Ancient Manuscripts How Are They Dated?

IN 1844, Bible scholar Konstantin von Tischendorf visited St.Catherine's monastery, located at the foot of Mount Sinai in Egypt.  Combing through its libraries, he came upon some notable parchments.  Being  a student of paleography, Tischendorf recognized the parchments as leaves from the Septuagint,  A Greek translation of the Hebrew Scriptures, or "Old Testament."  I had seen nothing that could be judged as of greater antiquity than these Sinaitic pages," he wrote. 

Forming part of what later became known as the Sinaitic Manuscript (Codex Sinaiticus), the parchments have been dated to the fourth century C.E. The Sinaitic is just one of the thousand of ancient manuscripts of the Hebrew and Greek Scriptures that make up a truly vast reservoir for scholars to study. 

The Development o the Greek Paleography

A Benedictine monk, Bernard de Monfaucon (1655-1741), laid the foundation for the systematic study of Greek manuscripts.   Later, other scholars added their contributions.  Tischendorf took up the enormous  task of compiling a list of the oldest Greek manuscripts of the Bible in the libraries of Europe.  He also made several trips to the Middle East, studied hundreds of documents, and published his findings. 

In the 20th century, additional tools became available to paleographers.  One is the Marcel Richard list of some 900 catalogs that describe  55,000 manuscripts, Biblical and non-Biblical, belonging to 820 libraries or private owners.  This vast amount of information assists translators and also helps paleographers to date manuscripts more accurately.

Next time: Ancient Manuscripts How Are They Dates?/How Manuscripts Are Dated

From the Awake! magazine