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Opera Evangelica: A Lost Collection of Christian Apocrypha

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 June 2021

Tony Burke
Affiliation:
York University, Department of the Humanities, Vanier College, 0247, 76 Winter's Lane, Toronto, ON, M3J 1P3Canada. Email: tburke@yorku.ca
Gregory Peter Fewster
Affiliation:
University of Toronto, Department of Classics, Lillian Massey Building, 125 Queen's Park, Toronto, ON, M5S 2C7Canada. Email: greg.fewster@mail.utoronto.ca

Abstract

Within the holdings of the Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library at the University of Toronto there is a curious, rarely examined handwritten book entitled Opera Evangelica, containing translations of several apocryphal works in English. It opens with a lengthy Preface that provides an antiquarian account of Christian apocrypha along with a justification for translating the texts. Unfortunately, the book's title page gives little indication of its authorship or date of composition, apart from an oblique reference to the translator as ‘I. B.’ But citations in the Preface to contemporary scholarship place the volume around the turn of the eighteenth century, predating the first published English-language compendium of Christian apocrypha in print by Jeremiah Jones (1726). A second copy of the book has been found in the Cambridge University Library, though its selection of texts and material form diverges from the Toronto volume in some notable respects. This article presents Opera Evangelica to a modern audience for the first time. It examines various aspects of the work: the material features and history of the two manuscripts; the editions of apocryphal texts that lie behind its translations; the views expressed on Christian apocrypha by its mysterious author; and its place within manuscript publication and English scholarship around the turn of the eighteenth century. Scholars of Christian apocrypha delight in finding ‘lost gospels’ but in Opera Evangelica we have something truly unique: a long-lost collection of Christian apocrypha.

Type
Articles
Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2021. Published by Cambridge University Press

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Footnotes

The authors wish to thank Germaine Warkentin and Marie Korey for consulting with us on the Toronto manuscript, as well as Thomas Keymer, Timothy Perry, Brandon Hawk, and Germaine Warkentin for reading and commenting on drafts of the article.

References

1 Fabricius, J. A., Codex Apocryphus Novi Testamenti: Collectus, Castigatus Testimoniisque, Censuris & Animadversionibus illustratus (Hamburg: Schiller & Kisner, 1703)Google Scholar; idem, Acta, Epistolae, Apocalypses. Aliaque scripta Apostolis falso inscipta. Sive Codicis Apocryphi Novi Testamenti Tomus ii (Hamburg: Schiller & Kisner, 1719); idem, Codicis Apocryphi Novi Testamenti Pars Tertia nunc Primum Edita (Hamburg: Schiller & Kisner, 1719).

2 J. Jones, A New and Full Method of Settling the Canonical Authority of the New Testament (2 vols.; printed for J. Clark and R. Hett at the Bible and Crown in the Poultrey near Cheapside, 1726). A third volume was added in 1727, incorporating previously published work by Jones. Jones’ translations appear also in the often-reprinted volume by W. Hone: The Apocryphal New Testament (London: printed for William Hone, 1820).

4 See discussion in McKerrow, R. B., An Introduction to Bibliography for Literary Students (Oxford: Clarendon, 1928) 164–74Google Scholar; and further Gaskell, P., A New Introduction to Bibliography (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1974) 80107Google Scholar, on the determination of book formats. An early catalogue entry for T indicates that the book is in the octavo format, but this is probably a reference to its size (Paterson, S., Bibliotheca Moresiana: A Catalogue of the Large and Valuable Library of Printed Books (London, n.p., 1779) 176Google Scholar). Chain lines run horizontally, which one would not expect in an octavo. Meanwhile the watermarks and countermarks are consistently found in the gutter, but vary in their precise position. Therefore, the book could be considered a small quarto or large duodecimo, but most likely the former.

5 ‘Fair copy’ simply describes a copy that had already undergone correction from a draft.

6 The Y was at this point the usual replacement for the much older runic þ (thorn).

7 Catchwords are prevalent in medieval manuscripts, but were adopted also in printed books. It is widely agreed that catchwords were binding aids, facilitating the correct assembly of quires during binding. Accordingly, in both medieval manuscripts and early printed books, catchwords tended to appear at the end of each quire. They were eventually included on each page, especially in English books. See McKerrow, Introduction to Bibliography, 82–4; Beal, P., A Dictionary of English Manuscript Terminology 1450–2000 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008) 65Google Scholar; Brown, M., Understanding Illuminated Manuscripts: A Guide to Technical Terms, Revised Edition (Los Angeles: J. Paul Getty Museum, 2018) 24Google Scholar.

