The Complutensian Polygot Biblios

As I read and searched for a suitable introduction the historical significance and background story of this authentic Scripture became more evident and only one excerpt from one text would not have done this beautiful book or its honoured tradition any respect. It is a book of epic history and influence with the backdrop of the Aryan Christian vs Semitic Judaic struggle in full regalia and heraldry.

Excerpt: Cardinal Ximenes: Statesman, Ecclesiastic, Soldier And Man Of Letters With An Account Of The Compultensian Polygot Bible by James P.R. Lyell ¹

CHAPTER IV

THE COMPLUTENSIAN POLYGLOT BIBLE

[1502-1517]

XIMENES earned the undying fame of posterity as one of the most liberal benefactors and patrons of learning. It was after his appointment to the See of Toledo that he found himself in a position to gratify his love of letters, and to extend to others those facilities for acquiring learning, the limited opportunities for which he had himself made such good use of in his early life.

The revenues of his high office were fortunately enormous. At the close of the fifteenth century they exceeded 80,000 ducats, while it is said the gross amount reached to as much as 180,000.

He determined to devote the greater portion of this official income to the foundation of a school of Arts and Sciences which should be unrivaled among any similar institutions of the time. His mind, no doubt, had often turned to Alcala, the little town where first he went to school.

Alcala de Henares, " the castle on the river," the site Arab fort, had for long been portion of the property belonging to the Episcopal See of Toledo. Its old Roman name of Complutum was given to it because it was the confluence, or meeting-place, of two rivers.

It is interesting to note in passing that it was the birthplace of Queen Catherine of Aragon, the first wife of Henry VIII., and also of Cervantes.

It was here that Ximenes decided to found his University. Plans were prepared by Pedro Gumiel, a famous contemporary architect, and in 1500 Ximenes laid the foundationstone of the first College of San Ildefonso. In 1508 the first students took up their residence, and signal marks of royal and papal favour ensured its success from the beginning. The professors, forty-two in number, were men of the highest standing and undoubted scholarship. There were eight chairs of philosophy, six each for theology, canon law and grammar, and four each for medicine, Hebrew, Greek and rhetoric, besides chairs of anatomy, surgery, mathematics and moral philosophy.

Ximenes endowed the University with a revenue of 14,000 ducats, and we are told that by the end of the first year there were no fewer than three thousand students.

Ferdinand paid a visit to the University in 1514, and at a later date Francis I. of France, upon visiting Alcala is reported to have said, " The University of Paris, the pride of my kingdom, is the work of many Sovereigns, but your Ximenes alone has founded one like it." (Vide Plate, No. II.)

It was in congenial surroundings such as these that Ximenes found time to crown his career by his edition of the Bible known as the Complutensian Polyglot.

A word or two is necessary as to the state of the text of the Bible at this period. The invention of printing was barely half a century old. As a matter of fact, the first book printed in Spain is dated 1474. The old manuscript copies of the Vulgate had become corrupted, and no printed text of the New Testament in its original language existed. As far as the Old Testament was concerned, it had been comparatively recently, viz., in 1488, that the first Hebrew version had been published at Soncino.

One of the obvious reasons why the Scriptures of the Old Testament had been printed in the original Hebrew earlier than the New Testament in Greek, was the fact that the Jews were resident all over Europe, and, being a numerous and wealthy people, they were able to command the money and skill necessary for the purpose.

The Greeks, on the other hand, were in an entirely different position. Turned out of Constantinople when it was captured by the Turks in 1453, a date practically identical with that of the invention of printing, they had neither the time nor the means to expend on the publication and distribution of printed copies of the New Testament in their own language. Most of the Greek exiles competent for such a task had been copyists or scribes, and no doubt innate conservatism encouraged them to ignore the new invention. In addition, there was a practical difficulty, that any Greek type that existed was of a remarkably clumsy and ineffective variety.

Under such circumstances the ignorance of the clergy on the subject of the sacred text was stupendous, and the necessity for some better provision being made in this respect must have been obvious to a man of the stamp of Ximenes. His views are well expressed in the following extract from his Preface to the Polyglot:

Ximenes assumed responsibility for the general supervision of the book, but he was careful to secure the best available editorial assistance.

The chief members of his staff were Diego Lopez de Zuniga, commonly known as Stunica, whose controversy with Erasmus over his editorial duties will later on be alluded to, Antonio de Lebrija, Demetrius Ducas of Crete, who had been invited by Ximenes to occupy the Greek chair at Alcala, Nunez de Guzman, another Alcala professor, and three converted Jews, learned Hebraists, Alphonso, a doctor at Alcala, Paul Coronel, a professor of theology at Salamanca, and Alphonso de Zamora, to whom was entrusted the Grammar and Hebrew Dictionary which forms one of the volumes.

The book has been often described, the best and most recent account being found in the Historical Catalogue of Printed Bibles, issued by the British and Foreign Bible Society and edited by Mr Darlow and Dr Moule. The writer has used their description in collating his own and other copies of the book, and can pay tribute to the care and pains which characterise the whole of their most valuable catalogue.

The Polyglot consists of six folio volumes, and, commenced in 1502 in honour of the Prince who afterwards became the Emperor Charles V., was printed at Alcala between the years 1514 and 1517.

