Page:The New Testament in the original Greek - 1881.djvu/40

 xxxii INTRODUCTION TO THE AMERICAN EDITION.

2. Codex ROBSANENSIS, found by two German scholars, Oscar von Gebhardt and Adolf llarnack, in March, 1879, at Rossano, in Calabria, in possession of the archbishop, who got it from the library of the former convent. It is beautifully written, with silver letters, on purple-coloured parchment (very rare among Greek MSS.), and richly or- namented with pictures ; hence important for the history of Christian art. It consists of 188 leaves of two columns of twenty lines each, and contains the Gospels of Matthew and Mark (Luke and John^arc lost). The Gospel of Mat- thew ends with the -words, EYAITEAION KATA MAT9AI- UX. Gebhardt and llarnack assign it to the sixth century. The text shows a departure from the oldest MSS. (x and B), and an approach to the amended Latin text. In this re- spect it resembles D. It contains, however, the doxology in the Lord's Prayer, Matt. vi. 1 3. See Evanycliorum, Co- dex argenteus purpureus Rossanensis (2), lltteris argentcis sexto ut videtur sceculo scriptus picturisque ornatits. T>\ O. von Gebhardt and Adolf llarnack, Leipsic, 1880. With fac-similes of portions of the text and outline sketches of the pictures. A full edition of the codex is promised.

We give a fac-simile from this work.

B. THE CURSIVE MANUSCRIPTS.

The cursive MSS. are indicated by Arabic numerals. They were written in current hand on vellum or parchment (mombrana) ; or on cotton paper (charta bombycina, also ckarta Damasccna, from the place of manufacture), which came into use in the ninth and tenth centuries ; or on linen paper (charta proper), which was employed first in the twelfth century. Some are richly illuminated. They date from the tenth to the middle of the fifteenth century, when

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