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144 posts categorized "Greek"

10 June 2011

Greek Manuscripts Update

We recently added more Greek manuscripts to the British Library's Digitised Manuscripts website.

A page from a copy of the Four Gospels in Ancient Greek, showing the Gospel of St Mark.

Gospel of St Mark, 1326 (Add MS 5117, f. 84v)

In response to some of our readers' comments, here is a list (with hyperlinks) of the 24 new additions:

A page from a 10th-century copy of the Orations of Gregory of Nazianzus, written in Ancient Greek.

Gregory of Nazianzus, Oratio 41 (In Pentecosten), 10th century (Add MS 14771, f. 70v)

Thank you for taking the time to comment -- we always welcome feedback.

Posted by Ancient, Medieval, and Early Modern Manuscripts at 10:02 AM in Greek | Permalink | Comments( 1)

25 May 2011

More Greek Manuscripts Digitised by the British Library

Phase two of the British Library’s project to digitise all of its ca. 1,000 Greek manuscripts is now well under way. This phase — also generously funded by the Stavros Niarchos Foundation) — will digitise and make publicly available a further 250 manuscripts, adding to the 284 manuscripts digitised in phase one. We are currently about half way through this second phase and plan to publish the digitised manuscripts in batches during the rest of this year on our Digitised Manuscripts viewer.

A page from a 6th-century copy of the Four Gospels in Ancient Greek, showing a portrait of the Evangelist St Matthew writing at a desk.

Portrait of St Matthew the Evangelist, Add MS 5111, f. 12r. 

A new batch of manuscripts has now been published online, and contains 24 manuscripts ranging in date from the tenth to the nineteenth centuries. They include a group of illustrated medieval manuscripts of the gospels, formerly owned by the celebrated English physician and book collector Anthony Askew (fl. 1699–1774), acquired by the British Museum in 1775. Also included is a tenth-century parchment manuscript of Old Testament fragments (Add MS 20002), acquired in parts from Sinai by Constantin von Tischendorf (1815–1874) during his second journey to the East in 1853, which came to the British Museum in 1854. Another part of this manuscript is housed in the Bodleian Library at Oxford (Bodleian Auct. T. infr. ii. 1). A further highlight is an eleventh-century manuscript of Symeon Metaphrastes’s Saints’ Lives for December (Add MS 11870), which bears ownership marks of Cardinal Salviati (d. 1553) and Pope Pius VI (1775–1779).

A page from an 11th-century collection of saints' lives, showing the opening of the Life of St John the Theologian, marked by an illustration of the saint.

Opening of the Life of St John the Theologian, Add MS 11870, f. 197v. 

Further batches of manuscripts published on Digitised Manuscripts will be announced on this blog.

James Clements (Project Manager)

Posted by Ancient, Medieval, and Early Modern Manuscripts at 4:49 PM in Greek , Illuminated manuscripts , Medieval | Permalink | Comments( 2)

24 January 2011

Codex Sinaiticus Facsimile Published

The printed facsimile of Codex Sinaiticus, the fourth-century biblical manuscript containing the oldest surviving complete New Testament, has just been published by British Library Publishing. It is the last major output of the international Codex Sinaiticus Project which began in November 2002 and involved close collaboration between us here at the British Library and the other three institutions which hold parts of the manuscript: Leipzig University Library, St Catherine's Monastery, Mount Sinai, and the National Library of Russia. The printed facsimile reunites the surviving parts of the Codex, as does the project's website www.codexsinaiticus.org, completed in July 2009. New digital photography of the whole manuscript during the project provided the images for both the website, with its new electronic transcription of the text, and for the facsimile.

The printed facsimile of Codex Sinaiticus.  

The facsimile is an enormous and extremely heavy book. It has 832 very large pages measuring 340 x 420 mm and retails for £495. I can't swear that it's available in all good bookshops, but it's definitely available in the British Library shop.

Our collaborator on the Codex Sinaiticus Project, Professor David Parker of the University of Birmingham, who led the creation of the new electronic transcription for the project's website, recently published his brilliant book, Codex Sinaiticus: The Story of the World's Oldest Bible. It's also available through the BL's online (and onsite) shop, for only £20!

Posted by Ancient, Medieval, and Early Modern Manuscripts at 3:04 PM in Greek | Permalink | Comments( 2)

Digitised Manuscripts website launched

Today we launch our Digitised Manuscripts site, which features full coverage of 284 Greek manuscripts drawn from our Additional and Harley manuscript collections. The manuscripts, dating from the sixth to the 18th centuries, encompass a wide range of literary, historical, biblical, liturgical and scientific texts. Some of the manuscripts are beautifully illuminated, including an artistic highlight of the collection, the Theodore Psalter (Add MS 19352).


A page from the Theodore Psalter, showing an illustration of the Anointing of King David by the Prophet Samuel.

