Das Portal der National Library of Israel (NLI) umfasst über 75.600 Handschriften aus über 530 Sammlungen.
„For thousands of years Jewish people have used the written word to express their religious beliefs and scientific knowledge. Jewish prayer, customs, histories of communities and information from a range of disciplines, both religious and secular, were transcribed assiduously.
Given that Hebrew was a written rather than spoken language, the extent of its use was surprisingly far-reaching. Jews gave abundant written expression to their rich intellectual world. Like the nomadic nature of the life of Jewish individuals and communities, Hebrew manuscripts and documents traveled across countries and continents.
These significant texts reflecting the knowledge and culture of a people eventually found haven in the halls of great libraries, and in the vaults of private collectors. Today these precious Hebrew manuscripts shed light on the diverse and wide-ranging cultures of the Jewish people, their intellectual life and history.
With the rapid advances in the technological environment that significantly expand options for preservation, presentation and access to digital content, the National Library of Israel initiated the renewal of its collection of copies of Hebrew manuscripts. This enterprise, undertaken in partnership with the Friedberg Jewish Manuscript Society (FJMS), is designed to make Jewish manuscripts widely available.
The International Collection of Digitized Hebrew Manuscripts will enable global centralized digital access to the complete corpus of existing Hebrew manuscripts. The images will be preserved long-term using state of the art technology, and the collection will be accessible to international communities of researchers and users from the comfort of their own institutions and homes.“
Unter anderem sind dort rund 500 Handschriften aus dem Bestand der Staats- und Universitätsbibliothek Hamburg zu finden; dieser Blog-Post gibt Hintergrundinformationen zum dazugehörigen Digitalisierungs-Projekt.