Ancient texts and manuscripts

[Kris]

I am not sure if this is the right place to put this, but I am trying to understand how the use of ancient manuscripts worked. For example, if an early Christian writer used a text such as Josephus, phlegons, or Tacitus' writings--- was there just one manuscript somewhere in a library? There just doesn't seem that there was a lot of these books or manuscripts floating around. And it seems like once a corruption in the text occurred---it continued in all reported quotes from books like these. I know that copiers may have added to this problem. But were these texts actually very rare and when a later writer is quoting from one of these authors are they actually quoting from another writer who quoted this material.

For example, when later writers such as Philopon or Pascale quote Phlegon, were they acually using Eusebius to get this quote-- or did they have an actual book from Phlegon? And if they had an actual book, would it be the same one Eusebius used or at least a later copy of the book Eusebius used--- with possible changes made to tge text--- changing the first year to fourth year? I would love to hear from people who know how these ancient texts were used. They must have been fairly rare since we don't have any current texts and haven't for some time!!

[outhouse]

--- was there just one manuscript somewhere in a library?

It would be based on a text by text basis after study.

One? not likely.

Popularity and importance, dictated how many were in circulation.


There were very few well educated people compared to the masses, these educated people wanted to get their hands on material that would help them further their opinions and studies. To copy previous work was the norm.

[MrMacSon]

... I am trying to understand how the use of ancient manuscripts worked. For example, if an early Christian writer used a text such as Josephus, phlegons, or Tacitus' writings--- was there just one manuscript somewhere in a library? There just doesn't seem that there was a lot of these books or manuscripts floating around. And it seems like once a corruption in the text occurred---it continued in all reported quotes from books like these. I know that copiers may have added to this problem. But were these texts actually very rare and when a later writer is quoting from one of these authors are they actually quoting from another writer who quoted this material.

For example, when later writers such as Philopon or Pascale quote Phlegon, were they acually using Eusebius to get this quote-- or did they have an actual book from Phlegon? And if they had an actual book, would it be the same one Eusebius used or at least a later copy of the book Eusebius used--- with possible changes made to tge text--- changing the first year to fourth year? I would love to hear from people who know how these ancient texts were used. They must have been fairly rare since we don't have any current texts and haven't for some time!!

Probably a range of permutations depending on the community, sect, or their 'leaders'; and how later generations in those communities or other communities, or both, interact with the manuscripts of previous generations.

There is some relevant concurrent discussion on another thread

eg. http://www.earlywritings.com/forum/view ... 120#p15224

[Charles Wilson]

I am not sure if this is the right place to put this, but I am trying to understand how the use of ancient manuscripts worked. For example, if an early Christian writer used a text such as Josephus, phlegons, or Tacitus' writings--- was there just one manuscript somewhere in a library? There just doesn't seem that there was a lot of these books or manuscripts floating around.

You are correct to worry about this. Scribes were valued through the centuries - Pettinato reports that Ebla and Mari exchanged Scribes even though they were at war with one another.

How long does it take to copy a manuscript? We look at Eusebius and his "Output" of suppression and fictions. He had many texts in front of him and everything that came after reflected what he left. Everything else appears to have been destroyed. In order for him to destroy the originals there must have been very few in a small area. He tried to get them ALL.

We know that there was at one time precisely ONE copy of the Book of Mark. It ends awkwardly, in the middle of a sentence. Are we to believe that someone told all of the copyists to tear their originals in exactly the same place? Were all of the originals that were torn at that place then destroyed? There was only one Book of Mark.

Titus so loved Josephus' Wars of the Jews that he personally commissioned the book's reproduction. How many were produced? Forty? So it was. A book was a most valuable piece of knowledge because there were so few of them and the readership was so small.

You are correct to the point of your question.

CW

[Kris]

Thanks for all of the responses so far. Charles, I particularily liked what you had to say.

[Leucius Charinus]

I am not sure if this is the right place to put this, but I am trying to understand how the use of ancient manuscripts worked. For example, if an early Christian writer used a text such as Josephus, phlegons, or Tacitus' writings--- was there just one manuscript somewhere in a library? There just doesn't seem that there was a lot of these books or manuscripts floating around.

You are correct to worry about this. Scribes were valued through the centuries ....

Scribes preserved books until the printing press came into its own and represented high technology in antiquity.

Your question opens an absolutely massive can of worms .... its called the manuscript tradition.

One way of starting to answer your question is to provide a diagram as follows:




The oldest extant manuscript is often called an archetype and from it a stemma diagram can be constructed (after massive research) to show later copies.

The above diagram shows the stemma diagram for an eptome of Cassius Dio's "Roman History" by the 11th century scribe John Xiphilinus.

[Roger Pearse]

I am not sure if this is the right place to put this, but I am trying to understand how the use of ancient manuscripts worked. For example, if an early Christian writer used a text such as Josephus, Phlegon's, or Tacitus' writings--- was there just one manuscript somewhere in a library? There just doesn't seem that there was a lot of these books or manuscripts floating around.

This is a very large subject. I would recommend that you obtain a copy of Reynolds and Wilson, "Scribes and Scholars", for this is the standard introduction.

