378 Clarence Russell WiUiams 



In liis second article "On the Last Twelve \'erses of St. Mark's 

 (iospcl" (The Expositor, December, 1895, p. 403), Conybeare has the 

 following discussion of MSS wliich seems of sufficient interest and 

 imi:)ortancc to quote in full : 



" In the Mechitarist hbrary on the island of San Lazaro at \'enice, 

 is a codex of the Gospels dated A.D. 902, by consequence nearly 

 a liundred years earlier than the Edschmiadzin copy. In this 

 codex V. 8 ends the second column of a verso. The same marginal 

 writing was continued on the recto side of the next folio but there 

 is not more of it than would amount to verses 9—13. It is, however, 

 too obliterated to be read without chemical treatment. I examined 

 it carefully, and satisfied myself that the writing so erased was not 

 any part of the twelve verses — a very curious and important fact. 

 There is too much of it for it to have been the alternative ending 

 of Mark found in the Greek uncial codex L. Perhaps the scribe 

 herein gave his reasons for omitting the last twelve verses. The 

 verso side of the folio is left blank and the entire pericope could 

 hardly have been contained even on both sides. 



In an Armenian codex of the four Gospels belonging to the Bod- 

 leian library and dated 1304, the scribe seems to have originally 

 written the last twelve ^^erses in the second column of the recto of 

 fol. 141 and in both of the verso, but to have himself afterwards 

 effaced them, adding the last line of verse 8 at the bottom of the 

 right-hand column of the recto side of folio 141. 



In more than one Armenian codex, where these verses occupied 

 a folio by themselves, that folio has simply been cut out. In a 

 13th or 14th century codex at San Lazaro in Venice there is prefixed 

 to the verses the notice, "This is unauthentic." In the Bodleian 

 Armenian codex of the four Gospels, dated A.D. 1355, a notice is 

 prefixed as follows: "This is an addition." Many codices of the 

 four Gospels, and also of the entire Bible, end the Gospel accor- 

 ding to Mark at verse 8, and then after a space proceed with the 

 twelve verses. This is so in the case of the oldest San Lazaro 

 Bible, dated 1220, and of a Bible in the collection of Lord Zouche 

 later in date but copied from an early archetype. In such cases 

 the words "The end of Mark [or of Mark's Gospel)" is added 

 after v. 8. 



As to the evidence of the Armenian lectionaries, Conybeare says 

 that is only modern, but declares that the oldest known, probably of 

 the ninth century, did not contain vs. 9—20. This is an uncial codex 

 now in Paris. It would seem therefore that these verses, in the 

 early Armenian cluirch, were not read on Ascension Day, as in other 



