Roger Pearse

Author: Roger Pearse

Tom Lehrer still singing the Vatican rag

The grotto of the Cumaean sybil

Locking up those who say Wrong Things – it begins

Pyramids of the black pharaohs

Still driving on Manuel

Latino Latini, Sirleto, and the last, lost manuscript of Eusebius’ “Gospel Questions”

Causing outrage in Ireland now illegal; who’s first to be jailed?

Massive French site of translations from Latin, Greek, Syriac, Arabic, Georgian…

Online version of the Codex Sinaiticus; more manuscripts to follow

Struggling a bit with Manuel Paleologus

Roger Pearse

Tom Lehrer still singing the Vatican rag

The grotto of the Cumaean sybil

Locking up those who say Wrong Things – it begins

Pyramids of the black pharaohs

Still driving on Manuel

Latino Latini, Sirleto, and the last, lost manuscript of Eusebius’ “Gospel Questions”

Causing outrage in Ireland now illegal; who’s first to be jailed?

Massive French site of translations from Latin, Greek, Syriac, Arabic, Georgian…

Online version of the Codex Sinaiticus; more manuscripts to follow

Struggling a bit with Manuel Paleologus

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Posted on July 15, 2009 by Roger Pearse

Enough serious stuff. Courtesy of Small Dead Animals, I have just discovered that Tom Lehrer’s rag-time classic, The Vatican Rag, is online here.

Posted on July 13, 2009 by Roger Pearse

I’ve been reading a guide-book to Naples and the Amalfi coast today, and I was struck by a photograph of the grotto of the Cumaean sybil, probably the most famous pagan prophetess of Roman Italy. This, it seems, was only discovered in the 1920’s.

I can’t find anything as evocative of Captain Kirk as the image in the book, but did find this one online:

I’ve never really paid attention to the Sybilline literature, which includes some prophecies of Christ. I understand that it has probably been tampered with both by Jewish and Christian interpolators. It would be interesting to see the manuscript tradition of the text, and what copies it exists in.

But… ancient magical stuff is always faintly disgusting, isn’t it? I recall getting a translation of the Hermetic corpus — the books supposedly by Hermes Trismegistus — while I was on holiday in Egypt, in Aboudi’s bookshop in Luxor, and feeling that it was rather creepy stuff. It’s a real element in the ancient world; but not necessarily one that deserved to live, while so much perished.

Posted on July 13, 2009July 13, 2009 by Roger Pearse

I hesitated on whether to post on this, but in the end felt that I had to, as a truly horrible step too far. Last Friday two men in the UK were given stiff jail sentences. Their crime? Running a website posting material which the UK government considered was “offensive”. The BBC report is here.

No-one seems to have been hurt. No quantifiable injury to anyone is mentioned anywhere that I have seen. The offence was to verbally attack ethnic minorities of various sorts. Apparently — the BBC is vague — they may have queried the holocaust as well in some way.

Simon Sheppard and Stephen Whittle correctly assessed their chances of justice, and fled to the US and asked for asylum, since they had committed no crime under US law and their website was based in the US. The judge, who apparently has a history of left-wing activism, denied them asylum.

Judge Rodney Grant told the men their material was “abusive and insulting” and had the potential to cause “grave social harm”.

He added: “Such offences as these have, by their very nature, the potential to cause grave social harm, particularly in a society such as ours which has, for a number of years now, been multi-racial.

Um. So, no actual harm to anyone. He then sentenced Simon Sheppard to four years and ten months in prison, and Stephen Whittle to a lesser term.

But…

That, said Adil Khan, head of diversity and community cohesion at Humberside Police, makes their conviction a first.

“This case is groundbreaking,” he said.

“The fact is now that we’ve been able to demonstrate that you’ve got nowhere to hide; people have been hiding on [sic] the fact that this server was in the US.

“Inciting racial hatred is a crime and one which seems to occur too regularly. This kind of material will not be tolerated as this lengthy investigation shows.”

Um. Inciting feelings … Was any evidence that these feelings *were* incited produced at the trial? Who precisely came along to testify that he now hated immigrants? Surely this is just weasel words for “saying anything that I think might cause people to react negatively to something I approve of.” I wonder how many political campaigns would pass that test?

