apostolicfathers0201clem - Carmel Apologetics

7l6 EPISTLE OF S. POLYCARP.
raneous. Secondly ; as they were interposed between two sets of Acts
both belonging to the age of the Antonines, the first impulse would be
to assign them to the same age.
The Acts of Fiofiius, as hitherto published, appear only in Latin,
but in two different recensions. (A) An old Latin version of Greek
Acts, first published in full by Ruinart Act. Sine. Mart. p.
i88 sq
(ed. Ratisbon.) from two Colbertine and two other mss. BoUand {Act.
Sand. Febr. i)
had already given fragments of this recension from a
MS of the monastery of S. Maximin at Treves. One of the Colbertme
MSS is stated by Ruinart to be nearly eight hundred years old ('ad annos
800 accedit').
I have myself looked at the British Museum MS Harl.
2800, which contains these Acts (fol. 246 b); but its text is corrupt and
of no value. (B) A modern Latin version made from 'the Metaphrast,'
and pubUshed under Febr. i by Lipomannus (a.d. 155 i sq) and Surius
(a.d. 1570). The greater part is
given likewise by Baronius Ann.
Eccles. s. a. 254. It is
reprinted
in Bolland Act. Sanct. Februarius i.
p. 37 sq. By the kindness of Dr O. von Gebhardt, who has transcribed
the unpublished Greek Acts from a MS in the Library of S. Mark,
Venice, Graec. ccclix, with a view to publication, I am enabled to give
some extracts. So far as I can judge from these extracts, this seems to
be the same recension from which the Latin version in Surius, Bolland,
and the others is made.
Of the comparative merits of these two recensions, which I shall call
A and B respectively, it
would be more easy to judge if we possessed
the more ancient
the originals. On the whole A seems to preserve
form. The chief distinguishing characteristic of B is the insertion of
some explanatory details which are wanting in A. Thus in § 3 B gives
a notice about the movements of the crowd, which implies some local
knowledge cum in forum venissent et in (' portion ad orientem sita ad
portam duplicem constitissent, impletum est totum forum et superiores
porticus, etc.'). So again in § 9,
where we are told that Sabina had
been schooled by Pionius to give her name as Theodota ' ne in manus
dominae impiae posset incidere,' the allusion is
unexplained in A (see
above, p. 639) but B inserts an explanation of which I give the ori-
;
ginal from the Venice MS: Trpos to ju,t) ifx-ma-uv avrrju ck tov ovofiaros
n-dXiV eh ras x"P«5 ttJs avd/xou YIoXltt7]