Wednesday, July 25, 2018

A new edition of the Dublin Kephalaia

MANICHEAN (MANICHAEAN) WATCH: Lost and found literature: NAU professor translates ancient Manichean papyrus manuscript (Julie Hammonds, NAU NEWS).
Over the past 16 centuries, it’s been buried, soaked, lost, looted, sold across international borders, feared, destroyed by war, painted with shellac and set between sheets of glass.

Its writers, followers of a visionary named Mani, wrote their religion’s oral traditions on papyrus. Damaged by moisture and blackened by age, this precious manuscript—known as the “Dublin Kephalaia”—was almost unreadable in 2007 when Northern Arizona University professor Jason BeDuhn, an expert in comparative religions in the Department of Comparative Cultural Studies, began a translation.

An NAU seed grant gave BeDuhn and two colleagues their start; larger grants from the Australian Research Council and the National Endowment for the Humanities totaling $500,000 followed. This month, after 10 years of analysis, the manuscript’s ancient stories will be heard again.

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The title of the edition seems to be The ‘Dublin Kephalaia Codex’ and it is the first of four volumes. I'll let you know when I find more information on it.

Meanwhile, past posts noting an earlier book on the codex cowritten by Professor Debuhn are here and here.

Cross-file under Coptic Watch.

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