The Digitalization of the Adolf and Ann Robison Collection of Hebrew Manuscripts (Part 2)

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by Gary A. Rendsburg

Blanche and Irving Laurie Chair in Jewish History

Department of Jewish Studies


see part 1 here …

Two-plus years after we began the digital imaging process, we now are able to see the fruits of our labor. A search for ‘Rutgers’ at the Ktiv website yields the requisite number of hits: 63 in total (because some of the documents contain multiple compositions, and thus they have been sub-divided by the Ktiv cataloguers, in order to maximize search capacity). See here for the screen shot indicating the 63 hits, with details about the first two manuscripts (MS 4 and MS 17).

 

 

To illustrate how the Ktiv website works in greater detail, I have elected to use Robison MS 9, with the main catalogue entry seen here:



The Hebrew heading informs the user that this document contains the book of Leviticus – though there is more.

If one clicks on ‘Detailed Information’, one is directed to this screen:


where one learns that the text includes not only the Hebrew original, but also the Aramaic translation (known as Targum Onqelos) and the Judeo-Arabic translation (known as the Tafsir, produced by Sa‘adya Gaon).

If one returns to the main catalogue entry and clicks on the ‘View Manuscript’ link (see two images above), one reaches the digital images themselves, with page after page available for viewing, as exemplified here:


The various options in the bottom left include the zoom feature, which – given the high-resolution images – allows the user to see as much detail as one would like. For example, see here for the screen capture of the four lines in the upper right (= the beginning of folio 1v):


Though in fact one can zoom even further – see here, for example, for the last four words on the first line (recalling that Hebrew, Aramaic, and Arabic are read from right to left):


Multiply this exercise by the hundreds, nay, by the thousands, and one can gain a sense of how our Hebrew manuscripts housed here in New Brunswick are now available to students, scholars, and researchers around the world.

to be continued …

The Digitalization of the Adolf and Ann Robison Collection of Hebrew Manuscripts (Part 1)

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by Gary A. Rendsburg

Blanche and Irving Laurie Chair in Jewish History

Department of Jewish Studies

Sometime in the late 1950s or early 1960s, the Adolf and Ann Robison Collection of Hebrew Manuscripts entered the Rutgers University library holdings. Naturally, they were deposited in Special Collections and University Archives (SCUA) in the then relatively recently opened Alexander Library. The c. 50 manuscripts were studied soon thereafter by Professor Leon Feldman (Hebraic Studies), in conjunction with Morris Lutzki, expert in Hebrew manuscripts at the Library of the Jewish Theological Seminary of America. The result of their collaboration was a 53-page typewritten catalogue, stored at SCUA along with the manuscripts themselves.

Cover page of the 1964 catalogue.

The manuscripts date to the 15th through 19th centuries and were all written in Yemen. Already in the late 15th century, within decades of the invention of movable type by Johannes Gutenberg, printers (especially in northern Italy) developed Hebrew font for the printing of Hebrew books. Throughout the 16th and 17th centuries, the printing of Hebrew books burgeoned, as the technology spread to main centers such as Salonika, Istanbul, Amsterdam, and Prague. With the new technology readily available throughout Europe and the Mediterranean basin, manuscripts became rarer and rarer (not only in the Jewish world, of course, but throughout book culture more generally).

The one main exception among Jewish communities was Yemen: due to both the relative poverty of the community and the geographical remoteness of the country, the printing press did not arrive until the 20th century. Hence, Yemenite Jewish scribes continued to copy by hand classical Jewish texts such as the Bible, the prayer book, and the Passover Haggadah. Our Robison Collection of Hebrew Manuscripts may constitute the best testimony to this practice in any library outside of Israel.

Enter the digital age, with more and more libraries digitizing their manuscript collections, with high-resolution images readily available for public inspection on the internet. Riding this wave, in 2014 the National Library of Israel (NLI) created “Ktiv: The International Collection of Digitized Hebrew Manuscripts,” in an effort to aggregate all Hebrew manuscripts at a single website. Eight years on, the project now has c. 600 partners (including Rutgers University), with c. 95,000 documents available in digital images.

Our involvement began in 2019, when Rutgers and the NLI signed an agreement, with the latter providing the funds for the digitalization of our Robison Collection. We moved quickly, hired Bruce White, photographer extraordinaire, arranged for library space to undertake the project, and completed the photographic record in January‒February 2020. The main result was c. 5000 images, using the best equipment possible – though note also the timing: we completed the project just weeks before the COVID-19 pandemic would cause the Rutgers campus to close in March 2020, with no further access to Alexander Library.

The pandemic caused some delay, but nonetheless work proceeded. Mr. White mailed an external hard drive containing all the images, all properly organized and labelled, to our colleagues in Jerusalem, and little by little they began to integrate the images into their database.

to be continued …

Updates to Services and Access to Materials

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We’re happy to report good news from Special Collections and University Archives: Improved access to our resources and expanded researcher hours and capacity. The main phase of moving our collections has been completed so most of our manuscript collections are accessible to patrons. We retained frequently used collection​s in Alexander Library and ​can provide access to the majority of material​ stored offsite. Retrieval does take longer than usual so advanced notice is required for appointments.