The Anointing of King David by the Prophet Samuel, The Theodore Psalter, Add MS 19352, f. 190r

This 18-month project, funded by the Stavros Niarchos Foundation, is a pilot for our wider plans to digitise the medieval and earlier manuscript collections. We will be enhancing the functionality of the site and adding more content - both Greek and Latin manuscripts - over the next 18 months.

 

Posted by Web Editor at 9:39 AM in Greek | Permalink | Comments( 1)

08 February 2010

The British Library's Greek Manuscript Digitisation Project

The British Library has one of the best manuscript collections in the world. Its Western Manuscripts collection alone comprises over 25,000 volumes and over 50,000 papyri, charters and rolls dating from before 1600. Included in this group are 1,000 Greek codices and 3,000 Greek papyri. The British Library's vision is to make available in digital format as many of our unique and primary resource collections as possible, for the benefit of research and knowledge creation, and to ensure our heritage is preserved for future generations.

The Greek Manuscripts Digitisation Project, generously funded by the Stavros Niarchos Foundation, is a pilot project that will fully digitise and make available 250 Greek manuscripts by summer 2010. In achieving this goal, we are seeking to develop strategies and workflows, as well as acquire the experience in pursuing a mass-digitisation approach that can be applied to our pre-1600 manuscripts collection.

As Project Manager, I feel privileged to be involved in this project and I am looking forward to sharing the views and experiences of those who are involved in similar initiatives. I trust that this blog will achieve that goal.

Juan Garcés

Το πρόγραμμα ψηφιοποίησης των Ελληνικών Χειρογράφων της Βρετανικής Βιβλιοθήκης

Η Βρετανική Βιβλιοθήκη διαθέτει μια από τις καλύτερες συλλογές χειρογράφων στον κόσμο. Μόνο η συλλογή Δυτικών Χειρογράφων της περιλαμβάνει πάνω από 25000 τόμους, ενώ ξεπερνούν τις 50000 οι πάπυροι, οι ιδρυτικές διακηρύξεις (charters) και τα ειλητάρια (rolls) που χρονολογούνται πριν το 1600. Σε αυτή την ομάδα ανήκουν και 1000 Ελληνικοί χειρόγραφοι κώδικες, καθώς και 3000 Ελληνικοί πάπυροι. Το όραμα της Βρετανικής Βιβλιοθήκης είναι να διαθέσει σε ψηφιακή μορφή όσο το δυνατόν περισσότερες από τις μοναδικές και πρωτογενείς συλλογές της, προς όφελος της έρευνας και γνώσης, με σκοπό να διασφαλίσει τη διάσωση αυτής της κληρονομιάς για τις επερχόμενες γενιές.

Το Πρόγραμμα Ψηφιοποίησης Ελληνικών Χειρογράφων, που χρηματοδοτείται από το Ίδρυμα Σταύρος Νιάρχος, είναι ένα πιλοτικό πρόγραμμα που σκοπό έχει να ψηφιοποιήσει πλήρως και να καταστήσει προσβάσιμα ψηφιακά 250 Ελληνικά χειρόγραφα μέχρι το καλοκαίρι του 2010. Προκειμένου να επιτύχουμε τον σκοπό μας, αναζητούμε να αναπτύξουμε στρατηγικές και ροές εργασίας, καθώς και να αποκτήσουμε την εμπειρία στο να εφαρμόσουμε μια προσέγγιση μαζικής ψηφιοποίησης, η οποία μελλοντικά θα μπορούσε να επεκταθεί και στη συλλογή χειρογράφων μας που χρονολογούνται πριν το 1600. 

Ως Διευθυντής του Προγράμματος νιώθω ευνοημένος που συμμετέχω σε ένα τέτοιο πρόγραμμα. Αναμένω με χαρά λοιπόν να μοιραστούμε απόψεις και εμπειρίες με ανθρώπους που συμμετέχουν σε παρόμοιες πρωτοβουλίες. Ευελπιστώ ότι αυτό το blog  θα συμβάλει προς αυτή την κατεύθυνση.

Juan Garcés
Translated by Dimitrios Skrekas

Posted by Web Editor at 6:03 PM in Greek | Permalink | Comments( 3)

05 February 2010

Welcome to the Digitised Manuscripts Blog

I created this blog in order to make it possible for all those interested to stay in touch with exciting manuscripts digitisation projects at The British Library, such as the Greek Manuscripts Digitisation Project, and to share our thoughts on all things related to digitised manuscripts. I hope to blog not only on the progress of our projects but also on more general topics associated with generating digital images of manuscripts, making them available to researchers, and pursuing old and new means of researching digital surrogates of ancient manuscripts.

I will also be joined from time to time by some of my colleagues – conservators, curators, imaging technicians, systems developers, researchers and others – who will guestblog on their experience with digitised manuscripts.

I hope you find the blog interesting and take advantage of the comments feature to let me know what you think.

Juan Garcés
Project Manager,
Greek Manuscripts Digitisation Projects

Posted by Web Editor at 5:57 PM in Ancient , Greek , Illuminated manuscripts , Manuscripts , Medieval , Medieval history | Permalink | Comments( 1)

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