His project explores how Muslim scholars in the 12th and 13th centuries added paratextual elements to the texts that they read. These included notes attesting to students reading the text with a teacher, transforming a manuscript into a social document. Dr. Keegan is examining a 12th-century copy of a 10th-century work entitled The Exegesis of Rare Words in the Quran, in which one of the attested students was Saladin’s nephew, who was both a prince and a scholar. The size, spacing, and placement of paratexts attesting to who read and interacted with this manuscript will help shed light on the aesthetic dimension of philological practices.
