A Sixth-Century Fragment of the Letters of Pliny the Younger Part 12

4 Arria.n.u.s Maturus] _?BFDra_ aria.n.u.s maturus _Gp_ Arria.n.u.s Maturius _?_

5 est] _?BFDG_(_p_?)_a_ _om. r Ber._

9 ardentibus dicere] _?BFDG_(_r_?)_a_ dicere ardentius _p?_

12 excolendusque] _?BFD_(_p_?)_a_ extollendusque _Gr?_

15 conferas in eum] _?BFD_(_p_?)_a_ in eum conferas _Gr?_

17 excipit] _?BFD_(_p_?)_a_ accipit _r?_

quam si] _?BFDG_(_p_?)_a_ quasi si _r_ quasi _Laet._, _Ber._

20 CORELLIAE HISPULLAE SUAE] CORELLIAE _?B_ AD CAERELLIAE HISPULLAE _ind. ?B_ CORELLIE ISPULLAE _F_ CORELLIAE HISPULLAE _a_ corneliae (Coreliae _Catanaeus_) hispullae (suae _add. Do_) _DGpr?_

22 teque et] _DG_(_p_?)_[sigma]_ teque _?BFra_

23 et in] _?BFDG_(_p_?)_a_ et _r?_

diligam, cupiam necesse est atque etiam] _?BFDG_(_p_?)_a_ diligam et cupiam necesse est etiam _r_ diligam atque etiam cupiam nececesse (_sic_) est etiam _Ber._

64, 2 erroribus modica vel etiam nulla] _BFDG_(_p_?)_a_ (_ex_ ERRORIBMODICAESTETIAMNULLA _m. 2_)_?_ erroribus uel modica uel nulla _r_ erroribus modica uel nulla _Ber._ uel erroribus modica uel etiam nulla _vulgo_

5 fortunaeque] _?BFDG_(_p_?)_a_ form(a)eque _r_ _Ber._

65, 11 alii quidem minores sed tamen numeri] (ali _D_) _DGp_ alii quidem minoris sed tamen numeri _?BFa_ alii quidam (quidem _Catanaeus_) minores sed tam (tamen _r?_) innumeri _MVr?_

15 superiore] _MVD?_ priore _?BFGra_ prior _p_

24 iam] _MVDG_(_pr_?)_?_ _om._ _?BFa_

66, 7 sint omnes] _?BFMVDG_(_pr_?)_a_ sint _?_

9 haec quoque] _?BFDVGra_ hoc quoque _M_ hic quoque _p_ haec _?_

11 Pomponi] _?BMVo_ Pomponii _FDpra_ Q. Pomponii _?_

12 amatus] _?FDG_(_pr_?)_a_ est amatus _MV?_ amatus est _corr. m. 1_ _B_

Here is sufficient material for a test. Aldus, it will be observed, whether or not he started with some special edition, refuses to follow the latest and best texts of his day (i.e., _?_) in these twenty-six readings. In one sure case (60, 15) and eleven possible[62]

cases (61, 18; 62, 26; 63, 5, 12, 15, 17 _bis_, 23 _bis_; 64, 2, 5), his reading agrees with the Princeps. In four sure cases (63, 4, 22; 65, 15; 66, 9) and one possible one (63, 9), he agrees with the Roman edition; in two sure (61, 12; 66, 11) and three possible (63, 2; 66, 7, 12) cases, with both _p_ and _r_. Once he breaks away from all editions reported by Keil and agrees with _D_ (62, 6). At the same time, all these readings are attested by _?FB_ and hence were presumably in the Parisinus. In two cases (65, 11, 24), we know of no source other than _P_ that could have furnished him his reading. Further, in the superscription of the third letter of Book III (63, 20), he might have taken a hint from Catanaeus, who was the first to depart from the reading CORNELIAE, universally accepted before him, but again it is only _P_ that could give him the correct spelling CORELLIAE.[63]

[Footnote 62: I say "possible" because the reading is implied, not stated, in Keil's edition. The reading of Beroaldus on 63, 23 I get from our photograph, not from Keil, who does not give it.]

[Footnote 63: I have purposely omitted to treat Aldus's use of the superscriptions in _P_, as that matter is best reserved for a consideration of the superscriptions in general.]

If all the above readings, then, were in the Parisinus, how did Aldus arrive at them? Did he fish round, now in the Princeps, now in the Roman edition, despite the repellent errors that those texts contained,[64]

and extract with felicitous accuracy excellent readings that coincided with those of the Parisinus, or did he draw them straight from that source itself? The crucial cases are 65, 11 and 24. As he must have gone to the Parisinus for these readings, he presumably found the others there, too. Moreover, he did not get his new variants by a merely sporadic consultation of the ancient book when he was dissatisfied with the accepted text of his day, for in the two crucial cases and many of the others, too, that text makes sense; some of the readings, indeed, are accepted by modern editors as correct.[65] Aldus was collating.

