Papyrus is a plant that is grown mainly along the shores of the Nile. It can be pressed into paper, or dried in a drying rack or flax hammock. Dried papyrus can be woven into baskets on a loom, or thrown onto a bonfire to produce ash.
Papyrus seeds are produced by drying papyrus at a high altitude. The higher the altitude at which the papyrus is dried, the more seeds are produced.
Plant papyrus seed by the Nile. 10 teppy minutes later, plants will appear on both banks of the river 150 coordinates north of where the seeds were planted.
Papyrus may be planted in any body of water, but the Nile is the only river long, wide, and straight enough to consistently produce a good harvest. Harvests are better on straight North-South stretches. (The bodies of water need not be connected: It is possible to plant papyrus in a pond and find the plants growing in an unconnected pond to the north.) (Also, papyrus is reported to grow better at night.)
Papyrus seeds are produced by drying the plant in a drying rack or flax hammock. The amount of seeds produced is somewhat random. The higher the location papyrus is dried at, the more seeds will be produced on average. At sea level, dried papyrus will usually produce no seeds; on the peaks of very tall mountains, an average of 4 seeds per papyrus is not uncommon.
Seeds come in handfuls (abbreviated as "hf").
The first papyrus plants were found growing wild by the Nile. Wild papyrus no longer occurs; if you see plants growing by the water, somebody planted them. Don't pick papyrus unless you've looked around for the person growing it. (And remember that they may be several hundred coordinates upstream.)
Trade to acquire an initial set of papyrus seeds; most established players will give them away for free or sell them for a nominal fee.
If you have few seeds, plant three handfuls of seed ten seconds apart. This will produce a 35-50 papyrus.
If you dry your papyrus on a suitably high mountain, you will soon have far more seed than you need. At this point, you can stop worrying about yield per handful of seed. Run north along the Nile, planting one handful of seeds about every 10-15 coordinates. Stop when you have travelled about 300 coordinates. Using this technique, you should harvest several hundred papyrus.
Always try to plant so the papyrus will appear near a bridge, so you can collect plants from both banks of the river.
I plant along the Nile in OE. Start on the west bank of the nile, 600 coordinates south of a bridge, and set a waypoint. Have 150-200 handfuls of papyrus seeds ready to plant. You will also need to either build a small chest by the bridge, or have a friend to help you.
Run South 100 coordinates. Pin the plant papyrus window open and open the map (F3). I also like using a /time to keep track of how long I've been planting. Start running north, planting papyrus every 3-5 coordinates. It will take 10 game minutes to run almost 600 coordinates north (which should put you just 100 coordinates south of the bridge). At that point waypoint back to the start (600 south of the bridge). Your papyrus will be sprouting. Run north again, this time collecting the papyrus as you go. If you have a friend, they can start collecting on the other bank. The papyrus will be growing all the way to the bridge (and maybe a bit farther). If you don't have a friend helping, stash your papyrus in the chest by the bridge and run down the other bank collecting the remainder. Each bank will produce over 400 papyrus (for 800-900 total papyrus).
My preferred method is to run in a continuous loop between two bridges.
So, starting at the southern bridge, I will sticky the plant papyrus menu and run north, throwing one handful every 20 steps or 10 coords. About 150 coords south of the next bridge, I will stop planting. (This will take some guessing, but it's not that hard.) Once I reach the second bridge I will wait about 7 minutes (papy takes 10 teppy minutes to develop) for the papy to finish growing.
Then, I will cross the bridge and gather papy until I am 150 coords south. At which point, I will continue to plant papy while running south and gathering what I find. About 150 coords north of the first bridge, the papy will run out, but I will continue planting until I get to the bridge.
Upon crossing the bridge, I keep planting (1 hf every 10 coords or 20 steps) and picking in a continuous loop until I have all the papy I need.
(See also: Agriculture)