[Coptic–Arabic Manuscript — Kitāb al-ʿAmūdiyya al-Muqaddasa (Euchologion: Book of Holy Baptism, Marriage, and Other Rites)]

[Coptic–Arabic Manuscript — Kitāb al-ʿAmūdiyya al-Muqaddasa (Euchologion: Book of Holy Baptism, Marriage, and Other Rites)].

Egypt, late 17th to early 18th century (c. 1680–1720), though modelled on earlier monastic exemplars.

A rare bilingual Coptic-Arabic “Euchologion”, containing the liturgical services for Holy Baptism, Marriage, Anointing, and major feast days according to the rites of the Coptic Orthodox Church. Written in Bohairic Coptic with Arabic glosses and translations in alternating red and black inks, occasionally green. Octavo (175 × 110 mm), ff. A–B, 1–149, a–c (154 ff. in total, c. 308 pp.).

On thick handmade laid paper with clearly visible chain-lines (25–30 mm) and a crescent-form watermark of Venetian or Ottoman type (cf. Briquet 5450 ff.), indicative of late-17th-century Italian export papers widely used in Egyptian monasteries.

Opening leaf with a full-page illuminated interlace cross in red, green, and black inks, surrounded by invocations; additional decorated titles on ff. 2r and 66v in the same style. Written in a large liturgical Coptic and Arabic script by an accomplished monastic scribe, probably at the Monastery of Abba Paula (founded 7th century AD). A later Arabic ownership or liturgical note appears on f. 149v (19th cent.). Bound in dark brown leather of later but sound workmanship.

Comparable Coptic hands and ornamental crosses are recorded in Sam Fogg, Manuscripts of the Christian East (London, 1996), nos. 47–48, dated c. 1350–1450, illustrating the conservative continuity of Coptic scribal style into the early modern period.

A fine and early modern survival of the Coptic euchological tradition, bridging medieval illumination and the manuscript revival preceding printed service books.