The research has been published in the journal Zeitschrift für die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft in a paper titled: The Valediction of Moses: New Evidence on the Shapira Deuteronomy Fragments.
Bullet Points: Antiques dealer Moses Willhelm Shapira released the scroll to the world in 1883 The 15 fragments claim to contain words from the biblical book of Deuteronomy He sold them to the British Museum for £1 million but they were branded as fake The museum sold the fragments at auction for £25 and they disappeared forever A new study into the linguistics and structure of the words based on drawings and writings from the 18th century suggest it may actually be ancient text
If only someone remembered where the original was placed.
Fascinating! It was claimed, by Shapira, that the scrolls were found in the desert hills of the Jordan valley. They ended up being denounced as fakes and so no one believed him... but then, in 1948, the Dead Sea Scrolls were found, in that very same area.
Kind of a stretch, seems like, since the originals are not around to see.
Yet, if true, truly fascinating.
You might be interested in this.
https://codexsinaiticus.org/en/
“Codex Sinaiticus is one of the most important books in the world. Handwritten well over 1600 years ago, the manuscript contains the Christian Bible in Greek, including the oldest complete copy of the New Testament. Its heavily corrected text is of outstanding importance for the history of the Bible and the manuscript – the oldest substantial book to survive Antiquity – is of supreme importance for the history of the book”
Is the text available in English?
Ping!........................