New Evidence on the Saruhanid Dynasty

The article offers new evidence on the Saruhanid succession in the fourteenth century in light of a short chronicle contained in a Greek manuscript housed in the Bodleian Library, Oxford, which records a hitherto unknown internal conflict that took place in 1383. This and similar historical evidence reflect the continuity of life of the Greek Orthodox communities under the Turcoman conquerors in a period marked by the increasing decline of Byzantine power and the rise of the Ottomans.

A Handwritten Greek Hagiography of Russian Saints from Mount Athos: The Life of St Mitrofan of Voronezh

Modern methods for studying old Russian texts are based on the reconstruction of foreign translations: this makes it possible to define the extent to which the world of the Middle Ages and the early modern period was acquainted with them. Post-Byzantine translations of the hagiographic works of old Rus’ and later periods are rare cases of such texts. The archive of the Athos Russian Monastery of St Panteleimon contains a text which makes up part of the Greek manuscript Cod. Athos. Panteleemon. gr. 283 (1848): it speaks of the life of St Mitrofan of Voronezh (†1703), a famous associate of Peter the Great canonised by the Russian Church in 1832. At the time of his canonisation, a handwritten abridged hagiography was released: this was followed a few years later by a longer version which the Greek text relies on. A codicological investigation has helped to identify the codex’s author and scribe: the monk Jacobos Neaksytiotes (1790s–1869), an outstanding theologian and historian (his opus magnum was Athonias) of Athos. The reconstruction of his biography and legacy allows the author of this article to understand this monk’s interest in Russian history and his translations of some hagiographic works from Russian into Greek. The article also contains a Russian translation of the Greek hagiographic text.

Romanian-Greek manuscript inventory number 27 Anthology – An Account of the activity of the copyist Chiril Monahul from Bisericani Monastery (Neamt County)

This paper is a fraction of an ampler project aimed at classifying and studying the entire collection of musical manuscripts from the “Dumitru Stăniloae” Ecumenical Library of the Metropolitan Church of Moldavia and Bukovina of Iasi. This documentary collection consists of a number of 32 musical manuscripts, in Chrysantine notation mainly originating from the 19th century. Manuscript 27 was created in 1846 by Cyril the Monk from the Bisericani Monastery (Neamt county) – he was a psalter, composer and copyist of great talent. He wrote other two manuscripts, ms. inventory numbers 23 and 31/49, which are in the “Dumitru Stăniloae” Ecumenical Library of the Metropolitan Church of Moldavia and Bukovina of Iasi. His own creation (with the mention “by the writer”) in Ms. 27 contains the first psalm, Blessed is the man in the plagal of the 4th mode, the troparia God is with us in the plagal of the 4th mode, the polyeleos Good word in the 4th mode legetos, the doxastikon of the Easter, The day of Ressurection, the plagal of the 1st mode and two heirmoi of the Holy Week. These are chants that are remarkable through their fluidity and expressiveness, as they retain the specific psaltic melodic formulas and reveal a balanced analytical musical writing. The liturgical music in Manuscript 27 consists of various chants, from those performed during the Vespers to the Matin and the Liturgy. Following analysis of the manuscript’s repertoire, I discovered that the main source of Ms. 27 is the first three volumes of the Anthology by Nektarios Frimu, published in Neamț (3rd volume, 1840) and Iași (1st and 2nd volume, 1846). Cyril the Monk, the copyist of Ms. 27, selected works from these sources, and introduced along the self-authored chants mentioned earlier, chants by other lesser-known authors, such as Nechifor (The Blessings of the Ressurection, the plagal of 1st mode in Greek) and Calinic (troparia from the chant Lord is with us, the plagal of the 4th mode in Romanian and the polyeleos The Lord’s servants, the plagal of the 2nd mode, in Greek). Besides, among the chants in Romanian, the manuscript records chants in Greek (by established Greek authors), which are proof of the continuous practice of the Greek chanting in Moldavia, long with that in Romanian, in the period before the Reforms (1863-1864) introduced by Alexandru Ioan Cuza, the ruler of the Romanian Principalities.

