Additional Manuscripts: Oriental manuscripts

Country

GB

Name of institution (official language of the state)

British Library

Language of name of institution

eng

Contact information: postal address

96 Euston Road, London NW1 2DB

Contact information: phone number

0044 (0)1937 546060 (Customer Services)

Contact information: web address

https://www.bl.uk/subjects/manuscripts-and-archives#

Contact information: email

mss@bl.uk

Reference number

Add MS

Type of reference number

Archival reference number

Title (official language of the state)

Additional Manuscripts: Oriental manuscripts

Language of title

eng

Creator / accumulator

British Library

Date note

bulk (Sephardic-related materials): 14th century/15th century

Language(s)

heb

por

spa

Type of material

Textual Material

Scope and content

The British Library preserves one of the most important Hebrew collections in the world, covering all facets of Hebrew literature and a wide range of religious and secular area studies. It includes around 3,000 manuscript volumes and approximately 7,000 manuscript fragments that are contained in several collections, including the Additional Manuscripts.
Among the Oriental manuscripts of this collection are several religious, biblical and liturgical works of Sephardic origin, such as the following:
MS Add. 14761: the "Barcelona Hagadah", dating from the 14th century.
MS Add. 15250: the "Duke of Sussex's Catalan Bible", a Hebrew and Aramaic Bible with Masorah Magna and Parva, dating from the third quarter of the 14th century.
MS Add. 15283: a Pentateuch produced in Lisbon, dating from 1475-1499.
MS Add. 15306: a Pentateuch with Masorah Magna and Parva, produced in Spain in the last quarter of the 14th or first quarter of the 15th century.
MS Add. 27089: a collection of legal and midrashic works, including the travel journey of Benjamin of Tudela.
MS Add. 27126: a Hebrew prayer book written in Sephardic semi-cursive script, produced in Spain in the second half of the 14th or first half of the 15th century.
MS Add. 27167: the "Almanzi Pentateuch", a Pentateuch with Haftarot and the Five Scrolls (Hamesh megillot), in Sephardic square script, produced in Lisbon in the third quarter of the 15th century
MS Add. 27210, fols. 1-101: the "Golden Haggadah", a Haggadah for Passover written in Sephardic square script, presumably produced in Barcelona in the second quarter of the 14th century.
MS Add. 18970: a Hebrew Grammar produced in Spain in the 15th century.

Archival history

The Additional Manuscripts collection of the British Library gathers a significant number of the Hebrew manuscripts held by the Library. The British Museum began acquiring these manuscripts over 200 years ago, either through purchase or donation. Since 1973, the British Library has continued to gather more and more Hebrew manuscripts to the collection already accumulated by the British Museum. Currently, the Hebrew collections held at the British Library comprise around 3,000 manuscript volumes and about 75,000 book titles, mostly in Hebrew, but also including works in other languages, such as Aramaic, Judeo-Arabic, Judeo-Italian, Judeo-Persian, Judeo-Spanish, Yiddish, among others. Additionally, the Britsh Library preserves around 7,000 manuscript fragments, mainly from the Cairo Genizah, nearly 1,000 Hebrew and Yiddish periodical and newspaper titles, and considerable numbers of manuscripts, printed books, and periodicals in microforms.

Sources:

British Library: Hebrew Illuminated Manuscripts

British Library: Hebrew collections

Administrative / Biographical history

The British Library was founded in 1973 in the sequence of the British Library Act. Several organisations were brought together to create a national library, including the British Museum.
The British Museum was created in 1753 as "one general repository" to hold the collections of Sir Hans Sloane, Sir Robert Cotton, and Robert and Edward Harley. When it inherited the library of George III in 1823, its printed books doubled in number, prompting a move to the site of the current British Museum. Opening in 1857, the British Museum Library’s Round Reading Room became an iconic destination in the literary landscape of London. The room welcomed many famous visitors including Charles Darwin, Charles Dickens, Karl Marx, George Bernard Shaw, and Virginia Woolf. During World War II, some of the British Museum Library's most precious treasures were moved to a secure cave in Aberystwyth, with round-the-clock guards.
The actual British Library's building in St Pancras opened its doors to the public in November 1997. The Library became the largest public building constructed in Britain in the last 100 years.
Over the last 250 years, the British Library has become one of the greatest libraries in the world. Its physical collections are growing all the time, and so are its digital collections, which include Digitised Manuscripts, the UK Web Archive, and over one million rights-free images.

(source: History of the British Library)