BMCR 2009.06.47: Luijendijk on Delattre, Papyrus coptes et grecs du monistere d'apa Apollo de Baouit conservees aux Musees Royaux d'Art et d'Histoire de Bruxelles

Alain Delattre, Papyrus coptes et grecs du moniste\re d'apa Apollo^ de
Baoui^t conservee/s aux Muse/es Royaux d'Art et d'Histoire de
Bruxelles.  Bruxelles:  Acade/mie royale de Belgique, 2004.  Pp. 351;
pls. 60.  ISBN 978-2-8031-0236-5.  EUR 30.00.

Reviewed by AnneMarie Luijendijk, Princeton University
([email protected])
Word count:  2329 words
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In this book, begun as dissertation presented at the Universite/ Libre
in Brussels in 2004, Alain Delattre presents an edition of 60 Greek and
Coptic documents originally from the Monastery of Apa Apollo of Bawit,
now in the Royal Museums of Art and History at Brussels. Delattre
offers detailed insights into daily life and business in one of Egypt's
largest monasteries. Although reading documentary papyri may be
acquired taste, I recommend the book warmly to all interested in
monasticism and in the socio-economic history of the 7th and 8th
centuries.

This volume comes on a wave of publications on the monastery of Apa
Apollo. The newly re-opened Coptic Museum in Old Cairo displays
frescoes from the monastery that rank among the most famous images of
Christian Egyptian art. Recently Coptologists including Anne Boud'hors,
Sarah Clackson, and Delattre have started to publish editions of papyri
and ostraca from the site.[[1]]

Delattre has divided the book into two parts: Part One provides the
social-economic, historical, religious, papyrological and linguistic
background to the 60 documents edited in Part Two. Extensive research
instruments, including Greek, Coptic, and French indices and black and
white images of all edited papyri, complete the work.

The introduction presents a short biography of Albert Henri Demulling
(1884-1941), who donated most of the papyri edited in this volume to
the Foundation E/gyptologique Reine E/lisabeth.

In the lengthy first chapter of part One (pages 29-109), Delattre
presents a general introduction to the monastery. What makes Bawit such
a fascinating topic is the wealth and diversity of sources:
Archaeological expeditions by the French in the early 20th century and
again in the early years of the 21st century excavated the remains of
the monastery's buildings.[[2]] Literary texts in Greek, Coptic, and
Arabic contribute to the knowledge about the monastery, and over 1300
published graffiti and inscriptions left by monks and pilgrims provide
prosopographical information and insights into the religious life in
the monastery. Papyri and ostraca from Bawit did not come to light in
the official excavations, but appeared on the antiquities market in the
19th and 20th century and as a result are dispersed among collections,
their provenance often unknown to editors. One of the topics that
occupies Delattre repeatedly is establishing the links between the
papyri at Brussels with the Bawit monastery.

Three saints, Apa Apollo with his companions Phib and Anoup, are
associated with Bawit. Documents and a calendar inscription mention
their feast days, and more than 350 inscriptions especially in the
reception hall testify to numerous pilgrims visiting the monastery.

Delattre's description of the monastery gives a good impression of its
size and economy. Founded in ca. 386-88, Bawit reached its height in
the 7th and 8th centuries, when according to Delattre's estimate some
1,000 monks inhabited the site. The monastic complex featured at least
2 churches, dining halls, monastic cells including special cells for
children, a bakery, oil and wine presses, and almost 100 acres of
landholdings. Library, scriptorium, or school have not been identified,
although they would have formed part of a big monastery. Inscriptions
indicate that nuns lived on the monastic complex. Unfortunately, these
women do not feature in the documents edited. Arabic fiscal policies
instituted in the early 8th century led to a slow decline of the
monastery and its demise in the 12th century.

The monastery possessed immovables, such as buildings and land, and
movables, such as books, clothing, liturgical objects (not well
documented in papyri), and boats for transportation and fishing. The
lands were partly rented out to lay-people, partly cultivated by the
monks. Agricultural production included wheat, barley, honey, linen,
viticulture, and the breeding of animals.

Wine was produced on the property both for distribution and for local
consumption. Delattre estimates based on documentary evidence that the
Bawit monastery produced some 50,000 liters (over 13,000 gallons) of
wine annually, or enough for a daily ration for 800 persons. While
literary sources (albeit for different monasteries at an earlier time)
give the impression that monks ate little, drank no wine, and were
vegetarians, the documentary and archaeological sources for Bawit
provide a different picture. For the 6th to 8th centuries, it seems
that monks at Bawit at least had no food restrictions and consumed wine
and meat.

Home-made rope, mats, baskets, and textiles were sources of income and
also had a religious dimension as the monks practiced meditation while
working in these industries.

