'I the Weak Scribe'

‘I THE WEAK SCRIBE’

SCRIBES IN THE CHURCH OF THE EAST IN THE OTTOMAN PERIOD

HELEEN MURRE-VAN DEN BERG*

Raban Yonan lived in a little chamber off the patriarchal church of Mar Shalita, and was one of the few monks remaining. A little man, with griz- zled hair, surmounted by a high conical hat and black turban, he had a sin- gularly pleasant smile and beautiful expression, which commanded love and reverence from all who saw him. He spent most of his time copying the ser- vice books and the other old works of his nation; indeed, he lived among books, and was quite the most learned man the Syrians had. […] [The boys] are much fonder of sitting in their class-rooms […] and writing out in a “beautiful pen” a copy of the Catechism, or a history, or a shamashutha, which is the deacon’s part in the Liturgy. Writing is really with them a fine art; it takes a long time, but is often a beautiful sight when finished. […] The boys sit on the floor with one knee up, against which they lean their paper. They do not want tables or chairs. They look upon their productions, when done, with justifiable pride.1

INTRODUCTION

When the two Anglican priests Arthur Maclean and William Browne described the life of the Assyrians of the Church of the East as they had come to know it during five years of mission work, the literary arts received due

* H. Murre – van den Berg is Associate Professor of the History of World Christianity at the Faculty of Theology at Leiden University. Her research focuses on the history of West- ern missions in the Middle East and the modern history of the Syriac churches, especially of the Assyrian Church of the East. 1 Arthur John Maclean and William Henry Browne, The Catholicos of the East and his Peo- ple; Being the Impressions of Five Years’ Work in the “Archbishop of Canterbury’s Assyrian Mis- sion” [etc.] (London: SPCK, 1892), pp. 19 and 171-172. J.F. Coakley, The Church of the East and the Church of England. A History of the Archbishop of Canterbury’s Assyrian Mission (Oxford, 1992), p. 108, contains a picture of Rabban Yonan that corresponds beautifully to the description by Maclean and Browne. 10 HELEEN MURRE-VAN DEN BERG attention. Two images stand out, that of the old monk Rabban Yonan among his books, and the young schoolboys trying their pens on the shamashutha. Not only do these descriptions indicate the variety of persons included in the art of writing, i.e., the long experienced scholarly monk and the proud young schoolboys, they also attest to the vitality of the art of writing, fifty years after printing presses had been introduced. In this contribution I intend to take a closer look at the scribes of the Church of the East in the Ottoman period. In the last decade the study of the more recent history of the Assyrian Church of the East, also known as the “Nestorian” Church, has received a number of new incentives, mainly based on the study of the colophons of a large number of East-Syriac manuscripts that date from this period. David Wilmshurst’s study on the Eccle- siastial Organisation of the Church of the East is the most important of these.2 Wilmshurst, building upon earlier work of Jean-Marie Fiey and Joseph-Marie Sauget,3 carefully identified numerous scribes and scribal families, especially those that were active in the seventeenth to nineteenth centuries. On scribes and manuscript writing in the Syriac tradition in general (including the Syr- ian-Orthodox tradition), the very informative overview article ‘The Art of the Scribe’, needs to be mentioned here.4 However, the picture of the scribes of the Church of the East is far from complete. We know hardly anything about their numbers, their training, standards of genre and language, their role in the religious life of the community, their income, and their family life. The answers to some of these questions require more extensive research, and for others reliable answers will perhaps never be found. The aim of the present article is to contribute to our knowledge of the scribes, focusing on two aspects: the groups to which the scribes belonged and the religious world-view

2 The Ecclesiastical Organisation of the Church of the East: 1318-1913, CSCO, 583, Sub- sidia, 104 (Louvain: Peeters, 2000). 3 J-.M. Fiey, Mossoul chrétienne. Essai sur l'histoire, l’archéologie et l’état actuel des monument chrétiens de la ville de Mossoul and Assyrie chrétienne. Contribution à l'étude de l'histoire et de la géographie ecclésistiques et monastiques du nord de l'Iraq, Recherches publiées sous la direction de l’Institut de lettres Orientales de Beyrouth, 12, 22, 23, 42 (Beirut: Imprimerie Catholique Beirouth, 1959, 1965-1986); J.-M. Sauget, Un gazza chaldéen disparu et retrouvé: le MS. Borgia syriaque 60, Studi e Testi, 326 (Città del Vaticano: Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, 1987). 4 ‘The Art of the Scribe’, Ch. 7, in The Hidden Pearl: The Heirs of the Ancient Aramaic Heritage, II, eds. Sebastian P. Brock and David G.K. Taylor (Rome: Trans World Film Italia, 2001), pp. 43-262. I THE WEAK SCRIBE 11 their colophons represent. As an introduction, a short overview is given of the literary revival that took place between 1500 and 1900 within the Church of the East. The main source for this contribution are the colophons of the East Syr- iac manuscripts. The vast majority of these manuscripts (almost 2500, preserved in a large number of academic and ecclesiastic libraries in East and West) have been described in varying detail in the library catalogues. The data that form the basis of this article have been culled from these catalogues,5 but the large number of colophons has so far not permitted a detailed reading of all of them, let alone an urgently needed study of all the original manuscripts and colophons. Most of the examples come from a limited number of colophons, the majority of these edited by William Wright (Cambridge) and Eduard Sachau (Berlin).6

