A 1,500-year-old papyrus keepsake found in a British library is believed to be one of the earliest ever found referring to the Last Supper, researchers say.
The papyrus was likely placed in an amulet or locket to offer its wearer protection from danger, says its discoverer, Roberta Mazza.
She found the 6th-century papyrus in the library of the University of Manchester, which has had it in its collection since 1901.
Its significance had not been realized until Mazza, a historian and classicist, examined it and translated it from the Greek to discover Old and New Testament passages.
"The character of the text is such that it looks like a charm to protect from evil," Mazza says.
Many early Christians adopted written charms, which had been an Egyptian practice, replacing prayers directed to Egyptian gods with chosen passages from the Bible, she says.
The amulet papyrus contains a psalm proclaiming God's power, along with a passage taken from the book of Matthew telling the story of the Last Supper.
The text was placed on the reverse side of a fragment of papyrus used for a grain tax receipt, suggesting its owner may have lived in a village in east Egypt near the ancient city of Hermopolis, now known as Al Ashmunin.
"This is an incredibly rare example of Christianity and the Bible becoming meaningful to ordinary people -- not just priests and the elite," Mazza says.
The maker of the amulet knew his or her Bible, but made mistakes in spelling and grammar, suggesting it was being written from memory rather than copied from a text, she suggests.
It is evidence that "knowledge of the Bible was more embedded in sixth century A.D. Egypt than we realized," she says.
At just 1 inch by 4 inches, the papyrus could have easily been folded and fitted into an amulet for wearing around the neck or keeping in a home, suggesting early Christians interacted with their Bible in a day-to-day fashion, Mazza says.
"Nowadays we think of the Bible as this fixed work where every word is in such precise place," she said. "A piece like this is telling us that the knowledge of the Bible was transmitted much more through words, liturgy, prayers and amulets than through a book."
The find is an early example of the Bible and Christianity becoming part of the lives of ordinary people, she says.
