Museum of the Bible delegation meets with Vartholomaios
After nearly a year of preparations, Kosinitza Manuscript 220 will return to the Patriarchal and Stavropegial Monastery of Theotokos Eikosiphoinissa in Drama, Greece, the Ecumenical Patriarchate said on Wednesday.
The manuscript, which was most recently purchased from Christie’s in 2011 and entered the collection of Washington DC’s Museum of the Bible in 2014, was among hundreds of priceless objects looted from the Monastery by Bulgarian troops in 1917.
Following the discovery of its origins by curator Brian Hyland, the Museum of the Bible began working in collaboration with Ecumenical Patriarch Vartholomaios for the repatriation of the manuscript to the monastery from which it was stolen.
On September 27, Vartholomaios received the museum’s official delegation at the Phanar. Representing the Museum, including founder and Chairman of the Board Steve Green, Chief Curator Dr. Jeffrey Kloha. The meeting was also attended by Archbishop Elpidophoros of America.
The Ecumenical Patriarch thanked the leadership of the museum for their “productive cooperation” with the Ecumenical Patriarchate, praising it for the return of the manuscript, noting that their act “is an example worthy of imitation” and contributes to the repatriation of the other “orphan” manuscripts and ecclesiastical relics to their “natural mother, that is, the Monastery.”
On May 14, the Ecumenical Patriarch signed the deed issued by the Museum of the Bible which officially transferred ownership of the manuscript to the Holy Patriarchal and Stavropegial Monastery, to which it was returned on August 31, 2022, and where it is now kept, Phanar said in a press release.
