The Participants
Elvira Martín Contreras (PI)
Elvira Martín-Contreras is Scientific Researcher at the Department of Jewish and Islamic Studies of ILC at
the CSIC (Spain). Her research is focused on the textual transmission and the reception of the Hebrew
Biblical text in rabbinic literature and the marginal annotations -known as Masora- found in most extant
medieval Hebrew Bible manuscripts. She is also interested in the annotating practices in the medieval Hebrew
Bibles, and Hebrew palaeography.
elvira.martin@cchs.csic.es
Esperanza Alfonso
Esperanza Alfonso is Research Fellow at the Center for Social and Human Sciences, Spanish National Research Council. She authored Islamic Culture through Jewish Eyes: Al-Andalus from the Tenth to the Twelfth Century (2007); and coedited Late Medieval Jewish Identities: Iberia and Beyond (2010). At the Katz Center, Alfonso will examine thirteenth-century vernacular translations of the Hebrew Bible.
Javier del Barco
Javier del Barco is Associate Professor at Universidad Complutense de Madrid specialising in Hebrew codicology and paleography, and in the history of Hebrew manuscripts and incunabula from the late Middle Ages to the early Modernity, particularly Hebrew Bibles. His research is focused in questions such as the study and interpretation of the book as a historical and cultural object, the relation between the object and the text, practices of reading, using and collecting manuscripts and incunabula, and Hebrew book transmission and circulation. He has also done research on Jewish liturgy and religion, and on biblical Hebrew linguistics. He has published several catalogues of Hebrew manuscripts, among which Catálogo de manuscritos hebreos de la Comunidad de Madrid (Madrid: CSIC, 2001-2006), and Bibliothèque Nationale de France: Hébreu 1 à 32; Manuscrits de la Bible hébraïque (Turnhout: Brepols, 2011), and has edited The Late Medieval Hebrew Book in the Western Mediterranean: Manuscripts and Incunabula in Context (Leiden: Brill, 2015). He is an active member in the following national and international research projects: "Legado de Sefarad III" (UCM), "Books within Books" (EPHE-PSL), "Manuscripta Bibliae Hebraicae" (AMU-CNRS), "Binah: Bibliothèque nationale Hebraica" (BNF-IRHT) and "Understanding the Paratexts of the Hebrew Bible (PARAHeB)" (ILC-CSIC).
Debora Matos
Debora holds a PhD in Digital Humanities from King's College London and has served as a researcher at the
Institute for Jewish Studies at the University of Münster. Her research lies at the crossroads of digital
methodologies, data analysis, Jewish book history, and visual artefacts. In this project, she delves into
the nuanced role of ornaments and decorative elements as paratexts in Jewish Bibles. Embracing the notion
that each artifact boasts unique characteristics, Debora aims to deepen our understanding of how
ornamental features modulate the viewer's gaze and reading experience. Beyond this, her exploration delves
into the complex dynamics between these elements and other paratexts, notably the Masora.
Irene Rincón Narros
Irene Rincón Narros is a Digital Humanities technician for the PARAHeB project (ILC). She holds a MA
in Digital Humanities from the National Distance Education University (UNED), Spain, with a
dissertation on “NoSQL Databases and their Implementation in Digital Humanities: Data Architecture for
the Theme Study of Tales”. She also has a degree in Journalism and another one in Semitic and Islamic
Studies.
irene.rincon@cchs.csic.es