A Sixth-Century Fragment of the Letters of Pliny the Younger Part 10

Tastes differ, and not all these eleven readings of Cla.s.s I may be errors. Kukula, in the most recent Teubner edition (1912), accepts three of them (60, 15; 62, 6; 65, 15), and Merrill, in his forthcoming edition, five (60, 15; 61, 12; 62, 6; 65, 12; 65, 15). Personally I could be reconciled to them all with the exception of the very two which Aldus could not admit--62, 23 and 64, 3; in both places he had the early editions to fall back on. However, I should concur with Merrill and Kukula in preferring the reading of the other cla.s.ses in 62, 16 and 65, 24. In 65, 11 I would emend to _alii quidam minoris sed tamen numeri_; if this is the right reading, _?BF_ agree in the easy error of _quidem_ for _quidam_, and _MVD_ in another easy error, _minores_ for _minoris_--the parent ma.n.u.script of _MV_ further changed _tamen numeri_ to _tam innumeri_. Whatever the final judgment, here are five cases in which all recent editors would attribute error to Cla.s.s I; in the remaining six cases the ma.n.u.scripts of Cla.s.s I either agree in error or avoid the error of Cla.s.s II--surely, then, _?_ is not of the latter cla.s.s. There are six other significant errors of _MV_ in the whole pa.s.sage, no one of which appears in _?_: 61, 15 si non] sint _MV_; 62, 6 mira illis] mirabilis _MV_; 62, 11 lotus] illic _MV_; cib.u.m]

cibos _MV_; 62, 25 fuit--64, 12 potes] _om._ _MV_; 66, 12 amatus] est amatus _MV_. Once the first hand in _?_ agrees with _V_ in an error easily committed independently: 61, 12 ordinata] ORDINATA, DI ss. _m. 2_ _?_ ornata _V_.

_?_, then, and _MV_ have descended from the archetype by different routes. With Cla.s.s III, the Verona branch of Cla.s.s II, _?_ clearly has no close a.s.sociation.

But the evidence for allying _?_ with _B_ and _F_, the ma.n.u.scripts of Cla.s.s I, is by no means exhausted. In 61, 14, _Bf.u.x_ have the erroneous emendation, which Budaeus includes among his variants, of _serua_ for _sera_. A glance at _?_ shows its apparent origin. The first hand has SERA correctly; the second hand writes U above the line.[32] If the second hand is solely responsible for the attempt at improvement here, and is not reproducing a variant in the parent ma.n.u.script of _?_, then _BF_ must descend directly from _?_. The following instances point in the same direction: 61, 21 considit] considet _BF_. _?_ has CONSIDIT by the first hand, the second hand changing the second I to a capital E.[33] In 65, 5, however, RESIDIT is not thus changed in _?_, and perhaps for this very reason is retained by the careful scribe of _B_; _F_, which has a slight tendency to emend, has, with _G_, _residet_. 63, 9 praestat amat me] praestatam ad me _B_. Here the letters of the _scriptura continua_ in _?_ are faded and blurred; the error of _B_ would therefore be peculiarly easy if this ma.n.u.script derived directly from _?_. If one ask whether the page were as faded in the ninth century as now, Dr. Lowe has already answered this question; the flesh side of the parchment might well have lost a portion of its ink considerably before the Carolingian period.[34] In any case, the error of _praestatam ad me_ seems natural enough to one who reads the line for the first time in _?_. _B_ did not, as we shall see, copy directly from _?_; a copy intervened, in which the error was made and then, I should infer, corrected above the line, whence _F_ drew the right reading, _B_ taking the original but incorrect text.

[Footnote 32: I have not always followed Dr. Lowe in distinguishing first and second hands in the various alterations discussed here (pp. 48-50).]

[Footnote 33: See above, p. 42.]

[Footnote 34: See above, pp. 11 f.]

There are cases in plenty elsewhere in the _Letters_ to show that _B_ is not many removes from the _scriptura continua_ of some majuscule hand.

In the section included in _?_, apart from the general tightness of the writing, which led to the later insertion of strokes between many of the words,[35] we note these special indications of a parent ma.n.u.script in majuscules. In 61, 10 me autem], _B_ started to write _mea_ and then corrected it. 64, 19 praeceptori a quo] praeceptoria quo _B_, (_m. 1_) _F_. If _B_ or its parent ma.n.u.script copied _?_ directly, the mistake would be especially easy, for PRAECEPTORIA ends the line in _?_. 64, 25 integra re]. After _integra_, a letter is erased in _B_; the copyist, it would seem, first mistook _integra re_ for one word.

