From Evil Eyes to Lost Friendships: Tales from the Gaster Amulet Collection
Amulet cataloguer Dr Gal Sofer gives you an expert’s insight into our fascinating amulet collection.
Author: Zsofia Buda
Curator of Global Manuscripts, John Rylands Research Institute and Library, specialised in Hebrew manuscripts, but enthusiastic about all book cultures.
From the Valley of Mexico to the Rylands: introducing Mexican MS 1
In this blog curator Dr Zsófia Buda shares the story of one of our three Mexican manuscripts.
The Wonderful World of Passover Haggadot
It is Passover. And this is the Rylands Library’s blog. Have you heard of the famous Rylands Sephardi Passover Haggadah?Continue Reading
ḤaBaD Hasidic Manuscripts in the Rylands. Part 2: Authoritativeness and Precision in Transmission
Dr Israel M. Sandman continues his exploration of the ḤaBaD Hasidic manuscripts in the Rylands’ collection, exploring the authoritativeness of various manuscripts, and methods for maintaining textual accuracy.
Lost and found? The rediscovery of a missing Avicenna manuscript
The story of an annotated copy of Avicenna’s medical writings in Hebrew translation that was thought to be lost for almost one and a half centuries and turned out to be hiding in the University of Manchester Library.
ḤaBaD Hasidic Manuscripts in the Rylands. Part 1: Transmitting Access to the Inner Life
Dr Israel M. Sandman explores some fascinating aspects of the Rylands’ ḤaBaD Hasidic manuscripts collection, all available online now.
A Fragile Beauty
Catch a glimpse of a hidden gem of the Rylands Hebrew Manuscripts Collection.
If you wanted to know…: number-letter divination in a Jewish miscellany
Learn about a curious prognostic technique called onomancy.
Rylands Karaite manuscripts: Jewish presence of the Ukrainian past
Among the many manuscripts bought from the famous rabbi and scholar Moses Gaster (1856-1939), the John Rylands Library holds a curious copy of a Karaite work.
And the Scroll of Esther unrolls…
To mark the festival of Purim, Zsofia Buda discusses our recently digitised collection of Esther scrolls.