Psalter of al-Mudil

Psalter of al-Mudil

The Psalter of al-Mudil is a leather manuscript from the late 4th or early 5th century from Middle Egypt . It contains the full text of the psalms in the Sahid dialect of the Coptic language and is the oldest complete Coptic psalter .

The manuscript consists of 498 sheets in the format 12.2 × 16.7 cm, which are bound in wooden covers. The text is written in 21 lines per page.

The manuscript was found in 1984 in a grave in the Coptic cemetery of al-Mudil. It lay open under the head of a young girl. Possibly this burial method was based on ancient Egyptian traditions of keeping the Egyptian Book of the Dead in a grave. The manuscript is now in the Coptic Museum in Cairo with the inventory number 12488 (Inv. 6614 of the manuscript department).

Text output

• Gregor Emmenegger: The text of the Coptic Psalter from al-Mudil. A contribution to the text history of the Septuagint and the textual criticism of Coptic Bible manuscripts, with the critical new edition of Papyrus 37 of the British Library London (U) and Papyrus 39 of the Leipzig University Library (2013) (= texts and investigations on the history of early Christian literature , vol. 159 ). Walter de Gruyter, Berlin / New York 2007, ISBN 978-3-11-019948-2 .