liaizon, 10 months ago

@jeffalyanak google translate attempts to auto translate the text, though badly. You can type all those Armenian characters into a few different translation softwares and you will get the jist better then this. the photo auto translate is only good enough for menus and and stuff in armenian (I spent 2 weeks there last year) but I think its mostly cause the fonts people use there are not that standardized and there is just too much variability

jeffalyanak, 10 months ago

@liaizon Ha, this is amazing!

Yeah, I suspect that this isn't what it says but I'm still saving this translated image. ;p

liaizon, 10 months ago

@jeffalyanak yeah as you move around the camera the translation changes a bit since the form of the words shift. there is actually a whole bunch of armenian fedi users they have a bunch of instances.

liaizon, 10 months ago (edited 10 months ago)

@jeffalyanak
in the large blue text this is what I managed to transcribe:
ԲԱ ԶՈՒՄԲՑՕԺԱՐԵ

llamasoft_ox, 10 months ago

@jeffalyanak why are those poor oxen on fire? 🐂🔥

jeffalyanak, 10 months ago

@llamasoft_ox That's exactly what we're hoping to get to the bottom of. ;p

sheepnik, 10 months ago

@jeffalyanak @llamasoft_ox if I remember rightly, the ox is a symbol of one of the Gospels, possibly Matthew.

llamasoft_ox, 10 months ago

@sheepnik @jeffalyanak Luke IIRC. 🐂

sheepnik, 10 months ago

@llamasoft_ox @jeffalyanak I had a 25% chance of getting it right 😂

fionac, 10 months ago

@llamasoft_ox @jeffalyanak aren’t those wings?

llamasoft_ox, 10 months ago

@fionac @jeffalyanak I might be ready to acquire religion if there are flying oxen in it.

mbergnordlie, 10 months ago

@jeffalyanak I'm a bit curious too

liaizon, 10 months ago

@mbergnordlie @jeffalyanak this is a famous Armenian font made of birds, I was in Armenia last year and its EVERYWHERE there. There are people out on the street who will write your name with the bird font in beautiful calligraphy for a few bucks.

DontMindMe, 10 months ago

@jeffalyanak
That . . . looks like a very old family Bible. Any help, @medievodons ?

jeffalyanak, 10 months ago

@DontMindMe @medievodons

Yeah, my wife took a look and was able to identify that the pages at the front are very old. I can get the details if people are interested.

She's very knowledgeable in codicology but her academic focus is on pre-christian and early christianization in old norse literature.

She doesn't know Armenian and I only learned a tiny bit when I was very young.

DontMindMe, 10 months ago

@jeffalyanak
Ah, so you already have a field-adjacent person looking at it, cool! My wife is trying to get her Armenian friends to take a look at it. Will update if we get anything.
@medievodons

jeffalyanak, 10 months ago

@DontMindMe @medievodons

It's been a while since she's looked at it—it's in an archival storage box with my father—but here's what my wife remembers about it:

"I'm not sure of the exact animal the vellum is made from but probably cow or goat, the oldest leaves at the front and back could be sheep."

"The oldest leaves I think are 11th century, the majority of the leaves look like 14th-16th century, I'd have to look at it again."

"It's illuminated and the younger leaves may be 'uterine vellum' […] made from splitting a sheet of vellum to produce very thin leaves."