[14.11.06]
- Ashburnham, number 60
- lat., numbers XXXIX, XLV 15 and LXV 1
- P., numbers from 19662 till 26023
- P. Flor., numbers from 1 till 391 [< publication numbers]
- PF, number 9 b
- PL, numbers from 1 till 74 [not all in database yet]
- PL I, numbers from 1 till 79
- PL II, numbers from 1 till 52
- PL III, numbers from 1 till 975
- PSI, numbers from 1 till 1449 [< publication numbers (cf. the list in Crisci, 1970)]
- PSI Copt., numbers 43 and 68
- PSI T., number 28
- Scatola di zinco, number 21
See now the website of PSI (under construction): http://www.psi-online.t/. All PSI papyri in the Laurenziana are receiving new inventory numbers and are gradually put online with (rather poor) photos

In a strong-box of the Biblioteca Rosario Pintaudi found in 1971 three zinc boxes full of papyri, a large majority of which still needed to be restored. Since then, he restored more than 1000 papyri, which are now located under glass in three separate series. All the papyri and ostraka are kept in drawers in conditioned and safe rooms.

Inventory books reporting essential data are available. All papyri, both edited and not, have been photographed, initially with glass plates from the beginning of the century, later with pancromatic microfilms. A program for reproducing all the edited papyri in 10 x 12 and 13 x 18 colour slides is ongoing. A CD reproducing all the literary papyri stored at the Biblioteca Laurenziana, with pictures, texts and references is available at the price of 40 euro : Papiri Letterari della Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana. The e-mail address to order is : viella@flashnet.it. The snail-mail address is : Viella s.r.l, Libreria Editrice, Via delle Alpi 32, 00198 Roma, Italia. Later on another CD with the PSI from the Zenon archive will follow, and Pintaudi hopes to continue the series with the Heroninos and Apiones archives and other parts of the collection.

For a history of papyrology in Italy, see: Cinquant’anni di papirologia in Italia, a cura di D. Morelli e R. Pintaudi, Napoli 1983, I-II For the Papiri Laurenzianae, see: R. Pintaudi, Per una storia della papirologia in Italia: Papiri Laurenziani (P.Laur), in: Miscellanea Papyrologica (Papyrologica Florentina, VII), Firenze 1980, p. 391-409

Several catalogues dedicated to specific exhibits are available: Pap.Florentina XI bis (1983), XXIV (1993), XXX (1998) 

PSI 1160 (Boulè Papyrus) PSI 1092 (Callimachus) PSI 1300 (Sappho) PSI 1182 (Gaius) PSI 1278 (Bacchilydes) PSI Zenon

Papyrology was initiated in Firenze and in Italy by Girolamo Vitelli, who in 1901 published the Papiro Fiorentino 1 in the journal 'Atene e Roma'. This money mortgage written at Hermoupolis Magna is the start of the papyrus collection now retained at the Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana in Firenze. In the early 20th century Vitelli travelled across Egypt, buying and excavating papyri. This became one of the main purposes of the Italian Society for Research of Greek and Latin Papyri in Egypt, established in Firenze in June 1908. Digging campaigns were conducted regularly: Hermoupolis, Oxyrhynchos, Tebtynis, Ankyronpolis, Antinoupolis. While the recovery of papyri through excavations was ongoing, a further papyri were purchased on the antiquities market in Egypt, through sellers as Farag Ali, Ali el-Arabi, Nahman, Tanos. The papyri were published and finally sold to the Biblioteca Laurenziana, where they were retained and preserved. Thanks to resources thus obtained, new digging and purchasing activities were made possible. This virtuous circle continued up to 1943. At present the Istituto Papirologico G. Vitelli is equipped for the proper preservation of the papyri in its own location.

Papyri collected at the Biblioteca Laurenziana are listed in a paper by Iginio Crisci, La collezione dei papiri di Firenze, in: Proceedings of the 12th International Congress of Papyrology, Toronto 1970, p. 89-95, in which 386 Papiri Fiorentini (P.Flor.) and 1142 Papiri della Società Italiana (PSI) are mentioned.

At present, all the PSI which are not located at the Biblioteca Laurenziana are kept at the Cairo Museum, where they were sent during the fifties, or at the Istituto Papirologico G. Vitelli in Firenze. A few have been lost in an aircraft bombing of the town when, on March 23, 1944 the house of Medea Norsa was heavily damaged. In 1971, when Pintaudi officially began his activity in the Magazzino dei papiri at the Laurenziana Library, the situation was such as above described.

Since 1971 Rosario Pintaudi organized the papyri in three separate series: PL 1-74, PL I/ 1-79, PL II/ 1-50, PL III/1-962. From these series, he started in 1976 the publications of the Papiri Laurenziani, which have now reached Vol. 5. Vol. 6 is being arranged already for several years. A majority of the Papiri Laurenziani was purchased in January 1903 by Vitelli in Egypt. Some of the papyri from Oxyrhynchos were found during the digging campaigns by E. Pistelli in Bahnasa in 1910-1914. The PL III/ series is still open and in the last years some small but relevant pieces ware bought on the European antiquities market (Jacques Schulman, Charles Ede, Sam Fogg, Michael Fackelmann).

Summary of the collection:

P.Flor.I-III = 386 items PSI I-XIV = 1142 items P.Laur. I-V = 205 items Unpublished Papiri Laurenziani = ca.700 items ca. 30 Latin papyri ca. 30 Coptic papyri ca. 20 Arabic papyri ca. 300 Greek literary papyri 43 ostraka