The sisters of Sinai
Subtitle: how two lady adventurers discovered the hidden Gospels
By: Janet Soskice
Edition: 1st Vintage books ed.
Publisher: Vintage Books
Published: 2010
Place of publication: New York
Language: eng
Number of pages: 316
ISBN-13: 9781400034741
Subjects: Bible; Description and travel; Travel; New Testament scholars; Church history; Biography
Description: In 1892, two sisters, identical twins from Scotland, made one of one of most important scriptural discoveries of modern times. Combing the library of St. Catherine's Monastery at Mount Sinai, they found a neglected palimpsest: one of the earliest known copies of the Gospels, a version in ancient Syriac, the language spoken by Jesus. This is the account of how two middle-aged ladies without university degrees uncovered and translated this text, bringing a treasure to world attention. This quintessentially Victorian adventure is partly a physical journey: when Westerners generally feared to tread in the region, the sisters Smith traversed the Middle East. It is also a journey of the mind: in an era when new discoveries in science and archaeology were rewriting the accepted understanding of the Bible's origins as well as those of humankind, a great contribution to knowledge was made by two whose only natural advantage was an astonishing gift for languages--From publisher description.
Notes: "Originally published in Great Britain in slightly different form as Sisters of Sinai : how two lady adventurers found the hidden Gospels by Chatto & Windus ... London"--Title page verso.

Includes bibliographical references (pages 301-303) and index.
Table of contents: title: Cambridge, 13 April 1893; title: The birth and upbringing of the lady Bible-hunters; title: The journey to the Nile; title: The boat; title: The perfect dragoman; title: The search for the perfect mate; title: Greece; title: The estate of marriage; title: The Cambridge antiquarian; title: Heresy and mortality; title: Sinai and von Tischendorf; title: The perils of Bible-hunting; title: The story von Tischendorf did not tell; title: Setting out for Sinai; title: The treasure in the dark closet; title: The Cambridge party; title: The disjoint expedition; title: The final falling-out; title: The devilish press and the Highland Regiment; title: The Cambridge cold shoulder; title: A lightning course in text scholarship; title: In the company of orientalists; title: Burying the hatchet; title: Keepers of manuscripts; title: Solomon Schechter and the Cairo Genizah; title: In Cairo with Schechter; title: Castlebrae; title: The college's opening; title: To the monasteries of the Nitrian Desert; title: The active life; title: The darkening to war; title: Palimpsest.