THE LITERARY REVIVAL

The reign of the Ottoman sultans, which began when Selim I (1512-1520) annexed northern Mesopotamia to the Ottoman Empire in the early sixteenth century, enabled the Church of the East to continue the modest cultural revival that had started under the reign of Yackub Bek of the Aq Qoyunlu towards the end of the fifteenth century.7 Despite the fact that the church was now much reduced compared to its earlier glory days (such as the time of patriarch Timothy the Great (8th-9th c.) or the metropolitan and illustri- ous author cAbdishoc bar Brikha of Nisibis (13th-14th), when the Church of the East had dioceses all over Central Asia, northern China and India; only the latter survived into modern times), there can be little doubt that the remaining community was greatly committed to the maintenance and strengthening of the East Syriac religious and cultural tradition. A great number of manuscripts were produced, and churches and monasteries were restored as much as possible. Especially the late seventeenth and early eigh-

5 This research is based on a personal database of MS colophons and on the list of colophons in Wilmshurst, The Ecclesiastical Organisation, pp. 382-732. 6 W. Wright, A Catalogue of the Syriac Manuscripts preserved the Library of the University of Cambridge, 2 vols. (Cambridge: University Press, 1901); E. Sachau, Verzeichniss der Syrischen Handschriften der Königlichen Bibliothek zu Berlin, 2 vols., Die Handschriften-Verzeich- nisse der Königlichen Bibliothek zu Berlin, 23 (Berlin: A. Asher & Co., 1899). Their edi- tions of the Syriac texts of the colophons have relatively few abridgments. 12 HELEEN MURRE-VAN DEN BERG teenth centuries appear to have been a particularly productive period, not only for the composition of new literature, which led Anton Baumstark to speak of the ‘School of Alqosh’, but also and perhaps more because of the large amount of copying that took place in what is now northern Iraq.8 The Ottoman period was also the time of growing contacts with Western churches, first mainly with Roman Catholics, later also with various Protes- tant denominations: Presbyterian, Lutheran and Anglican. In 1553, contacts with the Roman Catholic Church led to the establishment of the Uniate Chaldean Church, whose first patriarch was Yohannan Sulaqa. This union barely survived into the early sixteenth century, but a second attempt, resulting in the installation of patriarch Yosep I in Diyarbakir in 1681, proved more successful. This union laid the basis for the present Chaldean patriar- chate, especially after its merger with the patriarchal line of Alqosh in the early nineteenth century.9 Catholic missions in the nineteenth century, both in Mosul in northern Mesopotamia and in northwestern Iran (Urmia and Khos- rowa), were instrumental in the further spread and consolidation of the Chaldean Church. Initially, the Protestant missions of the nineteenth century were not intent on establishing separate churches, but rather aimed at reform- ing the Church of the East from within. Over time, however, fundamental differences in religious outlook between the American Protestants and the Church of the East led to the establishment of a separate Protestant church. The influence of these Presbyterian missionaries, however, extended much further than these small Protestant communities, and the missionaries became

7 J.-M. Fiey, ‘Une page oubliée de l’histoire des Eglises Syriaques à la fin du XVe – début du XVIe siècle’, Le Muséon, 107 (1994), pp. 124-133. 8 Anton Baumstark, Geschichte der syrischen Literatur (Bonn, 1922), pp. 334-335. On this literary revival see Alessandro Mengozzi, Israel of Alqosh and Joseph of Telkepe. A Story in a Truthful Language, Religious Poems in Vernacular Syriac (North Iraq, 17th century), CSCO, 589 and 590, Scryptores Syri, 230 and 231 (Louvain: Peeters, 2002) and my ‘Chaldeans and Assyrians: the Church of the East in the Ottoman Period’, to appear in Christianity in Iraq (provisional title), ed. Erica Hunter. 9 On the origins of the Chaldean Church, see Joseph Habbi, ‘Signification de l’union chaldéenne de Mar Sulaqa avec Rome en 1553’, L'Orient Syrien, 11 (1966), pp. 99-132, 199-230; Albert Lampart, Ein Märtyrer der Union mit Rom. Joseph I., 1681-1696, Patri- arch der Chaldäer (Einsiedeln: Benziger Verlag, 1966), and my ‘The Patriarchs of the Church of the East from the Fifteenth to Eighteenth Centuries’, Hugoye, 2,2 (1999), http://syrcom.cua.edu/Hugoye/index.html, which contains an overview and further literature. I THE WEAK SCRIBE 13 especially important in the introduction of printing and general education. In this, they sowed the seeds of fundamental changes in the roles of scribes and clergy in the transmission of knowledge, seeds that were to come to fruition towards the end of the nineteenth century. By that time the scribes of the Church of the East had to leave their central role in literacy and writing to a growing number of literate lay men and women who had other aims and concerns.10 The scribes of the Ottoman period are chiefly known from the detailed colophons they added to the manuscripts they copied. It is likely that they were also active as letter writers, but the limited number of letters published so far does not permit a detailed comparison with the colophons.11 I assume that inscriptions such as dedications on churches and monasteries and funeral inscriptions were composed by the same scribes, although perhaps executed by others.12 In this paper, however, I will confine myself to the scribes that are known from the manuscript colophons. Additional information may also be gleaned from a detailed study of the manuscripts as a whole: both the codicology of the manuscripts and the study of their contents could enlarge our knowledge of the world of the scribes. Other additions to the text that was copied, such as various drawings and short texts, should probably also be attributed to the scribes and should be taken into account in a wider study.13

