Brill announces a new forthcoming book series -- The Green Scholars Initiative: Papyrus Series, Edited by Dirk Obbink and Jerry Pattengale – that includes rare, unpublished papyri texts from the private Green Collection. Jeffrey Fish is serving as the editor of volume one.

Leiden (NL) / Boston (MA) -- 1 August 2012

Brill has signed an agreement to publish The Green Scholars Initiative: Papyrus Series, edited by Dirk Obbink and Jerry Pattengale – a new book series that will include rare, unpublished papyri texts from the private Green Collection. Brill is quite pleased with the collaboration and looks forward to working with the Green Scholars Initiative (GSI). The collection itself is an untapped repository of extremely significant papyri, and the GSI provides access to the leading specialists in the field working on the project.

Dirk Obbink (University of Oxford) directs the Oxyrhynchus Papyri Collection and publications, and Jerry Pattengale (Indiana Wesleyan University and Baylor University) directs GSI, is a prolific author, international speaker, and oversees the publication of all Green Collection and GSI research projects.

The new series fits well among Brill’s strong portfolio of Classical Studies and Biblical and Religious Studies publications, as well as its extensive list of digitized primary source manuscript collections. Comprising of one to two new volumes per year, the new series will publish approximately 20 papyri with a thorough description, commentary with images, and web-based support for further resources. The first forthcoming volume in the series, planned to be released in early 2013, is dedicated to an early 3c BCE papyrus containing an extensive, undocumented work by Aristotle on reason, and is currently being analyzed by a research group at Oxford University.

The Green Collection contains over 50,000 items, and now holds nearly 15,000 papyri acquired from private collections in Europe, and continues to grow. The collection is approximately 70% Greek, 15% Coptic and 15% late Egyptian. The collection is currently unpublished and contains items of extraordinary importance, including some of the earliest Greek literary texts known, dating to the early 3c BCE. A major building near Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C. was purchased in July 2012 to house an international museum for these items.

For more information about this forthcoming new book series, contact Senior Acquisitions Editor Suzanne Mekking (mekking@brill.nl).

About Brill (brill.nl)
Founded in 1683 in Leiden, the Netherlands, BRILL is a leading international academic publisher in the fields of Ancient Near East and Egypt, Middle East and Islamic Studies, Asian Studies, Classical Studies, Medieval and Early Modern Studies, contemporary History and History of War studies, Biblical and Religious Studies, Slavic Studies, Language & Linguistics, Biology, Human Rights and Public International Law. With offices in Leiden and Boston, BRILL today publishes more than 175 journals and around 600 new books and reference works each year. All publications are available in both print and electronic form. BRILL also markets a large number of research collections and databases with primary source material. The company’s key customers are academic and research institutions, libraries, and scholars. BRILL is a publicly traded company and is listed on Euronext Amsterdam NV. For further information please visit www.brill.nl.

About The Green Collection
The world’s newest and largest private collection of rare biblical texts and artifacts, The Green Collection is an ever-growing, non-sectarian compilation of more than 50,000 biblical antiquities. Named for the family who founded national arts and crafts retailer Hobby Lobby, the collection “has created a buzz” (FOXNews.com, 2011) and is “a sampler of Jewish, Roman Catholic and Protestant treasures” (USA Today, 2011). Hobby Lobby President Steve Green oversees the expansion and outreach of the collection and will serve as chairman of the board for an eventual national Bible museum to enable visitors to experience it year-round. The national museum also will house the Green Scholars Initiative (GreenScholarsInitiative.org), which brings together established and young scholars to pioneer groundbreaking research on items in the collection.

Photo caption from left: Dr. Jerry Pattengale, Director Green Scholars Initiative; Mr. Steve Green, President Hobby Lobby; Mr. Cary Summers, COO Museum of the Bible; Dr. Dirk Obbink, Christ Church, Oxford University; Suzanne Mekking, Senior Acquisitions Editor BRILL; Mattie Kuiper, Editor BRILL.

This release is available online at: http://www.brill.nl/news/brill-publish-new-papyrus-series-green-collection