British Library Hebrew Treasures Reveal Interfaith Narratives: The Sana’a Pentateuch

19 June, 2023

We are deeply honoured to welcome Ilana Tahan OBE, Lead Curator of Hebrew and Christian Orient Collections, The British Library, to lead a session of the International Interfaith Reading Group on Manuscripts in Interfaith Contexts on British Library Hebrew Treasures Reveal Interfaith Narratives: The Sana’a Pentateuch.

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Here are the details of this fascinating session.

Topic: British Library Hebrew Treasures Reveal Interfaith Narratives: The Sana’a Pentateuch

Abstract: I will present an overview of the Hebrew manuscript collection at the British Library revealing interfaith narratives and influences. We will explore manuscripts showing Western Christian and Islamic influences focussing on specific exemplars, including the Sanaa Pentateuch.

Speaker: Ilana Tahan OBE, Lead Curator Hebrew and Christian Orient Collections, The British Library.

Speaker’s biography: Ilana Tahan, M.Phil., OBE has been educated at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, Israel, and at the Aston University, Birmingham, UK where she was awarded a Master of Philosophy degree. Ilana joined the British Library as Hebraica Curator in 1989. In 2002 she became Head of the Hebrew Section in charge of one of the finest Hebraic collections in the UK, comprising some 3,000 Hebrew manuscripts, c. 7,000 Genizah fragments and over 70,000 printed books. Since 2010 Ilana has been Lead Curator of Hebrew and Christian Orient Studies. In addition to being responsible for the significant British Library’s Hebraic collections, she also manages the Library’s Christian Orient collections which include the Armenian, Coptic, Ethiopian, Georgian and Syriac holdings. In 2009, Ilana was awarded the Order of the British Empire for services to scholarship. Between 2013 and 2020, Ilana acted as Lead of the Hebrew Manuscripts Digitisation Project, a large-scale challenging initiative aimed at making accessible online the entire Hebrew manuscript collection held in the British Library.
Some of Ilana’s important publications include:
The Brother Haggadah. A Medieval Sephardi Masterpiece in Facsimile. An illuminated
Passover compendium from mid-fourteenth-century Catalonia in the collections of the British
Library. London: Thames & Hudson, 2016. [with Marc M. Epstein, Raphael Loewe, Jeremy
Schonfield and Eliezer Laine]
Hebrew manuscripts: the power of script and image. London: The British Library, 2007.
Sacred: books of the Three Faiths Judaism, Christianity, Islam, ed. by John Reeve. London: The
British Library, 2007. [catalogue contributions with Colin F. Baker, Kathleen Doyle, Scot McKendrick,
Vrej Nersessian]
Memorial volumes to Jewish communities destroyed in the Holocaust: a bibliography of British Library holdings. Introduction by Sir Martin Gilbert. London: The British Library, 2004.
Treasures in focus at the British Library: Hebrew manuscripts produced in Yemen, Les Nouvelles Chroniques du manuscrit au Yémen (nCmY) NS n° 16 (n° 35) – Janvier 2023, 121-172 . http://www.cdmy.org/cmy/ncmy16_35.pdf
Judeo-Spanish manuscripts in the British Library’s Hebrew collection. European Judaism, v.43, no.2, 134-152
The Hebrew collection of the British Library: past and present. European Judaism, v. 41, no.2, 43-55,

Date: 19 June, 2023

Time: 18:00-19:00 BST | 19:00-20:00 CEST |10:00-11:00 PDT | 13:00-14:00 EDT

Venue: Online

PLEASE REGISTER HERE

After registering, you will receive a Zoom email containing information about joining the meeting. If you do not see the zoom email in your inbox, please, check your spam folder.

* If you would like to join the International Interfaith Reading Group on Manuscripts in Interfaith Contexts please register HERE.

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