continuity.
The Egyptian amuletic
ankh symbol was
adopted as a cross
(known as the crux
ansata or cross with a
handle), particularly in
funerary stelae and
carved decoration, but
it was used alongside,
not instead of, the
more traditional
cross. It also adopts a
new form more
reminiscent of angelwings
Page 10 of 16
Unfortunately the Petrie has no examples on display of monumental
stones with the ankh or crux ansata, unless UC16798 above has
damaged ankh signs beneath the arch, which seems unlikely.
Most of the stones in the Petrie have traditional crosses of different
styles: cf. the crosses above the hands of the figure in UC 14771
(see above) with those above the conch in UC2373. It has been
suggested by Gawdat Gabra (2007: 27) that the shell itself, so
popular in classical antiquity because of its association with
Aphrodite rising from the waves, acquires the symbolism of Baptism
in the bath of regeneration or of the Resurrection of Christ in the
Christian period. The stele of Abba George, Bishop of Qasr Ibrim,
UC2373, in the same case, of the 10th-11th century AD, written in
Greek, also exhibits a crudely depicted conch.
The shell is
very popular in
architecture
particularly
because it fits
so neatly into
apses or
niches over
doorways and
continued in
use both in
churches and
on tombstones
for many
centuries.
From the 5th / 6th century church at
Denderah.
Military Saints and Martyrdom
Many of the most honoured Coptic saints were military martyrs, the
majority of whom suffered in what is known as the Great Persecution,
inaugurated under the emperor Diocletian who came to the throne in
284AD. So strong is this era in the Coptic psyche that their own
dating system begins in this year and is distinguished from the years
of our modern era by prefixing AM for the Age of the Martyrs to their
dates: thus AM 332 would actually be, by inclusive reckoning, 615
AD or CE. Eusebius in Book VIII of his Ecclesiastical History
mentions the many Egyptian Christians who willingly went to their
deaths rather than sacrifice to the genius of the Emperor.
Page 11 of 16
We may think of St. George (Mar Guirgis) as the dragon-slayer par
excellence, but there were many others - as depicted on the walls of
the Monastery Church at St. Antony’s on the Red Sea. St. Mercurius
(Abu Seifein) is another of these, with a huge cult in Egypt, as are St.
Theodore, Claudius and Victor. Frequently the saint is shown
mounted with his lance poised above the source of evil, often
depicted as a human person (like Julian the Apostate), sometimes as
a serpent (which the Greek word drakon means), and sometimes as
a dragon with feet. The precedent for the latter in Egypt was
undoubtedly the Nile crocodile, which in Pharaonic times might
represent the forces of chaos and danger for very obvious reasons,
with Horus shown standing triumphant over him, as he was also over
the hippopotamus.
In the classical period Horus is frequently shown as falcon-headed in
Roman armour, again mounted, since as soldier and horseman he
would still represent the restoration of maat or divine balance in the
empire. There is a famous depiction of this in the Louvre, see below,
and a similar tiny one, again of Roman period, in the Petrie in relief
on the interior of a black steatite bowl 8, UC2451.
UC2451
against a
background of
scallop shells,
with a flat rim
incised with
what may be an
olive design:
the exterior
possibly shows
a dromedary in
the right hand
compartment.
And example
from the
Louvre.
A similar image of the mounted saint or martyr is evidently borrowed
in the Christian period to represent the triumph of Christ (of whom
the saint is a champion) over evil, whatever its manifestation.
Because many such martyrs were men of high rank, often in the
emperor’s or governor’s entourage, and so had to abandon their
military oath to avoid sacrificing, they were shown as ‘knights’ on
horseback. In fact, in Constantinople in the mid-fourth century a
school of tribuni et notarii was founded to educate young men of high
rank in the imperial civil service and these were given nominal
military rank.
Page 12 of 16
It is interesting that one of the earliest depictions of St George, who
is always called a tribune in Coptic sources, which comes from St.
Katherine’s Monastery and is of the 6th century, shows the saint in
civil not military dress.
M581, the manuscript
with the confronted
birds mentioned
above, has a fine
frontispiece of St.
Pteleme, another
military saint with
much in common
with St. George, this
time meeting a
saintly ascetic called
Papnoute. He is
called both tribune
and notarios in the
text.
