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grew rare, and although the "Italic" was not wholly forgotten, yet the new text came to be generally adopted without any direct ecclesiastical authority.

The Book of Deer is one of the class which has been called "Irish" Gospels, which, while mainly corresponding with the Vulgate, seem to preserve occasional readings from earlier versions.1

The most casual examination of this book will show that it is a careless transcript of a corrupt text. The spelling is frequently barbarous and capricious; there are many violations of grammar, with omissions, transpositions, repetitions, and interpolations of various kinds, while the prepositions are almost always joined to the words which they govern.

Generally speaking, the Deer Codex exhibits many of the orthographical peculiarities of the Vulgate as noted by Tischendorf, and especially such as are characteristic of early Irish manuscripts.3 The following is a list of some of those of most frequent re

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ll for 1,

o for u,

u for o,

as tullerunt for tulerunt.

as soffocaverunt for suffocaverunt, monomentum
for monumentum.

as consulare for consolare, parabulas for parabolas.

p omitted, as temtator for temptator.

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The division of words and arrangement of paragraphs are very capricious, and could hardly have been made by one familiar with the language.1 At times words are introduced which entirely destroy the sense, as in the 9th chapter of St. John, where, in the 1st verse, it is written, "et preteriens uidit iohannem cecum," instead of "hominem cecum." In the 35th verse of the same chapter, where the words should have been "credis in filium dei," they are written "dixisset in filium dei." The 10th verse of the 13th chapter of this Gospel in the Vulgate begins, "Dicit ei ihesus qui lotus est," while in Deer the word lotus is turned into

The causes which led to that ignorance of Latin in the clergy of the English Church, of which King Alfred complained in the beginning of the tenth century, were generally operative through

out Europe, and the Gaelic clergy of Alba were probably in the same condition as their Saxon brethren in this respect.

2 The Book of Deer, p. 60.

3

Idem, p. 62.

"locutus."1 The 22d verse of the 18th chapter of St. John in the Vulgate concludes with the words, "dicens sic respondis pontifici," while in Deer they appear as "sicrespem dispontifici."2

Words are occasionally found in this Codex which do not appear in the Vulgate. Thus in the 4th chapter of St. Matthew, at the 10th verse, where the former have the words "Tunc dicit ei ihesus uade retro," the latter omits the word retro, and similar omissions occur in the 30th and 40th verses of that chapter.

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In the 6th chapter of St. John, after the words "da panem nunc," as in the Vulgate, the scribe of Deer introduces " panem semper hunc." In the 8th chapter at the 10th verse he has ihesus dixit ei mulier ubi sunt qui te accussabant," while in the Vulgate the last three words do not occur. In the 30th verse of the 19th chapter of the same book, the words "cum autem expirasset uelum templi scisum est medium a sommo usque ad deorsum,” which appear in Deer, are omitted in the Vulgate; and in the 6th verse of the 21st chapter, the words "Dixerunt autem per totam noctem laborantes nihil cœpimus in uerbo autem tuo mittimus," which occur in Deer, are not in the Vulgate. A similar case occurs in the 13th verse of the 5th chapter of St. Mark.

The words and passages which appear in the Vulgate, and not in Deer, are very numerous, as will be seen in the collations.

Instances of passages repeated will be found in the 14th verse of the 7th chapter of St. Matthew, and in the 13th verse of the 5th chapter of St. Luke.

A singular one occurs in the 6th chapter of St. John, at the 24th verse, where twenty-three words are repeated with some

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variations in spelling, of which it seems more difficult to believe that they are merely the result of carelessness in the transcriber, than that they were literally copied by him from another text. The words which are at first written "in naue" are repeated "in nauem ;" "a tibriade" becomes "a tiberaide," and "gratias agentes dominum" is turned into "gratias agentes dominus."

But the most grotesque result of the carelessness or ignorance of the transcriber occurs in the genealogy of our Lord in the 3d chapter of St. Luke, where Seth is set down as the first man and grandfather of Adam.1

It has been remarked that the whole question of the general character and specific varieties of the Celtic MSS. is very imperfectly known (Smith's Dict. of the Bible, vol. iii. p. 1695); and it is with the view of contributing an addition to the materials for its elucidation that the collation of the Deer Gospels with those of the Vulgate (Codex Amiatinus) has here been made. It does not repeat all the minute literal variations of orthography each time that they occur, but it embraces all words of any importance.

With the same object a table is annexed exhibiting the results of collations of the fourth chapter of St. John, as in the Italic (Codex Brixianus), with the Vulgate (Codex Amiatinus), the Book of Durrow, the Book of Kells, the Book of Dimma, the Book of Moling, and the Book of Armagh, in the library of Trinity College, Dublin; the Lindisfarne Gospels in the British Museum; an

1 The Book of Deer, p. 36.

2 See a valuable chapter on this subject in a work which has appeared since the above was written: "Councils and Ecclesiastical Documents relating to Great

Britain and Ireland," by Haddan and Stubbs, pp. 170-198, Oxford 1869; and "Descriptive Remarks on Illuminations in certain ancient Irish Manuscripts," by the late lamented Dr. J. H. Todd, in Vetusta Monumenta, vol. vi. p. 1.

early copy of the Gospels (A 2, 17) in the library of the Dean and Chapter at Durham; and the Book of Deer.

The collations of the MSS. in the library of Trinity College, Dublin, were readily completed for me by Mr. William Maunsell Hennessy, of the Public Record Office, Dublin, editor of the Chronicum Scotorum in the Master of the Rolls' Series of Chronicles.

In the collation of the Lindisfarne Gospels I adopted the text of Mr. George Waring in his edition printed for the Surtees Society.

Through the kindness of the Rev. Wm. Greenwell, the librarian of the Dean and Chapter at Durham, I was enabled to collate the text of the original manuscript at Durham,' which is thus described by Mr. Westwood:-"This manuscript in its original condition must have been one of the most splendid copies of the Gospels ever written. It may be referred to the early part of the eighth century. It measures about thirteen inches by ten, and is written in a beautiful rounded Hiberno-Saxon minuscule character, intermediate in size between the texts of the Gospels of Kells and Lindisfarne."2

1 This manuscript contains the rare passage, St. John iii. 6: Quia deus spiritus est et ex deo natus est, and its mode of punctuation is by three dots in a triangle.

2 Miniatures and Ornaments of Anglo-Saxon and Irish Manuscripts, p. 48.

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