Monday, July 17, 2017

Greek Manuscripts in the K. W. Clark Collection (Duke University)

            The Kenneth W. Clark Collection of Greek Manuscripts, at Duke University in Durham, North Carolina (USA), is among the most impressive collections of New Testament manuscripts in the United States.  It currently contains 106 Greek manuscripts – almost half of which have been digitized.  Over a dozen of these digitized manuscripts contain text from the New Testament.  (An introduction to the Kenneth W. Clark Collection can be found online at the website of the Rubenstein Library at Duke University.)    
 
Below the headpiece and title of the Gospel of Matthew
in GA 1780, the initial letter Beta is zoomorphic,
resembling a fox and snake in combat.
            Here is a list of embedded links to digital images of the New Testament manuscripts in the Kenneth W. Clark Collection that have been digitized.  Some of the other volumes are also listed.  Digitized Gospel-manuscripts are indexed with embedded links to the beginning of each book. 

MS 1 is GA 1780 (Codex Branscombius, from c. 1200), which is especially notable because it contains all 27 books of the New Testament.  (See this earlier post for a description and basic index of digital page-views of 1780.)

MS 2 is GA Lect 1619, a very late (1600’s) Gospels-lectionary, with many blank pages.

MS 3 is GA 2423, a manuscript of Acts and the Epistles, from the 1200’s.  It is not yet digitized.  Hebrews is between Second Thessalonians and First Timothy.

MS 4 is GA 2268, a leaf from the Gospel of Mark, from c. 1300.  It contains text from Mark 1:1-14.  A portrait of Mark is in the headpiece. 
The beginning of the Gospel of Mark
in Clark MS 4 (GA 2268).


MS 5 is GA 2612, a manuscript of the Gospels (1200’s).  It is not yet digitized.  The order of the Gospels is said to be highly unusual:  Mark, Luke, John, Matthew. 

MS 6 is GA 2613, a manuscript of the Gospels from the 1000’s.  The pericope adulterae does not appear in the text of John (though a note in the margin mentions it), but it appears at the very end of the manuscript, following a lectionary-table that occupies several pages after the end of John 21. 
 
MS 7 is GA 2614, a manuscript of the Gospels from the 1200’s.   Matthew:  21Mark: 200Luke:  325John:  518.     

MS 10 is GA Lect 1965, a Gospels-lectionary from the 1100’s.  The text is formatted in two columns per page.  The Heothinon-series is included.  A PDF describing this manuscript, prepared by John Lawrence Sharpe III, is available online.

MS 12 is GA Lect 1966, a Gospels-lectionary from c. 1100.  The text is formatted in two columns per page.  The lection for Saint Pelagia’s Day (October 8), from John 8:3-11, begins on page 365.

MS 15 is GA 2615, a manuscript of the Gospels from the 1100’s.  Matthew:  5 (missing the opening page).  Mark:  145Luke:  233John:  382.  This manuscript was obtained by Kenneth W. Clark himself in 1950 in Egypt during a trip to Egypt and St. Catherine’s Monastery.  In Luke 24:42 its text includes the phrase, “and the rest He gave to them.”  A PDF describing this manuscript, prepared by John Lawrence Sharpe III, is available online.  The pericope adulterae begins (in the text of John) on 421. 
            Some pages of GA 2615 are missing at the end; the text of John breaks off in 19:12 at the end of a page.  Curiously, after the chapter-list for the Gospel of Mark and before the beginning of the text of Mark (perhaps inserted out of order by an ancient repairer of the manuscript), page 138 contains only text from John 20:30b-31.       

MS 16 is GA 2616,  a manuscript of the Gospels from the 1100’s.  Matthew:  5Mark: 167Luke:  271John:  443.  A PDF describing this manuscript, prepared by John Lawrence Sharpe III, is available online

MS 17 is a Psalter from the 1100’s. with some braided and/or colored initials.  It includes most of the Odes at the end, including the Magnificat, extracted from Luke 1:46ff.

MS 22 is GA 2491, a fragment from c. 1050.  It is not yet digitized.  It is a single leaf with text from Matthew 22:31-23:10.