9 Fragments of vessels UC 19480, 19481 and 19482. UC 19481
Pottery Room PC37
One can see several fragments of vessels in the pottery case
showing images of unnamed mounted saints, sometimes with the
vessels’ owners also, who were presumably seeking the saints’
protection. UC19481 is also interesting in having the woman’s face
partly moulded, with her nose used as a kind of handle. This also
depicts seated ecclesiastical figures in vestments, and figures of fish
or birds. The woman is wearing an elaborate earring; it seems that
despite the strictures of St. Paul, Christian women continued to wear
jewellery. 10. Examples from Illahun and Qau can be found in the
bead cases very close to the pottery (BC 28-30). Some is specifically
Coptic, some of Roman period, but of course Roman design and
technique would have continued in use.
11 Pottery fragments with crosses and naturalistic scenes.
Some pottery fragments are decorated with crosses, whilst many of
them depict naturalistic scenes. There are palm trees in their bedding
pots UC19508 (as Hatshepsut’s brought from Punt at Deir el Bahri),
and more fish and birds, one perhaps a cock, UC19497. UC19500
displays a rather cross-eyed fish, and UC19496 has two birds
fighting over a worm. What looks rather like a comb at their feet is
perhaps a discarded fish skeleton or a ‘centipede’, as Margaret
Murray suggests, but with only 16 legs. There are also secular
figured scenes such as UC19487 and UC19488, perhaps intended to
depict the popular ‘pygmies’.
Page 13 of 16
Some pottery is plainer, such as the examples from the fifth-century
hermitage which Lady Petrie published in Petrie’s Tombs of the
Courtiers. Here, however, the walls were decorated, for instance with
an early example of confronted unicorns on either side of a cross, a
very popular subject in monks’ cells and in churches because of the
association of the unicorn with the incarnation and the unity of the
Godhead. Manuscripts also displayed unicorns, probably for the
same reason, such as the example from M581 (not illustrated).
12 Menas Flasks
Pottery Room PC37, at the back of the middle shelves
The fragmentary manuscript UC62835 (not on display) mentions the
transport of six litrai (presumably of water!) for the camels, as well as
200 diplai of wine for the town. Camels were very well used in all
situations by the time monasticism became established. St Antony
when he first went to his retreat near the Red Sea had camel
caravans bringing him supplies at least twice a year. Numerous
papyri from Oxyrhynchus and elsewhere mention the toll-taxes
applied to camel loads as they travel to the oases and elsewhere.
Although dromedaries were certainly known and perhaps
occasionally used in Egypt in the early first millennium BC or earlier
(the mandible of a camel was found in a domestic context of the 10th
century BC at Qasr Ibrim), their more extensive use follows the
Persian period and later the coming of the Greeks and Romans.
Camels are frequently depicted in the St. Menas flasks associated
with pilgrimage to the shrine of St. Menas at the monastery which
grew up at his topos or shrine on the shores of L. Mareotis near
Alexandria. There are examples of flasks in the pottery cabinet
UC19516-8.
St Menas, according to one version of the legend, was of Egyptian
origin, but did military service in Phrygia, where he was martyred. His
fellow soldiers brought his body home as a relic, its presence on
board ship affording protection against long-necked sea monsters.
The men then employed dromedaries to take the body home on
arrival in Egypt, but these stopped dead on the site where his
monastery was later built, and refused to go further, indicating divine
will over the choice of site. It is thus disputed whether the creatures
on the flask are the sea monsters or camels, or one of each!
13 Glass
Main Room, Glasswork case
There are fine examples of Roman and Coptic period glassware in
the glass cabinet, and also at the bottom of WEC 10 where the socks
are displayed.
14 Combs
Main Room, Near the Amarna / Mummy Portrait Case
Page 14 of 16
On special display are the Ancient Egyptian combs, which include
several Coptic examples.
15 Musical Instruments.
Pottery Room, Case.
There are examples of musical instruments which doubtless
continued in use into the Coptic period, scattered throughout the
museum, such as the bronze sistrum, UC35791, including the model
of a monkey or baboon with a flute, UC59262. The Coptic Liturgy
does not use instruments other than cymbals and the triangle,
however, which are apparently employed to attract attention to the
prayers of the congregation. Coptic chant is very ancient; until very
recently it was only handed down orally but has still been preserved
for centuries in this way.