The New Testament first appeared, its colophon being dated 10th January 1514. The next volume in chronological order is the Hebrew and Chaldaic Vocabulary of the Old Testament, the colophon to the Hebrew portion being dated 17th March 1514, and the Chaldean, 31st May 1514.

The four volumes of the Old Testament followed, the colophon in the last Old Testament volume being dated 10th July 1517 - almost exactly four months prior to the death of Ximenes, which took place on the 8th November in that year.

In the Old Testament the Hebrew appears in the outside column, with Hebrew roots in the margin. The Latin Vulgate is in the middle and the Greek Septuagint (interlined with a Latin translation) in the inside column. The Pentateuch has in addition the Chaldee paraphrase (in Hebrew characters) at the foot of the page and the Chaldee roots in the margin. (Vide Plate, No. III.)

The position of honour given to the Vulgate will be observed, and this is emphasised in the Second Preface, where it is stated that as our Lord was crucified between two thieves, so the Latin Church stands between the Synagogue and the Greek Church. ²

Attempts have been made to convict Ximenes of inconsistency by suggesting that these words necessarily imply the great superiority of the Vulgate text over the Hebrew and the Septaugint. It seems, however, clear that there was no disparagement of the original Scriptures as such, and it is generally accepted that the words in question refer not to distinctions of text, because in both prefaces the Hebrew text is referred to as the truth (veritas), but are only an unnecessary glorification of the Latin Church in comparison with the Greek Church and the Jewish Church.

In the Apocrypha only two texts appear, the Vulgate and the Septuagint (with the Latin interlined).

The first Old Testament volume contains the title within a woodcut border composed of flower-pots, flower baskets and floral arabesques. In the centre are the arms of Cardinal Ximenes printed in red. A variation of this titlepage, which is found in some copies, will be dealt with later.

The words of the title:

appear in seven lines below the arms, above which appear some verses:

These verses are thought by some to refer to the fifteen divisions in the shield of the Cardinal's arms, and to be a comparison with the fifteen days' visit of St Paul to St Peter at Jerusalem as narrated in the first chapter of the Epistle to the Galatians, or to the fifteen years occupied in the preparation of the work, namely, seven on the Old Testament and eight on the New Testament.

Masch, in his edition of Le Long's Biblia Sacra, writes "disputatum est inter eruditos," and another explanation suggests a reference to the College of St Peter and St Paul at Alcala and an allusion to the sacred number seven and the perfect number eight.

After the title, we find a Prologus addressed to Pope Leo X., followed by a series of prefatory notes, concluding with St Jerome's Preface to the Pentateuch.

On the verso of the last leaf of this preliminary matter is the Bull of Leo X., sanctioning the publication of the work, followed by a short address to the Reader by the Bishop of Abyla and Archbishop Mendoza, to whom Leo had addressed his Bull.

The precise order of this preliminary matter varies in some copies, but I have adopted the arrangement in my own.

This first volume contains the Pentateuch, concluding with two leaves of errata which are often missing.

The second volume has a similar title-page, the dedication to the Pope, the address to the Reader and St Jerome's preface to the book of Joshua.

The text in this volume consists of Joshua to the prayer of Manasses, followed by two leaves of errata.

The third volume is similar to the others, and the text begins with the book of Esdras and ends with the book of Ecclesiasticus and a leaf of errata.

The fourth volume presents the text from Isaiah to 3 Maccabees, ending with the colophon:

A fine woodcut device of the printer follows this colophon and the volume ends with two leaves of errata.

The fifth volume in the order in which they are usually found bound up is the New Testament, but it is more convenient first to dispose of the sixth volume containing the Hebrew and Chaldaic Vocabulary and other pieces, a course which has been adopted in the numbering of the volumes in my own copy.

The title-page to this volume is the same as in the others, with the exception of the actual words of the title:

On the verso of the title is an address to the Reader followed by "Interpretationes hebraicorum Chaldeorum Grecorum que nominum" (24 ff.), a list of names with: variations (2 ff.), and an alphabetical index of Latin words (8 ff.). There then follow 172 numbered folios of Vocabulary ending with a colophon dated 17th March 1515, and a variation of the large woodcut device of the printer. The volume concludes with 15 ff. of "Introductiones Artis Grammaticae Hebraice. Et primo de modo legendi et pronunciandi," which is dated 31st May 1515.

We can now return to Volume V., the New Testament and the editio princeps of those writings in Greek. The title (Vide Plate, No. V.) is printed entirely in black, and reads :

There are preliminary verses and prefaces (3 ff.), "Interpretationes hebreorum Chaldeorum Grecorumque nominum novi testamenti" (10 ff.), followed by the text which concludes with the colophon:

At the foot there is a different and smaller device of the printer. (Vide Plate, No. VI.)

The volume finishes with a leaf of commendatory verses in Greek and Latin, an " Introductio qua brevissima ad Grecas litteras " on another leaf, followed by a Greek glossary with Latin equivalents (38 ff.).

The exact order of the miscellaneous pieces in both these two volumes is very uncertain, and copies present a last bewildering variety in the order in which they have been bound up. The whole of the six volumes should consist of 1528 ff.

