Urbain Bouriant

Urbain Bouriant

Urbain Bouriant (born April 11, 1849 in Nevers , † June 19, 1903 in Vannes ) was a French Egyptologist .

education

Urbain Bouriant was born in Nevers and attended college there. In Paris he began to study law, which he broke off with the outbreak of the war in 1870 to join the marine infantry in Toulon. He took part in the battles of Mouzon and Douzy and of Bazeilles. Here he was taken prisoner, from which he was able to escape. When the peace was made at Versailles, he went to Martinique to do his military service. There he was secretary to the governor of the colony for almost two years. Back in France, he now devoted himself to studying Ancient Egypt and some time later was one of Gaston Maspero's best students .

The first years in Cairo

After the École française du Caire was founded on the model of the existing schools in Athens and Rome in December 1880 by a law of the Ministère de l'Instruction Publique et des Beaux Arts (Ministry of Education and the Arts) , Gaston Maspero became the first director. In addition to Urbain Bouriant and Victor Loret , Maspero Hyppolite Dulac took along for the Arabic language and the architect and draftsman Jules Bourgoin for the construction. They reached Cairo on January 5th, 1881. Auguste Mariette was already seriously ill and died on January 18th. On February 8th, Maspero was appointed Marette's successor in the Service des Antiquités d'Egypte (SAE) . Then Eugène Lefébure received the position as the new director of the school and 1883-1886 Émile Grébaut . In 1886 the name École française du Caire was changed to Mission archéologique du Caire and in 1898 it took its final name as Institut français d'archéologie orientale du Caire ( IFAO ) .

Bouriant began his work as a curator at the Boulaq Museum . During a flood in 1878, many objects were destroyed or even stolen and the museum was badly damaged. In 1880, Ismail Pasha brought Marette's collection of Boulaq to the extension of his palace in Giza on the west bank of the Nile and is now called the Giza Museum .

Tomb of Ramose in Sheikh Abd el-Qurna

The commission of the Académie des Belles Lettres noted in its minutes of the meeting of 1882 on the report of Gaston Maspero that Bouriant discovered the grave of a functionary named Ramose , who at the time of Amenhotep III during his excavations in Sheikh Abd el-Qurna . until Amenhotep IV would have lived. The grave allows the study of the change of religion. It can be assumed that Maspero soon took Bouriant with him on a trip through Egypt and they were also in Sheikh Abd el-Qurna.

From Bouriant himself there is a publication from 1882, in which he deals with the book Nile Gleanings published by Henry Windsor Villiers-Stuart in London in 1879 . Stuart is considered to be the discoverer of the TT55 grave . Stuart represents the people as Amenhotep III. and Amenophis IV. Bouriant points out the importance of the grave, since here the simultaneity or transformation of Amenophis IV. through his Aton cult in Akhenaten is documented. Using cartridges, he proves that Amenhotep IV and Akhenaten are one and the same person. The west wall of the tomb shows one of the earliest depictions of Akhenaten worshiping Aten . He further emphasizes that the depiction of the grave owner Ramose no longer shows the exaggerated image in the "Amarna style" - in contrast to his rock tomb in Amarna  - like an ink-sketched scene of Akhenaten and Nefertiti under the rays of Aten in the window of apparition shows in which to reward this Ramose. Villiers Stuart visited the grave again in 1882, removing further rubble and exposing parts of the south wall in the portico.

From now on Bouriant was fascinated by Akhenaten and it wasn't long before he came to Amarna.

Research into scriptures and papyrus finds

Bouriant copied and translated the fragments of the Coptic manuscripts that had recently entered the museum. He made a kind of “table of contents” over the inscriptions on the small objects in the museum “so that they are not lost”. One of his first works was La Stèle 5376 du Musée de Boulaq et l'Inscription de Rosette . Bouriant was fascinated by the scriptures and spent his life translating Coptic and Arabic texts. Always with the thought of passing on the old, he translated the writings of Aḥmad Ibn-Alī Al-Maqrīzī (1364–1442) from Arabic into French. Al Maqrizi created around 200 scriptures, of which Mawaiz wa al-'i'tibar bi dhikr al-khitat wa al-'athar (Khitat) was the most important. In it he describes the history of Cairo and other landscapes in Egypt. Bouriant translated two volumes into French as Description topographique et historique de l'Égypte (Volume I 1895. Volume II 1890). The University of Halle , Saale put the Al-Maqrīzī manuscript from the Boulaq online in Arabic (without translation) in 2010. The songs of the street singers, which he published in Arabic, were also of interest to him - nothing should be forgotten.

