Boris Liebrenz, Dr. phil.

I studied History and Arabic philology at Leipzig University, where I also received my PhD in 2013. My dissertation, published as Die Rifāʿīya aus Damaskus (Leiden: Brill, 2016) was awarded the Forschungspreis der Annemarie Schimmel Stiftung in 2017. After research positions in Bonn (Annemarie Schimmel Kolleg), Berlin (Free University), and New York City (CUNY Graduate Center), I returned to Leipzig in 2018 as a senior researcher in the Bibliotheca Arabica project.

Forschungsschwerpunkte

My work investigates the production, transmission, and reception of Arabic literary traditions from the medieval period up to the onset of widespread printing in the 19^th century. In particular, I am focusing on the histories of manuscripts, their owners and readers, the personal networks through which they were in motion, as well as the institutions in which they were preserved and used. To this end, I am employing a systematic study of manuscript notes, left in great numbers by those who previously interacted with a given book. Through a systematic collection and edition of such notes, I am currently building up the data set that will allow for an increasingly more generalized analysis, towards which a number of focused studies are developing.

Besides this main trajectory of my research, I am also interested in a variety of other documentary sources (endowment deeds, letters, administrative and court documents), not only for highlighting what they tell us about the time when they were created, but also the often convoluted mechanisms through which they have been preserved, lost, or reused. Recently, I have concentrated much on Arabic personal letters, from early Mamluk specimens to merchant letters of the 18^th century.

Finally, I have an ongoing interest in the history of Orientalism in the early modern period.

Publikationen

Monografien

• Arabische, Persische und Türkische Handschriften in Leipzig. Geschichte ihrer Sammlung und Erschließung von den Anfängen bis zu Karl Vollers (Arabic, Persian and Turkish Manuscripts in Leipzig: The History of Its Collection and Cataloguing from the Beginnings up to Karl Vollers), Leipzig: Leipziger Universitätsverlag, 2008.
• Die Rifā῾īya aus Damaskus. Eine Privatbibliothek in osmanischer Zeit und ihr kulturelles Umfeld (The Rifāʽiyya from Damascus: A Private Ottoman-Era Library and Its Cultural Context), Leiden: Brill, 2016.
• The Waqf of a Physician in Late Mamluk Damascus and its Fate under the Ottomans, Berlin: EB Verlag, 2019.
• (with Kristina Richardson) Notebook of the 16^th-Century Aleppan Silk-Weaver Kamāl al-Dīn. Edition and Study, Beirut: Orient Institut, 2021.

Sammelbände

• with Christoph Rauch), Studies on Johann Gottfried Wetzstein (1815-1905): Manuscripts, Politics and Oriental Studies, Leiden: Brill, 2019.
• The History of Books and Collections through Manuscript Notes, Leiden: Brill, 2018. [=Special Issue Journal of Islamic Manuscripts 9, 2-3 (2018)]

Übersetzungen

• Arabic, Persian and Turkish Manuscripts in the University Library Leipzig. Being an abridged translation of H. O. Fleischer: Codices Orientalium Linguarum Qui in Bibliotheca Senatoria Civitatis Lipsiensis Asservantur. (2008). Internet-publication in cooperation with Leipzig University Library: https://www.islamic-manuscripts.net/content/catalogue.xml.
• Ehab Zelaky, “Vorwort”, in Medienfreiheit in Ägypten. Zum journalistischen Arbeiten in Ägypten nach der Arabischen Revolution, ed. by Judith Jäger and Christopher Resch, Köln: von Halem, 2015, pp. 14-20.

