Dr. Jeremy R. Brown has been Senior Researcher, Cataloger, & Translator on PEMM since 2020. For PEMM, he conducts research on the earliest Marian miracle stories in Täˀammərä Maryam, as well as identifying and cataloging hundreds of such stories in Gəˁəz manuscripts, entering the information in the PEMM database, and training others to identify and catalog the same.

Dr. Brown has cataloged almost 32,000 stories in over 405 manuscripts for PEMM. He has also cataloged and analyzed over 2,500 paintings, and co-translated over 160 stories for PEMM.

He is the Cataloger of Ethiopic manuscripts for HMML, working primarily on those manuscripts microfilmed as a part of the Ethiopian Manuscript Microfilm Library collection.

He was a visiting assistant professor in the Department of Semitic and Egyptian Languages and Literatures at The Catholic University of America, where he teaches courses on Gəˁəz and Syriac.

He is an expert on ancient and medieval Ethiopian history and religion broadly, with specialties in Gəˁəz manuscripts, philology, biblical tradition, and hagiographies. He also studies texts in Syriac, Arabic, Hebrew, Greek, and Old South Arabian.  

He is the Director of Digitization and Special Projects for the Ethiopian Manuscript Imaging Project (EMIP) and is coauthor on several volumes in the Catalogue of the Ethiopic Manuscript Imaging Project series. He is a consultant on the Textual History of the Ethiopic Old Testament (THEOT) project, headed by Prof. Steve Delamarter and is working with a team of scholars on a catalogue of Ethiopic manuscripts at The Catholic University of America. He has published his work in Aethiopica and his 2019 doctoral dissertation will be published in the prestigious Aethiopistische Forschungen series, by Harrassowitz Verlag, as Jonah in the Ethiopic Biblical Tradition.  To learn more, see Dr. Brown’s Academia website.      

Translations

Dr. Brown has translated many PEMM stories, usually with Dawit Muluneh or Kate Pukhovaia. 

Here is a list of the stories in Täˀammərä Maryam manuscripts that he has co-translated as of January 31, 2024:

1.       Deacon Michael, who was a grocer, and his stolen ring that the Virgin Mary helped to retrieve from a fish

2.       The innocent Frenchman who was framed for theft by a spurned innkeeper's daughter and was hanged but did not die

3.       The Arabs who tried to plunder an Egyptian monastery during a famine in the time of the Patriarch Matthew and kidnap a monk when thwarted

4.       Dabra Qalemon's monks who are robbed by Berbers and aided by Arabs

5.       Dabra Qalemon's tailor, Jacob the Short, has his scissors stolen and the thief falls ill until he returns them

6.       Dabra Qalemon's icon of the Virgin Mary and the Arab who has contempt for it and is punished during the time of Patriarch Gabriel IV of Alexandria (1370-1378)

7.       Bishop Hildephonsus of Toledo who collected stories and compiled them into the Book of the Miracles of the Virgin Mary

8.       Amnut, the custodian of a church in Egypt, who quarreled with the resentful new bishop after Amnut refused to become the bishop

9.       Nekwal, the deacon from Marg and Kem near Cairo in Egypt, who spent his Muslim master's money on the poor

10.   The priest from Nardin, Egypt, who lived piously with a nun but was accused of sexual immorality

11.   Dabra Qalemon's icon of the Virgin Mary heals an Arab woman who had suffered from an issue of blood for many years

12.   The priest who accidentally knocked down the lamp hanging before the icon of the Virgin Mary and yet it did not spill or go out

13.   Two monks from the monastery of Saint Victor and the old man who stole from them and was punished

14.   The Christians of Atrib, Egypt, who gathered for a feast of the Virgin Mary and were saved from Arab thieves

15.   The hospitable Emma Yohannes (mother of John) of Lower Egypt who went with an Ethiopian monk on pilgrimage to Jerusalem and was baptized there

16.   The zealous European who tried to steal the bars of the door to Christ's manger at Bethlehem and was strangled by them

17.   A Christian's lamp was blown out by the wind during the feast of Mary at the Meneta Diyaqonat and his Muslim servant is protected from the storm

