Category: Manuscripts

A little-known find of Coptic books in 1910

Posted on by Roger Pearse

While perusing the Book-Think blog, I came across mention of a find of Coptic books at the Monastery of St. Michael in 1910.  This was interesting, since although I am interested in Egyptian manuscript discoveries, I had never heard of it.

I find an article in the Catholic Encyclopedia which deals with the find.

The most important of these discoveries was undoubtedly that of the library of the Monastery of St. Michael in the Fayûm (Spring, 1910). Most of the fifty-eight volumes of which it consisted found their way to Paris, where they were purchased by J. Pierpont Morgan (Dec., 1911), in whose library (at New York) they are now preserved. 5000 volumes remained in Egypt, and, with a few fragments of the same origin, are kept [in Cairo]… Mr. Morgan’s collection is no less remarkable as a group of dated manuscripts of absolutely certain provenance. … the Morgan collection contains eighteen dates ranging from A.D. 832 to 914… Many of the manuscripts are still in their original bindings…

Why do we have so many fragmentary books?

One of the most important features of the Morgan collection is that it consists of complete volumes, while other collections, yet reputed so valuable, those of Rome, Paris, and London (see below under British Museum Collection), to name the principal ones, consist mostly of fragments. It is an inveterate habit with the Arabs of Egypt to tear the manuscripts they discover or steal, so as to give each member of the tribe his share of the spoils, and also in the hope of securing higher prices by selling the manuscripts piecemeal, a process fatal to literature, for while some leaves so treated will be scattered throughout the public or private collections of Europe and America, a good many more will either meet destruction or remain hidden indefinitely by the individual owners. Most of the manuscripts of the Monastery of St. Michael had already been divided into small lots of leaves and distributed among a number of Arabs when they were rescued at the cost of untold toil and expense.

The same happened to the Gospel of Judas, the Exodus, the Greek Mathematical Treatise and the Letters of Paul manuscripts, half a century later.

The Catholic Encyclopedia article lists the books (bless them!).  There are biblical texts, liturgical stuff, and masses of Saints’ lives.  There are also some homilies by Chrysostom, Cyril of Alexandria, Athanasius, Shenuda, among others.

Interestingly, at the end of the page in the CE, are details of other purchases by the British Museum of Coptic mss.  Among the texts found is a “discourse of Eusebius of Cæsarea on the Chanaanite woman” [Ms. Or., 5001, item 10].   Has this ever been published, or translated?  The article gives as sources:

On Or. 5000 and Or. 5001 cf. CRUM, Catalogue of the Coptic Manuscripts of the Brit. Museum (London, 1905), Nos. 940, 171; WALLIS BUDGE, The earliest known Coptic Psalter in the Dialect of Upper Egypt from the unique Papyrus oriental 5000 in the Brit. Museum (London. 1908); IDEM, Coptic Homilies in the dialect of Upper Egypt (from Or. 5001 text and English tr., London 1910).

The last item is at Archive.org, which is a blessing, believe me.  For I saw a bound copy of this book, thick, small, fat and with a tight binding impossible to photocopy, and my heart failed me and I passed by on the other side and did not try to scan it.  Thankfully someone else has.   From this I find that the homily is of Eusebius of Caesarea in Cappadocia!

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Donate to get more NT mss online

Posted on by Roger Pearse

I’ve just discovered the link for donations to the Centre for the Study of New Testament Manuscripts.  They’re going around photographing manuscripts, and accustoming their holders to the idea of digital photography, and of putting manuscripts online.  This makes them trail-blazers for us all, even if — like me — NT manuscripts are peripheral to your interests.  They’re breaking down the barriers.

They take Paypal, credit cards, etc.  Why not give them a quick $20?

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Koln archive wins the Darwin award, puts selves in hole

Posted on by Roger Pearse

I’ve been blogging on the disaster at Koln, where the municipal archive fell into in a large hole in the ground when the building collapsed.  I speculated that the archive probably saw requests for photographs as a chance to make money, rather than an opportunity to record and preserve.  The local university has put out an appeal for anyone who did manage to get any photos to contact them, so I asked whether my suspicions were true.

And they were!  It seems that the Koln archive really did prevent readers photographing!  They really did charge the few people interested in their documents absurd prices for copies.  They had the chance to get much of their archive recorded, and they put a tax on those who wanted to do so!!!   And they’ve been caught out.

What we need to do now is fire the ass of the people who made that particular decision.  Accidents happen; but the loss of much of the material is not accidental; it followed directly from the decision to charge for photographs.

Anyone know who the politicians are, with responsibility for this archive?

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More on the Biblioteca Ambrosiana

Posted on by Roger Pearse

Well, after my last post, I got a quick reply — and in English! — from Valerio Brambilla at the Biblioteca Ambrosiana.  He was very helpful, which was a nice change.

Firstly, I learned that the BA is in fact a private collection!  It is not state-funded.  I didn’t know this; I wonder how many people do?  The English language website is offline because they changed the company that provided it.  The new prefect is Mons. Buzzi, and he told me that they have good relations with Notre Dame.

