This Acts and Epistles book was probably copied in the second half of the 10th century or first half of the 11th. The manuscript is a simple production with minimal ornament, and there was no supplementary textual content included apart from brief subscriptions at the end of most of the books, stating the context of the writing of each epistle and a conventional enumeration of the number of lines (stichoi). As was often the case with manuscripts not originally provided with such apparatus, later medieval users annotated it for liturgical use, marking out the lections to be read in the course of the liturgical calendar.
In the first half of the 16th century the manuscript was owned by the French humanist François Vatable (Franciscus Vatablus) (d. 1547), a noted scholar of Hebrew as well as Greek, who was involved in efforts to produce an improved edition of the Bible.
Dr Christopher Wright
The manuscript consists of 32 quires, of which one is a single folio and the rest are quaternia. A quire has been lost between Quires 29 and 30, another between Quires 31 and 32, and an unknown number after Quire 32.
There are modern quire signatures in Arabic numerals, in pencil,on the first folio of each quire, recto, lower right.
19th-century quarter leather binding, with marbled paper covering over couched-laminate boards and parchment pastedowns. Remnants of thread page markers survive at the edge of some folios (e.g. ff. 83, 90). There is decorative gold tooling on the spine, along with the classmark tooled in gold and the title "Novum Testamentum Graecum" tooled in gold on a red label.
Binding height: 187 mm, width: 134 mm, depth: 76 mm.
The text-block is broken into three parts, the first comprising the left board and endleaves and Quires 1-11, the second of Quire 12 and the third of Quires 13-32 and the right endleaves and board. The sewing attaching Quires 11 and 13 is largely broken, each being attached by a single surviving thread. The left outer joint is split and there have been losses to the covering material at the tail.The manuscript was copied by Hand A in upright mixed minuscule script, in brown ink, with little variation in letter size and some flourishing of tails into the margins.
Syllabic abbreviations and superscript word endings appear only at the end of lines. Breathings are angular and mute iota is absent. There is occasional decorative use of the double dot, and breathings are absent when this appears on a letter which would normally bear a breathing. Nomina sacra are usually unaccentuated, but occasionally accentuated when more than three letters long, or with enclitics. Circumflexes sometimes appear above breathings, but are not expanded.
Majuscule letter-forms present include epsilon, zeta, eta, kappa, lambda, xi, sigma and psi.
Punctuation used includes the lower, middle and upper points, question mark and full stop.
Subscriptions were written by the same hand in Alexandrine majuscule script in brown ink, headings in the same style in red ink.
The manuscript is foliated with the numbers 1 + 2 + 3-251 + 252 in pencil in Arabic numerals, recto, upper right.
There is another, intermittent foliation sequence in Arabic numerals, in black ink, recto, lower right, which does not include the two left endleaves (ff. 1-2) or the largely lost f. 10 in its sequence. These numbers appear usually on every tenth folio (11 on f. 14r, 21 on f. 24r etc.), but occasionally elsewhere.
The text of each book or hypothesis begins with a simple minor initial in red ink.
Marginal lection notes, including ἀρχή and τέλος marks inserted into the text, and other occasional annotations in Greek have been added by a number of different hands.
A later hand has added running headers in Greek indicating the current book in the upper margin of many folios.
Various different Greek hands have added brief prayers, notes of content, pen-trials and doodles and two plaited ornament designs on ff. 2v-3r.
The word or name "Despostis" has been written in Latin script on f. 3r.
Ownership notes of François Vatable ("Vatablus") have been marked on the left pastedown and the right pastedown.
Notes in Latin have been added recording lacunae (e.g. f. 250v).
An ownership note of J.B. Hautin has been added on the left pastedown.
There are Latin notes of content on the left pastedown and f. 1r, and a note in Latin and French on the left pastedown regarding the manuscript's date: "Novum Testamentum grec, tres ancien".
Owned by the humanist scholar François Vatable (Franciscus Vatablus) (d. 1547).
Owned by one J.-B. Hautin, probably the grandson of Jean-Baptiste Hautin (c. 1580-1640) (Easterling, 'Two Greek MSS.', p. 111, n. 1).
