2022 Study of Collections Fellowship Report:聽The Unpublished Materials of Charles Clermont-Ganneau
Matthew J. Suriano, University of Maryland
Through the support of the Collections Fellowship I was able to spend several days in Paris working at the Institut de France in the Acad茅mie des inscriptions et belles-lettres (AIBL). There, I studied the unpublished materials of Charles Clermont-Ganneau that are in the Cabinet du Corpus Inscriptionum Semiticarum (CIS). Access to this collection was granted by the kind permission of Christian Robin, the AIBL鈥檚 director. In Paris, I worked with Maria Gorea, the director of the Cabinet du CIS, where I benefited from her knowledge of Clermont-Ganneau and her ability to decipher his difficult handwriting. Dr. Gorea and her student No茅mie Carpentier also were of great assistance with French technical terms that I came across in Clermont-Ganneau鈥檚 writings.
The research is part of my larger project on the Hebrew funerary inscriptions from Silwan, which include the Royal Steward Inscription. That inscription together with a shorter inscription were first documented by Clermont-Ganneau in Silwan in 1870. He eventually purchased them for the British Museum, where they reside today. This summer in London I was able to study Clermont-Ganneau鈥檚 correspondence with the British Museum in the museum鈥檚 archives. My work in Paris, supported by the 17吃瓜Collections Fellowship, continued my investigation into the acquisition of the artifacts. Clermont-Ganneau鈥檚 papers in the Cabinet du CIS shed important light on two aspects involving the Hebrew epigraphic sources. First his papers describe the French diplomat / archaeologist鈥檚 efforts to buy the inscriptions from the Arab homeowner in Silwan, including details on how the inscriptions were extracted. Much of this information was left out of his 1899 published account of his discovery. Second, his notes, drawings, squeezes and casts (plaster and papier-m芒ch茅) reveal the extent of his work to translate the inscriptions, as well as his plans 鈥搖ltimately unfilled鈥� plans to publish them.
Access to Clermont-Ganneau鈥檚 papers was critical for my project, which seeks to publish the first comprehensive edition of the funerary inscriptions from Silwan. My collections study in Paris will allow me to write a chapter on the history of research that provides insight into the events that led to the acquisition of a famous Hebrew artifact from Jerusalem that is today prominently displayed in the British Museum.