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Lost in translation: Russian family mistook Soviet Criminal Code for Quran for generations

The senior citizen told reporters that her family had passed the book from generation to generation

© Artiom Geodakyan/TASS

UFA, June 5. /TASS/. A family from Russia’s Bashkortostan Region has presented the local museum of the Interior Ministry with a 1926 Arabic language edition of the Soviet Criminal Code, which they misidentified as the Quran for many years, the ministry’s press service said on Tuesday.

"The museum was presented with the 1926 edition of the criminal Code in the Arabic language. The book’s elderly owner said she had mistaken it for the Quran and put under her child’s head," the press service said, adding that the woman’s son later served in the police.

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The senior citizen told reporters that her family had passed the book from generation to generation.

"My mother said that this was a holy book, which should be wrapped in cloth and placed under a pillow so that children would keep calm and not misbehave," the elderly lady explained. "Many years later we found out that this is the 1926 edition of the Soviet Criminal Code."

The museum of the Interior Ministry was opened in Ufa, the capital of Bashkortostan, in 1982.

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