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KYPRIANOS M643

Sigla: question mark icon Modern names for the manuscript, including inventory and publication numbers.

Biblioteca Nazionale di Napoli I.B.14.06-07
Formerly Museo Borgiano Zoega CCLXXVIII
Formerly Museo Borgiano Zoega 278
P.Borg.Copt. 278

Category: question mark icon Classification of the contents, e.g. magical (formulary or applied), alchemical, liturgical, documentary or medical.

Magical (formulary)
Medical (recipe)
Contents:

1. p. 241 626.1-5: “For all swellings” (healing prescription)
2. p. 241 626.5-627.4: “For pustules” (healing prescription)
3. p. 241 627.5-18: “For psoriasis and those who scratch” (healing prescription)
4. p.241 627.18-628.1: “Another (recipe for psoriasis)” (healing prescription)
5. p. 242 628.2-8: “For psoriasis that itches very much” (healing prescription)
6. p. 242 628.8-17: “For wild psoriasis” (healing prescription)
7. p. 242 628.17-18: “For psoriasis” (healing prescription)
8. p. 242 628.18-19: “A swelling” (healing prescription)
9. p. 242 628.19-21: “A marvellous prescription for psoriasis” (healing prescription)
10. p. 242 628.22-25: “For a man whose body itches” (healing prescription)
11. p. 242-243 629.1-4: “Another concerning a man whose body itches” (healing prescription)
12. p. 243 629.5-9: “For a wart that comes out of the body” (healing prescription)
13. p. 243 629.9-13: “For every sickness of leprosy, itching, liver, jaundice, and the kidneys” (healing prescription)
14. p. 243 629.13-17: “Concerning a man who itches greatly from his head to his feet” (healing prescription)
15. p. 243 629.17-18: “For psoriases (?)” (healing prescription)
16. p. 243 629.18-19: “Another (prescription for psoriasis)” (healing prescription)
17. p. 243 629.19-20: “Another (prescription for psoriasis) again” (healing prescription)
18. p. 243 629.20-630.2: “Another again for psoriases (?)” (healing prescription)
19. p. 243 630.2-3: “For one who itches” (healing prescription)
20. p. 243 630.3-5: “Another (for itching)” (healing prescription)
21. p. 244 630.5-7: “For a wart and a hair-eater disease (? ouam-sir)” (healing prescription)
22. p. 244 630.7-9: “Another again” (healing prescription)
23. p. 244 630.10-11: “For a wart again, likewise” (healing prescription)
24. p. 244 630.11-14: “Another again (for a wart)” (healing prescription)
25. p. 244 630.14-15: “Likewise, for warts” (healing prescription)
26. p. 244 630.15-18: “For those whose bodies itch when they sleep” (healing prescription)
27. p. 244 630.19-20: “Another (for itching)” (healing prescription)
28. p. 244 630.20-22: “For those with psoriasis” (healing prescription)
29. p. 244 630.22-24: “For itchy fingers” (healing prescription)
30. p. 244 630.24-27: “For one with psoriasis” (healing prescription)
See all texts in this manuscript.

Language(s):

Egyptian (Coptic)
Arabic
Script(s):

Coptic
Dialect:

Sahidic
Language/dialect notes:

See related texts for further notes.
Date: question mark icon Dates are CE unless preceded by a minus sign <->, in which case they are BCE. 801 – 1100
Date notes:

Richter (2014: p. 191); 701-900 (Dulaurier 1843: p. 434).
Archive/collection: question mark icon Larger collection to which manuscript belongs. KYP A2
Archive name: White Monastery Library
State of edition:

Published. New edition in progress by Anne Grons.
Image:

Form:

Codex (?)
Material:

Parchment
Dimensions (cm): Height: 30.5 Width: 23 Depth:
Dimensions (notes):

Buzi (2009: p. 277).
Folding pattern:
State of preservation:

Fragmentary, only one bifolio survives, numbered from p. 241-244.
Pages/Columns: question mark icon Total surviving columns in the manuscript for rolls, sheets and rotuli; total number of pages for codices.