18.   A woman, married to Joseph, was given a male son who was later protected from drowning in the spring Christ created in Egypt, near Meneta Diyaqonat

19.   The French king's cupbearer who was slandered by other servants but saved from burning by the Virgin Mary

20.   A bankrupt husband who denied Christ and befriended Satan, who promised him great wealth, but was stopped by the Virgin Mary in his wife's guise

21.   A devout Muslim who mocked Christians for praying only once a day and became a Christian when the Virgin Mary appeared to him

22.   Dabra Metmaq's Annual Apparition: The annual apparition of the Virgin Mary at the Egyptian monastery of Dabra Metmaq with or without Christ's promises

23.   Dabra Metmaq's camel driver steals from the monastery and is punished by the Virgin Mary

24.   Dabra Metmaq's Prior Yeshaq flees to Scete, Egypt, to escape the burden of his office

25.   The Muslim Egyptian ruler's son who insulted the icon of the Virgin Mary and saw a vision of Christ enthroned

26.   Saint Eulogius the Stonemason, who lived in Egypt, was hospitable to strangers, and was brought back to the faith by Abba Daniel of Scete

27.   The old woman from Sembat who was chastised by the Virgin Mary for giving gifts to Saint George's church rather than to the Virgin Mary's church

28.   The church built on the tomb of the Virgin Mary that will turn into a ship during the second coming

29.   Rizqallah, a priest from Cairo, who vowed to the Virgin Mary that he would stop serving her if she did not help him recover, from Arab thieves, some pilgrims' stolen clothes

30.   A childless woman who prayed for a child, during the appearance of the Virgin Mary in the church of Matariya in the Meneta Sard region of Egypt, found her child safe despite tumbling from the roof

31.   Dabra Qalemon's Abbot Samuʾel intercedes an angel who had disobeyed the command of God.

32.   Dabra Metmaq's monks are helped to celebrate Passion Week when Bishop Michael sends Deacon John to help them

33.   Dabra Metmaq's water cistern is filled miraculously

34.   Scete's teacher who went into the desert and saw a multitude of demons, who dispersed after he prayed to the Virgin Mary

35.   Saint Victor, the martyr, and his mother Martha, and how the Virgin Mary saved him when the Roman queen killed him as a baby

36.   A Muslim woman who entrusted her jewels to a Christian woman for safekeeping and converted after Mary revealed that the Christian woman had lied when she said they had been stolen

37.   The Ethiopian abbot who did not allow the Miracles of Mary to be read in his monastery and died a sudden death

38.   Dabra Qwesqwam's church construction results in a man being killed but the Virgin Mary raises him from the dead.

39.   Dabra Qwesqwam's builders receive a gift of his earnings from the vinedresser of Manfalut

40.   John, a monk in the Monastery of Abba Macarius, who was visited by the Virgin Mary as a winged maiden of light

41.   Dabra Qwesqwam's church is robbed of lumber by an infidel

42.   King of Rome: Part 1: King Mark (Mareqos) abandons his throne secretly to become a monk

43.   King of Rome: Part 2: King Mark (Mareqos) is searched for by the people of Rome, who appeal to Patriarch Denys (Dionysius) to find him

44.   King of Rome: Part 3: King Masfeyanos's wife Sefengeya prays for a child to the Virgin Mary's icon and conceives Saint Yeshaq (Abba Garima)

45.   Entawos, a pagan from Qarays, who attacked the Church of Saint Theodore but became a Christian after being struck by miraculous arrows

46.   Emperor Tiberius has John the Evangelist paint an icon of the Crucifixion for him since Jesus was executed under Tiberius

47.   Petros Bawares, a man who built a church to the Virgin Mary, asked her son to reveal the mystery of the Trinity to him

48.   Rewh, a believer from Qarys, who attacked the Church of Saint Theodore and persucted Christians but became a Christian after being struck by miraculous arrows and was renamed New Anthony

49.   The priest Mark's wife, from Mallawi in Egypt, who is cured of a leprous sore on her belly by the prayers of Patriarch Matthew