The New Testament text is printed in two columns, the Greek on the left and the Latin Vulgate on the right.

There are references in the margins and special notes are added in five cases, which we shall consider hereafter.

The Book of Acts is placed after the Epistle to the Hebrews, a variation which we also find in the Codex Sinaiticus. Immediately before the Epistle to the Romans are six leaves containing αποδὴμια παυλου and Greek prefaces to the Epistles. These are an insertion and obviously printed after the rest of the book. They are missing in some copies and their presence is frequently alluded to in sale descriptions in catalogues. The type used for these six leaves has the ordinary accents and breathings, which are lacking elsewhere, and this is another indication that they were printed at a later date than the rest of the New Testament.

Gomez, whose life of Ximenes,³ is the chief authority for most of the existing information about his life and the Polyglot, tells us that the Cardinal spent no less than 50,000 gold ducats (the equivalent of more than £230,000 of our money to-day) upon the work. As an illustration of the lavish nature of the expenditure, he recounts how 4000 ducats were paid for seven Hebrew manuscripts alone.

We have the authority of Leo X., as set out in his Papal sanction, that only 600 copies were printed, while the executors of Ximenes only fixed a price of 61 ducats for the six volumes which at that time was only equal to about fifty shillings of English money.

We have seen that the last volume of the work was printed in 1517. The Pope's sanction is dated 22nd March 1520, but it was not until 1522 that the book was put into circulation.

This delay has never been very satisfactorily explained and wc must rest content with the theory that the ecclesiastical authorities of the Church of Rome, being doubtful as to the wisdom of throwing a new translation of the Scriptures into general circulation, took a considerable time to come to a favourable decision.

A very important result of this delay in publication was that the New Testament, although printed in 1514, was not published or circulated until eight years later. This enabled Froben, the Basle printer, with the assistance of Erasmus (then at Cambridge), to bring out in 1516 what is in fact the first published, but not printed, version of the New Testament in Greek. This edition of Erasmus no doubt increased the delay in publishing the Complutensian version, because it is recorded that Erasmus obtained an exclusive privilege for four years for his edition throughout the Holy Roman Empire.

Stunica, the editor of the Complutensian New Testament, was very contemptuous in his criticisms of this version of Erasmus, and on one occasion was told by Ximenes, "God grant that all writers may do their work as well as he has done his. You are bound either to give us something better, or not to blame the labours of others " — a striking example of large-minded magnanimity.

There is no doubt that this long delay between printing and publication is responsible for some variations in the setting of existing copies. It is quite conceivable that if the sheets were thus left for years, that some of them might get damaged by damp or otherwise, and require to be reprinted. This is doubtless the explanation of the typographical variations, which form the subject of an elaborate disquisition by Dr Adam Clarke, which is contained in the form of a letter dated 25th February 1824, and addressed to the Duke of Sussex. It will be found reprinted in Dr Pettigrew's Bibliotheca Sussexiana (vol. i. part ii, pp. 11-21).

Dr Clarke compares two copies of the Polyglot which he possessed, and which he calls the Red and the Blue copies, from the colour of their respective bindings. Beyond the fact that a few sheets were evidently set up again before publication, the only really material distinction that Dr Clarke draws attention to, is the undoubted fact that some few copies were supplied with a more ornate and decorative title page to vol. i. The arrangement of the letterpress on the title is different in the abnormal variety, the words of the title being compressed within six instead of seven lines, and the whole page is printed in black with no red.

The shield in the Cardinal's arms is hatched in a different manner, and there is an entirely new and superior woodcut border round the whole page. There are four square compartments, one at each corner, about two inches square, containing representations of a pope, a cardinal, a bishop and a mitred abbot, each bearing significant emblems of their office. (Vide Plate, No. VII.)

In all probability, the copies with this special title were prepared for presentation to the Pope and other high ecclesiastical and regal personages throughout Europe. I have only been able to discover four copies with this special title in this country. One is in the British Museum, one in the library of Morton College, Oxford, one in Trinity College, Cambridge, and one in the library of the Law Society in London. I was much interested, when examining this last copy; to see that it was at one time the property of Dr Adam Clarke, and probably the actual copy which first drew his attention to the fact that two varieties of this Bible exited. On turning over the leaves, I found an interesting letter from Dr Clarke addressed to the Rev.Joseph Mendham, M.A., whose collection of rare books and incunabula has found a final resting-place in the library the London Law Society, the governing body of English solicitors.

The copy is bound in blue morocco and has the arms of Spain upon the covers. In the letter Dr Clarke told Mr Mendham that he believed it came from the Royal Library at Madrid, having been looted by British soldiers with other rare books mentioned by Dr Clarke.

Three copies of the Polyglot are known to have been printed upon vellum. I have been able to trace two of them.

One is in the library of the Vatican at Rome.

The other, bound by Lewis in nineteenth-century morocco, was formerly in the Pinelli, MacCarthy, and Hibbert collections. It then passed into the possession of Mr Frank Hall Standish, who died in Cadiz in 1840. He bequeathed it, with other books in his library, to Louis Philippe, who in turn left it to his son, the Due D'Aumale. It is now in the Musee Conde at Chantilly, whose librarian has written me fully on the subject.

