The Presence (and Absence) of Nomina Sacra in To Theodore

[Secret Alias]

With all this practice I am learning how to write formal letters in modern Greek. Apparently the one person in the world who might know the origin of the modern Greek abbreviation κος has a degree in chemical engineering, works in the translation department of the European Parliament and lives in Luxembourg where among other things he writes books on bridge and other personal interests. Let's see what turns up ... if anything.

[Secret Alias]

Apparently this is our best guess for the origins of the abbreviation:



Efimeris
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For a general view on the Greek term, see Ephemeris. For the Greek Government Gazette Εφημερίς της Κυβερνήσεως (Efimeris tis Kyverniseos), see Government Gazette (Greece).

The title page of the issue of Efimeris of Tuesday 31 December 1790 (Julian calendar), or 11 January 1791 (Gregorian calendar).
Efimeris (Greek: Εφημερίς) was a Greek language newspaper published in Vienna from 1790 to 1797.[1] It is the oldest Greek newspaper of which issues have survived till today.[2]

History
In 1790, the Greek typographers Poulios Markidis-Pouliou and Georgios Markidis-Pouliou, from Siatista, started publishing the newspaper in the Greek, Serbian ("Illyrian") and German languages, after successfully negotiating a license from the Austrian authorities. Vienna, the Austrian capital, was at that time an important commercial center for Greek merchants. The newspaper published the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen in serials, as well as several works by Rigas Feraios. The newspaper's run lasted until 1797, when Georgios Pouliou was arrested along with Rigas Feraios for their publication of "revolutionary and godless" works, and the paper was shut down in January 1798.[3]

Many of its original issues can be seen in various public libraries in Greece, and in 2000, the Academy of Athens reprinted a collected edition of the newspaper.

[Secret Alias]

I found an example from 1835 and it involves newspapers

https://books.google.com/books?id=efrVA ... AHoECAIQAg

Μεταβάσα η έκδοση της Εφημερίδος εις την πόλιν ταύτην , εζητήσαμεν από τον συXNραφέα τας απαιτουμένας αποδείξεις περί των αναφερομένων κατά του Κου Κλεάνθους . Επειδή ο υπεύθυνος Συντάκτης της Εφημερίδος έμελλε να κριθή κατά

[Secret Alias]

Its not in the earliest surviving Greek newspaper from Vienna dated 1791

[Secret Alias]

1834. Ο Ρίζος σύντομα ἀνακοῖνωσε79 στὸν Ross ὅτι ἀντὶ του ΚλεάνΘη ποὺ παραιτήΘηκε «θέλει συνεργασθεῖ μεθ᾿ ὑμῶν εἰς τὴν ἀνέγερσιν τοῦ Παρθενῶνος ὁ ὑπουργικὸς Σύμβουλος ἀρχιτέκτων κος Σάουβερτ καὶ ὑπ᾿ αὐτοῦ τὴν διεύθυνσιν ὁ ἀρχιτέκτων κ. Ἄνσεν».

[Secret Alias]

I do notice examples of κυρ surviving down to 1808 - 1810 in some books. Even 1882 https://books.google.com/books?id=2N46A ... 82&f=false

[StephenGoranson]

Andrew Criddle wrote: “If so and lf this usage has influenced the manuscript, this seems to make it unlikely that the manuscript of the Letter to Theodore was written in the 18th century and would support a later date.

Seems to me a reasonable observation.
Maybe true:
Morton Smith presented a hypothesis that a copyist copied but after first also “correcting” a hypothetical older version of the Letter. But if a copyist copied –either directly or in “corrected” manner—using an abbreviation that S. A. claims did not exist until later [a matter beyond my ken—research welcome], then that does raise an apparent anomaly.
According to Smith’s student, Shaye Cohen, now at Harvard (which denied a job to Smith), wrote that Smith practiced the “hermeneutics of suspicion,” so suspecting an anachronism is doubly fair play. (Cohen used to teach at Brown, as did J Neusner, which denied Smith tenure.) To a New York Times reporter (May 29, 1973) Smith was quoted saying “Thank God I have tenure.” Since Smith lived in the 20th century, and if an abbreviation was not current in the 18th nor 17th) century, it is at least *possible* that Smith knew that abbreviation--unless one practices curiously limited, selective skepticism.
The argument that Smith couldn’t possibly fake because that would ruin his reputation may ignore the fact that he had already produced several high-quality publications; those don’t disappear if so. And that he changed from a believing religionist (assumed by his priest ordination) to one who apparently enjoyed scorning some religionists (with a few exceptions of scholars he admired, e.g. *maybe* including AD Nock, G Scholem, S Lieberman, E Bickermann). Smith liked, I know, to be known for being cuttingly witty. The argument the Smith could not have faked it because other scholars offered additional consequences so he could not have misunderstood anything if it were his own creation may ignore that such additional observations could seem to tend to give the ms added credibility, not diminish it.

[Secret Alias]

What does this have to do with nomina sacra in the Letter to Theodore? I hope this drive by graffiti made you feel better

[Secret Alias]

It is simply commendable HOW MANY BOOKS the Greek library system has digitalized and put on line. Simply incredible. It must be a 1,000,000 books and manuscripts which have no value for anyone except scholars!