[Footnote 35: See plates XIII-XIV.]

Other instances showing a close connection between _B_ and _?_ are as follows: 62, 23 unice] _?_ has by the first hand INUICE, the second hand writing U above I, and a vertical stroke above U. In _BF_, _uince_, the reading of the first hand, is changed by the second to _unice_; this second hand, Professor Merrill informs me, seems to be that of a writer in the same scriptorium as the first. The error in _BF_ might, of course, be due to copying an original in minuscules, but it might also be due to the curious state of affairs in _?_. 65, 24 fungerer]. In _?_ the final R is written, somewhat indistinctly, above the line.

_B_ has _fungerer_ corrected by the second hand from _fungeret_ (?), which may be due to a misunderstanding of _?_. 66, 2 avunculi]

AUONCULI _?_ (O _in ras._) _B_. This form might perhaps be read; _F_ has emended it out, and no other ma.n.u.script has it. 65, 7 desino, inquam, patres conscripti, putare] Here the relation of _BF_ to _?_ seems particularly close. _?_, like _MVDoxa_, has the abbreviation P.C. On a clearly written page, the error of _reputare_ (_BF_) for P.C.

PUTARE is not a specially likely one to make. But in the blur at the bottom of fol. 52v, a page on the flesh side of the parchment, the combination might readily be mistaken for REPUTARE.

Another curious bit of testimony appears at the beginning of the third book. The scribe of _B_[36] wrote the words NESCIO--APUD in rustic capitals, occupying therewith the first line and about a third of the second. This is not effective calligraphy. It would appear that he is reproducing, as is his habit, exactly what he found in his original.

That original might have had one full line, or two lines, of majuscules, perhaps, following pretty closely the lines in _?_, which has the same amount of text, plus the first three letters of SPURINNAM, in the first two lines. If _B_ had _?_ before him, there is nothing to explain his most unusual procedure. His original, therefore, is not _?_ but an intervening copy, which he is transcribing with an utter indifference to aesthetic effect and with a laudable, if painful, desire for accuracy. This trait, obvious in _B_'s work throughout, is perhaps nowhere more strikingly exhibited than here.

[Footnote 36: See plate XIV.]

[Sidenote: _? the direct ancestor of BF with probably a copy intervening_]

If _?_ is the direct ancestor of _BF_, these ma.n.u.scripts should contain no good readings not found in _?_, unless their writers could arrive at such readings by easy emendation or unless there is contamination with some other source. From what we know of the text of _BF_ in general, the latter supposition may at once be ruled out. There are but three cases to consider, two of which may be readily disposed of: 64, 3 proferenda] conferenda _BF_ CONFERANDA _?_; 64, 4 conproba.s.se] (comp.) _BF_ COMPROUa.s.sE _?_. These are simple slips, which a scribe might almost unconsciously correct as he wrote. The remaining error (63, 28 SIBI to _si_) is not difficult to emend when one considers the entire sentence: _quibus omnibus ita demum similis adolescet_, si _imbutus honestis artibus fuerit, quas_, etc. It is less probable, however, that _B_ with _?_ before him should correct it as he wrote than, as we have already surmised, that a minuscule copy intervened between _?_ and _B_, in which the letters _bi_ were deleted by some careful reviser. Two other pa.s.sages tend to confirm this a.s.sumption of an intermediate copy. In 65, 6 (_tum optime libertati venia obsequio praeparatur_), _B_ has _optimae_, a false alteration induced perhaps by the following _libertati_. In _?_, OPTIME stands at the end of the line. The scribe of _B_, had he not found _libertati_ immediately adjacent, would not so readily be tempted to emend; still, we should not make too much of this instance, as _B_ has a rather p.r.o.nounced tendency to write _ae_ for _e_. A more certain case is 66, 7 fungar indicis] fungarindicis _ex_ fungari dicis _B_; here the error is easier to derive from an original in minuscules in which _in_ was abbreviated with a stroke above the _i_. There is abundant evidence elsewhere in the _Letters_ that the immediate ancestor of _BF_ was written in minuscules; I need not elaborate this point. Our present consideration is that apart from the three instances of simple emendation just discussed, there is no good reading of _B_ or _F_ in the portion of text contained in _?_ that may not be found, by either the first or the second hand, in _?_.[37]

[Footnote 37: There are one or two divergencies in spelling hardly worth mention. The most important are 63, 10 caret _B_ KARET _?_; caritas _B_ KARITAS _?_. Yet see below, p. 57, where it is shown that the ancient spelling is found in _B_ elsewhere than in the portion of text included in _?_.]