Another treasure trove for Bouriant was the library of Déîr Amba Shenoudah , the Coptic Patriarch in Cairo, whose title was "Anba Shenouda". His official residence in Cairo has been in the Deir el Anba Rueiss monastery since the 11th century. Here he discovered the remains of the Alexander romance in the manuscripts. Maspero bought the fragments in 1885–1888 for the Bibliothèque nationale de Paris. Bouriant was the first to publish three leaves in 1887: Fragments d'un roman d'Alexandre en dialecte thébain . Another sheet from the same manuscript was later found in the British Museum in 1891 , published by W. E. Crum, and two sheets in Berlin in 1888, but only published in 1903 by O. de Lemm.

He also discovered in this library a manuscript with the first 14 chapters of the Memphite version of the Livre de Sagesse , ( Wisdom of Solomon ) as well as two copies of the Theban version and one copy of the Memphite version of the constitutions apopostoliques ( Apostolic Constitutions ) of Clement of Alexandria , the Lived at the end of the 2nd century and was also called the Bishop of Rome. So far only one Memphite specimen was known.

The Codex of Achmim

The fragment of Achmim - The Apocrypha of the Gospel of Peter

In March 1884 Maspero and Ernesto Schiaparelli had commissioned the rice Chalib of Qurna with excavation work in the necropolis east of Achmim (Herodotus called the place "Chemmis" and Strabo "Panopolis"). Here, too, the early Christians built their monasteries. When they found hundreds of mummies there, the rice used soldiers who then excavated several thousand. When Bouriant arrived there in 1886, he was appalled by the devastation of the Coptic necropolis. Bouriant found in a monk's tomb here in Achmim a small book measuring 15.24 x 11.43 cm (6 x 4.5 inches) containing 33 sheets of parchment which were held together by a cardboard cover that was roughly bound in leather. Today they are kept in the Cairo Museum under the Codex P.Cairo 10759 and date from the 6th – 9th centuries. Century.

Bouriant found that they were parts of the gospel. The find was a sensation. It was the first non-canonical gospel to be rediscovered and survived in the dry desert sands. The first nine pages contained the fragment of the Gospel of Peter , which was believed to be lost . The first page had a Coptic cross on the back . After a blank page, there are two pages with the apocalypse. Both fragments appeared to come from the same hand. The Greek version of the Book of Enoch followed . Since the sheets were handwritten and some were poorly preserved, Bouriant had to make a copy (transcription) and also research their written history ( palaeography ). Based on the location of the grave, Bouriant initially determined the date of origin "not before the 8th and not after the 12th century". It was six years before Bouriant published the facsimile in 1892. The Leroux publishing house in Paris made the photographic plates.

In 1893 the first publications with translations appeared - mostly by theologians: In England by J. Armitage Robinson with MR James, James Rendel Harris and Henry Barclay Swete , who received two photo plates from Leroux. In France it was Adolphe Lods (1867–1948) and in Germany it was the leading theologians of that time: Adolf Harnack and Theodor Zahn . However, in 1893 Oscar von Gebhardt only published a collotype of the newly discovered fragments based on a photograph of the "Gizeh Manuscript".

According to the Catalog général des antiquités égyptiennes du Musée du Caire , which BP Grenfell and AS Hunt published in 1903, the parchment comprised 33 sheets with some Apocryphal scripts in Greek:

• Parts of the Gospel of Peter (Giza manuscript)
• the apocalypse of Peter
• two fragments of the book of Enoch
• In the cover one found a parchment page with parts of the martyrdom of Julianus.

