Minuscule 543 (Gregory-Aland)
Encyclopedia
Minuscule 543 in the Gregory-Aland numbering (ε 257 in Soden's numbering and labelled 556 by Scrivener) is a Greek
Greek language
Greek is an independent branch of the Indo-European family of languages. Native to the southern Balkans, it has the longest documented history of any Indo-European language, spanning 34 centuries of written records. Its writing system has been the Greek alphabet for the majority of its history;...

 minuscule manuscript
Manuscript
A manuscript or handwrite is written information that has been manually created by someone or some people, such as a hand-written letter, as opposed to being printed or reproduced some other way...

 of the New Testament
New Testament
The New Testament is the second major division of the Christian biblical canon, the first such division being the much longer Old Testament....

, on parchment. Palaeographically
Palaeography
Palaeography, also spelt paleography is the study of ancient writing. Included in the discipline is the practice of deciphering, reading, and dating historical manuscripts, and the cultural context of writing, including the methods with which writing and books were produced, and the history of...

 it has been assigned to the 12th century.

The manuscript contains text of the four Gospel
Gospel
A gospel is an account, often written, that describes the life of Jesus of Nazareth. In a more general sense the term "gospel" may refer to the good news message of the New Testament. It is primarily used in reference to the four canonical gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John...

s with unusual grammar forms and numerous errors. Textually it does not belong to any of the main text-types, and is a member of the textual family Family 13
Family 13
Family 13, also known Ferrar Group , is a group of Greek Gospel manuscripts, varying in date from the 11th to the 15th century, which display a distinctive pattern of variant readings — especially in placing the story of Jesus and the woman taken in adultery in the Gospel of Luke, rather than in...

, known also as Ferrar Group. The lacunose manuscript is housed at the University of Michigan
University of Michigan
The University of Michigan is a public research university located in Ann Arbor, Michigan in the United States. It is the state's oldest university and the flagship campus of the University of Michigan...

.

Contents

The codex contains the text of the four Gospel
Gospel
A gospel is an account, often written, that describes the life of Jesus of Nazareth. In a more general sense the term "gospel" may refer to the good news message of the New Testament. It is primarily used in reference to the four canonical gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John...

s, on 184 thick parchment leaves (size ), with several lacunae
Lacuna (manuscripts)
A lacunaPlural lacunae. From Latin lacūna , diminutive form of lacus . is a gap in a manuscript, inscription, text, painting, or a musical work...

 (Matthew 12:11-13:10; Mark 8:4-28; Luke 15:20-16:9; John 2:22-4:6; 4:52-5:43; 11:21-47). One leaf was misplaced in binding. The parchment is coarse and yellowed by age.

The text of the codex was written two columns per page, 27-30 lines per page, 17 letters per line, in minute hand, in brown ink. The same scribe wrote all four Gospels. There are breathings and accents used in regular form, but in some sort of system. There is not found iota subscript
Iota subscript
Iota subscript in Greek polytonic orthography is a way of writing the letter iota as a small vertical stroke beneath a vowel. It was used in the so-called "long diphthongs" in Ancient Greek, that is, diphthongs the first part of which is a long vowel: and...

, iota adscript
Iota adscript
In Greek polytonic orthography, the iota adscript is a iota written after a long vowel in a long diphthong, as opposed to below the vowel as a small vertical stroke ....

um occurs very often (especially in Mark).

The titles to the Gospels of Matthew
Gospel of Matthew
The Gospel According to Matthew is one of the four canonical gospels, one of the three synoptic gospels, and the first book of the New Testament. It tells of the life, ministry, death, and resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth...

 and Mark
Gospel of Mark
The Gospel According to Mark , commonly shortened to the Gospel of Mark or simply Mark, is the second book of the New Testament. This canonical account of the life of Jesus of Nazareth is one of the three synoptic gospels. It was thought to be an epitome, which accounts for its place as the second...

 run: .In this way are also titled the headings of the Gospels in Minuscule 69
Minuscule 69
Minuscule 69 , δ 505 , known as Codex Leicester, or Codex Leicestrensis, is a Greek minuscule manuscript of the New Testament on paper and parchment leaves. The manuscript palaeographically has been assigned to the 15th century. Some leaves of the codex were lost. The text-type is eclectic...

