Liber linteus Zagrabiensis, more commonly known as the Mummy of Zagreb and more rarely called Liber Agramensis, is the longest text in the Etruscan language we have (about 1200 words) and the only existing linen book.
It is also considered the oldest book in Europe.
It is a linen cloth divided into twelve rectangular squares, which was used to bandage the mummy of a woman from the Ptolemaic period, found in Egypt in the mid-19th century. It is called "from Zagreb" because it was brought back from Egypt as an heirloom by the Croatian Mihajlo Barić, clerk of the chancellery of the Apostolic Kingdom of Hungary and Croatia in Vienna.
Between 1848 and 1849 he purchased a mummy of a young woman still wrapped in her bandages, which appeared covered in mysterious writings. In 1862 the mummy and bandages were donated to the National Museum in Zagreb by Ilija Barić, brother of Mihail who had since died. Nearly thirty years later the bandages were sent to Vienna to be studied by Egyptologist Jacob Krall, who however realized that the language was Etruscan. Krall reconstructed the shape the book should have had before being cut to create the bandages. Originally the book consisted of a cloth approximately 340 cm long and approximately 40 cm high; the book, written lengthwise from right to left, was distributed over twelve columns approximately 24cm wide; the various columns were demarcated by red lines. The book was probably originally folded like an accordion.
According to the scholar Van der Meer it was written by a haruspicy priestly brotherhood of ancient Ena, today San Quirico d'Orcia. While not completely decipherable, the text appears to be a ritual calendar.
It is also considered the oldest book in Europe.
It is a linen cloth divided into twelve rectangular squares, which was used to bandage the mummy of a woman from the Ptolemaic period, found in Egypt in the mid-19th century. It is called "from Zagreb" because it was brought back from Egypt as an heirloom by the Croatian Mihajlo Barić, clerk of the chancellery of the Apostolic Kingdom of Hungary and Croatia in Vienna.
Between 1848 and 1849 he purchased a mummy of a young woman still wrapped in her bandages, which appeared covered in mysterious writings. In 1862 the mummy and bandages were donated to the National Museum in Zagreb by Ilija Barić, brother of Mihail who had since died. Nearly thirty years later the bandages were sent to Vienna to be studied by Egyptologist Jacob Krall, who however realized that the language was Etruscan. Krall reconstructed the shape the book should have had before being cut to create the bandages. Originally the book consisted of a cloth approximately 340 cm long and approximately 40 cm high; the book, written lengthwise from right to left, was distributed over twelve columns approximately 24cm wide; the various columns were demarcated by red lines. The book was probably originally folded like an accordion.
According to the scholar Van der Meer it was written by a haruspicy priestly brotherhood of ancient Ena, today San Quirico d'Orcia. While not completely decipherable, the text appears to be a ritual calendar.
