Jewish Manuscript Cultures: New Perspectives

Description

Hebrew manuscripts are considered to be invaluable documents and artefacts of Jewish culture and history. Research on Hebrew manuscript culture is progressing rapidly and therefore its topics, methods and questions need to be enunciated and reflected upon. The case studies assembled in this volume explore various fields of research on Hebrew manuscripts. They show paradigmatically the current developments concerning codicology and palaeography, book forms like the scroll and codex, scribes and their writing material, patrons, collectors and censors, manuscript and book collections, illuminations and fragments, and, last but not least, new methods of material analysis applied to manuscripts. The principal focus of this volume is the material and intellectual history of Hebrew book cultures from antiquity to the Middle Ages and Early Modern Period, its intention being to heighten and sharpen the reader’s understanding of Jewish social and cultural history in general. Contents Preface Codicology and Palaeography From the Archaeological Turn to ‘Codicologie Structurale’: The Concept of Codicology and the Material Description of Hebrew Manuscripts Scribal Aspects of the Manufacturing and Writing of the Qumran Scrolls The Anatomy of Non-biblical Scrolls from the Cairo Geniza A Pentateuch to Read in? The Secrets of the Regensburg Pentateuch Editing Shedding Light on Metatron – Recently Discovered Fragments of Mystical Writings in Germany On the History of Editing Pre-Modern Yiddish Manuscript Texts Collections The Preservation of Hebrew Books by Christians in the Pre-Reformation German Milieu Johannes Reuchlin’s Collection of Hebrew Books – Its Afterlife and Influence Matters of Provenance: Hebrew Manuscripts Owned by a Distinguished French Archbishop Jacob Georg Christian Adler (1756–1834) and his Books Materials Studies Building a Bridge from the Dead Sea Scrolls to Mediaeval Hebrew Manuscripts Composition Analysis of Writing Materials in Geniza Fragments ‘Write on Three Ribs of a Sheep’: Writing Materials in Ancient and Mediaeval Jewish Magic Cultural Studies Codex hebraicus 18 and Codex hebraicus 53 in the Hamburg State and University Library – ‘Corrected by Yiṣḥaq of Arles’ The Pillars of Exile by R. Yiṣḥaq of Corbeil: The Small Book of Commandments in Codex hebraicus 17, State and University Library Hamburg Pictorial Messages in Mediaeval Illuminated Hebrew Books: Some Methodological Considerations List of Contributors Index of manuscripts