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General article

Lycopolitan Coptic

Lycopolitan Coptic is a group of Upper Egyptian dialects, also called Lyco-Diospolitan or Subakhmimic, whose textual varieties resist classification as a single uniform dialect.[^1]

Also known as: Lycopolitan · Lyco-Diospolitan · Subakhmimic · Asyutic · Assiutic · L

Published 10/2/2026Updated 2 revisionsPage history

Definition and names

Lycopolitan Coptic designates a group of Upper Egyptian dialects or subdialects conventionally represented by the siglum L, formerly also A2. Other names include Lyco-Diospolitan, Subakhmimic, and the older, less common Asyutic. Its linguistic characteristics distinguish the group from both Akhmimic and Sahidic, although its internal diversity has led scholars to question whether it constitutes a single distinct dialect.1

Beginning in 1972, Rodolphe Kasser proposed replacing “Subakhmimic” with “Lycopolitan,” partly because the older name and the symbol A2 could suggest that it was merely a subdivision of Akhmimic. From 1986, there was agreement on numerical designations for its principal branches: L4, L5, and L6.2

The designation adapts a variant of Chaîne’s “Assiutic” and has the advantage of a single-character siglum, corresponding to those of the other main Coptic dialects.12

Geographical range

The Lycopolitan entry identifies a linguistic center extending from Qaw to Asyut, ancient Lycopolis, with possible extensions northward and southward.1 The designation “Lyco-Diospolitan” reflects a broader possible homeland encompassing the region between Asyut and Diospolis Magna, or Thebes (Luxor).3 Manuscript findspots extend from the Fayyum to the vicinity of Thebes, perhaps as far south as Aswan, but the dialectal geography survey emphasizes the difficulty of locating L precisely.4

The entry on Mesokemic (Middle Egyptian) places that dialect between Fayyumic and Lycopolitan, both in its linguistic system and in the probable geography of the dialects.13

The sources differ in their characterization of the group: the geographical survey describes L, together with Sahidic, as among the most “neutral” classical Coptic idioms, whereas the dedicated Lycopolitan entry explicitly rejects describing L as “neutral” because of its diversification and subdivision.41

Principal textual varieties

The principal branches are associated with distinct groups of texts:25

  • L4: the Manichaean texts.5
  • L5: the London Gospel of John, a Dublin fragment of John, and a Geneva fragment of the Acts of Paul.5
  • L6: Lycopolitan texts from the Nag Hammadi collection and the Heidelberg Acts of Paul.56

Earlier branch designations were L-Mani, L-JoL, and L-NagH, corresponding respectively to L4, L5, and L6.14

Within the Nag Hammadi collection, the relevant texts occur in Codices I and X and the first two works of Codex XI. Most other texts in the collection are Sahidic.7 The Apocryphon of James, in Codex I, is an especially valuable representative of the L6 variety.8

The Nag Hammadi works were originally composed in Greek and presumably translated into Coptic during the fourth century or slightly earlier; the surviving codices contain later copies rather than the first Coptic copies of the texts.15

Publication history

The first Lycopolitan textual witness to become known was the Heidelberg Acts of Paul, published by Carl Schmidt in 1904, with a further folio published in 1909.16 In 1924, Sir Herbert Thompson published extensive fragments of the Gospel of John in a dialect very close to that of the Heidelberg Acts of Paul, but with characteristic peculiarities.17 A letter from the Meletian archives, edited by Crum in Bell’s 1924 publication as no. 1921, was the sole nonliterary Lycopolitan text known at the time.18 The Dublin fragment of John and the Geneva fragment of the Acts of Paul were unpublished at the time.19

Linguistic characteristics

Lycopolitan was not thoroughly standardized in any of its branches, and individual manuscripts display peculiarities and inconsistencies. Its subdivisions are distinguished principally through phonetic features recoverable from spelling and through particular areas of morphology.2

The entry reports that differences in vocabulary and syntax had not yet been investigated, apart from some preliminary elements presented by Funk in 1985.20

The phonological account identifies seventeen consonantal phonemes represented by sixteen graphemes; the laryngeal stop has no independent sign and can be recognized through a break in the vowels. Vowel spellings are particularly important for distinguishing L4, L5, and L6 and for comparing Lycopolitan with other Coptic dialects.6

Differences in the use of consonants, especially the pairs transcribed as b/f and c/s, also distinguish varieties within Lycopolitan.21 Like Mesokemic, Fayyumic, and Sahidic, Lycopolitan lacks the consonants /x/ and /ç/ found in certain other Coptic dialects.22

Biblical and inscriptional evidence

No Lycopolitan Old Testament translations had then been identified.9 Nevertheless, a Psalms fragment of uncertain dialectal classification may represent a preliminary stage of Lycopolitan.10