, 178
Minuscule 178
Minuscule 178 , ε 210 , is a Greek minuscule manuscript of the New Testament, on parchment. Palaeographically it has been assigned to the 12th century. It has marginalia.- Description :...

, 668
Minuscule 668
Minuscule 668 , ε 1205 , is a Greek minuscule manuscript of the New Testament, on parchment. Palaeographically it has been assigned to the 13th or 14th century. The manuscript has complex contents. Scrivener labelled it by 1144e.-Description:The codex contains the entire of the four Gospels, on 201...

.
The titles to the Luke
Gospel of Luke
The Gospel According to Luke , commonly shortened to the Gospel of Luke or simply Luke, is the third and longest of the four canonical Gospels. This synoptic gospel is an account of the life and ministry of Jesus of Nazareth. It details his story from the events of his birth to his Ascension.The...

 and John
Gospel of John
The Gospel According to John , commonly referred to as the Gospel of John or simply John, and often referred to in New Testament scholarship as the Fourth Gospel, is an account of the public ministry of Jesus...

 are usual: .

The lists of the (chapters) are placed before every Gospel, numbers of the are given at the left margin, with their (titles) in red at the top of pages. There is a division according to the Ammonian Sections, with a references to the Eusebian Canons. It contains lectionary markings, Synaxarion, Menologion, subscriptions, , and .
The list to Matthew is missing and Gospel of Matthew begins on the first of the codex. It has an additional non-biblical material: The Limits of the Five Patriarchates
Limits of the Five Patriarchates
The Limits of the Five Patriarchates is a text describing the five patriarchates of Christianity in the Middle Ages. It is found appended to some manuscripts of the New Testament. The text's sequence and validity of patriarchates is different from the traditional Pentarchy established by ecumenical...

(as in codices 69
Minuscule 69
Minuscule 69 , δ 505 , known as Codex Leicester, or Codex Leicestrensis, is a Greek minuscule manuscript of the New Testament on paper and parchment leaves. The manuscript palaeographically has been assigned to the 15th century. Some leaves of the codex were lost. The text-type is eclectic...

 and 211
Minuscule 211
Minuscule 211 , ε 234 , is a Greek-Arabic diglot minuscule manuscript of the New Testament, on parchment. Palaeographically it has been assigned to the 12th century. The manuscript is lacunose...

) — one page of it lost.

Nomina sacra and OT quotations

The nomina sacra
Nomina sacra
Nomina sacra means "sacred names" in Latin, and can be used to refer to traditions of abbreviated writing of several frequently occurring divine names or titles in early Greek language Holy Scripture...

 are contracted in the usual way, but there are a number of words which the scribe failed to abbreviate. In some of the cases where nomina sacra are uncontracted, they have the heavy bar signifying contraction. υιος is contracted only once (John 4:47). On the other hand, it gives unusual abbreviations: for σταυρωσον (crucify) the manuscript has στωσον, for σταυρωθη — στρωθη, (virgin) is contracted to παρνος.

Quotations from the Old Testament
Old Testament
The Old Testament, of which Christians hold different views, is a Christian term for the religious writings of ancient Israel held sacred and inspired by Christians which overlaps with the 24-book canon of the Masoretic Text of Judaism...

 are indicated in the left margin by a rubricated letter or sign.

Errors

Almost all the necessary corrections of misspellings have been made. Sometimes a stroke of the pen indicates an error, perhaps to be corrected later. Some corrections seem to be written by prima manu (e.g. Matthew 4:10; 5:19) others plainly secondary manu (Matthew 6; Luke 3; 10:35). The apostrophe is used even when not required, especially in εξ', and ουκ'.

