Roger Pearse
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rogerpearse.bsky.social
Roger Pearse
@rogerpearse.bsky.social
Patristics, texts & transmissions, ancient history.

https://www.roger-pearse.com/weblog
Reposted by Roger Pearse
Brrrrrrrrrr 🥶
#RomanFortThursday
(John Kenney 1959)
November 20, 2025 at 5:20 PM
Had to buy an academic book today. Couldn't find a PDF, didn't think an interlibrary loan would do much any time soon. But luckily all the ex-review copies are unsold, so it was cheap. Hurrah for selling off review copies!

www.roger-pearse.com/weblog/2025/...
From my diary
I posted yesterday about a number of breviaries containing the “Life” of St Botolph in abbreviated form. A kind commenter drew my attention to a publication unknown to me – Englis…
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November 19, 2025 at 2:51 PM
Still trying to finish up the text and translation of the Life of St Botolph. Today... three breviaries containing versions of the Life spring out at me, from where they were hiding. One in Nidaros/Trondheim, one from York, one from Hereford. Aaarrgh!

www.roger-pearse.com/weblog/2025/...
Breviaries, breviaries, is there no end of them?
Yesterday I finally located an image online of the page of the Botolph legend from a manuscript in Norway, in Bergen University Library, to be precise.  Today I collated that with Folcard’s &…
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November 18, 2025 at 6:40 PM
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Good to see the problems facing our colleagues @britishlibrary.bsky.social being raised here by @hetanshah.bsky.social (of @britishacademy.bsky.social). If this had happened in France it would be considered a national problem to be urgently addressed! www.cityam.com/the-british-...
The British library is in crisis: why does nobody care?
The widespread indifference to the British Library's crippling cyberattack demonstrates a perilous failure to value the knowledge infrastructure vital for national prosperity
www.cityam.com
November 18, 2025 at 7:58 AM
Any help gratefully received to transcribe the Life of St Botolph from a Swedish breviary. I've done what I can (included) but the script is a bit beyond me.

www.roger-pearse.com/weblog/2025/...
How’s your paleography? Two pages from a medieval breviary
I’ve had a go at transcribing the “Life” of St Botolph from this medieval breviary, but frankly my paleography is not great.  Would anyone else like to have a go, or a bit of one?…
www.roger-pearse.com
November 17, 2025 at 11:28 AM
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People do not talk enough about the fact that the Neo-Punic translation of Latin Imperator is a loan from Numidian

(Lepcis Magna Neo-Punic 14: mynkd, Numdian MNKDH)
November 8, 2025 at 11:15 AM
Does a Georgian translation of a work by Barsabas contain the earliest mention of the Trinity? Probably not.

www.roger-pearse.com/weblog/2025/...
Barsabas of Jerusalem – the earliest witness to the Trinity?
In the Iviron monastery on Mt Athos, there is a Georgian manuscript (shelfmark: Athos Iviron 11) which contains a work with the title, “The Word of Saint Barsabas, Archbishop of Jerusalem, ab…
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November 5, 2025 at 4:54 PM
Got an English translation of some German handbook? Better check the footnotes in the original - the translation may not contain them, or be transcribed correctly.

www.roger-pearse.com/weblog/2025/...
You cannot trust the footnotes in English translations of German handbooks!
Today is All Saints’ Day, and I have been looking at the entry for this in the Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church, and attempting to learn some real history about the origins of the me…
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November 1, 2025 at 3:54 PM
Just banged out a perfectly decent English 9 page translation of a pseudo-Chrysostom homily on Easter in a couple of hours this evening. So I'm feeling very proud of myself. My secret? Start with a nice modern French translation...
October 30, 2025 at 10:48 PM
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#ReliefWednesday - One of the pieces I so wanted to see when I first went to Venice a while back was the 'Tetrarchs', the statue group looted from Constantinople in 1204... But it was behind scaffolding, so this was the best shot I could get! Even so it was fabulous to get so close to it! #History 🏺
October 29, 2025 at 1:38 PM
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When I came across these images in an old book, I had to double-check they weren’t by a Ladybird artist.

They’re not - but are so cheery I have to share them anyway. 1/2
October 26, 2025 at 7:32 PM
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Unrelated to Proclus: one of the first texts in this codex is a "Lamentatio de calamitatibus in Cypro insula, a. 1191, sub Richardo, Angliæ rege," by Neophytus the monk. De Re Militari's site has a translation: deremilitari.org/2013/04/conq...

"England is a country beyond Romania on the north..."!
October 24, 2025 at 4:24 PM
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Unrelated to bombycin: a lot of the texts have very pretty shaped or tapering layouts at their ends. Here's the end of the text just before Proclus's letters.
October 24, 2025 at 4:20 PM
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New open-access publication: Discover how a multidisciplinary approach helped identify and contextualise three Qurʾānic parchment fragments from the University of Münster collection, revealing their shared origins in an Umayyad Qur’an:
www.nature.com/articles/s40...
From fragments to text and ink: a scientific and historical study of an Umayyad Qur’ān - npj Heritage Science
npj Heritage Science - From fragments to text and ink: a scientific and historical study of an Umayyad Qur’ān
www.nature.com
October 6, 2025 at 10:59 AM
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Now available on Wordpress!

phdnix.wordpress.com
September 30, 2025 at 11:33 AM
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30th September is the feast of St Jerome who is here depicted as translator of the Psalms
#StJerome
BnF MS Latin 1152; Psalter of Charles the Bald; 9th century (between 842 CE & 869 CE); School of the Palace of Charles the Bald; f.4r @gallicabnf.bsky.social
September 30, 2025 at 9:10 AM
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Great news!
JSTOR now have a free account with an Independent Researcher category. You can access 100 documents per month

www.jstor.org/action/showL...
September 29, 2025 at 3:27 PM