10 On the missionary activities of the nineteenth century, see Coakley, The Church of the East and the Church of England, and my From a Spoken to a Written Language. The Intro- duction and Development of Literary Urmia Aramaic in the Nineteenth Century, Publication of the “De Goeje Fund”, 28 (Leiden: NINO, 1999). 11 Some letters have been preserved in Roman archives, cf. S. Giamil, Genuinae Relationes inter Sedem Apostolicam et Assyriorum Orientalium seu Chaldaeorum Ecclesiam (Rome: Ermanno Loescher & Co., 1902). Other letters may have been preserved in the Ottoman archives and the archives of the Church of the East and the Chaldean Church, but to my knowledge these have not been studied or edited. Nineteenth-century observations on letter writing such as those by Maclean and Browne (The Catholicos of the East, pp. 115-117) suggest that the phraseology of letters was similar to that of colophons. 12 The most extensive inscriptions so far published are those in Rabban Hormizd, con- sisting mainly of funeral inscriptions of the patriarchs; see Jean-Marie Fiey, ‘Résidences et sépultures des patriarches syriaques-orientaux’, Le Muséon, 98 (1985), pp. 149-168 and Amir Harrak, ‘Patriarchal Funerary Inscriptions in the Monstery of Rabban Hormizd: Types, Literary Origins, and Purpose’, Hugoye, 6,2 (2003), http://syrcom.cua.edu/Hogoye/ 13 Drawings in East Syriac MSS vary from rather simple but elegant border decorations in red to occasional full-page drawings of crosses or scenes from biblical history in up to four colors. For an overview of Syriac manuscript illumination in general, see Jules Leroy, 14 HELEEN MURRE-VAN DEN BERG

However, the study of the largely unedited manuscripts of this period is still in its initial phases and most manuscripts have never been studied in their historical context.14 Before turning to the scribes, a few remarks on the colophons are in order. The colophons of the East Syriac scribes, however short or long they may be, basically consist of two main parts. The first is introduced by a phrase such as slem b-cudran maran (‘It was completed with the help of Our Lord’), fol- lowed by the title of the work that was copied (often a short version of the title) and the date of completion. The second part is usually introduced by a form of the verb ktb (etkteb ‘it was written’ and kteb ‘he wrote’, less often ketbet ‘I wrote’), in which the place of writing as well as the ecclesiastical allegiance and the name of the scribe are given. In many cases a third part is added, in which the commissioners and possible destination of the manuscript are noted. Many other additions are possible, informative (binding of the manuscript, transactions of selling and buying, notes on local history), as well as explicitly religious: prayers for whoever is mentioned in the colophon (authors, scribes, commissioners, clergy), a variety of doxologies, and occasionally curses on whoever intends to damage or steal the manuscript.15 Man- uscripts without colophons do occur, but it seems that these instances can practically all be attributed to later damage during which the last folios, which usually contain the colophon, became disconnected from the main text.16 Before turning to what the colophons tell about the scribes, let me conclude this section with an example of one relatively short (even though abridged) colophon written by the priest Yosep of Alqosh, in December 1729.

Les manuscrits syriaques à peintures conservés dans les bibliothèques d’Europe et d’Orient: contribution à l’étude de l’iconographie des églises de langue syriaque (Paris: Geuthner, 1964), and ‘The Arts: Architecture, Wall Painting and Manuscript Illustration’, in The Hidden Pearl, vol. II, pp. 228-239. 14 Few studies discuss the codicology of East Syriac MSS of the Ottoman period, the most important of which are Sauget’s Un gazza chaldéen and his earlier Un cas très curieux de restauration de manuscrit: le Borgia syriaque 39: étude codicologique et analyse du contenu, Studi e Testi, 292 (Città del Vaticano: Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, 1981). See also William H.P. Hatch, An Album of Dated Syriac Manuscripts (Boston: American Academy of Arts and Sciences, 1946). 15 These basic elements are also found in earlier East-Syriac ones and in colophons of the West-Syriac tradition (compare ‘The Art of the Scribe’, in The Hidden Pearl, vol. II). It is in the further development of these basic elements that these colophons acquire their dis- tinctive character. 16 So also Wilmshurst, The Ecclesiastical Organisation, p. 9. I THE WEAK SCRIBE 15

It was completed with the help of the adorable and praiseworthy Trinity […], this book of the teacher Khamis, with many other hymns. Praise be to the Father [etc.]. This book was finished and completed on Thursday, on the 18th of the blessed month First Kanun, of the year two thousand and forty-one of the blessed Greeks, Amen. It was written in the days of the father of fathers and the chief of the shepherds, Mar Eliya Catholicos Patriarch of the East [etc.]. It was written in the blessed and blissful village, strong in the Christian faith, Alqosh, village of Nahum the prophet, which is situated near the very holiest of monasteries, that of Rabban Hormizd the Persian [etc.]. He then wrote and corrupted and sullied this book, a sinner [etc.], priest Yosep, son of priest Giwargis, son of the deceased priest Israel, son of priest Hormizd of Alqosh. [etc.]. He then took care and heeded to the writing of this book of Khamis, the upright believer [etc.] deacon Yosep, son of deacon Maroge. He ordered it to be written from his expenses, for the holy church and wonderful shrine of Mat Maryam, mother of Christ, which is in the blessed and blissful village, strong in the Christian faith, Dergani [etc.].17