We may now examine a most important bit of testimony to the close connection existing between _BF_ and _?_. _B_ alone of all ma.n.u.scripts. .h.i.therto known is provided with indices of the _Letters_, one for each book, which give the names of the correspondents and the opening words of each letter. Now _?_, by good luck, preserves the end of Book II, the beginning of Book III, and between them the index for Book III. Dr. F.E. Robbins, in a careful article on _B_ and _F_, and one on the tables of contents in _B_,[38] concluded that _P_ did not contain the indices which are preserved in _B_, and that these were compiled in some ancestor of _B_, perhaps in the eighth century. Here they are, in the Morgan fragment, which takes us back two centuries farther into the past. A comparison of the index in _?_ shows indubitably a close kinship with _B_. A glance at plates XIII and XIV indicates, first of all, that the copy _B_, here as in the text of the _Letters_, is not many removes from _scriptura continua_. Moreover, the lists are drawn up on the same principle; the _nomen_ and _cognomen_ but not the _praenomen_ of the correspondent being given, and exactly the same amount of text quoted at the beginning of each letter. The incipit of III, xvi (AD NEPOTEM--ADNOTa.s.sE UIDEOR FATADICTAQ) is an addition in _?_, and the lemma is longer than usual, as though the original t.i.tle had been omitted in the ma.n.u.script which _?_ was copying and the corrector of _?_ had subst.i.tuted a t.i.tle of his own making.[39] It reappears in _B_, with the easy emendation of _facta_ from _fata_. The only other case in the indices of a right reading in _B_ that is not in _?_ is in the t.i.tle of III, viii: AD SUETON TRANQUE _?_ Adsu&on tranqui. _B_. In both these instances the scribe of _B_ needed no external help in correcting the simple error. Far more significant is the coincidence of _B_ and _?_ in very curious mistakes, as the address of III, iii (AD CAERELLIAE HISPULLAE for AD CORELLIAM HISPULLAM) and the lemma of III, viii (FACIS ADPROCETERA for FACIS PRO CETERA).

_?BF_ agree in omitting SUAE (III, iii) and SUO (III, iv), but in retaining the p.r.o.nominal adjectives in the other addresses preserved in _?_. The same unusual suspensions occur in _?_ and _B_, as AD SUETON TRANQUE (tranqui _B_); AD UESTRIC SPURINN; AD SILIUM PROCUL.[40]

In the first of these cases, the parent of _?_ evidently had TRANQ, which _?_ falsely enlarges to TRANQUE; this form and not TRANQ is the basis of _B_'s correction--a semi-successful correction--TRANQUI.

This, then, is another sign that _B_ depends directly on _?_.

Further, _B_ omits one symbol of abbreviation which _?_ has (POSSUM IAM PERSCRIB), the lemma of the ninth letter), and in the lemma of the tenth neither ma.n.u.script preserves the symbol (COMPOSUISSE ME QUAED). In the first of these cases, it will be observed, _B_ has a very long _i_ in _perscrib_.[41] This long _i_ is not a feature of the script of _B_, nor is there any provocation for it in the way in which the word is written in _?_. This detail, therefore, may be added to the indications that a copy in minuscules intervened between _B_ and _?_; the curious _i_, faithfully reproduced, as usual, by _B_, may have occurred in such a copy.

[Footnote 38: _C.P._ V, pp. 467 ff. and 476 ff., and for the supposed lack of indices in _P_, p. 485.]

[Footnote 39: I venture to disagree with Dr. Lowe's view (above, p. 25) that the addition is by the first hand.]

[Footnote 40: See above, p. 11.]

[Footnote 41: See plate XIV.]

These details prove an intimate relation between _?_ and _BF_, and fit the supposition that _B_ and _F_ are direct descendants of _?_.