The tombs of Tell el-Amarna

Topographic drawing with the rock tombs

The group of rock tombs on the slopes of Darb el-Hamzaouï, which the high functionaries at Akhenaten's court of Amarna had created, was discovered in December 1891 by Alessandro Barsanti (1858-1917). Of the seven graves he found, only one was partially decorated but unfinished.

Bouriant wrote: “ At last we will be able to carry out a project that has long been close to my heart. In the previous year we had found that many graves had not yet been explored and we promised ourselves that we would open some at the next opportunity to see whether they were really empty, as we had been assured . "

On April 1, 1893, Bouriant was with Maspero in Tell el-Amarna , who unfortunately fell seriously ill so that they only had two days to explore the graves.

In this short time Bouriant copied the great Aton hymn (sun hymn) in the grave of Eje ( Amarna grave 25 ), which had previously been unpublished. He discovered and opened the tombs of Ramose, Ipi and Mahu.

In the winter of 1893–94, Bouriant finally began exploring with Georges Legrain and Gustave Jéquier . They began with the tomb of Eje and had divided the work: Bouriant and Jéquier copied and compared the inscriptions, while Legrain drew the bas-reliefs and Jéquier also helped him. Jéquier also did the tracing in ink. It was a good collaboration.

In 1891 antique dealers came to Tell el-Amarna and Haggi-Quandil to secure cartouches or fragments of bas-reliefs from Akhenaten's time. The graves were ruthlessly destroyed. Large pieces of the wall of Eje's grave were removed. Thanks to Flinders Petrie , the Cairo museum owns one of the most beautiful fragments showing Eje and his wife Tij receiving royal gifts. The Service d'Antiquités sent Barsanti to put iron bars in front of the graves so that they could be prevented from being completely evacuated.

From December 1884 to January 1885 they were there again in the hope of finding new graves. They opened another 18 to 20 graves, but only one of them had a small inscription and was unfinished. All were anonymous, so they ended their stay.

The hills of the Haggi-Qandil Mountains were interrupted by a gorge, the Ouady (Wadi) el Darb el-Hamzaoui, which divides the rock tombs into a north and south part. They explored the following graves:

Name German	Grave no	Name Bouriant	Explorers and Notes
Eh	25th	Aï	Grave with hymn to the sun
is missing	24	Atonoumhabi	Discovered by Alessandro Barsanti in 1894
Any	23	Anouï	discovered by Alessandro Barsanti on December 26, 1892
unknown	22nd	unknown	Floor plan drawn - no decoration
unknown	21st	unknown	Floor plan drawn - no decoration
unknown	20th	unknown	Floor plan drawn - no decoration
Sutau	19th	Soutaou	an unfinished chamber
unknown	16	unknown	with six pillars, unfinished
Sui	15th	Souti	discovered by Alessandro Barsanti , published by Georges Daressy ; the copy of Bouriant's inscriptions differs in many respects from Daressy's
Maya	14th	Flabellifère	discovered by Alessandro Barsanti - published by Daressy; large, beautiful tomb with nine pillars - unfinished
Nefercheperosechepter	13	Nofirkhopirhiskhopir	1830 by Robert Hay and C. Laser - totally looted in 1892
Night couples	12	Nakhtpaatonou	Discovered by Alessandro Barsanti in 1891 and published by Georges Daressy
Ramose	11	Ramès	discovered April 1, 1883 by Urbain Bouriant and Gaston Maspero
Ipi	10	Apii	Discovered April 1883 by Urbain Bouriant
Mahu	9	Mabhou	discovered April 2, 1883 by Urbain Bouriant
Tutu	8th	Toutou	described by Nestor L'Hote and published by Karl Richard Lepsius
Parennefer	7th	Parannofir	Facade of 10 m; next to the grave of Eje the most beautiful grave

• 

  Sun hymn in 13 columns in the tomb of Eje. Relief: height 3.50 m, width 1.34 m.

• 

  Eje and his wife Tij at prayer. Relief: width 2.72 m, height 1.04 m.

