Byzantine News

From Gorgias Press: This work is concerned with investigating a corpus of several thousand lines of poetry, selected from the oeuvre of Eleazar be-rabbi Qillir, a liturgical poet (payyetan) whose period of activity dates to the early seventh century CE. The first portion of the work is a grammar devoted mainly to morphology and syntax. The aim of this portion is (1) to provide a structural description of the most salient/individuating features of the Qillirian dialect, and (2) to compare the morphological and syntactic data thus gathered with analogous phenomena in Biblical, Dead Sea Scrolls, and Mishnaic Hebrew, thereby establishing the position of the Qillirian dialect within the developmental trajectory of Hebrew in Roman/Byzantine Palestine. The second portion of the work is an investigation of the poetic norms, as well as rhetorical techniques employed by Qillir, together with an assessment of their impact on the grammar (e.g., the influence of rhyme on morphology). This porti...

Dumbarton Oaks and the HILL MUSEUM & MANUSCRIPT LIBRARY (HMML) announce a new four-week intensive introduction to Syriac language and paleography, July 10 to August 6, 2016. The program, sponsored and funded by Dumbarton Oaks, will be hosted at HMML, located on the campus of Saint John's University, Collegeville, Minnesota. The summer school will include a long weekend in Washington, DC, to visit Dumbarton Oaks and other institutions in the area to learn more about their resources for Byzantine and Eastern Christian studies. Approximately ten places will be available to doctoral students and recent PhDs, including including early-career faculty members, who can demonstrate the value of Syriac for their teaching and research. All costs apart from travel to and from Saint John's University (nearest airport: Minneapolis-St Paul) will be covered by Dumbarton Oaks, including the weekend in Washington, DC. Mornings will be devoted to Syriac language instruction by Prof. Sc...