“Probably a fake, rather well done:” understanding the collection of forged papyri, 1880-1999

<p dir="ltr">In recent decades, various high-profile, text-bearing forgeries have surfaced and drawn much needed attention to the dangers of consuming poorly documented antiquities. On a superficial level, the basic issues that facilitate the collection of forged papyri are widely understood, namely the longstanding willingness of market participants to engage with unprovenanced and unprovenienced objects. Following cases like the Gospel of Jesus’ Wife and the post-2002 Dead Sea Scrolls, there have been a growing number of voices arguing that concerns about provenance need to take centre stage when collections and academics interact with the material remains of the ancient world to prevent forgeries from corrupting the various corpora scholarship relies on. Despite this, outside a narrow range of high-profile forgeries, little is known about the wider consumption of forgeries, and much of the current scholarship on forgeries is impressionistic. </p><p dir="ltr">Therefore, to better understand the collection of forged papyri this thesis explores the processes that have underpinned their collection by institutional collections, and the subsequent consumption. It will be demonstrated that despite authenticity being arguably the most important factor involved in the acquisition of papyri, and other ancient material, concerns relating to authenticity are often not adequately reflected in collecting behaviours until after the point of acquisition. Such behaviour has meant that forged papyri, even if often of fairly obvious inauthenticity, have been collected as authentic materials. Once these forgeries then enter collections, they have then not been given adequate attention by the collections that house them nor the scholars that interact with them. Ultimately, this lack of concern shown by both collections and the academy regarding authenticity ensures that forged papyri remain an issue and collections (and scholars) continue to encounter them. </p><p dir="ltr">On the basis of this analysis, this thesis argues that concerns about (in)authenticity need to be play a more central role in decisions around policy development, collecting practices, and discussions around the ancient world.</p>