4
Pages/Columns (notes):

One surviving bifolio from a codex once containing at least 240 pages.
Hand:

Findspot:

Akhmim, Egypt

(TM places ID: 1589)
Place of purchase: (TM places ID: )
Writingspot:

Achmim, Egypt (?)

(TM places ID: 1589)
Present Location:

Naples, Biblioteca Nazionale
Collection History:

Formerly held at the Museo Borgiano (TM coll. 920), now held at the Bibliotheca Nazionale di Napoli
Trismegistos collection: question mark icon Page on the database Trismegistos collections for the institution which currently houses the manuscript. 239
Collection website:

Notes/Discussion:

Line numbering refers to divisions from Zoega, not manuscript, since he does not maintain line division.

Arabic notes in margins, apparently by second hand.

Richter (2014: p. 191) notes there is a second sheet in the Bibliothèque Nationale de France containing pages 214-215, published by Bouriant 1887 and Till 1951: p. 112 (as text BA).

Bibiliography
Editions:

Zellmann-Rohrer, Michael and Love, Edward O. D. Traditions in Transmission: The Medical and Magical Texts of a Fourth-Century Greek and Coptic Codex (Michigan Ms. 136) in Context. Berlin: De Gruyter, 2022, p. 181.

Zoega, Georgio. Catalogus codicum copticorum manu scriptorum qui in Museo Borgiano velitris adservantur (Rome: Typis Sacrae Congregationis de Propaganda Fide, 1810), p. 626-630, no. 278.
Translations:

Champollion, J.F. “Observations sur le catalogue des manuscrits coptes du Musée Borgia à Velletri, ouvrage postume de Geoge Zoega”, Magasin Encyclopédique (October 1811) 30-34. [non vidi]

Champollion, J.F. “Recettes médicales pour les maladies cutanées traduites d’un fragment égyptien, en dialecte thébain”, Revue Archéologique 11 (1854): 333-342 (French).

Dulaurier, Édouard. “Fragment d’un traité de médicine copte”, Journal Asiatique 4e série, no. 1 (May 1843) 433-452 (French).

Till, W.C. Die Arzneikunde der Kopten (Berlin: Akademie-Verlag, 1951), p. 111-112, p. 135-137 text ZB (German).
General:

Bouriant, Urbain, “Fragment d’un livre de médicine en copte thébain”, Comptes rendus de l’Académie des lnscriptions et Belles-Lettres 4,.15 (1887): 374-379.

Buzi, Paola. Catalogo dei manoscritti copti Borgiani conservati presso la Biblioteca nazionale “Vittorio Emanuele III” di Napoli : con un profilo scientifico di Stefano Borgia e Georg Zoega e una breve storia della formazione della collezione Borgiana (Rome: Bardi, 2009), p. 277.

Richter, Tonio Sebastian. “Neue koptische medizinische Rezepte”, Zeitschrift für Ägyptische Sprache und Altertumskunde 141.2 (2014): 191, no. 27.

Trismegistos ID:

874148

 PAThs:
PGM: question mark icon Papyri Gracae Magicae SM: question mark icon Supplementum Magicum GEMF: question mark icon Greek and Egyptian Magical Formularies (forthcoming) ACM: question mark icon Ancient Christian Magic
Bélanger Sarrazin: question mark icon Bélanger-Sarrazin. “Catalogue des textes magiques coptes” AKZ: question mark icon Ausgewählte koptische Zaubertexte CBd: question mark icon Campbell-Bonner Magical Gems Database Mert.-Pack: question mark icon Mertens-Pack online database
Van H: question mark icon van Haelst, Catalogue des papyrus littéraires Bruyn-Dijkstra: question mark icon de Bruyn and Dijkstra, “Greek Amulets and Formularies (Checklist)" TheDefix: question mark icon Thesaurus Defixionum To Zodion:
Edit History:

KD (18/3/2019); EL (29/3/2019); MPS (30/9/2019); EL (8/9/2020); MPS (22/3/2021); KD (4/12/2021); KD (21/3/2022)

How to cite:
Korshi Dosoo & Markéta Preininger (principal editors). "KYP M643," Kyprianos Database of Ancient Ritual Texts and Objects, www.coptic-magic.phil.uni-wuerzburg.de/index.php/manuscript/kyp-m643. Accessed on 15/12/2025

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