Ancient books were created by manual copying. Classical authors read their texts to audiences (sometimes a trial for the audience!), or delivered speeches. In either case they revised them. Friends might ask for a copy. This would usually be made by a slave. Anyone could make a copy, for there was no copyright. Authors might have a "publisher" - Cicero did - who arranged for multiple copies to be made. There were bookshops in Rome, and Martial in his epigrams advises his readers where to buy copies. These shops might contain all sorts of things, then as now. Aulus Gellius tells us of finding a yellowed copy of the Annals of Fabius Pictor in one, for instance. Men would collect libraries. If they were poor, they might copy desired books themselves. There was a library on the Palatine in the Domus Tiberiana, whose curator could be bribed to loan books. There were imperial libraries as well, where the well-connected might go and consult a volume. Temples in ancient times functioned as public depositories of precious items, more or less like public buildings, and no doubt sometimes contained libraries.

Copies might be made very cheaply at home. Slaves were not expensive, after all. The finds at Oxyrhynchus in Egypt are composed mainly of such copies. Sometimes they contain texts that are a bit wonky. Copies made at important libraries like the Museum in Alexandria would be corrected professionally; local copies might not.

How many copies were made would depend on all sorts of factors. It is often possible that very few copies ever existed. It has been argued that only a handful of copies of Pausanias' Description of Greece were ever made in antiquity.

But there were vast numbers of books in considerable numbers in circulation. Of course fashions came and went. The literature of the 1st century came back into fashion in the 4th century, which is one reason why so much of it survives. But the losses were immense. It was estimated at the renaissance (by Pietro Bembo; but I know that N.G. Wilson endorses the estimate) that around 99% of all ancient literature is lost. It would generally be unsafe to suppose that only one copy of some text existed unless we know that for certain.

And it seems like once a corruption in the text occurred---it continued in all reported quotes from books like these. I know that copiers may have added to this problem.

This is not correct. When a corruption occurred, any copies made from the damaged manuscript might contain the mistake. But the copyist might see the mistake. And, if he did, he would most likely try to fix it, perhaps by finding another copy. The process is not one-way.

The problem is that the numbers of copies in circulation, of every ancient work, diminish during the middle ages. For most works, that number drops to zero. No copies are preserved of most works. For nearly all the rest, it is usually the case that by the 9th century there was a single copy which is the source for all subsequent copies. The reason for this is the change in formal book handwriting at this period, in both east and west. Once people were used to the new style of letters, it was far easier to copy from a nice new copy in the new style, rather than from an old and battered copy in funny old letters. (The same effect has been demonstrated for the works of Tertullian in Italy at the renaissance by Emil Kroymann; a single copy in Gothic hand came across the Alps, a single copy was made of it, the original and the copy have been together in Florence side-by-side ever since; and every subsequent Italian copy was made from the copy, not the original.)

Obviously if the one copy had damage, all subsequent copies after that time were liable to contain it.

But were these texts actually very rare and when a later writer is quoting from one of these authors are they actually quoting from another writer who quoted this material. For example, when later writers such as Philopon or Pascale quote Phlegon, were they acually using Eusebius to get this quote-- or did they have an actual book from Phlegon?

Eusebius' works were very common, including his Chronicle (albeit this one often in edited versions); works that he quoted were often very rare (he was proud of having access to rare material). John Philoponus undoubtedly had access to that. Did he have access, in the 6th century, to Phlegon? Very doubtful. The Chronicon Pascale is 7th century, and the same is probably true. If the quote is entirely found in Eusebius, then it is unnecessary to suppose that the later authors had independent access. Phlegon, remember, was at the court of Hadrian, in the early 2nd century. Mind you ... his work on marvels survives even now, you know?

And if they had an actual book, would it be the same one Eusebius used or at least a later copy of the book Eusebius used--- with possible changes made to the text--- changing the first year to fourth year?

Phlegon wrote his work on a papyrus roll, almost certainly. Eusebius was one of the pioneers of using the modern book-format, the parchment codex, and he exploited the format to fill his Chronicle with tables of dates and events, in a way impossible before. Unless Phlegon's work was copied into a codex form, in the 4th century, it would be most unlikely to survive. Eusebius would have used Phlegon in a roll format. It is unlikely that this copy survived. I don't think we need suppose that Phlegon was extant much later than 500 AD at the most.

Numerals in Greek texts are the devil. The problem is that the Greeks, being idiots, employed letters of the alphabet to represent numerals. Consequently any scribe could misread a number as a word, or a corrupted word. This actually happened when Jerome translated Eusebius' Chronicle. He misread one number as a word, and translated it as such. Later he realised his mistake and corrected it - but we have copies of his translation with the mistake, and others with the correction. If it could happen to an experienced scholar like Jerome, it must have happened all the time. This is why mistakes in numbers are so easily hypothesised; they are far more vulnerable to damage than the rest of the text.

I once read a piece by someone in which he made an argument from the numbers, against the testimony of the text. It was curious to see such ignorance of the relative certainty of each.

Alden Mosshammer did an excellent volume on "Eusebius and the Greek Chronographic tradition", which I really wish I had a copy of.

I would love to hear from people who know how these ancient texts were used. They must have been fairly rare since we don't have any current texts and haven't for some time!!

I hope this helps. Do ask if I have misunderstood your point or you need more. NB: I don't understand the last bit. "current texts"?

All the best,

Roger Pearse

[Charles Wilson]

Thanks for all of the responses so far. Charles, I particularily liked what you had to say.

Thank you for your kind words. The Posts that follow from Leucius Charinus and Roger Pearse are better still.

CW

[Kris]

Yes---awesome info everyone. Thanks so much.

[Kris]

Roger-- by current texts, I meant to say versions that exist to this day.