Derveni papyrus becomes first Greek item in UNESCO’s Memory of the World program

The Memory of the World aims at preserving against decay and oblivion the world's documentary heritage and highlighting its value by facilitating access to the works. 

The papyrus is a philosophical treatise and an allegorical commentary on an older Orphic poem concerning the birth of the gods and its author is a contested issue among scholars, who have proposed Euthyphron of Prospalta, Diagoras of Melos and Stesimbrotus of Thasos. 

It was found in pieces in 1962 in Derveni, an area near the city of Thessaloniki in northern Greece, among the remains of a funeral pyre of a tomb of the late Classical period (4th century BC) that yielded many artifacts. Experts believe the document was saved because of the incomplete burning, as Greece’s climate doesn’t favour the preservation of papyruses. 

The surviving part of the papyrus is from the top of the cylinder, which is the book that resulted from the uniting of many papyrus leaves. Of the 266 surviving fragments of the papyrus, only 26 columns were restored. The text dates to between 340 and 320 BC, during the reign of Philip II of Macedon, but the book which was reproduced in the document is much older – possibly from 420-410 BC. 

“The Derveni Papyrus is of immense importance not only for the study of Greek religion and philosophy, which is the basis for the western philosophical thought, but also because it serves as a proof of the early dating of the Orphic poems offering a distinctive version of Presocratic philosophers,” UNESCO says about the papyrus. 

The text of the Papyrus, which is the first book of western tradition, has a global significance, since it reflects universal human values: the need to explain the world, the desire to belong to a human society with known rules and the agony to confront the end of life,” it added. 

The inclusion of the document was decided by the program’s International Advisory Committee (IAC) which convened in Abu Dhabi on October 4-6. It has attracted international interest and is the subject of study of the CHS Derveni Papyrus Project, conducted by the Center for Hellenic Studies of Harvard University. 

The Archaeological Museum of Thessaloniki believes its inclusion in UNESCO’s international list will contribute decisively to the further promotion and preservation of Greece’s tangible and intangible cultural heritage.  

The Derveni papyrus, an ancient Greek papyrus roll considered as Europe's oldest surviving readable manuscript, is the first Greek item to be included in UNESCO’s Memory of the World program, the Archaeological Museum of Thessaloniki, where the item is kept, announced on Tuesday.