Papyrus M 636
Papyrus M 636 is a Coptic liturgical manuscript in the Pierpont Morgan collection, dated to the ninth or eighth–ninth century, and a principal witness to dialect H, or Hermopolitan.[^1][^4]
Also known as: M 636 · P. Morgan M 636
Date and collection
Papyrus M 636 belongs to the Pierpont Morgan collection in New York and is dated to the ninth century, or more broadly to the eighth–ninth century.1
Contents
The manuscript contains mainly hermeneiai: liturgical texts assembled from biblical quotations, chiefly from the Psalms, grouped around a word considered central to the composition.12
Script and language
M 636 is written in three different hands. One, designated hand a, occurs in several sections and uses a distinctive spelling system with considerable regularity. The identification of a corresponding dialect or subdialect depends on whether this spelling system adequately reflects a distinct phonological system.3
The language represented by hand a is called dialect H, also known as Hermopolitan or Ashmuninic. The orthography of these sections is the principal basis for descriptions of H, while other late texts have language that resembles it less consistently.4
Linguistic classification
Scholarly classifications have varied. Earlier treatments regarded the language as a peripheral form of Fayyumic or as intermediate between Fayyumic and Sahidic. In Crum’s 1939 classification, twenty-three of the thirty-four cited words from hand a were assigned to F, six to Sf, and five to S.5
H instead falls largely outside the Fayyumic dialectal group and is described both as a mesodialect, possibly between V and S, and as a metadialect representing a strongly evolved form of Coptic. M 636 was unpublished at the time of writing.6
Grammatical features
The discussion of hand a notes systematic omission of the preposition e- and of prepositions or particles n-. It associates these omissions with changes in grammatical distinctions, including the loss of a distinction between a verb’s absolute and prenominal infinitive forms.7
References
Sources
- 1.The Coptic Encyclopedia, Volume 8 — Aziz S. Atiya (Editor in Chief) (p. 146)
Among the manuscripts of the famous Pierpont Morgan collection in New York is a papyrus, M 636, of the ninth (or eighth-ninth) century, which contains mainly what are called hermeneiai (Quecke, 1970, pp. 97-100).
- 2.The Coptic Encyclopedia, Volume 8 — Aziz S. Atiya (Editor in Chief) (p. 146)
A hermeneia is a liturgical text consisting of a mosaic of biblical quotations, chiefly from the Psalms, selected in relation to one word thought to be central and of prime importance, and so grouped.
- 3.The Coptic Encyclopedia, Volume 8 — Aziz S. Atiya (Editor in Chief) (p. 147)
Papyrus M 636 is written in three different hands, one of which, hand a, is distributed in several sections and uses (regularly or almost so) a completely original spelling system. If it is accepted that this orthographical system is an adequate witness to the existence of a corresponding phonological system, one is led to think of the language of these sections of M 636 as a special Coptic dialect or subdialect, probably a METADIALECT
- 4.The Coptic Encyclopedia, Volume 8 — Aziz S. Atiya (Editor in Chief) (p. 147)
The language to which M 636, hand a, testifies is today conveniently called dialect H; it is also termed Hermopolitan or Ashmuninic, since the ancient Hermopolis is the al-Ashmunayn of modern Egypt, and according to Kahle (1954), in idiolectal S documents, most of the orthographic characteristics similar to those in H are mainly found in the region of Hermopolis. Apart from the Morgan manuscript, some other texts (quite as late) show a language close to that of H, although never as coherently and as regularly. Thus, phonological and other descriptions of H will be based, above all, on an exami
- 5.The Coptic Encyclopedia, Volume 8 — Aziz S. Atiya (Editor in Chief) (p. 147)
to regard its language as a FAYYUMIC of a very special and highly peripheral type, or again, as an odd mixture, intermediate between F and S: thus, in Crum (1939), of the thirty-four words of M 636, hand a, that are quoted, twenty-three are classified under F, six under Sf, and five under S.
- 6.The Coptic Encyclopedia, Volume 8 — Aziz S. Atiya (Editor in Chief) (p. 270)
Finally, DIALECT H (or Hermopolitan or Ashmuninic; its sole witness, P. Morgan M 636, is unpublished) is an entity more outside than inside the Fayyumic dialectal group, being at once a MESODIALECT (between V and S?) and a METADIALECT (a manifestation of the Coptic language typically evolved to the extreme).
- 7.The Coptic Encyclopedia, Volume 8 — Aziz S. Atiya (Editor in Chief) (p. 153)
It must be mentioned above all that H systematically omits both the preposition e-, toward, in relation to, or for, and the numerous prepositions or particles n-, all of them as initial e- (and m-) and n-. In relation to classical Coptic, the sentence in H from then on appears to be completely disarticulate and dismembered; for example, the infinitive absolute of a verb can no longer be distinguished from its prenominal infinitive.
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This article was drafted from the sources listed above with AI assistance and reviewed by an editor before publication.