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It\u2019s not every day that a 1,700-year-old book gets sold.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The 104-page Crosby-Sch\u00f8yen Codex from Egypt just got sold in an auction for $3.9 million (\u00a33.06 million). It was expected to be sold between $2.6 million and $3.8 million.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The book, written in Coptic, dates back to 250-350 AD and marks a significant period in history during the early years<\/a> of Christianity. It\u2019s also one of the oldest pieces of evidence of a book, as we know it today.\u00a0<\/p>\n A single scribe wrote the entire book on 52 leaves over four decades.\u00a0<\/p>\n The codex is being auctioned as part of the \u201cmanuscript masterpieces\u201d in The Sch\u00f8yen Collection, which Christie\u2019s says is \u201cone of the largest and most comprehensive collections of manuscripts ever assembled.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cIt is of monumental importance as a witness to the earliest spread of Christianity around the Mediterranean: The earliest monks in Upper Egypt in the earliest Christian monastery were using this very book to celebrate the earliest Easter celebrations, only a few hundred years after Christ and only a hundred or so years after the last Gospel was written,\u201d Eugenio Donadoni, Christie\u2019s senior specialist in medieval and renaissance manuscripts, told CNN<\/em><\/a>.<\/p>\n The papyrus has aged well thanks to Egypt\u2019s dry weather<\/a>, becoming one of the world\u2019s oldest books in private ownership.\u00a0<\/p>\n The Crosby-Sch\u00f8yen Codex has changed hands many times since its discovery in the 1950s, along with several other religious texts called the Bodmer Papyri. It was acquired by the University of Mississippi in 1981 and was ultimately bought by Norwegian collector Martin Sch\u00f8yen in 1988.\u00a0<\/p>\n The best-known texts in the Codex are the Old Testament Book of Jonah and the First Epistle of Peter, still read in Easter services today<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\nSubscribe to The Broadsheet newsletter to stay updated on the world’s most powerful women in business. Sign up<\/a> for free.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n