173 research outputs found
Ancora sul "negotio chaldeo", ovvero gli esordi falliti della stampa in caratteri siriaci orientali (Roma, 1587-1588)
No full textThe article follows up on a previous study concerning the beginnings of the East Syriac typography (The Chaldean Business. The Beginnings of East Syriac Typography and the Profession of Faith of Patriarch Elias (Vat. Ar. 83, ff. 117-126), «Miscellanea Bibliothecae Apostolicae Vaticanae» 20 [2014] 211-258). A more accurate interpretation of documents in the State Archive in Florence allows the author to specify the dates when the punchcutter Robert Granjon designed two East Syriac fonts, thus providing the necessary tools for the printing project. The essay also suggests an identification of the Syriac types of the Stamperia Medicea, through a comparison with other documents relevant to the history of the Eastern types owned by the Stamperia after the end of its activity (1614). As a conclusion, a list of all Syriac types designed by Granjon is proposed
History of Mar Yahballaha and Rabban Sauma
No full textContents: Introduction (pp. 11-42); Critical edition of the "History of Mar Yahballaha and Rabban Sauma" based on the three extant Syriac Mss, and translation into English with linguistic and literary notes (pp. 43-228); historical commentary (pp. 233-338); appendix: related documents and quotations from historiographical contemporay Arabic, Syriac, Armenian, and Persian wors (pp. 339-370); bibliography, index and illustrations (pp. 371-423)
From the backcover presentation:
This book tells a story of serendipity. Two Christian monks left China about 1274, headed to Jerusalem. Travelling on an itinerary similar to that Marco Polo had taken, they reached Iran, ruled by a Mongol dynasty, the Ilkhans. There, what they never had expected happened: one of them, Mark by name, was elected Patriarch of the Church of the East (with the name Yahballaha), while the other, Rabban Sauma, was sent as ambassador to the pope and the courts of France and England by the Mongol Ilkhan Arghun.
From Rabban Sauma’s report of his embassy, and the two monk’s memories of their journey from China to Mesopotamia, an anonymous author compiled a biography of Sauma and Mark. He interspersed their report and memories with a narrative about “the occurrences of their time – what happened to them, through them or because of them, relating everything just as it happened”.
The result was a chronicle entitled “History of Mar Yahballaha and Rabban Sauma”, of which a single manuscript was discovered in the late nineteenth century in the remote mountains of Hakkari (Eastern Turkey). The “History” is one of the more recent examples of classical Syriac literature, a major Christian literary tradition of the Near East.
While the encounter with two Asian “Marco Polos” of sorts constitutes the History’s most immediate element of appeal for present-day readers, the work deserves to be read in its entirety, as a rich and lively testimony of a time of unprecedented interconnectedness in the history of Eurasia at the epoch of the Mongol Empire
Across the Ocean to the Land of Mines
No full textThis is a book of thousands of stories, names and family names of those that flew from the Apennine mountains of Bologna and Modena – between 1885 and 1915 – to the US and were part of the exodus known as the Great Italian Emigration. Swarms of men, women and children who, out of sheer lack of a decent living, moved from villages like Gaggio Montano, Fanano, Montese, Lizzano in Belvedere and Sestola, to labor in the American Midwest of Illinois and Oklahoma. These mountain villagers found themselves in the prairies crossed by rivers and valleys like the stunning Spoon River valley, but their lives were anything but idyllic. They toiled, suffered and sometimes paid with their lives as they tried to support families both in America and back in their homeland. The majority of them went down the bowels of the earth, digging and excavating “black diamonds” from the coal mines with their bare hands and tools. Many of them stayed and forged new lives, contributing to America’s melting pot; others, such as Vittorio Ardeni (the grandfather of the author), returned to Italy. And all of them were exposed to the ruthless capitalism of the Industrial Age that saw them as nothing more than cheap, dirty, soulless hands only apt to work. And yet, thanks to their struggle and sacrifice, their were able to contribute to the great leap of both the US and Italy into an era of increased wealth and improved living conditions. The work presented here is the result of years of research into the archives of Italy and the US, including the Immigration Records and the Passenger Lists at Ellis Island, the National Archive and Record Administration (NARA) files, the American Census data, the Naturalization and Passport applications, various on-line archives and even the church and population archives in the parishes and municipalities of Italy. The research has been enriched by interviews with the direct descendants of the immigrants and their collections of photographs, documents and letters
Embryonic Purkinje cells grafted on the surface of the cerebellar cortex integrate in the adult unlesioned cerebellum
No full textThe presence of an injury or the selective degeneration of specific neuronal populations is commonly assumed to be a necessary prerequisite for the survival and the integration of grafted neurons in the recipient brain. In the present study we have placed solid grafts of cerebellar anlage in the fourth ventricle of adult rats, in close contact with the host cerebellar cortex, to assess the capacity of embryonic Purkinje cells to interact with adult neurons and integrate in the unlesioned cerebellar cortex. Numerous grafted Purkinje cells are indeed able to leave the implant and migrate into the host molecular layer, where they develop adult structural features. In addition, such cells are able to elicit the growth of host climbing fibre sprouts which end in newly formed arborizations impinging upon their dendritic trees. Climbing fibre collateral branches also penetrate the implant to innervate Purkinje cells which have not migrated in the host cerebellum. These results show that embryonic Purkinje cells are able to survive and integrate in an adult unlesioned cerebellar cortex. In addition, adult olivary axons respond to the increased size of the target population by expanding their terminal domain to innervate grafted Purkinje cells
Progression of myocardial fibrosis assessed with cardiac magnetic resonance in hypertrophic cardiomyopathy
No full textObjectives This study sought to assess the rate of progression of fibrosis by 2 consecutive cardiac magnetic resonance (CMR) examinations and its relation with clinical variables.