The foundation of Kievan Metropolia in light of the latest scientific data

This article covers the foundation of Kievan Metropolia, which remains a stumbling stone for the modern historians. The author draws parallels between the opinions of experts of the past (G. Geltzer, J. Darrouzès, M. D. Priselkov, A. Poppen and E. Honigmann) and the latest scientific data. In the middle of the XX century, the Byzantinist E. Honigmann was first to use in solution of this problem the Byzantine codes of cannon – lists of metropolias of the Patriarchate of Constantinople (notitiae episcopatuum). The modern Russian historiography proves the hypothesis of E. Honigmann that “the Russian Metropolia as a part of Tsarigrad Patriarchate was established by 997 at the latest”. However, the latest research confute the outdated argument that Kievan Metropolia initially was under the jurisdiction of the Patriarchate of Constantinople. This article is first to introduce the Byzantine source of the late X century – the message of Leo of Synada to the anonymous Metropolis of Ephesus from the collection Österreichische Nationalbibliothek (Cod. Vindob. Phil. Gr. 342. fol. 163v, 166v-167v.). Although, the Vienna manuscript has been subjected to detailed description in a number of works, with regards to realities of the time of Christianization of Rus’ is examined for the first time. The unique information from the message of Leo of Synada about the Metropolis of Ephesus as “Head of the Church” was verified based on the paramount post-Byzantine monument of the XVI century, which is the synodic “assertive” charter of the Patriarch of Constantinople Joasaph II (of December 1560). The comparative analysis of Byzantine sources of the X and the XVI centuries, which contain identical information on this topic, confirms that namely Metropolitan of Ephesus, endowed with patriarchal dignity and nominated as “head of the Church” in the Greek manuscript of the X century from the collection Österreichische Nationalbibliothek, became the legitimate participant of creation of the autocephalous Kievan Metropolia since the time of Christianization of Rus’ by Vladimir the Great.

The Books of Kings

The books of Kings have some of the most challenging text-historical problems in all of the Hebrew Bible. The Septuagint edition (known as 3–4 Kingdoms) differs widely from MT Kings in both individual readings and the ordering of the textual units. These differences can be traced to its Hebrew Vorlage. The translation from the Hebrew was made in a highly literal, albeit not slavish, style. The study of the Septuagint of Kings is further complicated by the fact that most of its text was later subjected to the Kaige revision and that this revised text form is now found in most Greek witnesses. Thus the Old Greek translation is best preserved in different Greek manuscript traditions in different sections of Kings. Often the daughter versions, especially the Old Latin, are of great significance for the text-critical study of both the Old Greek and also its probable Vorlage.

Dating and Historical Context of a Greek Manuscript Containing Palaiologoi Emperors’ Portraits (Paris. gr. 1783)

This article puts forward a new later dating of the Greek manuscript BnF, Paris. gr. 1783 kept in the National Library of France and containing portraits of emperors of the Palaiologoi dynasty. The manuscript contains important texts related to the Constantinople period of court history and culture. Historiographers used to date the manuscript to the fifteenth century according to the portrait of Patriarch Joseph II (†1439), a famous participant of the Ferraro-Florence Council, which can be seen in the Italian fresco paintings of the fifteenth century. Meanwhile, the study of the manuscript’s palaeographical features shows that it was written by an anonymous scribe from Crete who worked in Venice and Rome for Italian humanists in the middle — third quarter of the sixteenth century. The handwriting of the famous Cretan calligrapher, employee of Francis I’s library in Fontainebleau Angelus Vergecius, as well as some other scribes associated with him was typologically close to the handwriting of the main scribe of the manuscript. Analogies to this handwriting can also be seen in the handwriting of Manuel Provataris, another famous scribe of the epoch, a Cretan Greek from Rethymno, employee and copyist of the Vatican Library. The new palaeographic dating of the Paris. gr. 1783 manuscript changes the date of creation of portrait drawings of the Byzantine emperors of the Palaiologoi dynasty and Patriarch Joseph II. Also, it is important to change the dating of all texts contained in the manuscript including such important texts as one of the three lists of imperial tombs of the Church of Sts. Apostles in Constantinople, as well the list of the offices of the Byzantine court. The Paris. gr. 1783 manuscript should be excluded from the circle of Late Byzantine booklore and attributed to post-Byzantine book heritage.

A Fragment of the Syriac Translation of Aristotle’s Poetics Preserved by Jacob Bar Shakko

The fragment of the Syriac translation of Aristotle’s Poetics preserved by Jacob (Severus) Bar Shakko (d. 1241) comprises Poet. VI 1449b24–1450a10. In spite of its small size, it serves as an important witness both to the Greek text of the Poetics, and to the reception of this work in the Christian Orient and, later on, in the Muslim world. The fragment derives from a translation, which most likely appeared in West Syriac circles in the 7th/8th centuries AD and later served as the basis for the Arabic translation of the Poetics made by Abū Bishr Mattā ibn Yūnus in the 10th century. The present article includes a new edition of the Syriac text preserved by Bar Shakko, which is based on the collation of six manuscripts and is accompanied by an English translation. The article also provides a detailed analysis of the Syriac fragment as compared to the transmitted Greek text of the Poetics, on the one hand, and to the Arabic translation of it by Abū Bishr, on the other. This comparison allows an assumption that the Syriac version is most likely based on a Greek manuscript, which may have contained glosses and scholia. A Greek and Syriac glossary is attached at the end of the article.