PAPER

CHAPTER II.

PAPYRUS MANUSCRIPTS.

PAPYRI OF HERCULANEUM THEIR DISCOVERY METHOD OF UNROLLING THEM ONLY WRITTEN UPON ONE SIDE- TITLES, WHERE PLACED. PRESENT STATE OF THE 1756 MSS. - PAPYRUS HOW MADE. - PAPYRUS AT SYRACUSE. CHEVALIER LANDOLINA. -LAWS SET TO MUSIC. TEUTONIC PARAPHRASE OF THE BIBLE. CEDMON. ARUNDELIAN MARBLES. WILLS OF THE ROMAN SOLDIERS.- WOOD. BONE MEMORANDA. -WAX. HOUSEHOLD BOOK OF PHILIP LE BEL. TALIPOT TREE. BARK BOOKS. INDIAN PAPER. GOLD MSS. GRADUAL OF ST. GREGORY. PARCHMENT. PURPLE VELLUM. SILK PAPER

1

LINEN CLOTH. SKINS.

COTTON -LINEN.CODEX

BLOCK PRINTING. MARCO POLO.

ARGENTEUS.

Papyrus, verdant on the banks of Nile,
Spread its thin leaf, and waved its silvery style;
Its plastic pellicles Invention took,

To form the polish'd page, and letter'd book,
And on its folds, with skill consummate taught
To paint in mystic colors sound and thought."

PAPYRI OF HERCULANEUM.

MRS. F.

31

In order that I may be able to give you a more detailed account of the various modes and materials employed for transmitting knowledge before the discovery of printing, I have brought down some notes which I made upon the subject many years since: but, before we leave the subject of Manuscripts, I must tell you something of the papyri discovered at Herculaneum.

HENRIETTA.

Thank you, aunt; I should so much like to know all about the Herculaneum and Pompeii MSS.

Not Pompeii, Henrietta, for those which were found in that city fall into powder as soon as touched. Those of Herculaneum alone are in a state to be unrolled, and the difficulty and delicacy of the undertaking render it a most laborious and ingenious operation.

ESTHER.

Where were these papyri found?

MRS. F.

In prosecuting the excavations at Herculaneum, the workmen came, in 1753, to a small room which had presses all round it, and one in the centre, containing books on both sides, but the wood of the press was so completely carbonised that it fell into pieces when touched.

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PAPYRI OF HERCULANEUM.

ESTHER.

How did they know they were books?

MRS. F.

The order in which they were found, carefully arranged one over the other, was the only circumstance which excited attention, and convinced the workmen that they could not be wood or cinders. Upon closer examination characters were discovered upon them, which the learned immediately occupied themselves in endeavoring to decipher.

HENRIETTA.

Were there none in any other parts of the city?

MRS. F.

but as they

Probably there may have been many lost to us, were in a mass with rubbish, lava, &c. they could not be recognised; for you must recollect that the excavations of Herculaneum are about 100 palmi* under ground indeed the accumulated mass of lava and ashes has buried the city at depths from 70 to 112 feet, and so completely filled up the town, that all the work is carried on with pickaxes. It is to this room (which was in a country house) not being entirely choked up, that we owe the fortunate circumstance of their preservation. A few more were found in the portico of the same house, preserved in little portable boxes, and some others in another room in the same habitation; making together 1756 manuscripts, all written upon papyrus. Various were the means employed to unroll them: some were cut into two longitudinally, by which a small portion of the characters was rendered visible: in short, they were subjected to all kinds of attempts, until Father Piaggio discovered the present manner of unrolling them.

What is it?

HENRIETTA.

* The Neapolitan palm is rather more than ten English inches.

PAPYRI OF HERCULANEUM.

MRS. F.

333

The papyrus is laid upon cotton, supported by a piece of pasteboard, which lies upon two semicircular pieces of metal. The workman begins by glueing small pieces of goldbeater's skin upon the back of the papyrus until the whole of the exterior of the roll is covered. He then attaches three threads to the end of the goldbeater's skin, and suspending them to the top of the frame, proceeds, with the point of a needle, to detach from the roll two or three lines of the end of the papyrus, which has been made of a tolerable consistency by the addition of the goldbeater's skin. As soon as these lines are unrolled, the same operation of applying the goldbeater's skin is repeated, until, by the greatest patience and diligence, the whole MS. is gradually unrolled. Here is a little sketch of the machine (which is placed in a kind of frame), which will perhaps better enable you to understand the process. (Fig 1.)

HENRIETTA,

But then, aunt, they can only read one side of the page.

MRS. F.

Fortunately, the Manuscripts are generally only written upon one side of the papyrus, otherwise the operation would be impossible. There is, however, one papyrus which is written on both sides. It would appear to be an original MS.; and the author having filled the end of his volume before he had arrived at the conclusion of his subject, has written three pages on the other side of the papyrus. I also saw, in the Ambrosian library at Milan, a Josephus in papyrus, which is said to be of the fourth century, and is also written upon both sides of the paper.

ESTHER.

How did the ancients arrange their books; because it must have been very difficult to distinguish one from another, among so many rolls?

MRS. F.

Those found in the kind of press or bookcase which I have

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PAPYRI OF HERCULANEUM.

described, were arranged horizontally along the shelves. Their titles were either written on the end of the papyrus* or upon a piece of papyrus paper fastened to the middle of the papyrus, in this way (Fig. 2). Some papyri were found tied up in bundles (Fig. 3.); others in double rolls, as if the last reader had left them open where he left off reading (Fig. 4.); and some in a box, as I have before mentioned, that they might be carried about in safety (Fig. 5). From the blank paper which is often found round the papyri, it would appear that each volume had a sheet of blank paper rolled round it, in order to protect the fragile material of which it was composed. The marks of the lines ruled for the guide of the copyist are still visible; and the ancients appear to have had their large paper copies of their works, as well as the moderns. The size of the Greek MSS. is generally smaller than the Latin; the former being from 8 to 12 inches, the latter from twelve to sixteen, broad. Some are 110 pages long, others upwards of 62 feet (75 palmi) by measurement. This is an engraving shaded so as to give an idea of the state of the MSS. when unrolled (Engraving II).

HENRIETTA.

What a ragged, torn looking thing.

MRS. F.

True; but when you take into consideration the difficulty of the task, it is wonderful that the unrolling is ever effected at all. If the glue be put on in too large quantities, it will probably remove a portion of the next layer of the papyrus; a breath of air will carry away all these pulverized particles, and dust is so fatal, that one Manuscript having become covered with dust, it took a whole year to remove it.

*Whether the title was also written, as some suppose, at the beginning, cannot be discovered from the papyri of Herculaneum, none of them being in a sufficient state of preservation to decide the point.