232 Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy. 



10. And here is another example of want of skill; this time 

 perhaps because M.^ Bouriant has not sufficient philological training- 

 to realize what the dialectal peculiarities of his own text are ! 



The passage occurs at [194, ii] wdikaios pe pjoeis efsoot 

 mpmokh nnrefrnobe, rendered, le Seigneur estjuHe, lui qui pimit 

 Its f antes des pecheurs. 



And since when, or in what dialect, does 



(«) mokh mean/^M^es? 

 or (h) soot mean punishes ? 



The word mokh is dialectal for makh, ' the neck ', and soot is 

 of course ' to cut off ', Kvptos St'Katos crvviKoif/ev av)(^evas dfJiapTwX.<i)v, 

 Ps. cxxviii. 4. 



11. Immediately after the above sentence, he resumes with the 

 words, mais n'insistons pas et retournons aux autres combats et A oe saint. 

 Here the phrase mais n' insistoyis pas is quite incorrect ; the words are 

 [194, ii], 



eita je nnenjoore ebol mpsaje. 



M. Bouriant thought of jo ore, 'strong', so he translated 

 vCinsistons pas ; and as it seems a difficulty to other Able Editors,, 

 it will not be out of place to exemplify the proper meaning of the 

 word when followed by elol. 



It means ' to scatter, to confound ' ; thus Gen. xi. 9, * they 

 called its name ' p-joore ebol, uvyyyaiv. It is regularly used for 

 SLaa-KopTTLlu), Stao-KcSa^w &c., cf. Ps. xxi. 40; xxxii. 20; Ixxii. 2; 

 Ixxxviii. 11; Eccl. xii. 5; Job xvi. 12; Jerm. xiii. 24; John x. 

 12, 52 ; &c. Of this meaning he has no notion, for he renders 

 Steo-KopTTtorev oottS of Ps. lii. 6, of which the Coptic [204, 12] is 

 pjoeis na joore ebol nnkees, by le Seigneur brisera les os [!] 

 Therefore the above passage meant, "that we may not scatter, put 

 into confusion, the matter". 



12. The very next words are wrongly rendered: Commengons a 

 nous oindre et a parfumer nos cosurs de son parfum. These words have 

 a sort of ' Song of Songs ' ring about them, though perhaps the 

 repetition of the word is weak; '■ perfiime our hearts yiMCo. perfume \ 

 is not a good rhetorical phrase, even if it advocated an intelligible 

 process ! But may be it might become intelligible after we had ' legun 

 to anoint ourselves\ There is no mention of any such 'anointing 

 of ourselves' in the Coptic text, which says simply [194,13], 

 etrenkim epsocn, tare penhet wnof hm pefstinwbe, i.e. 



