• Armenian Catholic Clergy Institute
  Bzommar, Lebanon
• Bibliothèque Orientale at the Université Saint-Joseph
  Beirut, Lebanon
• Our Lady of Balamand Monastery and University
  Tripoli, Lebanon
• Armenian Apostolic Catholicosate of the Great House of Cilicia
  Antelias, Lebanon
• Deir Mar Yuhanna al-Shuwayr (“Monastery of Saint John the Baptist at Shweir”)
  Khonchara, Lebanon
• Monastery of Saint George at Deir-esh-Shir
  Jounieh, Lebanon
• Université du Saint-Esprit
  Kaslik, Lebanon
• Deir el-Kreim, Lebanese Maronite Missionary Order
  Jounieh, Lebanon

• Priory of Rome
• National Archives of Malta

• Melkite Greek-Catholic Archdiocese of Aleppo
  Aleppo, Syria
• Syriac Orthodox Archdiocese of Aleppo
  Aleppo, Syria
• Syriac Catholic Archdiocese of Aleppo
  Aleppo, Syria
• Syriac Orthodox Archdiocese of Homs
  Homs, Syria

• The Stefanyk Library of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine
  L’viv, Ukraine
• L’viv Historical Museum
  L’viv, Ukraine

• Saint Thomas Christian Manuscript Collections
  Kerala, India

• Austria/Germany/Switzerland
• British Isles
• Iberia
• Italy
• Malta
• South Africa
• Sweden
• Ethiopia

Armenian Apostolic Catholicosate of the Great House of Cilicia Antelias, Lebanon
239 Armenian Manuscripts

 
Abbot John Klassen of Saint John’s Abbey presents the Pax Christi Award to His Holiness Aram I, Catholicos of the Great House of Cilicia. © HMML 2007.

According to tradition, Armenia was first evangelized by the apostles Thaddeus and Bartholomew and later became the first nation to adopt Christianity. Armenian Christianity developed its own liturgical and literary traditions after Mesrob Mashtots created the Armenian alphabet in the 5th Century to enable the translation of the Bible into the native language of the Armenian people.

The manuscript collection now housed at the Armenian Catholicosate in Antelias was originally at Sis, in Cilician Turkey. That region of southeastern Turkey was the site of the last independent Armenian kingdom, finally conquered by the Ottoman Turks in the late 14th century. When the Armenian Genocide forced Catholicos Sahak II to flee Turkey almost 600 years later, the escaping Armenians carried their most precious manuscripts and sacred objects to Syria and, finally, to Lebanon. The Armenian Catholicosate of the Great House of Cilicia is one of the two pontifical seats of the Armenian Apostolic Church. The other is the Catholicosate of All Armenians at the Holy City of Etchmiadzin in Armenia.

Learn more about the Armenian Apostolic Church.

17^th century Armenian Book of the Gospels, Letter of Eusebius to Carpian with images of both. Ms. Antelias 225, fols. 3v-4r.

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Manuscript Resources at HMML

The manuscript collection of the Armenian Apostolic Catholicosate of the Great House of Cilicia is described in detail in an Armenian-language printed catalogue. Use the button below to access an online version of this catalogue:

Sample images of the Antelias manuscripts can be browsed. Here's how to decipher the image filenames:
EXAMPLE:  acc_00003_004_v
"acc" is the code for the Antelias project, "00003" is the manuscript shelfmark, "004_v" means that the image is of page 4, verso. Shelfmarks should refer to manuscript numbers in the scanned catalogue.

Viewing Sample Images by Shelfmark (Manuscript Number)
If you've found a particular manuscript number in the printed catalogue, you can enter it in the box below and press "go" to retrieve sample images from that particular work if samples from that manuscript have been posted on Vivarium.

Syntax for Searching Shelfmarks:
Manuscript numbers must be preceded by the project code "ACC" followed by a space. Enter numbers with leading zeroes so that the number is in five-digit form. Example: manuscript number 7 would be entered as ACC 00007, manuscript number 102 would be entered as ACC 00120.

Finding Manuscripts from This Project in OLIVER, HMML's Online Manuscript Database

To find manuscript records from this collection in OLIVER, go to:
OLIVER Manuscript Search
and use the "City" drop-down menu to select the city, "Antelias."