Sinai Library Digitization Project
2018–present, St. Catherine’s Monastery of the Sinai, Egypt.
A collaboration of EMEL, St. Catherine’s Monastery of the Sinai, and the UCLA Library to digitize the Monastery’s unparalleled manuscript library (including the New Finds) and publish the resulting images online with searchable metadata. Donors include the Ahmanson Foundation, Arcadia, the Steinmetz Family Foundation, and the Museum of the Bible.
- Phase One: Arabic & Syriac (2018-2021)
The Monastery holds arguably the world’s most important collection of Christian Arabic manuscripts and one of the two most important collections of Syriac manuscripts. These preserve important contemporary evidence for the transmission of Greek classical learning into Arabic, fostering the “Golden Age of Islam,” which in turn influenced the reading of the classics in the West. - Phase Two: Greek, Georgian, Slavonic, and other languages (2021-2027)
The Monastery’s collection of Greek manuscripts is considered to be second only to that of the Vatican Library. The Monastery also preserves important and unique manuscripts in Georgian, Slavonic, and seven other languages. - Continuation of Palimpsest Imaging
Project plans include the resumption of the spectral imaging of palimpsests, continuing the first scientific imaging campaign of 2011-2016 (see Sinai Palimpsests Project below in “Past Projects”)