Thoughts on Antiquity, Patristics, putting things online, freedom of speech, information access, and more
Via AWOL I learn that an edition and translation of Bar Hebraeus’ scholia on the Old Testament is now available in PDF form online from the University of Chicago. The PDF is here (linked on that page under the red down-arrow next to the text “Terms of Use”. In addition, an interesting volume, The Early Text of [...]
We owe the preservation of a considerable portion of the Greek classics to the actions of a single man. The Italian Giovanni Aurispa made a trip to Constantinople in the early fifteenth century. On his return, in the winter of 1423, he came back with 238 Greek manuscripts. Many of these are the only, the oldest or [...]
The second century writer Arrian is our best source for the life of Alexander the Great, using impeccable sources then extant but now lost. A number of his other works are extant, and indeed his work On hunting even exists in English, and can be found on Archive.org. But equally interesting to us is his [...]
I have had an email back from Veronique Boudon-Millot today, giving the story of how the lost text by Galen, Peri Alupias (On consolation for grief) was found. It’s very interesting, and I have asked for permission to translate it and place it here. She also mentions that Vlatadon 14, the manuscript that contained the [...]
I’m reading through the first volume of Diogenes Laertius Lives of the Philosophers. In book 3, devoted to Plato, we find the following interesting excursus, which I copy from a version present on Wikisource here. 65. The right interpretation of his dialogues includes three things: first, the meaning of every statement must be explained; next, [...]
I was very tired last night, and in need of something gentle to read. So I took Andrew Lang’s Books and Bookmen to bed with me. The name of Andrew Lang is one that I knew when I was a lad, for Tolkien refers to him often in his essay on fantasy, as the author [...]
Who cares to read the works of an doctor of the 2nd century AD? Well, it doesn’t matter anyway; you can’t! Not unless you are fluent in Greek at least, anyway. Do we care? Those of us who have the “Indiana Jones” approach to lost texts and manuscripts cannot fail to find Galen interesting. He’s [...]
This post raises some interesting questions about the destruction of Iconoclast literature after the second council of Nicaea in 787 AD. (Also commented on here at Labarum). The thrust of the post is that the council ordered the destruction of iconoclast books, aside from those held in a private collection by the patriarch of Constantinople. The [...]