We found a match
Your institution may have access to this item. Find your institution then sign in to continue.
- Title
A CYRILLIC 16-CENTURY MANUSCRIPT MANUAL OF HEBREW AND VILNIUS OLD TESTAMENT FLORILEGIUM.
- Authors
TemČin, Sergej
- Abstract
A concise Manual of Hebrew, recently discovered in a Cyrillic manuscript copy of Ascetic Miscellany (Moscow, the Russian State Archive of Early Acts, F. Mazurin collection (f. 196), No 616, f. 124-130), which dates back to the 3rd quarter of the 16th century, is very important for the history of the Ruthenian written culture in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. Three inscriptions, dated 1592 and 1656, mentioning some names of the dukes of Sugorie as well as those of Vadbola (both branches stem from the same family of the dukes of Belozersk) indicate that the manuscript must have been written and/or at least used somewhere in the Northern part of the Muscovite state. The succinct Manual of Hebrew comprises material of three different kinds: a) some excerpts from the original Hebrew Old Testament text (Ge 32.27-28; Ps 150; So 3.4 or 8.2; 8.5) written in Cyrillic characters; b) a bilingual Hebrew-Ruthenian vocabulary with explanatory notes; c) certain quotations from the Ruthenian text of three Old Testament books (Genesis, Isaiah, Song of Songs). The article presents a full transcript of all these quotations. The metalanguage used in the Manual of Hebrew is Ruthenian (and not Old Church Slavonic). his is indicative of the Manual being compiled in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, although it is extant in a (later) Muscovite copy. The translations present in the Manual have been made directly from Hebrew. A comparison between the quotations from the Song of Songs found in the Manual, and all known Cyrillic and Glagolitic versions of this book (according to both manuscript and printed sources of different periods) reveals their principal coincidence with the Ruthenian translation present in the Vilnius Old Testament Florilegium (Vilnius, Wróblewskie Library of the Lithuanian Academy of Sciences, F 19-262) and their deviation from all other Cyrillic and Glagolitic versions. It means that the compiler of the Manual did not translate this Bible book a new, but merely cited from a previously made Ruthenian translation, namely from that represented by the Vilnius Old Testament Florilegium. his translation probably originated in the 2nd half of the 15th century in the circle of the learned Kievan Jew Zachariah ben Aaron ha-Kohen who is also known as Schariya, the initiator of the Novgorod movement of the Judaizing Orthodox (1471-1504). If this is true, the manuscript Manual of Hebrew is to be ascribed to the same circle of translators where, as this is now apparent, the entire Hebrew Tanakh (in three volumes) was translated from Hebrew into Ruthenian. The fact that the same Bible translation is present in two different 16th-century manuscripts respectively of Ruthenian and North Russian origin probably reflects the process of transmitting this Cyrillic text from the Grand Duchy of Lithuania to Novgorod where the Kievan Jew Schariya initiated the movement of the Judaizers in 1471.
- Subjects
LITHUANIA; MANUSCRIPTS; RUSSIAN literature; OLD Testament; RELIGIOUS literature; METALANGUAGE; HEBREW language
- Publication
Knygotyra, 2011, Issue 57, p86
- ISSN
0204-2061
- Publication type
Article