111 Syriac Manuscripts From St. Joseph's Monastery In Mannanam, India, Are Now Active In Reading Room

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Decorative title page for the Qūddāša of Addai and Mari, an East Syriac liturgical text, in APSTCH MANN 00097 (fol. 3v)

111 Syriac manuscripts from St. Joseph's Monastery in Mannanam, India, are now active in Reading Room

Posted: 2022-05-20

The Syriac manuscripts from St. Joseph’s Seminary in Mannanam, India, have now been cataloged and are available for viewing in vHMML. The library of St. Joseph’s Seminary holds a rich collection of liturgical manuscripts from various traditions of Christian communities in India. In addition to liturgical manuscripts, this collection also boasts an interesting collection of linguistic materials, including various grammars and dictionaries.

One of the most interesting of these grammatical resources is APSTCH MANN 00088, which contains a hand-copied version of the Nomenclator Syriacus, a Syriac dictionary by an Italian Jesuit named Giovanni Baptista Ferrari originally pubished in 1622. The original dictionary contained definitions of Syriac words in Latin, but in this version of the text, the definitions have all been translated from Latin to Malayalam and are written in Malayalam Garshuni. This work, and others like it, testify to the linguistic diversity of the Syriac Christian communities in India. View now

Image caption: Decorative title page for the Qūddāša of Addai and Mari, an East Syriac liturgical text, in APSTCH MANN 00097 (fol. 3v)

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