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The Hill Museum & Manuscript Library (HMML) photographs, catalogs, & provides access to manuscripts—partnering with more than 1,500 libraries worldwide to preserve & share handwritten history. Learn more: hmml.org

HMML August 7, 2026 Manuscript Witnesses to the Assyrian and Armenian Genocides Josh Mugler, Curator of Easter Christian and Islamic Manuscripts Pictured: a manuscript digitized in the collection of the Chaldean Catholic Church, Patriarchate of Baghdad, in Baghdad, Iraq. View online in HMML Reading Room (CPB 00180): vhmml.org/readingRoom/view/139280
Pictured: a Syriac evangelion in the collection of the Church of the Forty Martyrs, Mardin, Turkey. View online in HMML Reading Room (CFMM 00037): vhmml.org/readingRoom/view/123211
In-person event. Ethiopian Cultural Day. Saturday, August 8, 12-5 p.m. (CT), Saint Paul, Minnesota Mahibere Kidusan, the Saint Paul Public Library-Highland Park branch, and HMML for a fun, hands-on, celebration of Ethiopian culture! (logos) Pictured: a Miracles of Mary manuscript in the collection of Gunda Gundē Monastery, Tegrāy Province, Ethiopia. View the full manuscript in HMML Reading Room (GG 00043): vhmml.org/readingRoom/view/600786
Hindu ascetics from the Thrissur monastic order. Photograph by Olga Nowicka (Thrissur, 2025).
In-Person Event. "Beyond the Book: Ethiopian Books." Saturday, August 15 at 9 a.m. (CT), Minneapolis, Minnesota Experience HMML manuscripts alongside the book bindings of Islam Aly, a visiting artist at the Minnesota Center for Book Arts. Register for this free event at HMML.org
Illuminated Mashtotsʻ, copied in Artskē, Kajberunik‘, Eastern Turkey (modern-day Adilcevaz, Turkey), in the year 1432, by priest Karapet. (PCA 00062)
Dr. Ushus K. Unnikrishnan, a researcher in the DiPiKA project, surveys the manuscripts of the Tantra Vidyā Pīṭham collection in Aluva. Photograph by Hugo David (2024).
Passenger list dated 1800 (NAMCLV 00001)
Illuminated Gospel manuscript from Constantinople, Turkey, copied by T‘okhats‘i Mk‘ayēl in 1659 (AMKS 00016, fol. 223r)
A text on the Sufi orders by ʻUthmān al-Ṭabbāʻ, written in Gaza in 1907 CE, with a note and seals of approval by his teacher Aḥmad Bisīsū. (EOH 00023)
Exhibition. Lost and Found in Translation. A new exhibition on the challenges of translation and the connections it fosters. View at HMML in Collegeville, Minnesota, and online at hmml.org/exhibitions.
The manuscript was completed on February 5, 1780 CE, and the fact that it was copied by a monk within a monastery suggests it was intended for the monastery's library. An adjacent note to the colophon bears the seal of the superior general of the Lebanese Maronite Order: it documents the transfer of the manuscript 54 years later to another monastery of the same order. This note provides insight into the circulation of manuscripts among monasteries of the same order, aimed at building or enriching their libraries. It also underscores the value of manuscripts, regarded as an asset that could only be moved by the superior general.
The library of the Benedictine Abbey of Seitenstetten, Austria, was founded in 1112. Many of its manuscripts were destroyed by a fire in 1348. HMML microfilmed 282 of the remaining manuscripts (mainly 11th–17th century) in 1965—one of the early projects led by Father Oliver Kapsner, OSB, HMML’s founding director. In 2025, Dr. Matthew Z. Heintzelman (curator of Western European manuscripts and Special Collections at HMML) visited Seitenstetten library as part of his work to foster further collaboration with HMML’s partners. Photograph by Dr. Heintzelman.
