one of my favorite people wrote one of my favorite recent reads. can't recommend it enough!

GenAut research trip | Our colleague Maria S. Thomas @dekayra.bsky.social at Deir al-Surian for manuscript work. Here are some photos!

Cairo peeps: I'm giving a talk for the CEDEJ and Institut français d’archéologie orientale - Ifao on May 10th. Join us if you can! www.ifao.egnet.net/recherche/ma...

This wonderful conference in Rome starts Wednesday! Looking forward to present some glimpses of my favourite biblical manuscript(s)!

The time has finally come: Here is the first volume of Julien Ogereau’s “Epigraphical Commentary on the New Testament,” focusing on 1 Thessalonians: available via Open Access and packed with new insights: www.mohrsiebeck.com/buch/1-thess... #epigraphy #1Thessalonians

Tomorrow!!!

#NewPublication #OpenAccess #Syriac #ChristianEast www.degruyterbrill.com/document/isb...

GenAut research trip | A few snapshots from these weeks' manuscript work in Oxford and Cambridge.

We've launched the website for our 'Coptic in Manchester: Connecting Manuscripts and Communities' UKRI-funded project ('26–28) with @thejohnrylands.bsky.social ! Please share! sites.google.com/view/coptici...

Reminder! We hope that you can join us tomorrow evening for Prof. Drpić's talk ! April 6 • 🕔 5:15 PM EST Attend either in-person on the sixth floor of Penn's Van Pelt Library, or remotely on Zoom. (See pennmaterialtexts.org for details.)

Proofs day for A Workshop of Eloquence: A Collection of Gazan Literature from Late Antiquity! I'm grateful to be working with DAK University Press in Bethlehem and a Gazan Arabic translator to offer an introduction and selection of translated texts by, from, and about late ancient Gaza.

Tomorrow!

GenAut recording | Philipp Pilhofer, "The Circle of Barnabas: Generative Authority in Cypriot Hagiography" The online seminar: genaut.univie.ac.at?page_id=671

Tomorrow ! GenAut online seminar | Philipp Pilhofer (Vienna), "The Circle of Barnabas. Generative Authority in Cypriot Hagiography" Tuesday, 24 March (10 AM CET). See you there! •Followers of the Apostles in Cultic Contexts• genaut.univie.ac.at

New release 📚 The Martyrdom of Polycarp: Translation, Introduction, and Commentary 📜 N. Clayton Croy's magnum opus provides a detailed introduction and a section-by-section commentary on the earliest, full-length narrative of an early Christian martyrdom. Read it here: brill.com/display/ti...

Rounding off this busy week, I’m looking forward to presenting this year’s Peake Lecture with my friend and colleague Samuel Hildebrandt tomorrow on our current research: ‘From Miriam to the Magdalene: Women Witnesses in the Bible and Beyond’ (no points for guessing which bit I’ll be covering!).

Please join us on Thursday 26 March at 10 am CET for the next TeTra talk by Julia Schwarzer (KU Leuven): "A Mischievous Manuscript or Infidel Rule Reimagined: Julian in Coptic Sources"

This has been out a little while but it only just landed on my doormat - containing a little chapter I wrote on my OGs (Deleuze and Guattari). Congratulations to the editors! 📘

This is great news for late antiquity: top journal turns full Open Access. Way to go, Zeitschrift für Antikes Christentum! More info here: www.degruyterbrill.com/.../10.../za...

New article about Chalcedonian Armenians in eleventh-century Byzantium! Open Access: austriaca.at?arp=0x00416251

Check out "Miss Piggy and the Pretty Woman of Proverbs 11:22: Beauty, Animality, and Gender" by Anne Létourneau in Ask the Animals: Developing a Biblical Animal Hermeneutic edited by Arthur W. Walker-Jones, Suzanna R. Millar. buff.ly/USlwpnC #WomensHistorySBL26

🎉The first 3 books have now published in The Islamicate East series, edited by @arezouazad.bsky.social, Hugh Kennedy and Teresa Bernheimer🎉 @invisibleeast.bsky.social Find out more at edinburghuniversitypress.com/series-the-i...

So, here's the article I have out as of today and it's #OpenAccess. It deals with one of the earliest Christian Arabic scribal workshops in the Sinai monastery, where many of the mss produced there have been preserved to this day. In this 🧵 I do a quick rundown of the most important findings. 1/n

Since it's still Library Lovers' Month, you might as well expand your collection by learning about other collections!

If you're in Vienna next week, this is a very interesting conference.