THE SCRIBES’ BACKGROUNDS

The above description indicates that most knowledge about the scribes comes from their own pens. The East Syriac scribes freely give their names (unlike some other scribal traditions, including the Latin Western one),18 they often

17 Camb. Add. 1991 (Wright I 384-5), fo. 140b (translation mine). Note that Wright uses the Syriac w-s < w-sarka to denote passages where he did not note the complete sentence, usually in case of strings of praises and other ‘superfluous’ epithets, indicated by me with [etc.]. In the first line of this colophon Wright indicates a lacuna, ending on Áube (‘blessed’- pl), which I have not translated. 18 On the relative scarcity of scribe names in Latin manuscripts, compare Albert Derolez, ‘Pourquoi les copistes signaient-ils leur manuscrits?’, Emma Condello and Giuseppe De Gre- gorio, Scribi e colofoni. Le sottoscrizioni di copisti dalle origini all’avvento della stampa. Atti del seminario de Erice, X Colloquio del Comité international de paléographie latine (23-28 otto- bre 1993) (Spoleto: Centro italiano di studi sull’alto medioevo, 1995), pp. 37-56. Also, in the Christian Arabic tradition the scribe apparently revealed his name less often than in the Syriac context; cf. Gérard Troupeau, ‘Les colophons des manuscripts arabes chrétiens’, in Scribes et manuscrits du Moyen-Orient, eds. François Déroche et Francis Richard (Paris: Bibliothèque nationale de France, 1997), pp. 224-231. On the Armenian colophons, see 16 HELEEN MURRE-VAN DEN BERG say something about their families in short or long genealogies, they describe the village in which the manuscript was written, refer to the ecclesiastical context to which they belong, and often say something about other mem- bers of their communities by mentioning of donors and others involved in the production of the manuscript. All this information enables us to sketch the main characteristics of the background of the scribes. The first notable characteristic is that the overwhelming majority of scribes indicate that they belong to the clergy of the Church of the East. Three titles are mentioned most frequently: that of msammsana or sammasa (‘deacon’), qassisa or qasa (‘priest’) or rabban (‘monk’). In addition, a significant number of bishops and metropolitans are found among the scribes.19 A few scribes do not indicate any ecclesiastical rank. In some of these cases when the scribe is particularly reticent about personal information, one may assume that modesty prevented the scribe from mentioning his clerical titles.20 However, it seems very well possible that unordained men, too, were allowed to serve as a scribe, at the very least in the period preceding their first ordination.21 Note, by the way, that although the designation katoba is the appropriate term to refer to the office of the scribe, the scribes themselves do not use it very frequently in the colophons, and certainly not as a title to be prefixed to their names.22

the introduction in Avedis K. Sanjian, Colophons of Armenian Manuscripts, 1301-1480. A Source for Middle Eastern History (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1969). 19 E.g., bishop Yawalaha in Qaru, in 1562 (Berlin 82, Sachau I, 309), metropolitan Yosep of Shakh in the monastery of Mar Ishaq in 1591 (Berlin 31, Sachau I, 129-30), Ishocyaw metropolitan, brother of Mar Eliya in 1776 (Camb. Add. 2021, Wright II, 597); compare also ‘The Art of the Scribe’, in The Hidden Pearl, vol. II, p. 250. 20 Compare, e.g., Shimcun of Alqosh in 1735 (Camb. Add. 1996, Wright I, 424) and Sapar in Bet Daywe, in 1746 (Berlin 76, Sachau I, 292). Shimcun reveals that he comes from a family of priests, Sapar indicates nothing of his background. 21 This might be suggested by Maclean and Browne’s picture of the young schoolboys copying their deacon’s church book, although it is possible that some of these boys had already been ordained; the usual age being around seventeen, cf. Maclean and Browne, The Catholicos of the East, pp. 169-170 and 201. 22 The term is mostly used in the scribe’s depreciating self description: spoiling the manuscript ‘in the way resembling a scribe’ (Camb. Add. 1981, Wright I, 191, or ‘I the weak scribe’ (London Or. 6719, fo. 245b, personal notes). In addition, scribes use derivations from sr†, ‘to draw’, ‘to write’, to refer to their scribal activities, cf. Camb. Add. 2013 (Wright I, 541-2) and Camb. Or. 1145, fo. 81b (personal notes). I THE WEAK SCRIBE 17

During the Ottoman period, the importance of monks and monasteries for the scribal tradition seemed to have diminished rather significantly. Whereas until the early seventeenth century about 25% of the scribes belonged to the monastic class, this number declined to about 5% towards the end of the seventeenth century. Only under the influence of the Roman Catholic movement, which in the nineteenth century also included a monastic revival, the relative number of monastic scribes increased again. The decrease of monastic scribes runs parallel to what appears to be a general diminishing of the importance of monasteries and monasticism in this period, resulting in the almost complete disappearance of organized monasticism within the Church of the East in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Despite these developments, solitary monks continued to have a place within the Church of the East, as testified by the reference to Rabban Yonan at the beginning of this article. In this connection I should also mention that in general, writing was a man’s profession. Despite a number of nuns that we know were active in this period, no women scribes have been identified so far.23 This fits in with the small number of women that were able to read, although hard facts are difficult to come by.24 One should conclude, therefore, that scribes were practically always recruited from the ranks of male clergy, both secular and monastic. Nuns as well as lay men and women of all ranks may occasionally have been able to read and even to write, but few traces remain of their activities. One of the most striking characteristics of the scribal class in this period is that, like our priest Yosep who wrote the above colophon, a considerable number of scribes of this period came from only a few families from the vil- lages of Alqosh and Telkepe. Anyone who starts collecting names of scribes