According tο Scrivener N εφελκυστικον occurs 416 times especially with words , . In Matthew 12:7; Luke 8:10; John 5:46; 7:7; 8:27 there is a hiatus
Hiatus (linguistics)
In phonology, hiatus or diaeresis refers to two vowel sounds occurring in adjacent syllables, with no intervening consonant. When two adjacent vowel sounds occur in the same syllable, the result is instead described as a diphthong....

 for lack of it. The error of iotacism
Iotacism
Iotacism is the process by which a number of vowels and diphthongs in Ancient Greek converged in pronunciation so that they all sound like iota in Modern Greek....

 occurs 358 times: ει for ι (16 occurrences), ι
Iota
Iota is the ninth letter of the Greek alphabet. In the system of Greek numerals it has a value of 10. It was derived from the Phoenician letter Yodh . Letters that arose from this letter include the Roman I and J and the Cyrillic І , Yi , Je , and iotified letters .Iota represents...

 for ει (35), ο for ω
Omega
Omega is the 24th and last letter of the Greek alphabet. In the Greek numeric system, it has a value of 800. The word literally means "great O" , as opposed to omicron, which means "little O"...

 (40), ω for ο (33), αι for ε (13), ε
Epsilon
Epsilon is the fifth letter of the Greek alphabet, corresponding phonetically to a close-mid front unrounded vowel . In the system of Greek numerals it has a value of 5. It was derived from the Phoenician letter He...

 for αι (31), ει for η (23), η for ει (19), η for ι (11), ι for η
ETA
ETA , an acronym for Euskadi Ta Askatasuna is an armed Basque nationalist and separatist organization. The group was founded in 1959 and has since evolved from a group promoting traditional Basque culture to a paramilitary group with the goal of gaining independence for the Greater Basque Country...

 (7), ε for η (11), η for ε (2), οι for ι (3), ω for ου (20), η for υ (3), υ for η (5), υ for οι (1), υ for ει (1), η for οι (1), οι for η (1), ι for υ (1), οι for ει (2).

There are many errors by homoioteleuton (Mark 2:18; 4:24; 12:26; 14:70; 15:14; Luke 12:22.47; 13:28.29; John 4:14).

There are some unusual forms like: .

Text

The Greek text of the codex is a representative of the Caesarean text-type
Caesarean text-type
Caesarean text-type is the term proposed by certain scholars to denote a consistent pattern of variant readings that is claimed to be apparent in certain Greek manuscripts of the four Gospels, but which is not found in any of the other commonly recognized New Testament text-types; the Byzantine...

. It belongs to the textual family f13
Family 13
Family 13, also known Ferrar Group , is a group of Greek Gospel manuscripts, varying in date from the 11th to the 15th century, which display a distinctive pattern of variant readings — especially in placing the story of Jesus and the woman taken in adultery in the Gospel of Luke, rather than in...

, known also as Ferrar Family. Also the handwriting and the menology show that is a close member of the group. According to Kurt
Kurt Aland
Kurt Aland was a German Theologian and Professor of New Testament Research and Church History. He founded the Institut für neutestamentliche Textforschung in Münster and served as its first director for many years...

 and Barbara Aland
Barbara Aland
Barbara Aland, née Ehlers is a German theologian and was a Professor of New Testament Research and Church History at Westphalian Wilhelms-University of Münster until 2002.- Biography :...

 it agrees with the Byzantine standard text 151 times, and 72 times with the Byzantine when it has the same reading as the original text. It agrees 31 times with the original text against the Byzantine. It has 57 independent or distinctive readings. Alands placed it in Category III.
According to the Claremont Profile Method it represents the textual family f13 in Luke 1
Luke 1
Luke 1 is the first chapter of the Gospel of Luke in the New Testament of the Christian Bible. It describes the events leading up to the birth of Jesus. It is written to Theophilus, who could be a real person or could simply mean a fellow Christian as theo philus is Greek for God lover...

, Luke 10, and Luke 20, as a core member.

The Pericope Adulterae follows Luke 21:38, like in other manuscripts of the Ferrar Family.

Textual variants
The words after the bracket are the readings of the codex (before the bracket are readings of Textus Receptus
Textus Receptus
Textus Receptus is the name subsequently given to the succession of printed Greek texts of the New Testament which constituted the translation base for the original German Luther Bible, the translation of the New Testament into English by William Tyndale, the King James Version, and for most other...