This may be strengthened by another consideration. If _?_ and _B_ independently copy the same source, they inevitably make independent errors, however careful their work. _?_ should contain, then, a certain number of errors not in _B_. As we have found only three such cases in 12 pages, or 324 lines, and as in all these three the right reading in _B_ could readily have been due to emendation on the part of the scribe of _B_ or of a copy between _?_ and _B_, we have acquired negative evidence of an impressive kind. It is distinctly harder to believe that the two texts derive independently from a common source.

Show us the significant errors of _?_ not in _B_, and we will accept the existence of that common source; otherwise the appropriate supposition is that _B_ descends directly from its elder relative _?_. It is not necessary to prove by an examination of readings that _?_ is not copied from _B_; the dates of the two scripts settle that matter at the start. Supposing, however, for the moment, that _?_ and _B_ were of the same age, we could readily prove that the former is not copied from the latter. For _B_ contains a significant collection of errors which are not present in _?_. Six slight mistakes were made by the first hand and corrected by it, three more were corrected by the second hand, and twelve were left uncorrected.

Some of these are trivial slips that a scribe copying _B_ might emend on his own initiative, or perhaps by a lucky mistake. Such are 64, 26 iudicium] indicium _B_; 64, 29 Caecili] caecilii _B_; 65, 13 neglegere]

neglere _B_. But intelligent pondering must precede the emendation of _praeceptoria quo_ into _praeceptori a quo_ (64, 19), of _beaticis_ into _Baeticis_ (65, 15), and of _optimae_ into _optime_ (65, 26), while it would take a Madvig to remedy the corruptions in 63, 9 (_praestatam ad me_) and 65,7 (_reputare_ into _patres conscripti putare_). These are the sort of errors which if found in _?_ would furnish incontrovertible proof that a ma.n.u.script not containing them was independent of _?_; but there is no such evidence of independence in the case of _B_. Our case is strengthened by the consideration that various of the errors in _B_ may well be traced to idiosyncrasies of _?_, not merely to its _scriptura continua_, a source of misunderstanding that any majuscule would present, but to the fading of the writing on the flesh side of the pages in _?_, and to the possibility that some of the corrections of the second hand may be the private inventions of that hand.[42] We are hampered, of course, by the comparatively small amount of matter in _?_, nor are we absolutely certain that this is characteristic of the entire ma.n.u.script of which it was once a part. But my reasoning is correct, I believe, for the material at our disposal.

[Footnote 42: See above, pp. 48 f.]

[Sidenote: _The probable stemma_]

Our tentative stemma thus far, then, is No. 1 below, not No. 2 and not No. 3.

No. 1 No. 2 No. 3

_?_ _?_ _X_ | | / | | / _?_ _?_ / / | _X_ _?_ / | / _B_ _B_ / _F_ | _B_ | _F_ _F_

Robbins put _P_ in the position of _?_ in this last stemma, but on the a.s.sumption that it did not contain the indices. That is not true of _?_.

[Sidenote: _Further consideration of the external history of P, ?, and B_]

Still further evidence is supplied by the external history of our ma.n.u.scripts. _B_ was at Beauvais at the end of the twelfth or the beginning of the thirteenth century, as we have seen.[43] Whatever the uncertainties as to its origin, any palaeographer would agree that it could hardly have been written before the middle of the ninth century or after the middle of the tenth. It was undoubtedly produced in France, as was _F_, its sister ma.n.u.script. The presumption is that _?_, the copy intervening between _?_ and _B_, was also French, and that _?_ was in France when the copy was made from it. Merrill, for what reason I fail to see, suggested that the original of _BF_ might be "Lombardic," written in North Italy.[44] An extraneous origin of this sort must be proved from the character of the errors, such as spellings and the false resolution of abbreviations, made by _BF_. If no such signs can be adduced, it is natural to suppose that _?_ was of the same nationality and general tendencies as its copies _B_ and _F_.