23 One woman scribe is known, who wrote in Arabic and belonged to the Catholic movement: Theresa, daughter of the priest Khadjador, son of the deacon cAbdelkarim, son of the priest Bakos, son of the priest Khadjo, son of the priest Bet Sabrishoc of cAyn Tannur, on 9 February 1767 (Diarbakir 155). See A. Scher ‘Notices sur les mss. syriaques et arabes conservés à l’archevêché chaldéen de Diarbekr’, Journal Asiatique, 10 (1907), pp. 332-362. 24 In fact, considerably more women might have been able to read than can be deduced from the sources written by men. Such women might also have been able to write, but might not have been allowed to copy for monasteries or churches. On the religious roles of women in this period, including one reference to a ‘daughter of the covenant’, see my ‘Generous Devotion, Women in the Colophons of the Church of the East (1550-1850)’, Hugoye, 7,1 (2004), http://syrcom.cua.edu/Hugoye 18 HELEEN MURRE-VAN DEN BERG of this period and region soon discovers numerous family connections from which intricate family trees may be constructed. The best ones published so far are those by Wilmshurst.25 These not only show the considerable numbers of deacons and priests in one family at a particular time, but also the long time frame over which some of these families were known (from the early seventeenth to the early twentieth century). This suggests that in the Ottoman period the decrease of monastic scribal communities was more than made up for by the rise of familial scribal communities, involving networks of fathers, uncles, sons and nephews.26 The heydays of these networks were the second half of the seventeenth and the early decades of the eighteenth century. Note, however, that such familial connections did not exclude links to a specific monastery: close to Alqosh, the famous monastery of Rabban Hormizd, the see of the most important patriarchal line of the time, continued to play a central role in the copying of manuscripts, alongside and in cooperation with the scribal families of Alqosh. In the same part of the colophon in which the scribe reveals his familial identity, usually two other aspects of the scribe’s background are mentioned: his location at the time of writing the manuscript, and his ecclesiastical allegiance. Although the scribe in all likelihood primarily intended this information to add to the identification and reliability of the manuscript rather than to complete his personal biography, these references are helpful in further understanding the scribes’ contexts. What were the centers of scribal activities, and which patriarch was important in which region? If not for such references to the two and later three rival patriarchates of the time, it would have been impossible to reconstruct the struggle between Roman Catholic and traditionalist influences in the Church of the East in any detail.27 Although all three patriarchates that existed from 1681onwards created their

25 Wilmshurst, The Ecclesiastical Organisation, pp. 227, 244, 249 and 251. The last figure contains a few mistakes, see my review in Bibliotheca Orientalis, 60 (2003), 3-4, pp. 459- 461. 26 In these genealogies, the scribes indicate their forefathers titles, such as deacon, priest or a secular title such as rayis, ‘head man’, (e.g., Camb. Add. 1975, Wright I 78ff); they usually do not indicate whether their forefathers were scribes as well, which can consequently only be concluded from cross-comparison with other manuscripts. 27 On this struggle, see the many references in Wilmhurst, The Ecclesiastical Organisation; Lampart, Ein Märtyrer der Union mit Rom; and my ‘The Patriarchs of the Church of the East’ (with maps). I THE WEAK SCRIBE 19 own demand for and supply of the products of the scribes, it is the traditionalist patriarch Eliya IX Yohannan Maraugin (1660-1700) in Rabban Hormizd who stands out because of his apparent protection and support of the abundant activities in the Alqosh region during his reign. However, in almost half of the manuscripts in Wilmshurst’s list no reference is made to a patriarch in office, suggesting that in quite a number of cases scribes did not need to state their allegiance explicitly. To conclude this section on the background of the scribes, a word should be said about their education. Unfortunately, the colophons tell us very little about that subject. Learning, if mentioned at all, is usually attributed to others, like donors or the recipients of the manuscripts.28 So far I have never encountered remarks on where or from whom scribes had learnt to read or write. Early nineteenth-century sources suggest the near-absence of schools of general education in the Church of the East.29 Basic reading skills aimed at participation in the liturgy were in all likelihood taught in churches and monasteries, whereas the niceties of writing were most likely transmitted within the scribal communities, both monastic and familial. The colophons do not indicate whether the scribes considered themselves ‘learned’. The neg- ative epithets the scribes often apply to themselves generally refer to their supposedly sinful lives, although perhaps references to the supposed tendency to ‘sullying’ or ‘corrupting’ the manuscript covertly hint at the professional pride of the scribe, a pride that is also referred to in the passage on the schoolboys at the beginning of this article. It is mainly from nineteenth-century sources that we learn that scribes were often also seen as religious experts who were at home in the liturgical and theological traditions of the church. Rabban Yonan is a favorite example within the Anglican missionary context, but already in the earliest period of the American Presbyterian mission references to such learned scribe-priests occur.30 Perhaps not all scribes were