8 See examples of Janssen's watermarks in Churchill, W. A., Watermarks in Paper: In Holland, England, France Etc., in the xvii and xviii Centuries and their Interconnection (Amsterdam: Menno Hertzberger, 1935) ccxiii–iv, 28Google Scholar.

9 See the discussion in Crouzet, F., ‘The Huguenots and the English Financial Revolution’, Favorites of Fortune: Technology, Growth, and Economic Development since the Industrial Revolution (ed. Higonnet, P. L. R. et al. ; Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1991) 230Google Scholar; Veale, E., ‘Janssen, Sir Theodore, First Baronet (c. 1658–1748)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004)Google Scholar, online at https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/14656.

10 It is, of course, impossible to determine the time of publication of a book based solely on watermarks, given that paper can sit for an indeterminate amount of time before being inscribed.

11 Details of Mores’ life and career are accessible in J. Makala, ‘Mores, Edward Rowe (1730–1778)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, online at https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/19203. The precise date and circumstances of Mores’ acquisition of the book are uncertain due to a major shift in dating conventions, from Julian to Gregorian calendars, that had been slowly taking place on the Continent and in England. Although Gregory XIII established his calendar in 1582, Protestant states by-and-large did not adopt the New Style until the eighteenth century, with England following suit in 1752. Therefore, it is most likely that Mores used the Old Style date in his inscription. See the discussion in Cheney, C. R. and Jones, M., eds., A Handbook of Dates for Students of British History (new edition; Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000) 1, 1719Google Scholar.

12 Mores, E. R., A Dissertation upon English Typographical Founders and Founderies (London: n.p., 1778)Google Scholar. This work became the basis for a later monograph on English letter foundries by Talbot Baines Reed, who characterised Mores’ work as a ‘quaint and crabbed sketch, full of valuable but half-digested information’ (A History of the Old English Letter Foundries: With Notes, Historical and Bibliographical, on the Rise and Progress of English Typography (London: Elliot Stock, 1887) vi.

13 The volume, listed as item 53, is described in the auction catalogue of Mores’ library as follows: ‘Opera Evangelica, or the Gospel of St. James and Nicodemus, together with some other remarkable Pieces of Antiquity; done into English, by J. B. 8vo’ (Paterson, Bibliotheca Moresiana, 176).

14 See Fraser, B. J., Church, College, and Clergy: A History of Theological Education at Knox College, Toronto, 1844–1994 (Montreal: McGill-Queen's Press, 1995) 125–6Google Scholar; see also Vaudry, R. W., ‘Theology and Education in Early Victorian Canada: Knox College, Toronto, 1844–61’, Studies in Religion/Sciences Religieuses 16 (1987) 431–47CrossRefGoogle Scholar, at 436.

15 See Fraser, Church, College, and Clergy, 109–10.

16 Horne, T. H., An Introduction to the Critical Study of the Holy Scriptures, vol. i (4th corrected edn; Philadelphia: Littel, 1825) 638Google Scholar.

17 These were taught by Rev. Dr. Michael Willis. See the report on Knox College courses and curricula in The Ecclesiastical and Missionary Record 11, no. 7 (May 1855) 106; Vaudry, ‘Theology and Education’, 443.

18 See https://fisher.library.utoronto.ca/content/knox-college-collection. As noted, a fully digitised catalogue of this collection is in progress.

19 C. Hardwick et al., A Catalogue of the Manuscripts Preserved in the Library of the University of the University of Cambridge (5 vols.; Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1856–7) iii.318–19. The authors wish to thank Jesse Grenz and Matthew Pawlak for photographing the manuscript for us and Simon Gathercole for connecting us with Grenz.

20 On this binding style, see Pearson, D., English Bookbinding Styles 1450–1800: A Handbook (London: British Library, 2005) 73–6Google Scholar. Despite its designation as ‘Cambridge panel style’, the form of binding was widely used throughout England.

21 See Hardy, W. J., Book-Plates (London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trübner & Co., 1893) 5961Google Scholar; also B. N. Lee, British Royal Bookplates and Ex-Libris of Related Families (Aldershot: Scholar, 1992) 89–92.

