For Coffee With A Codex on December 4, South Asian Studies Librarian Jef Pierce will bring out Ms. Coll. 390 Item 3020, a manuscript that contains the legend of Kālaka, important to the Śvetāmbara Jains and read during the first night of the Paryuṣaṇā.
Join us to celebrate the launch of this landmark, multi-volume project presenting an up-to-date, diverse history of Philadelphia across its many dimensions.
December 4, 2025
5:30pm -
7:00pm
Class of 1978 Orrery Pavilion, Van Pelt-Dietrich Library Center, sixth floor
Ali Noori explores manuscript copies housed in Penn Libraries' collections of a 15th-century Islamic devotional manual Dalail al-Khayrat (The Guide to Goodness), composed by the North African Sufi mystic al-Jazuli (d. 1465) and considers the parallels between this Islamic bestseller and the roughly contemporary medieval European bestseller, the Book of Hours.
Come by the Vitale II Book+Digital Lab (623 Van Pelt Library) on Wednesday, December 10, between 2 and 4pm for FUN WITH MANUSCRIPTS. You'll color your own decorative medieval illustration and make it into a button.
For Coffee With A Codex on December 11, Curator Dot Porter will bring out LJS 16, a volume comprising Books 25 to 28 of the Speculum historiale of Vincent of Beauvais. It was written in France, probably Paris, circa 1400.
For Coffee With A Codex on December 18, Curator Dot Porter will bring out Ms. Codex 1904, a copy of the Qur'ān, with instructions for how much to read from the Qur'ān every day of the week added in modern script. Written in Malta in 1654.
