Hostname: page-component-84b7d79bbc-x5cpj Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-08-01T17:14:49.488Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Byzantium in the Cairo Genizah

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 January 2016

Nicholas De Lange
Nicholas De Lange*
Affiliation:
Faculty of Divinity, University of Cambridge
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

On the occasion of the Byzantine Symposium at Cambridge in March 1990, an exhibition of manuscripts of Byzantine interest recovered from the Cairo Genizah was mounted in the University Library. Although these manuscripts have been in Cambridge for nearly a century, they are still not as well known as they deserve to be, and the exhibition provoked a good deal of interest among participants. It therefore seemed useful to provide this more permanent record. I have taken the opportunity to add one or two items which, for various reasons, could not be exhibited. I have also introduced references to publications in English or other western languages; it should be remembered, however, that there is a growing quantity of Genizah publication now in Hebrew. It should also be borne in mind that, although most of the Genizah manuscripts are in Cambridge, other smaller collections are to be found in many other libraries, notably (so far as Byzantine material is concerned) in St Petersburg, New York and Oxford.

Type
Articles
Information
Byzantine and Modern Greek Studies , Volume 16 , 1992 , pp. 34 - 47
Copyright
Copyright © The Centre for Byzantine, Ottoman and Modern Greek Studies, University of Birmingham 1992

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1. I must express my gratitude to Dr. Jonathan Shepard for his enthusiasm and support, and also to the Revd. N.J. Hancock, Dr. S.C. Reif, and Dr. G. Khan of the library staff for their considerable practical assistance.

2. See the review by Smythe, Dion C. in Bulletin of Judaeo-Greek Studies 6 (Summer 1990) 23–25.Google Scholar

3. On the background to the discovery of the Genizah see Bentwich, N., Solomon Schechter (Cambridge 1938) 126–163 Google Scholar. For an account of its contents, an assessment of its importance, and the history of research, see Goitein, S.D., A Mediterranean Society: the Jewish Communities of the Arab World as Portrayed in the Documents of the Cairo Genizah, Vol. 1 (Berkeley, Los Angeles, London 1967) 1–28.Google Scholar

4. There is no complete catalogue of the Cambridge Genizah material as yet. In the meantime, so far as published items are concerned, the most useful reference work is: Reif, S.C. et al. (ed), Published Material from the Cambridge Genizah Collections: A Bibliography 1896-1980 (Cambridge 1988)Google Scholar. See the comments and additional notes by de Lange, N., ‘Greek and Byzantine fragments in the Cairo Genizah’, Bulletin of Judaeo-Greek Studies 5 (Winter 1989), 13–17.Google Scholar

5. On Genizah palimsests see Sokoloff, M. and Yahalom, J., ‘Christian Palimpsests from the Cairo Genizah’, Revue d’Histoire des Textes 8 (1978), 109–132 CrossRefGoogle Scholar. There are other Greek biblical palimpsests in the Genizah: see de Lange, N.R.M., ‘Two Genizah Fragments in Hebrew and Greek’, in Emerton, J.A., Reif, S.C. (ed), Interpreting the Hebrew Bible. Essays in Honour of E.I.J. Rosenthal (Cambridge 1982) 61.Google Scholar

6. Published by Burkitt, F.C., Fragments of the Books of Kings according to the translation of Aquila (Cambridge 1897) 5–32.Google Scholar

7. Published in de Lange, ‘Two Genizah Fragments’, 64-75.

8. Published by de Lange, N., ‘Some new fragments of Aquila on Malachi and Job?’, Vetus Testamentum 30 (1980) 291–294.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

9. Published in Golb, N., Pritsak, O., Khazarian Hebrew Documents of the Tenth Century (Ithaca NY 1982) 11–15 Google Scholar. According to Golb, the letter was written on behalf of the Jewish community of Kiev (spelt qiyyov in line 8). If this reading is correct, this is not only the earliest reference to a Jewish community in Kiev, but also the earliest original document naming the city. The last word, written by brush not pen, is in Turkish runes, and has been read as huqurum: ‘I have read (it)’.

10. English translation in Starr, J., The Jews in the Byzantine Empire (641-1204) (Athens 1939) 187–189 Google Scholar. The document is studied by Reinach, T., ‘Un Contrat de mariage du temps de Basile le Bulgaroctone’, in Mélanges offerts à G. Schlumberger (Paris 1924) 118–132 Google Scholar. For the Antinoopolis document, see Sirat, C. et al., La Ketouba de Cologne (Opladen 1986).Google Scholar

11. Partial English translation in Starr, The Jews, 182-3.

12. See Mann, J., The Jews in Egypt and in Palestine under the Fatimid Caliphs (2 vols in 1, reprinted with a preface and reader’s guide by S.D. Goitein, New York 1970) I. 92fGoogle Scholar. Mann read the place name as ‘Mastaura’; Golb, N. pointed out, under the rubric ‘Correspondence Received’ in Bulletin of Judaeo-Greek Studies 1 (Autumn, 1987) 7 Google Scholar, that it actually reads ‘Marathia’. Various other Genizah documents mention Byzantine captives ransomed or offered for ransom in Egypt: see Starr, The Jews, 186f. (from the 1020s) and 220f. (from the 1140s).

13. See Ankori, Z., ‘The Correspondence of Tobias ben Moses the Karaite’, in Blau, J.L. et al. (edd.), Essays on Jewish Life and Thought Presented in Honor of S. W. Baron (New York 1959) 1–38 Google Scholar; Gil, M., A history of Palestine, 634-1099 (Cambridge 1992) 815–818 Google Scholar, and more generally on the personality and work of Tobias ben Moses see Ankori, Z., Karaites in Byzantium: The Formative Years, 970-1100 (New York-Jerusalem 1959)Google Scholar passim.

14. Translation and discussion by Goitein, S.D., ‘A Letter from Seleucia (Cilicia) Dated 21 July 1137’, Speculum 39 (1964) 298–303.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

15. See Bowman, S., ‘Messianic Expectations in the Peloponnesos’, Hebrew Union College Annual 52 (1981) 195–202 Google Scholar. Partial translation in Bowman, S., The Jews of Byzantium, 1204-1453 (Alabama 1985) 224–227.Google Scholar

16. Partial English translation in Starr, The Jews, 220.

17. Translation and detailed study in Golb and Pritsak, Khazarian Hebrew Documents, 73-156.

18. Discussion in Golb and Pritsak, 79-86.