A fascinating and painstakingly researched exploration of Jerusalem and its many libraries and archives, large and small, public and private, well-known and hidden away. The authors have delved into these invaluable archives and spoken to the librarians and archivists who safeguard them. Many manuscripts and documents have been lost or destroyed over the centuries, and it’s not surprising that access to some of the libraries is hard to obtain, but Mack and Balint valiantly persevered to uncover many incomparable treasures. There is much that is truly fascinating about what they discover but it is above all a scholarly text and I did find some of it abstruse and, it has to be said, dull at times. Nevertheless, it’s an impressive work of scholarship and detection and an important contribution to the history of the word and the history of Jerusalem.

This is not your average biography. First it for a city and second it's more of a history of of archaeological findings, given the fact there are long passages about Dead Sea Ancient Scrolls, I learned a lot from this book and would recommend to any history lover.

An incredible adventure for armchair travelers and appreciators of history. The authors examine the history of Jerusalem through the history of libraries and provide a fascinating perspective on the role that repositories of manuscripts and printed books continue to play in the metropolis and the larger religious communities.

This is a book I would recommend to readers who are into religious themes, book related archeological findings in Jerusalem. The book is very well written, a definite pleasant to read, no hard Academic language at all. However, I find it a bit more to the topic of archeological findings, given the fact there are long passages about Dead Sea Ancient Scrolls (I am even lucky to see it with my own eyes in museum). It is very nice to read about that knowledge, but a more passionate book or library experience in Jerusalem in recording was I expecting.

this is a different type of biography. First it for a city and second it's more of a history of the history of the City. There is a short narrative of the history of the City and those who lived, battled and conquered it. From this short narrative you can see that the city has had few periods of peace.

The real meat of the book is about the authors trying to find where information about the life of the city over the last five thousand years. Unlike a lot of cities of the many libraries (archives) that exist in the city, many are 'hidden' and the information there is 'protected' from their use by anyone. While Mack is exploring the Old City, he is traveling all over the world to get permission to go into places where he told he can't see anything.

An example of the difficulties is the archives of the Ethiopian Church where the authors have to travel to Ethiopia to get permission to contact the Chief of the Archive in Jerusalem. Then they have to get an appointment with the head of the church in Jerusalem, who is not happy to have to see them much less show them anything. Eventually the Archivist agrees to show them some manuscripts, but under his personal guidance. That's one of the easy ones.

Most of the current archives that are in the city of Jerusalem are protected under amazing amounts of security because so many of the ancient manuscripts were pilfered during the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. One archive is so secretive that the archivist in charge has never been in the actual archive himself! Unfortunately, much of what was in the different European archives were pilfered by the Nazis and destroyed during the second World War.

Probably the saddest destruction, for me, came during the 1948 War of Independence by the Arab League. During the battle for the Old City, the Jordanian Army destroyed seventy-nine of the eighty synagogues that existed in the Jewish Quarter. Hundreds or thousands of records, many hundreds of years old, books and manuscripts were destroyed or burned by the Arab League forces.

So there is much to be discovered by scholars in the City but it appears that little of it will be coming into the light in the next years.

Not sure I can read this.
I’ve been to Jerusalem and to the library is and I’m Jewish I was interested but it’s too hard for me to read a book that’s not on my Kindle.
PDF reading is not an enjoyable - easy way to read a book.
I’m sooo sorry. If I knew ahead of time - o wouldn’t have requested to read it.
I’d read a PHYSICAL book -love them - but not on my computer.

Sorry, I did realize that this book is download only, and I am currently only reading kindle editions.