Editing Papyrus (section)

== History ==
Papyrus was first manufactured in Egypt as far back as the third millennium BCE.<ref>Houston, Keith, ''The Book: A Cover-to-Cover Exploration of the Most Powerful Object of our Time'', W. W. Norton & Company, 2016, pp. 4–8 excerpt [https://delanceyplace.com/view-archives.php?p=3763]</ref><ref name=BritishMuseum>{{cite journal|title=Ayn Sukhna and Wadi el-Jarf: Two newly discovered pharaonic harbours on the Suez Gulf|journal=British Museum Studies in Ancient Egypt and Sudan|last=Tallet|first=Pierre|volume=18|year=2012|pages=147–68|issn=2049-5021|url=https://www.britishmuseum.org/PDF/Tallet.pdf|access-date=21 April 2013}}</ref><ref name=Skeat>H. Idris Bell and T.C. Skeat, 1935. [http://www-user.uni-bremen.de/~wie/Egerton/BellSkeat2.html "Papyrus and its uses"] ([[British Museum]] pamphlet). {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131018121945/http://www-user.uni-bremen.de/~wie/Egerton/BellSkeat2.html |date=18 October 2013 }}</ref> The earliest archaeological evidence of papyrus was excavated in 2012 and 2013 at [[Wadi al-Jarf]], an [[ancient Egypt]]ian [[harbor]] located on the [[Red Sea]] coast. These documents, the [[Diary of Merer]], date from {{Circa|2560}}–2550 BCE (end of the reign of [[Khufu]]).<ref name=BritishMuseum/> The papyrus rolls describe the last years of building the [[Great Pyramid of Giza]].<ref>{{Cite web|title = The World's Oldest Papyrus and What It Can Tell Us About the Great Pyramids|url = http://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/ancient-egypt-shipping-mining-farming-economy-pyramids-180956619/|access-date = 2015-09-27|first = Alexander|last = Stille}}</ref>

[[File:Busto maschile.JPG|thumb|left|[[Roman portraiture]] fresco of a young man with a papyrus [[scroll]], from [[Herculaneum]], 1st century AD]]{{Multiple images
| image1            = Book of the Dead of Hunefer sheet 3.jpg
| image2            = Book of the Dead of Hunefer sheet 7.jpg
| caption2          = Sections of Hunefer's [[Book of the Dead]] written on papyrus
| direction         = vertical
}}
For multiple millennia, papyrus was commonly rolled into [[Scroll|scrolls]] as a form of storage. However, at some point late in its history, papyrus began being collected together in the form of [[Codex|codices]] akin to the modern book.<ref name="inaguralLetter">{{Cite book |last=Černý |first=Jaroslav |author-link=Jaroslav Černý (Egyptologist) |url=https://archive.org/details/1_20200529_20200529_2202/page/2/mode/2up |title=Paper and Books in Ancient Egypt: An Inaugural Lecture Delivered at University College London |date=1952 |publisher=T. & A. Constable Ltd Edinburgh |pages=30 |orig-date=Delivered 29 May 1947 |archive-url=https://archive.org/details/1_20200529_20200529_2202/ |archive-date=2020-05-29}}</ref> This may have been mimicking the book-form of codices created with [[parchment]].{{Citation needed|date=May 2024}} [[List of early Christian writers|Early Christian writers]] soon adopted the codex form, and in the Greco-Roman world, it became common to cut sheets from papyrus rolls to form codices. Codices were an improvement on the papyrus scroll, as the papyrus was not pliable enough to fold without cracking, and a long roll, or scroll, was required to create large-volume texts. Papyrus had the advantage of being relatively cheap and easy to produce, but it was fragile and susceptible to both moisture and excessive dryness. Unless the papyrus was of perfect quality, the writing surface was irregular, and the range of media that could be used was also limited.{{Citation needed|date=May 2024}}

Papyrus was gradually overtaken in Europe by a rival writing surface that rose in prominence known as [[parchment]], which was made from [[animal skins]]. By the beginning of the fourth century A.D., the most important books began to be manufactured in parchment, and works worth preserving were transferred from papyrus to parchment.<ref name=metzger>{{Cite book |last=Metzger |first=Bruce |title=The Text of the New Testament: Its Transmission, Corruption, and Restoration |date=2005 |publisher=[[Oxford University Press]] |edition=4th |pages=8 |language=EN}}</ref> Parchment had significant advantages over papyrus, including higher durability in moist climates and being more conducive to writing on both sides of the surface.<ref name=metzger /> The main advantage of papyrus had been its cheaper raw material — the papyrus plant is easy to cultivate in a suitable climate and produces more writing material than animal hides (the most expensive books, made from foetal [[vellum]] would take up to dozens of bovine fetuses to produce). However, as trade networks declined, the availability of papyrus outside the range of the papyrus plant became limited and it thus lost its cost advantage. 

