New Fragments of MS London-Ashkar

In the most recent issue of Genizah Fragments, the newsletter of the Taylor-Schechter Genizah Research Unit, Mordechai Veintrob presents exciting new identifications of Cairo Genizah fragments from MS London-Ashkar. This confirms that the scroll originally came from the Genizah, and the identified contents now preserve close to 10% of the Torah, including fragments from Genesis, Exodus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy (primarily clustering into two groups containing Gen 44-Exod 3 and Exod 8-17). Relatively securely dated to the 7th-8th centuries (by C14 and paleography), this manuscript is by far the most substantially preserved biblical manuscript between the DSS and the famous Masoretic codices from the 10th-11th centuries (Veintrob is somewhat imprecise in his description at this point). Congratulations to Veintrob on these important discoveries! The total inventory of fragments according to Veintrob now include:

1. Cambridge, T-S AS 36.30 — Gen. 10:28–13:9; 
2. Cambridge, T-S AS 36.31 + Cambridge, T-S AS 37.26 — Gen. 44:23–46:20;
3. Cambridge, T-S AS 37.1 + Cambridge, T-S AS 37.22 — Gen. 47:17–50:23; 
4. Cambridge, T-S AS 36.36 —Exod. 2:14–3:21; 
5. London, Jews’ College 31 — Exod. 9:18–13:2; 
6. Cambridge, T-S AS 36.19 + Cambridge, T-S AS 37.8 + Durham, Duke University, Ashkar Collection 2 — Exod. 13:2–16:1; 
7. Cambridge, T-S NS 282.88 — Exod. 17:5–18:14;
8. Cambridge, T-S AS 36.10 — Num. 10:16–35; 
9. Durham, Duke University, Ashkar Collection 21 — Deut. 2:9–3:12;
10. Cambridge, T-S AS 37.10 + ENA 4117.13 — Deut. 32:50–end of the Pentateuch.