Manuscript Copies Research Articles

Анонимная рукопись «История Крыма» (B 747) из собрания Института восточных рукописей РАН: атрибуция источника

Research objectives: Attribution and description of the anonymous manuscript, conventionally named “History of Crimea”, from the collection of the Institute of Oriental Manuscripts of the Russian Academy of Sciences. Research materials: Anonymous manuscript “History of Crimea”, kept in the collection of the Institute of Oriental Manuscripts of the Russian Academy of Sciences under the signature B 747. Results and novelty of research: The manuscript is a miscellany of various information about the Crimean Khanate, as well international relations, mainly between Russia and Turkey. In 1881, its Ottoman-Turkish text in Arabic script was published by the famous Russian researcher Vasiliy D. Smirnov (1846–1922), on the basis of the St. Petersburg copy, with corrections made according to the copy kept in Paris. V.D. Smirnov made several assumptions on who was the author of the text. The analysis showed the correctness of one of his assumptions, namely that the author – compiler of the text was Kesbî, the Turkish official from the second half of the eighteenth century. The identification of the author became possible due to the appearance of studies on the written heritage of Kesbi in recent decades, primarily the works of A. Ogreten. The comparison of B 747 with the text of “İbretnüma-yı devlet” (“Instruction to the State”, 1213 AH (1798–99 CE)) published by Ahmet Öğreten in 2002, leaves no doubt that the “History of Crimea” is the St. Petersburg copy of the aforesaid manuscript. In recent years, new hypotheses also appeared concerning the author, disputing the opinion of A. Öğreten and aiming to show that the miscellany was compiled not by Mustafa Kesbî, but by another Ottoman official, who wrote under the pseudonym Kesbî, Mehmed Haşim. At the same time, the text of the St. Petersburg copy of “İbretnüma-yı devlet” published by V.D. Smirnov 140 years ago, as well as the copy of the manuscript kept in Paris, still remains out of sight of Turkish specialists engaged in the study of this written text.

Eşrefoğlu’s Müzekki’n-nüfûs


 
 
 Eşrefoğlu Rumi was a Sufi master and poet from the time of the Ottoman sul- tan Mehmed II (Fatih, The Conqueror). His principal writings, a small collection of poems (divan) and a treatise Müzekki’n-nüfûs (Disciplining the self), are both still popular today. Numerous manuscripts of both works survive from the late sixteenth century onward. But there is a substantial gap in the transmission his- tory—no manuscript copy of either work survives from the century following his death, which should be considered anomalous in comparison to other writers of his time. A curious sentence found in some old copies of his Müzekki’n-nüfûs offers an unexpected look into the politics of the day—and, quite probably, an explana- tion for that gap.
 
 

John Brown’s Description of the Lake at Keswick: A Manuscript and a Few More Clues

Abstract This note reports on a previously undocumented manuscript copy of John Brown’s Description of the Lake at Keswick. Brown’s Description is an early, influential account of Derwent Water in the English Lake District. The text is generally regarded as having helped promote picturesque tourism in the region during the later eighteenth century. Prior to publication, the Description circulated privately. Until recently, however, none of these private copies were known to exist. The provenance of the manuscript discussed in this note is obscure, but there are grounds for supposing that the manuscript may relate to copies of Brown’s Description published in Newcastle upon Tyne, UK, during the mid-1760s. The note outlines the evidence for this potential relationship and, in doing so, puts a few more pieces of the puzzling history of Brown’s Description into place.

Los cautivos de Argel

Los cautivos de Argel

Collective Reasoning of Cirebon’s Petatah-petitih in the COVID-19 Pandemic Era

The local wisdom-based Cirebon's Petatah-petitih, namely Slaman, Slumun, Slamet, and Slata, Slutu, Wutuh, has played an important role in shaping people's mindsets, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic. This paper is a philological study of copies of manuscripts about Jawokan and Suluk still practiced by the people of Cirebon. The paper aims to discuss the contextual problems of COVID-19 from the perspective of oral literature that has developed in Cirebon. Using a qualitative-descriptive approach, this study will examine the oral literature of Cirebon's Petatah-petitih through Abed al-Jabiri's critique of reason named burhānī. The study found that the ideas formed in Cirebon's Petatah-petitih could be a power of knowl­edge in dealing with the COVID-19 pandemic. Later, it will use Michel Foucault's theory of the relationship between power and knowledge as an analytical framework. In this regard, the meaning of something is always found in relation to other meanings. The value of Cirebon's Petatah-petitih will be meaningful and have life value if it is applied to deal with the recent pandemic.