Owned by John Moore (b. 1646, d. 1714), bishop of Ely: number 1014 in the handwritten supplementary list of Moore's manuscripts, now MS Oo.7.50(2), compiled by Thomas Tanner after the publication of Bernard, Catalogi librorum manuscriptorum Angliæ et Hiberniæ (1697).
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The manuscript consists of 32 quires, of which one is a single folio and the rest are quaternia. A quire has been lost between Quires 29 and 30, another between Quires 31 and 32, and an unknown number after Quire 32.
There are modern quire signatures in Arabic numerals, in pencil,on the first folio of each quire, recto, lower right.
19th-century quarter leather binding, with marbled paper covering over couched-laminate boards and parchment pastedowns. Remnants of thread page markers survive at the edge of some folios (e.g. ff. 83, 90). There is decorative gold tooling on the spine, along with the classmark tooled in gold and the title "Novum Testamentum Graecum" tooled in gold on a red label.
Binding height: 187 mm, width: 134 mm, depth: 76 mm.
The text-block is broken into three parts, the first comprising the left board and endleaves and Quires 1-11, the second of Quire 12 and the third of Quires 13-32 and the right endleaves and board. The sewing attaching Quires 11 and 13 is largely broken, each being attached by a single surviving thread. The left outer joint is split and there have been losses to the covering material at the tail.The manuscript was copied by Hand A in upright mixed minuscule script, in brown ink, with little variation in letter size and some flourishing of tails into the margins.
Syllabic abbreviations and superscript word endings appear only at the end of lines. Breathings are angular and mute iota is absent. There is occasional decorative use of the double dot, and breathings are absent when this appears on a letter which would normally bear a breathing. Nomina sacra are usually unaccentuated, but occasionally accentuated when more than three letters long, or with enclitics. Circumflexes sometimes appear above breathings, but are not expanded.
Majuscule letter-forms present include epsilon, zeta, eta, kappa, lambda, xi, sigma and psi.
Punctuation used includes the lower, middle and upper points, question mark and full stop.
Subscriptions were written by the same hand in Alexandrine majuscule script in brown ink, headings in the same style in red ink.
The manuscript is foliated with the numbers 1 + 2 + 3-251 + 252 in pencil in Arabic numerals, recto, upper right.
There is another, intermittent foliation sequence in Arabic numerals, in black ink, recto, lower right, which does not include the two left endleaves (ff. 1-2) or the largely lost f. 10 in its sequence. These numbers appear usually on every tenth folio (11 on f. 14r, 21 on f. 24r etc.), but occasionally elsewhere.
The text of each book or hypothesis begins with a simple minor initial in red ink.
Marginal lection notes, including ἀρχή and τέλος marks inserted into the text, and other occasional annotations in Greek have been added by a number of different hands.
A later hand has added running headers in Greek indicating the current book in the upper margin of many folios.
Various different Greek hands have added brief prayers, notes of content, pen-trials and doodles and two plaited ornament designs on ff. 2v-3r.
The word or name "Despostis" has been written in Latin script on f. 3r.
Ownership notes of François Vatable ("Vatablus") have been marked on the left pastedown and the right pastedown.
Notes in Latin have been added recording lacunae (e.g. f. 250v).
An ownership note of J.B. Hautin has been added on the left pastedown.
There are Latin notes of content on the left pastedown and f. 1r, and a note in Latin and French on the left pastedown regarding the manuscript's date: "Novum Testamentum grec, tres ancien".
Owned by the humanist scholar François Vatable (Franciscus Vatablus) (d. 1547).
Owned by one J.-B. Hautin, probably the grandson of Jean-Baptiste Hautin (c. 1580-1640) (Easterling, 'Two Greek MSS.', p. 111, n. 1).
Owned by John Moore (b. 1646, d. 1714), bishop of Ely: number 1014 in the handwritten supplementary list of Moore's manuscripts, now MS Oo.7.50(2), compiled by Thomas Tanner after the publication of Bernard, Catalogi librorum manuscriptorum Angliæ et Hiberniæ (1697).