Zeitschriftenartikel und Buchbeiträge

• “Die arabischen, persischen und türkischen Handschriften der ehemaligen Ratsbibliothek Leipzig. Geschichte ihrer Sammlung und Erschließung.” Wolfenbütteler Notizen zur Buchgeschichte 32 (2007): 107-141.
• “Orientalistik.” Erleuchtung der Welt. Sachsen und der Beginn der modernen Wissenschaften, eds. Detlef Döring, Cecilie Hollberg, and Tobias U. Müller (Dresden: Sandstein, 2009), 202-209.
• “Andreas Acoluthus und der Beginn des armenischen Druckes in Deutschland.” Armenisch-Deutsche Korrespondenz 146 (2009): 46-48.
• “Eine frühe arabische Quittung aus Oberägypten.” Archiv für Papyrusforschung 56 (2010): 294-314.
• “Lese- und Besitzvermerke in der Leipziger Rifā῾īya-Bibliothek.” Manuscript Notes as Documentary Sources, eds. Andreas Görke and Konrad Hirschler (Beirut: Orient-Institut Beirut, 2011): 141-162.
• co-authored with Alain Delattre, Naïm Vanthiegem, and Sebastian Richter, “Écrire en arabe et en copte. Le cas de deux lettres bilingues.” Chronique d’Égypte 87(2012): 170-188.
• Die Rifā῾īya. Neue Forschungen zur Geschichte einer Familienbibliothek aus dem osmanischen Damaskus.” Das Buch in Antike, Mittelalter und Neuzeit. Sonderbestände der Universitätsbibliothek Leipzig, eds. Thomas Fuchs, Christoph Mackert, and Reinhold Scholl (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 2012): 265-279.
• “The library of Aḥmad al-Rabbāṭ. Books and their audience in 12^th to 13^th / 18^th to 19^th century Syria.” Marginal Perspectives on Early Modern Ottoman Culture. Missionaries, Travelers, Booksellers, eds. Ralf Elger and Ute Pietruschka (Halle [Saale]: Zentrum für Interdisziplinäre Regionalstudien, 2013): 17-59.
• “Zum Verhältnis von Fleischer und Joseph von Hammer-Purgstall.“ Heinrich Leberecht Fleischer – Leben und Wirkung. Ein Leipziger Orientalist des 19. Jahrhunderts mit internationaler Ausstrahlung, eds. Hans-Georg Ebert and Thoralf Hanstein (Frankfurt am Main: PL Academic Research, 2013): 115-133.
• “Johann Jacob Reiskes arabistische Schüler.” Heinrich Leberecht Fleischer – Leben und Wirkung. Ein Leipziger Orientalist des 19. Jahrhunderts mit internationaler Ausstrahlung, eds. Hans-Georg Ebert and Thoralf Hanstein (Frankfurt am Main: PL Academic Research, 2013): 169-196.
• “Früher Druck mit arabischen Typen in Leipzig, 17.-18. Jahrhundert.” Historical Aspects of Printing and Publishing in Languages of the Middle East. Papers from the Symposium at the University of Leipzig, September 2008, ed. Geoffrey Roper (Leiden: Brill, 2014): 17-52.
• “The social history of surgery in Ottoman Syria: Documentary evidence from Eighteenth-Century Hamah.” Turkish Historical Review 5 (2014): 32-58.
• “Note on the Term al-mushtarī and the Dating of Leiden Or. 1020a.” Journal of Islamic Manuscripts 5 (2014): 63–70.
• “Books Tell Their Story: Cataloguing Secondary Notes in Islamic Manuscripts in Gotha.” Comparative Oriental Manuscript Studies Newsletter 8 (2014): 3-4.
• “Mit Gold nicht aufzuwiegen. Der Wert von Büchern im osmanischen Syrien (11.-13./17.-19. Jahrhundert).” Zeitschrift der Deutschen Morgenländischen Gesellschaft 164 (2014): 653-686.
• “Mit Luft geschrieben / Writing with the air.” Manuskript des Monats / Manuscript of the Month, 2012-2014. (Hamburg [2015]): 92-95.
• “Troubled History of a Masterpiece. Notes on the creation and peregrinations of Öljeytü’s monumental Baghdad Qur’ān.” Journal of Islamic Manuscripts 7 (2016): 217-238.
• “Golius and Tychsen and Their Quest for Manuscripts. Three Arabic Letters.” Journal of Islamic Manuscripts 8 (2017): 218-239.
• “An Arabic Letter (Around 6th/12th ct.) Concerning the Production of a Manuscript of Ibn Sīnā’s al-Šifā’.” Journal of Islamic Manuscripts 9 (2018): 32-38.
• “A Medieval Muslim Scholar’s Legacy. Ibn Ṭāwūs and the Afterlife of his Library.” Journal of Islamic Manuscripts 9 (2018): 218-224.
• (with Christoph Rauch), “Introduction.” Studies on Johann Gottfried Wetzstein (1815-1905): Manuscripts, Politics and Oriental Studies, eds. Boris Liebrenz and Christoph Rauch (Leiden: Brill, 2019): 1-9.
• (with Christoph Rauch), “Arabic Manuscripts and Books from the Bequest of Wetzstein.” Studies on Johann Gottfried Wetzstein (1815-1905): Manuscripts, Politics and Oriental Studies, eds. Boris Liebrenz and Christoph Rauch (Leiden: Brill, 2019): 174-193.
• “From Leipzig to Damascus – Wetzstein as a broker of Arabic prints in Syria.” Studies on Johann Gottfried Wetzstein (1815-1905): Manuscripts, Politics and Oriental Studies, eds. Boris Liebrenz and Christoph Rauch (Leiden: Brill, 2019): 323-345.
• “The Vendor’s Note: A First Assessment.” Journal of Islamic Manuscripts 10 (2019): 269-291.
• “An Archive in a Book: Documents and Letters from the Early-Mamluk Period.” Der Islam 97 (2020): 120-171.
• “The History and Provenance of the Unique Dustūr al-munaǧǧimīn Manuscript, BnF Arabe 5968.” Journal of Islamic Manuscripts 11 (2020): 28-42.
• “Fire, Consuls, and Scholars – Conflicting Views on the Discovery of the Qubbat al-Khazna Documents.” The Damascus Fragments. Towards a History of the Qubbat al-khazna Corpus of Manuscripts and Documents, eds. Arianna D’Ottone, Konrad Hirschler, Ronny Vollandt (Beirut, Orient-Institut, 2020): 75-89.
• “Curious Readers. The Bodleian’s Book of Curiosities as a Fatimid View of the World Through Ottoman Eyes.” Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient 64 (2021), 404-424.