Unfortunately they seem to be obsessed with the possibility that commercial publishers may use materials they put online.  This relates mainly to artworks in the collection of paintings.  But in consequence they are trying to devise a way to put images there in a “no download, no print” manner.  It’s understandable that they need to protect themselves from commercial exploitation; but not at the price of preventing access to the collection.

 

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Digging in the hole which was once an archive

Posted on by Roger Pearse

The Koln archive is currently sitting at the bottom of a large hole filled with rubble etc.  This link gives information on an appeal for volunteers to help dig out the archive material. 

Some entirely unofficial (as he notes) remarks posted to Mediev-L by Alexander Regh:

Short news update: Approximately 40% of the documents in the archive were stored in buildings in the back of the main building and were unharmed. Another 20% have been retrieved now from the rubble, in varying conditions. Some not damaged at all, others torn to shreds, and everything in between. Which means that another roughly 40% of the documents are still missing.

Among the things saved are a large collection of seals and one of the two manuscripts by Albertus Magnus.

Unfortunately, many of the more valuable documents were stored on the fourth floor of the main building, because in Cologne, there is always some worry about flooding. Which means whatever was stored there is now right in the middle of the rubble heap.

On the site itself, the search for a missing person currently still has priority, which means that retrieving the documents in a systematic way is a secondary concern. Every bit of rubble removed is checked by hand for documents though. The roof that is going to protect the rubble is coming up nicely, after stability problems in the last days. Rescue operations are also constantly hampered by the unstable ground.

http://www.historischesarchivkoeln.de/index.php?lang=en is not an official site, but they are collecting any digital copies of material from the town archive.

I wonder if the archive did its best to ensure that these copies were as few as possible, if it’s like most such institutions?  If so, I wonder if they feel a bit short-sighted now?  I’ve written to enquire; it seems like a good time to point out the merits of allowing readers to photograph.

http://archiv.twoday.net/ is also an archivists blog that tries to keep up-to-date and some articles are in English. There is n particular an article about coordinating help offers.

Pictures from the Rescue Work at the scene w. English comments

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Arabic manuscripts in the British Library on micro-fiche

Posted on by Roger Pearse

I learned today that all the Arabic manuscripts in the British Library were filmed and placed on micro-fiche.  Apparently an Arab princeling paid for it, but great news.  Less good news is that the set is available from IDC, offline, at the usual inflated prices (ca. $180,000).  Remarkable really, considering that their investment is nil.  They seem to have fiches of other collections too, such as SOAS. 

I’ve never had much luck getting access to IDC microfiches.  Does anyone know of a copy, somewhere that one could get copies of particular manuscripts in some usable form?

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More NT manuscripts from CSNTM

Posted on by Roger Pearse

A couple of blog posts on recent activity from Dan Wallace and his team.  This will be a busy year:

In January 2009, we sent a team to Sydney, Melbourne, Perth, Australia; and Auckland, New Zealand. We are right now gearing up for the rest of 2009. On the docket are Athens, Andros, Kozani, and Meteora, Greece; Muenster and Munich, Germany; Bucharest, Romania; Milan, Italy; Patmos, Greece; and Tbilisi, Georgia. We are also hoping to go to Cairo and St. Catherine’s Monastery in Egypt.

We are extremely grateful to these monasteries and museums, universities and public libraries, for allowing us to shoot their manuscripts and preserve them digitally for generations to come. In 2008 alone, we discovered more than a dozen manuscripts—about equal to what the rest of the world has discovered in the last six years. Among the manuscripts photographed are two papyri, both from the third century, a purple codex from the sixth century, and scores of later manuscripts, some of which are far more significant than their medieval date would suggest.

Meanwhile the team are onsite in Athens:

On February 23rd, a team led by Dr. Wallace left Dallas for Athens, Greece. They are staying at the Greek Bible Institute in the suburb of Pikermi, approximately an hour’s travel time from the Benaki Museum where they are photographing MSS. Despite the distance, the Center was able to save financial resources by staying at the Institute. So far the Center has identified seven manuscripts that were previously unknown to scholars! That’s equal to what typically turn up in two years’ time worldwide, and it brings the number to nineteen that the Center has discovered in this season of expeditions. Remarkably, one out of five MSS that CSNTM photographs is a new discovery.

Times are hard for many of us, but perhaps we should find a way to donate to these supremely worthwhile activities.  Remember that today we learned of the destruction of manuscripts at Koln?  CSNTM are doing something to save vulnerable texts, and make them accessible to us all.

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Koln archive building falls into large hole in ground

Posted on by Roger Pearse

According to the report on the English pages of Der Spiegel, the 1971 building collapsed.  Work on the tube line running under the front wall may be responsible.  Loads of documents may be lost, some dating back to 922 AD.  It’s unclear whether any medieval manuscripts will have gone west.  More here (in German), which links to a PDF showing pages of a 9/10th century gospel manuscript on p.20 of the PDF.

I bet that they didn’t allow anyone to photograph them first.  In most disasters, the fire brigade are called in to saturate the building with water, just in case any documents escaped.  That usually finishes them off!

