papyrus Definition
pa·py·rus (pə pī′rəs)
noun pl. -·ri′-rī′ or -·ruses
- a tall water plant (Cyperus papyrus) of the sedge family, abundant in the Nile region of Egypt and widely cultivated as an ornamental
- a writing material made from this plant by the ancient Egyptians, Greeks, and Romans, by soaking, pressing, and drying thin slices of its pith laid crosswise
- any ancient document or manuscript on papyrus
Etymology: ME papirus < L papyrus < Gr papyros, prob. < Coptic paparo < ? Egypt pʾ-n-pr-ʿʾ, that of the pharaoh
papyrus Usage Examples
Converse of object
- publish: This same papyrus published by Hayes will give us much information on this aspect of the life of Joseph.
- write: Amenemhat III is the first king of whom we may say that papyri certainly written in his reign were found at Kahun.
- discover: That husbands had to register their families for the Roman census was mandated in census papyri discovered in Egypt.
- have: We are fortunate to have a papyrus from the Middle Kingdom that deals with slaves.
- know: It is recorded in the longest know papyrus, the Great Harris Papyrus, that many people throughout the region were made homeless.
- date: We find an example in a papyri dated 13 BCE where the aorist tense is used in a reflexive sense.
Adjective modifier
- Egyptian: You can buy anything from African tribal charms to Roman swords, Egyptian papyri to fossils.
- magical: Most of Jesus's miracles have parallels in the magical papyri.
- Greek: In other words in the very time that the Greek magic papyri were being composed.
- ancient: Ever wondered how the Bible went from being a collection of ancient papyri into the text we have now?
- medical: A brief overview of the medical papyri and medical inscriptions is included.
- early: We thus have sixteen early papyri of John's Gospel.
Modifies a noun
- codex: Linguistic or numerical listing was employed and the storage media were clay tablets, papyrus codices, leather scrolls or hieroglyphics.
- swamp: Kenya: Found closely associated with water, particularly papyrus swamps, in the W of the country.
- scroll: This was much faster to write, especially on papyrus scrolls.
- reed: The early boats were made from papyrus reeds bound together with string made from reed fibers.
- fragment: Also a Matthew papyrus fragment dated to the 60s AD has been discovered 4.
- manuscript: To my knowledge there are about 97 papyrus fragment manuscripts of the New Testament.
Noun used with modifier
Browse dictionary entries near papyrus
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- ‹ paprika
- ‹ pappy
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- ‹ papovavirus
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