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papyrus Definition

pa·py·rus (pə pīrəs)

noun pl. -·ri′-rī′ or -·ruses

  1. a tall water plant (Cyperus papyrus) of the sedge family, abundant in the Nile region of Egypt and widely cultivated as an ornamental
  2. 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
  3. 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

  • divorce: In a follow-on paper I will examine the same chapter in the light of Jewish Greek and Aramaic marriage and divorce papyri.
  • century: P66 is a second century papyrus that contains almost all of John.

Browse dictionary entries near papyrus

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