Tag: Eusebius

I agreed to use the Sources Chrétiennes Greek text of Eusebius’ Quaestiones with the editors.  This will appear opposite the English translation that I commissioned, when I publish the book.

Well, the contract from Les éditeurs du Cerf has arrived! It’s all in French, of course, but is only three pages. 

In fact it’s a sensible contract, designed to facilitate business; that much I can see at once.  You see, I get to see a lot of contracts, professionally.  They get offered to me to sign when I do a freelance job.  Most of those are deeply unfair, and have one-sided clauses in them which one has to try to mitigate as best one can.  The Cerf contract has none of that rubbish.  All the clauses I have read so far seem reasonable, and designed only to protect them against a rogue, rather than to screw the translator.

Now I need to read it very, very carefully and make sure it won’t stop me doing what I need to do, which is put the English translation online under a Creative Commons license eventually.  I can’t do that with a thumping headache, so I will put off doing so for a day or two.

I wonder if we can call the board of directors the “Cerf board”!  I love that pun.  And they seem to be a good company, and one doing a great work for patristics.  All of us, you know, live in what people will one day call the “age of the Sources Chrétiennes”.  Long may they flourish.

One bit of paranoia concerned the Syriac fragments of Eusebius, printed by Gerhard Beyer in 1926 in the German journal Oriens Christianus.  I couldn’t find any information on when he died.  In Europe, copyright extends until 70 years after the death of the author, you see.  So I wrote to Hubert Kaufhold and Manfred Kropp, the current editors of Oriens Christianus, asking whether they knew when he died and if they claimed a copyright.

I had a very friendly email back from Dr Kropp yesterday, promising to look; and tonight Dr Kaufhold wrote as follows:

… Bei dem Autor des Oriens Christianus Dr. Gerhard Beyer handelte es sich um einen katholischen Priester, der 1931 gestorben ist (vgl. H. Kaufhold, Oriens Christianus. Gesamtregister für die Bände 1 (1901) bis 70 (1986), Wiesbaden 1989, S. 39, 146. Ein Urheberrecht besteht deshalb nicht mehr, so daß Sie seine Edition ohne weiteres verwenden können.

…Dr Gerhard Beyer was a Catholic priest, who died in 1931 (see H. Kaufhold, Oriens Christianus. Collected indexes for vols 1 (1901) to 70 (1986), Wiesbaden 1989, pp. 39, 146.  No copyright exists any longer, so you can use his edition freely.

Full marks to the OC team to keep track of such things!  Who would have guessed that an index with that sort of information in it existed?

I must remember to thank them in the book, and send them a copy of the electronic text when I have it.

On Wednesday I wrote to Hubert Kaufhold, editor of Oriens Christianus, which published the Syriac text of the fragments of Eusebius back in 1926 (OC 3).  I can’t find any evidence that the editor of that article, Gerhard Beyer, ever published anything else.  So … presumably the text is out of copyright, even under the daft and oppressive German copyright laws.  (If not, I shall have to waste time and money on getting a microfilm of the Vatican ms. and editing a text again from that – not what I want to do).

But… no reply.  Today I’ve emailed a colleague of his with the same query.

I’ve also  heard again from Brepols about the 500 words of Jerome and 580 words of Ambrose.  One awkward addition to the problem; if I include a translation of those two fragments based on the text they printed, they want control of my translation.  This would mean that I have to pay them not merely for the hardback, text and translation, but also for any popular paperback versions or magazine versions I might do of the translation only. 

That might be liveable with, although undesirable; but after the books are done with,  it would effectively prevent me placing the translation of the whole thing online under some kind of Creative Commons license, which is what I have in mind.  And that would destroy the point of the whole thing.

Perhaps instead I should have two different translations; one for book form, based on the critical text, and the other for online based on Mai.  That would allow me to give away the latter one.  The minor differences wouldn’t matter to 99% of those who read it, and the rest could consult the book form.

Fortunately I didn’t know the critical texts existed when the translation was made, so I already have the latter.  When I found out about the Jerome I passed a copy to the translator to collate, and I have his notes on the differences.  So effectively I do have the two versions of this already.  The Anastasius of Sinai has yet to reach me, but with luck that won’t be more difficult.

But all this is extra buggeration, which adds no value to anyone’s life and puts no money in anyone’s pocket.  It’s enough to drive a man to drink.

I have no urge to be a publisher.  What we want is English translation of patristic texts online where the world can use them.  If I were a rich man, I would simply hire the staff and churn them out.  Because I am poor, it is necessary for me to sell some copies to fund the next round. 

But all this crap does drain away my time and energy, I must say.  That may limit what I do.  Once everything just makes you feel tired, why do it?

One thing I need to do for the Eusebius book is to get the extracts from Cramer’s catena transcribed into electronic form.  I’ve agreed with someone for this, and emailed him the details of the first couple tonight.  Let’s see how it goes!

Meanwhile I have written back to Brepols.  They claim that they own the text of Jerome and Anastasius that they publish, as an original creative text.  Of course this is absurd, but commonplace.  But an interesting issue; they may be claiming that they own any translation made from that text.  If so, that would mean I cannot use their text.  After all, the idea is to produce a translation that can circulate freely.  In fact it would probably rule out the use of any modern text, unless I started thinking about lawyers. 

But … most of the texts that I am interested in, I am interested in precisely because they are neglected.  They are texts which have never received an English translation, and are unlikely to any time soon.  Mostly they don’t have critical editions.  Indeed most of the Eusebius material has never been edited critically.  So it is possible that even a demand that extreme would not really inconvenience me. 

I don’t believe that the text of ancient literature can be in copyright.  Publishers claim otherwise, but as far as I know these claims have not been tested in court. The idea is a shameful abuse of copyright law; like claiming copyright of Shakespear.  Unfortunately once money is involved, it seems more prudent for a little chap like me to pay them than pay lawyers.

My remaining copyright issue concerns the fragments from Jerome’s Commentary on Matthew, and those from Anastasius of Sinai, Quaestiones et responsiones.

The critical edition of the Jerome is Hieronymus, Commentariorum in Matheum libri IV. Corpus Christianorum, Series Latina 77 Turnhout, Brepols, 1969.  The extracts printed by Mai are about 500 words in total.

The critical edition of the Anastasius is Anastasii Sinaitae Quaestiones et responsiones, Corpus Christianorum, Series Graeca 59. Ed. Marcel Richard; Joseph A Munitiz. Turnhout : Brepols, 2006.  There are three extracts, two from Q.153 and one from Q.148, in total 581 words.

Both are owned by Brepols, the big Belgian publisher.  It is a great pity that the founder of the Corpus Christianorum, Dom Dekkers, is no longer with us.  But I will write to them and see if they will agree not to sue me if I use their version of the original text for these extracts. 

If not, or if they want more than a nominal sum, I will print Mai’s text with an apparatus of the differences and a note as to why.  But … who knows?  I have had very good experiences with publishers so far.