Papyrus 20

New Testament manuscripts
papyri • uncials • minuscules • lectionaries

Papyrus $\mathfrak{P}$20
Name	P. Oxy. 1171
Text	Epistle of James 2-3 †
Date	3rd century
Script	Greek
Found	Egypt
Now at	Princeton University Library
Cite	B. P. Grenfell & A. S. Hunt, Oxyrhynchus Papyri IX, (London 1912), pp. 9-11
Size	11.5 by 4.5 cm
Type	Alexandrian text-type
Category	I

Papyrus 20 (in the Gregory-Aland numbering), designated by $\mathfrak{P}$²⁰, is an early copy of the New Testament in Greek. It is a papyrus manuscript of the Epistle of James, but it only contains Chapter 2:19-3:9. The manuscript has been paleographically assigned to the early 3rd century.

Description

The original size of the leaves was 17 by 12 cm.

The text is neatly written in upright semi-cursive letters. The main Nomina Sacra are used, but πατηρ/pater/father and ανθρωπος/anthropos/man are written out in full.

The Greek text of this codex is representative of the Alexandrian text-type (rather proto-Alexandrian). Aland placed it in Category I. This manuscript shows the greatest agreement with Codex Sinaiticus and Vaticanus, but not with codices Ephraemi, Regius and other late Alexandrian manuscripts.

Philip Comfort has conjectured that the scribe who wrote $\mathfrak{P}$²⁰ was also the same scribe who wrote $\mathfrak{P}$²⁷, where the Greek letters α, β, δ, ε, λ, ι, μ, ν, ο, π, ρ, σ, ψ, υ, φ, ω are formed identically in both manuscripts.

It is currently housed at the Princeton University Library (AM 4117) in Princeton.

See also

• List of New Testament papyri
• Princeton Papyri

Further reading

• B. P. Grenfell & A. S. Hunt, Oxyrhynchus Papyri IX, (London 1912), pp. 9-11.

External links

• Robert B. Waltz. NT Manuscripts: Papyri, $\mathfrak{P}$²⁰
• Images of the $\mathfrak{P}$²⁰ at the Princeton University Library Papyrus
• P. Oxy. 1171 at the Oxyrhynchus Online

Grenfell and Hunt

Bernard Grenfell		Arthur Hunt