St. Petersburg: self-published (Tip. E. Thiele), 1901. Oblong folios (27 × 36.5 cm). Original printed wrappers; [8], 94 pp. With one hundred illustrations in the text, including plans, drawings, and mostly photographs. With thirty-three leaves of photographic plates in a separate printed slipcase. Wrappers of text volume dust-soiled; light soil to corners of first two leaves; the slipcase worn; first plate toned; else about very good.

Vladimir Georgievich Bok (1850–1899) was a Russian archaeologist and scholar of Coptic culture from the Saratov Region of the Russian Empire, and a descendant of a well-known Baltic German noble family. From 1886 onward, he served as curator of medieval and Renaissance art at the Hermitage, where he founded the collection of Coptic antiquities. in the 1890s, he traveled to Egypt twice to acquire materials for the Coptic collection in St. Petersburg and to study and document a series of important Coptic monuments. In spite of being an autodidact, he is today considered a pioneer in the field of research on Coptic art and archaeology. Scattered publications appeared in various journals during his lifetime, but this, his main work, which is based on his two expeditions, was published only after his death. It focuses, in particular, on the monuments of the Kharga Oasis and the town of Sohag. Many of the plates show parts of the White Monastery (of Abba Shenouda) and the ancient Christian cemetery of El Bagawat. One of the great and earliest centers of Christianity, modern Egypt still is the home of approximately ten million Copts. Egypt is also considered by many to be the original of Christian monasticism.

Bilingual edition, in Russian and French.

As of June 2023, KVK, OCLC show eight copies in North America.

Book ID: 52064

Price: $1,500.00