The "Rubensohn Library" of Elephantine: 4000 years of ancient Egyptian cultural history on papyri are now online
Press release from 05/20/2015
A new research database makes the so-called "Rubensohn Library" of the Egyptian Museum and Papyrus Collection of the National Museums in Berlin accessible. As part of a research project, a total of around 800 documents have been restored and scientifically analysed over the past two years. As of today, they are available online in open access format.
The "Rubensohn Library" comprises written artefacts from the Nile island of Elephantine, located near modern-day Aswan on the southern border of Egypt. The 626 papyri, 235 ostraca, 5 wooden tablets, 4 palm ribs and other items originate from the excavations carried out on the Nile island between 1906 and 1908 by the archaeologist Otto Rubensohn and the papyrologist Friedrich Zucker on behalf of the museums. They cover a period of around 4000 years and have been preserved in various languages and scripts (Hieratic, Demotic, Aramaic, Greek, Coptic, etc.). The database facilitates future research work on the texts with comprehensive information on origin, material, state of preservation, script, language, etc., as well as content processing through indexing and digitisation.
The project was funded by the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media and the Governing Mayor of Berlin. It was led by Prof. Dr Verena Lepper, curator for Egyptian and Oriental papyri at the Egyptian Museum and Papyrus Collection. Alongside the Louvre (Paris), the Brooklyn Museum (New York) and the Egyptian Museum (Cairo), it is home to the world's largest collection of papyri from Elephantine. For her follow-up project "Localising 4000 Years of Cultural History. Texts and Scripts from Elephantine Island in Egypt", Lepper received the ERC Starting Grant from the European Research Council at the end of 2014. This will provide her with a total of 1.5 million euros over the next five years to continue her Elephantine research.