tinct characters are used; the figure denoting F, and the letter P. So also in the grammatical forms, the Chaldee developement is followed in preference to the Western Syriac. To this version has been given the name of the HIEROSOLYMITAN. It was made on the basis of the Alexandrine Greek text. The passage, John vii. 53; viii. 1-11, wanting in the Peschito, is given in close resemblance with the text of the Codex Bezæ.

V. THE SCRIPTURES IN THE DIALECTS OF EGYPT.

CHRISTIANITY took early root in Egypt. Among the first evangelists we find men of Alexandrine education, as Apollos and Barnabas of Cyprus. The apocryphal "Gospel according to the Egyptians" is thought, by Neander, to prove the influence so soon exerted by the great facts of our religion among that people.*

Tradi

tion assigns to St. Mark the honour of being the founder of the church in Alexandria. Constant intercourse and congeniality of spirit would contribute to spread the gospel among the Jewish and Grecian colonies in Lower Egypt; and though the prevailing use of the country language, the power of the priests, and the strength of the olden superstitions, would render the progress of the truth difficult in Middle and Upper Egypt, yet a persecution of the Christians in Thebais, under the emperor Septimius Severus,† proves that the faith of the Cross had already made considerable way in Upper Egypt towards the close of the second century.

I. The Coptic language was a combination of the antique Egyptian and Greek; the latter having become so widely used in Lower Egypt after the time of Alexander, * NEANDER, K. G. § 1. + EUSEB. H. E. lib. vi. cap. 1. + Coptos, Aiguptos. So Scaliger.

as, by coalescing with the parent language, to have produced a new dialect.

The version of scripture in this tongue is called, interchangeably, the Coptic or Memphitic. The Old Testament is from the Hesychian text of the Seventy, and was probably executed in the fourth century. Parts of it only survive. Of these, Wilkins published the Pentateuch, in 1731. The Psalms were printed at Rome, in 1744 and 1749. Portions of Jeremiah, (ix. 17, to xiii.) by Mingarelli, at Bologna, in 1785; and the ninth chapter of Daniel, by Münter, at Rome, in 1786. In our own time, Archdeacon Tattam has published the twelve Minor Prophets, at Oxford. The New Testament was rendered on the Alexandrine Greek text, and not later than the third century. It was edited by Dr. Wilkins, with a Latin version, and printed at Oxford.

II. In the Sahidic or Thebaic dialect the Old and New Testaments had been translated, according to Woide, in the second century. But the work was probably co-eval with the Memphitic. Parts of the Old Testament have been edited by Münter, Zoëga, and Mingarelli; and of the New, by Woide and Ford. As might be expected, it harmonizes, with some few exceptions, with the Alexandrine recension of the Greek.

III. There was a third Egyptian version, in a bastard kind of dialect, called the Bashmuric, Ammonian, or (as Quatremere) Oasitic, of which some fragments only of each Testament have been brought to light. These were published at Copenhagen, in 1816, with a Latin version.

[The student who wishes to turn his attention to these dialects will find, both on them and the other oriental languages, a valuable bibliography of Grammars and Lexicons in the Rev. T. H. Horne's "Introduction to the

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critical Study of the Holy Scriptures.' The several editions of the Egyptian scriptures above mentioned are entitled as follows:

Quinque Libri Moysis Prophetæ in Lingua Ægyptiaca. Ex MSS. Vaticano, Parisiensi, et Bodleiano descripsit, ac Latine vertit DAVID WILKINS. Lond. 1731. 4to.

Psalterium Coptico Arabicum. Roma, 1744, 4to. Psalterium Alexandrinum Coptico-Arabicum. Romæ, 1749, 4to.

Duodecim Prophetarum minorum Libros in Lingua Egyptiaca, vulgo Coptica seu Memphitica: Edidit H. TATTAM, A.M. Oxon. 1836, 8vo.

Novum Testamentum Egyptiacum, vulgo Copticum: ex MSS. Bodleianis descripsit, cum Vaticanis et Parisiensibus contulit, et in Latinum Sermonem convertit DAVID WILKINS. Oxonii, 1716, 4to.

SAHIDIC.-Appendix ad Editionem Novi Testamenti Græci e Codice Alexandrino descripti a G. C. WOIDE: in qua continentur Fragmenta Novi Testamenti juxta Interpretationem Dialecti Superioris Ægypti, quæ Thebaica vel Sahidica appellatur, e Codd. Oxoniens. maxima ex parte desumpta. Cum Dissertatione de Versione Egyptiaca: Quibus subjicitur Codicis Vaticani Collatio. Oxon. 1799, fol.

