Coptic Museum
Egypt, Cairo, Mar Jirdgis Street, 3
About the company:
The Coptic Museum in Cairo is dedicated to the culture and history of the Coptic Christians. It houses the world’s largest collection of Coptic art. The museum was founded in 1910. Its founder, Marcus Simaika Pasha, was one of the leaders of the Coptic Community Council. The museum is based on his personal collection.
The interior of the museum contains elements common to Coptic and Muslim cultures. The museum funds contain about 16 thousand exhibits, in the permanent exhibition there are 1200 samples of Coptic art: wood and stone carvings, icons, frescoes, fragments of fabrics decorated with embroidery and gold embroidery, coins. The Coptic Museum has a separate hall dedicated to ancient Christian monasteries.
Of particular interest to both tourists and researchers is a collection of Coptic writings – about 6 thousand manuscripts on papyrus. The pride of the museum is the world’s only complete copy of the Psalms of David, dating from the 6th century, as well as 13 papyrus sheets of the so-called “Gospel of Judas”, found in the 1970s and illegally exported outside Egypt.