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EVTIVW 1LEFM1
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EVTIVW 1LEFM1 TPEla Ka--co ra 7rpos TIpI KaXXtep--al T1)V beau rou 7r'—) In the See also:long range covered by the See also:Greek papyri the formation of individual letters necessarily varied under different influences; but in not a few instances the See also:original shapes were remarkably maintained. From those which thus remained conservative it is rash to See also:attempt to draw conclusions as to the precise See also:age of the several documents in which they occur. On the other See also:hand, there are some which at certain periods adopted shapes which were in See also:vogue for a limited See also:time and then disappeared, never to be resumed. Such forms can very properly be regarded as sure guides to the palaeographer in assigning See also:dates. We may therefore take a brief survey of the Greek cursive See also:alphabet of the papyri and See also:note some of the peculiarities of individual letters. The incipient See also:form of the See also:alpha which gradually See also:developed into the minuscule See also:letter of the See also:middle ages may be traced back to the Ptolemaic documents of the and See also:century B.C., but the more cursive letter, which was a See also:simple acute See also:angle, representing only two of the three strokes of which the See also:primitive letter was composed, was characteristic of the 3rd century B.C., and seems to have gone out of use within the Ptolemaic See also:period. The development of the cursive beta is interesting. At the very beginning we find two forms in use: the primitive See also:capital letter and a cursive shape somewhat resembling a small n, being in fact an imperfectly written B in which the bows are slurred. This form lasted through the Ptolemaic period. Then arose the natural tendency to See also:reverse the strokes and to form the letter on the principle of n; but still the capital letter also continued in use, so that through the See also:Roman and See also:Byzantine periods the u-shape and the B-shape run on See also:side by side. Analogously the letter kappa, formed on somewhat the same lines as the beta, runs a similar course in developing a cursive u-shaped form by the side of the primitive capital. See also:Delta remained fairly true to its primitive form until the Byzantine period, when the See also:elongation of the See also:head into a flourish led on to the minuscule letter which is See also:familiar to us in the See also:medieval and See also:modern alphabet. Epsilon, the most frequently recurring letter in Greek texts, departs less from its original rounded uncial form that might have been expected. Frequent and varied as its cursive formations are, yet the original shape is seldom quite disguised, the See also:variations almost in all instances arising from the devices of the See also:scribe to dispose swiftly and conveniently of the See also:cross-See also:bar by incorporating it with the See also:rest of the letter. The tendency to curtail the second See also:vertical See also:limb of eta, leading eventually to the h-shape, is in See also:evidence from the first. But in the development of this letter we have one of the instances of temporary forms which lasted only within a fixed period. In the 1st century, side by side with the more usual form, there appears a modification of it, somewhat resembling the contemporary upsilon, consisting of a shallow See also:horizontal See also:curve with a vertical limb slightly turned in at the See also:foot, 1. Its development from the original H is evident: the first vertical limb is slurred, and survives only in the beginning of the horizontal curve, while the cross-bar and the second vertical are combined in the rest of the letter. This form was in See also:general use from the middle of the 1st to the middle of the and century, becoming less See also:common after about A.D. 16o, and practically disappearing about A.D. 200. The letters formed wholly or in See also:part by circles or loops, theta, omikron, rho, phi, in the earlier centuries have such circles or loops of a small See also:size. Just as there is an See also:analogy between beta and kappa in their developments, as already noticed, so also do mu and pi advance on somewhat similar lines. From the earliest time there is a resemblance between the broad shallow forms of the two letters in the 3rd century B.C., and particularly when they adopt the form of a See also:convex' stroke the likeness is very See also:close; and again, in both Roman and Byzantine periods an n-shaped development appears among the forms of both letters. There is also one phase in the development of sigma which affords a useful criterion fot dtio‘e O-Evaneit. fixing the date of documents within a fixed limit of time. In the Ptolemaic period the letter, always of the C-form, is upright, with a flattened horizontal head; in the Roman period a tendency sets in to curve the head, and in the course of the 1st century, by the side of the old stiffer form of the letter, another more cursive one appears, in which the head is See also:drawn down more and more in a curve, C' C'. This form is in common use from the latter part of the 1st century to the beginning of the 3rd century. The cursive form of tau, in which the horizontal stroke is kept to the See also:left of the vertical limb, without See also:crossing it, is one of the See also:early shapes of the letter. The formation of the letter Xi in three distinct horizontal strokes is characteristic of the Ptolemaic period, as distinguished from the later type of letter in which the bars are more or less connected. Lastly; the early Ptolemaic form of the w-shaped omega is noticeable from having its second curve undeveloped, the letter having the See also:appearance of being clipped. See also:Literary Hands.