Thanks to A K Eyma and Michael Tilgner for giving the EEF Email list a heads up on this:
At the University of Halle, a papyrus (from the Julius Kurth
Collection) has been discovered, which on one side has
a Book of the Dead text, and on the other side a lexicon.
This lexicon in three columns assigns precious metals, minerals,
trees and animals to certain godheads (e.g., gold and lapis lazuli
to Re, the cedar to Osiris, the ibis to Thoth, etc).
The main news article is in German, but from what I have been able to gather, the papyrus in question is around 2,300 years old, putting it at the end of the Late Period or beginnings of the Ptolemaic Period. Although we know of other lexicons compiled in Ancient Egypt, this is the oldest so far. The dictionary style list of associations between the gods, and things such as animals, woods and minerals bears no apparent relation to the “Book of the Dead” text on the other side. The associations given as examples are ones that were already known to us, so I assume that there is no new information concerning religious associations in the text, but it does push back the date at which this sort of listing of associations in a plain, simple, dictionary style form first appear on papyrus.
The text was discovered during the process of digitizing the papyrus collection of University Halle, and the digital database entry for the papyrus (P.Hal.Kurth Inv. 33) can be found here, with 72dpi images.
Link to article in Der Standard (German language)