The value of the Complutensian Polyglot as the parent of the textual criticism of the printed Bible must not be underestimated.

In the first place, a word as to its influence on the printed text. It will be remembered that Ximenes paid no less than 4000 ducats for seven Hebrew manuscripts. How far these were used it is now impossible to say, and indeed one writer (Quintanilla) alleges that these particular manuscripts arrived too late to be employed. It seems fairly certain, however, that the editors followed the Lisbon Pentateuch of 1491, and an Old Testament Hebrew edition printed by Soncino at Naples in the same year. That they made use in addition of some manuscript source, is confirmed by a Hebrew manuscript now in the University library in Madrid, which bears obvious traces of having been used for such a purpose.

The Complutensian Old Testament text was followed, more or less, in all the great Polyglots that succeeded it, viz., the Antwerp of 1568, the Heidelberg of 1586, and Walton's London Polyglot of 1655.

After that date its influence rapidly declined, as succeeding generations of learned Hebraists, notably Kennicott in the eighteenth and Ginsburg in the nineteenth centuries, devoted their attention to the examination and collation of many hundreds of hitherto unknown Hebrew manuscripts, and produced critical editions of the utmost value.

The influence of the New Testament text was, from a critical point of view, of infinitely greater importance.

Textual critics have always been anxious to discover and identify the actual manuscripts on which this editio princeps was based.

We can get little information from the editors themselves and that little in very general terms. In their New Testament preface they tell us that "ordinary copies were not the archetypes for this impression, but very ancient and correct ones ("sed antiquissima emendatissimaque"), and of such antiquity that it would be utterly wrong not which the Supreme Pontiff Leo X., to use their authority our most holy father in Christ and Lord, desiring to favour this undertaking, sent from the apostolical library to the most reverend lord the Cardinal of Spain, by whose authority and commandment we have had this work printed."

Ximenes himself speaks in his dedication to Leo X. of "very ancient codices both of the Old and New Testament which Leo had sent, and which had aided them very much in their work." Modern scholarship has been compelled to refuse to accept these quotations in their literal sense.

Some of the manuscripts may have been, and probably were, lent by the Vatican authorities, and it is possible, nay probable, that the editors themselves believed them to be of the very oldest and best description no doubt best available oldest and at the period the when knowledge of such subjects was in its infancy. In the light of what we know to-day it is abundantly clear that their manuscripts were comparatively late, certainly not earlier than that. It is significant that whenever a comparison is made between a modern manuscript of, say, the twelfth to the fifteenth centuries and one of the fourth or fifth, or with the quotations from the early Greek Fathers, the Complutensian text is found almost invariably to be in accord with the modern manuscript.

Attempts have been made to ascertain if the manuscripts now exist. Professor Moldenhawer of Denmark went to Alcalti in 1874 to see if he could find them in the University Library. He seems to have been put off with a fantastic story of their alleged sale in 1749 by the then librarian to a rocket-maker of the name of Toryo, and the proceeds credited in his accounts as having been received for useless parchments ("como membranas inutiles").

The story was further embellished by the suggestion that the rocket-maker employed these particular manuscripts to make rockets to celebrate the arrival at Alcala of some unknown Grandee!

Dibdin repeats this legend, with all his accustomed scripts wealth of superfluous verbosity, in his account of the Polyglot. ⁴

Fortunately, later investigation has disproved the whole story of this alleged vandalism. It appears that so far from the library at Alcala being in charge of an illiterate and incompetent librarian, he was a man of considerable eminence in the world of letters, who merely sold as waste paper the worn-out parchment covers of some manuscripts, prior to their being rebound. Moreover, Toryo, the firework manufacturer, was himself an educated man, and on terms of intimacy with the professors at the University.

The seven Hebrew manuscripts supposed to have been used for the Old Testament, and spoken of by Gomez, appeared in a catalogue of the University Library in 1745, and are now in Madrid with the rest of the library which was removed when the University was transferred from Alcala.

No New Testament manuscripts appeared in this catalogue, or have ever been traced.

Custodians of ancient manuscripts have ever been jealous of any outside investigation into their treasures, and we can only conclude that the Danish professor was never intended to see any manuscripts, and was accordingly politely dismissed with this legend, a characteristic specimen of Spanish humour. We remember how Tischendorf experienced very much the same treatment on his second visit to the Convent on Mt. Sinai in search of the Codex Sinaiticus, while the blunt refusal of the Vatican authorities for so many years to allow any inspection of their famous Codex B is another case in point.

An attempt has been made to controvert the statement of Ximenes that Leo X. lent him manuscripts for the New Testament. It is argued that, as the New Testament volume was printed in January 1514 and Leo only elected Pope in February 1513, that there was insufficient time for the employment of any such manuscripts.

In the first place, there is nothing to have prevented Leo from having been the means of procuring the loan before he was elected Pope. Again, there is no inherent improbability on the score of shortness of time, when we remember that Erasmus prepared his edition when commissioned by Froben, the Basle printer, in the short space of five months, and at a time, moreover, when he was burdened with many other literary labours. The distinguished men who were devoting all their time and attention to the editing of the Complutensian New Testament were surely equally competent with more than double the amount of time at their disposal.

