Page:The New Testament in the original Greek - Introduction and Appendix (1882).pdf/303

Rh texts affords only the most uncertain indications; for (1) there is no reason to suppose that more than a small fraction of the readings often called Alexandrian had any special connexion with Alexandria, and (2) the clearest phenomena of Versions of the fourth and fifth centuries shew how widely spread at that time were Greek MSS containing a large proportion of those readings which did really originate at Alexandria.

348. Possibly hereafter some of the external accompaniments of the text may be found to contain trustworthy evidence. At present we know of almost nothing to appeal to except such orthographies as are shown by their isolated distribution to be due to scribes, not to the autographs. This evidence at best points only to the home or school of the scribe himself, and cannot take account of migration on his part. Such as it is, it suggests that A and C were connected with Alexandria. Orthographies apparently Alexandrian occur also in, but chiefly or wholly in words for which A or C have them likewise. On the other hand some Western or Latin influence is very clearly marked in the usual or occasional spelling of some proper names, such as and  or. In Β the Alexandrian indications are to the best of our belief wholly wanting. Western indications are fainter than in, but not absent. The superfluous euphonic is sometimes inserted in  but only in Acts, apparently implying the presence of Western or Latin influence in the scribe of that manuscript of Acts which was copied by the scribe of B. The substitution of  for  in places where it is almost certainly not right is mainly confined to Western documents, and it is also in St Paul's Epistles a favourite individualism of B.