Hagiography
Manuscript miscellany in honor of St. Mercurius the general (St. Mercurius of Caesarea); written and illuminated at the Monastery of Kalamōn, in the Fayyūm Province, Egypt, and dated Baramhāt 12, AM 558, 5th indiction, AH 227 (i.e., Wednesday, Mar. 8, 842).
Colophons: fol. 1v: Artist-copyist in Coptic: By Zakh(arias); 2) fol. 31r: Date of copying in Greek: Baramhāt 12 AM 588, 5th indication, AH 227 (Wednesday March 8, 842); 3) fol. 31r: Copyist, place of copying in Greek: By Zakharias, priest and copyist of the Monastery of Kalamōn, son of [...] likewise copyist of Heracleopolis and (?) his brother, a servant of (?) the aforesaid (monastery); 4) fol. 31v: Donation in Coptic: To the Monastery of St. Michael near present-day Hamuli.
Written area ca. 280 x 221 mm. Divisions: Brown leather tabs fastened to fore-edge of fols. 9, 27 at major divisions of the codex; title with dividers above and below, setting off Miracles by Mercurius, enlarged initial and paragraphus sign (vine-scroll coronis) setting off subdivisions at fols. 14v, 16v, 18v, 19v (large coronis), 21v; ekthesis, enlarged initials, and paragraphus sign (reddened zeta-shaped coronis, reddened obelus, small vine-scroll coronis) setting off paragraphs. Exceeding letters of last line of recto occasionally written below end of the line and encompassed by a red stroke, twice below column a of fols. 8r and 9r.
Script: Upright (titles and colophons right-sloping). 10 lines = ca. 73 mm
Superlineation: Non-standard. Punctuation: Raised reddened dot in conjunction with a space; sometimes reddened colon and space filler at ends of paragraphs. No tremas.
Collation: Signed on first and last page of the quire, top inner margin. Quire ornaments. No monograms, headlines or catchwords.
Artist and Scribe: Zakharias.
Zakharias also copied M.586.
Decoration: frontispiece, headpieces, tailpiece ornaments, paragraphus signs, signatures and page numbers, extended letters. Colors: moderate reddish orange (Centroid 37), moderate yellow (87).