28 E.g., the scribe Giwargis on his anonymous commissioner, in 1677: ‘the excellent priest and eminent scholar’ (Camb. Add. 2018, Wright II, 568-9), and priest Aprem who in 1521 copied a book for his ‘learned daughters Tamar and Shmuni’ (Mosul 74). See A. Scher, ‘Notice sur les manuscrits syriaques conservés dans la bibliothèque du patriarcat chaldéen de Mossoul’, Revue des Bibliothèques, 17 (1907), pp. 237-260. 29 From a Spoken to a Written Language, p. 44, n. 8. 30 Asahel Grant, The Nestorians or the Lost Tribes (London, 1841; reprint: Gorgias Press, New Jersey, 2002), p. 65: ‘At Asheeta I became the guest of priest Auraham (Abraham), who is reputed the most learned Nestorian now living. He has spent twenty years of his 20 HELEEN MURRE-VAN DEN BERG learned, a conclusion even more likely when we consider the young age at which scribes began their careers, but certainly most of the learned also served as scribes.31

THE RELIGIOUS WORLD OF THE SCRIBES

One of the elements of the writing of colophons that so far has not received sufficient attention is the way in which the seemingly straightforward elements of the colophon, i.e., date and place of writing, ecclesial connections, family background of the scribe and names of commissioners, are used by the scribes to paint a picture of the religious life of the community they belong to.32 Of course, as in most writing traditions that use colophons, the colophons were first and foremost intended to record the circumstances of the genesis of a certain manuscript, thereby guaranteeing its authenticity and reliability.33 In addition, to a certain extent the colophons also functioned as historical archives, in which the scribes recorded incidents that were important to them, varying from the death of a brother-scribe in 1561,34 the apostasy of the Syr- ian Orthodox patriarch Nacma to Islam in 1576,35 a famine that severely hit the Amadiah region in 1613,36 to a the insurrection of a local Islamic leader

life in writing and reading books, and has thus done much to supply the waste of, if not to replenish, the Nestorian literature.’ 31 Another link to be investigated further is that between authors and scribes. Although the number of composers of new texts, hymns, prose, is relatively small, a number of these are also known as scribes; in connection to Neo-Aramaic compositions, compare Mengozzi, Israel of Alqosh and Joseph of Telkepe, pp. 69-70. 32 An interest similar to that of this article is found in F. Briquel-Chatonnet, ‘Le temps du copiste. Notations chronologiques dans les colophons de manuscripts syriaques’, in Proche-Orient Ancien. Temps vécu, temps pensé, eds. F. Briquel-Chatonnet and H. Lozach- meur (Paris: Librairie d’Amerique et d’Orient, 1998), pp. 197-210. 33 I would like to thank the late David Lane († 9-1-2005) for his contribution to this part of the paper, in helping me to shape my thoughts during a discussion at a session of the Syriac Symposium in Beirut in September 2004. 34 Berlin 35 (Sachau I, 139-40); a very moving piece reflecting personal grief and trust in God. 35 In two manuscripts: Seert 83 (A. Scher, Catalogue des manuscrits syriques et arabes con- servés dans la bibliothèque épiscopale de Seert (Kurdistan), Mosul: Imprimerie des Pères Dominicains, 1905) and Diyarbakir 50 (Scher, ‘Notices sur les mss. syriaques et arabes’). In Syrian Orthodox sources this patriarch is known as Ignatius XVII Nicmatullah. 36 Camb. Add. 1981 (Wright I, 187). I THE WEAK SCRIBE 21 called Mahdi in 1705/6.37 However interesting such notes are to later histo- rians, their relative scarcity suggests that historiography was not among the prime interests of the scribes. What is present in every single colophon, though, are numerous references to the religious world in which the scribe lived, by a variety of prayers and doxologies added to the factual information given, as well as by the choice of words and phraseology in the information itself. It is these references that so far have received little attention, even to the point of being dis- regarded and excluded by most editors of the colophons. In my opinion, these references are of great importance in understanding the religious outlook of the scribes, and, through their eyes, of the Church of the East in this particular period. One word of caution must be given. Although the colophons display a surprising diversity of detail and formulation, the basic elements are shared by all scribes and should therefore be treated as reflecting their common training and (religious) tradition, not their individual opinions or beliefs. Perhaps closer study will enable us to distill a few personal traits from the wealth of varying detail, but so far this has not been possible. The variety between the colophons seems to be guided by stylistic pref- erences, much more so than by individual opinions on religious or secular matters. In addition, practical concerns such as the remaining space on the paper may have invited the scribe to be concise or relatively extensive. The most explicit reference to the religious world-view of the scribes is the name of God, usually mentioned in the initial lines of the colophon. The vast majority of colophons of this period start with attributing the successful completion of the manuscript to ‘our Lord’, usually in a phrase like ‘it was completed with the help of our Lord, this book … ’. This grateful tone is often further supported by a doxology either following the title or the date of completion, both usually in the same first line of the colophon. These doxologies, starting with something like ‘glory be to God’, are regularly abridged by the editors of the colophons, and further study of the original manuscripts is needed to uncover the variations that are possible in this respect. One of the more extensive doxologies edited by William Wright (though also in an abridged form) was written by the scribe Daniel, in 1701: ‘to him in whose