The Location of Literature: Authorship and Co-Authorship in Abdelmalek Smari’s Fiamme in paradiso

This article is devoted to a late-early Italian “migrant” novel, Abdelmalek Smari’s Fiamme in paradiso (2000), and to the two collaborative processes from which this work originated. Intersecting migration and post-colonial studies, Smari’s case is unique in the early production of recent Italian “migrant literature,” as a copy of the original manuscript has been preserved and reveals how the author negotiated his authorship in two collaborations: the first with his teacher of Italian and the second with his literary editor. Situating the novel at the crossroads between Italian, Algerian, and Arabic literary traditions, in this article I study the way in which these two collaborations took place, by comparing the two versions of the text to point out how each participant’s ethical and linguistic choices contributed in shaping the novel’s aesthetics.

The Birth of the Author: Pictorial Prefaces in Glossed Books of the Twelfth Century

The Birth of the Author: Pictorial Prefaces in Glossed Books of the Twelfth Century

Dispirited Away: The Peer Review Process

Dispirited Away: The Peer Review Process

Two Nineteenth-Century Copies of Joseph Prémare’s Notitia linguæ sinicæ

Abstract French Jesuit Joseph Prémare, a missionary to Qing Dynasty China, had completed by the end of 1728 the draft of a book entitled Notitia linguæ sinicæ, intended to assist aspiring Catholic missionaries from Europe in learning the Chinese language. One of the original manuscripts sent from Canton to Paris, now held in the Bibliothæque nationale de France in Paris, was rediscovered in the 1810s by the French sinologist Jean-Pierre Abel-Rémusat, and became the source for some manuscript copies, made mostly before the work’s eventual publication in 1831. This paper examines two of these manuscript copies dated between 1825 and 1830, held respectively in the Archive of the School of Oriental and African Studies in London and the the Bayerische Staatsbibliothek in Munich, both important in their own ways, and both somewhat misunderstood and largely neglected by recent studies.

“G‘aroyib us-sig‘ar”devonidagi alif bilan tugallanuvchi hamd g‘azallarning matniy xususiyatlari(To‘pqopi, Parij va Dushanbe nusxalari asosida)

This article analyzes the text of praise poems of Alisher Navai, which begins with the letter “Alif” in the first divan of “Khazayn ul-Maoniy” – “Gharoyib us-sigar”. Three copies of Devon's manuscripts preserved in Dushanbe (1990), Istanbul (Revan 808) and Paris (Turc 317) are comparatively studied. There also applied for a critical text prepared by H. Suleiman. In terms of reliability, the article examines from the literary practical and theoretical point of view and textual criticism. The author explores the differences between the copying of gazelles, as well as their content. There also defined the two of three manuscripts, there is a hymn of praise that is included but not in one.

CONSIDERAȚII DESPRE REFORMA LITURGICĂ ROMÂNEASCĂ DIN SEC. AL XVII-LEA: MOLITFELNICUL DE LA BĂLGRAD

This paper discusses the place of the Romanian Euchologion printed in 1689 at Bălgrad (today Alba Iulia, Romania) in the liturgical reform of the Orthodox Church of Transylvania during the 17th c. The author aims to establish that the apparition of the Euchologion of Bălgrad was not only the product of Calvinist Reformation, which insisted on the translation of the liturgical orthodox texts into the vernacular language, but also the result of the liturgical reform undergone by the Orthodox Church of Wallachia. After a summary presentation of the context of liturgical reform in the Romanian Church during the 17th century, the author offers a brief comparison of the contents of the Euchologion of Bălgrad and the Slavonic Trebnik printed at Câmpulung (Wallachia) in 1635, which inaugurated the domination of the Ruthenian liturgical practice in the Church of Wallachia, as an effect of the church reform supported by Metropolitan Peter Mohyla of Kiev. The comparison led to the conclusion that the former was mostly a Romanian translation of the latter, with some adaptations, which reflect either local usages or changes caused by the dynamic of the liturgical practice. The apparition of the Euchologion of Bălgrad aimed the correction and standardization of the byzantine-slavic rite in Transylvania and the initiation of the faithful through the translation of euchological texts into the vernacular. Its large circulation through manuscript copies until the 19th century demonstrates the value of this book in the liturgical life of the Romanian Orthodox Church of Transylvania

Абдуллах ибн Ризван-паша. Хроника «Теварих-и Дешт-и Кипчак». Часть 4 (окончание)