• 

  Distribution of gifts by Akhenaten and Nefertiti. So-called. "Balcony scene". Relief: width 3.88 m. Height: 2.03 m.

• 

  Akhenaten and his family bring food offerings. Aton was embodied by the sun disk, the rays of which flow into hands.

The publication of the graves

At the end of 1894, Georges Legrain was sent to Karnak and Gustave Jéquier went to Susa in Persia with Jacques de Morgan in December 1897 . Joseph-Etienne Gautier agreed to draw the plans for the graves before he too went to Persia. It was now up to Bouriant to complete the work that had been started. Much of the preparatory work was done in the fall of 1896. The images were engraved and all that remained was to edit the description of the graves and to write an introduction. Bouriant's dream of writing about Akhenaten was finally about to come true.

On December 1, 1886 Bouriant had succeeded Émile Grébaut as director of the Mission archéologique du Caire. In 1897 the mission had to move to Rue Antikhana, so that he hardly had time to work on the publication and to conduct his own scientific research. In early 1898, his health forced him to hand over his position as director to Émile Chassinat .

In February 1898 Bouriant drove again to Tell el-Amarna for a short time to check some of his text copies on site. In the summer he traveled to France for a vacation. On August 25, 1898, he suffered a stroke there. This made him completely immobile and the doctors were unable to tell if and when his condition would change.

Émile Chassinat was now faced with the problem of how and whether he could publish Bouriant's book, since there was interest in a publication from many quarters. Jéquier had given Chassinat the free disposal of his documents and left the clichés of his photos outside the text for an appendix. Much time had passed without any improvement in Bouriant's health. Chassinat then got in touch with Georges Legrain, who without hesitation agreed to take on the delicate task of completing the unfinished book. The inscriptions were taken from Bouriant, while Legrain now continued the description of the tombs.

The intended title "Tell el-Amarna" had to be replaced, once because Legrain had brought together a number of Bouriants documents relating to the Aton cult, which made it advisable to publish one volume on Akhenaten and a second on the graves. Moreover, had Norman de Garis Davies indicated that he would soon issue a publication on the same graves. So they chose a title that should be different from other publications: Les Tombes de Khouitatonou . The first part is about the tombs in Darb el-Hamzaouï (the royal tombs), which Barsanti discovered in 1891. He concentrates on Akhenaten's tomb with the description of the chambers α and γ, as well as the tomb of EJE with 13 illustrations. The second volume includes the rock tombs of Haggi-Qandil with the other court officials.

Urbain Bouriant did not live to see the publication. He died on June 19, 1903 in Vannes.