FREDERICI MUNTER Commentatio de Indole Versionis Novi Testamenti Sahidica: accedunt Fragmenta Epistolarum Pauli ad Timotheum, ex Membranis Sahidicis Musei Borgiani, Velitris. Hafnia, 1789.

Fragmentum Evangelii S. Joannis Græco-Coptico-Thebaicum ex Museo Borgiano, Latine versum et Notis illustratum ab AUGUSTINO ANTONIO GEORGIO. Rom. 1789, 4to.

BASHMURIC.-Fragmenta Basmurico-Coptica Veteris et Novi Testamenti, quæ in Museo Borgiano Velitris asservantur, cum reliquis Versionibus Egyptiis contulit, Latine vertit, nec non criticis et philologicis Adnotationibus illustravit, W. F. ENGELBRETH. Hafnia, 1816, 4to.]

VI. THE BIBLE IN ETHIOPIC.

THOUGH revealed religion had not been altogether unknown in Abyssinia in preceding ages, through the medium of intercourse with Palestine, and, at the commencement of the gospel era, by the presence of converted Jews and proselytes; yet it was not till far into the fourth century that Christianity had manifested its power in those lands, or that Ethiopia, as a nation, stretched out her hands unto God.* Hence the assertion sometimes made, that the Ethiopic version dates so far back as the second century, is altogether improbable. That the version, however, was nearly co-eval with the first general outgoings of the gospel in the country, is evident from the reference which Chrysostom makes to its existence in his time. This translation is in the Geez, or sacred dialect of the Ethiopians. The Old Testament is from the Septuagint. It is used by the Abyssinian Jews, though evidently made by Christians. The New Testament is said to have been from the Greek: it is a literal version, though not equal in all its parts, and agrees with the text of Alexandria; but the translators appear to have had frequent reference to the Syrian Peschito. Some critics have thought that it was made upon several existing versions rather than the Greek archetype. Could this opinion be substantiated, its value would be materially diminished.

The Ethiopic New Testament is in four parts: the Gospels, the Acts, the fourteen Epistles of St. Paul, the

* 1 Kings x. Acts viii. SOCRAT. SCHOL., Hist. Eccl. lib. i. p. 19. LUDOLF. Hist. Æthiop. vol. iii. p. 4. See too an abstract of the "History of the Abyssinian Church," by PROFESSOR LEE, appended to BISHOP GOBAT'S "Journal of a Residence" in that Country, p. 322.

+ Hom. 2 in Joan.

catholic epistles. The Book of Revelation (Abukalamsis) takes the form of a supplement.

[For an account of known biblical manuscripts in Ethiopic, see LUDOLF'S "Commentary on his History of the Ethiopians," Francfort, 1691. LE LONG, Bib. Sac. ed. Masch. vol. i. p. 173. BRUCE'S "Travels," vol. i. book ii. c. 6, 7. HORNE'S "Introduction," vol. ii. part i. p. 229; and the Catalogue published by T. P. Platt in 1823.]

The portions which have been hitherto printed, are the Psalms and Canticles, by Potken, at Rome, 1513: reprinted at Cologne in 1518. The Psalms are printed from Potken's text in the London Polyglot, 1656. have also an Ethiopic Psalter edited by Ludolf.*

We

The New Testament in this language was first printed at Rome, with the title, Testamentum Novum, cum Epistola Pauli ad Hebræos........Quæ omnia FR. Petrus, Ethiops, Auxilio Piorum, sedente Paulo iii. Pont. Max. et Claudio illius Regni Imperatore, imprimi curavit, Anno Salutis 1548. Romæ, 4to. This edition, which is of the utmost rarity, was reprinted in the London Polyglot. But it is not unimportant to mention, that in the Acts of the Apostles, the manuscript being defective, some parts were rendered, by the editors, from the Vulgate.†

A Latin translation of the Ethiopic Gospels was made by Dudley Loftus, and corrected, though insufficiently, by Castel, for the Polyglot; but the more accurate version is that by Professor Bode.‡

* Reprinted by the Bible Society in 1815.

+ The names of the editors, themselves Abyssinians, are found in the subscription at the end of Matthew's Gospel. They were Tesfa Sion, Malhesin, (who took the name of Peter, as in the title,) Tensca Waldi, and Zalaski.

Novum Testamentum ex Versione Æthiopici Interpretis in Bibliis, polyglottis Anglicanis editum, ex Æthiopica Lingua in Latinam translatum. Brunsvigæ, 1752, 1755. 2 tom. 4to.