"Pursuing Papyri
and Papyrology by Way of eBay:
A Preliminary
Report"
to the 25th International Congress of Papyrology, 3 August 2007
(University of Michigan, Ann Arbor) [see Abstract]
In September of 2005,
art collector/dealer Bruce
P. Ferrini declared bankruptcy [images
of news
clips]
after several months of trying to keep
his financial ship afloat including the gradual sale of the holdings of
his
Akron Ohio (USA) store in an attempt to meet the demands of the
lawsuits
which he had lost.\1/ These
holdings were
extensive, ranging from very
ancient
items such as clay tablets
[image]
to very modern ones such as recently
published exhibit
catalogs [image].
Included
were hundreds of papyri and related fragments
in the
usual languages of Egypt,
and numerous pieces of
cartonnage [image] as
well. These
materials
began to appear on eBay early in 2005 and at some point early on, came
to be
brokered by an associate, Michael J. Farr.
Minimal documentation accompanied the Ferrini/Farr eBay sales [image], usually in
the form of language identification (although confusion between Greek
and Coptic was not infrequent, and also between Demotic and Hieratic),
dimensions in millimeters (with the usual problem of measuring
irregular shapes), and some vague attempt at identifying content or at
least of using descriptions
[image] that might encouraging bidding
(e.g.
"business document," "secret text," "mathematical treatise").
Occasionally there would be specific information about the text, as
with the hieratic linen clippings from the Book of the Dead [image]
(see
further below), or hier102
[image] ("
My inquiry to the active seller, Michael J. Farr,
about the source(s)
of the papyri produced the following response (to which I have added
a few identification notes) [image
of this text]:
What we have in our
possession is one collection [i.e. Ferrini's] made from several
purchases. There are no records and no way of figuring exactly
what pieces came from which particular purchase. There are too
many fragments and not enough past records of the transactions.
But from Mr. Ferrini's recollection he bought them from the following:
1986 from a Paris private collection [probably Guy
Ladrière (dealer)]
1987 from a Paris private collection [probably Guy Ladrière (dealer)]
1990 from Sam Fogg,
London [collector and dealer]
1992 Michael Sadhig [unknown; probably of Sadigh
Gallery,
NYC]
1995 K. Rendell (ex. James Ede) ["London Antiquities market 1960 James
Ede and Kenneth Rendell, to anonymous donor 1997"; Coptic fragment; "Special
Visit Ministry" site]
1998 Pars
Antiques, London [dealer, with associations to Ferrini and Schoyen]
1999 Sam Fogg, London [see above, 1990]
2001 F. Nussberger, Zurich [Frieda Tchacos Nussberger //
Nussberger-Tchacos; Gospel of Judas, etc.]
The papyri we are selling were a part of each of these sales, however,
the sales included other more important papyri that were already sold
as part of another business. We have no access to the other
papyri that had been already sold nor their records.
Since it was also my intention to offer a papyrology
seminar
[image] in the near future
(it took place in fall 2006), I began to bid on some
of the cartonnage fragments, for my own research and to
offer students experience in separating and conserving papyri as well
as
attempting to decipher the writing. I was successful in purchasing 45
lots of cartonnage (some containing multiple small pieces), at an
average cost
of about $35 each. These proved extremely useful
as teaching and learning aids, and some of the results can be consulted
on the course
web page.[link]
At least one larger cartonnage panel of which there is a published
photo (2004) from when it was still
intact [image] had
been cut up by someone in the meantime and sold
in
separate pieces, including some split layers -- thus creating a three
dimensional puzzle for any reconstruction
[image]. I was fortunate
enough
to
have purchased a couple of pieces of this panel in which the layers
were all present, with the
decorated plaster on one side and unpainted plaster on the other.
Inbetween were six layers which I succeeded in separating [image]. Those layers
contained mostly (Hieratic
and?) Demotic
texts, attesting the probable Ptolemaic
date of the
panel.
Early
in 2006, I created a file
with accompanying images and the coded identifications of the eBay
purchasers (with the seller's permission) [note3
file]
and placed it on a
temporary
web page, in an attempt both to keep track of where the pieces of
papyri were going, and to to assist in contacting buyers to find out
more about the earlier sales that had taken place before I became
involved. Unfortunately, in July 2006 one of the buyers (actually an
agent for others) objected to this exposure, and the seller thenceforth
removed all identifications of buyers from the sales information. Thus
I have no way of knowing who the purchasers were from July 2006 onward,
except for a few with whom I did establish contact on the basis of the
earlier information.
