Overview
- Researcher Mark de Kreij first spotted the torn parchment in Utrecht University Library holdings in 2024 while studying the university’s Egyptian manuscript collection.
- Utrecht University announced this week that the fragment contains verses from Book 12 of Homer’s Odyssey describing Helios discovering Odysseus’ men after they ate his sacred cattle.
- Experts date the fragment to a 3rd–4th century CE parchment codex likely produced in Egypt’s Fayum oasis and estimate its original leaf measured about 2.6 by 3 inches, consistent with a pocket-size edition.
- The find joins other 2026 Homeric recoveries—including Iliad papyri found in an Egyptian mummy and a Met display—and highlights how library bindings and old collections continue to yield rare ancient texts.
- De Kreij and Utrecht University are preparing a fuller scholarly study for a forthcoming book that will place this piece among roughly 30 known comparable Odyssey fragments and analyze its implications for transmission and readership.