The Dead Sea Scrolls Concordance, Volume 1

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The Astrolabe

An ancient instrument for solving problems of location and distance, as well as time

Astrolábon órganon is the word used in Ptolemaeus Syntaxis 5.1 to describe a form of armillary sphere consisting of both fixed and rotating rings for determining the ecliptic co-ordinates of stars. Also called astrolabe were two-dimensional representations of the celestial sphere: over fixed disks with a representation of the horizon of the earth (in each case for a specific geographic latitude) and its parallels up to the zenith lies a rotating representation of the heavens (called ‘spider’ or ‘net’) with zodiac and indicators for some of the brightest stars. On the back is an indicator (‘alidade’) with visor plates for calculating the height of the stars. The astrolabe allows its user to determine the hours of day and night, the positions of stars, and the height and depth of objects on earth (mountains, buildings, wells). The oldest extant descriptions of the flat, planispheric astrolabe come from Iohannes Philoponus, 6th century AD, and (in Syrian) from Severus Sebokht, c. 660 AD. Indirect references may date back as early as Theon (4th cent.). Between the 8th and the 9th centuries the Arabs appropriated the knowledge of the astrolabe. At the end of the 10th century and again in the 12th century, they passed it on to Western Europe, where astrolabes were constructed up until the 17th cent. Today, one Byzantine astrolabe (from 1062) is extant, as are some 750 Arabic-Islamic astrolabes and approximately the same number of European astrolabes.

This information is abstracted from Brill's New Pauly, the English edition of the authoritative Der Neue Pauly, Encyclopaedia of the Ancient World. The encyclopaedic coverage and high academic standard of the work, the interdisciplinary and contemporary approach and clear and accessible presentation have made the New Pauly the unrivalled modern reference work for the ancient world. For more information see www.brillsnewpauly.com or visit our website catalog: www.brill.nl/bnp
Brill’s New Pauly and the complete original Der Neue Pauly, the recognized standard reference works for students and scholars of the ancient world are also available online. This dual-language edition offers basic and advanced search facilities and is fully browsable. New English translations are added as they become available. See www.paulyonline.brill.nl for more information and a demo version.

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Publications & Services> Advanced Search> The Dead Sea Scrolls Concordance, Volume 1

The Dead Sea Scrolls Concordance, Volume 1

The Non-Biblical Texts from Qumran

Martin G. Abegg, Jr. with James E. Bowley and Edward M. Cook in consultation with Emanuel Tov

Books

Available
Publication year: 2003


ISBN-13 (i)The ISBN (International Standard Book Number) has been changed from 10 to 13 digits on 1 January 2007:	978 90 04 12521 6
ISBN-10:	90 04 12521 3

Cover:	Cloth with dustjacket
Number of pages:	vol.1: xx , 498 pp.; vol. 2: viii, 460 pp.

List price:	€ 347.00 / US$ 517.00

Reviews

'.. the DSSC is remarkably comprehensive and a vital resource for serious work in the Scrolls.'
Daniel M. Gurtner, Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society, 2005.
'…ein grosses, geradezu unverzichtbares Hilfsmittel sowohl für die alttestamentliche als auch für neutestamentliche Wissenschaft…'
Heinz Giesen, Theologie der Gegenwart, 2005.
'At long last we now have the research tool on the Dead Sea Scrolls that we have been eagerly awaiting - a complete and up-to-date concordance that is readily accessible. Abegg's work supersedes the earlier, more limited, and preliminary attempts and thus gives us a wonderful entry into the entire Qumran corpus.'
James C. VanderKam, John A. O'Brien Professor of Theology at the University of Notre Dame, USA.

Readership

Scholars and students in Hebrew Bible, Ancient Near East, Judaism, Intertestamental Literatures, Rabbinic Studies, New Testament, Semitic Languages, and Archaeology.

About the author(s)

Martin Abegg, Jr., Ph.D., Hebrew Union College, is Associate Professor of Religious Studies and Co-Director of the Dead Sea Scrolls Institute at Trinity Western University, British Columbia. He is one of the translators of The Dead Sea Scrolls (Harper, 1996) and The Dead Sea Scrolls Bible (Harper, 1999).

For decades a concordance of all the Dead Sea Scrolls has been a major desideratum for scholarship. The Dead Sea Scrolls Concordance covers all the Qumran material as published in the Discoveries in the Judaean Desert series, as well as the major texts from caves 1 and 11, which appeared elsewhere.
This keyword-in-context concordance, prepared by Martin G. Abegg in collaboration with other scholars, contains a new and consistent linguistic analysis of all the words found in the Dead Sea Scrolls. The total number of entries is around 134,000. Every entry includes the keyword with its context, exactly as published in the editions referred to above, with notes on some readings. All keywords have an English translation, and they are listed in alphabetical order rather than by verbal root, which makes the concordance easier to consult for the non-specialist.
This concordance to the non-biblical texts from Qumran is the first of a projected series of three. Future volumes will consist of concordances to the biblical texts from Qumran and to the texts from other sites in the Judean Desert.

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