Read on Twitter
Thread. The Mingana-Lewis Palimpsest
1/6. In 1895, Mrs Lewis purchased a rare manuscript in Suez. It was a palimpsest: a Christian Arabic text from the 9th or 10th CE, written on recycled parchment leaves with remnants of several different texts. Among them, old Qur’ān leaves…
1/6. In 1895, Mrs Lewis purchased a rare manuscript in Suez. It was a palimpsest: a Christian Arabic text from the 9th or 10th CE, written on recycled parchment leaves with remnants of several different texts. Among them, old Qur’ān leaves…
2/6. In 1914, she and Mingana published a short study with the very attractive title: "Leaves from Three Ancient Qurans, possibly pre-‘Othmanic". But the 1st World War started, and the manuscript – which was then exhibited in Leipzig - disappeared until 1936…
3/6. It entered the collection of Cambridge University, and is still there today (MS Or.1287). Coincidentally, in 1936, Mingana was in Leiden and purchased half a sheet of the same manuscript for the Birmingham collection. And 2 other fragments were in Beuron’s Abbaye in Germany.
4/6. The manuscript gathers different texts, mainly in Syriac, but also Qur’ānic folios (21 ff + 3 half ff.), and, at a less extent, Greek and Arabic legal texts…
5/6. The Qur’ān leaves are from 2 distinct copies. They share several features: both are vertical (one smaller than the other), and are written in a script style quite similar: a variety of professional Hijazi, with tendencies to Umayyad style (O.I), perhaps 2nd half of 1st H.(?)
6/6. Restored between 2009 and 2011, the ms was entirely digitized under UV and IR lights. Dr. Alba Fedeli has done a stunning work for reconstructing the scriptio inferior! See here the pictures and bibliography (mostly A. Fedeli and A. George):
https://cudl.lib.cam.ac.uk/collections/minganalewis/1
https://cudl.lib.cam.ac.uk/collections/minganalewis/1
