HERB - Parkinson's "Paradisi in Sole"

[Katherine Blackthorne]

>>Has anyone tried and
>>succeeded? Tried and failed?
>>
>
>The University of Texas at Austin keeps books like that in the humanities
>research center.  If you have a library card, you can see rare documents.
>They'll give you white gloves, set you down with a desk with padded book
>rests, and let you look.  I just came from an A&S competition where one lady
>was displaying a bound book, based directly off one she had handled at a
>local university.  Museum curators are generally approachable about looking
>at manuscripts and things as well.  Most places you can arrange for a
>private showing.
>
>-Magdalena

OK, so there I was, browsing in the antique book store I'd walked past a
million times.  As luck would have it, they were packing up to go "do a
show" that weekend, so there were boxes (and empty shelves) everywhere.  I
was very obviously drooling, not buying, but they encouraged me anyway.

Then, as I was leaving, one of the owners handed me a leather case and
said, "For the man who has everything."  I was afraid to touch the leather,
lest it disintigrate in my hands.

He explained that it was an Ethiopian Prayer Book, and helped me open the
complicated case.  (There were several steps and a trick involved.)  Then I
held the book in my hands.  I have never seen anything like it.  The pages
were obviously of some kind of parchment -- rather thick as I recall.  The
text (completely inintelligible to me) was very evenly spaced, and
obviously written over an evenly grooved surface, for you could still see
the marks on the pages.  There were "bookmarks" made by piercing the edges
of the pages and tying a piece of heavy thread.  You could see the details
of the hand-binding.
The estimate was it was made no *later* that 1700.

Katherine.


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