Works

• Notice of the monuments coptes du musee de Boulaq. In: Recueil de travaux relatifs à la philologie et à l'archéologie égyptienne et assyrienne. (RT) No. 5, 1884, pp. 60-70 Internet Archive .
• Les Canons apostolique de Clément de Rome . Traduction en dialect copte thébain d'après un manuscrit de la Bibliotheque du Patriarche Jacobite du Caire. In: Recueil de travaux relatifs. (RT) No. 5, 1884, pp. 199-216 Internet Archive .
• Fragments de manuscrits thébain du Musée Boulaq In: Recueil de travaux relatifs. (RT) No. 4, 1883, pp. 1-4 Internet Archive .
• Les papyrus d'Akhmim (Fragments de manuscrits en dialectes bachmourique et thébain). In: Mémoires publiés par les membres de la mission archéologie française au Caire. (MMAF) Volume I, publiés par les Membres de la Mission Française d'Archéologie Orientale au Caire, Paris 1884–89, pp. 243–304.
• L'Eglise copte du tombeau de Déga. In: MMAF. Volume 1, Paris 1884.
• La Stèle 5576 du Musée de Boulaq et l'Inscription de Rosette. In: Recueil de travaux relatifs. (RT) No. 6, Vieweg, Paris 1885, pp. 1-20 Internet Archive .
• Fragments Memphitiques de divers livre inédits de l'écriture et des instructions pastorales des pères de l'église copte . With a list of the first 89 patriarchs of the Coptic Church. In: Recueil de travaux relatifs. (RT) No. 7, 1886, pp. 82-94 Internet Archive .
• Petits Monuments et petits Textes réceuillis en Egypte. In: Recueil de travaux relatifs. (RT) No. 7, 1886, pp. 114–132 (description of the sarcophagus, vases, steles, statuettes etc. with origin and inscriptions No. 1–25 in the Boulaq Museum, as well as two Coptic chants in honor of St. George) Internet Archives .
• Petits Monuments et petits Textes réceuillis en Egypte. In: Recueil de travaux relatifs. (RT) No. 8, 1886 pages 158–169 (description of the objects according to their origin with inscriptions No. 26–47 in the Museum Boulaq) Internet Archive .
• Petits Monuments et petits Textes réceuillis en Egypte. In: Recueil de travaux relatifs. (RT) no. 9, livre 3 + 4, 1887, pp. 91–100 (description of the objects according to origin with inscriptions no. 48–77 in the Boulaq Museum) Internet Archive .
• Report au ministre de l'instruction publique sur une mission dans la Haute Égypte 1884–85. In: MMAF. Volume 1, Paris 1887.
• Fragments d'un roman d'Alexandre en dialecte thébain. In: Journal asiatique. Series VIII, Volume IX, pp. 1-38, avec une planche. Paris 1887.
• Description topographique et historique de l'Égypte - Al-Maqrīzī. Traduite en français by Urbain Bouriant. Volume I, Paris 1895; Volume II, Paris 1890.
• Notes de voyage: le Deir Amba Samaan en face d'Assouan. In: Recueil de travaux relatifs. (RT) No. 15, 1893, pp. 176-189. Saint-Siméon Monastery (Deir Amba Samaan)
• Émile Brugsch, Urbain Bouriant: Le livre des rois contenant la liste chronologique des rois, reines, princes, princesses et personnages importants de l'Égypte depuis Ménès jusqu'a Nectanebo II. Cairo 1887 Internet Archive .
• La Bibliothèque du Deir-Amba Sheinoudi . Part 2: Actes du Concile d'Éphès . Coptic text with French translation by Bouriant. In: MMAF. Volume 8, Paris 1892, pp. 1-143.
• l'Éloge de l'Apa Victor fils de Romanos . Cop. Text with French Translation of Bouriant. In: MMAF. Volume 8, Paris 1892, pp. 145-268.
• Fragments du texte grec du Livre d'Énoch et de quelques écrits attribués à saint Pierre. Greek Text with French Translation of Bouriant. In: MMAF. Volume 9 / Volume 1, Paris 1892, pp. 93-147.
• Chansons populaires arabes en dialecte du Caire: d'après les manuscrits d'un chanteur des rues. Leroux, Paris 1893.
• Urbain Bouriant, Georges Legrain, Gustave Jéquier: Monuments pour servir à l'étude du culte d'Atonou en Égypte. Les Tombes de Khouitatonou. In: MMAF. Volume 8, Paris 1903.
• Volume I: Les Tombeaux du Darb El-Hamzoui.
• Volume II: Les Tombeaux de Haggi-Qandil.

