THE ORIGINAL PROVENANCE AND DATE OF THE MS. MS. is an abbreviation for Manuscript.

further research will ultimately show that it is found in other documents, but it is in any case rare, and the fact that all the peculiarities of the Codex Sinaiticus are also found in Papyrus Rylands 28, as well as in Codex Vaticanus, is remarkable: it is enough to suggest the possibility that these documents come from the same scriptorium A room in a monastery or library set aside for writing and copying manuscripts., and, as will be shown later, in the case of the two vellum codices there is further evidence to support this suggestion. Moreover, it is obvious that this evidence points to Egypt for the provenance The place of origin. of the Codex Sinaiticus, in so far as there is nothing in it which is unparalleled in Egyptian documents; but it is desirable to emphasize once more that this fact ought not to be regarded as conclusive, so long as we have no evidence as to other local hands. As the matter stands the identity of script between the papyri and the Codex Sinaiticus may be due to a common provenance, but we cannot prove that it may not equally well be due to the existence of a single type of professional literary script throughout the Graeco-Roman world in the fourth century. One may, however, at least claim that so far as palaeography The study of ancient handwriting. is concerned the onus probandi Latin: "burden of proof." is on those who maintain any provenance other than Egyptian.

¹ It is, however, worth observing that whereas the scribe A prefers the spelling ei to i the scribe D prefers i to ei, but this is a purely personal idiosyncrasy, and is of no value for defining the date or provenance of the MS.

Besides this purely palaeographical evidence attention may be called to two orthographical Relating to spelling. points, which stand out among the otherwise quite ordinary spellings of the Codex Sinaiticus, for the interchange of i and ei, e and ai is so universally found in all MSS. of every time and place that it cannot be regarded as possessing any importance.¹

(1) In ten out of the eleven times that the word krabattos Greek: κράβαττος, meaning a bed or cot. is found it is spelt krabaktos original: κράβακτος (Acts 5:15 has krabattōn). This may be illustrated from P. Tebt. 406, line 19 (about 266 A.D.) and P. Grenf. ii 111, line 32 (fifth-sixth cent.). Prof. Moulton has an interesting note on this point in the German edition of his ‘Prolegomena’, p. 60. ‘The mass of the good MSS.,’ he says, ‘spell thus [krabattos], but B* A scholarly shorthand for the original hand of Codex Vaticanus. in Mark has krabatos, and א The Hebrew letter Aleph, the symbol for Codex Sinaiticus. nearly always krabaktos: E in Acts 5:15 seems about the best of the authorities for krabattos, which is normal in late MSS. . . . The papyri vary between krabattos (so P. Brit. Mus. ii 191, line 14 (p. 265) of the reign of Trajan), krabatos (Mélanges Nicole, p. 184, a “probably Ptolemaic ostracon A piece of pottery used as a writing surface.,” and krabaktos (P. Tebt. 406, line 19, of 266 A.D., cf. P. Grenf. ii 111, line 32 of 5th/6th century A.D.). Now Thumb in Indogermanische Forschungen ii. 85 gives Modern Greek krevvati as the normal form, but krevátti Bova and krévato Rochudi: “the remaining Italo-Greek forms have probably emerged from the basic form krevátti” original German: "die übrigen italienisch-griech. Formen sind wahrscheinlich aus der Grundform krevátti hervorgegangen". The Latin grabatus shows that in the West a form with one b prevailed: the bb arises at a late date in some other district and spreads over the whole area, the late New Testament MSS. agreeing. The interest of the dialectical differentiation for us lies in the agreement of א with witnesses exclusively Egyptian, dating from the centuries before and after its own period: so far as that goes, it is very suggestive for the provenance of the MS., which is in this point sharply distinguished from its general associate B.’ I would only add that the last words here must not be taken to imply that there is anything in the orthography of B which points away from Egypt. Prof. Moulton only means that the evidence as to krabaktos is not in its case characteristically Egyptian.

¹ Notes on Egyptian Epigraphy, extract from the Bulletin of the Archaeological Society of Alexandria, No. 11, 1909.

(2) The word Israilite Greek: Ἰσραηλείτης (Israelite). occurs nine times in the New Testament; and in eight of them the Codex Sinaiticus spells it ISARAHLITE original: ICAPAHΛEITHC. This euphonic dental A speech sound produced with the teeth; here referring to the insertion of a 't' or similar sound to make the word easier to pronounce. is commonly inserted in the MSS. of the Old Latin version, both of the African and of the European type, but among the Greek Uncials Manuscripts written entirely in capital letters. it appears to be found only in the Codex Sinaiticus and in the Codex Vaticanus, in the latter in the form of ISTRAHLITE original: ICTPAHΛЄITHC. Westcott and Hort used this fact to support their theory of a Western provenance for one or both of these MSS., but strong though their argument seemed, it has been deprived of its force by the papyri of Egypt. The same spelling is found in the Magical Papyri (e.g. the great Paris Codex Suppl. Gr. 574), and although Traube in his Sacred Names original: Nomina Sacra (p. 106) says ‘The form Istrahel is probably to be considered a Latinism, following Rönsch, Collectanea Philologica p. 245’ original German: "Die Form Istrahel ist wohl mit Rönsch... für einen Latinismus zu halten", he goes on to admit that ‘in Greek, ISTRAHL is often found in the magical papyri’ original German: "im Griechischen findet sich ICTPAHΛ oft in den Papyri magici". M. de Ricci has also recently found the spelling ISARAHL in an unpublished Graeco-Egyptian tablet in the Louvre, and also in a Jewish inscription in the Museum at Alexandria.¹ Thus the evidence for this spelling in Egypt is probably as