450 
Armenian translation of the com- 
mentary. This has been made avail- 
able for the use of scholars who are 
not expert in the Armenian language 
by a Latin rendering prepared by J. B. 
Aucher and edited by Georg Moe- 
singer in 1876. Again, early in the 
sixth century Bp. Victor of Capua in 
Italy found an anonymous Latin har- 
mony of the Gospels which he thought 
a descendant of that made by ‘atian. 
The Bishop edited it, substituting, 
however, a Latin Vulgate text for that 
which he found. Bp. Victor’s work is 
still extent in codex Fuldensis, written 
at the monastery of Fulda in 541-546. 
In addition there are Arabic and 
Persian translations, several medieval 
Dutch, Old High German, and Low 
German harmonies, a Middle English 
and two medieval Italian forms of 
harmonies, all more or less closely 
related to Tatian’s work. 
In the light of the foregoing it is not 
surprising that scholarly interest was 
aroused when it was announced in 
1933 that a Greek fragment of Tatian’s 
long-lost Diatessaron had been dis- 
covered. In an expedition conducted 
under the collaboration of Yale Uni- 
versity and the French Academy of 
Inscriptions and Belles Letters on the 
site of the ancient fortress town of 
Dura-Europos on the lower Euphrates, 
a tiny scrap of the Diatessaron was 
unearthed (see pl. 8). Situated on 
the frontier of the Roman Empire, 
Dura-Europos fell to the Persians un- 
der King Shapur I in the year 256- 
257. During the few years prior to 
that date the Roman garrison within 
the city prepared for a siege by 
strengthening the city walls; they 
threw up against the inner face of the 
western city wall a huge embankment 
of earth, ashes, and rubbish. Covered 
by a layer of mud bricks and later 
by the desert sand which eventually 
spread over the entire city, various 
documents, most of them merely waste 
paper, have been preserved from the 
elements during the centuries. One 
of these is a vellum fragment measur- 
ing 3% by 4 inches and containing 14 
ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1948 
imperfect lines of the Diatessaron in 
Greek. The date of the roll of the 
Diatessaron from which this shred 
came must, of course, be prior to 256, 
and it may be assigned with certainty 
to the first half of the third century. 
The text of the fragment contains 
the narrative of the coming of Joseph 
of Aramathea for the body of Jesus. 
A literal translation will show how 
words and phrases from all four Gos- 
pels are woven together. Since the 
left-hand margin of the vellum has 
suffered damage, the first half dozen 
or so letters at the beginning of each 
line are lacking. They can be re- 
stored, however, with almost perfect 
confidence. In the following render- 
ing the restorations are enclosed within 
square brackets and the modern 
Scripture references (which are not, 
of course, in the fragment) are en- 
closed within parentheses. 
‘“‘—. . . The mother of the sons of 
Zebadjee (Matt. 27:56) and Salome 
(Mark 15:40) and the wives [of those 
who] had followed him from [Galile]e 
to see the crucified (Luke 23:49b-c). 
And _ [the daly was Preparation; the 
Sabbath was daw{ning] (Luke 23:54). 
And when it was evening (Matt. 
27:57), on the Prep[aration], that is, 
the day before the Sabbath (Mark 
15:42), [there came] up a man (Matt. 
27:57), be[ing] a member of the coun- 
cil (Luke 23:50), from Aramathea 
(Matt. 27:57), a city of Judea (Luke 
23:51), by name Jo[seph] (Matt. 
27:57), good and ri[ghteous] (Luke 
23:50), being a disciple of Jesus, but 
se[cret]ly, for fear of the [Jew]s (John 
19:38). And he (Matt. 27:57) was 
looking for [the] kingdom of God 
(Luke 23:51b). This man [had] not 
[con]sented to [their] p[urpose]... 
(uuke' 23:51a)-?? 
Evidently Tatian went about com- 
posing his Diatessaron with great 
diligence. Probably he worked from 
four separate manuscripts, one of each 
of the Gospels, and, as he wove to- 
83 The fragment was edited by Carl H. 
Kraeling in Studies and Documents, vol. 3, 
London, 1935. 