Note the length of the sentences. Now look at this article: a drug dealer got more or less the same. Wreck hundreds of lives and make a million, and you get just under five years. Say Wrong Things, and you get just under five years. And we can be pretty certain that the establishment will bully and abuse Sheppard and Whittle in prison, in a way it would never dare do to a favoured group.

Groundbreaking? Yes, indeed it is. How proud we all are of Humberside police, and their “head of diversity and community cohesion”.

You have to hate people pretty badly to lock them up for their opinions. Whether we agree with Sheppard and Whittle is irrelevant; they had the right to say what they thought. At least, they thought they did.

First they came for those they called “racists”…

(Thanks to Five Feet of Fury for the tip).

Posted on July 13, 2009December 6, 2016 by Roger Pearse

This gorgeous image by Vit Hassan is of Meroe:

This via Egyptology News.

Posted on July 13, 2009 by Roger Pearse

I’m labouring away on translating the 7th Dialogue with a Persian of Manuel II Paleologus, the work that was the pretext for all those Moslem attacks on the Pope. I’m beginning to get an idea of the context of the quotation; “what did Mohammed bring into the world that was not evil.”

The whole dialogue is addressing a single question: which is the best Law? — that of Moses, that of Christ, or that of Mohammed. Both sides agree that Christ added to the Law of Moses; that Mohammed added his stuff on top of both. So the question is whether the additions made were an improvement.

Both sides agree that Christ’s additions improved the Law of Moses. But the learned Persian asserts that the Law of Christ is impractical for ordinary people, and the additions of Mohammed make it tolerable and practical. Manuel is having none of this; which of them, he asks, is not in fact an evil?

That was the real context.

Posted on July 11, 2009July 18, 2009 by Roger Pearse

One problem with a project that runs on is that you forget stuff. And I realise, with irritation, that I have done just this. For my own benefit, here is the matter again.

Eusebius’ work on problems in the gospels, and their solutions, is lost. But for a moment in the 16th century, it looked as if it might be recovered. Angelo Mai, in the 1st edition of his publication of the fragments, refers (p. xii) to a letter by the scholar Latino Latini (Latinus Latinius) to Andreas Masius. In this he says:

Sirletus scire te vult, in Sicilia inventos esse libros tres Eusebii caesariensis de evangeliorum diaphonia, qui ut ipse sperat brevi in lucem edentur.

Sirleto wants you to know that in Sicily there may be found three books by Eusebius of Caesarea on the differences in the gospels, which he hopes soon to publish.

I would like to get this letter translated and include it in my translation of the remains of this work. But… where to find it?

Mai gives the reference: Op. Tom. II, p. 116. This seemingly helpful note is in fact deeply unhelpful, because it is too brief. No work named “Opera” exists.

A google search here reveals that this letter should be dated 1663.

The following item might seem to be it:

Epistolae, conjecturae, et observationes sacra, profanaque eruditione ornatae / Ex Bibliotheca Cathedralis Ecclesiae Viterbiensis a D. Magro … collectae …, Published: Romae : Viterbii, 1659-1667. Physical desc.: 2 v. ; 23 cm. (4to) Other names: Magri, Domenico, 1604-1672.

But in fact I have examined a copy of this at Cambridge University Library (shelfmark Acton.c.49.128), and it contains no such text, although it does include letters to Masius. Another book of the same title exists at Durham. I don’t know of another work by this writer which could be it. His only other work, Bibliotheca Sacra et Profana, also in 2 volumes, is perhaps the only possibility. I am hampered by these books being in rare books rooms, and themselves being rare! A copy exists at Oxford, which may be read only in Duke Humphrey’s reading room (shelfmark S 67 Th). Another is at Satan’s Seat, the British Library (shelfmark 1492.i.14).

I shall resume the struggle soon! Perhaps the Cambridge copy is defective somehow. I suspect, tho, that everyone has taken Migne’s reference, borrowed from Mai, and no-one before me has ever checked this!

Later: Mai probably used the Vatican collection. Why not check there? I find, by searching on “latini, latino”, two editions of the letters.

