Budge_Ethiopic_Alexander

XIV PREFACE.
LL. D., Keeper of the Greek and Roman Anti-
quities of the British Museum, I am indebted for
superintending the reproduction on copper of the
fine head of Alexander the Great in the British
Museum. Thanks are due also to W. Drugulin of
Leipzig, and to his manager Dr. Chamizer, for
the care which they have taken in printing the
book.
To Lady Meux of Theobalds Park, Herts, I
owe entirely the publication of this work. Several
years ago whilst preparing an edition of the Syriac
version of the Alexander story, I copied the
Ethiopic versions which are preserved in the
British Museum, hoping that as, in many par-
ticulars, the Syriac and Ethiopic versions agree,
I might be able to publish them together. The
bulk of the work was, however, found to be so
great that the idea had to be abandonned, and I
was only able to give a brief resume of the work
in the introduction to my History of Alexander.
The copies of the texts which I had made had
lain in my drawer for ten years when Lady Meux
offered to defray the whole cost of publishing
them, together with English translations and notes
this offer was joyfully accepted, and the present
work is the result of her munificence. Further,
Lady Meux, thinking it possible that there might