22 For a detailed discussion of Moore's collection and its donation to Cambridge, see McKitterick, D., Cambridge University Library: A History (2 vols.; Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992–98) ii.47224Google Scholar; and in brief Ringrose, J., ‘The Royal Library: John Moore and his Books’, Cambridge University Library: The Great Collections (ed. Fox, P. K.; Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998) 7889Google Scholar.

23 Bernhard, E., Catalogi librorum manuscriptorum Angliae et Hiberniae (4 vols. in 1; Oxford: E Theatro Sheldoniano, 1697) ii.361–84Google Scholar, with addenda and corrigenda at 390, 393–9 and 399–403.

24 McKitterick (Cambridge University Library, ii.130–42) describes Moore's manuscript collection but without mention of Opera Evangelica.

25 Hardwick et al., Catalogue, 319.

26 Hardwick et al., Catalogue, 456. See also McKitterick, Cambridge University Library, ii.69–70.

27 McKitterick, Cambridge University Library, ii.126–7, 130.

28 See Rivington, C., ‘Sir Thomas Davies: The First Bookseller Lord Mayor of London’, The Library 3 (1981) 187201CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

29 Herold, J., Orthodoxographa Theologiae Sacrosanctae ac syncerioris fidei Doctores Numero lxxvi (Basle: Heinrich Petri, 1555) 123Google Scholar.

30 The translation of Gos. Nic. in Opera Evangelica is close to the Latin A recension available in C. von Tischendorf, ed., Evangelia Apocrypha (1853; 2nd edn, Leipzig: Mendelssohn, 1876) 312–95. Chapter and verse divisions here are based on Tischendorf's edition. For English translations, see J. K. Elliott, The Apocryphal New Testament (Oxford: Clarendon, 1993) 169–85 (Greek A only), 190–8 (Latin A, chs. 17–28).

31 See Herold, Orthodoxographa, 18, at line 18.

32 Robinson, O. P. and Robinson, C. H., Christ's Eternal Gospel: Do the Dead Sea Scrolls, the Pseudepigrapha, and Other Ancient Records Challenge or Support the Bible? (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book Co., 1976) 54–5Google Scholar.

33 Robinson and Robinson, Christ's Eternal Gospel, 54.

34 On these collections, see the studies by I. D. Backus, ‘Les apocryphes néo-testamentaires et la pédagogie luthérienne des xviiexviie siècles. Les recueils de Michael Neander (1564, 1567) et Nicolas Glaser (1614)’, Apocryphité. Histoire d'un concept transversal aux religions du livre. En hommage à Pierre Geoltrain (ed. S. C. Mimouni; Bibliothèque de l’École des Hautes Études. Sciences religieuses, 113; Turnhout: Brepols, 2002) 263–76; eadem, ‘Early Christianity in Michael Neander's Greek–Latin Edition of Luther's Catechism’, History of Scholarship: A Selection of Papers from the Seminar on the History of Scholarship Held Annually at the Warburg Institute (ed. C. Ligota and J.-L. Quantin; Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006) 197–230; eadem, Historical Method and Confessional Identity in the Era of Reformation (1378–1615) (Studies in Medieval and Reformation Thought 94; Leiden: Brill, 2003), esp. 253–324; eadem, ‘Jacques Lefèvre d'Étaples: A Humanist or a Reformist View of Paul and his Theology?’, A Companion to Paul in the Reformation (ed. R. W. Holder; Leiden: Brill, 2009) 61–90; and eadem, ‘Renaissance Attitudes towards New Testament Apocrypha: Jacques Lefèvre d'Étaples and his Epigones’, Renaissance Quarterly 51 (1998) 1169–97. Some of Backus’ work is summarised in J.-M. Roessli, ‘North American Approaches to the Study of the Christian Apocrypha on the World Stage’, Forbidden Texts on the Western Frontier: The Christian Apocrypha in North American Perspectives. Proceedings of the 2013 York University Christian Apocrypha Symposium (ed. T. Burke; Eugene, OR: Cascade, 2015) 19–57, at 38–44.

35 G. Postel, Proteuangelion, Sive de Natalibus Iesu Christi, & Ipsius Matris Virginis Mariae, Sermo Historicus Diui Iacobi Minoris, Consobrini & Fratris Domini Iesu, Apostoli Primarii, & Episcopi Christianorum Primi Hierosolymis (Basle: Johannes Oporinus, 1552).

36 As observed above, a note in the margin of the translation of Ep. Lent. indicates that the author has compared the text from the Orthodoxographa and the Magdeburg Centuries (T, p. 144).