Background In hypertrophic cardiomyopathy (HCM) myocardial fibrosis, detected by late gadolinium enhancement (LGE), is associated to a progressive ventricular dysfunction and worse prognosis.
Methods A total of 55 HCM patients (37 males; mean age 43 +/- 18 years) underwent 2 CMR examinations (CMR-1 and CMR-2) separated by an interval of 719 +/- 410 days. Extent of LGE was measured, and the rate of progression of LGE (LGE-rate) was calculated as the ratio between the increment of LGE (in grams) and the time (months) between the CMR examinations.
Results At CMR-1, LGE was detected in 45 subjects, with an extent of 13.3 +/- 15.2 g. At CMR-2, 53 (96.4%) patients had LGE, with an extent of 24.6 +/- 27.5 g. In 44 patients, LGE extent increased significantly (>= 1 g). Patients with apical HCM had higher increments of LGE (p = 0.004) and LGE-rate (p < 0.001) than those with other patterns of hypertrophy. The extent of LGE at CMR-1 and the apical pattern of hypertrophy were independent predictors of the increment of LGE. Patients with worsened New York Heart Association functional class presented higher increase of LGE (p = 0.031) and LGE-rate (p < 0.05) than those with preserved functional status.
Conclusions Myocardial fibrosis in HCM is a progressive and fast phenomenon. LGE increment, related to a worse clinical status, is more extensive in apical hypertrophy than in other patterns. (J Am Coll Cardiol 2012;60:922-9) (C) 2012 by the American College of Cardiology Foundatio
The “History of Mar Yahballaha and Rabban Sawma” as a source for the Ilkhanid history
No full textThe Syriac anonymous narrative known as the History of Mar Yahballaha and Rabban Sawma (written before 1319) consists in the biography of the catholicos of the Church of the East, Mar Yahballaha III (ca. 1248–1317), and his mentor, the monk Sawma (ca. 1225–1294). The author’s interests go beyond the biography of two eminent clergymen of the Church of the East, and his commitment combines with that of a chronicler. The narrative of the journey of Rabban Sawma in Europe as ambassador of the Khan Arghun (1287-1288) elicited the interest of translators, readers and scholars more than the rest of the book. Nevertheless, the author’s interest does not seem to focus on it more than on other episodes: for instance, much more space is devoted to the destiny of the Christians living in the city of Erbil, a case that from his point of view deserved a detailed explanation of the events, as it resulted in the elimination of the Christian population of the city. Church history is apparently a central issue for the author: his reports are abundantly detailed when devoted to the restorations and building of churches and monasteries, and to the relationship with the sovereigns. On the contrary, what pertains to the relations of Mar Yahballaha with Latin Christians, both in the Ilkhanid dominion and in the West, remains largely out of the narrative. Mar Yahballaha’s good relationship with the Latin missionaries, as the Dominican friar Riccoldo da Montecroce, and the contacts with the pope after the mission of Rabban Sawma, are not mentioned at all. The paper focuses on two episodes reported in the History, which provide information about the policy of the Ilkhans towards the Church of the East. The first one relates the events occurring just after the election of Aḥmad/Teguder, when two envious bishops and two Muslim officials defamed Mar Yahballaha and Rabban Sauma with false accusations, as Arghun’s supporters. The author’s qualification of Aḥmad as a persecutor of Christiany does not fit with other evidence (for instance Marco Polo’s report of Aḥmad’s reign), nor combines with the development of the affair in the narrative itself: after an enquiry and a trial, both the catholicos and Rabban Sawma are recognised as innocent, freed and reinstalled in their positions. The second episode is the report of the revolt of the Mongol garrison of the citadel of Erbil, the Christian qayajiyē, “rock climbers”, which marks the end of Christianity in the city. Comparison with the Persian narrative about the same case by Qāshānī shows interesting parallels
Metabotropic glutamate receptor-mediated currents at the climbing fiber to Purkinje cell synapse
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