At the cemetery of al-Bagawat, the account of Coptic graffiti observes traces of affinity between the local speech and Lycopolitan. It places Coptic-speaking visits to the site broadly between the sixth and eleventh centuries, without identifying all the inscriptions as Lycopolitan.11

References

Sources

  1. 1.The Coptic Encyclopedia, Volume 8 — Aziz S. Atiya (Editor in Chief) (p. 332)
    A group of Coptic subdialects (or, better, dialects) is usually classed together as Lycopolitan or Lyco-Diospolitan (siglum L or, in earlier years and even sometimes today, A2) or Subakhmimic (more rarely and in former times Asyutic). Each Coptic (sub)dialect is composed of a number of individual texts (see IDIOLECT) and groups of texts whose uniform designation (linguistically and in terms of dialectal geography; see GEOGRAPHY, DIALECTAL) seems somewhat difficult. The entire group of L (sub)dialects and connected idiolects can justifiably be given a collective description only in terms of the
  2. 2.The Coptic Encyclopedia, Volume 8 — Aziz S. Atiya (Editor in Chief) (p. 338)
    Recognition that A2 is an independent “dialect” in relation to A and S is contradictory to the still rather widely current description of the dialect as “Subakhmimic,” which, like the siglum A2, tends to lead one to assume a subdialect or collateral dialect of Akhmimic, or A, even if the terminology is only used conventionally. Hence, in a series of publications since 1972, Kasser has proposed instead of “Subakhmimic” the dialectal designation “Lycopolitan” (L), to correspond to the linguistic center of this dialect, or, more exactly, of an important branch of this dialect (see especially Kass
  3. 3.The Coptic Encyclopedia, Volume 8 — Aziz S. Atiya (Editor in Chief) (p. 331)
    Indeed, not only Lycopolis (Asyut) and its area but virtually every place between this area in the north and the area of Diospolis Magna (Thebes, Luxor) in the south must be taken into consideration as a possible home of the L dialects (L4, the Mani dialect; L5, the John dialect; L6, the Nag Hammadi non-Sahidic dialect).
  4. 4.The Coptic Encyclopedia, Volume 8 — Aziz S. Atiya (Editor in Chief) (p. 297)
    There remain L and especially S, the most neutral classical Coptic idioms, the localization of each being particularly difficult to determine. The area within which L manuscripts have been found extends apparently from the Fayyum to the region near Thebes (perhaps even farther south, as far as Aswan; Worrell, 1934, p. 74).
  5. 5.The Coptic Encyclopedia, Volume 8 — Aziz S. Atiya (Editor in Chief) (p. 3)
    the group of dialects included under L (i.e., L4 = Manichaean texts; L5 = London Gospel of John, ed. Thompson, 1924, as well as the Dublin fragment of the Gospel of John and the Geneva fragment of the Acta Pauli, the latter two being unpublished; L6 = Nag Hammadi texts of codices I, X, and XI, as well as the Heidelberg Acta Pauli, ed. Carl Schmidt, 1904, 1909).
  6. 6.The Coptic Encyclopedia, Volume 8 — Aziz S. Atiya (Editor in Chief) (p. 339)
    L6 (or L-NagH) (all Nag Hammadi L texts, and also AP. Heid) ... There are sixteen graphemes matching the seventeen consonantal phonemes of Lycopolitan. The laryngeal stop phoneme /’/ has no sign of its own but is expressed, or is recognizable, by the break in the vowels (e.g., kaa=f, to place him or it), as in S (with pS) and also A, as in most of the F branches. ... The vowel indicators of Lycopolitan are important because they often show and clarify relationships with A and deviations from, on the one hand, M, F, etc. and, on the other, S, B, etc. (see Till, 1961, pp. 8-11; Kasser 1982b, p.
  7. 7.The Coptic Encyclopedia, Volume 6 — Aziz S. Atiya (Editor in Chief) (p. 173)
    Although some of the texts were translated into a variety of the Lycopolitan dialect (Codices I, X, and the first two texts in XI), most were translated into the Sahidic dialect, with varying degrees of deviation from what is generally recognized as the classical standard.
  8. 8.The Coptic Encyclopedia, Volume 8 — Aziz S. Atiya (Editor in Chief) (p. 212)
    for L, the Nag Hammadi type (L6) of Subakhmimic (i.e., LYCOPOLITAN or LYCO-DIOSPOLITAN), exposing its most valuable representative in Codex I, 2, The Apocryphon of James (Malinine et al., 1968; Kirchner, 1977)
  9. 9.The Coptic Encyclopedia, Volume 6 — Aziz S. Atiya (Editor in Chief) (p. 334)
