An agreement of cooperation was recently signed by Lu’ai Saïd, Coordinator of the Bibliotheca Alexandrina’s (BA) Coptic Studies Programme, and Khaled al-Anani, of the French Antiquities Institute in Egypt, within the wider cultural cooperation accord between Egypt and France
An agreement of cooperation was recently signed by Lu’ai Saïd, Coordinator of the Bibliotheca Alexandrina’s (BA) Coptic Studies Programme, and Khaled al-Anani, of the French Antiquities Institute in Egypt, within the wider cultural cooperation accord between Egypt and France.
“The agreement is part of the cooperation between local and foreign cultural institutions, and it aims at exchanging experience on the latest technology of archaeological indexing in general, and that of Coptic heritage in particular,” Dr Saïd told Watani. This exchange of experience will be particularly valuable in case of indexing the results of excavations in Coptic antiquities sites, as well as the methods used to restore Coptic papyri, he said.
The BA will seek the French expertise on its Coptic studies programme, and also on the website it intends to launch to help researchers in Coptology, Dr Saïd said. The BA Coptic Studies Programme receives all field projects concerned with the documentation of Coptic heritage.
The BA Programme deals with Coptic studies in a wider sense, including Coptic culture and heritage as an issue of Egyptian public concern. Coptic heritage was an important bridge between the Pharaonic and Islamic eras. Coptic culture did not fade away by the introduction of Islam to Egypt in the year 641; on the contrary it mingled and interacted with the new culture producing a unique Egyptian mix for all Egyptians, both Muslims and Christians.
Dr Said believes Coptic heritage should be included in school and university curricula; and should receive focus from the media. Failure to do so over the last years, he said, led to the spread of the incorrect notion that Coptic heritage concerns Christians alone. This, he pointed out, resulted in complete ignorance of the Coptic heritage and culture as part of the history of Egypt, the Egyptian Church’s role in combating foreign occupation to Egypt, as well as the Copts’ continuous contribution to the Egypt’s civilisation.
Watani International
21 February 2012