The Table of Noteworthy Cities (; also known as "the Kanon") is a list of cities compiled by Ptolemy shortly after creating the Geography. Whilst the term "ÃÂÃÂûõÃÂý á¼ÂÃÂùÃÂîüÃÂý/póleon episémon" (noteworthy cities) was in use before his time, Ptolemy is thought to have popularised the term. Roberts (1938) suggests that it formed an aid ("hilfsmittel") to the Handy Tables.
Originally, the text of the Kanon was thought, for example by Vogul Fischer, to derive from Book 8 of the Geography, however it is now demonstrated to be part of an independent textual tradition. The first critical edition and translation into a modern language (German) appeared in 2006 by Koch, Mittenhuber and Stückelberger.
Several medieval recensions of the text survive with the earliest being the early 3rd century P. Ryl. Gr. 3 522 in the Rylands Library of Manchester University; the next 4 oldest manuscripts date to the 9th century:
The Rylands Papyrus 522 is the earliest surviving fragment of the Kanon, that from tables 2 to 6 (Europe), dating from the early to mid 3rd century AD, less than a generation after Ptolemy himself. It measures 11.3cm by 11.7cm and was acquired by Rylands Library in 1917 and was authored, it is thought, in Fayum. According to Defaux, who produced the critical edition and translation in 2020, the following cities are mentioned in the fragment:
Approximately 27 toponyms survive intact on the papyrus which can be compared with the 8th century codicies to study the transmission of the text. Of the three manuscripts V, L & f (M is difficult to read):
Therefore f or M are the closest to the papyrus archetype.