One of the early purchasers, David Howell, had special interest
in the hieratic linen
pieces, and has been able to show that many of them originated from the
right side of a large piece of the Book of the Dead which had been pictured intact [image] in the earlier
exhibition books from as recently as
2004. Howell's overlaid
image
of the right side[image]shows
how extensively this material was
mutilated for the sales (at least 19 pieces) Whether the
left side [image] of the original
piece went to
Ferrini's litigants (or was held in court-ordered custody) or perhaps
was sold as such by
Ferrini remains to be determined. I also made contact with another
earlier
buyer, Alexander
Mihaylovich of Los Angeles, who
successfully bid on a group of
small fragments
[image] in which I was
able to identify, through the eBay image, a scrap of Homer's Iliad,
and
the new owner has given me permission to publish
the fragment
(which can
be
seen [image] on my web page -- including the undeciphered other side).
It is the only Greek literary fragment to
be identified thus far from the images, although not the only neatly
written Greek hand represented [grk030r].
The Coptic pieces, and especially the small
brittle fragments of
literary hands (often only parts of a letter or
two! [image]), sold
for more on
average than the Greek, probably because it was rumored that Ferrini
still possessed pieces of the Gospel of Judas, the Epistles of Paul,
and some other Sahidic works of similar value. Bids
went as high as
$260 for a group of three
small scraps
[cop094],
with the average winning
bid on the 58 "literary" lots being $ 53.61 (the lowest winning bid was
a mere $05.50 for three
small scraps [cop127]).\3/
One buyer of scholarly
orientation with whom I am in contact, Ernest
Muro, has identified a small Coptic fragment of Paul's letter to
the Philippians
[cop045]
among his purchases,
so there may have been some truth to the
rumors.
Other
Coptic pieces, mostly
obviously
documentary or paraliterary, ranged in price from $ 08.50 [cop046-2]
to $141.38 [cop081], with an
average price
of $42.33 (on 79 pieces). They include
part of a note from a monk, reconstructed from three cut pieces [cop24-26], which fortunately is
in the hands of someone (E. Muro) who plans to
publish it, and what appears to be a folded and
wrapped page [cop 014],
in need of
careful flattening. Another note mentioning personal
names ([cop111a] "I MAROUTI
... and I PAMOUNT[I]") is more extensive (and more legible) than many
of the other
fragments. An
interesting Greek monastic
piece [image]
advertized as "Coptic" and offered by another seller is also worth
mention.
Some Demotic pieces also often brought relatively
higher prices, and
one large Demotic documentary
panel [image]
that had been cut into at least 22
pieces that I can document (and probably a couple of additional pieces
unknown to me) cost the various buyers (including
myself, for one inexpensive token piece) a total
of $761.72 , for an average price of $34.62 (from a low of $13.08 to a
high of $84.00).\4/ What the panel
would have
fetched when it was still
intact is anyone's guess, but I suspect it would be much less than the
$760 plus that was realized through the dismemberment.
Nearly 90 lots of
what the seller described
as "magical" text -- which resembles what has been classified in other
collections as artificial or "fake" writing, although not necessarily
of modern origin [see Arabic on verso of fake28]
-- were
purchased by various bidders, for prices ranging from a low of $02.45 [fake59]
to a high of $371.00 (one hopes it was an unintentional bid
[$37.10 makes more sense?], soon corrected?) [fake37],
but on
average only
$27.60. These, like the hieratic linens, appear to have been cut from
larger panels [fake74+]
and
the $2400 total for these sales was undoubtedly much
more than the original small number of panels of disputable
significance would have brought if sold intact!
Which brings us to the Greek materials -- about 250 lots, with some understandable confusion between Greek and Coptic fragments. The winning bids ran from a bargain $2.25 [gk144] to $399.00, an uncleaned Ptolemaic piece from Sam Fogg's collection [gk239], with the average cost of $39 per lot. The seller sometimes put a "reserve" price (e.g. $299, but as high as $1000) on what were thought to be the more valuable pieces, but usually did not find bidders willing to spend that much. (Higher reserves also were sometimes put on the line drawings [image] on some Hieratic linens -- this one finally sold for $400, after twice failing to meet the $1,000 reserve -- and lower reserves on some other items in each language group.)
Finally, the handful of Arabic
pieces also exhibited the now familiar slicing of a larger panel into
multiple items [Arab02+03],
which in this
case together brought the seller $53.38 from the two different bidders.
Another Arabic fragment sold for $102.50 [Arabic01]
while the rest were more modestly priced.
Conclusions:
These heterogeneous materials
contain many
interesting items, especially for students of documentary evidence.
