Oxford Academic Under Investigation

Robert Mendick, 'Mystery deepens over Oxford academic accused of illegally selling Bible fragments to US ' Times 16 October 2019

The mystery over the ‘unauthorised’ sale of ancient bible fragments by an Oxford academic deepened last night amid claims matching texts have been sold to other private collectors. Dr Dirk Obbink, 62, an associate professor at Oxford University’s classics faculty, has been accused of selling without permission fragments belonging to the vast Oxyrhynchus collection. Dr Obbink has denied any wrongdoing but is now under investigation by Oxford University, which continues to employ him while inquiries are ongoing.

Let us not forget the - as yet unresolved - issue of the origins of Obbink's new 'Sappho' pieces discussed on this blog and in other places earlier and also this: Brent Nongbri, ' The Green Collection Mummy Masks: A Possible Source ' Variant Readings January 30, 2019 ["It would be interesting to learn whether the masks in these images are the personal property of Professor Obbink or the results of EES excavations"] - 'Peter Gurry , 'The Source of Scott Carroll’s Mummy Masks?' Evangelical Textual Criticism, Jan 30, 2019.

Interestingly, a number of links to Obbink's work are already dead:  'New poems by Sappho' by Obbink on the TLS webpage, on the National Geographic: 'Papyrus Reveals New Clues to Ancient World'