Another accusation made against the editors was that they wilfully distorted their text in order to make it coincide with the Latin of their much venerated Vulgate. There is little or no proof of this. On the contrary, their Greek text differs from the Vulgate in more than 900 places, and often in important passages they have obviously followed manuscript sources and provided renderings entirely opposed to those contained in the Vulgate.

The chief reason that gave rise to such an accusation is the fact that they included in 1 John v. 7 and 8 the testimony of the heavenly witnesses. Verse 7 reads "For there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost and these three; are one."

These are the words of our Authorised Version, but they do not appear in the Revision of 1881.

This is one of the best known examples of the formation and introduction of a gloss into the text. The Complutensian editors inserted these words with the exception of the last five "and these three are one," and made a note (the longest of the five notes they have given us throughout the New Testament), to explain, not the inclusion of the words as to the heavenly witnesses, but their reason for omitting the last clause, which they did on the authority of St Thomas Aquinas. Up to the time of the invention of printing, the appearance of this gloss wasconfined within very narrow limits. The evidence against its authenticity is overwhelming. It is not found in any reliable Greek manuscript.

The only two Greek manuscripts which do contain it are late, and one of them is itself an obvious copy of the Complutensian text. (Codex Ravianus, Evan. 111.)

It is not contained in the Peshitta, or in the majority of the other versions. On the other hand, it is found in the works of Vigilius of Thapsus in the fifth century, and thereafter it obtained general acceptance in the Latin Church, appearing in the printed editions of the Vulgate. No doubt the desire to support the doctrine of the Trinity increased the inclination of the ecclesiastical authorities to adhere to an obvious interpolation, but we can only agree with Richard Baxter, who, writing on the disputed passage, ⁵ says: "Though much of these words be not in many ancient copies of the Bible ... it need not offend the Faithful, there being so many other texts which assert the Trinity."

Erasmus left the words out in his first two editions of 1516 and 1519, but being called upon by Stunica to justify the exclusion, promised to insert it if any Greek manuscript could be produced in its favour. It is fairly clear from Stunica's own correspondence with Erasmus that the debated words were merely a translation from the Latin. However, a manuscript. Codex Montfortianus (Evan. 61), now in Trinity College, Dublin, was produced with the passage included, and Erasmus, in fulfilment of his promise, inserted the words in his third edition of 1522.

There appears, however, to be a doubt whether this particular Greek manuscript, which is as late as the fifteenth or early sixteenth century, had not in fact been largely corrected from the Vulgate. The particular passage in the manuscript has been glazed over with some preparation for protection, which made a witty Irish priest observe that no one could fail to see that it was a gloss

There are only four other annotations made by the Complutensian editors, viz. a reference to the omission of the Doxology in the Lord's Prayer (Matthew vi.), two alternative renderings in 1 Corinthians xiii. 3 and 1 Corinthians xv. 31, and in the 51st verse of the same chapter the suggested insertion of the Greek word ἁλλου, which would make the passage run: "We shall not all sleep, but elsewhere, we shall all be changed."

This is a significant and interesting variation in the accepted reading. When I read this note and found this new marginal reading, I searched everywhere to see if the leading textbooks threw any light on the subject, but without any result.

I have had some correspondence with Mr H. C. Hoskier, the well-known textual critic, on this passage and he gives as his opinion that the Complutensian reading of ἁλλον is really ἁλλ΄ ού, which has ample justification, the variation arising from the manipulation of a short lined codex.

The Complutensian version of the New Testament did not appear in many subsequent editions, with the exception of the Antwerp Polyglot.

For one thing, the revision of Erasmus had the great advantage of a long start and a far larger circulation. The Complutensian, nevertheless, influenced in many places the textus receptus. For example, Erasmus in his third edition of 1522 largely adopted the Complutensian text of the Apocalypse.

As a first attempt at a critical edition, it is deserving of all possible praise, particularly having regard to the paucity of material at the disposal of the editors.

A word now as to the printer and his type. Arnald Guillen de Brocar has often been thought to be a German, but as Haebler ⁶ points out, the Latin form of his name which he employs, Arnaldus Guillelmus, is incompatible with a German origin, as if he had been a German he would have rendered it Arnoldus Guillelmus.

In all probability he came from the South of France. He is first found in 1489 as a printer at Pampelona, where he printed some sixteen books in the fifteenth century.

In 1500 he removed to Logrono and later on to Alcala, but he continued to maintain presses at Logrono, Toledo, and Valladolid. After the death of Ximenes, Brocar secured the patronage of Charles V. and was appointed court printer, and he also was fortunate enough to obtain the contract for printing all Papal Bulls and Letters of Indulgence throughout Spain. He died in 1523, and his activities, and the general commercial success attending his efforts, remind us very forcibly of Anthony Koberger of Nuremberg.

Brocar printed some ninety-two books, but his title to fame rests without doubt on his printing of this Complutensian Polyglot.

The best experts on early Hebrew printing unite in praising the fount of Hebrew type made use of in the Old Testament.

Mr E. N. Adler, whose collection of Hebrew incunabula is unrivalled, tells me that he knows nothing to compare with it among early Hebrew books, not even among the Spanish and Portuguese incunabula. The fount is in three types (a) a few large initial letters, (b) the ordinary type of the text, and (c) the smaller type of the notes, which is also found in a Zamorra Hebrew Grammar printed at Alcala in 1524.