[Secret Alias]

Here's where we are with the use of kos:

1. the handwriting of to Theodore has now been confirmed by 3 scholars as being "late seventeenth century, early eighteenth century." I'd go further with my striving to be forthright. Having gone through countless MSS it looks very much like the samples I've seen from 1770 - 1790. I am not an expert of course. But some of them have been so strikingly similar I've had to stop and examine in minute detail and then realize "no this isn't a match." I can send the sample to anyone who cares.
2. the earliest examples of kos that I can come up with is the beginning of the Greek war of independence and specifically 1835. Here is the translation of the material related to the death of the naval commander Andreas Miaoulis (died June 11, 1835) and the arrival of Otto of Bavaria as king of Greece https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otto_of_Greece. Apparently Andreas Miaoulis had won many naval battles against the Turks but then near the end of his life, made a terrible mistake and burned some Greek ships which was reported unfavorably in the Greek newspapers:

I went to the publication of the newspaper in the same city, we asked the consultant for the required evidence regarding the allegations against Mr. Cleanthos. Because the Editor-in-Chief of the Journal was to be judged according to the law and not the author: When the King asked to move his palace closer to the ruins of Mr. Cleanthos, which he wanted to bring of the utmost benefit, he warmly begged S. Our King, visiting him, owed his duty above all to recommend to His Majesty his rivals with whom he fought and defeated all the united fleets of Constantinople, Egypt, Algeria, Tunisia and Tripoli in their misfortune. begged our King to oversee, and so much more, as not only did they gloriously fight for our political existence, our King to oversee, and so much more, as they not only gloriously fought for our politics and existed as from our struggle this became the unhappiest of all. The King's only promise that he wanted to fulfill his wishes pleased him and reassured him. Today, Greece lacks Miaoulis the Mourner, the Greeks who respect him so much are deprived, he is deprived of the glorious Hydra, his children, his relatives and friends, and all that remains is the memory of his glorious achievements. And a memory that few on earth left

Μεταβάσα η έκδοση της Εφημερίδος εις την πόλιν ταύτην , εζητήσαμεν από τον συXNραφέα τας απαιτουμένας αποδείξεις περί των αναφερομένων κατά του Κου Κλεάνθους . Επειδή ο υπεύθυνος Συντάκτης της Εφημερίδος έμελλε να κριθή κατά τον νόμον και όχι ο συXγραφεύς : αλλ ' όχι μόνον αποδείξεις δεν εύρομεν , αλλ ' ου καν μικρές ενδείξεις , δια τα όσα εγράφθησαν κατ ' αυτού εξεναντίας εμάθαμεν , ότι ο Κος Κλεάνθης εις περίστασιν καθ ' ην ο Βασιλεύς εζήτησε να μεταφέρη το παλάτιόν του πλησίον εις τας χαίας του Κου Κλεάνθους , πράγμα το οποίο ον ήθελε να φέρει μεχίστας ωφελείας , αυτός παρακάλεσε θερμότατα τον Σ . Βασιλέα , μας , επισκεπτόμενον αυτόν , χρέος του προ πάντων έκρινε να συστήση προς την Μεγαλειότητά του τους συναγωνιστές του με τους οποίους καταπολέμησε και ενίκησε όλους ενωμένους τους στόλους της Κωνσταντινουπόλεως , της Αιγύπτου , του Αλγερίου , του Τυνεζίου και της Τριπόλεως εις αυτών την σημερινήν δυστυχίαν επαρακάλεσε τον Βασιλέα μας να επιβλέψη , και κατά τοσούτον περισσότερον , καθ ' όσον όχι μόνον ηγωνίσθησαν ενδόξως υπέρ της πολιτικής μας υπάρξεως τον Βασιλέα μας να επιβλέψη , και κατά τοσούτον περισσότερον , καθ ' όσον όχι μόνον ηγωνίσθησαν ενδόξως υπέρ της πολιτικής μας υπάρξεως αλλά και ως εκ του αγώνος μας τούτου κατήντησαν οι δυστυχέστεροι πάντων . Μόνη δε υπόσχεσις του Βασιλέως , ότι θέλει εκπληρώσει τας ευχάς του , τον ευχαρίστησε και τον ησύχασε . Τον Μιαούλη Πενθοφορούσα στερείται σήμερον η Ελλάς , στερούνται οι τόσον σεβόμενοι αυτόν Έλληνες , τον στερείται η ένδοξος Ύδρα , τα τέκνα του , οι συγγενείς και φίλοι του , και άλλο δεν μένει εις όλους τούτους παρά η μνήμη των ενδόξων κατορθωμάτων του. Μνήμη δε την οποίαν ολίγοι επί της γης άφησαν

I am in the preliminaries of all this but from my perspective having spent a day looking at MSS in the Greek libraries - mostly ecclesiastic. I think the use of kos is foreign. I think it doesn't show up in ecclesiastic sources because it was a barbarism. They used kur into the nineteenth century. But the use of kos is tied to Greeks living in Europe.