Valerius Maximus: Memorable Deeds and Sayings

...following pages I diligently noted down what differed from the context of the Halmian edition; then, having compared the various readings placed under his work by Halm, I re-examined with the manuscript consulted whatever departed from Halm's notes and weighed accurately which of us had read it more correctly; finally, if ever anything seemed ambiguous either in the ancient script or in distinguishing the various hands of the scribes, I appealed to the judgment of most expert friends. I trust that by this labor of mine, I have achieved the result that it now seems impossible to doubt the testimony of this book, unless where I myself have indicated that the script is ambiguous.

And I see that I have not undertaken this task in vain, since I have noticed more errors committed by Halm than I had suspected. In which I particularly wondered how it could have happened to a man most versed in reading the books of ancient writers, especially since he had that primary manuscript brought with him to Munich, and had it at home while his own copy of Valerius was being printed. I do not criticize him because he purposely omitted many lighter and manifest errors of the first hand, which have already been corrected by another hand in manuscript A—for I have recalled the same notation for the Bern book that I used in the larger edition, since B is to me the Vienna manuscript Codex Vindobonensis, with the Berlin manuscript C as the best among the more recent ones—but when he adds (p. XXI): "these excepted, if I thought anything in these matters should be changed against the testimony of the Bern manuscript, it is noted in the critical commentary," let us now see whether faith can be held in this assertion of consistency. Certainly at 2, 6. 5 (p. 76, 14 of my ed.) he should not have omitted that manuscript A hands down caperet, which itself also exists in the Laurentian Codex Laurentianus (L). — Nor ibid. 7. 6 (p. 85, 22) was it to be changed silently from ab lictore to a lictore, or at 3, 8. 6 (p. 156, 22) from ab tribuno to a tribuno. — It should at least have been mentioned at 2, 8. init. (p. 93, 9) that in A it is written a paruulo romuli casa, not e paruula. — In the disputed passage 4, 3. 4 (p. 179, 7) not correctly si-