Paedagogica Historica 40 (2004), pp.825-828.
Bernard Legras, Lire en Egypte, d’Alexandre à l’Islam (Paris, A. et J.
Picard, 2002) 191 pp., ISBN 2-7084-0674-4, euro 39.
This study deals with ancient books, how they were written and produced,
how they were distributed, collected and read in schools, libraries and
private houses over a period of more than a thousand years, from the fourth
century BC to the Arab conquest of Egypt about AD 650. It is richly
illustrated (90 figures in black and white and 17 in colour)1 and draws on the
most recent research in the field of papyrology, with a preference for
publications in French. After an introductory chapter on books and readers
in ancient Athens, the focus is on Egypt, where the great papyrus finds
provide first-hand knowledge of how Greek literature spread in a colonial
society.
Greek literary culture was largely oral up to the fourth century BC, but
reading became widespread at least a century earlier. Up to 10% of the
Athenian population was able to read (and write), and this figure was no
doubt more than double among the male citizens. Though orality prevailed
in the courts, the theatres and the schools, laws were written down on
papyrus rolls and books were offered for sale in bookshops and collected by
scholars such as Euthydemos or Plato. With Aristotle and the Peripatetics
books will for the first time become the basis of information gathering and
the instruments of analysis rather than the writing down of oral discussions.
In this context the colourful history of Aristotle’s own library is described
(pp. 41–42).
Greeks arrived in Egypt from the seventh century BC onwards. Returning
home after a successful career under Psammetich I, Pedon of Priene
dedicated a typically Egyptian block statue with a Greek inscription. In the
same period Greek soldiers left their graffiti on the colosses of Ramses II in
Abu Simbel, and under king Amasis, in the second half of the sixth century,
Greek merchants lived in Memphis and in Naukratis. Though the import of
papyrus from Egypt to Greece may have started in the Mycenaean period,
the earliest surviving Greek papyrus dates from the fourth century BC: it is a
commentary on an Orphic poem, found2 in a tomb at Derveni, in northern
Greece. In Egypt very few Greek papyri precede the reign of Ptolemy II
(285–246 BC). Two of the earliest examples, the curse of Artemisia and the
Persae of Timotheos,3 both of them written before the arrival of Alexander,
stem from the Greek community of Memphis (Chapter II).
The first great period of Greek book production in Egypt starts about 260
BC, following in the trail of age-old Egyptian traditions. The writing
material is the stem of the papyrus plant, cut into thin strips, which are made
into sheets with two layers; these sheets are then pasted into rolls. The texts
are written in parallel columns, often quite narrow, on rolls of up to 20 m in
length and about 30 cm in height. Usually only the inside of the roll, where
the papyrus fibres run horizontally, was used for writing. Egyptian demotic
is painted with a brush from left to right; Greeks write with a reed pen from
left to right, turning over the roll 180, so that brush and pen always go
down from one sheet of the roll to the next (Chapter III). Due to the absence
of word division (scriptio continua) and the near-absence of punctuation4
ancient books are quite user-unfriendly.
The codex or modern book with pages finds its origin in notebooks on
wooden tablets, sometimes also waxed tablets, used in business and at
school. The Romans were the first to substitute parchment for wood and in
the late first century AD experimented with literary works in this form
(Martial). In Egypt papyrus codices are also used from the second century
onwards. The surviving copies show that for Christian works, and especially
bible books, codices were preferred from the second century AD, whereas
pagan literature converted only gradually between the third and sixth
centuries (Chapter IV).5 But in Egypt most codices continue to be written on
papyrus and the statement (p. 93) “au Ve siècle la fin du papyrus est presque
consommée” is manifestly untrue.
Schoolbooks used by both teachers and pupils in Greek and in Egyptian
education have been intensively studied of late (Chapter V). They can be
recognized by their format, their script and their contents. Starting with the
alphabet, syllables and single words, they quickly come to maxims in
monostychs and to extracts of poetry, mainly Homer and Euripides. Since
Greek higher education took place in the gymnasia, most (male) members of
the higher classes were thoroughly literate. Egyptian schools were closely
linked to the “house of life” in the temple. Part of the temple libraries of
Tebtynis and Soknopaiou Nesos have been preserved, showing a great
diversity of literary works in demotic in the Roman period.6 The ostraca
found in the temple of Medinet Madi show an interesting mix of Greek and
demotic in the Roman Fayum. No certain archaeological remains of libraries
can be identified in Egypt, however.
The main centre of Greek culture was of course Alexandria, with its great
libraries and its universities. Under the impulse of the first Ptolemies books
from all over the world were collected, catalogued and edited here, and
books in foreign languages translated into Greek. The most famous example
is of course the translation of the Hebrew Old Testament, the Septuagint or
“Alexandrian bible”. The story of the royal library and its smaller
counterpart in the Serapeum, perhaps the first real public library, is told in
Chapter VI.
