What is Papyrus?

Some of you may know of papyrus as a beautiful piece of ancient artwork with paintings of Egyptian pharaohs, gods and goddesses. But what is papyrus exactly, and what do these paintings actually represent?

Papyrus is actually a long, green plant grown in Egypt along the Nile River, it grows to 13-16 feet high! That is more than double the height of the average professional basketball player! But these plants weren’t just used to make paper, they were used for just about everything else. The papyrus plant was used to make tables, chairs, clothes, medicine, perfume, you name it! They even tried to make boats out of the reed, but that did not seem to work very well because of how easily the papyrus absorbed water. 

Back to making paper for these exquisite paintings, the stalks of the papyrus were first peeled into long strips. Next, they would take one strip and lay it horizontally, then one strip vertically into two layers. After the layers were formed they would be pressed and dried to form the papyrus paper you see today. But how could the papyrus stick together without any glue of some sort? Well, the natural stickiness of the papyrus stuck to each strip just by pressing down and allowing it to dry. They even made books out of the paper, mostly only a couple feet long but there are still remains of books stretching to over 150 feet long! With all that hard work, that book has got to be very interesting. Of course, text and images were only produced on one side because it is still papyrus and could absorb water, so in order to be safe and keep their writing in tact they were only able to write on one side. And after the discovery of the first paper, the Romans and Greeks started to develop the techniques to create their own paper as well. 

But what do these hand crafted paintings on papyrus represent? A whole lot of history. Every picture on a papyrus paper has its own unique story, ranging from nature, to the civilization of Egypt, to the gods and pharaohs the ancient Egyptians worshipped. A lot of papyrus symbolizes the balance and order that took place in Egypt while others represent worship of each god and stories ranging over the Egyptian Dynasties. Every papyrus painting is extraordinary, delicate, and fascinating in their own way and probably one of the most remarkable pieces of history you can own.