Among the most charming of the dozens of thousands of Bible fragments found in the Cairo Genizah,1 are the hundred or so in which the biblical text is written in some sort of shorthand, or abbreviated, manner.2 At least three different methods of abbreviation are found among these manuscripts. Sometimes, only the opening few words of each verse are written (the ‘Lemma Method’). The great pronouncement of comfort in the opening... Read More
Kim Phillips
on Thu 8 Feb 2024
Has tags: Bible, FOTM, Genizah Fragments, serugin, Targum, vocalisation
Melonie Schmierer-Lee
on Sun 29 Oct 2023
Food represents culture without boundaries with flavors, changing fashions, and personal preference all gaining expression in our plates. Celebrating the food culture of the Middle East, a new temporary exhibition 'Tastes of Heaven: Tales of the Arab Kitchen' – curated by Limor Yungman and Adi Namia-Cohen at the Museum for Islamic Art in Jerusalem – brings together cookbooks, artworks, travelers' literature, cooking, eating and drinking utensils, archaeological discoveries, historical... Read More
Has tags: exhibition, food, Genizah Fragments
Sarah Sykes
on Sat 28 Oct 2023
In recent weeks Genizah researchers recorded two radio interviews about the collection and its Bible fragments for the Catholic radio station Radio Maria England. On 24 July 2023, Dr Ben Outhwaite gave an introductory talk on the Cairo Genizah covering its history and importance to our understanding of Jewish medieval life, and on 25 September, Dr Kim Phillips followed up with a talk about early Bible fragments in the Genizah collections, explaining how scribes maintained the accuracy of their holy texts and how that relates to the Bible you read today.
Radio Maria England aims to... Read More
Has tags: audio, Bible, Genizah Fragments
Ben Outhwaite
on Fri 27 Oct 2023
Today we are announcing a new piece of Genizah research and a new book in the field of book history from our friends over at Gorgias Press. This book, titled Literary Snippets: Colophons Across Space and Time, is a collection of essays examining the widespread phenomenon of ‘colophons’ in manuscript culture. From Gorgias Press:
The colophon, the ultimate or “crowing touch” paragraphs of a manuscript or a book, provides readers with a the historical context in which the scribe produced the manuscript (or the publisher, a book). At its most fundamental level, the... Read MoreHas tags: article, colophon, Genizah Fragments, printed
Nadia Vidro
on Thu 13 Jul 2023
Most Genizah fragments are damaged – “torn”, “stained”, “rubbed”, “faded” occur frequently in Genizah catalogues – but some fragments are more damaged than others. Ink corrosion can destroy a text almost completely. A page torn vertically is harder to make sense of than one torn horizontally. It is especially frustrating but also tantalising when writing is preserved but earlier conservation work has, through error or a misunderstanding, obscured it. In such cases, working today with the UL’s Conservation... Read More
Has tags: calendar, conservation, Genizah Fragments, polemic, Saadiah Gaon
Ben Outhwaite
on Wed 22 Mar 2023
The Arabic Poetry in the Cairo Genizah project (APCG) recently embarked on a tour of the United Arab Emirates, showcasing its collection of poetry manuscripts to scholars and the public in Abu Dhabi and Dubai. Dr Mohamed Ahmed, head of the project, organized the tour in the Gulf with the aim of highlighting the significance of the Cairo Genizah as a repository of Arabic literature and an important – but little known – resource for Arabic textual history.
... Read More
Has tags: Arabic, exhibition, Genizah Fragments, poetry
Melonie Schmierer-Lee
on Tue 21 Mar 2023
The Kedem YouTube channel has recently published three video interviews with Ben Outhwaite, dealing with some recent discoveries and perennial fascinations of the Genizah. So, if you are interested in hearing what he thinks about the Kyiv Letter’s origins (spoiler: he thinks Norman Golb was spot on) or the new Maimonides discovery by Prof. Delgado (... Read More
Has tags: Genizah Fragments, Hexapla, Kiev, Moses Maimonides, podcast
Melonie Schmierer-Lee
on Thu 16 Feb 2023
A new online exhibition ‘Coins of the Cairo Geniza’, curated by Matthew Dudley and Alan Elbaum of the Princeton Geniza Lab, brings together data on the many coins and currencies that crop up in Genizah manuscripts. The exhibition presents coins from the Princeton Numismatic Collection and images of Genizah documents, according to state authority, regnal years, production thresholds, alternative names, and etymology.
In the 12th century fragment T-S AS... Read More
Has tags: coins, currency, exhibition, Genizah Fragments
Ben Outhwaite
on Tue 7 Feb 2023
In December 1033 CE – late afternoon on the 12th day of the Hebrew month of Tevet – a terrible earthquake shook Palestine. Across the region, cities were levelled and a tsunami wave arrived on the Mediterranean coast. The events of that day and its aftermath reached Egypt soon afterwards in a letter written by the scribe Solomon ben Ṣemaḥ. The letter, T-S 18J3.9, can be seen on Cambridge Digital Library with... Read More
Has tags: earthquake, Fatimid, Genizah Fragments, letter, Ramla, scribe
Sarah Bunin Benor and Abby Graham
on Wed 2 Nov 2022
Historically, most well-known documents in Jewish languages have been penned by men. However, Jewish women have also recorded their voices in writing and in song. At the Hebrew Union College—Jewish Institute of Religion (HUC-JIR) Jewish Language Project, we searched for Jewish women’s voices throughout history. We found documents and recordings in twenty languages (some with multiple dialects) from the tenth century to the present, including letters, poetry, memoirs, lullabies, translations of religious texts, and more. To give a sense of the chronological, geographic, and linguistic... Read More
Has tags: Dunash b. Labrat, Genizah Fragments, language, letter, widow, Women