MS 24 is GA Lect 1967, from the 1000’s.  It is not yet digitized.

MS 25 is GA 1813, a manuscript of the Gospels, from c. 1100.  Matthew:  19Mark:  145Luke:  225.  John:  367.   A PDF describing this manuscript, prepared by John Lawrence Sharpe III, is available online.  The copyist, Hierotheos, mentioned himself in a colophon at the end of the book.

MS 28 is GA Lect 648.  It is not yet digitized.

MS 31 is GA 2766, a manuscript of the Gospels, from the 1200’s.  It is not yet digitized.  It has pictures of the Evangelists.  A PDF describing this manuscript, prepared by John Lawrence Sharpe III, is available online.  

MS 38 is GA 2757, a manuscript of the Gospels, from c. 1100.  Matthew:  25 (Pigment from the picture of Matthew on the opposite page has severely damaged most of the text on this page.)  Mark:  165Luke:  261. (The headpiece to the Gospel of Luke contains the wrong title – Ευαγγέλϊον Κατὰ Μάρκον – as if the artist did not realize where he was at in the book.)  John: 421.  A PDF describing this manuscript, prepared by John Lawrence Sharpe III, is available online.          

MS 39 is GA Lect 2138, a very late Gospel-lectionary, from 1627.  The text is formatted in two columns per page.  A PDF describing this manuscript, prepared by John Lawrence Sharpe III, is available online.  The Synaxarion, Heothinon, Menologion are all included.  The copyist was Lucas Buzau, a prolific scribe whose manuscripts have reached multiple monasteries and museums.  

MS 43 is GA Lect 2145, a leaf from a Gospels-lectionary from the 1200’s, containing text from Luke 1:59-80 and Matthew 16:13-18.  It is not yet digitized.

MS 60 is GA 1423, Codex Daltonianus, a manuscript of the Gospels from c. 1000, with marginal commentary-material.  It is not yet digitized.  A PDF describing this manuscript, prepared by John Lawrence Sharpe III, is available online.    

MS 64 is GA 2757, a manuscript of the Gospels from c. 1300.  It is not yet digitized.  A PDF describing this manuscript, prepared by John Lawrence Sharpe III, is available online.

MS 65 is GA Lect 1839, a Gospels-lectionary from the 1000’s.  It is not yet digitized.

MS 82 is GA Lect 1623, a Gospels-lectionary from c. 1200.  It is not yet digitized.

MS 83 is GA Lect 302, a Gospels-lectionary from c. 1450.  It is not yet digitized. 

MS 84 is a manuscript of the Gospels from c. 1150.  It is not yet digitized. 

In Clark MS 106, on this page, in the second column,
an account of the life of Gregory, missionary to
Armenia, begins (for September 30).
MS 85 is GA Lect 451, a Gospels-lectionary from 1052.  It is not yet digitized.  The copyist’s name was Clement.

MS 89 is a fragment from a Gospels-lectionary from the 1100’s.  It is not yet digitized.  It contains text from Matthew 8:31-9:3.

MS 92 is a Gospels-lectionary from the 1100’s.  It is not yet digitized.

MS 93 is a Gospels-lectionary from the 1100’s.  It is not yet digitized. 

MS 100 is a manuscript of the Gospels and Revelation from c. 1000.  It is not yet digitized. 

MS 104 is a late lectionary (c. 1530?) with readings from the Gospels, Acts, and Epistles.  It is not yet digitized.

MS 106 has been described as a Menologion, but is a Menaion (containing saints’ biographies) for the month of September.  The text is formatted in two columns per page.  (This manuscript has been returned to Mount Athos.) 


3 comments:

Maurice A. Robinson said...

Also to be included but not yet digitized is Duke Gr. 53 (ca. AD 1450), Commentary of Theophylact on the Gospel of John with NT text interspersed. Peculiarly, this MS has no GA number even yet, although other Theophylact commentary MSS have a GA number). In this MS, the PA is not included, as is typical for commentaries.

Daniel Buck said...

So, Lucas Buzau was a prolific scribe. I suppose that could be useful information. What kind of studies have been done of scribal habits where the identity of the scribe is known?

Abidan Paul Shah said...

May need to take a visit there!