As is common with documentary papyri, issues of economy dominate the
discussion. Nevertheless, the texts mention religious orders, feast,
and pilgrimages. Direct evidence for book production at Bawit is
lacking, but Delattre assumes that it took place at the monastery based
on evidence of other large monasteries. Delattre points to the
importance of non-canonical literature in the religious life of the
monastery; for instance, two inscriptions at Bawit mention Enoch and
another inscription quotes the Abgar legend. Magical inscriptions and
papyri also feature among the texts from Bawit.

The sources remain silent on two important issues in scholarship on
Egyptian monasticism: monastic organization and religious affiliation.
Delattre suggests that Bawit had elements of both semi-ascetic and
cenobitic organization: the monks had a communal life with a hierarchy
and centralized economy, but, in contrast to a truly cenobitic order,
they appear to have had considerable individual freedoms, especially
financial ones. On the topic of affiliation, Delattre offers hypotheses
for both Monophysite or Chalcedonian leanings, and even considers it
possible that the different church buildings indicate that both
communities were represented on its campus. If only we had the
monastery's library with literary texts, would we learn more about
these topics.

Chapter 2 of Part One gives background on the texts edited in the
volume. Delattre establishes criteria for attribution of texts to
Bawit. He discusses writing materials, reuse of papyrus, and matters of
paleography and orthography. He also provides a list of scribes from
the monastery who are known by name.

The choice of language (Greek, Coptic, Arabic) presents itself as a
topic when studying the documents from this monastery. In this volume,
I counted 17 documents written in Coptic, 9 in Greek, 30 bilingual
Greek/Coptic, 3 bilingual Greek/Arabic, and one document did not have
text preserved. Most monks spoke Coptic as their mother tongue and from
the 7th century, Coptic replaces Greek as the common written language
in loan contracts and letters. Greek remained in use in the 7th and 8th
centuries for documents pertaining to administration and accounting in
continuation of earlier practices.

In Part II, Delattre presents editions of papyri with a more or less
certain Bawit provenance, grouped according to genre in eight chapters.
The edition of each document consists of a description of the papyrus,
the text, translation and detailed textual notes.

Chapter 1 (nrs. 1-3) deals with three papyri that belong to a distinct
group: internal communications from the monastery's superior, that
begin with the Coptic epistolary formula "It is our father who writes".
In one letter, the archimandrite instructs a monk at the infirmary to
give someone two beds "until he dies" (nr. 1), in another he orders
that a person from a village be given his annual distribution--the
substance is lost in a lacuna (nr. 3). These letters offer, as Delattre
analyzes, a remarkable insight into the micro-management of the
monastery. In this respect, he notes, the Bawit monastery differs from
other Egyptian monasteries, where an oikonomos, not the archimandrite,
executed such tasks.

The orders for payment edited in Chapter 2 (nrs. 4-21) constitute a
dossier of small-sized, bilingual Coptic-Greek texts composed in a
specific formula used at Bawit, with the following elements: mention of
the recipient in Coptic, then in Greek the nature of the payment (wine,
oil, salted fish, bread, other products), name of the accountable
person (oikonomos, priests), and the date. I would add that such
specific in-house scribal customs provide evidence also for training of
scribes within the monastery and awareness of tradition.

In the monastery, internal communications such as these were often
written on reused papyrus; some sheets appear to have been reused
several times. This recycling happened not because of a shortage of
writing material, but out of frugality. The reuse also helps to
establish a date for this dossier: some texts are written on the back
of Greek-Arabic pieces, the earliest ones dating from 705, which thus
becomes the terminus post quem.

Through these small papyri, a diverse group of people featured on the
monastery's commodities-payroll comes into view, both monks and lay
people: shepherds, singers, dioiketes, assistants, guards, a mason,
horse groom, sub-deacons, couriers, incense vendors, and Arabic
financial officers. Most are mentioned by profession, but as Delattre
cautions, they are not necessarily paid for work related to their jobs.
The reason for the payment is not indicated and may have involved
salary, fiscal obligation, or charity. Even though the oikonomos
administered these transactions, the archimandrites still supervises
them--in my opinion another sign of his micro-management. Most people
received payment in wine, which, Delattre notes, was the common
currency in monasteries, but other staples are also mentioned.

These small texts touch upon many issues of daily life in the
monastery. An order to pay wine to an incense seller (nr. 4) evokes the
fragrance of a church, while the mention of people working at a cistern
(nr. 13) reminds us of the scarcity of water and the dangers of digging
and maintaining cisterns. In another payment slip, Delattre identifies
an animal-groom who transported dung, and who received oil and
vegetables (nr. 12). The detailed note informs the reader about the use
of dung for both fertilizing and heating, and mentions monks from other
monasteries that also busied themselves transporting dung.