Rezensionen

• Review of Tobias Heinzelmann and Henning Sievert (Eds.), Buchkultur im Nahen Osten des 17. und 18. Jahrhunderts. (Bern: Lang, 2010) in H-Soz-u-Kult, 21.02.2011, http://hsozkult.geschichte.hu-berlin.de/rezensionen/2011-1-124.
• Review of El Mustapha Lahlali, Salah al-Dihan, and Wafa Abu Hatab, The Travels of Ibn al-Tayyib. The Forgotten Journey of an Eighteenth Century Traveller to the Hijaz (London: I.B. Tauris, 2010) in H-Soz-u-Kult, 22.02.2012, http://hsozkult.geschichte.hu-berlin.de/rezensionen/2012-1-123.
• Review of Emilie Savage-Smith, A new catalogue of the Arabic manuscripts in the Bodleian Library, University of Oxford. Volume 1: Medicine (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011) in Der Islam 90 (2013): 421-426. 
• Review of Jean-Michel Mouton, Dominique Sourdel, and Janine Sourdel-Thomine, Mariage et séparation à Damas au Moyen Âge (Paris: Geuthner, 2013) in Archiv für Papyrusforschung und Verwandte Gebiete 60 (2014): 258-263.
• Collective review of six volumes Verzeichnis der Orientalischen Handschriften in Deutschland (Stuttgart: Steiner, 2005-2010) in Der Islam 91 (2014): 437-445.
• Review of Konrad Hirschler, The Written Word in the Medieval Arabic Lands: A Social and Cultural History of Reading Practices (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2013) in Review of Middle East Studies 48 (2014): 81-83.
• Review of Werner Diem, Arabische Briefe auf Papier aus der Heidelberger Papyrus-Sammlung (Heidelberg: Winter, 2013) in Orientalistische Literaturzeitschrift 110, Heft 3 (2015): 233-236.
• Review of Christian Müller / Muriel Roiland-Rouabah (Eds.), Les non-dits du nom. Onomastique et documents en terres d’Islam. Mélanges offerts à Jacqueline Sublet (Beirut: Presses de l’IFPO, 2013) in Der Islam 92 (2015): 533-541.
• Review of Torsten Wollina, Zwanzig Jahre Alltag. Lebens-, Welt- und Selbstbild im Journal des Aḥmad Ibn Ṭawq (Göttingen: V&R unipress, 2014) in Der Islam 92 (2015): 552-557.
• Collective review of Petra M. Sijpesteijn, Shaping a Muslim State (Oxford 2013) and Maged S.A. Mikhail, From Byzantine to Islamic Egypt (London/New York 2014) in Der Islam 93 (2016): 320-325.
• Review of Christian Gaubert und Jean-Michel Mouton, Hommes et villages du Fayyoum dans la documentation papyrologique arabe (X^e–XI^e siècles) (Genève: Librairie Droz 2014) in Archiv für Papyrusforschung 62 (2016).
• Review of Konrad Hirschler, Medieval Damascus. Plurality and Diversity in an Arabic Library. The Ashrafīya Library Catalogue (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2016) in Der Islam 96 (2019), 223-227.
• Review of Gülrü Necipoğlu / Cemal Kafadar / Cornell H. Fleischer (eds.), Treasures of Knowledge. An Inventory of the Ottoman Palace Library (1502/3-1503/4). 2 vols. (Leiden: Brill, 2019) in Der Islam 98 (2021), 282-289.
• Review of Frédéric Bauden & Élise Franssen (eds.), In the Author’s Hand. Holograph and Authorial Manuscripts in the Islamic Handwritten Tradition (Leiden: Brill, 2020) in Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society 31 (2021).
• Review of Konrad Hirschler, A Monument to Medieval Syrian Book Culture. The Library of Ibn ʿAbd al-Hādī (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2020) in Der Islam 98 (2021), 603-608.

