iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Paul Babinski @paulbabinski.bsky.social · 11/10/2026

Unfinished Latin translation of Ibn ʿArabshāh’s biography of Timur, by Dionysius Vossius (1612-1633). Vossius studied Arabic with Jacob Golius, whose edition of Ibn ʿArabshāh was later published (without translation) in 1636. Amsterdam University Library, ms Bc 2

081

Paul Babinski @paulbabinski.bsky.social · 05/10/2026

Come join us in Athens! My department (the Department of Religion at the University of Georgia) is hiring an Assistant Professor of Religion specializing in religion, ethics, and politics. Please apply and spread the word.

142

Reposted by Paul Babinski

Princeton University Press @princetonupress.bsky.social · 15/09/2026

We're thrilled to be co-sponsoring the 2026 E.H. Gombrich Lecture Series next week, 22-24 September at 6:00 pm BST, with @warburginstitute.bsky.social! Dr. Anthony Grafton of @princeton.edu will deliver this three-part lecture series on the life & controversies of Joseph Scaliger. Details below:

25725

Paul Babinski @paulbabinski.bsky.social · 30/08/2026

Keine tiefere Bedeutung, glaube ich. Kronen auf Turbanen finden sich manchmal in frühneuzeitlichen Darstellungen östlicher Könige. Das Bild bleibt mir aber ein Rätsel...

130

Paul Babinski @paulbabinski.bsky.social · 04/08/2026

Later, though it is unclear exactly when.

000

Paul Babinski @paulbabinski.bsky.social · 01/08/2026

The annotator's choppy Arabic script imitates his source, the ligatureless printed Arabic in Postel's grammar

092

Paul Babinski @paulbabinski.bsky.social · 01/08/2026

Paris copy of the 1516 polyglot Genoa Psalter, in which a sixteenth-century reader has added the Lord’s Prayer and Sūrah al-Fātiḥah in Arabic and Latin, both copied from Guillaume Postel’s Grammatica Arabica (ca. 1538). BnF - Arsenal FOL-T-188

1266

Paul Babinski @paulbabinski.bsky.social · 01/08/2026

I'll reach out if I'm in town. The Stabi is great (and you there's a world-class museum right across the street). I hope you get the chance to explore the other German collections, too: Hamburg, Leipzig, etc.

010

Paul Babinski @paulbabinski.bsky.social · 31/07/2026

You're in Germany this summer? That's wonderful. Are you working on any of the collections in Berlin? It's such a nice place to do research.

110

Paul Babinski @paulbabinski.bsky.social · 30/07/2026

Interestingly, the manuscript appears to have passed through the hands of another former Ottoman subject, Salomon Negri of Damascus, who pledged it to Louis de Byzance in 1691 as security for thirty-three livres.

051

Paul Babinski @paulbabinski.bsky.social · 30/07/2026

Sixteenth-century Arabic-Turkish dictionary (Lüġat-i Aḫterī), annotated by Louis de Byzance (1647-1722), born Raphaël Levi in Istanbul, a Jewish convert to Catholicism who was ordained a priest at the Oratory in Paris. BnF, ms Supplément Turc 262

171

Paul Babinski @paulbabinski.bsky.social · 29/07/2026

Yes, and I will reply shortly! Sorry, you caught me at busy moment, and I went down a rabbit hole trying to find a flyleaf annotation that I recall but for some reason did not mark in my notes...

010

Paul Babinski @paulbabinski.bsky.social · 28/07/2026

Persian-Turkish rhyming dictionary (Tuḥfe-i Şāhidī), glossed in French by André Du Ryer (1580-1660), the orientalist responsible for the first printed translation of the Gulistān and the first French translation of the Qur’an from Arabic. BnF, ms Turc 206

191

Paul Babinski @paulbabinski.bsky.social · 25/07/2026

here's an alternate form of address, from a young German scholar who visited Picques in Paris.

120

Paul Babinski @paulbabinski.bsky.social · 25/07/2026

That jumped out at me, too, though on second thought I don't think it's all that odd for a French ownership inscription from that time. Also: transliterating monsieur as موسو?

