The Appendices to the Gospel according to Mark. 407 



Discussion. 



In L verse 8 ends with -o yap on the last hne but one of the first 

 column of folio 113 recto. The last line of the same column is filled 

 up by ornamental marks, which is this scribe's method of indicating 

 the end of a Gospel, and therefore indicated here that in some sense 

 the Gospel according to Mark is held to end at this point. 



At the beginning of the second column, enclosed in ornamental 

 marks, is written OEPETE nOl' KAI TAITA "These also are in a 

 manner (or "somewhere" i. e. in some authorities) current." The 

 next line contains a small ornament and then follows the Shorter 

 Ending. This is immediately followed by another note, surrounded, 

 as before, with ornamental lines EXTIN AE KAI TAVTA <I)EP()- 

 MENA :META to EOOBOVNTO tap "And there are these also current 

 after £(po[iiouvTO yap," The Longer Conclusion follows, beginning with 

 a large and ornate uncial A (compare Cursive 22), the first two lines 

 of which completes the recto of folio 113, and the remainder of which 

 fills both columns of the verso, the first column of Folio 114 and the 

 first line of the second column, which reads QN *AMHN* followed 

 immediately by the usual colophon zu^K^yiXiov xa^a Mapxov sur- 

 rounded, as were the preceding notes, with ornamental lines, more 

 elaborate in character however than the preceding (not the case- 

 in the colophon of Luke, the last verses of Matthew and Mark are lost). 

 This is followed immediately by the chapter headings of Luke's Gospel. 



This codex has always been of peculiar interest, not only because 

 up to 1884 it was the only known Greek codex to contain the double 

 ending of Mark, and therefore naturally evoked the scorn of Burgon, 

 who declared that the scribe was "evidently incapable of distingui- 

 shing the grossest fabrication from the genuine text," but because of 

 the character of the text itself, which has given it a high standing 

 with textual critics from the times of Stephens and Beza. "By far 

 the most remarkable document of its age and class" (Scrivener) it 

 contains many important critical notes either in the margin or the 

 text, which appear to be by the first hand. Of these we have just had 

 examples. Tischendorf declares that many readings found in the 

 margin of the later Syriac editions seem to be found in this codex only. 



The manuscript is written in a curious hand in compressed uncials. 

 It is poorly written, showing many ignorant blunders, and may have 

 been copied by a scribe who did not understand Greek. 



Nevertheless the text is "extraordinarily good" (Gregory) and it 

 seems to have been copied from a MS of the same type of text as B, 

 with which it often agrees, though at the date when this MS was 

 produced, another type of text had become dominant in the church. 