37 See M. Flacius, ed., Ecclesiastica Historia, Integram Ecclesiae Christi Ideam, Quantum Ad Locum, vol. i (Basle: Johannes Oporinus, 1559) 354–5. The volume also includes the Letter of Jesus to Abgar, which is not included in the Toronto volume. There is a 1544 edition of Hegesippus that includes the Epistle of Pilate to Claudius – a reprint of the editio princeps printed in Paris by Josse Bade and prepared by Jacques Lefèvre d’Étaples. The 1544 edition seems an unlikely source, however; it was printed in Cologne not Basle, and the text departs from that found in the Magdeburg Centuries. Additionally, as noted, OE indicates explicitly that the Epistle of Pilate to Claudius was printed with the other three works. See J. Gennepaeus, ed., Egesippi Historiographi inter scriptores ecclesiasticos vetustissimi, de rebus a Iudaeorum principibus in obsidione fortiter gestis, deque excidio Hierosolymorum, aliarumque civitatum adicentium, libri v (Cologne: Johannes Soter, 1544) lxvi–lxvii.

38 See Gounelle, R. and Izydorczyk, Z., ‘Thematic Bibliography of the Acts of Pilate’, The Medieval Gospel of Nicodemus: Texts, Intertexts, and Contexts in Western Europe (ed. Izydorczyk, Z.; Tempe, AZ: Medieval & Renaissance Texts & Studies, 1997) 418519Google Scholar, at 431–2.

39 J. L. d’Étaples, ed., Pseudo-Dionysius Areopagita: opera (trans. A. Traversarius; Paris: Johann Higman & Wolfgang Hopyl, 1498–9).

40 See Comber, T., Christianity No Enthusiasm: Or, the Several Kinds of Inspirations and Revelations Pretended to by the Quakers, Tried, and Found Destructive to Holy Scripture and True Religion (London: Henry Brome, 1678) 58Google Scholar; Dodwell, H., Dissertationes in Irenaeum (Oxford: E Theatro Sheldoniano, 1689)Google Scholar.

41 Baxter, R., A Paraphrase on the New Testament, with Notes, Doctrinal and Practical. The Second Edition Corrected (London: T. Parkhurst, 1695)Google Scholar.

42 Sylburgio, F., ed., Clementis Alexandrini Opera Graece et Latine quae Extant. Editio Nova (Cologne: Schrey, 1688)Google Scholar.

43 D. Erasmus, ed., Opus eruditissimum divi Irenaei episcopi Lugdunensis in quinque libros digestum (Basle: Froben, 1526) 38.

44 F. Feuardent, ed., Divi Irenaei episcopi Lugdunensis, et martyris, adversus Valentini, et similium Gnosticorum Haeresis, Libri quinque: Iam secundo diligenti editorum codicum collatione (Cologne: Arnold Mylius, 1596) 105; cf. idem, Divi Irenaei episcopi Lugdunensis, et martyris, adversus Valentini, et similium Gnosticorum Haeresis, Libri quinque (Paris: Apud Sebastianum Niuellium, 1576) 49.

45 Grabe, J. E., ed., Sancti Irenaei Episcopi Lugdunensis et Martyris, Detectionis et Eversionis falso cognominatae agnitionis seu Contra Haereses libri quinque (Oxford: E Theatro Sheldoniano, 1702), 86Google Scholar. See the discussion of the Greek fragments in A. Rousseau and L. Doutreleau, eds., Irénée de Lyon: Contre les hérésies. Livre i, vol. i: Introduction, notes justificatives, tables (Sources chrétiennes 263; Paris: Éditions du Cerf, 1979) 61–100.

46 Massuet, R., ed., Sancti Irenaei Episcopi Lugdunensis et Martyris, Detectionis et Eversionis falso cognominatae agnitionis seu Contra Haereses libri quinque (Paris: Coignard, 1710) 91Google Scholar. However, it is worth noting that Massuet does include the previous numeration in the margins.

47 Toland, J., Nazarenus: Or, Jewish, Gentile, and Mahometan Christianity (London: J. Brown, J. Roberts and J. Brotherton, 1718)Google Scholar.