The special feature, however, of the printing of the Complutensian is the very remarkable and truly magnificent fount of Greek type used in the New Testament.

Whereas other Greek types in use since the days of Aldus have been founded on the cursive, or running handwriting, in which beauty was sacrificed to speed, this fount of Brocar imitates the formed and stately uncials of the best Greek manuscripts.

Proctor ⁷ says that " To Spain belongs the honour of having produced as her first Greek type, what is undoubtedly the finest Greek fount ever cut, and the only one of which it can be affirmed with certainty that it is based on the writing of a particular manuscript."

Proctor backed his opinion by himself designing a type in imitation of it and improved it by a set of capital letters, providing also accents and breathings in which it was almost entirely lacking. ⁸

Proctor says that the Complutensian fount had only one capital letter, a Π. He is, wonderful to relate, in error as to this. There are the following other capital letters, viz.:-

The whole type is of singular simplicity and beauty. In the Vocabulary to the New Testament a set of accents is provided.

Brocar tells us in his preface that the type was cut on the model of the Greek manuscript lent to Ximenes by Leo X., and excuses its deficiencies on the ground that it was more respectful to print it after the fashion employed by the ancient Greeks!

The Greek type he used later in the Old Testament was entirely different, resembling that of Aldus. It is a smaller and a poorer type, and was no doubt necessitated by the interlined Latin which prevented the employment of anything larger. Here again, Brocar provides the explanation that the Greek in the Old Testament being merely a translation, it was not worth his while to use his special fount.

The devices he uses are of three varieties in this book. The one at the end of the Old Testament is within a woodcut border and measures 6 inches by 7J. It represents a figure kneeling before the Cross. There are protrait medallions of two saints, one in each top corner; below are two figures on pedestals upholding a triangle within which is the motto " In hoc signo vinces." (Vide Plate, No. IV.) At the foot his initials appear in monogram.

The same device appears at the end of the Vocabulary volume with a variation of the motto "Per signu Cru/cis de inimi/cis nfis libera/nos dne Deus/noster."

In the New Testament we find a much smaller device, 1 5/8 inches by 2 1/4 inches, consisting of a circle, printer's staff and his monogram, all in white upon a black ground. (Vide Plate, No. VI.)

Haebler thinks the fact that he used a device at all, suggests a German origin, but as many early Spanish printers undoubtedly adapted their devices from French and Italian examples, there is no special reason why, in his case, a German provenance should be assumed.

The larger Complutensian device is not, as far as I am aware, found in any other book. It is obviously adapted from an elaborate device which Brocar had used in several of his books.

This other device has the same design of a man kneeling at the Cross, but underneath there are two angels holding up a shield within which is his monogram surmounted by a porcupine. There is also a somewhat strange motto:

It has been suggested that we have here an indication of family dissension, or some reflection upon the competency of his workpeople, but it is a motto that has never been satisfactorily explained.

The small New Testament device and the border and arms of Ximenes I have found in a copy of the Letters of Catherine of Sienna, printed by Brocar for Ximenes at Alcala in 1512, nearly two years before the Complutensian. The borders of the title and the device are identical, but the blocks of the border have been transposed. This particular book is printed in a line Gothic type.

Early books from Brocar's Complutum press are scarce, and increasingly difficult to obtain.

The relations between the Cardinal and his printer were of the friendliest description. We are told that Brocar's son carried the last sheets of the final volume of the Polyglot to Ximenes, who was then lying ill on what proved to be his death-bed, and that the aged Cardinal, raising his eyes to heaven, said:

During the last three years I have endeavoured to compile a census of the existing copies of this Complutensian Polyglot Bible. ⁹ I am fully conscious that in many respects it must be inadequate and incomplete.

For example, the response from Spain has been very disappointing, and there must be some copies of the work in South America, particulars of which I have not been able to ascertain.

I think I may say, however, that as far as the United Kingdom, France, Italy, and the United States are concerned, my information is fairly complete. I make this reservation that it is always difficult to obtain information as to copies in private hands.

The book is very seldom found perfect and complete, and a large proportion of the copies which I have been able personally to collate are imperfect in some particular.

I am under a great debt of obligation to librarians all over the world for information and assistance cordially placed at my disposal, and, whenever I have asked for it, for facilities for inspection.

To summarise the results, I have traced ninety-seven copies, perfect and imperfect.

In the United Kingdom there are forty-nine, of which no fewer than twenty are in Oxford and Cambridge libraries. Eight are in private hands and nine are in six London libraries. Scotland has four copies (two in Glasgow, one in Edinburgh, and one in St Andrews). The United States have sixteen copies France, nine Italy, eight Germany, seven Portugal, two Spain, two and Denmark, Holland, Switzerland, and Russia have one each.

Unrecorded copies undoubtedly exist, particularly in Germany, Spain, and South America, but making allowances for them, and for copies in private hands and any on sale by booksellers, I think we may safely assume that there are not more than two hundred copies which have survived the four centuries since the book was printed.

Copies are very seldom on the market. ¹⁰ A really good copy usually fetches a high price, and with the increasing demand for early printed books from Spanish presses, the price is likely to be maintained.