50.   Dabra Qwesqwam is visited by the monks of Saint Anthony to celebrate Holy Week there

51.   Dabra Qwesqwam's monks, from Saint Anthony's monastery in Egypt, are extorted for money by an Arab named Katib

52.   Homily of John Chrysostom on the visit of the Virgin Mary and her Son to John the Baptist.

53.   Pifamon, the noble martyr from Awsim near Cairo, Egypt, who was visited by Jesus and the Virgin Mary before his martyrdom

54.   John, the martyr from Senhut, Egypt, who refused to worship impure gods when Emperor Diocletian commanded it and was martyred in Atrib

55.   Emperor Zeno in Constantinople builds churches in Scete, Egypt

56.   A priest who was warned not to rush when incensing the icon of the Virgin Mary; the patrariach who received miraculous baptismal water; and Hilaria the daughter of Emperor Zeno who became a nun in Scete

57.   Holy Family's Journey: The Virgin Mary blesses Scete, which Saint Macarius chooses for his monastery.

58.   Michael, the Christian scribe of Upper Egypt, who converted to Islam when his master beat him severely and then converted back, became a monk, and was martyred

59.   The Muslim Egyptian man who lived next to Saint Mark Church, the Saint Shenute Church, and a Muslim Mosque in Cairo and was left behind in the desert while on pilgrimage to Mecca

60.   A hermit in Jerusalem who was tempted by Satan to commit sexual sin but was saved when he refused to stop venerating the icon of the Virgin Mary

61.   The gardener named Absadi, of Saint Shenute's monastery, who gave the monks' vegetables away to the poor but was defended by Abba Shenoute

62.   The church official who wanted to stop the singing of hymns to the Virgin Mary during the Eucharist and heard of an abbot who was punished by Mary for doing so

63.   A European man, lame due to a stone foot, is healed by praying in front of the icon of the Virgin Mary

64.   Thieves at the Spring: Part 2: The daughter of the chief of the thieves is cured of her leprosy at the miraculous spring.

65.   Thieves at the Spring: Part 4: The Virgin Mary saves the soul of a thief who was slain by the miraculous spring

66.   Homily on the miracles of the Virgin Mary.

67.   Patriarch Cosmas and his Christian flock in Alexandria, Egypt, who were persecuted by Caliph Jafar (Abbasid caliph al-Mutawakkil) and forced to wear indigo-dyed clothes

68.   Patriarch Gabra Krestos of Alexandria who heard of the withered olive tree that bloomed at the Andalusian church gate every year on the feast of the Virgin Mary (from the History of the Patriarchs)

69.   King's Parable: Part 1: Patriarch Abraham of Alexandria (d. 978), King al-Muizz, and the parable of the mustard seed (whole or opening)

70.   King's Parable: Part 2: Patriarch Abraham of Alexandria (d. 978), King al-Muizz, and the parable of the mustard seed (continuation)

71.   The daughter of the rich man from Caesarea who could not deliver her baby and almost died until taken to the church of the Virgin Mary

72.   Emperor Arcadius of Constantinople, the golden statue of the Virgin Mary, and the exposition of the Byzantine Patriarch Saint John Chrysostom on Matthew 1:25

73.   A Cairo woman's daughter, who lived by the Nile river and became blind due to too much reading and study but was healed by the Virgin Mary

74.   Thieves at the Spring: Part 3: The thieves who killed each other at the miraculous spring, one who was the Cannibal of Qemer and the thief who repented on the cross

75.   A Cappadocian official's beloved son who died but was raised from the dead when he was carried to the icon of the Virgin Mary

76.   King Zara Yaqob's reign and the beggar at the church of Qirqos in Amhara from whose head a horn grew

77.   Book of Felsata la-Maryam??: AOld?: Dormition: The Apostles gather for the funeral of the Virgin Mary.

78.   A merchant from Senfewat who struck the icon of the Virgin Mary.

79.   The beautiful Church of the Virgin Mary in the Harat Zuwayla neighborhood, in Cairo, Egypt, that was closed by Muslim decree for over three years but reopened when the Virgin Mary and the Patriarch Matthew acted

80.   Nestorius, the Archbishop of Constantinople and a heretic, is punished by the Virgin Mary for insulting her

81.   Saint Basil and the rich man who refused to give him a tablet [saleda] for an icon of the Virgin Mary.

82.   The noble man from Qemer who was a cannibal and ate 78 people, gave a drop of water to a beggar, and went to heaven

83.   Saint Basil and the Jewish merchant of Caesarea who stole a golden plate from the church, but later became a Christian.