A manuscript (ATUP 00786) in the collection of Anjuman-i Taraqqī-yi Urdū Pākistān, located in Karachi. Learn more about the collection: hmml.org/stories/where-were-working-anjuman-i-taraqqi-yi-urdu-pakistan
A manuscript in the collection of Dabra Ṣeyon Māryām Monastery in Arsi Province, Ethiopia. View the full microfilm in HMML Reading Room (EMML 7602): vhmml.org/readingRoom/view/201129
The same manuscript, in the collection of the Chaldean Catholic Church, Patriarchate of Baghdad, Iraq. The manuscript was photographed by Arthur Vööbus (1) and decades later by the Centre Numérique des Manuscrits Orientaux and HMML (2), where it was identified by Grigory Kessel. Its texts include poetry, a commentary on the Nicene Creed, and Ephrem of Qirqesion’s "Explanation of Yawsep Ḥazzāyā’s Chapters of Knowledge." Both photographic copies are preserved by HMML. (Baghdad 513; CPB 00463)
Meet Mary Hoppe, digital projects assistant. Visit hmml.org/stories to learn more. HMML.
HMML June 3, 2026 What is Persian about the Persianate? Manuscripts from Ottoman Bosnia and Herzegovina. Josh Mugler, curator of Easter Christian and Islamic manuscripts. Fondacije Meyli (Kaćuni) T-38 (1907), fol. 2v
Detail of a seal, on a folio of a manuscript in the collection of Qaċanē Dabra Salām Madḫānē Ālam Church, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.
Pictured: a fragment of Bello’s history of the Hausa region, Infāq al-maysūr fī tārīkh bilād al-takrūr. (SAV BMH 14522, page 26). Learn more in a story about Banned Books, authored by Dr. Paul Naylor, cataloger of West African manuscripts at HMML: hmml.org/stories/series-books-unreliable-books
In-person event. Across Borders and Centuries: Protecting Humanity’s Written Heritage. May 16 at Westminster Presbyterian Church in Minneapolis 10 a.m.—Museum Without Glass 11 a.m.—Presentation by Columba Stewart 12 p.m.—Reception Register for this free event at HMML.org
Now hiring: Cataloger, West African Manuscripts
Georges Rouault's print of a mother and child was created using multiple printing and surface techniques—sugar aquatint, drypoint, etching, photogravure, engraving, scraping, burnishing, roulette, and sanding.
This fāʼidah (pictured) is part of a manuscript (SAV ABS 04736) in the collection of the Aboubacar Ben Said Library in Timbuktu, Mali, digitized in collaboration with SAVAMA-DCI, Bamako. View more fawāʼid in HMML Reading Room: vhmml.org/readingRoom/view/157124
A page of KKMA 00065, digitized in the collection of Kutub K̲h̲ānah-yi Muḥammad Anvar in Lahore, Pakistan.
In-person event. Across Borders and Centuries: Protecting Humanity’s Written Heritage. May 16 at Westminster Presbyterian Church in Minneapolis 10 a.m.—Museum Without Glass 11 a.m.—Presentation by Columba Stewart 12 p.m.—Reception Register for this free event at HMML.org
On the theme of #Animals, Dr. Josh Mugler, curator of Eastern Christian & Islamic manuscripts at HMML, looks at some of the ways that dogs appear in Arabic literature. Pictured: Illustration of a dog (kalb) from Zakarīyā al-Qazwīnī’s (d. 1283) text on the “wonders of creation,” copied in 1761 CE. Collection of Österreichische Nationalbibliothek, Austria. (Cod. N.F. 152a; HMML project number 24606, fol. 271v)
Opening pages of a commentary on Islamic law, copied in 1611 CE. (GAMS 01147)
In-Person Event. Reading Without Words: Hidden Stories of Ethiopic Manuscripts. Workshop with Dr. Jeremy R. Brown. Date: April 23 (workshop 3:30–4:30 p.m., reception to follow). Location: Minnesota Humanities Center, St. Paul, MN. RSVP: HMML.org
An icon depicting the Great Feasts of the Orthodox Church. Represented in continuous narration around a larger central image of the feast of Easter are 12 feasts: the Nativity of the Theotokos, the entrance of the Theotokos into the temple, the Annunciation, the Nativity of Christ, the Theopany, the Ascension, the elevation of the Holy Cross, the Dormition of the Theotokos, the Last Supper, Pentecost, Palm Sunday, and the presentation of Christ in the temple. Text in Old Church Slavonic appears at the upper and lower edges of the icon. View this and other icons in HMML Museum (HMML 02006 009): vhmml.org/museum/view/5916
