The first book form in the ancient world was the papyrus or textile scroll, dating back to the mid-third millennium BCE. Being flexible, portable, and able to contain extended texts, the scroll was superior to such alternatives as clay tablets, and remained central well into Roman times. Its Latin designation, volumen, and its derivations are still common terms in many languages for a physically bound text.

Over time scrolls were replaced by the codex, single- or multi-gatherings of sheets, bound at one side to a spine and cover of wooden, cloth, or leather boards. Pages could be written on two sides, desired passages were easier to find, and they did not need frequent unrolling. Its cover provided additional protection. Codices existed both in papyrus and parchment forms, and became the preferred form of early Christianity given its ease of access to different parts of a text, even while in some higher status contexts scrolls remained in use.

Shown here is an early Egyptian papyrus scroll displaying parts from the work usually called the Book of the Dead, a varying collection of magic spells to assist a dead person’s journey into the afterlife. Regularly placed in burial chambers from circa 1550 BCE, this copy, here unrolled, dates from the last few centuries BCE, and was owned by Khay Hapy, “son of Isis-great-of-truth”. It is one of 10 such scrolls in Princeton University Library’s collections.

Princeton Papyri Collections, Pharaonic roll no. 9

For further reading

Scalf, Foy (ed.) Book of the dead: becoming God in ancient Egypt. Chicago: Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago, 2017.

Taylor, John H.(ed.) Journey through the afterlife: ancient Egyptian Book of the dead. London: British Museum Press, 2010.

Although it has lost its binding and now consists only of a stack of leaves, this third-century Greek Book of Ezekiel was once an early codex, bound at one side and with page numbers. With their long shapes, such early papyrus codices differ from early parchment codices. The codex form was especially prominent amongst early Christian communities.

Scheide M 97

For further reading

Biblioteca Nacional de España. El papiro de Ezequiel. La historia del códice P967 (Exposición).Accessed May 20, 2025. https://www.bne.es/es/agenda/papiro-ezequiel-historia-codice-p967

Johnson, Allan Chester, Henry Snyder Gehman and Edmund Harris Kase (ed.) The John H. Scheide Biblical papyri: Ezekiel. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1938.

Turner. Eric G. The typology of the early codex. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1977.

Although the original leather spine binding the two wooden boards together with four leather ribbons has not been preserved, this exceptional parchment codex shows how multiple gatherings are bound together. Its particular linguistic properties and form made scholars decide upon the origin and date given. Such surviving early texts are extremely rare. In addition to the Coptic Gospel of Matthew, the book contains the Hymn to Angels also known as the Doxology.

Bequest of William H. Scheide ’36, 2015

Scheide 30.1

For further reading

Boudalis, Georgios. The codex and crafts in Late Antiquity. New York: Bard Graduate Center, 2018.

Metzger, Bruce M. “An early Coptic manuscript of the Gospel according to Matthew.” Princeton University Library Chronicle 37, no. 2 (1976): 117-25.

Metzger, Bruce M. “An early Coptic manuscript of the Gospel according to Matthew.” In Studies in New Testament language and text: essays in honour of George D. Kilpatrick on the occasion of his sixty‑fifth birthday, edited by James Keith Elliott, 301–12. Leiden: Brill, 1976.

Needham, Paul. “The codex book and the earliest bookbindings.” In his Twelve centuries of bookbindings 400 – 1600, 3-11. New York: Pierpont Morgan Library, 1979.

Schenke, Hans-Martin (ed.) Das Matthäus-Evangelium im mittelägyptischen Dialekt des Koptischen (Codex Scheide). Berlin: Akademie-Verlag, 1981.

Theodore of Mopsuestia (now Yakapınar) was a Christian writer who after his death became central to the Church of the East. This particular Syriac copy, a Commentary on the Psalms, had been referred to in other works, but was thought lost until identified in 2013. Its form of writing is a particularly old form of the Syriac script commonly referred to as Estrangela and based on the script, a date of 500 CE for the manuscript has been proposed.

Gift of Robert Garrett, Class of 1897, 1942

Garrett Syriac 7

For further reading

Rompay, Lucas Van. “Theodore of Mopsuestia’s Commentary on Psalms: modern and ancient sources.” SARA: The Syriac Annals of the Romanian Academy 1 (2020-21): 31-64.

This is an example of a palimpsest parchment on which a text has been erased so that the surface can be used again for writing. Visible is a Georgian translation from an earlier Greek Finding the Cross by Alexander of Cyprus, copied in 986 by the Georgian scribe Iona Tosime. Underneath are Greek liturgical odes, written circa 750–800 and later in the Jerusalem area, as well as Christian Palestinian Aramaic fragments in Estrangela Syriac of texts by John Chrysostom (On repentance) and Saint Sylvanus (Sayings of the desert fathers).

Gift of Robert Garrett, Class of 1897, 1942

Garrett MS. 24

For further reading

Kotzabassi, Sofia, Nancy Patterson Ševčenko and Don C. Skemer. Greek manuscripts at Princeton, sixth to nineteenth century: a descriptive catalogue. Princeton: Department of Art and Archaeology and Program in Hellenic Studies, Princeton University, 2010. Entry Garrett MS. 24.

Müller-Kessler, Christa. “Piecing together Christian Palestinian Aramaic texts under Georgian manuscripts (St. Petersburg, NLR, Syr. 16; Sinai, Georg. NF 19, 71; Oslo, Martin Schøyen, MS 35, 37; Princeton, Garrett MS 24; Göttingen, Syr. 17, 19, 23, 25).” Digital Kartvelology 1 (2022): 24-49.

Raasted, Jørgen. “The Princeton Heirmologion palimpsest.” Cahiers de l'Institut du Moyen-Age Grec et Latin 62 (1992): 219–32.

Skemer, Don C. “The anatomy of a palimpsest (Garrett MS. 24).” Princeton University Library Chronicle 57, no. 2 (1996): 335-43.

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