In the Pinelli sale the copy on vellum now in the library at Chantilly fetched £483. In the MacCarthy sale the same copy fetched £676. Of ordinary copies on paper, the Sunderland copy fetched £l95 and the Beresford Hope copy £166. Odd volumes and defective sets are sometimes obtainable for a few pounds.

The notes of previous ownership relating to the copies set out in the Appendix are pregnant with interest. You will find copies that belonged to great kings and to famous ecclesiastics, embracing a long line of popes, archbishops, cardinals, and bishops. We handle a copy bound for De Thou, that prince of bibliophiles. Another, looted during the French Revolution from a Jesuit College in Montpellier, has found its last resting-place in the library of a theological seminary in New York.

If all these volumes could only speak to us, what a tale they would tell!

As has been well said : ¹¹ "We sit as in a theatre, the stage is time, the play is the play of the world. What a spectacle it is. What kingly pomp, what processions file past. What cities burn to heaven, what crowds of captives are dragged at the chariot weheels of conquerors!"

We turn over the leaves of these Old Testament volumes and "we breathe the morning air of the world while the scent of Eden's roses still lingered in it, while it vibrated only to the world's first brood of nightingales, and to the laugh of Eve.

"The silence of the unpeopled Syrian plains, the outgoings and ingoings of the patriarchs, Abraham and Ishmael, Isaac in the fields at eventide, Rebekah at the well, Jacob's guile, Esau's face reddened with desert sun heat, Joseph's splendid funeral procession. What a silence as of a half-peopled world. What green pastoral rest, what indubitable human existence!

Excerpt: The Catholic Encyclopedia, Volume 5 (1913) ¹²

(2) Critical Editions of the Pre-Massoretic Text

The editors whose work we have thus far noticed endeavoured to restore as far as possible the text of the Massorah. However valuable such an edition may be in itself, it cannot pretend to be the last word which textual criticism has to say concerning the Hebrew text of the Old Testament. After all, the Massoretic text attained to its fixed form in the early centuries of the Christian Era; before that period there were found many text-forms which differed considerably from the Massoretic, and which nevertheless may represent the original text with fair accuracy. The most ancient and reliable witness for the pre-Massoretic text-form of the Hebrew Bible is found in the Septuagint. But it is practically certain that, even at the time of the Septuagint, the original text had suffered considerable corruptions; these can be corrected only by comparing parallel passages of the context, or again by conjectural criticism; a critical edition of this kind presupposes, therefore, a critical edition of the Septuagint text.

Various attempts have been made to restore the pre-Massoretic text of single books of the Old Testament: thus Olshausen worked at the reconstruction of the Book of Genesis (Beiträge zur Kritik des überlieferten Textes im Buche Genesis, 1S70); Wellhausen (Text der Biicher Samuelis, 1871), Driver (Notes on the Hebrew Text of the Books of Samuel, 1890), and Klostermann (Die Bücher Samuelis und der Könige, 1887) at the correction of the Books of Samuel; Cornill at the correction of the Book of Ezechiel (Das Buch des Propheten Ezechiel, 1886). To these might be added various other publications; e. g., several recent commentaries, some of the works published by Bickell, etc. But all these works concern only part of the Old Testament text. "The Sacred Books of the Old Testament", edited by Paul Haupt (see Criticism, Biblical, s. v. Textual), is a series intended to embrace the whole Hebrew text, though the value of its criticism is in many instances questionable; Kittel's "Biblia Hebraica" (Leipzig, 1905), too, deserves a mention among the critical editions which attempt too, deserves a mention among the critical editions which attempt to restore the pre-Massoretic Hebrew text.

II. EDITIONS OF THE GREEK TEXT OF THE BIBLE

Before speaking of the Greek text of the New Testament, we shall have to give a brief account of the editions of the Greek books of the Old Testament. They appear partly in separate editions, partly in conjunction with the Septuagint.

1. Seperate Editions

The principal separate editions of the deuterocanonical books appeared at Antwerp, 1566 (Plantin), 1584, and with Latin text taken from Ximenes' Polyglot, 1612; at Frankfort, 1694; Halle, 1749, 1766 (Kircher); Leipzig, 1757 (Reineccius), 1804 (Augusti), 1837 (Apel), 1871 (Fritzsche); Oxford, 1805; London, 1871 (Greek and English); Frankfort and Leipzig, 1691 (partial edition); Book of Tobias, Franeker, 1591 (Drusius), and Freiburg, 1870 (Reusch); Book of Judith, Wiirzburg, 1887 (Scholz, Commentar); Book of Wisdom, 1586 (Holkoth's "Praelectiones" edited bv Ryterus); Coburg, 1601 (Faber); Venice, 1827 (Greek, Latin, and Armenian); Freiburg, 1858 (Reusch); Oxford, 1881 (Deane); Ecclesiasticus, 1551, '55, '68, '70, '89, '90 (Drusius), 1804 (Bretschneider); Books of Machabees, Franeker, 1600 (Drusius); I Mach., Helmstadt, 1784 (Bruns).

