-
Title
-
Service Book
-
Institution
-
University Library, Cambridge
-
Collection Title
-
Ethiopian Manuscripts
-
Creator(s)
-
Unknown
-
Description/Scope and Content
-
This work is a typical example of a privately-owned Ethiopian service book containing hymns and prayers arranged for the hours. Several coloured images are inserted towards the beginning and end of the codex, with miscellaneous common service texts and other readings in between. Images appear on f. 4r (Daniel in the lion's den, St. George and the dragon, Virgin and child with angels and a priest, and Täklä Haymanot and the dragon) and f. 95v (the Crucifixion). According to a note on the inside front cover, William Simpson, an illustrator for the Illustrated London News, bought it from an Ethiopian during the Napier Expedition as the troops returned to Aden after the defeat of Tewodros II: “This book of Devotion, 350 or 400, years old, I bought from an Abyssinnian [sic], at the tent door, during the return march from Magdala, 1868”. The seller may have been either Waldä Giyorgis or Śarḍa Māryām; both names appear in the manuscript.
-
Date
-
18th cent.
-
Identifier
-
Add. 3682
-
Language
-
Ethiopic language
-
Extent
-
95 ff. Leaf height: 14.0 cm, width: 10.2 cm.
-
Collection Type
-
Special Collection
-
Level of Processing
-
Catalogued - FIHIRST & digitised on CUDL
-
Type of Materials/Format
-
Codex
-
Related Collections: Types of Materials
-
Islamic Manuscripts - Ethiopian Manuscripts
-
Presevation/Conservation concerns
-
Digitised - fragile
-
Provenance
-
Ethiopia
-
Copyright
-
Out of copyright
-
Donor Information
-
The manuscript was purchased by William Simpson
-
Notes
-
Binding: Boards are partly covered with stamped leather. Has linen chemise with ‘tail’ that extends to cover the exposed edges of the text block. No endbands. Pictorial inserts at front and back – not original. For more details contact the Near & Middle Eastern Specialist
