The Foead-papyrus collection (Foead; inv. n° 266)
is in possession of the Société Egyptienne de
Papyrologie in Caïro. This collection is dated from the
1st century B.C.
The collection was discovered in Egypt in 1939 and includes
parts from the Bible books of Genesis and Deuteronomy. The
Name cannot be found in the Genesis fragments, because the
text is incomplete. But, in the book of Deuteronomy, in the
midst of the Greek text, it is written 49 times in Hebrew
characters. The Tetragrammaton can be found three more times
in fragments that are not identified (fragments 116, 117 and
123).
IIn a commentary on this papyrus collection Paul Kahle
wrote in 'Studia Evangelica', edited by Kurt Aland, F. L.
Cross, Jean Danielou, Harald Riesenfeld and W. C. van Unnik,
Berlin 1959, page 614:
“A distinguishing characteristic of the papyrus
is the fact that the name of God is written as the Tetragrammaton
in Hebrew square-shape. Upon my request made for an examination
by father Vaccari in regards to the published fragments of
the papyrus, he came to the conclusion that the papyrus must
be written 400 years before the codex B, probably the most
perfect text of the Septuagint that has reached us".