220

Paul Babinski @paulbabinski.bsky.social · 25/07/2026

“Pity those who remain helpless in ignorance”: notes in Arabic, Persian, & Turkish by the French orientalist & librarian Louis Picques (1637-1699). Picques copied the proverb from the Persian-Turkish rhyming dictionary he was annotating (Tuḥfe-i Şāhidī). BnF, ms Suppl. Turc 312

1101

Paul Babinski @paulbabinski.bsky.social · 24/07/2026

Eighteenth-century copy of the Pandnāma traditionally attributed to ʿAṭṭār, made "for the use of the jeunes de langue of France", apprentice diplomatic interpreters in Istanbul, one of whom annotated the manuscript. BnF, ms Supplément Persan 648

080

Paul Babinski @paulbabinski.bsky.social · 22/07/2026

Paris copy of the 1516 Genoa Psalter (which presents the text in Hebrew, Latin, Arabic, Greek, and Aramaic) from the library of the Couvent des Jacobins de la rue Saint-Honoré. Interestingly, a reader vocalized a portion of the Arabic translation. BnF, RES-A-491

1209

Paul Babinski @paulbabinski.bsky.social · 21/07/2026

Persian literature in the Mediterranean: a copy of the Gulistān with annotations in Italian and transliterated Turkish, today in the French National Library. BnF, ms Supplément Persan 860

0124

Paul Babinski @paulbabinski.bsky.social · 20/07/2026

I think the mix might be consistent with someone compiling from a number of different glossaries, but why the transliterated Turkish? Could also reflect oral transmission, where Italian sometimes functioned as an interlanguage.

120

Paul Babinski @paulbabinski.bsky.social · 20/07/2026

Philological waste: pages of seventeenth-century notes listing transliterated Turkish words with their equivalents in Italian, French, or Latin, reused to form pasteboards for the binding of a Persian manuscript. BnF, ms Supplément Persan 759

1184

Paul Babinski @paulbabinski.bsky.social · 19/07/2026

“Le dernier jour du monde”: late seventeenth-century glosses, in Turkish and French, from a Paris copy of al-Zamakhsharī’s Muqaddimat al-adab, annotated by Louis de Byzance, priest of the Oratoire. BnF, ms Supplément Persan 449

0132

Paul Babinski @paulbabinski.bsky.social · 29/06/2026

An Arabic-Persian-Turkish glossary, copied in the early 18th century by one of the great orientalist autodidacts, Henry Wild, a tailor from Norwich who was said to have taught himself Hebrew, Arabic, & Persian, among other languages. University of Sydney Library, ms Add. Ms. 56

0113

Paul Babinski @paulbabinski.bsky.social · 23/06/2026

Printed: yes, but manuscript: no, not that I could find in the catalog, at least.

120

Paul Babinski @paulbabinski.bsky.social · 23/06/2026

Some other notes: earlier bibliographic inscription in French, decorative endpapers (eighteenth/early nineteenth century?), sold by an Anglophone bookseller in the nineteenth/early twentieth century.

040

Paul Babinski @paulbabinski.bsky.social · 23/06/2026

A Turkish manuscript translation of the Gospels at the State Library of New South Wales in Sydney, which appears to be independent of the ʿAlī Ufḳī, Kieffer, and Seaman translations. Notably, it uses both Coptic and Vulgate chapter divisions, and renders “Jesus” as ايسوس (Īsūs). ms L1/B.

294

Paul Babinski @paulbabinski.bsky.social · 21/06/2026

It’s an interesting copy, with annotations and some earlier ownership inscriptions (also note the spurious etymology of “sir”). State Library of New South Wales, Sydney.

020

Paul Babinski @paulbabinski.bsky.social · 21/06/2026

Notes in a 1615 copy of Buxtorf’s Hebrew lexicon, charting the life of its owner, William Saumarez Smith, after acquiring it in 1860 while at Trinity College, Cambridge: ordained, elected fellow, years in India. 1890: Bishop of Sydney. Last entry, in another hand: “died 1909”

170

Reposted by Paul Babinski

Coffee & Donatus @coffeeanddonatus.bsky.social · 14/06/2026

Found an interesting little 19th-century lithographed Arabic grammar, with text and tables reproduced from handwritten copy. The author, Nicolas Perron (1798-1876) was a French physician, Arabist, and educator.

Title page of Perron’s "Abrégé de grammaire ou principes les plus généraux de l’arabe vulgaire" (Paris, 1832).

Opening showing pages 12–13, with Arabic verb paradigms and French grammatical commentary.

Facing pages (112-113) with an Arabic grammatical chart arranged in a branching layout and French explanatory text with Arabic examples.

293

Paul Babinski @paulbabinski.bsky.social · 06/06/2026

Copenhagen copy of Hoca Mesʿūd’s Ferhengnāme, a 14th-century Turkish translation from Saʿdī’s Būstān, acquired in Leipzig in 1677 by the Danish scholar Hans Wandal, whose ownership note includes an Arabic proverb: “Assure yourself of victory after patience”. CKB, ms Cod. Turc. 20

090

Paul Babinski @paulbabinski.bsky.social · 01/06/2026

A manuscript of Petraeus's Coptic-Arabic-Latin edition of Psalm 1, with annotations that were left out of the 1663 printing, presented in 1661 to the Danish King Frederick III. CKB, ms Or. Arch. 2(2).