—Literary papyri written in See also:book-hands, distinct from the cursive See also:writing which has been under See also:consideration (and in which literary See also:works were also occasionally written), may be divided into two classes: those which were produced by skilled See also:scribes, and therefore presumably for the See also:market, and those which were written less elegantly, but. still in a literary hand, and were probably copied by or for scholars for their own use. See also:Standing at the head of all, and holding that See also:rank as the only literary See also:papyrus of any extent which may be placed in the 4th century B.C., is the famous lyrical See also:work of See also:Timotheus of See also:Miletus, entitled the Persae, which has already been referred to and of which a See also:section of a few lines is here reproduced: . See also:AIN-A- r4U r1AI7E'NALN'E'AA T'F1`~~'~'-1`~NEve. 1`tllaMA a=oYt MPYPat'ACAIa, r6 NaE't4TA&E'ahr1i AAM F'f E'AA AAArf See also:rat' rN 7 TE me NT ET ?As (—µa fbaro SE KUµalvw--v O•Elplac re vaes EXX-- re r7aav vtwv 7ro?Ua--a%ouo-c,u 7.c 7rvpos Se ae$a--S o vo ra SE aAyri--a a µEs EXAaSa r7yav--yvvm 71Ev r€rpao—) The hand, as will be seen, is rather heavy and irregular, but written with facility and strength, and, though the papyrus, perhaps, is not to be classed among the calligraphic productions for the book market, it must rank as a well-written example of the literary script of the time. Capital forms of letters which afterwards assumed the rounded shapes known as uncial are here conspicuous. The exactly formed alpha, the square epsilon with projecting head-stroke, the irregular sigma, the small theta and omikron are to be remarked. Indeed, the only letter which departs essentially from the See also:lapidary See also:character of the alphabet is the omega, here a See also:half-cursive form but still retaining the principle of the structure of the old See also:horse-See also:shoe letter and quite distinct from the w-shape which was soon to be developed. Of this type of writing are also the two non-literary documents already mentioned above, viz. the " Curse of See also:Artemisia " at See also:Vienna, and the See also:marriage See also:contract of the See also:year 311–310 B.C., found at Elephantine. In the latter the sigma appears in the rounded uncial form. By rare See also:good See also:fortune important literary fragments were recovered in the Gurob collection, which yielded the mostancient dated cursive documents of the 3rd century B.C., so that, almost from the beginning, we start with coeval specimens of both the cursive and of the book-hand, and we are in a position to compare the two styles on equal terms, and thus approximately to date the literary papyri. Palaeographically, this is a See also:matter of the first importance; for while cursive documents, from their nature, in most instances See also:bear actual dates, the periods of literary examples have chiefly to be decided by comparison, and often by conjecture. The literary fragments from Gurob fall into the two See also:groups just indicated, See also:MSS. written for See also:sale and scholars' copies. Of the former are some considerable portions of two works, the See also:Phaedo of See also:Plato and the lost See also:Antiope of See also:Euripides. Both are written in carefully formed characters of a small type, but of the two the Phaedo is the better executed. As the cursive fragments among which they were found date back to before the middle of the 3rd century B.c., it is reasonable to See also:place these literary remains also about the same period. Their survival is a particularly interesting fact in the See also:history of Greek See also:palaeography, for in them we have specimens of literary rolls which may be fairly assumed to differ very little in appearance from the See also:manuscripts contemporary with the See also:great classical authors of See also:Greece. Indeed, the Phaedo was probably written within a See also:hundred years of the See also:death of the author. In the facsimile (fig. 7) of a few lines from this papyrus here placed before the reader, the characteristics of the Ptolemaic cursive hand are also to some extent to be observed in the formal book-hand: tfw'er-c E 1L rcAsrfl ~••T N Arr A), vP-p pi rJ sc M MI-t See also:AnI A,-h i ?tp1–tc A'I'A~-rHNIAEIcEA1"iMrJc'A• Af r•tcAl VA I A. 0rolsFeeAir-eApAlc AF'Y'fc AtI-ciMrEyrI44i'M{-c4c,iI4A i'1 (—oEwv 7raOov0•a de EK TOVTW/L —avaKwp€CV ovoµ µ77 avayK77 xf n7v[O1 ac avrrp' S as eavrrgv au). XEyeCBac Kai aOpoq'EVBac 7rapaKe Xev6o[O]ac 7nareuaV Se tc1)SEYL aX7Wl) The general breadth of the square letters, the smallness of the letters composed of circles and loops, and the particular formation of such letters as pi and the clipped omega, are repeated. But the approach also