UPDATE:  The Cologne Archive is currently asking for volunteers in the area to help with the disaster recovery.  If you are interested in helping out, please see the archive website: http://www.koelner-stadtarchiv.de/index.html

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E. W. Brooks and the Chronicle of James of Edessa

Posted on by Roger Pearse

Chronica Minora III (CSCO 6, AD 1906) contains Latin translations of a number of Syriac historical texts, each with an introduction.  I thought that I would give the introduction to the Chronicle of James of Edessa here in English, since this text is an important one for the early history of Islam.  Notes by me are in square brackets.

The text was around 340 words of Latin, and took me about 45 minutes, although I read over it last night first, and only had to look up about 3 words. 

II. Chronicle of James of Edessa, translated by E. W. Brooks.

Fragments of this chronicle are preserved in British Museum manuscript Additional 14,685, which according to Wright [the cataloguer of the BM Syriac mss] was written in the 10th or 11th century.  The author given as is James Philoponus, or “lover of work”, who is the same as James of Edessa, in Wright’s opinion, because excerpts from the work of James of Edessa are quoted by Michael the Syrian.  The canon-table itself, which begins on folio 10r, is a continuation of the Chronicle of Eusebius of Caesarea; to it a preface is prefixed in which the work of Eusebius is corrected and supplemented.

 In the manuscript as we now have it, the fragments are wrongly ordered: fol. 12v must be read before fol. 12r, and fol. 18v before 18r [i.e. these pages have been bound in backwards], fol. 11 and 13 come from the same folio, and likewise fol. 19 and 20; and two fragments which contain fol. 19 are stuck together.

The fragments go no further than 942 A. S. [=the Seleucid era, or year of the Greeks], = 631 AD, but the canon, as we learn from Michael the Syrian, was continued to 1021 A.S.  Michael notes that James died two years before this, so that the last two years must be supposed to be the work of a pupil.  But Elias of Nisibis says that James composed the Chronicle in 1003 A.S. = 692 AD; and if this is true, then 18 years must be ascribed to the continuator.  The canon of years was copied by Michael, so portions now missing from the manuscript can easily be restored.  The same author quotes several places from the preface in a complete form which are now mutilated in our manuscript.  We have also edited from Elias of Nisibis material both from the preface, which he calls the Chronicle, and excerpts from the canon itself, to fill up the gaps.

Among the sources for the Chronicle the following must be included: Socrates, Theodoret, the Chronicle of Edessa, John of Ephesus, the history generally ascribed to Zacharias Rhetor, and perhaps lists of emperors, kings and bishops.  In the preface, besides Eusebius, James used certain Alexandrian chronographers, perhaps Anianus and Andronicus, and, as we see, a catalogue of kings of the Persians.

The beginning of the preface was translated [not so; edited] in the Catalogue by the excellent Wright; I myself edited the Canon in 1899 with an English translation and commentary: the complete text of the whole work is now translated for the first time [into Latin].  Many places which in the previous edition of the canon were left lacunose or wrongly filled up I have now restored from Michael and corrected. [Michael was published between 1899 and 1906] I have imitated the layout of the manuscript where possible in both text and translation; in the translation I have restored lacunas in the canon of years, but in the text it did not seem worthwhile to do so.

Bibliographical note:

You can read a description of the manuscript in Wright, Catalogue of Syriac MSS in the British Museum, p. 1062-1064  [online here, vol. 3; the PDF is p.1062 also.  This gives the text of the start of the work, not a translation].
Editions: W. Wright, op. cit., p. 1062, 1063, London, 1872.  Text of the start.
E. W. Brooks, The Chronological Canons of James of Edessa (Zeitschr. d. Deutschen Morgenländischen Gesellschaft, Bd. LIII, p. 261 ff and p. 550).  Canon with English translation. — Cf. also ibid. p. 534 ff (notes by Sigismund Fränkel) — See also F. Nau, Notice sur un nouveau ms. de l’Octoechus de Severe d’Antioche et sur l’auteur Jacques Philoponus (Journ. asiatique, ser. IX, tom. XI, p. 346 ff).

*      *     *

From Wright:

DCCCCXXI.  Paper, about 12 in. by 7, consisting of 23 leaves, all of which are more or less stained and torn.  There are from 36 to 40 lines in each page.  This volume is written in a good, regular hand of the 10th or 11th century and contains…

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Microfilms of the Ambrosian library in the USA

Posted on by Roger Pearse

Christopher Ecclestone has sent me this link which shows that a US university has microfilm copies of all the manuscripts in the Ambrosian library in Milan.  Good to know these exist; now what about getting them online where we can see them?

The holdings of the Biblioteca Ambrosiana (named after Ambrose of Milan, of course) are very rich, and include the manuscripts from the abbey of Bobbio.  These remained unknown through much of the renaissance, and were only discovered in 1493.  The abbey was founded in the early Dark Ages by the Irish monk St. Columbanus, and many of its books were made by reusing old parchment.  Consequently the books include many palimpsests of classical texts not known elsewhere.

PS: A sinister note.  Apparently the Ambrosian have banned this US library from making microfilms available.  All requests must go to the library itself.  The library has a site — only in Italian, of course — in which I was unable even to locate the microfilm-ordering service.  I think I will write and ask why they do such a thing.

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