About
I am a translator, teacher/tutor, language consultant, and writer. Most of my academic experience and interests relate to the multilingual mycelium of late ancient literary survival. Most recently (2017-21), I taught various languages and literatures of late antiquity at the University of Notre Dame. In these four years I taught Syriac, Arabic, Armenian, Coptic, Hebrew, Gǝʕǝz, Jewish Aramaic dialects, and Old Turkic at various levels.
Prior to that (2015-17), I worked on Syriac and other texts in in an ERC-funded project (
Reassessing Ninth Century Philosophy: A Synchronic Approach to the Logical Traditions) based at the Institut für Byzantinistik und Neogräzistik at Univeristy of Vienna. From 2010 to 2015 I cataloged Syriac and Arabic/Garšūnī manuscripts for the Hill Museum & Manuscript Library, Saint John’s Univeristy.
My graduate work (2002-09) centered on Semitic languages, and secondarily late ancient Greek and Latin texts. My dissertation is a close philological study of the Syriac translation of a Greek philosophical text, the ps-Aristotelian
De mundo. At this time I also worked for the Comprehensive Aramaic Lexicon (
CAL) project with my advisor, Stephen Kaufman.
My publications include articles on philological topics, translations, and a Festschrift. While at HMML, I published about 300 blog posts at
hmmlorientalia that deal with manuscripts, Syriac, Arabic, Georgian, Armenian, etc.
I give
language and text/reading courses online for individuals or (small) groups in any kind of Aramaic (incl. Syriac), pre-modern Arabic (incl. Garšūnī and Judeo-Arabic), old/classical Georgian, old/classical Armenian, all dialects of Coptic (Bohairic, Sahidic, etc.), biblical and rabbinic Hebrew, Gǝʕǝz/Ethiopic, Old Uyghur/Turkic, Latin, and Greek (up to Byzantine). In addition, I am available for
manuscript cataloging,
translation, and
other consulting work for these and other languages.
Other Publications
books
2017. Editor,
Studies in Ethiopian Languages, Literature, and History: Festschrift for Getatchew Haile, Aethiopistische Forschungen 83 (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz). isbn 978-3-447-10848-5.
2014.
Jacob of Sarug’s Homilies on Jesus’ Temptation, The Metrical Homilies of Mar Jacob of Sarug / Texts from Christian Late Antiquity 38 (Piscataway: Gorgias Press). isbn 978-1-4632-0285-9.
2013.
The Story of Mar Pinḥas, Persian Martyr Acts in Syriac: Text and Translation 2 (Piscataway: Gorgias Press). isbn 978-1-4632-0217-0.
2009.
A Greek and Syriac Index to Sergius of Reshaina’s Version of the De Mundo (Piscataway: Gorgias Press). isbn 978-1-60724-583-4.
2009.
Jacob of Sarug’s Homily on Simon Peter, when our Lord said, ‘Get behind me, Satan’, The Metrical Homilies of Mar Jacob of Sarug / Texts from Christian Late Antiquity 26 (Piscataway: Gorgias Press). isbn 978-1-60724-214-7.
some articles
2021. “Poetized Hagiography: The Martyrdoms of Jacob the Persian & Tahmizgard in Syriac Story & Song.” In Flavia Ruani and Sergey Minov, eds.,
Syriac Hagiography: Texts and Beyond. Brill. Pages 223-256.
2020. “Adoration of the Magi.” In Tony Burke, ed.,
New Testament Apocrypha: More Noncanonical Scriptures, vol. 2. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. Pages 3-12.
2019. “Two languages, two scripts, three combinations: A (personal?) prayer-book in Syriac and Old Uyghur from Turfan (U 338).”
Ancient Jew Review. May 14, 2019.
https://tinyurl.com/yxsrr7cx.
2018. “Notes and Colophons of Scribes and Readers in Georgian Biblical Manuscripts from Saint Catherine’s Monastery (Sinai)”. In Liv Ingeborg Lied and Marilena Maniaci, eds.
Bible as Notepad: Tracing Annotations and Annotation Practices in Late Antique and Medieval Biblical Manuscripts. Manuscripta Biblica 3. Berlin/Boston: De Gruyter. Pages 111-124.
2017. “A New Gǝʿǝz Text on Adam and the Judgement of the Angels (Gundä Gunde 177).” In Adam Carter McCollum, ed.
Studies in Ethiopian Languages, Literature, and History: Festschrift for Getatchew Haile. Äthiopistische Forschungen 83. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. Pages 431-446.
2017. “Epiphanian Literature Beyond Greek: The Multilingual Textual Afterlives of Epiphanius.”
Ancient Jew Review. May 2, 2017.
https://www.ancientjewreview.com/read/2017/4/5/epiphanian-literature-beyond-greek-the-multilingual-textual-afterlives-of-epiphanius.
2015. “A Newly Identified Old Georgian Witness to the Greek Homily CPG 4622 at the Hill Museum & Manuscript Library”.
Comparative Oriental Manuscript Studies Bulletin 1 (2015): 85-93.
https://www.aai.uni-hamburg.de/en/comst/pdf/bulletin1/pp085-93.pdf.
2015. “On Judeo-Persian Language and Literature | Part Two: Texts and Bibliography.”
