The present study offers a comparative evaluation of the performance of different AI-based digital tools for handwritten text recognition (HTR) on historical manuscripts and prints. The focus is on generic models capable of transcribing a range of texts in a similar script. The training dataset for these comprises Old Cyrillic ustav and poluustav manuscripts, on the one hand, and early Glagolitic printed books, on the other. We give an overview of the performance statistics for the HTR platforms Transkribus and eScriptorium as well as for the command-line tool Calamari. In each case, we additionally offer a close, qualitative analysis of select examples in order to convey a sense of the models’ real-world performance. In this way, our study supplies comparative data on the respective capabilities of these technologies that ought to be of interest to scholars working with them in digital humanities projects.

The article discusses theoretical and practical issues of creating tools for demonstrating medieval Slavonic text corpus at the “Manuscript” website (http:// manuscripts.ru/). The specific features of the historical corpus and its sources are: the limited number of manuscripts, variability of medieval graphics and orthography, complex structure, and composition of original documents. They require special instruments and techniques for data preparation (information about a text and its physical media, analytical tagging of fragments, variability, and other), and visualization of data sampling, including texts. The article focuses on the ways of solving two opposite tasks: the texts’ demonstration in a form as close as possible to the original and their simplified form, and, consequently, the possibilities of their transformation. The first task should be solved by preparing a transcription via a specialized editing tool, which interacts with the full-text database with a complete set of required characters, text formatting, and make-up to fit the original page. To solve the second problem, analytical tagging (chapters and verses, authors of texts, structure of manuscript, main text and marginalia, and so forth) and linguistic tagging (including lemmatization) are performed to make data search and data transformation available when displayed. The latter allows users to see a text in modern Cyrillic or Latin, syllables, meaning of analytical fragments, links between the main text and its marginalia, and so forth. The ability to data search based on deep tagging and the digital edition (LIM, MS 37, 13th c., 291 f.) which has been included in the “Manuscript” historical corpus (http://manuscripts.ru/mns/main?P_TEXT=94065041&p_lang=EN).

The earliest attestation of the Slavonic translation of the Scala Paradisi is not furnished by the excerpts in the Simeonov Sbornik, but by those in the Scaliger Patericon, which can reliably be dated before the removal of library resources from Pliska to Preslav, i.e. ‘after 887 but before 893’. It contains 59 excerpts (ca. 1210 words) from twelve chapters (1 through 30), which provide a convenient base to examine the relationship of versions a and b of the translation. Both versions have protographs written in Glagolitic, which discredits the claim that version b be a 14th century Athonite work. Both versions vary in 21%, but share 79% of the text, i.e. one of them served as an exemplar for the other. The proposal to consider a co–author of 21% is based on the following: a corrects deficiencies in b, but b not in a; recurrent variation shows patterning in a, not in b; a is ignorant of Cyrillo–Methodian monastic terminology. The most probable dating of a is to ‘before 887’ and of b correspondingly to ‘before a’.

No Horologion (“Book of the Hours”) has survived in the Old Church Slavonic corpus. Since early Russian sources, however, tend to retain South Slavic liturgical traditions, the authors attempt to reconstruct such a book for daily prayer on the basis of Russian manuscripts from the 13th–14th centuries. A key factor in the reconstruction are the so-called kata stichon hymns, an archaic genre of Byzantine hymnography used for night prayer. The authors analyze the text and meter of these hymns, including one hymn originally composed in Slavonic in imitation of the Byzantine genre, and argue that the later Russian sources reflect an Horologion translated in Bulgaria in the late 9th or early 10th century.

The current Bulgarian-Austrian project on the investigations of the manuscript Zograf No. 105 and its fragment No. 3070

Muz. 3070 (Russian State Library) includes a portion of the lost Grigorovič manuscript of the Life of Stefan Lazarević, which was removed from Zogr. 105 (previously 151) by Grigorovič during his 1844 visit to the Zograph monastery.

The Slavic text of the Ohrid chrysobull of 1273 in Muz. 3070 (Russian State Library) represents a translation by a Slav with a poor understanding of the original Greek.

The paper represents edition and introductionary words about the copy of the Proverbs of Solomon as found in the Slavic manuscript No 105 from the Zograf monastery of Mount Athos. The text is compared with the earliest Slavic copies of Prophetologia and the full text of this Old Testament book. The paper discusses the contents and structure of this copy. A conclusion is made that this is a draft copy of the Slavic text of Proverbs, com

The paper discusses a medieval South Slavonic text referring to the Book of Daniel in the framework of the Chronicle of Johannes Zonaras contained in manuscript No. 105 which is kept in Zograf Monastery. The author believes that this Slavonic version of the Chronicle was compiled by Konstantin Kostenečki. The author compares the version of the Book of Daniel in the Zograf manuscript with older Slavonic translations and versions of the Book of Daniel known to him to highlight the differences and the specific Constantine’s approach that is somewhat unique for this book from the Bible. This comparison makes it evident that Zograf 105 preserves a unique version of this biblical book which is not known to medieval Bulgarian and Greek written traditions. The juxtaposition is carried out on structural and lexical levels.

