The Manuscript
From Papyri to King James: The Transmission of the English Bible: This exhibit from The University of Michigan Papyrus Collection includes two very clear color images of papyrus, one from the epistles of Paul, as well as images of manuscript and early print Bibles.  See their other online exhibits too.

Donald Binder's Papyrology site at SMU
See especially two links under Biblical Texts: 1) Catalogue of NT Papyri and Codices 2nd-10th Centuries; and 2) Images of NT Texts

The Aberdeen Bestiary Project: A bestiary is a book about beasts.  This beautiful manuscript was written and illuminated (that is, decorated) in England around the year 1200. The online version was created by the Aberdeen University Library, the Department of History of Art and the Centre for Computer Based Learning in Land Use and Environmental Sciences (CLUES).  If you want to jump right in, click here for the first image, with commentary (you can connect to a translation at the bottom of each page). The home page of the university's Special Collections and Archives will lead you to their other projects.

"Chaucers Wordes unto Adam, His Own Scriveyn"
As the title suggests, this is one of Chaucer's poems, written to a scribe.

The Electronic Canterbury Tales: The Wife of Bath's Tale
OK, we don't have time to discuss this site this semester. But you really should check it out anyway. This is just one page from Daniel T. Kline's amazing new web site on the Canterbury Tales and Chaucer. It pulls together everything from images of the manuscripts to modern translations to sources and analogues--and of course, the edited texts themselves. See especially the main page, which begins with a discussion of the qualities the Canterbury Tales and the Web share.

Excerpts from AElfric
AElfric, probably the most prolific writer of the late Anglo-Saxon period, addresses himself directly to scribes in these excerpts from some of his prefaces.  Dr. Menzer translated these from the Old English.

Two other helpful manuscript sites:

The Labyrinth's Manuscripts, Paleography, Codicology web page: Part of the Labryrinth, on-line source for all things medieval, this web page can lead you to images of a number of manuscripts, as well as some other resources for studying manuscripts (Paleography is the study of the writing in manuscripts; codicology is the study of manuscripts and books as physical artifacts).

Texts, Manuscripts, and Paleography is another collection of links to useful sites, this one from the Prep Center at UPenn. This page includes links to many papyrology sites as well.

The Book
The Milton Reading Room
This site from Dartmouth University, contains information about and texts written by Milton.  Please read excerpts from Milton's Areopagatica here.  As you read, please think both about what Milton is saying and about how this web site's presentation of the text differs from Octavo's presentation of the 1644 edition.

The ARTFL Project: Multilingual Bibles: This project, created by Mark Olsen at the University of Chicago, allows you to search or browse different versions of the Bible, including the King James and the Vulgate.

Orality
Plato's Phaedrus
This 19th-century translation of Plato's text comes from James J. O'Donnell's web site, which accompanies his book (one of our course texts) Avatars of the Word.  Using the "Find" function of your browser, do a search for the line, "Enough appears to have been said by us of a true and false art of speaking."

"Caedmon's Hymn"
This edition, by Melanie Siebert at the University of Virginia, is part of her "An Old English Translation Aid."  It includes the West Saxon version of the poem, a glossary, and, you'll be happy to know, a translation into Modern English.  As of 2/25/00, the sound file wasn't accessible. Daniel O'Donnell is working on a Caedmon hypertext; a demo version is available.  Just for fun, you can compare the Northumbrian and West Saxon versions in the Old English "Minor Poems" section of the Labyrinth's Old English library.

Hypertext and the Web
History of the Internet and WWW
This history of the Internet and WWW, created by Internet Valley, is either delightful or unreadable, depending on your perspective.  Nonetheless, you need to know this information.  As one of their readers comments, "If you've ever wondered how the Internet came into being, then be sure to check this site out... If you've never wondered how the Internet came into being, then go anyway. You shouldn't be such a barbarian" (caveat lector: Internet Valley wants to sell you investment advice, and you have to keep clicking to get the advertisements to go away.).

net.wars by Wendy Grossman
Can you read a book online?  Should you read a book online?  NYU Press has published this book about the Internet on the web as well as on good old-fashioned paper.  You can read what Grossman has to say about the Internet or focus on the way she and NYU Press direct you through this text-made-cybertext.  Or you can think about this web site as a marketing tool: does the web site sell or replace the print book?

You can look up other books (and see how they are presented online) at The On-line Books Page, an easy-to-search database by John Mark Ockerbloom.  You can connect to 9000+ free books from this site. Ockerbloom has some interesting notes about recent copyright issues on his News page.

The Perseus Project
Sven Birkets argues in The Gutenberg Elegies (another one of our course texts) that this project is contributing to The End of Civilization As We Know It.  Check it out yourself.  Greg Crane, the editor-in-chief of the Perseus Project, came to speak to the Furman-Wofford Mellon Capstone Seminar in February; he was very impressive.

Evaluating Sources: Readings and Questions
This site was created by a team of professors at Furman and Wofford as part of an on-going seminar on technology and the liberal arts education.  Please look through the whole page;  be sure to explore the Cases for Study.

Attitudes Toward Texts
The Oxford English Dictionary
What are dictionaries for?  Look through the OED's web site for the perspective of the editors of the world's greatest dictionary.  See especially The 1999 Appeal and the section in the Preface to the Third Edition on Distractions.

Judaism 101: Torah
This page is part of the Judaism 101 web site, created by an interested Jewish lay person, Tracey Rich, who comes out of the Conservative tradition.  It is a little simplified (as is fitting for a "101"), but it contains good information.

A Page of Talmud
This site, created by Dr. Eliezer Segal, an authority on the Talmud based at the University of Calgary, is an introduction to the Talmud. Click on parts of the image of a Talmud page for more information, or see the links below.

Intertexuality
"Scullionspeak"
Nick Howe, an Anglo-Saxonist from Ohio State and good guy, wrote this review of Seamus Heaney's new Beowulf translation for The New Republic. It discusses (at least) two key questions: Is the translation a good translation?  What is a good translation?

Heaney Reviews
Paul Deane is collecting reviews of Heaney's Beowulf from the popular press.  His site includes a link to a review by Terry Eagelton, a prominent scholar who is openly contemptuous of Old English literature (don't get me started).  It also has a link to an interview with Heaney from The Sunday Times (UK).

(last updated 4/28/00)

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