84.   Saint Menas and his jealous brother and the story of the saint's birth

85.   Patriarch Matthew I of Alexandria and his election

86.   Emperor Theodosius of Constantinople's son, the Saint Alexius [Abd al-Masih], and the story of his life

87.   The faded icon of the Virgin Mary that the mother-in-law wanted to discard.

88.   A woman from Cairo whose nine children all died but the Virgin Mary helped her conceive three more.

89.   Holy Family's Journey: The places in Egypt visited by the Holy Family.

90.   The sinful deacon who was healed from his illness by a drop of the Virgin Mary's breast milk

91.   The thief whom the king's soldiers could not kill by hanging because he prayed to the Virgin Mary

92.   Pilgrim to Santiago: Part 1: The bishop for whom the Virgin Mary tailored a new sackcloth sends a penitent pilgrim to Santiago (whole or opening)

93.   Pilgrim to Santiago: Part 2: When Pariqos of Fesa confesses his sins to the bishop, the latter, refusing him absolution, tells him to go to Abba Yaceqob (Santiago).

94.   Alexander, a nobleman from Jerusalem, was swallowed up by a dragon (crocodile) and delivered after three days

95.   A man who drowned when a pilgrim ship sank and was delivered unharmed to their destination

96.   A woman from Rome whose daughter returns to life for a day on the anniversary of her death

97.   The pious official who was accused of embezzlement and of having an affair with the wife of his lord

98.   An aged monk from Egypt whom the Virgin Mary made young again

99.   The monastic scribe who used to write the Virgin Mary's name in golden ink

100.                 The former pagan, the Bishop of Rome, who cut off his hand because of a lustful thought and the Virgin Mary healed him

101.                 The former pagan, the Bishop of Rome, who cut off his hand because of a lustful thought and the Virgin Mary healed him

102.                 A nun in prison for her faith prays for two young virgin women who come to visit her

103.                 The sinful woman who despaired when she kept on sinning and swallowed a tarantula as an attempt to die

104.                 A monk who was carried by his fellow monks to church when he became too sick to walk

105.                 A monk who was carried by his fellow monks to church when he became too sick to walk

106.                 A bishop who was commanded by the Virgin Mary in a dream to bury an executed robber in consecrated ground

107.                 The laborer who complained to the Virgin Mary because she did not reply to his Hail Mary

108.                 The pious rich man whom Satan served in hopes of destroying him and who tried to trick him through fishing, hunting, and fasting

109.                 The hypocritical superior of a monastery who pretended to be religious and is rescued from hell by the Virgin Mary

110.                 A monk who got himself appointed by the king to be abbot when the abbot died, angering the monks, and then he himself died

111.                 The nun who used to pray for the dead lost her virginity but died before completing her penance and the Virgin Mary delivered her from hell

112.                 The nun who the Virgin Mary encouraged to recite the Hail Mary more slowly because the Virgin Mary enjoyed it

113.                 A wealthy man to whom the Virgin Mary appeared in the form of a bird to save the countryside from pestilence.

114.                 Giyorgis Haddis, the martyr, and his wife Sawla, who was visited by the Virgin Mary

115.                 Awr, the sorcerer son of the princess and the magician Abrasit, who converted when confronted by the Virgin Mary

116.                 The Virgin Mary, as a young woman, cures the son of a Roman official in Bethlehem.

117.                 Book of Felsata la-Maryam: [Chaine Part 04] Dormition: The Virgin Mary heals a woman possessed by evil spirits.

118.                 Book of Felsata la-Maryam: [Chaine Part 02] Dormition: An Egyptian woman comes to the Virgin Mary in Bethlehem and is healed of her fever.

119.                 Book of Felsata la-Maryam: [Chaine Part 03] Dormition: A woman whose right eye had been blinded by a demon is healed by The Virgin Mary.

