E. S. Drower - The Book Of The Zodiac

https://archive.org/details/e.-s.-drower-the-book-of-the-zodiac/page/n1/mode/2up

FROM THE PREFACE

Like most of the longer Mandaic manuscripts, the Book of the
zodiac is a miscellany, a group of manuscripts of varying source and
date, the main subjects being astrology and omens. At every new
year Mandaean priests meet together and peruse its pages carefully
in an endeavour to pierce the veils of the near future for themselves
md the community. In thus doing they carry on traditions of the
cowtry, for in ancient Babylon on the eighth and eleventh days of
the New Year Festival, ceremonies to “ fix the fates ” of the coming
year took place in a part of the Nebo-temple.1 In times of personal
or national crisis, too, recourse was had to priest-astrologers and omen
readers, and 80 when during recent years Mandaean priests turned
anxiously the pages of the Book of the Zodiac they were following the
example of those who lived on the same soil thousands of years ago
and, in days of stress and war, hoped to and in the stars a promise
of peace and better times.
In form, the Sfar Malwdia is a kurasa, that is, a set of unbound
pages kept within a pair of stiff covers. The last word of a page is
repeated at the beginning of the first line of the next. My own
manuscript was completed by the copyist in the year 1247 A.H. A copy of
earlier date, 1212 A.H., in the Bibliotheque Nationale in Paris (library
reference number C.S. 26) was micro photographed for me ; and later
on, in Baghdad, J was able to make a word-for-word comparison with
a third copy dated 1350 A.H., lent me for the purpose by a Mandean
priest. Reference to these three MSS. is made respectively under
“ D.C. 31 ” (my own), “ C.S. 26 ” (the Paris MSS.), and “ A ” (the
priest’s copy). Access to German  libraries was, unfortunately, impossible.
My translation, therefore, is based on three copies. All three have
mistakes, miscopyings, and omissions, but they are not of importance
and in most cases it is possible to correct by comparison. Trifling
differences are only noted when they may affect sense or construction.
The nucleus around which the fragments were originally assembled
k, most probably, the last segment. It is racy in style and rich in
idiom.

Ethel Stefana Drower née Stevens (1 December 1879 – 27 January 1972) was a British cultural anthropologist who studied the Middle East and its cultures. She was considered the primary specialist on the Mandaeans, and the chief collector of Mandaean manuscripts.

She was a daughter of a clergyman. In 1906 she was working for Curtis Brown, a London literary agency when she signed Arthur Ransome to write Bohemia in London.

In 1911, she married Edwin Drower and after his knighthood became Lady Drower. As E. S. Stevens, she wrote a series of romantic novels for Mills & Boon and other publishers. In 1921, she accompanied her husband to Iraq where Sir Edwin Drower was adviser to the Justice Minister from 1921 to 1946. Her works include The Canonical Prayerbook of the Mandaeans (a translation of the Qolusta); The Secret Adam (Mandaeans); and The Peacock Angel (about the Yezidis). Among her grandchildren was the campaigning journalist Roly Drower.