Papyrus

Source:

 Africana: The Encyclopedia of the African and African American Experience, Second Edition

Papyrus

The papyrus plant grows about one to three meters (about three to ten feet) high and has a woody, aromatic, creeping rhizome (root stalk). The leaves are long and sharp-keeled, and the upright flowering stems are naked, soft, and triangular in shape. The lower part of the stem is as thick as a human arm, and at the top is a compound umbel (flower cluster) of numerous drooping spikelets, with a whorl of eight leaves. Papyrus grows in Egypt, in Ethiopia, in the Jordan River valley, and in Sicily.

Various parts of the plant were used in antiquity for a variety of purposes, including wreaths, sandals, boxes, boats, and rope. The roots were dried and made into fuel. The pith of the stem was sometimes boiled and eaten, but it was used mainly in making papyrus, the type of paper most common in the classical world.

The papyrus of the Egyptians was made of slices of the cellular pith laid lengthwise, with other layers laid crosswise on it. The whole was then moistened with water, pressed and dried, and rubbed smooth with ivory or a smooth shell. The sheets of papyrus, varying from about 12.5 by 22.5 centimeters (about five by nine inches) to about 22.5 by 37.5 centimeters (about nine by fifteen inches), were made into rolls, probably some six to nine meters (about twenty to thirty feet) in length. The Egyptians wrote on papyrus in regular columns, which in literary prose rarely exceeded 7.6 centimeters (three inches) in width; in poetry the columns were often wider to accommodate the length of the verse.

The Greeks seem to have known papyrus as early as the beginning of the fifth century B.C.E., but the earliest extant Greek papyrus is believed to be the Persae of the poet Timotheus, who lived during the fifth and early fourth century B.C.E. The use of papyrus for literary works continued among the Greeks and the Romans to the fourth century C.E.., when it was superseded by parchment. It was still used for official and private documents until the eighth or ninth century.

Scientific Classification: Papyrus belongs to the family Cyperaceae. It is classified as Cyperus papyrus.

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