120.                 The priest who left the keys of the church locked up inside.

121.                 As a girl, the Virgin Mary gave water in her shoe to a thirsty dog

122.                 Giyorgis, the monk, who followed the heretical teachings of Za-Mika'el and his fate

123.                 Dabra Metmaq's people are shown a negative vision of the religious leader Muhammad (Mohamed)

124.                 An official who kidnapped a girl who had made a vow of virginity is visited by the Virgin Mary

125.                 A man with paralysis who was healed on the Feast of Our Lady's Assumption

126.                 A priest becomes insane after his entire family dies of the plague.

127.                 King Zara Yaqob's general, who went off to fight the Muslims without the consent of the king.

128.                 A man who out of jealousy burned down the house of a former wife who had abandoned him.

129.                 A man who suspected a former wife of having burned down his house

130.                 The hungry man whom the Virgin Mary used to feed when he prayed to her

131.                 Jesus asks the Virgin Mary what her greatest sorrow is and she replies saying these five sorrows

132.                 The girl who was going to be stoned after she was caught committing fornication.

133.                 The king's washerman who was attacked by a lion.

134.                 A young man whom his mother had vowed to the service of the Virgin Mary becomes impotent when his parents try to wed him.

135.                 A man who wanted to give a banquet on the Virgin Mary's feast but was unable because of a famine.

136.                 The fisherman who was eaten up by a dragon but was found alive when the dragon's belly was cut open.

137.                 A sinner is saved from damnation because he had built a shrine in the name of the Virgin Mary.

138.                 Holy Family's Journey: Herod's soldier saves Baby Jesus from being killed by another soldier and is saved

139.                 Thieves try to steal from a church of the Virgin Mary in Syria but are unable to bring what they have stolen out of the church.

140.                 A child whom his mother had vowed to the Virgin Mary is rescued from drowning.

141.                 Dabra Sedeneya's Icon Endangered: A European almost steals the famous Icon of the Virgin Mary

142.                 Book of Nagara Maryam??: OldM: Journey: The Virgin Mary travels in Ethiopia and Christ gives Ethiopia to her as a tithe, her belonging

143.                 Emperor Honorius, who lived like a monk.

144.                 Dabra Metmaq's Annual Apparition of Our Lady Mary: Summary: The annual apparition of the Virgin Mary at Dabra Metmaq [not the same as 35A, a digest]

145.                 Bishop Hildephonsus sees the icon of the Virgin Mary sweating; she asks him to raise a girl from the dead.

146.                 Sara from Mesot, who became insane and went about naked.

147.                 The Stephanites (Estifanites/Estifanites) in Egypt and Palestine.

148.                 Satan came to some monks and entrusted a child to them; the monks ate the child.

149.                 A monk heals two blind hyena cubs with an icon of the Virgin Mary.

150.                 A Muslim herder starts to build a shrine to the Virgin Mary on good land; when he dies, she saves his soul from the angels of darkness.

151.                 Abiathar, a monk in Nubia, who was led to repentance by a vision of the Virgin Mary.

152.                 A man, who had been refused instruction, was taught how to write by the Virgin Mary

153.                 A woman marries seven times, but each time her husband is killed by a demon.

154.                 Agabos from Dalga, who looks like the cannibal of Qemer, enters the church and the icon of the Virgin Mary weeps.

155.                 The heir who planned to terminate his father's custom of a monthly feast in honor of the Virgin Mary.

156.                 Book of Nagara Maryam: Month F: Part 01: The Virgin Mary helps the seventy women of the King of Rahrahie in the city of Sidag become pregnant

157.                 A spring is brought forth by the Virgin Mary to provide water for the construction of a church

158.                 An incense box doesn't burn and a church fire goes out

159.                 A man who travels to a new land becomes sick and is healed with water that he prayed over

160.                 Gabra Maryam receives a golden throne from the Virgin Mary

161.                 A bitter servant commits suicide but is brought back to life by Mary

162.                 A sinner from Rome prays for forgiveness and Mary forgives all his sins

163.                 A weary pilgrim woman who was served communion by the angels when she couldn't journey to the church of the Virgin Mary