Papyrus' last appearance in the [[Merovingian]] chancery was with a document from 692 A.D., though it was known in [[Gaul]] until the middle of the following century. The latest certain dates for the use of papyrus in Europe are 1057 for a papal decree (typically conservative, all [[papal bull]]s were on papyrus until 1022), under [[Pope Victor II]],<ref>[[David Diringer]], ''The Book before Printing: Ancient, Medieval and Oriental'', Dover Publications, New York 1982, p. 166.</ref> and 1087 for an Arabic document. Its use in Egypt continued until it was replaced by less expensive [[paper]] introduced by the [[Muslim world|Islamic world]], which originally learned of it from the Chinese. By the 12th century, parchment and paper were in use in the [[Byzantine Empire]], but papyrus was still an option.<ref name=Byzantine>Bompaire, Jacques and Jean Irigoin. ''La paleographie grecque et byzantine'', Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, 1977, 389 n. 6, cited in [[Alice-Mary Talbot]] (ed.). ''Holy women of Byzantium'', Dumbarton Oaks, 1996, p. 227. {{ISBN|0-88402-248-X}}.</ref>

Until the middle of the 19th century, only some isolated documents written on papyrus were known, and museums simply showed them as curiosities.<ref name="Betz">{{cite book |author=Hans Dieter Betz |url=http://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/G/bo3684249.html |title=The Greek Magical Papyri in Translation, Including the Demotic Spells, Volume 1 |publisher=University of Chicago Press |year=1992}}</ref> They did not contain literary works.<ref>[[Frederic G. Kenyon]], [https://archive.org/stream/cu31924024493649#page/n11/mode/2up ''Palaeography of Greek papyri''] (Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1899), p. 1.</ref> The first modern discovery of papyri rolls was made at [[Herculaneum]] in 1752. Until then, the only papyri known had been a few surviving from medieval times.<ref>[[Frederic G. Kenyon]], [https://archive.org/stream/cu31924024493649#page/n13/mode/2up ''Palaeography of Greek papyri''] (Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1899), p. 3.</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last=Diringer |first=David |author-link=David Diringer |url=https://archive.org/details/bookbeforeprinti0000diri/page/250 |title=The Book Before Printing: Ancient, Medieval and Oriental |publisher=Dover Publications |year=1982 |isbn=0-486-24243-9 |place=New York |pages=[https://archive.org/details/bookbeforeprinti0000diri/page/250 250–256]}}</ref> Scholarly investigations began with the Dutch historian [[Caspar Reuvens|Caspar Jacob Christiaan Reuvens]] (1793–1835). He wrote about the content of the [[Leyden papyrus X|Leyden papyrus]], published in 1830. The first publication has been credited to the British scholar [[Charles Wycliffe Goodwin]] (1817–1878), who published for the [[Cambridge Antiquarian Society]] one of the [[Papyri Graecae Magicae]] V, translated into English with commentary in 1853.<ref name="Betz" />

=== Varying quality ===
Papyrus was made in several qualities and prices. [[Pliny the Elder]] and [[Isidore of Seville]] described six variations of papyrus that were sold in the Roman market of the day. These were graded by quality based on how fine, firm, white, and smooth the writing surface was. Grades ranged from the superfine Augustan, which was produced in sheets of 13 digits (10 inches) wide, to the least expensive and most coarse, measuring six digits (four inches) wide. Materials deemed unusable for writing or less than six digits were considered commercial quality and were pasted edge to edge to be used only for wrapping.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Lewis|first=N|year=1983|title=Papyrus and Ancient Writing: The First Hundred Years of Papyrology|journal=Archaeology|volume=36 |issue=4|pages=31–37}}</ref>