Prodromus Coptus

Likewise, the discovery of Nestorian texts in China suggested that Christianity was not a recent introduction to the country, and that there was a connection between the ancient civilisations of the world.

He was shown several Coptic manuscripts by Nicolas Claude Fabri de Peiresc in Avignon, and later also obtained an Arabic-Coptic vocabulary brought from Egypt by Pietro della Valle.

[7]: 32  As an appendix there was a grammar of the Coptic language and finally an advertisement for Kircher's promised major work on these matters, Oedipus Aegyptiacus, including an outline of the sections of the proposed book.

Normally censors wrote succinct reports with an opinion as to whether a work posed any doctrinal problems, but Inchofer was expansive in his praise, hailing the book as "a worthy beginning from which we may anticipate what will follow.

"[3] A more critical note was sounded by Kircher's former mentor Peiresc, who complained of his inaccurate transliterations and warned him that presenting theories and conjectures as established fact would damage his reputation.

[6]: 531 Jean-François Champollion, a later Coptic scholar who deciphered the Rosetta Stone, said that "L'Europe savante doit en quelque sorte a Kircher la connaissance de la langue copte; et il merite, sous ce rapport, d'autant plus d'indulgence pour ses erreurs nombreuses, que les monuments litteraires des Coptes etaient plus rares de son temps".