Oxford Handbook of Neo-Latin (2015)
Chapter 19
Andrew Taylor
https://books.google.com/books?id=jps_CQAAQBAJ&pg=PA297
Classical Journal (1827) originally 1790s
Richard Porson
https://books.google.com/books?id=qobx5D2P3D8C&pg=PA245
Memoirs of the Life and Works of Lancelot Andrewes, Lord Bishop of Winchester
By Arthur Tozer Russell
Michaelis
https://books.google.com/books?id=9WAUAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA341
252. Codices Laurentii Vallæ, noted 82 in the first part of Wetstein's N. T., in the second 51, in the third 44, in the fourth 5.
Laurentius Valla 327 has written remarks on the Latin New Testament, in which he generally censures the Latin version, and observes that this, or that reading is different in the Greek. This work, which for the time when it was written, as criticism was at that time in its infancy, has great merit, was discovered in a library by Erasmus, who under the patronage of Chriftopher Fifcher, protonotary to the Pope, published it in 1505, under the following title, Laurentii Vallenfis viri tam græcæ quam latinæ linguæ peritiffimi in latinam N. Τ. interpretationem ex collatione Græcorum exemplarium adnotationes apprimæ utiles. The opinion of Valla is at present of little importance: he engaged in a branch of literature which was entirely new, and of which he perceived not the full extent: he imagined therefore that what he found in a few Greek manufcripts, was contained in all, and, if the Latin was different, that it should be condemned without a further hearing. Not all the cenfures, which are in Mill's Prolegomena, § 1086, 1087, appear to be grounded, and I would rather retain εικη, Matth. v. 22. with Valla, than reject it in conformity to Mill 328. But without entering further into this inquiry, let us examine matters of fact, and confider the readings, which he actually found in his manufcripts.
These he has no where circumftantially described, but agreeably to the usual practice of the learned, when criticism was in its childhood, proceeds immediately to
:
collate the Latin text, with manuscripts unknown to his readers. We are ignorant therefore of the number which he used, of the books which they contained, of the age in which they were written, of the library where he found them, and of the place where they have been fince preserved. It is therefore not impossible that we often quote Valla for a reading, which we had before quoted from another manufcript, and produce therefore the fame evidence twice, under different names. He collated, and quoted, not only Greek, but Latin manuscripts. As it is probable that they are still extant, and that a part of them at least has been consulted, and quoted under different names, a further description would be unneceffary, had not the controversy, relative to the celebrated paffage, 1 John v. 7. occafioned a more minute examination of various manuscripts, and among them those of Laurentius Valla, which have afforded fubject of difpute, in regard to their number and contents.
Valla himself says on Matth. xxvii. 12. tres codices Latinos, et totidem Græcos habeo, cum hæc compono, et nonnunquam alios codices confulo. Now we have no reafon to suppose that these included more than the Gofpels, of which he had three Greek manuscripts in his poffeffion, but they hardly included the whole New Teftament. Nor is this account contradicted by what he writes on John vii. 29. ' quærebant eum apprehendere.' Septem Græca exemplaria legi, quorum in fingulis ita scriptum est, 'ego scio eum, quia ab ipso sum et ille me mifit. Quærebant igitur eum apprehendere." Cætera verba abfunt, neque a Græcis exemplaribus tantum, fed etiam a plerifque latinorum. For though Valla had only three copies of the Gofpels in his own poffeffion, he might on this paffage have confulted seven, in which the claufe ' et fi dixero, quia nefcio eum, era fimilis vobis mendax, which is added in several Latin manuscripts, was not contained. Wetstein therefore had no reason to affert that Villa wrote græca' by miftake for latina exemplaria, since Valla clearly diftinguishes the Latin from the seven Greek manufcripts;
nor
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nor on the other hand was Martin, with other advocates for 1 John v. 7. juftified in contending that these seven Greek manufcripts comprehended the whole of the New Testament. The number of manuscripts, which Valla used of the first epistle of St. John, is not to be determined by the number of those which he had of the Gofpels: the conclusions therefore of both Emlyn and Martin were ungrounded.
Though the manufcripts of Valla are not known to us by name, it is highly probable that many of them have been again collated in modern times. There is no reason therefore to suppose that they contained readings, that are found in no manufcript with which we are at present acquainted, and least of all that they had the celebrated passage in the first epistle of St. John, which in so many manuscripts has been fought in vain. But the advocates for this passage have contended, that it could not have been wanting in Valla's manuscripts, because he has not remarked its absence from the Greek: a very precarious inference, since it might either have been wanting in the Latin copy, with which he made the collation, or he might studiously have avoided a remark on so delicate and controverted a subject, which is the more credible, as on other accounts he had been greatly exposed to perfecution. This at least is certain, that from this filence alone we can draw no positive conclufion. This circumstance it would have been unnecefsary to mention, if the name of Valla had not been fo - frequently introduced in the controverfy relative to the above-mentioned passage.
As it is probable that the Codices Vallæ have not only been quoted in later ages under different titles, but that they contain the fame readings with the Codices Barberini, and other collections of that nature, they are at present of little importance, except in the book of Revelation, of which the number of manufcripts is so few, that the extracts of Valla are a useful acceffion.
