Monday, March 19, 2012
Intercultural dialogue and the promotion of scientific knowledge on Byzantine manuscripts, through which most of antiquity texts have survived, were the focus of a series of activities organized by the Institute of Byzantine Research of Greece’s National Research Foundation (NFR), under the scientific supervision of Dr. Niki Tsironis.
The endeavour was undertaken under the European project STUDITE-Study and creation on Byzantine book bindings.
Byzantine bindings are the traditional bindings of Greek manuscripts from medieval times to the 17th century. Indeed, the term "Byzantine" refers to this specific technique and type of binding. Collections of Greek manuscripts are found mainly in Western Europe (but also in Russia and the Middle East), in libraries and monasteries.
These collections represent between 50,000 and 60,000 manuscripts, but only a small part of these retain their ancient bindings. The project is run in collaboration with scientific communities from France, Romania, Italy, the UK, Hungary and Turkey.
An international group of experts -book historians, manuscript and book conservationists and researchers- visited Athens and had the opportunity to be guided through and study the rich collections of the Byzantine and Christian Museum, the Gennadius Library and the Hellenic Parliament Library. The group also had the opportunity to participate in workshops that produced modern bindings, inspired by Byzantine and post-Byzantine techniques. 