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Another Hierosolymitanus Ligature

4/21/2008 5:19:39 PM
Series: Greek Handwriting
This post is in a series. To see more about the series and other posts in the series, see the bottom of the post or skip to there by clicking here.

This is part n of my never-ending series on Greek handwriting. Here is another ligature:

Recognize that? Probably not. I didn't either. So here's a clue. Here is the same ligature finishing out a very common word.

This is one of those ligatures that make for creating an unnecessary variant. The first ligature occurred at the end of a line and one might mistake it for a comma. But with the grave accent and the fact that Leo the scribe isn't down with much punctuation, it was pretty clear that this was a word and not some random marking.

The answer is that the ligature is for δε. Usually Leo spells out the word, as you can see here:

But apparently not always. The first ligature occurs in 2 Clement 2:3 where the ligature is for the entire word δε. The second in 1 Clement 3:4 where the word with ligature is μηδε.

Series: Greek Handwriting
Series focusing on scribal handwriting in Greek manuscripts. Most manuscripts will be related to the New Testament, though some snippets will be pulled from other pieces of Greek literature.
Want to see more posts in this series?
  1. Greek Handwriting 1 - 1/12/2008
  2. Greek Handwriting 2 - 1/15/2008
  3. Greek Handwriting 3 - 1/23/2008
  4. Greek Handwriting 4 - 2/5/2008
  5. Smarts About The Nomina Sacra - 3/2/2008
  6. Alpha and Lambda In Alexandrinus - 3/3/2008
  7. Ligature in Codex Hierosolymitanus: ει - 3/24/2008
  8. Crazy Kappa Leo - 3/30/2008
  9. Scribe Leo And The Nike Swoosh - 4/4/2008
  10. Another Hierosolymitanus Ligature - 4/21/2008
  11. It Is και Ligature Day - 4/23/2008
  12. Tips For Reading Greek New Testament Minuscule GA 676 - 5/7/2008
  13. Corrections to Uncatalogued Lectionary Fragment (ULF) - 5/12/2008
  14. More Corrections To ULF - 5/13/2008
Comments: 5
Filed Under: Greek Greek Handwriting

Comments

Brett Williams
Monday 4/21/2008 8:48 PM
Eric: Have you seen the scribe's KAI in 2882? It looks like an English 'S' with a downward slanging line above it. Go to file 031a and look at the last line. Is there any rationale as to why this S was used for KAI? By the way, I don't see my Scripture Index for that minuscule. Any reason it is not posted? Brett
Eric
Monday 4/21/2008 9:22 PM
Guess I missed that index. Just uploaded it. As for that ligature for και, you see it quite commonly in Hierosolymitanus (I'll post some pics soon) and I'm pretty sure I've seen in other minuscules. Some uncials even have single-letter ligatures for και.
Brett
Monday 4/21/2008 11:10 PM
Is this "S" even a Greek letter? The older Greek mss of course use all capitals, but even with the minuscules, I don't recall seeing the final sigma that we see in our printed GNTs. Do you know when this final sigma first appears in the Greek mss?
Eric
Monday 4/21/2008 11:25 PM
I'm not sure where the "sign" came in, but I don't think it has anything to do with a final sigma. In this case I think it's more of a symbol than an abbreviation. As for when final sigmas showed up, I'm not sure. I think I read that somewhere, but I don't recall.
Eric
Monday 4/21/2008 11:58 PM
BTW, the slanting line is the grave accent on the και. You can see the same in the symbol for the δε above.

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