#NewPublication #OpenAccess #ChristianEast #ManuscriptStudies #BookHistory #ArabicBible “Monastic Literature in Early Islamic Palestine and Sinai: Manuscripts, Scribes, Translators, Authors, and Later Readers”, COMSt Bulletin Special Issue, ed. by Adrian C. Pirtea

A TeTra paper by @dekayra.bsky.social tomorrow!

GenAut talks | Maria S. Thomas, "Publishing in a Twelfth-Century Syriac Monastery: Manuscript Production, Authority, and Scribal Practice at the Monastery of Mary Magdalene in Jerusalem," Thursday 26 February, online. @dekayra.bsky.social.

I see "Western Civilisation" is back in the discourse and I'd love to do a thread all about it but... I have no time this week so maybe read my book instead? All good bookshops etc... uk.bookshop.org/p/books/all-...

Conference Announcement! Sanctity and Ritual Remembrance: Comparative Approaches to Christian Liturgical Memory from Medieval Iberia to Central Asia ÖAW, Vienna | 5–6 March 2026

Congrats to our collaborators @worldlyscribe.bsky.social, Giorgia Nicosia, @madalinatoca.bsky.social, and Adrian Pirtea for their articles in the newly published thematic issue of the Journal of Eastern Christian Studies (co-edited by Marion). Several in Open Access! brill.com/view/journal...

The first talk of this years online seminar: Jakob Engberg, "The Care for the Remains of Polycarp in the Martyrdom of Polycarp in its Second Century Context." Tuesday, 17 February (10 AM CET) •Followers of the Apostles in Cultic Contexts• genaut.univie.ac.at

Read Nabataean!

Next week we are hosting another paper, this time by Nicolas Atas (KU Leuven) on Syriac lexica! Tune in on Thursday 5 Feb at our regular time of 10 AM CET. As always, don't forget to register w/ @andyhilkens.bsky.social if you're not yet on our mailing list!

We're thrilled to share with you the programme for the 2026 online seminar of the project! The series is curated by our colleague Maria S. Thomas (@dekayra.bsky.social). All welcome! Let us know if you'd like to add you to the email list. genaut.univie.ac.at/?page_id=671

We have now a bsky page for the Vienna project, which just announced the 2026 online seminar. Check it out, it's a nice series of talks – organised by @dekayra.bsky.social.

My (free) website for learning to read from Greek manuscripts is available. Still some tweaks to be made but it’s ready with 12 lessons, tips and hints, downloadable reports if you use it for a class, and links to lots of resources. Please share and give feedback! xeirographa.com

today’s the day!!

it’s officially book promo time! so, hey, i wrote this book; it comes out in a week! would you mind signal boosting and asking your library to buy it? if you’d like a copy, the code AUFLY30 will get you 30%off.

Attend: A Short History of the Entanglement between Syriac and Armenian Christianities, lecture by Andy Hilkens, Princeton University, November 13, 2025, 4:30–6:00 PM maryjahariscenter.org/blog/a-short...

Later today (at 1pm CET): Chance Bonar (Virginia), "Onesimus: Apostle and Martyr in Eastern Mediterranean Literature"

Since we mourn for the dead and fight like hell for the living, I’m bumping my thread about how from my perspective as a former Junior Olympic level track runner, this “fairness” transphobia is fucking bullshit blacksky.community/profile/did:...

A reminder that we have no colloquium event this week! However, our affiliated program, the Philadelphia Seminar on Christian Origins, is holding a book event on Zoom with Prof. Ellen Muehlberger (Michigan) from 6:30–8:00 pm on Thursday, Oct. 30. Details here: rels.sas.upenn.edu/events/2025/...

🗣️ PLEASE SHARE 🗣️ I'm writing an intro & sourcebook on late ancient Gazan literature for Dar al-Kalima University Press. The press and I plan to produce an Arabic translation to make Gazan literature more accessible to Palestinians. Help me compensate the Gazan translator! spot.fund/dn8t744sc

In today's post, Ephrem Aboud Ishac writes about using #AI to visually reconstruct and complete partially damaged or fragmented #Syriac manuscripts, exploring its benefits and the ethical obligations involved. 🔗 digitalorientalist.com/2025/10/21/s...

Also next week!

It’s hard to overstate how important these resources are!

Mind-numbing how many layers of history there can be to a single manuscript page: Syriac upper text (10th c.), Armenian undertext (pre-10th c.), Arabic material used for binding (11-12th c.?), Coptic foliation in the margin (date?), modern foliation at the bottom. Image: Leiden UL Or. 14236, link ⬇️