1016 REPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1896. ] 



j 



encouraged by the Reverend Clergy of different denominations, and by other lovers I 



of the Sacred Scriptures in the Hebrew Laugiiage. \ 



Polychrome edition of the Old Testament, edited by Prof, ] 



Paul Hanpt, since 1892. — Some modern scholars are of the opinion that ., 



some of the books of the Old Testament as they now stand in the ] 



received text of the Massorites are composed of several sources. A com- ] 



pany of these scholars under the editorial supervision of Prof. Paul I 



Haupt is preparing an edition, representing by various colors the com- ' 



ponent parts as well as the portions which they consider as later i 

 additions. 



Leicester Codex of the New Testament. Facsimile. Origi- ■ 



nal preserved in the archives of the borough of Leicester, England. — ■ 



It is written in cursive script (i. e,, in a continuous running hand), and ' 



is usually ascribed to the eleventh century. In the opinion of Prof. J. ] 



liendel Harris the manuscript is of Italian origin, and no earlier than ' 



the fourteenth or even the fifteeenth century. j 



Greek and Latin New Testament of Erasmus. (See plate 42.) 



Editio princeps. Printed by Frobenius in Basel, 151G. — The first com- , 



plete book produced by the printing i^ress was a Latin Bible in 1456. i 



The Greek New Testament was first printed in the Complutensian Poly- j 



glot (so called from the Latin name of Alcala, Spain, where it was j 



printed) of Cardinal Ximenes in 1514, but it was not issued until 1520. | 



The edition of the Greek New Testament, by Erasmus, was, therefore, \ 



the first ever published, and became, with a few modifications, the | 



received text printed by Elzevir in Leiden. Luther's translation was ; 



based upon it. To the Greek original Erasmus added a corrected Latin 1 

 version with notes. 



Greek Testament. (See plate 43.) First American edition. < 



Printed by Isaiah Thomas, 1800, Worcester, Massachusetts. ! 



Greek Testament. The second issued in America. Printed at i 



Philadelphia by S. F. Bradford, 1806. ; 



ANCIENT VERSIONS OF THE BIBLE. ' 



i 



Translations of the Scriptures became necessary when the Jews were ' 



dispersed in the Greco-Roman world and gradually abandoned the use ' 



of the Hebrew language, and later when Christianity was jiropagated i 



among various nations. The oldest and most important version of the i 



Old Testament, which in its turn became the parent of many other \ 



translations, is the Greek of Alexandria, known by the name of the j 



Septuagint. The name Septuagint, meaning seventy, is derived from ; 



the tradition that it was made by a company of seventy (or rather ' 



seventy-two) Jewish scholars, at Alexandria, under the reign of | 



Ptolemy Philadcli)hus, 285-247 B. C, who desired a copy for the ^ 



library he was gathering. The truth of its origin seems to be that ' 



Alexandria became, after the Babylonian captivity, a center of Jewish j 



