48 Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy. 



58. An equally curious passage is found in his version and note 

 on the word theodokos, at p. 80 of his translation: "this word, 

 formed from ©cos, God, and from the verb SexofJ-aL (Ionic SeKOfxai), 

 signifies literally, one tvho receives God, title perfectly adapted to 

 Mary the Mother ("la generatrice") of God. However, owing to 

 the frequent change of t into 8 in Coptic, somebody might believe 

 that theodokos stands for theotokos {®eoTOKo<;, Deipara) ; but 

 this cannot be so here, because the latter epithet is given to Mary 

 immediately after, in its Coptic form trefjpenwte; and therefore 

 it would be a useless repetition of the same title". 



The argument on the score of "useless repetition" is utterly 

 worthless, for nothing is commoner than just this habit of adding 

 the Coptic meaning to a Greek word used ; but when it is recollected 

 that this passage occurs in a declaration of faith against the jLrians, it 

 seems needless to do more than quote his note. 



59. I shall conclude this " Text" with one more example [61, 1] : 



esje "W na arilce Sii propenso 



epheke je al povero, perche 



miif supe nnaet non e felice. 



eie w petuasope Che cosa sard 



mprmiuao efka del ricco, che pone 



uwb ejn nwb oro sopra oro 



santTV rsebe sino a che arrugginisca ? 



" Be kindly disposed to the poor, because he is not happy" : so runs 

 Prof. Rossi's version of the above text. 



There is not a particle of sense in it, in reference to the context, 

 and no justification for it from the Coptic words. The words mean : 

 "if there is a charge (a cause of blame) against the poor man, that 

 he has not been merciful", esje wn arike epheke, "in that case, 

 eie, what shall befall the rich &c." If the poor is blameworthy for 

 not having shown mercy, what will befall the rich ? The word 

 arike, airta, ixefjnj/L<s, &c., is a common Coptic word ; but instead of 

 this the editor has had recourse, in his helplessness, to the imperative 

 particle a, prefixed in a quite unwarrantable way to the root rike, 

 "to bend", which had to be twisted to mean "be kind to"; and 

 then the word naet, "merciful", had to be rendered "happy", 

 in order to make a suitable maxim : 



" be thou kind to the poor, because he is not happy" (! !). 