The seemingly dry accounts and lists edited in Chapter 3 (nrs. 28-33)
provide fresh glimpses into the life at the monastery. For instance, in
a list of salary payments (nr. 28), a monk who is a "dog-breeder"
(<greek>kunotro/fos</greek>) appears. Who knew that monks bred dogs?
Delattre suggests, based on extensive research, that these dogs were
not bred for hunting (or consumption) but may have been used as watch
dogs, shepherd dogs, or companion dogs, or simply for selling. Another
document (nr. 32) gives a list of goods, among which are a bench, a
bed, seat, and different water vessels made of stone--were they perhaps
the possessions of a monk?

Chapter 4 (nrs. 34-35) adds two new loan contracts to those previously
known from Bawit (listed conveniently at the end of the chapter). None
of these contracts mentions the payment of interest. Delattre mentions
the possibility that interest was included in the amount to be paid
back, and that the sum that was lent had been smaller. Monks appear
frequently as the lenders of money, lending to lay people and other
monks; nrs. 34 and 35 are both contracts between two monks. These
documents thus show that some monks possessed private funds. Contracts
with lay-people (e.g., nr. 52, whose provenance is less certain) also
indicate that monks did not live in complete seclusion from the world.

Chapter 5 (nrs. 36-42) is devoted to letters. Given the decline in the
use of Greek in Egypt in these centuries, it is important that three of
the letters are written in that language (nr. 36-38). Of these three,
nr. 36 is the best preserved. It contains mainly pious greetings and
mentions a "very pious monk John." Although the name and title of the
addressee are missing, it appears that the letter was written to a monk
or other religious person. Nr. 37, written on the verso of a Byzantine
protocol (nr. 55) contains just fragmentary sections of lines. It is
interesting for its date, which Delattre sets in the sixth or seventh
century, and thus, among the earlier pieces in his collection. Nr. 38
contains only a fragment of an epistolary formula also present in the
other letters probably from Bawit: "With the present letter. . ." Yet I
wonder whether this expression is really specific to Bawit, or a local
or regional one.

The Coptic letters in this chapter (39-42) are so fragmentary that it
is hard to grasp their context. Most contain only segments of greeting
formulas. Delattre finds another archimandrite of the monastery, who is
also known from inscriptions (nrs. 39, 40).

Chapter 6 (nrs. 43-47) contains the edition of several documents that
Delattre thinks come from the Bawit monastery. The most interesting
one, nr. 43, dating to the 6th or 7th century, has a Trinitarian
formula in Greek.

In Chapter 7 (nrs. 48-54), Delattre edits Coptic pieces from the
Demulling cache, whose Bawit provenance remains uncertain. These texts
are very damaged. Nr. 48 contains just the first two or three letters
of four lines; it is perhaps another letter of the type of "It is our
Father who writes. . ." Nr. 49 seems to present an account for the
payment of wine to harvesters of linen.

Chapter 8 (nrs. 55-60) presents "protocols" (the front leaf of a
papyrus roll with a written or painted stamp) from the Byzantine and
Arabic period which have been reused for other purposes in the
monastery. The ones given here are bilingual, Coptic-Greek and
Greek-Arabic. (I am not sure why Delattre calls nr. 59 a bilingual
Greek-Arabic protocol, since its preserved text is Greek-Coptic).

Delattre is to be commended for his hard work of deciphering small,
effaced and difficult-to-read documents in multiple languages and
putting them in context. This has paid off in a book that remains
accessible despite its level of detail and that contributes
significantly to scholarship on Bawit, on Egyptian monasticism in
general, and on issues of daily life and economy in Egypt in these
centuries. These fragmentary and often reused papyri both complement
and complicate our knowledge about monastic life from other sources and
also evoke larger questions, for instance, about writing history with
literary and/or documentary sources, about bilingualism in Egypt,
nourishment, monastic production and economies, the impact of fiscal
policies on religious life, education in the monastery, and contacts
with outsiders.[[3]]


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Notes:


1.   Especially Sarah J. Clackson, Coptic and Greek texts relating to
the Hermopolite Monastery of Apa Apollo (Oxford: 2000); Anne Boud'hors,
Ostraca grecs et coptes: des fouilles de Jean Maspero a\ Baouit: O.
Bawit IFAO 1-67 et O. Nancy (Cairo, 2004); Sarah J. Clackson, It is Our
Father Who Writes: Orders from the Monastery of Apollo at Bawit
(Cincinnati, 2008).

2.   Published by different authors in the series e/moires publie/s par
les membres de l'institut franc,ais d'arche/ologie orientale (MIFAO),
vols. 12, 13, 39, 59.

3.   There are some small issues with the layout of the book: on pages
19-20, a quotation covers more than one page, flowing over several
paragraphs, but there is no difference in font or warning in the text
that a very long quote is coming. In the formatting of the index
something went wrong, as spaces are lacking between bold chapter
headings. I noted some typographical errors: page 67, double "mais,
mais;" on page 182, second paragraph, the font for et between Coptic
"Mhna" and "Isaak" should be Roman, not Coptic.