He carefully noted minutiae, such as the omission of _et_ and _iam_, and accepted what he found, unless the ancient text seemed to him indisputably wrong. He gave it the benefit of the doubt even when it may be wrong. This is the method of a scrupulous editor who cherishes a proper veneration for his oldest and best authority.

[Footnote 64: See above, p. 58.]

[Footnote 65: See above, pp. 47 f.]

Budaeus, on the other hand, is not an editor. He is a vastly interested reader of Pliny, frequently commenting on the subject-matter or calling attention to it by marginal signs. As for the text, he generally finds Beroaldus good enough. He corrects misprints, makes a conjecture now and then, or adopts one of Catanaeus, and, besides supplementing the missing portions with transcripts made for him from the Parisinus, inserts numerous variants, some of which indubitably come from that ma.n.u.script.[66] In the present section, occupying 251 lines in _?_, there is only one reading of the Parisinus--a false reading, it happens--that seems to Budaeus worth recording. Compared with what Aldus gleaned from _?_, Budaeus's extracts are insignificant. It is remarkable, for instance, that on a pa.s.sage (65, 11) which, as the appended obelus shows, he must have read with attention, he has not added the very different reading of the Parisinus. Either, then, Budaeus did not consult the Parisinus with care, or he did not think the great majority of its readings preferable to the text of Beroaldus, or, as I think may well have been the case, he had neither the ma.n.u.script itself nor an entire copy of it accessible at the time when he added his variants in his combined edition of Beroaldus and Avantius.[67]

[Footnote 66: See Merrill, "Zur fruhen Ueberlieferungsgeschichte des Briefwechsels zwischen Plinius und Trajan," in _Wiener Studien_ x.x.xI (1909), p. 257; _C.P._ II, p. 154; XIV, p. 30 f. Two examples (216, 23 and 227, 18) will be noted in plate XVII a.]

[Footnote 67: Certain errors of the scribe who wrote the additional pages in the Bodleian book warrant the surmise that he was copying not the Parisinus itself, but some copy of it. Thus in 227, 14 (see plate XVII b) we find him writing _Tamen_ for _tum_, Budaeus correcting this error in the margin. A scribe is of course capable of anything, but with an uncial _tum_ to start from, _tamen_ is not a natural mistake to commit; it would rather appear that the scribe falsely resolved a minuscule abbreviation.]

But I do not mean to present here a final estimate of Budaeus; for that, I hope, we may look to Professor Merrill. Nor do I particularly blame Budaeus for not constructing a new text from the wealth of material disclosed in the Parisinus. His interests lay elsewhere; _suos quoique mos_. What I mean to say, and to say with some conviction, is that for the portion of text included in our fragment, the evidence of that fragment, coupled with that of _B_ and _F_, shows that as a witness to the ancient ma.n.u.script Aldus is overwhelmingly superior to either Budaeus or any of the ancient editors.

Our examination of the Morgan fragment, therefore, leads to what I deem a highly probable conclusion. We could perhaps hope for absolute proof in a matter of this kind only if another page of the same ma.n.u.script should appear, bearing a note in the hand of Aldus Manutius to the effect that he had used the codex for his edition of 1508. Failing that, we can at least point out that all the data accessible comport with the hypothesis that the Morgan fragment was a part of this very codex. We have set our hypothesis running a lengthy gauntlet of facts, and none has tripped it yet. We have also seen that _?_ is most intimately connected with ma.n.u.scripts _BF_ of Cla.s.s I, and indeed seems to be a part of the very ma.n.u.script whence they are descended. Finally, a careful comparison of Aldus's text with _?_ shows him, for this much of the _Letters_ at least, to be a scrupulous and conscientious editor.

His method is to follow _?_ throughout, save when, confronted by its obvious blunders, he has recourse to the editions of his day.

[Sidenote: _The latest criticism of Aldus_]

Since the publication of Otto's article in 1886,[68] in which the author defended the _F_ branch against that of _MV_, to which, as the elder representative of the tradition, Keil had not unnaturally deferred, critical procedure has gradually shifted its centre. The reappearance of _B_ greatly helped, as it corroborates the testimony of _F_. _B_ and _F_ head the list of the ma.n.u.scripts used by Kukula in his edition of 1912,[69] and _B_ and _F_ with Aldus's Parisinus make up Cla.s.s I, not Cla.s.s II, in Merrill's grouping of the ma.n.u.scripts. Obviously, the value of Cla.s.s I mounts higher still now that we have evidence in the Morgan fragment of its existence in the early sixth century. This fact helps us to decide the question of glosses in our text. We are more than ever disposed to attribute not to _BF_ but to what has now become the younger branch of the tradition, Cla.s.s II, the tendency to interpolate explanatory glosses. The changed att.i.tude towards the _BF_ branch has naturally resulted in a gradual transformation of the text. We have seen in the portion included in _?_ that of the eleven readings which Keil regarded as errors of the _F_ branch, three are accepted by Kukula and five by Merrill.[70]

[Footnote 68: "Die Ueberlieferung der Briefe des jungeren Plinius,"

in _Hermes_ XXI (1886), pp. 287 ff.]