Fortunately, the images supplied on eBay are usually adequate for
detailed study, although it will seldom be possible to identify the
current owners. (Many buyers seem to be agents for others, or
themselves owners of antiquarian shops, purchasing for resale.) For
papyrologists who enjoy puzzles, there is much to be done here, and
some of the reconstructed panels (such as the large demotic panel [image]) will prove to be worth
closer examination. The cartonnage painted pictures
and designs [images] may
also have some value for art historians, while the layers of
papyrus to which they adhere will probably carry their mysteries,
and/or treasures, into obscurity, with a few exceptions.
Hopefully many of the widely distributed items will ultimately find
their way into publicly accessible museum and library collections, but
that will probably be for later generations to discover and explore.
Meanwhile, the electronic image library remains as our main link to
these scraps of ancient activity, and I hope interested parties will
take advantage of it as another aspect of papyrological research. [end image]
--NOTES--
\1/
A complicated affair. Three private collectors -- Ferrini, Lee Biondi
(a California antiquities expert) and William H. Noah (physician)
-- had put together a traveling exhibit called "From the DSS to
the English Bible" (or similarly), which ran in Dallas in 2003 under
the sponsorship of the company "HisStory, LLC [Limited Liability
Company]" created to handle the exhibit. One of the partners, William
H. Noah, sued the other partners (Biondi and Ferrini) for his share of
the profits from the shows, and the company filed for bankruptcy in
February 2004. Other creditors also sued. The bankruptcy court took the
exhibit in hand when it opened in Akron in April 2004 and prohibited
Ferrini from further involvement. Meanwhile, Biondi, who had never
officially signed on as a partner in "HisStory LLC," organized his own
exhibit after the breakup, using a similar "Dead Sea Scrolls" title [image],
and Noah
also started his own traveling exhibit, called "Ink
& Blood." [weblink or
book image] Ferrini later filed for bankruptcy, in Sept 2005.
According to reports of the filing, he owes nearly 100 creditors
between $4.6 million and $10 million -- $2.7 million of it to Akron's
First Merit bank. His separated wife, Pamela, also filed for bankruptcy
and Ferrini put his expensive house in Bath Ohio up for sale in 2006.
Ferrini had led a successful career as an art collector and dealer, but
apparently was both careless and deceptive in his flamboyant management
style, and also suffered a crushing personal blow with the tragic death
of his son Matthew in 2001. His involvement in the saga of the Gospel
of Judas and associated papyri (Sahidic “First Apocalypse of
James” and “Epistle of Peter to Philip,” LXX Exodus, Sahidic
Epistles of Paul, Greek "mathematical treatise") is vaguely
described in various connections [e.g. Pearse
weblink, see also],
although the full story is yet to be uncovered and recorded.
\2/ The breakdown
is as follows (figures are approximate as are average costs):
150 cartonnage [+ especially Demotic layers, sold as Demotic]; $47 average
250 Greek [and/or ambiguous "Coptic"]; $39 average
140 Coptic [58 literary + 79 other images]; $54 and $43 respectively
175 Demotic [including some cartonnage layers]; $52 average
115 Hieratic (mostly on linen, but a few on papyrus); $37 and $31 respectively
009 Arabic; $45 average
094 Ancient Fakes (sold as "secret text from a religious sect"); $28 average
075 Aramaic inscribed on lead (often illegible)
006 "Magic Bowl" fragments (pottery)
\3/ The pieces that seem to be "literary" and/or from a codex include:
[c019]cop13 [cod lower mg] = 7366537739- @ $ 40.99
These fragments came from the Gardner papyri sold at Sothebys back in the early 90's. (28fe06)
cop050-2 = 7393570568 0??x?? [r uncial grk?] @ $ 66.99 (04mr06)-cop097 = 120065553903 023x09 [r, uncial] @$102.50 (23de06)
-cop098 = 120066783423 018x14 [r,
uncial]
@$152.50 (26de06)
-cop099 = 120067055525-2
015x01 013x13 [r,r cd] @$ 21.86 (27de06)
-cop100 = 120067375474-2
015x08 [r,r? uncial] @$ 16.27
(30de06)
-cop101 = 120068597656-2
012x03 [r,r ?? uncial] @$
59.00 (06ja07)
-cop102 = 120071330012 015x07 [r
uncial]
@$129.50 (10ja07)
-cop121 = 120090621986-3 015x07 [r&v] @$ 50.00 (02mr07)
-cop122 = 120091714014-3 015x07
[r&v]
@$ 21.50 (05mr07)
-cop123 = 120093152265-2
015x07 [r&v]
@$ 34.00 (09mr07)