An Armenian manuscript copied by the Armenian Catholic Brotherhood of Saint Joseph on April 15th, 1742 in Constantinople. It is Turkish in Armenian characters, which was very common in Constantinople.

The manuscript is of the founding and rules of the Brotherhood of Saint Joseph, a Catholic Armenian organization, dated April 15th, 1742.

According to scholar Sebouh Aslanian, “This precious Armeno-Turkish manuscript appears to be some sort of book of prayers or notes kept by the Apostolic Vicariate of Istanbul founded on 15 April 1742 with the official appointment by Pope Benedict XIV of Girolamo Bona as the Vicar Apostolic of the East.

This Vicariate was founded in the same year Abraham Artsivean [Ardsivian] was was appointed as the official patriarch of Catholic Armenians with jurisdiction in Greater Syria.

The Latin decree establishing the Vicariate is reprinted in Terzian, Mesrob J. Le Patriarcat de Cilicie et les Arméniens Catholiques (1740-1812). (Beirut: Imp. La Photo Presse, 1955), 53. For some background, see the outdated but still useful overview in Charles A. Frazee, Catholics and Sultans: The Church and the Ottoman Empire, 1453-1923 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983), 158. ”