Carbon Dating Confirms World's Oldest Torah Scroll. A scroll at the University of Bologna is shown to be 800 years old. The scroll dates to between 1155 and 1225, making it the oldest complete Torah scroll on record. We have fragments of other Torah scrolls from the Cairo Geniza that date to the same time or earlier, and they show identical styles to this copyist. Maybe we will find another Torah scroll that is older, but for now this is it. It has been at the University of Bologna library for centuries. It's very possible that at some time it came into the possession of a monastery, was later taken to Paris after Napoleon suppressed the monastic and religious orders, and finally restored to Bologna after Napoleon's collapse.
Friday, May 31, 2013
World's Oldest Surviving Torah Scroll
Carbon Dating Confirms World's Oldest Torah Scroll. A scroll at the University of Bologna is shown to be 800 years old. The scroll dates to between 1155 and 1225, making it the oldest complete Torah scroll on record. We have fragments of other Torah scrolls from the Cairo Geniza that date to the same time or earlier, and they show identical styles to this copyist. Maybe we will find another Torah scroll that is older, but for now this is it. It has been at the University of Bologna library for centuries. It's very possible that at some time it came into the possession of a monastery, was later taken to Paris after Napoleon suppressed the monastic and religious orders, and finally restored to Bologna after Napoleon's collapse.
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