48 J. Toland ‘A Catalogue of Books mentioned by the Fathers and other Ancient Writers, as truly or falsely ascrib'd to Jesus Christ, his Apostles, and other eminent Persons: with several important Remarks and Observations relating to the Canon of Scripture’, Amyntor: Or, a Defence of Milton's Life (London: n.p., 1699) 20–41; idem, ‘A Catalogue of Books Mention'd by the Fathers and Other Ancient Writers, as Truely or Falsely Ascrib'd to Jesus Christ, His Apostles, and Other Eminent Persons; or of Such Books as Do Immediately Concern the Same: Some of Which Pieces Are Still Extant Entire, Most of Which Shall Be Markt in Their Places; Tho the Fragments Only of the Greatest Part Remain, and but the Bare Titles of Others’, A Collection of Several Pieces of John Toland, Now Publish'd from His Original Manuscripts: With Some Memoirs of His Life and Writings (2 vols.; London: J. Peele, 1726) i.359–403. Since the latter ‘Catalogue’ was published posthumously, it is unclear when the revision was actually made.

49 This quotation appears in both Toland's telling of the story and in a posthumous printing of Blackhall's sermons. See ‘Discourse xcvii: God's Design in afflicting good Men. Preached on the thirtieth of January’, The Works of the Right Reverend Father in God, Ofspring Blackall, D.D. Late Lord Bishop of Exeter, vol. ii (London: Thomas Ward in the Inner-Temple Lane, 1723) 1077; Toland, Amyntor, 11–13; cf. J. Toland, The Life of John Milton, Containing, besides the History of His Works, Several Extraordinary Characters of Men and Books, Sects, Parties, and Opinions (London: John Darby in Bartholomew Close, 1699) 90–1.

50 Toland, Amyntor, 16.

51 As argued in P. Lurbe, ‘“Those Fabulous Dragons Teeth”: Invented Beginnings, Lost Causes and New Beginnings in John Toland's Amyntor (1699)’, Études anglaises 66 (2013) 139–41.

52 See J. Champion, ‘Apocrypha Canon and Criticism from Samuel Fisher to John Toland, 1650–1718’, Judaeo-Christian Intellectual Culture in the Seventeenth Century: A Celebration of the Library of Narcissus Marsh (1638–1713) (ed. S. P. Coudert et al.; Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1999) 102–9, on Toland's ‘Catalogue’ in particular; and idem, ‘Enlightened Erudition and the Politics of Reading in John Toland's Circle’, The Historical Journal 49 (2006) 111–41, on Toland's provocative mode of scholarship more generally.

53 Whiston's contributions thus operated at an intersection between scholarship on apocrypha, on one hand, and ongoing Trinitarian debates, on the other. As Kristine Haugen points out, however, Whiston was part of a movement that enacted shifts in the modes by which Trinitarian debates were conducted, shifts that included antiquarian and textual scholarship. See K. L. Haugen, ‘Transformations of the Trinity Doctrine in English Scholarship: From the History of Beliefs to the History of Texts’, Archiv für Religionsgeschichte 3 (2010) 149–68.

54 W. Whiston, Primitive Christianity Reviv'd (4 vols.; London: n.p., 1712); idem, A Collection of Authentick Records Belonging to the Old and New Testament, Translated into English (2 vols.; London: n.p., 1727–8).

55 Jones, New and Full Method, 33–6, at 35.

56 Jones, New and Full Method, 165–78. Manuscripts of the correspondence were known by 1644 to James Ussher and John Gregory. However, the text was only unpublished in 1715 by David Wilkins and was reprinted shortly thereafter by Fabricius. See D. Wilkins, Epistolae S. Pauli ad Corinthios et Corinthiorum ad S. Paulum Armenicae ex Musaeo Viri Clarissimi Philippi Massonii, Versionem Latinam accurante Davide Wilkins (Amsterdam: Typis Guilielmi & Davidis Goerei, 1715); Fabricius, Codex apocryphus, i.668–83; cf. J. Ussher, In Polycarpianam epistolarum Ignatianarum syllogen annotationes (Oxford: Henricus Hall, 1644) 29; J. Gregory, Notes and Observations upon Some Passages of Scripture (Oxford: R. Royston, 1646) 2*.

57 James Ussher had long been engaged in debates concerning the relative authority of bishops. He contended especially with John Milton, who shared Ussher's view that the Ignatian epistles are crucial data for the early history of the episcopate. Ussher's construction of the so-called ‘middle recension’, which he published in 1644 (Polycarpi et Ignatii Epistolae: Una cum vetere vulgata interpretatione Latina, ex trium manuscriptorum codicum collatione, integretati suae restituta (Oxford: Leonardus Licefield, 1644)), was a crucial element of his developing positions. See the discussion of Ussher and Milton on the episcopacy in J. Max Patrick, ‘The Date of Milton's “Of Prelatical Episcopacy”’, Huntington Library Quarterly 13 (1950) 303–11; W. M. Abbott, ‘James Ussher and “Ussherian” Episcopacy, 1640–1656: The Primate and his Reduction Manuscript’, Albion: A Quarterly Journal Concerned with British Studies 22 (1990) 237–59; and A. Ford, James Ussher: Theology, History, and Politics in Early-Modern Ireland and England (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007) 223–56.

