Ben Sira Ms A fol. I recto and fol. VI verso (T-S 12.863) Revisited

This article offers some remarks on the reading of the offset letters preserved on the first lines of Ms A folio I recto and folio VI verso. As Eric D. Reymond has recently observed, the traces on Ms A I recto, lines 1–4 indeed reflect parts of a Hebrew version that corresponds to a portion of text hitherto only known from the Syriac translation. Discussing the reading of the offset traces proposed by Reymond, the article offers an analysis of its own and demonstrates how image manipulation programs can help to both reconstruct missing text as well as check the results. Among other observations the article proposes a reconstruction of the barely legible offset traces on Ms A VI verso, which seems to suggest that the now lost Hebrew text of Sir 16:26b–29 might correspond to an expanded textual form as preserved in the Syriac version of Codex Ambrosianus (7aI).