Talk:Scroll

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When I'm thinking about a "scroll", in the traditional sense, what length of text should I be thinking about? Could they be made arbitrarily long, and rolled-up? When I hear that the Library of Alexandria had 400,000-700,000 scrolls, is that more like 500,000 pages, or 500,000 books? -- Creidieki 17:53, 10 October 2005 (UTC)Reply

not really sure, but more like a book than a page. Torah is all on 1 (unusually large) scroll & some Chinese painted ones (exceptionally) are about ? 200 feet long. At a guess each book of the Old Testament would have been on 1 scroll in Hebrew. Also I think each "book" of the Aenead was 1 scroll. Certainly they were rolled up, but if they got too long it would take ages to go straight to a particular place. Anyone got better info?

Johnbod 20:07, 9 December 2006 (UTC)Reply

From Bernard Knox, "Introduction", in The Iliad translated by Robert Fagles (but I am re-translating from a french translation and am not english-fluent):

"In the ancient world the Iliad was composed of a number of scrolls of papyrus with text written in columns in the internal side. This scrolls shouldn't be too tight (else they will break on opening); for a long poem like the Iliad, maybe up to twenty-four scrolls were needed - and possibly the "songs" of present text reflect the original divison in scrolls."

Ersalo 14:24, 5 August 2007 (UTC)Reply

The name "Scroll (parchment)" in not quite right name for this article, as this deals with scrolls, and they were not predominantely parchment but papyrus. I suggest this article to be the main article and others (see Scroll) for other uses? If nobody objects it, I will make the change in two weeks. --Aethralis 09:42, 27 September 2006 (UTC)Reply

While I agree that it shouldn't be located at Scroll (parchment), I don't think it should be the main article either, because there is way too many disambiguations. And one can argue that for the information age, scroll is more often heard when used to talk about mouse or webpages. I propose that it be moved to Scroll (roll) or Scroll (writing) or Scroll (medium) (my personal favorite) or some other broader description of scrolls. --Wirbelwind 06:44, 12 October 2006 (UTC)Reply

Ok. I almost agree but when you look at the disambiguation page, the only other meaning of "scroll" is from music (Scroll (music)). All others come from the verb "to scroll", and so scrolling and scrollwork actually do not need this disambiguation page at all. And more to the point, scroll is the orginal meaning and the basis of all the derivative meanings.--Aethralis 08:48, 12 October 2006 (UTC)Reply

I removed the entry from WP:RM. If you want the article moved, please reopen the case at WP:RM but I urge you to follow all the steps described there, especially creating the place for discussion on this talk page. I have no particular opinion on the subject. Duja 08:43, 18 October 2006 (UTC)Reply

Scratch that, changed my mind. Having investigated "What links here" for Scroll, all the incoming links refer to the parchment. It seems you're right, and this should be the primary meaning. I'll fix the situation. Duja 08:46, 18 October 2006 (UTC)Reply

Parchment is also a problem from the worldwide view angle, as the Chinese & other East Asians used paper from very early on - invented c100-200. Johnbod 03:22, 7 December 2006 (UTC)Reply

There is next to nothing on Asian scrolls, and the Chinese (Torah scrolls apart) used the scroll the longest. I may add a bit, but I don't know much. Johnbod 03:20, 7 December 2006 (UTC)Reply

PS the external link seems deadJohnbod 03:37, 7 December 2006 (UTC)Reply

Can we move the information on how the Torah is copied away from the history section? This deserves its own page. This information has little to do with the history and description of what a scroll is.

The discussion on the Christian era is not 100% helpful, since it implies that the scribal practises at the time were sloppy, and that the introduction of changes into the text mean that the NT is impossible to reconstruct.

There are not many scholars who would claim this.

It would be more helpful to say what the scribal practises were (eg people changing Jesus to Lord, or being more flexible with word order) and what the majority of those 30-200,000 errors were (single letter changes, word order issues etc.) and the nature of the 30 "serious" changes.

I do not dispute the factual accuracy of the figures used, nor the superiority of the scribal practises of the Masoretes, simply the skew that the current wording gives that makes is sound like we have no idea what any of the authors said. A copy of NA27 and the editor's notes puts paid to that theory.

Rev Dr J Ward —Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.144.38.97 (talk) 07:12, 19 July 2009 (UTC)Reply

The image on the top right of the page is called the Joshua Roll but on the same page it says that a scroll is different from a roll. " It is distinguished from a roll by virtue of being intended for repeated use rather than continuous, but once-only use of the roll." this is already marked as dubious and I think one of these things have to go —Preceding unsigned comment added by Rockyroadster555 (talk • contribs) 14:25, 1 May 2011 (UTC)Reply

The concern about the definition in the lead has been resolved, but there are other issues. Papyrologists and classicists call ancient manuscripts that are not codices "rolls" not "scrolls". Does anyone from other disciplines have an idea how to address this? Because this page seems to be influencing a lot of classics articles into an uncommon usage. Thank you, The Cardiff Chestnut (talk) 18:51, 20 July 2011 (UTC)Reply

The oldest complete Torah scroll was recently discovered on May 2013 by Professor Mauro Perani. It was stored in an academic library in Bolonia, Italy. It had been mislabeled in 1889 as dating from the 17th century. Carbon testing dates the prayer book to the year 840, which is 300 to 400 years before the oldest known Torah scroll from the 12th and 13th centuries.

The oldest complete Torah scroll was recently discovered on May 2013 by Professor Mauro Perani. It was stored in an academic library in Bolonia, Italy. It had been mislabeled in 1889 as dating from the 17th century. Carbon testing dates the prayer book to the year 840, which is 300 to 400 years before the oldest known Torah scroll from the 12th and 13th centuries.

The scroll is made up of 58 sections of soft sheep leather. It is 36 meters long and 64 centimeters wide. It was written in an archaic form of Hebrew, on pages of aged parchment. The text includes 100 Jewish blessings and discusses topics such as the apocalyptic tale of the End Times and the Passover Seder. This Torah scroll is worth around 1.3 million dollars. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Gonzalev1 (talk • contribs) 18:36, 2 April 2014 (UTC)Reply

There's a photo but at least some greater coverage of scrolls in Chinese and Asian contexts needs to be added here. In particular, the standard division of large literary works in East Asian contexts even after the advent of Chinese bookbinding was the scroll or roll (卷). — LlywelynII 08:41, 24 August 2025 (UTC)Reply