Ancient Jew Review. August 26, 2015.
http://tinyurl.com/hnj5hk6.
2015. “On Judeo-Persian Language and Literature | Part One: State of the Field.”
Ancient Jew Review. August 19, 2015.
http://tinyurl.com/ha4a2ww.
2015. “Greek Literature in the Christian East: Translations into Syriac, Georgian, and Armenian”.
Intellectual History of the Islamicate World 3 (2015): 15-65.
2015. “The Rejoicing Sailor and the Rotting Hand: Two Formulas in Syriac and Arabic Colophons, with Related Phenomena in Some Other Languages.”
Hugoye 18 (2015): 67-93.
http://tinyurl.com/jpqq3ua.
2014. “The Application of Thought to Language Learning: An Experiment in the Study of Old Georgian.” In Basil Lourié et al., eds.
Memorial Volume for Shalva Nutsubidze. Leiden: Brill. Pages 344-373.
2014. “Garšūnī as it Is: Some Observations from Reading East and West Syriac Manuscripts.”
Hugoye 17 (2014): 215-235.
https://hugoye.bethmardutho.org/article/hv17n2mccollum.
2013. “Prolegomena to a New Edition of Eliya of Nisibis’
Kitāb al-turjuman fi taʿlīm luġat al-suryān.” Journal of Semitic Studies 58 (2013): 297-322.
2012. “Remarks on Recent Cataloging Efforts among Syriac Manuscripts Preserved at the Hill Museum & Manuscript Library.”
Hugoye 15 (2012): 345-365.
https://hugoye.bethmardutho.org/article/hv15n2mccollum.
2012. “A Syriac Fragment from The Cause of All Causes on the Pillars of Hercules.”
ISAW Papers 5.
http://dlib.nyu.edu/awdl/isaw/isaw-papers/5/.
2011. “Sergius of Reshaina as Translator: The Case of the De Mundo.” In Josef Lössl and John W. Watt, eds.
Interpreting the Bible and Aristotle in Late Antiquity: The Alexandrian Commentary Tradition between Rome and Baghdad. Ashgate. Pages 165-178.
2010. “An Arabic Scholion to Gen 9:18-21 (Noah’s Drunkenness) attributed to Philoxenos of Mabbug.” Hugoye 13 (2010): 125-148.
https://hugoye.bethmardutho.org/article/hv13n2mccollum.
2010. “The Martyrdom of Theonilla in Syriac.”
Analecta Bollandiana 128 (2010): 312-328.
2010. “What Does Syriac masparta Mean?”
Le Muséon 123 (2010): 193-202.
2009. “A Puzzling Verb in the Syriac Version of Gregory of Nyssa’s De Anima et Resurrectione.”
Aramaic Studies 7 (2009): 19-26.
2006. “Recent Studies on the Jewish Northeastern Neo-Aramaic Dialects.”
Jewish Quarterly Review 96 (2006): 569-577.
some book reviews
2018.
Altuigurische Texte der Kirche des Ostens aus Zentralasien, by Peter Zieme.
Sehepunkte.
http://www.sehepunkte.de/2018/07/30067.html.
2018.
Armenian Apocrypha Relating to Angels and Biblical Heroes, by Michael E. Stone.
Review of Biblical Literature.
https://tinyurl.com/ybyuoobm.
2016.
The Bible in Arabic: The Scriptures of the “People of the Book” in the Language of Islam, by Sidney H. Griffith.
Journal of the American Oriental Society 136 (2016): 452-455.
2016.
The Ancient Martyrdom Accounts of Peter and Paul, by David L. Eastman.
Bryn Mawr Classical Review 2016.04.10.
http://bmcr.brynmawr.edu/2016/2016-04-10.html.
2015.
The Sasanian World through Georgian Eyes. Caucasia and the Iranian Commonwealth in Late Antique Georgian Literature, by Stephen H. Rapp Jr.
Sehepunkte 15.9 (2015).
http://www.sehepunkte.de/2015/09/26361.html.
2013.
Armenian Apocrypha Relating to Abraham, by Michael E. Stone.
Review of Biblical Literature.
http://www.bookreviews.org/pdf/8694_9565.pdf. Dec. 17, 2013.
2013.
The Sentences of Sextus, by Walter T. Wilson.
Bryn Mawr Classical Review 2013.08.45.
http://bmcr.brynmawr.edu/2013/2013-08-45.html.
2013.
The Semitic Languages, edited by Stefan Weninger. Handbooks of Linguistics and Communication Science 36.
Linguist List Jan. 8, 2013.
http://linguistlist.org/pubs/reviews/get-review.cfm?SubID=6517120.
2012.
A Grammar of Qumran Aramaic, by Takamitsu Muraoka.
Review of Biblical Literature Oct. 4, 2012.
http://www.bookreviews.org/pdf/8451_9255.pdf.
2012.
Semitic Studies in Victorian Britain: A portrait of William Wright and his world through his letters, by Bernhard Maier. Hugoye 15 (2012): 186-190.
http://www.bethmardutho.org/images/hugoye/volume15/hv15n1prmccollum.pdf.
2009.
Aristotelian Meteorology in Syriac by Hidemi Takahashi.
Wiener Zeitschrift für die Kunde des Morgenlandes 99 (2009): 419-21.
