ABSTRACT
It is currently impossible to write a history of literature and erudition in antiquity without taking into account the rich and varied testimony of papyri, which are an essential supplement to literary sources. Dioscorus is one of the great figures of Byzantine papyrology, revealed in 1905 by the discovery of ajar filled with papyri in a village of Middle Egypt named Kum Ishqaw. With Dioscorus, the Greek culture of a certain social background is revealed: not that of an exceptional figure, a genius of literature or erudition, but that of an average man of letters, belonging to the Greek-speaking élite of a village in a province of the proto-Byzantine empire. A man of letters cannot be conceived of without his library, his first tool, especially in the imperial period where bookish culture become increasingly important in ways which Dioscorus' example will highlight.
