“The books of Abyssinia are bound in the usual way, sometimes in red leather, and sometimes in wooden boards, which are occasionally elaborately carved in rude and coarse devices: they are then enclosed in a case, tied up with leather thongs; to this case is attached a strap for the convenience of carrying the volume over the shoulders, and by these straps the books were hung to the wooden pegs, three or four on a peg, or more if the books were small: their usual size was that of a small, very thick quarto.”
The labour required to write an Abyssinian book, it is said, is
“immense, and sometimes many years are consumed in the preparation of a single volume. They are almost all written upon skins; the only one not written upon vellum that I have met with is in my possession; it is on charta bombycina. The ink which they use is composed of gum, lamp-black, and water. It is jet black, and keeps its colour for ever. Indeed, in this respect, all oriental inks are infinitely superior to ours, and they have the additional advantage of not being corrosive or injurious either to the pen or paper. Their pen is the reed commonly used in the East, only the nib is made sharper than that which is required to write the Arabic character. The ink-horn is usually the small end of a cow’s horn, which is stuck into the ground at the feet of the scribe ... seated upon the ground, the square piece of thick greasy vellum is held upon the knee, or on the palm of the left hand. The Abyssinian alphabet consists of eight times twenty-six letters, two hundred and eight characters in all; and these are each written distinctly and separately, like the letters of an European printed book. They have no cursive writing; each letter is therefore painted, as it were, with the reed-pen, and as the scribe finishes each, he usually makes a horrible face, and gives a triumphant flourish with his pen. Thus he goes on letter by letter, and before he gets to the end of the first line he is probably in a perspiration, from his nervous apprehension of the importance of his undertaking. One page is a good day’s work; and when he has done it, he generally, if he is not too stiff, follows the custom of all little Arab boys, and swings his head or his body from side to side, keeping time in a sort of nasal recitative, without the help of which it would seem that few can read even a chapter of the Koran, although they may know it by heart.”
The habitudes of Eastern nations undergo so little change in the lapse of ages that, probably, these descriptions of things as they are now, would differ little from a similarly graphic account of the same operations, dated a thousand years back. Where the arts of life remain in their rude state, all those operations which depend upon them continue nearly the same. We may infer this from the identity of many implements and tools, such as are now seen in Museums, with those at present in use in the same countries; and the same inference is warranted by what we meet with in the illuminations of ancient manuscripts, which often exhibit the usages and methods of common life; just as we see those of China displayed in the decorations of its potteries, and its screens.
“The paint-brush used by the illuminators of Egypt is made by chewing the end of a reed till it is reduced to filaments, and then nibbling it into a proper form: the paint-brushes of the ancient Egyptians were made in the same way; and excellent brooms for common purposes are made at Cairo by beating the thick end of a palm-branch till the fibres are separated from the pith; the part above, which is not beaten, becoming the handle of the broom. The Abyssinian having nibbled and chewed his reed till he thinks it will do, proceeds to fill up the spaces between the inked outlines with his colours; ... the colours are mixed up with the yolk of an egg, and the numerous mistakes and slips of the brush are corrected by a wipe from a wet finger or thumb, which is generally kept ready in the artist’s mouth during the operation; and it is lucky if he does not give it a bite in the agony of composition, when, with an unsteady hand, the eye of some famous saint is smeared all over the nose by an unfortunate swerve of the nibbled reed.”
These descriptions of the oriental literary craft, may perhaps fail to bring before us what might have been witnessed in the copying-room of a Greek monastery a thousand years ago; but as to the technical part of the operation it was not even then in a much higher state of efficiency. For it appears that copies executed in what, to Europeans, seems the rudest manner—as to apparatus, and implements, and accommodation—are often of great beauty—the patient skill and adroitness of the scribe and artist, who is never hurried in his work, making up for the deficiencies of his appointments.
Mr. Curzon’s explorations in these Nitrian monasteries, although not the first that had been made by European travellers and scholars, had the effect of drawing the attention of learned persons afresh towards them; and the result has been to bring to light very many literary treasures which otherwise must soon have fallen into a state of irrecoverable decay. Of these restored treasures, a very remarkable example has just now come before the world; and the reader may inspect it, if he has the opportunity to take in hand a sumptuous quarto, entitled, “Remains of a very ancient Recension of the Four Gospels in Syriac, hitherto unknown in Europe; discovered, edited, and translated by William Cureton, D.D., &c., 1858.”
The account which the learned editor gives of this volume agrees well with that idea of the course of things in the Nitrian monasteries which has been brought before us in Mr. Curzon’s descriptions of what he found there. From his Preface we learn that—
“The manuscript from which the text of the Fragments of the Gospels contained in this volume has been printed, was one of those obtained in the year 1842, by Archdeacon Tattam, from the Syrian monastery, dedicated to St. Mary Deipara, Mother of God, in the valley of the Natron lakes. It consisted of portions of three ancient copies, bound together to form a volume of the Four Gospels, with a few leaves in a more recent hand, added to make up the deficiencies.”
A note added to the last leaf of the volume is such as is commonly found at the end of similar manuscripts. In it the copyist dedicates his labour to the glory of the Holy Trinity, and commends himself to the prayers of those who may read it—these rendered efficacious through the prayers of “the Mother of God, and of all the saints continually.” This note bears date in the year 1533 of the Greek reckoning, which corresponds with the year 1221 A.D. The leaf upon which this note occurs, and which contains some verses of St. Luke’s Gospel, is a palimpsest vellum, “which was formerly a part of a manuscript of the sixth or seventh century, and originally contained a portion of the first chapter of St. Luke, in Syriac.”