Claremont Coptic Encyclopedia 22 June 2026
babnuda (alleged coptic patriarch)
Sherif Ramzy Keywords: Babnuda; Coptic Orthodox Church; Patriarchs and patriarchate; History of the Patriarchs; Ibn Kabar, Shams al-Riʾāsa Abū al-Barakāt, –approximately 1324; Maximus; Misbah al-Zulmah wa-Idah al-Khidmah (The Lamp of Darkness for the Clarification of the Service); Popes–Election; Theonas, Saint, Bishop of Alexandria, –300 In most extant manuscripts of the Sīyar al-Bayʿah al-Muqaddasah (history of the patriarchs of alexandria), especially the earlier witnesses such as the Hamburg manuscript (Hamburg State and University Library, Orient. 26 [Serial No. 304], copied in 1266 CE), the biography of the fifteenth Patriarch of Alexandria, Pope maximus (264–282 CE) concludes in the customary manner with the account of his repose (Ramzy 2023: 159). After this mention of his repose, the succession proceeds directly to Pope theonas, the sixteenth Patriarch of Alexandria (282–300 CE).
However, in several considerably later manuscripts of Sīyar al-Bayʿah, particularly those copied from the eighteenth century onward, an unusual interpolation appears, appended to the conclusion of Maximus’s biography. The addition reads: “After the departure of Abba Maximus, a patriarch named Babnuda was consecrated. He castrated himself and consequently was deposed, and Abba Theonas was appointed in his place” (translated from Ms. Red Sea, St. Antony Monastery, History 6, f. 60v; Ms. Wadi al Natrun, Abu Maqar, Hagiography 49, 87r). Although this addition is relatively late in the manuscript tradition, it nevertheless appears to reflect dependence upon an earlier source tradition, rather than being an entirely modern interpolation. Evidence for this may be found in one of the oldest known manuscripts of miṣbāḥ al-ẓulma wa-īḍāḥ al-khidma (The Lamp of Darkness and the Clarification of the Service) by the renowned Coptic encyclopedist, priest, and scholar Shams al-Riʾāsa Abū al-Barakāt ibn kabar (d. 1324 CE). Within the patriarchal chronological tables contained in that work, Ibn Kabar includes the following marginal notice concerning Pope Maximus:
After him, a man named Babnuda was appointed. He remained in the patriarchate for six months, castrated himself in the month of Hathor, and was subsequently deposed from his rank. His name was erased and omitted from the biographies of the patriarchs. Nevertheless, his account was transmitted from a manuscript collection whose copyist stated that he had found it written in the hand of Anbā Yūʾannis al-Dimyāṭī. In his place, Theonas was appointed. (translated from bnf Arabe 203, ff. 282v) This notice later found resonance in the writings of several modern Coptic historians and ecclesiastical scholars, including Bishop Isidorus (Al-Barmousy 1897: 57; Isidorus 1923: 218), Father manassa yuḥannā (Yuḥanna 1924: 84), Deacon Kamīl Ṣāliḥ Nakhlah (Nakhlah 1943: 60), and Prince ʿUmar Ṭūsūn (Tousson 1996: 105).
As for Anbā Yūʾannis al-Dimyāṭī, the bishop whose name is associated with this significant and controversial notice concerning the alleged deposed patriarch, very little reliable information survives. He is generally said to have served as Bishop of Damietta (see dumyat) during the late twelfth century, under Pope john vi of Alexandria (1189–1216 CE), the seventy-fourth Patriarch (Abd al-Masih 1990: 64).
The medieval historian abū al-makārim, in his Akhbār min Nawāḥī Miṣr wa-Iqṭāʿihā (“Accounts from the Regions and Districts of Egypt”), now commonly known as Tārīkh al-Kanāʾis wa-al-Adyirah (“History of Churches and Monasteries”) and traditionally © Claremont Graduate University 1 Sherif Ramzy, Babnuda (Alleged Coptic Patriarch) 22 June 2026 attributed in part to Abū Ṣāliḥ the Armenian, refers in both the first (Ms. Munich, Bavarian State Library, Arabic 2570, fol. 33r) and second (Ms. Paris, Bibliothèque nationale, Arabic 307, fol. 63v) parts of the work to a book entitled Dalāl al-Aʿyād (“The Guide to Feasts”), said to exist in the handwriting of Anbā Yūʾannis al-Dimyāṭī (Abu Al-Makarim 1999: 29; Abu Al-Makarim 2000: 80). It is possible that this manuscript collection was the same source mentioned above, from which the story of Babnuda was allegedly derived.
Yet several significant difficulties remain. Most notably, Anbā Yūʾannis al-Dimyāṭī is absent from the catalogues of Coptic authors preserved by Ibn Kabar himself, as well as from the bibliographical surveys of later modern scholars. This raises the possibility that the works attributed to Anbā Yūʾannis were not authored by him personally, but that he merely copied them. The uncertainty is compounded by the fact that none of the original writings has survived or been identified with certainty to the present day.
More importantly, and perhaps most decisively, the narrative concerning the alleged patriarch Babnuda is entirely absent from known ancient historical sources. It does not appear, for example, in the listing of the bishops of Alexandria provided by eusebius of caesarea (c. 260–c. 339/340 CE) in his principal work Historia Ecclesiastica, the main source upon which the biographies of the early Alexandrian patriarchs were constructed, nor does it appear in any extant Coptic or Arabic historical traditions dependent upon Eusebius. The complete silence of the earlier tradition substantially weakens the historical credibility of the later account and strongly suggests that this narrative represents either a late legendary accretion or a confusion introduced into the manuscript tradition at a later stage.