    Among the literary dialects of Coptic—Akhmimic, Lycopolitan (also called Subakhmimic), Middle Egyptian, Fayyumic, Sahidic, and Bohairic (we may here disregard the further specification that is gaining ground in the study of the Coptic dialects)—only the Lycopolitan dialect has (so far) yielded no Old Testament translations.
  10. 10.The Coptic Encyclopedia, Volume 6 — Aziz S. Atiya (Editor in Chief) (p. 335)
    Psalms (a fragment is extant that presents problems with regard to dialectal classification, representing perhaps a preliminary stage of Lycopolitan)
  11. 11.The Coptic Encyclopedia, Volume 2 — Aziz S. Atiya (Editor in Chief) (p. 20)
    From 1013, however, there are two graffiti by the same visitor, written in Bohairic. The local speech shows traces or remainders of its affinities with the Lycopolitan dialect. In sum, everything seems to indicate that the frequenting of the site at al-Bagawat by Coptic speakers was spaced out between the sixth and eleventh centuries.
  12. 12.The Coptic Encyclopedia, Volume 8 — Aziz S. Atiya (Editor in Chief) (p. 338)
    This description adapts a variant of Chaîne’s “Assiutic” and has the advantage that the siglum consists of just one sign, corresponding to the signs of the other main dialects of Coptic.
  13. 13.The Coptic Encyclopedia, Volume 8 — Aziz S. Atiya (Editor in Chief) (p. 359)
    Both according to its theoretical system and according to the probable geography of the Coptic dialects (see GEOGRAPHY, DIALECTAL), M lies between FAYYUMIC (siglum F) and LYCOPOLITAN (siglum L).
  14. 14.The Coptic Encyclopedia, Volume 8 — Aziz S. Atiya (Editor in Chief) (p. 338)
    Now numerical indices are preferred: thus, L4 rather than L-Mani, L5 rather than L-JoL, L6 rather than L-NagH (see also LYCO-DIOSPOLITAN).
  15. 15.The Coptic Encyclopedia, Volume 6 — Aziz S. Atiya (Editor in Chief) (p. 173)
    All the texts were originally composed in Greek, at different times (mostly during the first four centuries of the Christian era) and in various parts of the Mediterranean world. They were translated into Coptic, presumably during the fourth century or slightly earlier. Although some of the texts were translated into a variety of the Lycopolitan dialect (Codices I, X, and the first two texts in XI), most were translated into the Sahidic dialect, with varying degrees of deviation from what is generally recognized as the classical standard. None of the Nag Hammadi Codices contains the first Copt
  16. 16.The Coptic Encyclopedia, Volume 8 — Aziz S. Atiya (Editor in Chief) (p. 332)
    The first textual witness to become known was the Acta Pauli (AP. Heid.), which Carl Schmidt published from the Heidelberg Papyrus Collection (1904 and a further folio in 1909).
  17. 17.The Coptic Encyclopedia, Volume 8 — Aziz S. Atiya (Editor in Chief) (p. 332)
    In 1924 Sir Herbert Thompson published extensive fragments of St. John’s Gospel in a dialect very close to the AP. Heid. but showing some characteristic peculiarities.
  18. 18.The Coptic Encyclopedia, Volume 8 — Aziz S. Atiya (Editor in Chief) (p. 332)
    In the same year, a letter of the Meletian archives (Crum, in Bell, 1924, no. 1921), the sole nonliterary text thus far known in L, was edited
  19. 19.The Coptic Encyclopedia, Volume 8 — Aziz S. Atiya (Editor in Chief) (p. 3)
    L5 = London Gospel of John, ed. Thompson, 1924, as well as the Dublin fragment of the Gospel of John and the Geneva fragment of the Acta Pauli, the latter two being unpublished
  20. 20.The Coptic Encyclopedia, Volume 8 — Aziz S. Atiya (Editor in Chief) (p. 338)
    Except for Funk (1985), where some primary elements of the kind are already shown, there have been until now no available investigations for differences in the lexical and syntactical field
  21. 21.The Coptic Encyclopedia, Volume 8 — Aziz S. Atiya (Editor in Chief) (p. 339)
    The use of some of these consonants, especially b/f and c/s, is indicative of a difference within the L dialect (see 2.3.1.3 and 2.3.2.1).
  22. 22.The Coptic Encyclopedia, Volume 8 — Aziz S. Atiya (Editor in Chief) (p. 359)
    Like F, V, W, L, S etc., dialect M does not have the /x/ of P, i, A, and B, or the /ç/ of P and i.

This article was drafted from the sources listed above with AI assistance and reviewed by an editor before publication.