37 Camb. Add. 2017 (Wright II, 557-60). This is one of the longer notes, extending over several pages, telling of unrest in the region that also affected the Christian communities, leading to the patriarch forced departure from Alqosh to Telkepe. 22 HELEEN MURRE-VAN DEN BERG strength we started and in the support of whose mercy we finished, be glory without interruption and honor without limits [etc.]’.38 While these lines probably originated from a well-deserved feeling of achievement after fin- ishing the copying of the sometimes very extensive manuscripts, they also tes- tify to a strong sense of divine support without which the scribes’ actions would not have succeeded. Considering the explicitly religious content of practically all manuscripts to which these colophons were added, it is not strange to find many indica- tions of the religious merit attached to the writing and sponsoring of a manuscript. The most common and explicit of these are those connected with the mentioning of the donors. Here the phraseology seems to be rather free, and such prayers often give the impression of having been composed with the commissioners of the manuscript in mind. Bishop Yohannan of Abbnaye included in his colophon a prayer for a woman donor, Alpo: ‘may the Lord give her an inheritance with Sarah, I say, Ripqa (Rebecca) and Rachel [etc.], and with all the righteous saints, Amen’.39 An explicit connection between the costs involved for the donor is made by the priest Bahaydin of Gazarta, when after stressing the expenses incurred by Hormizd of Gazarta he concludes: ‘May our Lord see to his wages in the kingdom of heaven’.40 The scribes also expected religious rewards, although they generally were very cautious in hinting at this. Priest Giwargis of Alqosh is one of the few who also explicitly prays for his personal benefit: ‘may not the Lord withhold the wages of salvation five times two’.41 Many others, when they include an explicit prayer in the colophon, focus on forgiveness of sins, like priest Yalda of Alqosh, ‘who asks of you, readers, pray for him that the Lord in his mercy may have pity on him and pardon his transgressions and sins, Amen’.42 The majority of scribes, however, does not include a prayer request at all, or merely inserts the very simple ‘pray for him’.43 Whether an explicit prayer is included

38 Camb. Add. 1994 (Wright I, 401). 39 Berlin 31, 1591 (Sachau I, 129-130). 40 Camb. Add. 1981, 1607 (Wright I, 186). 41 Camb. Add. 2018, 1677 (Wright II, 568-569). 42 Berlin 87, 1714 (Sachau I, 320-321). 43 E.g., priest Yosep in 1707 (Camb. Add. 1984, Wright I, 301). Note that this phrase is sometimes also inserted in other places in the manuscript, either as part of a decorative draw- ing (of a cross, usually), or in a concise colophon somewhere halfway the manuscript, like in Camb. Or. 1295, fo 61a, 1685 (personal notes): ‘Pray for Thomas Daqtar’. I THE WEAK SCRIBE 23 or not, almost all scribes introduce themselves with a long enumeration of sins and weaknesses, both in general and in connection with manuscript writing. Priest Yosep’s self description (in the example above) is apparently short- ened by Wright, like that of the deacon Hormzid of Pioz, of whose description, however, a little bit more survived: ‘He blackened, destroyed, sullied and darkened these pages, in a manner which only resembles a scribe, a weak and sinful man [etc.], who in name is deacon, Hormizd, in his deeds fruit- less and worthless, son of the believer Hanna…44 In these phrases the scribes stress their unworthiness (because of their sins) as well as their unsuitability (because of the mess they pretend to make in copying) for manuscript writing. Apart from a variety of social and historical reasons that might have induced scribes to describe themselves in such uncomplimentary ways, in the context of their religious world-view, these phrases underline the scribes’ need for divine forgiveness, regardless whether that is asked for implicitly or explicitly. Seen and read in the context of the usually quite beautiful execu- tion of the manuscripts, these phrases also, contrastively, underline the scribes’ quests for such rewards. The scribes regularly include another kind of prayer into the colophons of the manuscripts: prayers for protection. The most common of these are the prayers for the village in which the manuscript was written, usually a variation on ‘may our Lord make it populous’.45 Another popular prayer for a village refers to the difficult situation in which many of the Christians lived: ‘may our Lord Christ protect it, may he magnify it with his strong right hand, may he quiet and bring to an end for it the oppression of the oppres- sors, the burden of the emirs and the injustice of the wicked, and turn away from it the rage and anger of evil and barbarous men’.46 Prayers for protection can be inserted almost anywhere a scribe thinks them useful, following, as indicated earlier, the names of donors, of the scribe himself, or of the patriarch in office.

44 Camb. Add. 2812, 1806 (Wright II, 643). 45 E.g., for Gazarta in 1561 (Berlin 35, Sachau I, 139) and for Gugtapa in 1686 (Camb. Add. 2045, Wright II, 1176). 46 Camb. Add. 1975, Wright I, 79, personal notes. A similar phrase is found in Berlin 31, 1591 (Sachau I, 129) and Camb. Add. 1294 (1736), fo 122b, personal notes; each time in connection with a different village or monastery. 24 HELEEN MURRE-VAN DEN BERG

