Papyrus Rylands 463 is a copy of the apocryphal Gospel of Mary

Gospel of Mary

The Gospel of Mary is an apocryphal book discovered in 1896 in a 5th-century papyrus codex. The codex Papyrus Berolinensis 8502 was purchased in Cairo by German scholar Karl Reinhardt....

 in Greek

Greek language

Greek is an independent branch of the Indo-European family of languages. Native to the southern Balkans, it has the longest documented history of any Indo-European language, spanning 34 centuries of written records. Its writing system has been the Greek alphabet for the majority of its history;...

. It is a papyrus

Papyrus

Papyrus is a thick paper-like material produced from the pith of the papyrus plant, Cyperus papyrus, a wetland sedge that was once abundant in the Nile Delta of Egypt....

 manuscript

Manuscript

A manuscript or handwrite is written information that has been manually created by someone or some people, such as a hand-written letter, as opposed to being printed or reproduced some other way...

 in roll form. The manuscript has been assigned palaeographically

Palaeography

Palaeography, also spelt paleography is the study of ancient writing. Included in the discipline is the practice of deciphering, reading, and dating historical manuscripts, and the cultural context of writing, including the methods with which writing and books were produced, and the history of...

 to the 3rd century. It is one of the three manuscripts and one of the two Greek manuscripts of the Gospel of Mary. It is longer than Papyrus Oxyrhynchus L 3525

Papyrus Oxyrhynchus L 3525

Papyrus Oxyrhynchus L 3525 is a copy of the apocryphal Gospel of Mary in Greek. It is a papyrus manuscript formed in a roll. The manuscript palaeographically had been assigned to the 3rd century. It is one of the three manuscripts and one of the two Greek manuscripts of the Gospel of Mary...

 (POxy 3525).

Description

Only a small fragment of a single sheet (probably roll) has survived. The fragment is broken on all sides and contains the material contained in 7.4-19.5 of the Coptic manuscript. The reconstruction of the missing parts (especially the starts and ends of the lines) is not an easy task and depends on the Coptic text. The Greek text can only be conjectured on the basis of the Coptic version. The manuscript is fragmentary but shows two errors.

There are some differences between the Greek fragment and the Coptic text. The nomina sacra

Nomina sacra

Nomina sacra means "sacred names" in Latin, and can be used to refer to traditions of abbreviated writing of several frequently occurring divine names or titles in early Greek language Holy Scripture...

 are written in abbreviated form. The text was edited by C. H. Roberts in 1938. The manuscript currently is housed at the John Rylands Library

John Rylands Library

The John Rylands Library is a Victorian Gothic building on Deansgate in Manchester, England. The library, which opened to the public in 1900, was founded by Mrs Enriqueta Augustina Rylands in memory of her late husband, John Rylands...

 (Gr. P. 463) at Manchester.

See also

• Gospel of Mary
  Gospel of Mary
  The Gospel of Mary is an apocryphal book discovered in 1896 in a 5th-century papyrus codex. The codex Papyrus Berolinensis 8502 was purchased in Cairo by German scholar Karl Reinhardt....
  
  
• Papyrus Oxyrhynchus L 3525
  Papyrus Oxyrhynchus L 3525
  Papyrus Oxyrhynchus L 3525 is a copy of the apocryphal Gospel of Mary in Greek. It is a papyrus manuscript formed in a roll. The manuscript palaeographically had been assigned to the 3rd century. It is one of the three manuscripts and one of the two Greek manuscripts of the Gospel of Mary...
  
  – another Greek manuscript of the Gospel of Mary

Further reading

• Roberts, C. H. (1938) Gospel of Mary in: Catalogue of the Greek and Latin Papyri in the John Rylands Library, Manchester.
• Lührmann, D. (1988) Die griechischen Fragmente des Mariaevangeliums POxy 3525 und PRyl 463, in: Novum Testamentum; 30 (1988), pp. 321-338.

External links

• P. Ryl. 463 - exact transcript
• Christopher Tuckett, The Gospel of Mary, Oxford 2007.