).
  • Matthew 1:18 and 1:23 — εν γαστρι (pregnant, literary in womb) ] εγγαστρι (inwomb)
  • Matthew 5:48 — εν τοις ουρανοις (in heavens) ] ουνιος (heavens)
  • Matthew 6:24 — μαμμωνα (mammona) ] μαμωνα (mamona)
  • Matthew 7:2 — απο (from) ] εκ (from)
  • Matthew 8:4 — Μωσης (Moses) ] Μωυσης (Moses)
  • Matthew 8:8 — δεινως (terrible) ] δεινος (terrible)
  • Matthew 8:8 — ικανος (worthy) ] αξιος (worthy)
  • Matthew 8:26 — τοις ανεμοις (winds) ] τω ανεμω (wind)
  • Matthew 9:17 — απολουνται (ruined) ] απολλουνται (ΝΑ27 has απολλυνται)
  • Matthew 9:17 — αμφοτερα ] αμφοτεροι (both)
  • Matthew 11:5 — και νεκροι εγειρονται και πτωχοι ευαγγελιζονται (and the dead are raised up and the poor have the gospel preached to them) ] και πτωχοι ευαγγελιζονται και νεκροι εγειρονται (and the poor have the gospel preached to them and the dead are raised up)
  • Matthew 26:39 — ] ωφθη δε αυτω αγγελος απο του ουνου ενισχυσον αυτον και γενομενος εν αγωνια εκτενεστερον προσηυχετο εγενετο δε ο ιδρος αυτου ωσει θρομβη αθματος καταβαινοντες επι την γην
  • Mark 1:9 — Ναζαρετ (Nazaret) ] Ναζαρεθ
  • Mark 1:10 — απο ] εκ
  • Mark 1:10 — εκ (from) ] εις (to)
  • Mark 2:4 — κραββατον ] κραβαττον (bed)

History

J. Rendel Harris
J. Rendel Harris
James Rendel Harris was an English biblical scholar and curator of manuscripts, who was instrumental in bringing back to light many Syriac Scriptures and other early documents...

 pointed out that the menology of the Ferrar group contains saints which appear to be peculiar to Calabria
Calabria
Calabria , in antiquity known as Bruttium, is a region in southern Italy, south of Naples, located at the "toe" of the Italian Peninsula. The capital city of Calabria is Catanzaro....

 or Sicily
Sicily
Sicily is a region of Italy, and is the largest island in the Mediterranean Sea. Along with the surrounding minor islands, it constitutes an autonomous region of Italy, the Regione Autonoma Siciliana Sicily has a rich and unique culture, especially with regard to the arts, music, literature,...

. Abbe Martin had previously stated that certain palaeographical traits to be observed in these manuscripts were characteristic of Calabrian scriptoria.

Of the history of the codex 543 nothing is known until the year 1864, when it was in the possession of a dealer at Janina
Ioannina
Ioannina , often called Jannena within Greece, is the largest city of Epirus, north-western Greece, with a population of 70,203 . It lies at an elevation of approximately 500 meters above sea level, on the western shore of lake Pamvotis . It is located within the Ioannina municipality, and is the...

 in Epeiros. It was then purchased from him by a representative of Baroness Burdett-Coutts
Angela Burdett-Coutts, 1st Baroness Burdett-Coutts
Angela Georgina Burdett-Coutts, 1st Baroness Burdett-Coutts , born Angela Georgina Burdett, was a nineteenth-century philanthropist, the daughter of Sir Francis Burdett, 5th Baronet and the former Sophia Coutts, daughter of banker Thomas Coutts...

 (1814–1906), a philanthropist, together with other Greek manuscripts (among them codices 532
Minuscule 532
Minuscule 532 , ε 255 , is a Greek minuscule manuscript of the New Testament, on parchment. Palaeographically it has been assigned to the 12th century.Scrivener labeled it number 545....

-546
Minuscule 546
Minuscule 546 , ε 511 , is a Greek minuscule manuscript of the New Testament, on parchment. It is dated palaeographically to the 13th century. It has some marginalia, the scribe has made numerous errors....

). They were transported to England in 1870-1871.

The manuscript was presented by Burdett-Coutts to Sir Roger Cholmely's School, and was housed at the Highgate (Burdett-Coutts III. 5), in London. In 1922 it was acquired for the University of Michigan. It is currently housed at the University of Michigan
University of Michigan
The University of Michigan is a public research university located in Ann Arbor, Michigan in the United States. It is the state's oldest university and the flagship campus of the University of Michigan...