Katalogbeiträge

• Ein Garten im Ärmel. Islamische Buchkultur. Katalog zur Ausstellung in der Bibliotheca Albertina, 10. Juli – 27. September 2008. Ed. Verena Klemm. (Leipzig: Leipziger Universitätsverlag, 2008): catalogue descriptions pp. 15, 16, 22, 30, 32, 40-41, 58-66, 71.
• Refaiya 1853. Buchkultur in Damaskus. Ed. Verena Klemm. (Leipzig: Leipziger Universitätsverlag, 2013): 24-41, 47-50, 54-86, 110.

Online-Publikationen

• Writing with the air / Mit Luft geschrieben. Contribution for the blog Manuscript of the Month / Manuskript des Monats of the Centre for the Study of Manuscript Cultures, Universität Hamburg.
  English version: http://www.manuscript-cultures.uni-hamburg.de/mom/2014_09_mom_e.html
  German version: http://www.manuscript-cultures.uni-hamburg.de/mom/2014_09_mom.html

Datenbanken

• Refaiya-library project, Leipzig University Library (1.200 manuscript notes, finished):
  http://www.refaiya.uni-leipzig.de
• Oriental manuscripts of the Berlin State Library (1.900 manuscript notes to date):
  http://orient-digital.staatsbibliothek-berlin.de
• Oriental manuscripts of Forschungsbibliothek Gotha, Schloss Friedenstein (1.500 manuscript notes to date):
  http://www.manuscripts-gotha.uni-jena.de
• Prosopographical database of manuscript notes (2.900 biographical entries to date):
  http://orientportal.dl.uni-leipzig.de/content/index.xml

Im Druck befindliche Bücher und Artikel

• “Being Samaritan in Late Mamluk Damascus. The experience of Ṣadaqa al-Sāmirī,” Between Saladin and Selim the Grim: Syria under Ayyubid and Mamluk Rule, ed. Reuven Amitai and Bethany Walker.
• “Libraries after 1500 in the Arab Lands,” Encyclopaedia of Islam 3.
• “The Sciences in Two Ottoman Private Libraries from Syria,” in Science in the Islamicate World, ed. Sonja Brentjes. London: Routledge (2022).
• “The History of Ibn Ḥazm’s Neckring of the Dove,” in Medieval Bestsellers vs Solitary Masterpieces: What was read then and now?, ed. Dwight Reynols and Heather Blurton (2022).
• “Putting Margins in Context. Some Practical Suggestions,” in Marginal Matters. Explorations into Commenting and Glossing Techniques in Arabic Manuscript Cultures, eds. Stefanie Brinkmann and Boris Liebrenz (Leiden: Brill).
• “Partisan Readers. Fighting over the Interpretation of History in the Margins of BnF Arabe 1825,” in Marginal Matters. Explorations into Commenting and Glossing Techniques in Arabic Manuscript Cultures, eds. Stefanie Brinkmann and Boris Liebrenz (Leiden: Brill).
• “What’s in a Seal?” Journal of Islamic Manuscripts (2022).
• Arab Traders in Their Own Words. Merchant Letters from the Eastern Meditteranean Around 1800 (Leiden: Brill, 2022).