The column presents one of the principal narrative sources reflecting the history of the Golden Horde and the Crimean Khanate – the work “Tevarikh-i Desht-i Kiptchak” (“The Chronicle of the Desht-i Kiptchak”, 1638) from under the pen of Abdullah ibn Rizvan. Notwithstanding the presence of works in the scientific literature on this chronicle, they still have a superficial character. The artistic and literary merits of the work have not been fully analyzed. The chronicle is a vivid example of evolution of the Crimean Ottoman traditions of verbal creativity and chronology, which later gave impetus to the emergence of other universal histories. The text of “Tevarikh-i Desht-i Kiptchak” is given in the original transliteration from two manuscripts (National Library of France S 874 and The Library of Topkapı Palace Museum B 289) and in Russian translation (author of transliteration and translation – R.R. Abduzhemilev). The translation is made up of the combined text from two manuscript copies in the book Ananiasz Zajaczkowski “La Chronique des Steppes Kıptchak Tevarih-i Deşt-ı Qıpçaq du XVIIe siècle” (Warszawa 1966).

К текстологической и рецептивной истории южных поэм А. С. Пушкина: «<Вадим>», «Братья разбойники» и их ранние списки

The article introduces the academic community to the earliest and the most complete manuscript copy of Alexander Pushkin’s poem Vadim, discovered in the Mukhanovs’ Archive (stored at the Manuscript Department, the State Historical Museum, Moscow), which should be acknowledged as the most authoritative source of the main text, and systematizes the early manuscript copies of an-other Southern poem — The Robber Brothers, outlining its creative history. The close connection between the creative and reception history, illustrated here by the Southern poems, broadens our understanding of the textual status of early manuscript copies and prompts us to reconsider our operational methods, both in textual and literary, and historical perspectives.

Totoristika Lietuvos mokslų akademijos Vrublevskių bibliotekos fonduose

Tatar documentary heritage collections held in various holdings of the Wroblewski Library shed light on the history of one of the oldest national minorities in Lithuania, the Tatars. This article aims to look at old documents and Tatar printed heritage held in the Wroblewski Library, and at modern Tatar studies. It is particularly important to find and study iconography and egodocuments, which can provide researchers with plenty of valuable information. The first knowledge about the Tatars can be found in old chronicles, as well as travel accounts, historical works, and extant manuscript documents such as privileges, legal or religious papers. The Tatars assimilated linguistically, but retained their religious individuality – they remained Muslims and used Arabic script. Their written culture is closely related to religion – khamails, dalawars, kitabs, and semikitabs were needed to perform religious rites. The Tatar manuscripts were written in Arabic characters in the local languages, the prayer books served as a testimony to a family’s history. The Wroblewski Library holds a number of unique religious documents, starting with the kitab of Ivan Lutskevich and a khamail (prayer book) from the mid-19th century, and ending with recently-acquired copies of Tatar manuscript documents from a private collection. In the 19th century, a scholarly interest in the Tatar community grew; the numbers of intellectuals in their midst increased, and the Tatar identity strengthened. The Tatar publishing in Lithuania, developing along with the ethnic revival of the Tatar community, flourished in the first half of the 20th century. Vilnius gradually became the center of Tatar intellectual activity: the acclaimed scholar Prof. Stefan Bazarewski taught at Vilnius University; here existed the Turkology study circle led by Prof. Seraya Shapshal; it is in Vilnius that Tatar societies were founded and a museum was opened in 1929, and it is here that a number of works in Tatar studies and periodicals were published. The Vilnius Muftiate also engaged in publishing pursuits. From this period, the Wroblewski Library has numerous photographs featuring religious objects (mosques, cemeteries) and group photographs showing Tatar community members. World War II interrupted Lithuanian Tatars’ cultural and educational activity, their intellectuals were scattered or killed. Much of their valuable religious and cultural heritage was lost. Because of the war, the smallish Tatar community was divided into several even smaller ones, and their living and working conditions in Lithuania, Belarus and Poland differed. A considerable number of Tatars reassimilated, this time due to the influence of the Russian language. In the late 20th – early 21st century, the state of the Tatar community improved again, as there appeared new opportunities for education, culture, and religion. The Wroblewski Library houses one of the largest collections of Tatar documentary heritage in Lithuania, which is divided between the Main Collection, Rare Books Department and the Manuscripts Department. It consists of early Tatar documents, examples of their written culture and religious literature, and iconographic materials. These items have been copiously used by scholars. The library has also amassed a large number of recent works in Tatar studies in Polish, Lithuanian, Belarusian, and other languages, as well as research published across the world, whose variety of topic will hopefully attract the attention of the Tatar community, scholars, and all interested in Tatar studies. Keywords: Tatars; written culture; historical memory; Wroblewski Library of the Lithuanian Academy of Sciences; manuscripts.