Author :	Latini, Latino, 1513-1593.
Title :	Latini Latinii … Epistolae, coniecturae & observationes sacra profanaque eruditione ornatae. Ex bibliotheca cathedralis ecclesiae Viterbiensis, a Dominico Magro … studio ac decennali labore selectae … Tomus secundus.
Publication :	Viterbii, ex typ. Brancatia, apud Petrum Martinellum,
Date of publication :	1667.
Physical description :	xii, 213 p. 1 tav. 22 cm.
Language :	Latin
Date of record :	950117

No.	Department	Call number

1	MAG	Stamp.Chig.IV.947

and

Author :	Latini, Latino, 1513-1593.
Title :	Latini Latinii … Epistolae, coniecturae et observationes sacra, profanaque eruditione ornatae … a Dominico Magro … studio ac labore collectae …
Publication :	Romae, typis Tinassij,
Date of publication :	1659-1667.
Physical description :	2 v. in 1 24 cm.
Language :	Latin
Date of record :	950117

Interesting that the call number, or shelfmark, of the latter includes one in a “Mai” collection! Who knew that Mai’s books were at the Vatican? Not me, that’s for sure. But this does tend to suggest the existence of two different editions, printed at different places in the same year.

Posted on July 10, 2009 by Roger Pearse

A new law has been passed in Ireland. It’s being called a blasphemy law, because this is a Catholic country and voters will suppose that it is intended to protect the Church. But the real effect is to allow the establishment to silence any criticism of whichever powerful and noisy groups it pleases. Who these groups are, who are to be above criticism, remains to be seen.

Atheist site Palibandaily has the legal text here:

36. Publication or utterance of blasphemous matter.

(1) A person who publishes or utters blasphemous matter shall be guilty of an offence and shall be liable upon conviction on indictment to a fine not exceeding €100,000. [Amended to €25,000]

(2) For the purposes of this section, a person publishes or utters blasphemous matter if (a) he or she publishes or utters matter that is grossly abusive or insulting in relation to matters held sacred by any religion, thereby causing outrage among a substantial number of the adherents of that religion, and (b) he or she intends, by the publication or utterance of the matter concerned, to cause such outrage.

(3) It shall be a defence to proceedings for an offence under this section for the defendant to prove that a reasonable person would find genuine literary, artistic, political, scientific, or academic value in the matter to which the offence relates.

37. Seizure of copies of blasphemous statements.

(1) Where a person is convicted of an offence under section 36, the court may issue a warrant (a) authorising any member of the Garda Siochana to enter (if necessary by the use of reasonable force) at all reasonable times any premises (including a dwelling) at which he or she has reasonable grounds for believing that copies of the statement to which the offence related are to be found, and to search those premises and seize and remove all copies of the statement found therein, (b) directing the seizure and removal by any member of the Garda Siochana of all copies of the statement to which the offence related that are in the possession of any person, © specifying the manner in which copies so seized and removed shall be detained and stored by the Garda Siochana.

(2) A member of the Garda Siochana may (a) enter and search any premises, (b) seize, remove and detain any copy of a statement to which an offence under section 36 relates found therein or in the possession of any person, in accordance with a warrant under subsection (1).

(3) Upon final judgment being given in proceedings for an offence under section 36, anything seized and removed under subsection (2) shall be disposed of in accordance with such directions as the court may give upon an application by a member of the Garda Siochana in that behalf.

I’ve marked a couple of key words in bold. The law says that if a well-organised group get upset (and the poster intended them to get upset — but I imagine this caveat will have no meaning) that makes it blasphemous.

Note also 36c; this means that members of the establishment will be excluded from this law, under the usual “it’s art, innit” pretext.

The atheists at Palibandaily say that they are worried. This must be because they imagine themselves as the intended victims. They could be, so broad is the scope — they’re right there — but it’s unlikely I think. The establishment hardly ever worries about atheists. Indeed in Britain it would be hard to find a figure more at the heart of the establishment than Richard Dawkins. Indeed an atheist in Scotland is an avid campaigner for laws to ban “hate” — no different in principle or effect.