literature

• Wilhelm Ültzen: Constitutiones apostolicae: textum Graecum recognovit, praefatus est, annotationes criticas et indices subiecit. Stiller, Suerini / Rostochii 1853; New edition: Kessinger, 2009, ISBN 978-1-104-69606-1 .
• von Gebhardt, Oscar Leopold: The Gospel and the Apocalypse of Peter; The newly discovered fragments based on a photograph of the Giza manuscript in collotype . Hinrichs, Leipzig 1893.
• Theodor Zahn: The Gospel of Peter: The recently found fragment of his text. Deichert, Erlangen 1893 ( Internet Archive ).
• Henry Barclay Swete: The Akhmim Fragment of The Apocryphal Gospel of St. Peter. Macmillan, London 1893 ( Internet Archive ) (English)
• George William Horner: The Coptic Version of the New Testament in the Northern Dialect, Otherwise Called Memphitic and Bohairic. Volume I-IV. Clarendon Press, Oxford 1898–1905 Internet Archive, English New edition: Nabu Press, September 13, 2010, ISBN 978-1-171-89279-3 .
• George William Horner: The Coptic Version of the New Testament in the Southern Dialect, Otherwise Called Sahidic and Thebaic. Volume I-VII. Clarendon Press, Oxford 1911-1924. Internet Archive English New edition: Nabu Press, 2010, ISBN 978-1-171-89279-3 .
• Wolfgang Kosack : "Novum Testamentum": Bohairice / curavit Wolfgang Kosack, Basel 2014, ISBN 978-3-906206-04-2 .
• Lührmann, Dieter, Egbert Schlarb: Fragments of Gospels that have become apocryphal in Greek and Latin. Elwert, Marburg 2000, ISBN 3-7708-1144-5 .
• Thomas J. Kraus, Tobias Nicklas: The Gospel of Peter and the Apocalypse of Peter: The Greek fragments with German and English translation. de Gruyter, Berlin 2004, ISBN 3-11-017635-1 .
• Franz-Jürgen Schmitz, Gerd Mink: List of the Coptic manuscripts of the New Testament. Volume I: The Sahid Manuscripts of the Gospels. de Gruyter, April 1986, ISBN 3-11-010256-0 . (English)
• Apocalypse of Peter and Gospel of Peter . In: Brockhaus Konversations-Lexikon 1894–1896, Volume 13, p. 33.

Web links

• Works by and about Urbain Bouriant  in the German Digital Library
• Papyrus Cairensis 10759 - Fragment of the Gospel of Peter ( Memento from January 17, 2014 in the Internet Archive )
• Coptic alphabet
• Work on New Testament text research (ANTF) at the University of Münster
• Bouriant documents ( Memento of November 3, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) in the archive of the L'Institut français d'archéologie orientale du Caire (IFAO)
• Notice on Urbain Bouriant. From his son Pierre. Vannes July 1, 1903

Remarks

1. ↑ In publications of that time both the Boulaq Museum and the Gizeh Museum are mentioned. The Boulaq collection remained in Giza until March 1902. Then it was transferred to the new building of the Egyptian Museum in Cairo by Gaston Maspero .
2. ↑ The time of origin can now be determined very precisely due to the large number of documents found and the latest research methods.
3. ↑ The French called Akhenaten Khouni-atonou and the sun god Aton Atonou . Khouit-Atonou was the new nome , which was marked by border steles .

Individual evidence

1. ^ Dictionnaire biographique
2. ^ Maspero et la création de l'Ecole française du Caire
3. ^ Rapport au nom de la Commission du Nord de l'Afrique, sur le rapport de M. Maspero concernant les travaux de la mission archéologique du Caire durant l'année 1882 (Comptes rendues des séances de l'Académie des Inscriptions et de belles Lettres . Année 1882, Vol. 26, pp. 287ff)
4. ^ Henry Windsor Villiers Stuart: Nile Gleanings, concerning the Ethnology, History, and Art of Ancient Egypt. London, 1879.
5. ↑ Le tombeau de Ramès à Cheikh-abd-el-Qournah. In: Revue d'archéologique. 43. Vol. 1882, p. 278 ff.
6. ^ University and State Library of Saxony-Anhalt.
7. ↑ The Patriarch of Cairo
8. ↑ Alexander Romance
9. ↑ Livre de Sagesse - The Book of Wisdom of Solomon
10. ^ Photographic Archive of Papyri in the Cairo Museum
11. ↑ The Akhmim Fragment (Cairo Papyrus 10759) 10 pages by O. v. Gebhardt ( Memento from December 26, 2010 in the Internet Archive )
12. ^ U. Bouriant: Deux jours de fouilles à Tell el-Amarna. Mémoires tome 1, publiés par les membre de la Mission archéologique francaise au Caire, 1884.
13. ^ E. Chassinat: Avertissement. Le Vésinet, July 29, 1903. Communication in Volume I.