Coptic magical papyri aremagical texts in theCoptic language. There are approximately 600 such texts.[1] The majority date to between the 4th and 12th centuries AD, although there are someOld Coptic texts from the 1st through 4th centuries.[2] There are also bilingual texts in Coptic andGreek orArabic.[3][4] Although the texts are collectively known as papyri and the majority are written onpapyrus, the corpus as studied and published includes texts onparchment,rag paper, wooden tablets,ostraca and limestone flakes.[5] Generally, older texts are on papyrus and younger ones on paper. Parchment texts are more evenly distributed.[3]
The Coptic magical tradition originates from theGreek magical tradition in Egypt.[6] "Virtually all" its texts were produced byCoptic Christians in Egypt.[7][8] This took place in spite of clerical opposition to magic.[6] Besides texts from a Christian milieu, there are alsoManichaean andGnostic texts.[9][10]
The Coptic magical papyri have been the subject of two research projects at theUniversity of Würzburg:Vernacular Religion in Late Roman and Early Islamic Egypt (2018–2023) and the ongoingCorpus of Coptic Magical Formularies (2024–2027).[11] All known Coptic magical texts may be found in the projects' onlineKyprianos database.[12]