Archaeologists found a fragment of Homer's Iliad tucked inside a 1,600 year old Egyptian mummy

[Estuary59]

Archaeologists working at the ancient Egyptian city of Oxyrhynchus, modern day Al Bahnasa, have made a genuinely unprecedented discovery, a papyrus fragment from Homer's Iliad deliberately incorporated into the mummification process of a Roman era body, the first time a literary text has ever been found used this way in the archaeological record

The mummy was uncovered in Tomb 65 of Sector 22 during excavations led by Núria Castellano between November and December 2025, with the papyrus resting directly on the deceased's abdomen as part of the embalming ritual. The Oxyrhynchus Archaeological Mission, run through the University of Barcelona's Institute of Ancient Near East Studies and led by Maite Mascort and Esther Pons, had previously documented similar Greek papyri placed on mummies in this exact position, but every prior example contained magical or ritual content rather than literature

Further study between January and February 2026 by conservator Margalida Munar, papyrologist Leah Mascia and professor Ignasi-Xavier Adiego identified the text as coming from the Catalogue of Ships in Book II of the Iliad, one of the epic's most famous passages, listing the Greek forces mustered against Troy. The text was analyzed using noninvasive laboratory techniques given its fragile condition, and researchers say they can't yet rule out that other literary fragments may still turn up among papyri from the same tomb still awaiting restoration

Oxyrhynchus has yielded an enormous volume of papyri since excavations began there in the late 19th century, including many significant Greek literary texts, but researchers stress the real novelty here isn't finding Homer at the site, it's finding a literary work placed with this kind of deliberate ritual intent inside a body being prepared for burial, suggesting literature held a place in ancient Egyptian and Greco-Roman burial culture that scholars hadn't previously documented

Archaeologists found Homer's Iliad inside a 1,600-year-old Egyptian mummywww.sciencedaily.com

[Lucy05]

The distinction between finding Greek papyri at this site generally versus finding one used with this kind of deliberate ritual intent in a burial is such an important nuance that easily gets lost in a quick headline read