(CE:1330b-1331a)
JIRJA, town in Upper Egypt on the West Bank of the Nile some 20 miles (32 km) southeast of Suhaj.
A number of early Coptic gravestones come from Jirja, which may indicate that the town had a Christian community at an early date, but the first definite witness for Christianity in the settlement is from the seventeenth century. A manuscript in the Vatican (MS copt Barberinianus 51) was copied from a manuscript dated to 1629 that was preserved in Jirja (Hebbelynck and Lantschoot, 1937, no. 51, pp. 198ff.).
In 1714 C. Sicard reported that Jirja formed a bishopric together with Naqadah, Abu Tij, and Asyut (see Munier, 1943, p. 65).
RANDALL STEWART