We have expanded ​our reading room hours and are now open Tuesday, Wednesday​, and Thursday 10 am -12:30 pm and 1:30 pm – 4 pm, by appointment only. Likewise, we look forward to increasing our reading room capacity by June, when we move to a larger space on the first floor of Alexander.

Please see the SC/UA Migration Project: Seeking Higher Ground web page for regular updates on our move.

If you have questions about availability of specific material or would like to make an appointment, please contact us.

SC/UA’s Limited Reopening

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Good news! On Tuesday, February 15th, Special Collections and University Archives will open a small Reading Room in Alexander Library. Initially the Reading Room will be open Tuesdays and Wednesdays, 10-12:30 , and 1:30-4. Advance appointments are required. Walk in patrons will not be admitted. Requests for material will take longer than usual and some material will not be available due to our ongoing collections move. Rare books, with the exception of 100 books, are inaccessible.

Up to two patrons–current Rutgers faculty, staff, and students only–can be accommodated at a time. These limits are based on the Return to Rutgers policies for visitor access and spacing and will be updated as Rutgers guidelines evolve. Please consult with an SC/UA faculty or staff member about scheduling an appointment.

Happy New Year from Special Collections & University Archives!

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George Street, looking north toward Albany Street, New Brunswick, 1888. New Jersey Views Photograph Collection.

As we return from the holiday break, we continue our collections move and prepare for the semester ahead.

We’d like to take a moment to remind readers of digital resources we have available while our services remain limited during our move.

Our Digital Resources Guide brings together all currently available Special Collections and University Archives (SC/UA) digitized materials, as well as digital resources outside of Rutgers that are related to our work and that we frequently use. Two new additions to the Guide are:

  • Personal Correspondence of the Rutgers College War Service Bureau, a project led by Digital Humanities Librarian Francesca Giannetti that features selected correspondence from the War Service Bureau, established in August 1917 to keep Rutgers students in contact with the college as well as with one another during the Great War. The correspondence has been transcribed, edited, and encoded by students of Rutgers–New Brunswick and Rutgers Future Scholars.
  • Digital Scriptorium is a consortium of American libraries and museums that makes pre-modern manuscript materials freely available online. SC/UA’s contributions include manuscript fragments, leaves, and bound volumes spanning the 9th through 16th centuries, nine countries, and seven languages, primarily Latin.

SC/UA’s Primary Source Highlights is a growing collection of high-resolution images and selected PDF’s that represent our rich holdings across our collecting areas. 

We are always working to digitize more materials, so check the Digital Resources Guide and Primary Source Highlights periodically for new additions.

Late December Move Update

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The commercial mover has now moved 973 linear shelf feet of SC/UA manuscripts and rare books from the Alexander subbasement to off-site storage. They have also moved 70 filing cabinets that include printed material, photographs, and maps into the New Jersey Reading Room that will be available onsite when SC/UA reopens. Packing and moving will continue through December 22 and begin again in January.

You can catch up on all of our move updates under “SC/UA Migration Project: Seeking Higher Ground.”

We wish you happy holidays and look forward to a return to reference services in 2022!

Phased Reopening of Special Collections & University Archives

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The ​phased reopening of SC/UA will begin January 10, 2022, with remote reference service being provided through ​the Libraries’ Ask a Librarian Service. ​Please be aware that the availability of research material will be limited and ​our response time will be longer than usual ​due to many collections being located off-site. When the SC/UA move is complete, ​which by the mover’s estimation will be in March ​2022, research visits for Rutgers patrons will resume by appointment-only. The Clifford Case room in Alexander Library will be used as a temporary reading room for patron visits.

Hurricane Ida and Changes to Our Services

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Special Collections and University Archives (SC/UA) closed the New Jersey Reading Room on October 1 to allow staff to work on flood recovery activities. The closure will remain in effect for the rest of the academic year.

Hurricane Ida severely impacted SC/UA, so we are taking these measures to ensure the long-term preservation of collections and improve the storage and research environment. No collections were destroyed but there was extensive flooding and damage to the storage areas necessitating moving 27,000 linear feet of collections to safety.

Remote reference, scanning, and instruction will temporarily close on October 15 as we prepare collections to move off-site. We anticipate that a large portion of our collections will be inaccessible for at least a year.

Our two top priorities are preserving our collections and providing access to them. As we secure the material, we are working to find ways to provide access to limited parts of our collections to enable research and instruction to continue. We’ll provide updates on access during renovation on our website and here on “What Exit?”

If you have questions, please contact us.

We apologize for this inconvenience and appreciate your patience and understanding.