A survey of the collection is given by F.Uebel, Die Jenaer Papyrussammlung,Proceed. XIIth Internat. Congress of Papyrology, Toronto 1970, pp.491-495. See now also See now J. Hammerstaedt - R.S. Scholl, Akten des 23. Papyrologenkongresses, Wien 2007, p. 255-260
Most papyri were acquired through purchases of the Deutsches Papyruskartell between 1904 and 1913. When F. Zucker started a new inventory in 1918, when there were 60 papyri with number under glass and 47 unnumbered papyri in paper folders; the other texts, mostly fragments, were kept in tin boxes and had remained untreated. By 1970 the number of inventoried and glassed papyri had amounted to 1281. Uebel distinguishes several groups :
1. 61-64 : fragmentary Ptolemaic papyri from the Lycopolites
2. 65-111 papyri of different origin, already partly cleaned before 1918, including a few Coptic and Arabic items
3. 112-258 Greek papyri from the Fayum , Roman and Byzantine period; also 6 Arabic papyri.
4. 259-472. Papyri from Edfu, a few are Ptolemaic and Roman, but the bulk is Byzantine. There are a few demotic, Coptic and Arabic papyri in this group, which also includes the Irenaeus papyrus and a list of books.
5. 473-657. Papyri bought at Hermopolis, most of them byzantine, including a few Coptic and Arabic items.
6. 658-1097. Greek Ptolemaic papyri from mummy cartonnage, from the Oxyrhynchites and Koites toparchy of the Herakleopolites
7. 1150-1281. Demotic Ptolemaic papyri from mummy cartonnage, from the Oxyrhynchites and Koites toparchy of the Herakleopolites
8. The private collection of F. Zucker was donated in 1962. It contained 70 ostraca, 3 wooden tablets and a few fragments of papyri.
Several Jena fragments have been joined by Uebel to papyri in other collections, e.g. in Paris, Hamburg, Leningrad, Giessen and Leipzig.