Тверской список Сокращенной редакции Жития Ефрема Новоторжского

In this article the author shows that the Tver manuscript copy оf the abridged redaction оf the Life of Efrem of Torzhok was based on the texts of its extensive redaction, the Panegyric, and legends about the translation of the relics and miracles of the saint. The article is accompanied by the publication of the Life.

The Origins of the Byliny: a Working Hypothesis

The oral heroic poems found in the Northern province of Olonets in the late nineteenth century, usually known as byliny, present a unique case of oral preservation of medieval literature within European context. For decades, due to the lack of manuscript copies of those texts, theories about their origin have been highly conjectural and subject to many ideological demands. While any definitive conclusion on their authorship, place and time of composition has to remain necessarily speculative, the present article, analysing the internal evidence of the poems and what can be concluded from studies on orality in other literary traditions, proposes that they were originally composed in written form in a clerical environment in the Northern area of Kyivan Rus’.

Celebration of a military doctor : an unknown poem by Johannes Gregor Macer Szepsius (ca. 1530 – after 1579)

Johannes Gregor Macer Szepsius (ca. 1530 – after 1579) wrote an epigram in praise of his friend Anton Schneeberger (1530–1581) and a celebratory poem on his genealogy, both appearing in Schneeberger's most famous book, De bona militum valetudine conservanda [On the Good Health of Soldiers] in 1564. However, the poem praising Schneeberger's ancestry appears only in the printed version of the book; a surviving manuscript copy of the work in the Palace Library in Ansbach, Germany, features a paean in celebration of the military doctor instead. From a literary perspective, the poem does not surpass the standard level of occasional poetry of this period. Since it is a celebratory poem, the high regard for the doctor is expressed there and this stance contradicts the criticism of the status of the medical profession found in Macer's other works.

Cultural and Literary Ties of Khorezm and the Volga Region in the 19th – Beginning of the 20th cс. (on the Example of the Manuscript Collections of the Southern Aral Sea Region)

The paper is dedicated to the collection of manuscripts, lithographs and early printed books of the Karakalpak Institute of Humanities (Branch of the Academy of Sciences of the Republic of Uzbekistan) that combines receipts from various sources (these are individual entries from individuals, and the receipts of whole collections associated with the name of a particular collector –for example the so-called “Chimbay collection”). The work on the description of the entire fund, its systematization and compilation of a general catalog of manuscripts was started by the staff of the Karakalpak Scientific Research Institute of Humanities, and subsequently the author of this paper. Many manuscripts and early printed books represent the area of reading of a Muslim of that epoch (19–first half of the 20th century) and are one of the illustrations of the close literary and cultural ties between the Aral Sea region and the Volga region. Among them are such works as “Fiqh” al-Kaydani, “Bakirgan kitabi” and many others that were printed or copied in the Volga region (Kazan) and came to the libraries of Karakum-ishans in Khorezm and used in the educational programs of mektebs and madrasahs. The print and manuscript copies of dastan epic texts (such as “Garip Aşik”, “Köroğlu”, local versions of the “Idige” epic cycle and many others) indicates that the oral tradition of performing dastans connected with the other Turkic folklore (including the Volga region), as well as their written existence, was preserved in Karakalpakstan the 20th century for quite a long time.

Remaking Orinda: The Role of Manuscript Copying and Print Technology in Fabricating Katherine Philips' Legacy

Remaking Orinda: The Role of Manuscript Copying and Print Technology in Fabricating Katherine Philips' Legacy

The three manuscript copies of Robert Ashley’s Of Honour and Sebastián Fox Morcillo’s De honore. Study of a translation plagiarism

Robert Ashley’s Of Honour, edited in 1947 by Virgil B. Heltzel, has become a reference work in studies on honor in English literature, but we have known since 2016 that it is a translation plagiarism of Sebastián Fox Morcillo’s De honore (1556). In this paper the authors analyze and compare the three existing manuscripts of Of Honour (two of them recently identified), discuss Ashley’s possible intentions in producing it, and make a complete comparative study of De honore with Robert Ashley’s translation.