Commentary on the First Three Books of Aristotle's Physics

VATICANUS 1028 [Brandis Abhandl. der Berl. Akad. 1831 p. 67 nr. 103], L

Paper. It contains f. 1 Aristotle's Physics books I–VII, f. 38 Plato's Menexenus, f. 45 Simplician excerpts on the Physics, f. 93 Philoponus' commentaries on Physics books I–IV, f. 371 Alexander of Aphrodisias on On Sense and Sensibles, f. 411 Iamblichus' Protrepticus. It was written by several contemporary or nearly contemporary scribes, the first of whom wrote f. 1–44, the second f. 45–92, the third (similar to the first) f. 93–181 (Philop. books I, II), the fourth f. 182–242 (Philop. book III from p. 349, 7 of our edition), the fifth (similar to the one we called the third) f. 243–370, and the sixth, seventh, and eighth the rest. The learned Augustus Mau accurately compared and described the codex, and he thinks it was written in the 13th century. Torstrik, on the other hand, had attributed it to the 15th century. I myself inspected it hurriedly some years ago and thought it to be of the 14th century, although it reflects a more ancient appearance of shorthand and intricate script; nor would I judge it more unfairly, for the Protrepticus of Iamblichus was certainly copied from a 14th-century codex (Laurentianus LXXXVI, 3), as Pistellius will shortly demonstrate with the strongest arguments in Museo ital. di ant. class. vol. III. In books I–II the authority of the codex is great, somewhat less in book III (written more negligently), and non-existent in book IV. For book IV was copied from codex G, from which, by being read wrongly, wonderful errors often arose, such as p. 719, 22: L appeared to itself to read "as" original: ὡς instead of "or" original: ἡ; 622, 22: "the...remaining" in G, "the...one" in L; 496, 14: "is used," according to Torstrik, in L, surely because in G the letter 'n' original: ν is almost partially worn away. To these are added many other errors, which the scribe admitted freely, so that it is not at all surprising that it sometimes agrees with KM in such things, as on p. 643, 17, in the omission of the word "it shall be." The note L² indicates a more recent corrector.

MARCIANUS 230 [Zanetti p. 118], paper, 14th century (15th according to Zanetti), M

357 leaves, written by several scribes. Leaves 1–170 contain Philoponus' commentaries on Physics books I–IV, written fairly accurately up to the quaternion ιγ' 13 (whose last words "of those acting it happens" original: δρώντων συμβαίνει ἀκ- are read on p. 423, 8 of our edition), but very negligently in the rest. I said that the Trincavellian edition in books I–III depends on this codex (and perhaps the corrections are owed to the Venetian editor himself, which I have indicated with the note M²), and this can be gathered from our own critical annotation; cf. ad p. 4, 19; 12, 22; 14, 26; 35, 29; 425, 28; 427, 20; 432, 17, 24; 433, 3 etc. It is furthermore certain that the typesetters of Trincavellius had the codex itself in their hands, not a transcript; for in it appear signs written in lead stylus, by which the ektheseis expositions/projections and the ends of each printed page are designated. Cf. R. Schoell in Hermae vol. V (1870) p. 126 sq. But from quaternion ιδ' 14 on, deterred by the abundance of errors, as I suppose, the editor procured another codex for himself by means of which he might restore the words of Philoponus; in book IV, however, he completely abandoned M and took on another. But how it happened that in the Corollary on the Void (p. 675, 12—695, 8) he used codex M again (and this is again indicated by the lead signs of the typesetters), I, for my part, do not know. I myself compared the codex, which was transmitted to Florence.