| Sumario: | In 1936, Le Muséon published an article by the famous Coptic scholar Oswald Hugh Ewald Burmester on the Coptic liturgy in the presence of the Patriarch or a bishop. In this brief six-page article, Burmester briefly described the rubrics of the preparation of the eucharistic oblations (prothesis) in the patriarchal and episcopal liturgy from a manuscript found in the church of St. Barbara in Qaṣr al-Sham‘ in Old Cairo, and dated AM 1276 (= AD 1560). Unfortunately, Burmester did not consider all the available sources for the Coptic patriarchal liturgy with their rich liturgical details, a shortcoming that is rectified in this article. To do so, a more thorough and systematic analysis of the patriarchal prothesis rite is presented based on additional sources of this fascinating ritual. These sources are the description in Coptic Patriarchate 74 Lit. (AD 1444), the so-called Baramūs Codex, Baramūs 6/278 (AD 1514), and an addendum to Ibn Kabar’s description of the liturgy in Uppsala O. Vet. 12 (AD 1546), one of the manuscripts of his work the Lamp of Darkness. Altogether, these newly analyzed sources reveal precious details about the Coptic medieval patriarchal prothesis rite, and pave the way towards a more nuanced view of late antique and medieval Coptic liturgy.
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