....were written between 1900 and 1927 and include translations of biblical and other Christian texts, letters, ethnographic texts, Nubian songs, travelogues, narratives, literacy and autobiographical material. More about the collection and its history: short-url.cc/1vPT1 @stabiberlin.bsky.social

...Rāhu's lower body became Ketu, while his immortal head pursues the Sun and Moon, attempting to devour them. These 2 shadow planets are worshipped like the other 7 in order to ward off negative influences. Miniature entitled: Śrīrāhudarśanam, shelfmark Hs. or. 2376. @stabiberlin.bsky.social

.....one can find lovingly decorated pages even in small manuscripts: @qalamos: qalamos.net/receive/DE1B... @stabiberlin.bsky.social

...but are merely attributed to him: qalamos.net/receive/MyMs... @stabiberlin.bsky.social The Śṛṅgerī Maṭh—the Southern of the tradition's four principal monasteries—was founded, according to tradition, by Śaṅkara himself. Photo by Anish Nellickal – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0.

Maps can also be admired online in #Qalamos, such as this beautiful Ottoman-Turkish atlas containing 50 nautical charts depicting the islands and coasts of the Mediterranean (shelfmark Diez A fol. 57: Kitāb-i Baḥriyye)..../1

..../2 A digital copy of the beautiful entire manuscript can be viewed on #Qalamos: qalamos.net/receive/DE1B... @stabiberlin.bsky.social

Some of these are copies of the first translations of Christian texts into the two South Indian languages and are therefore of great historical significance. /2

#Qalamos: Some beautiful ḥaräg (“vine” or “tendril”) ornaments from @stabiberlin’s Ethiopian manuscript collection. These ribbon-shaped ornaments often serve as headpieces: they decorate Ethiopian manuscripts and sometimes frame or divide the text. They vary widely in design. /1

/2 We hope that this beautiful Buddhist manuscript can be digitised in the future and thus made available to the public via #Qalamos, where the record can already be found: qalamos.net/receive/DE1B... @stabiberlin.bsky.social

Discover an illuminated Sinhalese palm-leaf manuscript bound between ebony covers (shelfmark Hs. or. 2389). It contains the "Vessantarajātakakāvyaya", a poetic adaptation of the "Vessantarajātaka" comprising 691 verses and 87 drawings, including three full-page illustrations and two colored ones. /1

.....who built and maintain the entire Qalamos infrastructure. The remaining phase 2 team members will be leaving #Qalamos at the end of September.

The photos feature team members from phases 1 (2020-2023) and 2 (2023-2026)—from @stabiberlin.bsky.social and the Bavarian State Library—as well as permanent Stabi staff members involved with #Qalamos, and, last but certainly not least, employees from Leipzig University Computing Centre..../2

A potluck farewell party for Team #Qalamos, phase 2: As the first Qalamos team member marks his final day of work today, an early farewell party was held yesterday. .../1

Last Monday, our colleagues Dr. Thoralf Hanstein and Dr. Yoones Dehghani Farsani introduced the Portal #Qalamos to students and staff members of the philological department of Diponegoro University (UNDIP) in Indonesia./1

Dreamsea (Digital Repository of Endangered and Affected Manuscripts in Southeast Asia) is a joint project of the Center for Islamic and Social Studies (PPIM) at the UIN Jakarta in cooperation with the University of Hamburg. /2

As part of the preparations for the cooperation with Dreamsea, Dr. Thoralf Hanstein virtually presented #Qalamos' work, specifically in the field of metadata management, at a workshop on manuscripts from Southeast Asia in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, on May 12, 2026. /1

On International Book Day, we celebrate the journeys of books across languages, cultures, and centuries. The #Qalamos portal opens a window into this world: bringing together digital copies of around 30,000 manuscript versions of books, spanning over 100 languages and 60 scripts.

#Qalamos is increasingly digitizing manuscripts from South Asian writing cultures, including this Nepalese manuscript with 22 miniatures (shelfmark Hs. or. 2376), which depict deities as well as figures from the Indian epic Mahābhārata. ..../1

Metadata regarding the #provenance of a handwritten document is also a central focus of the #Qalamos project and portal. The “Provenance” module (presented as "History of the object") contains metadata on an object’s history ideally in chronological order: From its creation to its current location.

Best wishes for the upcoming Easter holidays with this beautiful miniature of the Resurrection (#Qalamos shelfmark Minutoli 291, dated 1450, from the village of Harhoc near Lake Van). ..../1

The international project Midrash (Migrations of Textual and Scribal Traditions via Large-Scale Computational Analysis of Medieval Manuscripts in Hebrew Script) is pioneering for the analysis of the paleography and text recognition of #Hebrew_manuscripts. www.midrash.eu

...The work was printed on wove paper by the renowned Ismail Bei Gazprinsky (1851-1914) in Crimea. Permission to print was granted on October 20, 1898, in St. Petersburg, see #Qalamos: qalamos.net/receive/DE1B... @stabiberlin.bsky.social

Among the highlights: a 4th-century papyrus codex (shelfmark: Ms. or. fol. 3065; image above) with the Epistle of Clement to the Corinthians (acquired 1886), and a Proverbs codex with its rare original binding (shelfmark: Ms. or. oct. 978, image below). Read more: 👉 shorturl.at/AbK66

@stabiberlin.bsky.social preserves an important collection of 111 Coptic and 2 Old Nubian manuscripts. The collection began as early as 1677–1679, when the widow of orientalist Theodor Petraeus sold Coptic texts—mainly copies of biblical books and scholarly treatises—to the library.

The visitors from the Hindu temple were very knowledgeable, asked many interesting questions and were able to contribute a lot of interesting information. You can find the album's metadata and portrait online on #Qalamos: ..../3 qalamos.net/receive/DE1B...

.... the most important leader of the Marathas in the 17th century, who inflicted great damage on the Mughals and Deccan Sultanates.On this occasion, 6 other noteworthy or rare manuscripts were also shown. .../2

Last Friday, approximately 60 people from the #SriGaneshaHinduTemple, Berlin, visited #StabiBerlin in order to admire Shivaji Maharaj's precious Deccani painting portrait on the occasion of the annual celebration (Shiv Jayanti) in honour of Shivaji Maharaj, ....../1

The manuscript belongs to a collection of Indian manuscripts acquired by the Königliche Bibliothek in 1893 from the Indian merchant Bhagavandās Kevaldās (1850-1900). qalamos.net/receive/DE1B... @stabiberlin.bsky.social

The #Qalamos team wishes everyone a Happy Valentine's Day on Feb. 14th! 💘The following illustrations show various romantic scenes from #manuscripts from Iranian and Indian writing cultures💝 #HappyValentine (left to right) fig. 1: shorturl.at/XfJKy fig. 2: shorturl.at/ZC6F6 fig. 3: shorturl.at/Hg7cG

Provenance research data regarding the ownership and chain of custody contained in manuscripts are included in the #Qalamos metadata, if available. The catalogue "Singhalesische Handschriften" by H. Bechert... /1 @stabiberlin.bsky.social