This consideration helps out the possible evidence furnished by the scribbling in a hand of the Carolingian variety on fol. 53v;[45] we may now be more confident that it is French rather than Italian. But whatever the history of our book in the early Middle Ages, in the fifteenth century it was surely near Meaux, which is not far from Paris--about as far to the east as Beauvais is to the north. Now, granted for a moment that the last of our stemmata is correct, _X_, from which _?_ and _B_ descend, being earlier than _?_, must have been a ma.n.u.script in majuscules, written in Italy, since that is unquestionably the provenience of _?_. There were, then, by this supposition, _two_ ancient majuscule ma.n.u.scripts of the _Letters_, most closely related in text--veritable twins, indeed--that travelled from Italy to France. One (X) had arrived in the early Middle Ages and is the parent of _B_ and _F_; the other (_?_) was probably there in the early Middle Ages, and surely was there in the fifteenth century. We can not deny this possibility, but, on the principle _melius est per unum fieri quam per plura_, we must not adopt it unless driven to it. The history of the transmission of Cla.s.sical texts in the Carolingian period is against such a supposition.[46] Not many books of the age and quality of _?_ were floating about in France in the ninth century. There is nothing in the evidence presented by _?_ and _B_ that drives us to a.s.sume the presence of two such codices. There is nothing in this evidence that does not fit the simpler supposition that _BF_ descend directly from _?_. The burden of proof would appear to rest on those who a.s.sert the contrary. _?_, therefore, if the ancestor of _B_, contained at least as much as we find today in _B_. Some ancestor of _B_ had all ten books. Aldus, whose text is closely related to _BF_, got all ten books from a very ancient ma.n.u.script that came down from Paris. Our simpler stemma indicates the presence of one rather than more than one such ma.n.u.script in the vicinity of Paris in the ninth or the tenth century and again in the fifteenth. This line of argument, which presents not a mathematically absolute demonstration but at least a highly probable concatenation of facts and deductions, warrants the a.s.sumption, to be used at any rate as a working hypothesis, that _?_ is a fragment of the lost Parisinus which contained all the books of Pliny's _Letters_.

[Footnote 43: See above, p. 44, n. 2.]

[Footnote 44: "Zur fruhen Ueberlieferungsgeschichte des Briefwechsels zwischen Plinius und Trajan," in _Wiener Studien_ x.x.xI (1909), p. 258.]

[Footnote 45: See above, pp. 21, 41.]

[Footnote 46: See above, p. 22.]

Our stemma, then, becomes,

_P_ (the whole ma.n.u.script), of which _?_ is a part.

| | _P_ / / _B_ _F_

[Sidenote: _Evidence from the portions of BF outside the text of ?_]

We may corroborate this reasoning by evidence drawn from the portions of _BF_ outside the text of _?_. We note, above all, a number of omissions in _BF_ that indicate the length of line in some ma.n.u.script from which they descend. This length of line is precisely what we find in _?_. Our fragment has lines containing from 23 to 33 letters, very rarely 23, 24, or 33, and most frequently from 27 to 30, the average being 28.4. These figures tally closely with those given by Professor A.C. Clark[47] for the Vindobonensis of Livy, a codex not far removed in date from _?_. Supposing that _?_ is a typical section of _P_--and after Professor Clark's studies[48] we may more confidently a.s.sume that it is--_P_ had the same length of line. The important cases of omission are as follows:

[Footnote 47: _The Descent of Ma.n.u.scripts_, 1918, p. 16. Professor Clark counts on two pages chosen at random, 23-31 letters in the line. My count for _?_ includes the nine and a third pages on which full lines occur. If I had taken only foll. 52r, 52v, 53r and 53v, I should have found no lines of 32 or 33 letters. On the other hand, the first page to which I turned in the Vindobonensis of Livy (133v) has a line of 32 letters, and so has 135v, while 136v has one of 33. The lines of _?_ are a shade longer than those of the Vindobonensis, but only a shade.]

[Footnote 48: _Ibidem_, pp. vi, 9-18. There is some danger of pushing Professor Clark's method too far, particularly when it is applied to New Testament problems. For a well-considered criticism of the book, see Merrill's review in the _Cla.s.sical Journal_ XIV (1919), pp. 395 ff.]

32, 19 atque etiam invisus virtutibus fuerat evasit, reliquit incolumen optimum atque] etiam--atque _om. BF_. _P_ would have the abbreviation for _bus_ in _virtutibus_ and for _que_ in _atque_. There would thus be in all 61 letters and dots, or two lines, arranged about as follows:

ATQ ETIAMINUISUSUIRTUTIBFUERATEUA (30) SITRELIQUITINCOLUMEMOPTIMUMATQ (31)