The Syriac Galen Palimpsest by Pormann, Peter Ernst;

Short description:

This volume explores the Syriac Galen Palimpsest from the vantage point of numerous disciplines.

Long description:

This volume explores the Syriac Galen Palimpsest, containing On Simple Drugs by Galen of Pergamum (129–216) from the vantage point of numerous discipline. Greek scholars analyses the source text and argue that the Syriac translation can help improve the Greek text and help us understand it. Syriacists and Arabists then explore the subsequent tradition and argue that later texts who excerpted the Syriac translation, can be used to reconstitute this translation, as they offer indirect evidence. Conservators and scientists detail the methodologies used to decipher the erased undertext, and finally there is a preface to the digital edition of the Syriac translation, as well as two further articles exploring machine learning and the traditional paradigm of describing Greek-Syriac-Arabic translation technique. The volume as a whole shows what can be achieved when colleagues from different disciplines come together to decipher an unreadable text and allow us to see the invisible.

Table of Contents:

List of Figures Notes on Contributors

Introduction PETER E. PORMANN

Proem The Syriac Galen Palimpsest in the Context of the History of Medicine VIVIAN NUTTON

Galen’s Simple Drugs in Greek The Contribution of the Syriac Translation to the Edition of Galen’s Simple Drugs and Foodstuffs VÉRONIQUE BOUDON-MILLOT

Clarification and Systematisation in Pharmacology: Galen, Simple Drugs, books 1–5, with a Note on the Greek Tradition JOHN WILKINS

Battling the Empiricists: Blood, Vipers, and The Fragments of Xenocrates of Aphrodisias CAROLINE PETIT

The Syriac and Arabic Traditions of Simple Drugs The Enigma of Who Translated Galen’s Simple Drugs, Book 9, into Syriac NAIMA AFIF, PETER E. PORMANN, AND NATALIA SMELOVA

Galen’s Simple Drugs in the Syriac Alchemical Tradition MATTEO MARTELLI

Simple Drugs in the Medical Handbook (Kunnāšā) by Īšōʿ bar ʿAlī (ninth century): In Pursuit of ‘Old’ and ‘New’ Sources GRIGORY KESSEL

Studies on a Tabular Summary of Galen’s Simple Drugs ascribed to Ḥunayn FABIAN KÄS

Establishing the Syriac Text of Galen’s Simple Drugs: Editorial Technique and Practical Principles PETER E. PORMANN, NAIMA AFIF, SIAM BHAYRO, WILLIAM SELLERS, AND NATALIA SMELOVA

Conserving and Imaging the Syriac Galen Palimpsest Integrating Imaging Technologies to Reveal the Unseen in the Syriac Galen Palimpsest: Exploring the Syriac Galen Palimpsest MICHAEL B. TOTH

A Tale of Two Palimpsests: The Role of Conservation in Revealing the Lost Words of Archimedes and Galen ABIGAIL QUANDT

X-ray Fluorescence Imaging of the Syriac Galen Palimpsest UWE BERGMANN ET AL.

New Perspectives Studying the Syriac Medical Traditions: the Mesopotamian and Classical Greek Legacies SIAM BHAYRO

The Alexandrian Tradition: New Discoveries of Gesius’ Galenic Commentaries in Syriac NAIMA AFIF, PETER E. PORMANN, AND NATALIA SMELOVA

Using Machine Learning Techniques to Improve the Legibility of the Undertext in Palimpsest Studies WILLIAM I. SELLERS

Final Reflections SEBASTIAN BROCK

Bibliography Index locorum General Index