Much work has been done in recent years to locate and record the
Coptic musical repertoire as accurately as possible, and to transcribe
it into notation. Through the Institute for Coptic Studies which was
founded in 1955, Ragheb Moftah saw to the recording of the
repertoire of the great blind cantor, Mikhail Girguis, and then a
recording of St. Basil’s Liturgy was made. Late in his life Moftah
donated all his recordings to the Library of Congress, and their
librarian Marian Robertson-Wilson collated these recordings and
produced in 1997 the Guide to the Ragheb Moftah collection of
Coptic Chant, which was revised in 2005 to be used with 21 CD’s.
The earlier history of research on Coptic music was published by Brill
in a useful survey done by John Gillespie in Future of Coptic Studies
1978 (available online).
Icons
Although the Petrie museum does not itself show/own any Coptic
icons, icons play an extremely important part in Coptic church and
home life, and must not be forgotten. As it has often been remarked
that there is a similarity between Coptic iconography and the mummy
portraits from Hawara or elsewhere, and possibly an influence of the
latter on Coptic art, it is worth looking at the case of mummy portraits
separating the two halves of the top gallery. Similar techniques may
well have been used initially although Coptic iconography has its own
distinct naïve look and proportions. Zuzana Skalova and Gawdat
Gabra’s book Icons of the Nile Valley published in 2001 covers the
different phases and developments of Coptic Art and later influences.
Brief Bibliography
Adams, W.Y.(1996) Qasr Ibrim - The Late Mediaeval Period. London: Egypt Exploration
Society.
Boardman, John (1999) The Greeks Overseas: Their early Colonies and Trade,
London: Thames and Hudson.
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Bolman, E.S., ed. (2002), Monastic Visions. Wall Paintings in the Monastery of St.
Antony at the Red Sea London: Yale University Press.
Crum,Walter (1893), Coptic manuscripts brought from the Fayyum by W M Flinders
Petrie London
Digital Egypt Website: http://www.digitalegypt.ucl.ac.uk/
Depuydt, Leo (1993), Catalogue of Coptic Manuscripts in the Pierpont Morgan Library,
with Album of Photographic Plates by David A. Loggie, Leuven: U. Peeters.
Gabra, Gawdat (2002), Coptic Monasteries: Egypt’s Monastic Art and Architecture, with
a historical overview by Tim Vivian. London: American University in Cairo.
(2007) The Treasures of Coptic Art in the Coptic Museum and Churches of Old Cairo
Cairo, Egypt: American University in Cairo Press.
Griggs, C.Wilfred (1993), Early Egyptian Christianity from its origins to 451C.E, Leiden,
New York, Köln: E.J.Brill.
Grossmann, Peter (1986), Abu Mina - A guide to the Ancient Pilgrimage Centre, Cairo,
Fotiadis and Co. Press
(2002) Christliche Architektur in Ägypten. Leiden, Boston and Cologne: E. J. Brill.
Kamil, Jill (2002) Christianity in the Land of the Pharaohs: The Coptic Orthodox Church,
London: Routledge.
Lehnert and Landrock (2000) Illustrations from Coptic Manuscripts, Cairo, Egypt
Lehnert and Landrock (1998), Coptic Icons I and II, Cairo: Egypt
Lyster, William, ed. (2008), The Cave Church of Paul the Hermit at the Monastery of St.
Paul Egypt American Research Centre in Egypt, London: Yale University Press.
Meinardus, Otto F.A. (1961 & 1989), The Monks and Monasteries of the Egyptian
Deserts, American University in Cairo Press.
(2002) Coptic Saints and Pilgrimages, American University in Cairo Press.
Montserrat, Dominic (2000) Digging for Dreams (Treasures from the Petrie
Museum).Glasgow City Council.
Russell, N. (trans.) and Ward, B., SLG (Introduction) (1981), The Lives of the Desert
Fathers: The Historia Monachorum in Aegypto, London and Oxford: Mowbray;
Kalamazoo USA: Cistercian Studies series 34. Abbrev. HM.
Walters, C.C. (1974), Monastic Archaeology in Egypt, Warminster: Aris and Phillips.
This trail has been funded by the
British Egyptian Society
www.britishegyptiansociety.org.uk.
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