0120

Reposted by Paul Babinski

Oxford Bibliographical Society @obs1922.bsky.social · 31/05/2026

Borna Izadpanah on 'Printing the Qur’an across Empires' All welcome to our final event of the academic year - in person in Oxford, or online (email secretary@oxbibsoc.org.uk).

0115

Paul Babinski @paulbabinski.bsky.social · 31/05/2026

“Greetings, O foremost among the masters of the languages of the Franks”: a commendatory poem, written in Turkish by an unidentified orientalist, prefacing Theodor Petraeus’s 1663 edition of the first Psalm in Coptic and Arabic.

170

Paul Babinski @paulbabinski.bsky.social · 30/05/2026

“O Lord, always make Your grace a guide for me / Do not show me that path which does not lead to You”: a line of Turkish poetry (by Fużūlī) in an annotation on the “straight path” in Sūrah al-Fātiḥah by the seventeenth-century orientalist Theodor Petraeus. CKB, ms Or.Arch. 2(1)

0111

Paul Babinski @paulbabinski.bsky.social · 24/05/2026

A wonderful final project by a student this semester, now proudly on display in my office: a hand-colored reproduction of Nikolaus Meldemann’s composite woodcut 360-degree panorama of the 1529 Ottoman Siege of Vienna, in English translation and mounted on a rotating platform.

080

Paul Babinski @paulbabinski.bsky.social · 20/05/2026

Bedwell’s album amicorum has been digitized here: hdl.handle.net/1887.1/item:...

041

Paul Babinski @paulbabinski.bsky.social · 20/05/2026

“God’s will is my will”: an entry in Arabic, Syriac, and Danish by a traveler from Denmark, Lauge Christensen, in the friendship album of the English Arabist William Bedwell (c. 1563-1632). Leiden, ms BPL 2753

1329

Reposted by Paul Babinski

Ottoman and Turkish Studies Vienna @turkishstudies.bsky.social · 05/05/2026

Upcoming conference: Mecmuas in the Ottoman World. Interdisciplinary Approaches and Current Research 4–6 June 2026 mecmuaconference.univie.ac.at

Poster "Mecmuas in the Ottoman World" Conference

054

Paul Babinski @paulbabinski.bsky.social · 28/04/2026

“To my lord Toma ibn Erben, who is currently in Saumur, a city in France on the river Lijeris (Ligeris, i.e. Loire)” Address for a letter from the Egyptian Copt, Yūsuf ibn Abū Dhaqn to the Dutch Orientalist Thomas Erpenius. Leiden, ms or. 1228

0254

Reposted by Paul Babinski

Forschungsbibliothek Gotha @fbgotha.bsky.social · 30/03/2026

Commentaries and glosses functioned as vehicles for the study of astronomy. @nadineloehr.bsky.social presents "Reflections on the Many Forms of Commentary in Astronomical and Astrological Manuscripts" in this week's Gotha Manuscript Talk 📆 Wednesday, 1 April 2026, 6:15 CET 1/2

a manuscript containing a drawing with circles and marginal notes

12511

Paul Babinski @paulbabinski.bsky.social · 30/03/2026

Nineteenth-century collection of Turkish proverbs with French translation, collected by Adrien Royer from a dictionary compiled at the end of the seventeenth century by Antoine Arcère (1664-1699). BULAC, ms Turc 17a

140

Paul Babinski @paulbabinski.bsky.social · 28/03/2026

The manuscript, Cod. 10313, today in the Austrian National Library, has been digitized here onb.digital/result/1322D...

040

Paul Babinski @paulbabinski.bsky.social · 28/03/2026

The inconsistent transliteration & orthography suggest it may have been written by someone who did not know the language well and was listening to a Turkish-speaking informant. Sometimes the Turkish has a Latin translation. There are also notes in Spanish and German.

1101

Paul Babinski @paulbabinski.bsky.social · 28/03/2026

“Can the soul be separated from the body?”: Ottoman poetry, recorded in transliterated Turkish by a seventeenth-century German traveler in an album with Ottoman decorative paper. ÖNB, ms Cod. 10313

1359

Paul Babinski @paulbabinski.bsky.social · 26/03/2026

A digitized copy of Du Ryer’s Rudimenta grammatices linguae Turcicae digitale-sammlungen.de/en/view/bsb1...

030

Paul Babinski @paulbabinski.bsky.social · 26/03/2026

A Paris copy of André Du Ryer’s 1630 Turkish grammar, annotated by a seventeenth-century French orientalist studying Turkish with the help of a manuscript Persian-Turkish dictionary. From the library of the Abbey of Saint-Victor. BnF-Arsenal, 4-BL-214

1144

Paul Babinski @paulbabinski.bsky.social · 25/03/2026

I was very happy to be part of this special issue on Julia's wonderful book, which I used as an opportunity to reflect on the broader history of Persian literature in Europe and the limits of viewing translation and literary history through a national lens.

0167