Papyrus P122: John 21:11–14 and 22–24 in a Greek Witness

Like the adjacent P.Oxy. 4803–4805 manuscripts, P122 derives from the Grenfell and Hunt excavations at Oxyrhynchus undertaken for the Egypt Exploration Fund in 1896–1907. J. David Thomas published it in 2007 in The Oxyrhynchus Papyri LXXI, and the INTF registered it as P122. It is preserved in the Oxford collection under P.Oxy. 4806. The city-level origin and modern chain from excavation collection to publication are stronger than those of an unprovenanced market fragment, but accessible records do not associate it with a precise building, archaeological layer, depositional date, named owner, or identifiable Christian institution.

Two papyrus pieces from one codex leaf preserve a single-column text. Reconstruction proposes approximately forty-four lines per page, twenty-five to twenty-seven letters per line, and a writing area around 10 by 24 centimeters. That tall, densely written page is inferred from textual spacing and surviving fiber orientation; most of the leaf is absent. Both faces contain John 21, with lost lines separating the surviving ranges. The hand, line breaks, sacred-name forms, and damaged margins allow codicological analysis, but a fragmentary leaf cannot disclose the original quire count, binding, complete contents, or whether the final Gospel title stood immediately after the extant ending.

The manuscript is assigned to the fourth or fifth century by palaeography. The range appropriately reflects uncertainty because no colophon dates the copy. John was already circulating widely in Greek codices, and Oxyrhynchus has produced multiple Johannine fragments from different centuries and hands. That concentration documents repeated local possession or discard of John manuscripts, not necessarily a single scriptorium or textual lineage. P122’s papyrus material remained practical in late antiquity even as parchment books became prominent. Neither material nor handwriting proves the exemplar’s age, geographic origin, or the number of copying generations separating it from the Gospel’s composition.