58 See generally the discussions in H. Love, Scribal Publication in Seventeenth-Century England (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1993); P. Beal, In Praise of Scribes: Manuscripts and their Makers in Seventeenth-Century England (Oxford: Clarendon, 1998); A. Johns, The Nature of the Book: Print and Knowledge in the Making (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1998); M. J. M. Ezell, Social Authorship and the Advent of Print (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1999); D. McKitterick, Print, Manuscript and the Search for Order, 1450–1830 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003); and S. Gillespie, English Translation and Classical Reception: Towards a New Literary History (Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell, 2011) 104–22. Unfortunately, as Ezell points out, ‘the latter part of the seventeenth and the early part of the eighteenth century still lack a clear description of the nature of manuscript literary activity, much less a theory of nonprint literary culture’ (p. 22). This continues to be true, twenty years later.

59 As Grafton states, ‘The experience of collectors and readers changed rather less sharply than one might expect with the advent of printed books’ (A. T. Grafton, ‘The Importance of Being Printed’, Journal of Interdisciplinary History 11 (1980) 265–86, at 274).

60 Grafton, ‘Importance of Being Printed’, 274.

61 On such cautions, see Love, Scribal Publication, 36–8, 187–9, 217–24; Grafton, ‘Importance of Being Printed’, 276–8; Johns, Nature of the Book, 104–5, 458–9; McKitterick, Print, 97–138, 152–62. Note also that sometimes manuscript copies of printed books were made because the print versions were no longer available (McKitterick, Print, 47).

62 Some sections appear in G. E. Lessing, Zur Geschichte und Literatur: Aus den Schätzen der herzoglichen Bibliothek zu Wolfenbüttel (Braunschweig: Fürstl. Waysenhaus-Buchhandlun, 1774–8), with others published by other writers in subsequent years. The Apologie was printed from a copy given to Lessing by Reimarus’ son; the Lessings were not pleased that he published it. The entire text is now available in H. S. Reimarus, Reimarus: Fragments (ed. C. H. Talbert; trans. R. S. Fraser; Philadelphia; Fortress, 1970). On details of Reimarus’ life and career, see Talbert's ‘Introduction’ to Reimarus: Fragments, 3–43; and in more detail, U. Groetsch, Hermann Samuel Reimarus (1694–1768): Classicist, Hebraist, Enlightenment Radical in Disguise (Brill's Studies in Intellectual History 237; Leiden: Brill, 2015).

63 On the other known copies, some of which are now lost, see Talbert, ‘Introduction’, 18–20.

64 The earlier draft of Nazarenus, written in French, is entitled ‘Christianisme judaique et mohametan’ (Vienna, Österreichische Nationalbibliothek, MS 10325, a). See the critical edition and introduction, J. Toland, Nazarenus (ed. J. Champion; Oxford: Voltaire Foundation, 1999); with further discussion in F. S. Jones, ‘The Genesis, Purpose, and Significance of John Toland's Nazarenus’, The Rediscovery of Jewish Christianity: From Toland to Baur (ed. F. S. Jones; Boston: SBL, 2012) 91–101.

65 As Champion points out, the full catalogue known from Amyntor and the posthumous edition of Toland's writings is not extant in this surviving manuscript. However, its title and the text itself suggests that, at some point, the manuscript contained the full ‘Catalogue’. Toland also appears to have sent a manuscript copy of the ‘Catalogue’ to Jacob Arminius. See J. Champion, Republican Learning: John Toland and the Crisis of Christian Culture, 1696–1722 (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2003) 193–94. An edition of Österreichische Nationalbibliothek Ms 10325, a–e, is now available: J. Toland, Dissertations diverses. Édition, introduction et notes (ed. Lia Mannarino; Paris: Champion, 2005).

66 Love, Scribal Publication, 47.

67 Swanson, D. R., ‘Undiscovered Public Knowledge’, Library Quarterly 56 (1986) 103–18CrossRefGoogle Scholar, esp. 116.