A 16th c. manuscript of truly remarkable content is kept at the Russian State Archive of Ancient Acts (RGADA) – No 88, Op. 1, Obolensky Collection (f. 201). It includes an excerpt of the Life of Stefan Lazarević by Konstantin Kostenečki and a Rodoslov (Genealogy) of the Serbian rulers designed as a Loza Nemanjića-type family tree scheme. The genealogical work replicates part of the facts from the hagiographic one, but complements the vita and enriches the information it provides. The excerpt from the Life of Stefan Lazarević is an account about the rulers of the Nemanjić dynasty, from Stefan Nemanja to Uroš V and from Vukan to Stefan Lazarević. The Genealogy does not overlap with any of the known Serbian chronicles. It has a larger chronological scope and deals with the so-called second branch, which is presented briefly in most related texts. While the hagiographical part talks about the descendants of Stefan Prvovenčani (the “First-Crowned”), the second part emphasizes the descendants of his brother Vukan. There are included those representatives of the dynasty who were rulers or wives of rulers. Considered as a whole, the two texts show a different conception of power and this distinguishes them from other Serbian Genealogies.

The publication brings into scholarly circulation the recently identified interpretation of the liturgy under the title Протль лургїи, и црк҃ви, и чи́н сщ҃енничьском, which is known in two manuscripts of Serbian origin, 16th century: RGADA 88 (84r – 87r) and in Bogisic 52 (122v21, 133r-v, 124r-v. Based on specific differences in the text, it has been established that the work is a summary translation of the treatise ‘Ἑρμηνεία περὶ τοῦ θείου ναοῦ’ by the Byzantine theologian Simeon of Thessalonica (1381/1387–1429). The Slavic translator did not leave his name. It is assumed that the prototype of the codices is a medieval Serbian manuscript from the first half of the 15th century, created in the circle of scribes under the patronage of the despot Stefan Lazarević and that Konstantin Kostenečki, also called the Philosopher, made the translation of the text. He was a Bulgarian intellectual in exile, who worked in the court of the mentioned despot. The main argument in favour of this assumption is that the interpretation of the liturgy in the two collections appears in the context of works confirmed in paleo-Slavic studies as coming from the pen of Constantine.

The oldest Romanian translations of the work of St. Symeon the New Theologian circulated in two ways: a corpus of 24 discourses and in a fragmentary form. The first one consists of 6 Catechesis, 16 Hymns, 62 Practical and Theological Chapters and the Pseudo-simeonian Method of prayer. Six sermons and the Method survive in the oldest Romanian manuscript: Prodromos No. 1 (3674), issued in 1766. These were selected from the newly translated corpus of the 24 slovo, as attested by Staretz Basil of Poiana Mărului’s letter of 1766 to his apprentice Alexios. According to the same letter, the work of St. Symeon had been already known to the monks from Poiana Mărului Skete (Buzău county) but in a fragmentary form. This is a different translation produced, therefore, ante 1766. The oldest Romanian manuscript that preserves this translation is Rom. MS Slatina Monastery II-1 from 1763. In this case, the manuscript witnesses a process of selecting excerpts from some of the Catechesis, Hymns and Practical Chapters.

Iskra Hristova-Šomova at 65

In Memoriam Georgi Popov (1943–2023)

In Memoriam Elena Tomova (1947–2023)

Риккардо Пиккио: гражданин наднациональной Respublica litterarum. К столетию со дня его рождения (Riccardo Picchio: a citizen of the supranational Respublica Litterarum. To the centenary of his birth)

Das 100-jährige Jubiläum von Rudolf Aitzetmüller (The 100th anniversary of Rudolf Aitzetmüller)

Book Review: Ива Трифонова. Ръкописната традиция на Книга Откровение сред южните славяни. Част I: Сръбският препис от края на XIV в. София: Кирило-Методиевски научен център, 2022

Book Review: Žagar, Mateo. Introduction to Glagolitic Palaeography (Empirie und Theorie der Sprachwissenschaft 4). Heidelberg: Universitäts verlag Winter, 2021. 542 pp. ISBN 978-3-8253-4608-9

Book Review: Пенкова, Бисерка, Веселина Йончева, Георги Геров, Емануел Мутафов, Иван Ванев, Майа Захариева, Маргарита Куюмджиева, Мария Колушева, Цвета Кунева. Корпус на стенописите от ХVІ век в България. Под ред. на Бисерка Пенкова. София: Институт за изследване на изкуствата – БАН, 2022

Book Review: Христова, Боряна, Елисавета Мусакова, Искра Христова-Шомова. Славянски и гръцки ръкописи в Регионален исторически музей – Ловеч. София: Издателство „Логис,“ 2022

Book Review: Kriza, Ágnes. Depicting Orthodoxy in the Russian Middle Ages. The Novgorod icon of Sofia, the Divine Wisdom. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2022. 384 pp., 105 figs. ISBN 9780198854302

Book Review: Rapp, Claudia et al. Mobility and Migration in Byzantium: A Sourcebook (Moving Byzantium 1). Eds. Claudia Rapp, Johannes Preiser-Kapeller. Vienna University Press, 2023. 500 pp. ISSN: 2940-3529, ISBN: 978-3-7370-1341-3, ISBN Print: 9783847113416, ISBN E-Lib: 9783737013413

Book Review: Rigo, Antonio, Мarco Scarpa. La Vita di Romylos da Vidin asceta nei Balcani (1310 ca. – 1376/1380) (Subsidia Hagiographica 99). Bruxelles: Société des Bollandistes, 2022. XI+233 pp., 1 map, ill. ISBN: 9782873650384

Book Review: Попова, Татьяна. Г. Первый славянский перевод Лествицы Иоанна Синайского. Москва – Санкт-Петербург: Нестор-История, 2020. 320 pp. ISBN: 978-5- 4469-1705-1

Book Review: Златанова, Румяна. Книги на пророците Осия, Софония, Агей, Захария и Малахия в старобългарски превод (Диалог и духовност 9). София: TEMTO, 2022. 392 pp. ISBN 978-954-9566-94-9

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