Bookbinding workshops and book archaeology from the library of the Monastery of St Catherine’s, Sinai
The Balkan Heritage Foundation and the Department of Archaeology at New Bulgarian University organized the next of the BEMA Online Seminars in Balkan and Eastern Mediterranean Archaeology on Saturday, October 02, 2021. Guest lecturer Dr. Nikolas Sarris – conservator of paper and archive materials at the National Library of Greece gave a talk on the topic “Bookbinding workshops and book archaeology from the library of the Monastery of St Catherine’s, Sinai”.
Abstract: The library at the monastery of St Catherine’s in Sinai is known to hold one of the largest collections of early and undisturbed bookbindings on manuscripts from a number of different East Mediterranean traditions, including Greek, Arabic, Georgian, Ethiopic and Slavonic. Yet, how have these books survived to date, how and why were they bound or rebound and who was responsible for the production of these bindings? The study into the archaeology of these bookbindings aims to unfold the bookbinding workshops that existed within the monastic community in parallel with the importation of books from active manuscript productions centers throughout several centuries and through that to contribute to our knowledge of the history of the St. Catherine’s Library.
You can now watch the lecture online in the gallery bellow.