In addition to all these more or less explicit ways in which the scribes refer to their own and their community’s religious concerns, the colophons also reflect the religious world-view of their times in a more subtle way. Every aspect of the context in which the scribes produced their manuscripts is described in such a manner as to make an explicit link to the religious world. Not a single aspect of their world, the village, the clergy, the donors, the time, was excluded from this type of ‘sacralization’. An interesting example is the way in which a direct connection is made between the history of Chris- tianity and the region in which these Christians live. Compare, for instance, the way in which the village of Hassen, close to Gazarta, is described: ‘the blessed and blissful village Hassen, village of the chosen Noah, where he planted a vine, pressed wine, drank it and became drunk – may the Lord make her populous with his right hand’.47 Another Old Testament figure with Mesopotamian links is the prophet Nahum, who is traditionally and proudly connected with Alqosh (see the colophon above).48 Of the later Christian saints, Mar Augin and Rabban Hormizd are usually seen as having a direct link with the region.49 In addition to these links with saintly persons, place names are usually preceded by a form of the verb ‘to bless’, often even in two forms (brika w-mbarrka), which translates to something as ‘blessed and blissful’ (like in the case of Alqosh in the example above). Similar sacralization takes place in the mentioning of the dates, which not only often includes a reference to the ‘blessed Greeks’ or the ‘blessed month’ (see the example above), but which also often mentions the liturgical time of the year, as in the colophon by priest Giwargis of Alqosh of 1677: ‘on Saturday, on the evening of the third Sunday of the Apostles whose hymn is ‘the priesthood

47 Berlin 31 (Sachau I, 129). On the strong tradition that links Noah to this region, see Fiey, Assyrie chrétienne II, pp. 749-753. 48 Compare Nahum 1,1. A similar link exists between the prophet Jonah and Mosul/Nin- eveh, but in this period, this link is less often explicitly referred to; compare, however, the Ktaba da-nbiye ‘Book of the Prophets’ copies in the mid-17th century: see A. Mingana, Cat- alogue of the Mingana Collection of Manuscripts, now the Possession of the Trustees of the Woodbrooke Settlement, Selly Oaks, Birmingham (Cambridge: Heffer, 1933-1939), no. 64, where the scribe gave the opening lines of Nahum and Jonah a decoration different from the other books. 49 On Rabban Hormizd see the numerous MSS produced in Alqosh, on Mar Augin, who is said to have christianized the region of Mcarre, see a MS of 1558 (Camb. Add. 1988, Wright I, 358-359). I THE WEAK SCRIBE 25 of the house of Aaron’.50 If a manuscript was completed on a Saturday or Sun- day, or during Lent or a holiday, such a reference is regularly included. It is in this light, therefore, that the historical notes in some of these colophons have to be understood: the scribes interpreting local history as part of the divine economy, as the sacralization of time. Such references, in combination with the numerous prayers, doxologies and the contrastive self-reference of the scribes, together paint a picture of the religious world of the scribes. They show us a world that is characterized by a strong dependency on God, belief in the efficacy of prayer by living con- temporaries as well as by departed saints, and belief in the importance of accumulating religious merits through the writing and sponsoring of manuscripts. They also show a world that in all its aspects, but especially in time and place, is part of a religious order given by the Christian religion in general and the Church of the East in particular. Lastly, it is through these references that the sacredness of the manuscripts themselves is articulated and confirmed. In this process, the scribes play a crucial role: in writing the manuscripts they establish a link between the sinful world of humanity and the holy world of divine presence.51

CONCLUSION

The picture these scribes paint does not come as a surprise to those familiar with Christian traditions in the Middle East. However, an overview such as this indicates that a further study of the colophons will add considerably to our knowledge of the religious world of the Church of the East in the Ottoman period. For now, the description of the world of these ecclesial scribes suggests that not only a relatively large class of literate clergy existed for most of the period under discussion, but also that this clergy made an essential contribution to the preservation and further development of a lively

50 Camb. Add. 2018 (Wright II, 568-569); the third Sunday of the Apostles is the third Sunday of the period starting with Pentecost. On the religious and social importance of dating, compare also Briquel-Chatonnet, ‘Le temps du copiste’. 51 The depreciating self description may further be explained as the scribes’ way to mark this transferal from the worldly to the divine; I thank Luk Van Rompay for his insightful comments on an earlier version of this article, especially with regard to this issue of sacralization and the role of the scribes. 26 HELEEN MURRE-VAN DEN BERG religious world view that motivated many people to contribute to it, most concretely by sponsoring the writing of manuscripts. When one then also thinks of the Islamic context of these Christian communities, one once again admires the conscious effort to create a Christian world, characterized by the sacralization of time and place, within the larger Islamic society of which these communities were part. The scribes of the Ottoman period enable us to see and better understand this religious and communal vitality. In the nineteenth century, the role of the scribes slowly began to change. In the early stages of the introduction of general education and printing, the ecclesial scribes were the experts on whom Western missionaries relied in the process of learning the language and getting acquainted with the literary heritage of the Church of the East. Over time, however, a new elite of lay men and women began to emerge from the missionary educational system, an elite that had aims different from those of the ecclesial scribes. Rather than the preservation and justification of the religious world of their time, their goal was modernization and secularization, to which, over time, was added the cause of Assyrian nationalism. Although the copying of manuscripts was never abandoned completely, certainly not in the nineteenth century, the central religious role of both colophons and scribes began to disappear. The clergy too began to use the printing press to further their religious aims, and the colophons lost their function as storehouses of religious knowledge and merit. The weak scribes of the Ottoman period had done their duty: the heritage of the Church of the East had been preserved for new generation in a new century, a century in which the texts they had copied and the colophons they added to it would be disseminated and studied more widely than ever before.