Across Borders and Centuries: Protecting Humanity’s Written Heritage. May 16 at Westminster Presbyterian Church in Minneapolis 10 a.m.—Museum Without Glass 11 a.m.—Presentation by Columba Stewart 12 p.m.—Reception Register for this free event at HMML.org
Fenqitho for Easter, liturgy for the feast of the Resurrection, photographed in the manuscript collection of the Syriac Orthodox Church, Archdiocese of Homs, in Homs, Syria. View in HMML Reading Room (SOAH 00048): vhmml.org/readingRoom/view/502653
In-Person Event. Reading Without Words: Hidden Stories of Ethiopic Manuscripts. Workshop with Dr. Jeremy R. Brown. Date: April 23 (workshop 3:30–4:30 p.m., reception to follow). Location: Minnesota Humanities Center, St. Paul, MN. RSVP: HMML.org
Winter Lecture Series. Now available for streaming: • “The Extraordinary, Ordinary Work of Building a Digital Library” • “Manuscripts in Partition” • “Finding Common Ground Across Cultures: Building Relationships Through HMML’s Work” View each lecture on YouTube: https://bit.ly/WLS-2026-playlist HMML Events.
The manuscript (MUL 00105) is in the collection of Mumtazul Ulama Library in Lucknow, India. See each page in HMML Reading Room: vhmml.org/readingRoom/view/833306
Marc Chagall, "The Lament of Jeremiah and Daniel in the Lion's Den," a lithograph from the 1956 series "The Bible" for the art review journal Verve.
A miniature of the Annunciation in a Book of Hours created in the mid-15th century.
A manuscript in the collection of Bibliothèque Cheick Hamma Hamma, in Dibla (SAV CHH 03872): vhmml.org/readingRoom/view/798167
Finding Common Ground Across Cultures: Building Relationships Through HMML’s Work Dr. Matthew Z. Heintzelman Curator of Western European manuscripts & Special Collections March 25 from 11 a.m.–12 p.m. (CT) Free, virtual Winter Lecture Series RSVP at HMML.org
One highlight of the collection is an Armenian Gospel dating to 1338 CE (AODA 00033, pictured). An example of the Van Monastic School’s color, patterns, and artistry, the manuscript includes miniatures that illuminate episodes from the Gospels and the life of Christ. Originating from Arckē (modern-day Adilcevaz, Turkey), the manuscript was safeguarded and carried to Aleppo by survivors of the Armenian Genocide in 1919–1920, a testament to both its sacred significance and enduring historical legacy.
Finding Common Ground Across Cultures: Building Relationships Through HMML’s Work Dr. Matthew Z. Heintzelman Curator of Western European manuscripts & Special Collections March 25 from 11 a.m.–12 p.m. (CT) Free, virtual Winter Lecture Series RSVP at HMML.org
The front cover of the printed notebook shows two children studying, with the text in the girl's book shown upside down from our perspective so that it faces her; it says "Homeland: Love for the homeland is part of faith. The palm tree is tall. The date is its fruit." There are blank lines for the student's name, school, and class. Collection of Mar Behnam Monastery in Mosul, Iraq, digitized in 2012 in collaboration with Centre Numérique des Manuscrits Orientaux. View each page in HMML Reading Room (MBM 00512): vhmml.org/readingRoom/view/132382
The full treatise (DINL 00186 195, pictured) can be accessed in HMML Reading Room: vhmml.org/readingRoom/view/519714
Manuscripts in Partition Dr. Josh Mugler HMML curator of Eastern Christian & Islamic manuscripts February 25 from 11 a.m.–12 p.m. (CT) Free, virtual Winter Lecture Series RSVP at HMML.org
Manuscripts in Partition Dr. Josh Mugler HMML curator of Eastern Christian & Islamic manuscripts February 25 from 11 a.m.–12 p.m. (CT) Free, virtual Winter Lecture Series RSVP at HMML.org