[Footnote 69: See p. iv.]

[Footnote 70: See above, pp. 47 f.]

Since Cla.s.s I has thus appreciated in value, we should expect that Aldus's stock would also take an upward turn. In Aldus's lifetime, curiously, he was criticized for excessive conservatism. His rival Catanaeus finds his chief quality _supina ignorantia_ and adds:[71]

"Verum enim uero non satis est recuperare venerandae vetustatis exemplaria, nisi etiam simul adsit acre emendatoris iudicium: quoniam et veteres librarii in voluminibus describendis saep.i.s.sime falsi sunt, et Plinius ipse scripta sua se viuo deprauari in quadam epistola demonstrauerit."

[Footnote 71: See the prefatory letter in his edition of 1518.]

Nowadays, however, editors hesitate to accept an unsupported reading of Aldus as that of the Parisinus, since they believe that he abounds in those very conjectures of which Catanaeus felt the lack. The att.i.tude of the expert best qualified to judge is still one of suspicion towards Aldus. In his most recent article,[72] Professor Merrill declares that Keil's remarks[73] on the procedure of Aldus in the part of Book X already edited by Avantius, Beroaldus, and Catanaeus might safely have been extended to cover the work of Aldus on the entire body of the _Letters_. He proceeds to subject Aldus to a new test, the material for which we owe to Merrill's own researches. He compares with Aldus's text the ma.n.u.script parts of the Bodleian volume, which are apparently transcripts from the Parisinus (= _I_);[74] in them Budaeus with his own hand (= _i_) has corrected on the authority of the Parisinus itself, according to Merrill, the errors of his transcriber. In a few instances, Merrill allows, Budaeus has subst.i.tuted conjectures of his own. This material, obviously, offers a valuable criterion of Aldus's methods as an editor. There is a further criterion in the shape of Codex _M_, not utilized till after Aldus's edition. As this ma.n.u.script represents Cla.s.s II, concurrences between _M_ and _Ii_ against _a_ make it tolerably certain that Aldus himself and no higher authority is responsible for such readings. On this basis, Merrill cites twenty-five readings in the added part of Book VIII (viii, 3 _quas obvias_--xviii, II _amplissimos hortos_) and nineteen readings in the added part of Book X (letters iv-xli), which represent examples "wherein Aldus abandons indubitably satisfactory readings of his only and much belauded ma.n.u.script in favor of conjectures of his own."[75] Letter IX xvi, a very short affair, added by Budaeus in the margin, contains no indictment against Aldus.

[Footnote 72: _C.P._ XIV (1919), pp. 29 ff.]

[Footnote 73: _Op. cit._, p. x.x.xvii: nam ea quae aliter in Aldina editione atque in illis (i.e., Avantius, Beroaldus, and Catanaeus) exhibentur ita comparata sunt omnia, ut coniectura potius inventa quam e codice profecta esse existimanda sint et plura quidem in pravis et temerariis interpolationibus versantur.]

[Footnote 74: But see above, p. 62, n. 2.]

[Footnote 75: Pp. 31 ff.]

[Sidenote: _Aldus's methods in the newly discovered parts of Books VIII, IX, and X_]

The result of this exposure, Professor Merrill declares, should convince "any unprejudiced student" of the question that "Aldus stands clearly convicted of being an extremely unsafe textual critic of Pliny's _Letters_."[76] "This conclusion does not depend, as that of Keil necessarily did, on any native or acquired acuteness of critical perception. The wayfaring man, though a fool, need not err therein."[77]

I speak as a wayfarer, but nevertheless I must own that Professor Merrill's path of argument causes me to stumble. I readily admit that Aldus, in editing a portion of text that no man had put into print before him, fell back on conjecture when his authority seemed not to make sense. But Merrill's lists need revision. He has included with Aldus's "willful deviations" from the true text of _P_ certain readings that almost surely were misprints (218, 12; 220, 3), some that may well be (as 217, 28; 221, 12), one case in which Aldus has retained an error of _P_ while _I_ emends (221, 11), and several cases in which Aldus and _I_ or _i_ emend in different ways an error of _P_ (222, 14; 226, 5; 272, 4--not 5). In one case he misquotes Aldus, when the latter really has the reading that both Merrill and Keil indicate as correct (276, 21); in another he fails to remark that Aldus's erroneous reading is supported by _M_ (219,17). However, even after discounting these and possibly other instances, a significant array of conjectures remains.

Still, it is not fair to call the Parisinus Aldus's _only_ ma.n.u.script.