 (Ms. 15) in Ann Arbor
Ann Arbor, Michigan
Ann Arbor is a city in the U.S. state of Michigan and the county seat of Washtenaw County. The 2010 census places the population at 113,934, making it the sixth largest city in Michigan. The Ann Arbor Metropolitan Statistical Area had a population of 344,791 as of 2010...

.

Scrivener observed a close textual affinity to the Ferrar group
Family 13
Family 13, also known Ferrar Group , is a group of Greek Gospel manuscripts, varying in date from the 11th to the 15th century, which display a distinctive pattern of variant readings — especially in placing the story of Jesus and the woman taken in adultery in the Gospel of Luke, rather than in...

 and announced in 1883 in the third edition of "Plain Introduction
A Plain Introduction to the Criticism of the New Testament
A Plain Introduction to the Criticism of the New Testament: For the Use of Biblical Students is one of the books of Frederick Henry Ambrose Scrivener , biblical scholar and textual critic. In this book Scrivener listed over 3,000 Greek manuscripts of the New Testament, as well as manuscripts of...

" (p. 236) as portaining to the same class. Scrivener collated its text and it was edited posthumous in 1893. This collation was not wholly accurate and Jacob Geerlings, from the University of Utah
University of Utah
The University of Utah, also known as the U or the U of U, is a public, coeducational research university in Salt Lake City, Utah, United States. The university was established in 1850 as the University of Deseret by the General Assembly of the provisional State of Deseret, making it Utah's oldest...

, gave a new and more accurate collation in 1932. The collation was made against the Textus Receptus
Textus Receptus
Textus Receptus is the name subsequently given to the succession of printed Greek texts of the New Testament which constituted the translation base for the original German Luther Bible, the translation of the New Testament into English by William Tyndale, the King James Version, and for most other...

 in Stephani
Robert Estienne
Robert I Estienne , known as Robertus Stephanus in Latin and also referred to as Robert Stephens by 18th and 19th-century English writers, was a 16th century printer and classical scholar in Paris...

 edition (Editio Regia
Editio Regia
Editio Regia , it is the third and the most important edition of the Greek New Testament of Robert Estienne . It is one of the most important printed editions of the Greek New Testament in history, the Textus Receptus. It was named Editio Regia because of the beautiful and elegant Greek font it...

).

See also

  • List of New Testament minuscules
  • Biblical manuscript
    Biblical manuscript
    A biblical manuscript is any handwritten copy of a portion of the text of the Bible. The word Bible comes from the Greek biblia ; manuscript comes from Latin manu and scriptum...

  • Textual criticism
    Textual criticism
    Textual criticism is a branch of literary criticism that is concerned with the identification and removal of transcription errors in the texts of manuscripts...


Further reading

  • J. Rendel Harris
    J. Rendel Harris
    James Rendel Harris was an English biblical scholar and curator of manuscripts, who was instrumental in bringing back to light many Syriac Scriptures and other early documents...

    , Further researches into the history of the Ferrar-group (London, 1900)
  • Frederick Henry Ambrose Scrivener, Adversaria Critica Sacra: With a Short Explanatory Introduction (Cambridge, 1893), pp. XVI-XXII, 1-59. (as a)
  • Kenneth W. Clark, A Descriptive Catalogue of Greek New Testament Manuscripts in America (Chicago, 1937), pp. 280–282.
  • Jacob Geerlings, Codex 543, University of Michigan 15 (Gregory 543; von Soden ε 257), in Six Collations, pp. 26–76 and plate II.

For more bibliography see: Family 13
Family 13
Family 13, also known Ferrar Group , is a group of Greek Gospel manuscripts, varying in date from the 11th to the 15th century, which display a distinctive pattern of variant readings — especially in placing the story of Jesus and the woman taken in adultery in the Gospel of Luke, rather than in...


External links

  • Images of the minuscule 543 at the CSNTM
    Center for the Study of New Testament Manuscripts
    The Center for the Study of New Testament Manuscripts is a non-profit organization set out to preserve ancient manuscripts of the Christian Scriptures New Testament. This aim is accomplished by taking high resolution digital photographs of all extant Greek New Testament manuscripts. The...

  • Minuscule 543 at the Encyclopedia of Textual Criticism
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