2. Editions Joined To The Septaugint

The history of these editions of the deuterocanonical books of the Old Testament is connected with that of the Septuagint editions. The reader will find full information on this question in the article SEPTAUGINT. ¹³

The newly invented art of printing had flourished for more than half a century before an attempt was made to publish an edition of the Greek New Testament. The Canticles, Magnificat and Benedict were printed at Milan, 1481; at Venice, 1486 and 1496, as an appendix to the Greek Psalter; John, i, 1, to vi, 58, appeared in Venice, 1495 and 1504, together with the poems of St. Gregory Nazianzen the beginning of the Fourth Gospel, John, i, 1-14, was published at Venice, 1495 and 1504, together with the poems of St. Gregory Nazianzen the beginning of the Fourth Gospel, John, i, 1-14, was published at Venice, 1495, and at Tilbingen, 1511. Not that the reading public of that age did not feel interested in the other parts of the New Testament but it did not show any desire for the Greek text of the Bible. After the beginnmg of the sixteenth century the world's attitude with regard to the Greek text of the New Testament changed considerably. Not counting the publication of codices, mere stereotype reprints, or the issue of parts of the Testament, the number of editions of the complete Greek text has been estimated at about 550; in other words, since the beginning of the sixteenth century, every year has witnessed the publication of, roughly speaking, two new editions of the complete Greek text. For our present purpose, we may consider the principal editions under the four headings of the Complutensian, the Erasmian, the Received, and the Critical text.

1. The Complutensian Text

It was the Archbishop of Toledo, Cardinal Ximenes de Cisneros, who began at Alcalả, in 1502, the preparation of the edition of the Old Testament in Hebrew, Greek, and Latin, and of the New Testament in Greek and Latin. It has been thus far impossible to ascertain what codices served as the basis of the work called the Complutensian Polyglot. Though Leo X sent from the Vatican Library some manuscripts venerandce retustatis for the use of the scholars engaged in the work at Alcalả, it is quite certain that the well-known Codex Vaticanus was not among them. It appears that the Greek New Testament text of the Polyglot rests on the readings of a few manuscripts only, belonging to the so called Byzantine family (see CRITICISM, BIBLICAL, s. v.Textual). The charge that the Complutensian text was corrected according to the evidence of the Latin Vulgate, is now generally abandoned, excepting with regard to I John, v, 7. The New-Testament text is contained in the fifth or, according to other arrangements, in the last of the six folios of the Polyglot it was finished 10 Jan., 1514, and though the rest of the work was ready 10 July, 1517, four months before the great cardinal's death (8 Nov., 1517), it was not published until Leo X had given his permission propria motu, 22 March, 1520.

The Complutensian text, corrected according to certain readings of the Erasmian and of that of Stephanus, was repeated in the Antwerp Polyglot published, under the auspices of King Philip II, by the Spanish theologian Benedict Arias Montanus and his companions, and printed by the celebrated typographer, Christopher Plantin, of Antwerp, 1569-72. The Greek New Testament text occurs in the fifth and in the last of the eight folios which make up the Antwerp Polyglot; in the fifth it is accompanied by the Syriac text (both in Hebrew and Syriac letters), its Latin version, and the Latin Vulgate; in the eighth volume, the Greek text has been corrected in a few passages, and is accompanied by the interlinear Latin Vulgate text. The text of the fifth volume of the Antwerp Polyglot was repeated only in the fifth volume of the Paris Polyglot, 1630-33, while that of the eighth volume reappears in a number of editions: Antwerp, 1573-S4 (four editions, Christopher Plantin); Leyden, 1591-1613 (four editions, Rapheleng); Paris, 1584 (Sryiac, Latin, and Greek text; Prevosteau); Heidelberg, 1599, 1602 (Commelin); Lyons, 1599 (Vincent); Geneva, 1599; Geneva, 1609-27 (eight very different editions; Pierre de la Rouiere, Sam. Crispin, James Stoer); Leipzig, 1657 (with the interlinear version of Arias Montanus; Kirchner); Vienna, 1740 (edited by Debiel, published by Kaliwoda); Mainz, 1753 (edited by Goldhagen; published by Varrentrapp); Liege, 1839 (Kersten). To these editions, containing the Plantinian, or the modified Complutensian, text, the following may be ailded, which represent a mixture of the text of Plantin and that of Stephanus: Cologne, 1592 (Arnold Mylius; Greek and Latin text); Nuremberg, 1599-1600' (Hutter's Polyglot, twelve languages); 1602 (the same, four languages); Amsterdam, 1615 (the same, Welschaert); Geneva, 1628 (Jean de Tournes; one edition gives only the Greek text, another gives Beza's Latin version and a French translation).

Footnotes:

File List: Volume 01 : Pentateuch, Volume 02-03: Joshua to Ecclesasticus, Volume 04: Isiah to 3 Maccabees, Volume 05: New Testament, Volume 06: Hebrew [Aramaic] and Chaldaic Vocabulary

Download: CPB Volume Contents.md (the above file list in a text Markdown file) (.md), Volume 01 (.zip), Volume 02-03 (.zip), Volume 04 (.zip), Volume 05 (.zip). Volume 06 (.zip)

Related:

• Cardinal Ximenes
• Apostolic Bible Polygot
• The Alexandrian Septaugint History by Barry Setterfield
• The Vulgate
• The Old Latin Version Bible

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