Likewise an article in the Guardian is here. The anger in the comments will provoke a wry smile or two from Christians in the UK, about to be jailed if gay pressure groups want them to be.

No-one really knows who the intended victims are. It is pleasing, in a way, to see these intolerant people now feeling threatened by the sort of laws for which they have so assiduously campaigned. But it is a pleasure that passes, and I doubt these laws will. It will only need a small change of political temperature for the same approach to be applied to others.

We live in a period when special interest groups get the government to pass laws allowing them to drag before courts anyone who expresses any objection to them, or their views. This has happened in Canada, where Ezra Levant is leading the fightback, it is happening in Britain, it is happening here in Ireland. When I was young, any very strong expression of opinion was likely to be greeted with “It’s a free country.” No-one says that any more.

All these laws that criminalise opinion or speech or feelings, are evil. They are always selective, always biased, always political. To me, government is a utility; a way to get the roads built and the drains to work, and the police to restrain thugs, and the army to defend us from the likes of Kim Il Sung. I do not want the powerful telling me what to think, what to say, what to write; I do not want them equipping my fellow citizen with the means to drag me into court, pretending “outrage.”

In days gone by, censorship was justified by protecting us from a torrent of filth. Today we have the torrent of filth. So… why do we have so much censorship?

FREE SPEECH. NOW.

Posted on July 10, 2009July 11, 2009 by Roger Pearse

I’ve just come across this French site, http://remacle.org/. It contains a simply enormous amount of French translations, often with parallel original text. Partly the site is a portal; but much is actually at the site itself. It seems to be the work of a collective, although lots of stuff is by Marc Szwajcer, and on the site itself. The Armenian history Agathangelos is there. Agapius is there — I wish I’d known, for I had to scan this myself for my own English translation. A work by Severus Sebokht on the Astrolabe is there. Letters of Jerome are there.

Among the gems are the poems of Claudian, and those of Sidonius Apollinaris, including his panegyric for the emperor Majorian, and his panegyric on his ineffectual successor, Anthemius. Firmicus Maternus is there. So is a lot of Photius.

“But what is this to me?” I hear you cry, “I don’t speak French.” But Google translate is really very good for French. So you really can make use of this, even so.

Stephen C. Carlson’s blog Hypotyposeis is not updated as often as it might be, so I only look in infrequently. But I owe this tip to him. Thank you!

Posted on July 10, 2009June 11, 2013 by Roger Pearse

We’ve all seen the PR for this online manuscript, which has even caused the servers to crash, although it is back now. The PR has been very well managed, and it can only be a good thing that more interest is being generated in online manuscripts. The announcement of more manuscripts at the Virtual Manuscript Room at Birmingham is well-timed.

I learn that the British Library is now beginning a pilot project to place some 250 Greek manuscripts online. The project will be led by Juan Garces, who has been involved in the Sinaiticus project. Clearly success begets success, and we can only hope that this marks the beginning of the end of the long hostility of the British Library to putting material on the internet.

Philip Comfort’s book Encountering the Manuscripts – about New Testament manuscripts, including Sinaiticus – should be selling very well just now!

Posted on July 10, 2009July 10, 2009 by Roger Pearse

In all the textbooks on textual criticism, you will find little mention of a factor that must decide whether texts live or die. This is the B-word; BOREDOM. Who can bring themselves to copy a text, if they keep calling asleep or going off to pluck their eyebrows, or sort the rubbish, of whatever?

I’m working on translating Manuel Paleologus’ Dialogue with a Persian at the moment — mainly because Pope Benedict quoted from it and no-one could read the text. But I am wishing I had not. It’s really boring, to me anyway. Worse yet, I find Manuel’s arguments contrived, while his Moslem antagonist makes what seem like reasonable criticisms.

Feeling a little under the weather as well, although that may be due to eating too many strawberries with cream yesterday. But Manuel isn’t helping.

Oh well. Back to it.

On second thoughts, what’s on TV?

Department

Call number

Mai.XI.P.VII.30

R.G.Teol.IV.4185

Stamp.Barb.Y.X.75-76

Stamp.Ferr.IV.4011