In Chapter VII are given a few examples of small private libraries in the
Egyptian countryside, such as that of Zenon in the third-century Fayum or
that of the brothers Ptolemaios and Apollonios7 in the Serapeum of
Memphis a hundred years later. In the Roman period, a copy of Aristotle’s
Athenaion Politeia was written on the back of four rolls of accounts of an
estate holder in first-century Hermopolis, but the link between the papyrus
and the documents remains uncertain. For the Byzantine period a more
thorough discussion of the archive and library of Dioskoros would have
been relevant,8 but Dioskoros is relegated to a short reference on p. 154.
Instead we hear of some lists of books, which were collected, bought or
copied on different occasions. Because the Coptic side is largely missing in
the presentation the impact of Greek culture in the later period is overrated.9
In an epilogue (Chapter VIII) the author returns to the earliest find in
Herculaneum and the latest discoveries, the Milan anthology of epigrams by
the Hellenistic author Poseidippos and the papyrus of the geographer
Artemidoros, with its sketchy map of Spain and its beautiful artistic
drawings. The online version of the Leuven Database of Ancient Books
http://ldab.arts.kuleuven.be, which offers a survey of all books in Greek,
Latin, Demotic and Coptic, allows an update of the graphs on p. 90. The last
twenty pages (pp. 165–188) are taken up by a chronological table,10 maps,11
a bibliography and indexes. The chronological table is defective for the late
Byzantine period, where important events such as the “reigns” of pope
Athanasius (AD 328–373) or the emperor Justinian (AD 527–565), the
council of Chalkedon (AD 451), the beginning of the Islamic era (AD 632)
and the introduction of Arabic as the official language (AD 707) are omitted,
and the Persian invasion (AD 619, not 527) is misdated.
This book is meant for a general public and serves its purpose well. It draws
on both literary sources and prime papyrological material, and keeps the
reader’s attention by telling some interesting episodes. Examples are often
taken from recent papyrological headlines, which gives the book an up-todate flavour. The main change in book production in the millennium
between Alexander and Mohammed, from (papyrus) roll to (parchment)
codex, is convincingly portrayed.12 This happened in a colonial world where
for many centuries Greek culture was predominant. The relationship
between Greek and Egyptian culture is shown rather patchily: one would
expect here a reference to Greek literary papyri and demotic medical
handbooks full of Greek terms found in the temples and priestly houses or
the many bilingual tax ostraca. Least convincing is the picture of Late
Antiquity, when classical literature gave way to Christian texts and Greek
was gradually replaced by Coptic.
WILLY CLARYSSE K.U. Leuven, Belgium
(1) Plate XIII (on p. 21) and fig. 37 (p. 77) are printed upside down. Fig. 50 represents
names of two, three and four syllables, not the Phoenician women of Euripides. The plate
on p. 40 shows that the library was open up to the sixth hour, not the fifth. €826
(2) Not by A.Fackelmann (p. 51) but by Greek archaeologists.
(3) For the Sitz-im-Leben of this text, see now P. van Minnen, Archiv für
Papyrusforschung 43 (1997), pp. 246-260.
(4) On p. 53 there is a confusion between paragraphos, a short horizontal line in the
margin, and koronis, a bird-like sign that is much more rarely used.
(5) Four leaves constitute a quaternio, not a quatertio (p. 91).
(6) Though demotic disappears in the Roman period in the administration and the notarial
offices, demotic literary culture flourishes more than ever before; in fact, most demotic
literary papyri date from the 1st and 2nd centuries AD (pace p. 95).
(7) The brothers were katochoi. This may have to do with temple asylum (thus p. 140),
but it certainly also has a religious dimension of “being caught by the god”.
(8) A reference to J.-L.Fournet, Hellénisme dans l’Égypte du VIe siècle. La bibliothèque
et l’oeuvre de Dioscore d’Aphrodité, MIFAO 115, Cairo 1999, was expected here.
(9) A very different picture is drawn on the basis of the LDAB material in Atti del XXII
Congresso Internazionale di Papirologia (Firenze, 2001), pp. 248-249.
(10) The battle of Raphia (217 BC) was not a defeat for the Ptolemies, but an unexpected
victory; the loss of foreign possessions comes only 15 years later, after the death of
Philopator.
(11) The modern name of ancient Panopolis is Achmim, not Achmin (p. 145 and map p.
169).
(12) Though it is not true that papyrus is completely replaced by parchment (p. 93); even
in the 6th century papyrus books are far more common than parchments books (680 vs.
225 items according to the LDAB).