Steven Avery
Administrator
retracings - overwriting - reinforcement
This retracings issue is one of the puzzles of the modern British Library and CSP scholarship.
And for vagueness and inaccuracy we can go also go back to Scrivener, who was apparently simply using Tischendorf as his source:
Anyone who looks at the ms. will see that this is simply nonsensical. There is no large-scale retracing indicated by anybody of the main text. Mostly just selected letters on a small minority of pages. The CSP adds to the confusion. Where did Sara Mazzarino get her info? Tischendorf ??
Can anybody here play this game?
As to the Tischendorf confusion, we also have this from an 1863 article:
Apparently Tischendorf set up a retracing schema that involved double retracings in the early centuries. And somehow tied that into his early date.
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You can see some discussion in the ending of John as well. Since the ink there is very strong, some possibilities are that it is recent, or that it was subject to retracing. It is also a section where Tischendorf had a type of x-ray vision, even before Superman.
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Dirk Jongkind touches on some of these Skeat overwriting sections, p. 16
and p. 119-120 going into the Matthew section numbers,
p. 38 is about red ink titles.
Again, nothing about the main text.
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So we have a massive disconnect, even in the post-2000 science.
Scrivener and the CSP analysis talk of major retracings.
The CSP site shows a smidgen of minor retracing sections, the overwriter is unidentified.
Skeat and Jongkind, for the main text, tell us .. nothing.
This retracings issue is one of the puzzles of the modern British Library and CSP scholarship.
CSP - Report on the different inks used in Codex Sinaiticus and assessment of their condition
Sara Mazzarino - 1.4.2 Re-tracing
http://codexsinaiticus.org/en/project/conservation_ink.aspx
The retracing of the characters (main text, corrections, some quire numbers and some of the squiggles) was repeated several times throughout the history of the Codex Sinaiticus, always using different types of inks.
(continues)
The ink used for the second retracing of the main text, for example, appears to be more friable than the one used to write the original text, suffering from major ink loss.
... There have been two, possibly three, re-tracings of the brown ink text
And for vagueness and inaccuracy we can go also go back to Scrivener, who was apparently simply using Tischendorf as his source:
The full Scrivener quote is below on a separate postA full Collation of the Codex Sinaiticus with the received text of the New Textament (1864)
Scrivener (see note http://books.google.com/books?id=1MMtAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA24 )
https://books.google.com/books?id=v-JUmBD5zIcC&pg=PP32
By this time [SA: 7th century or later, p. xxii] .... necessary to retrace the original strokes,
Anyone who looks at the ms. will see that this is simply nonsensical. There is no large-scale retracing indicated by anybody of the main text. Mostly just selected letters on a small minority of pages. The CSP adds to the confusion. Where did Sara Mazzarino get her info? Tischendorf ??
Can anybody here play this game?
As to the Tischendorf confusion, we also have this from an 1863 article:
Christian Remembrancer (1863)
The Imperial Edition of the Codex Sinaiticus
Author may be:
Benjamin Harris Cowper
https://books.google.com/books?id=rPQDAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA387
Again, even in the eighth century, the ink had become so pale in many places, that it had to be retouched. Indeed, it had been retouched before. This is one of the points which has to be examined. Is the Professor right in assigning the eighth century as the date for retouching the MS.? May not the fact that this was not the first retouching, indicate something faulty in the ink? If so, we cannot depend on this argument for the antiquity of the MS.
Apparently Tischendorf set up a retracing schema that involved double retracings in the early centuries. And somehow tied that into his early date.
=================================
You can see some discussion in the ending of John as well. Since the ink there is very strong, some possibilities are that it is recent, or that it was subject to retracing. It is also a section where Tischendorf had a type of x-ray vision, even before Superman.
CSP
"The Codex Sinaiticus inks have never been chemically characterized, and the type and proportions of ingredients mixed together have never been determined."
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Nothing about overwriting in the main text from Skeat. Only a bit about superlines, rubrics, section #s and corrections.Skeat and Milne, Scribes and Correctors
... throughout the Codex nearly all B's superlines have been overwritten by one or other of the correctors. One of the few which escaped retouching is illustrated in Fig. 7. p. 20
We may now on analogy expect to find that the remainder of the Psalms were rubricated by scribe A, the writer of the accompanying text; here the primary evidence has been obscured by the fact that nearly all the original rubrics have been overwritten, but it is clear that in their first state they differed notably in style from those of scribe D ... The overwriting, apparently undertaken because the colour had faded badly, p. 35
The Eusebian apparatus is clearly the work of two scribes; the first numbered only sections 1-52 of Matthew, in a small fine hand using a rather faint pigment. Both section and canon number are capped with horizontal lines. The second scribe overwrote almost all the first hand's work, and entered the remainder of the apparatus, except in Luke where he got no farther than §106.(1) Apart from Matthew §§ 1-52, where he is merely overwriting, this scribe regularly omits the line over the canon number, and sometimes that over the section number as well. .... Psalms, where A's numeration is similarly overwritten by D. p. 36
Cb2 .. That he follows Cb1 is proved by his overwriting of the latter's corrections p. 48
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Dirk Jongkind touches on some of these Skeat overwriting sections, p. 16
The Eusebian apparatus was not assigned to any of the scribes by Tischcndorf or Lake, but Milne and Skeat distinguish the work of two scribes: (29) scribe A writes the first 52 numbers in Matthew, scribe D all the remaining ones, retracing also the numbers initially written by scribe A. p. 16
and p. 119-120 going into the Matthew section numbers,
Concluding observations on the Eusebian apparatus
Scribes and Correctors states that the first 52 numbers of Matthew are by scribe A and were later retraced by scribe D who also adds all the other
numbers. This may be correct, but it does not show up as a changed level of quality in the Eusebian apparatus.127
127 Though I had genuine doubts whether Milne and Skeat were correct in their judgement on the retracement, it clearly proves to be the case when the apparatus is checked in the original. That a change of hand is also very likely is also indicated by the sudden absence of paragraphi after section 52. It may be, though, that not all the Eusebian apparatus after this section are by scribe D, at some places I suspect that scribe A took over again. The scribes were not totally consistent in the bookhand that they used; see for example the different alphas before column 4 of folio 74.8 (NT 16). p. 119-120
p. 38 is about red ink titles.
Milne and Skeat .... They also claim that the red ink in scribe A's section has been retraced, probably by scribe D.
Again, nothing about the main text.
=================================
So we have a massive disconnect, even in the post-2000 science.
Scrivener and the CSP analysis talk of major retracings.
The CSP site shows a smidgen of minor retracing sections, the overwriter is unidentified.
Skeat and Jongkind, for the main text, tell us .. nothing.
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