Budge_Ethiopic_Alexander

CHRISTIAN CHARACTER OF THE NARRATIVE. XXV
and the similarity of its contents with those of the
Syriac version is striking. Between it, however,
and the Syriac, there is one remarkable difference.
In the Syriac version of the Pseudo-Callisthenes
there are a few passages which seemed to me to
indicate the hand of the Christian priest,' but it
is not until we come to the "Christian Legend"
that the whole narrative becomes imbued with
Christian ideas and traditions, and has compara-
tively little connexion with the work of the Pseudo-
Callisthenes.^ In the Ethiopic version, however, Alexander
Alexander has become a Christian king, and his King.
'^'^°
words and acts are represented as those of a
convert to the Christian religion. It is not easy
to decide whether the Ethiopian translator invented
these things, or whether he found them in the
Arabic work from which he translated, or whether
he found this idea suggested therein and enlarged
upon it; many statements certainly seem to be
additions by the Christian translator, for they
cannot possibly be of Muslim origin. In matters
' Prof. Noeldeke thinks not. "Dass. der Uebersetzer
gerade ein Geistlicher war^ wie Budge meint, ist nicht not-
wendig; die sehr wenigen biblischen Anklange, die sich im
Syr. zeigen, wiirden auch bei einem Laien nicht auffallen."
Beitrage, p. 17.
^ "Diese Erzahlung ware zwar ohne Pseudocallisthenes
kaum denkbar, denn erst aus der Umbildung des geschicht-
Hchen Helden in den des Romans konnte der Konig der
Legende werden, aber im Einzelnen hangt sie nur durch
wenige Ziige mit ihm zusammen." Beitrdge, p. 30.