of many of the letters to the lapidary capital forms, like those in the papyrus of Timotheus, is to be remarked, such as the precisely shaped alpha, and the epsilon in many instances made square with a long head-stroke. This mixture of forms seems to indicate an advance in the development of the book-hand of the 3rd century B.c., as contrasted with the archaic See also:style of the older Timotheus. Of the and century B.C. there are extant only two papyri of literary works written in the formal book-hand, and both are now preserved in the Louvre. The one, a dialectical See also:treatise containing quotations from classical authors, has long been known. The other is the oration of See also:Hypereides against Athenogenes, which is an acquisition of comparatively See also:recent date. The dialectical treatise must belong to the first half of the century, as there is on the verso side of the papyrus writing subsequently added in the year 16o B.c. The period of the Hypereides cannot be so closely defined; but the existence on the verso of later See also:demotic writing, said to be of the Ptolemaic time, affords a limit, and the MS. has been accordingly placed in the second half of the century. While the writing of the earlier papyrus is of a See also:light and rather sloping character, that of the Hypereides is See also:firm and square and upright. Passing to the 1st century B.C., the papyri which have been recovered from the ashes of See also:Herculaneum come into See also:account. 562 Many of them, the texts of which are of a philosophical nature, are written in literary hands, and are conjectured to have possibly formed part of the library of their author, the philosopher See also:Philodemus; they are therefore placed about the middle of the century. To the same time are assigned the remains of a See also:roll containing the oration of Hypereides against Philippides and the third See also:Epistle of See also:Demosthenes (Brit. See also:Mus. papp. cxxxiii., exxxiv.). But the most important addition to the period is the handsomely written papyrus containing the poems of See also:Bacchylides (fig. 8), which retains in the forms of the letters much of the character of the Ptolemaic style, although for other reasons it can hardly be placed earlier than about the middle of the century: >C t.rp-i-t'r 1 N H ri r ocPrr;'R 1nh~+Kb-ctA-4°r -r t- p-as.TeTl+4-4 0I°N7r 1'1,4 f"1Ap"~ I'o-S t E~ArD~111—4 O-Yry.5.e-ra1. Iicarl See also:gore 7rD-t'+oi1-+1140Tf1 t Wetpas avretvwv 7rpos avyas 17rirWKEOS aEXLov TEKVa Svuravoto Avo-Oas 7rap4povos E ayayEty BU OW SE TOL ELKOOL OOUS of vyas 4 OLPLKOTpLXaS) With the latter half of the 1st century B.C. we quit the Ptolemaic period and pass to the consideration of the literary papyri of the Roman period; and it is especially in this latter period that our extended knowledge, acquired from recent discoveries, has led to the modification of views formerly held with regard to the dates to be attributed to certain important literary MSS. As in the cafe: of non-literary documents, the literary writing of the Roman period differs from that of the Ptolemaic in adopting rounded forms and greater uniformity in the size of the letters. Just on the See also:threshold of the Roman period, near the end of the 1st century B.C., stands a fragmentary papyrus of the last two books of the Iliad, now in the See also:British Museum (pap. cxxviii.), which is of sufficient extent to be noted. Then, emerging on the See also:Christian era, we come upon a See also:fine surviving specimen of literary writing, which we have satisfactory See also:reason for placing near the beginning of the 1st century. It is a fragment of the third book of the Odyssey (fig. 9), the writing of which closely resembles that of an See also:official document (Brit. Mus. pap. cccliv.) which happens to be written in a formal literary hand, and which from See also:internal evidence can be dated within a few years of the close of theist century B.C. There can be no hesitation, there-fore, in grouping the Odyssey with that document. The contrast between the See also:round Roman style and the stiff and firm Ptolemaic hands is here well shown in the facsimiles from this papyrus (fig. 9) and the Phaedo and Bacchylides:
TT A t A,000k.(O1Arej11Xt'AtA)<Wl
I-CY AeY4.kP-ktx-arONTeCIN
cuCe#J.6 O 12s sP.1TOY- wxIueN
\4
;tN berYNt-I-See also: The writing of this MS. differs from the usual type of literary hand, being a rough and See also:ill-formed uncial, inscribed on narrow, and therefore inexpensive, papyrus; and. if the roll were written for the market, it was a cheap copy, if indeed it was not made for private use. Of the same period is a papyrus of Isocrates, De See also:pace (Brit. Mus. pap. cxxxii.), written in two hands, the one more clerical than the other; and two papyri of Homer, Iliad, iii.-iv. (Brit. Mus. pap. cxxxvi.), and Iliad, xiii.-xiv. (Brit. Mus. pap. dccxxxii.), the first in a rough uneducated hand, but the latter a fine specimen of uncial writing. To about this period also is the Oxyrhynchus See also:Pindar to be attributed, that is to the close of the 1st or beginning of the 2nd century. Then follows another famous papyrus, the Bankes Homer, containing the last book of the Iliad, which belongs to the 2nd century and is also written in a careful style of uncial writing. To these is'to be added the beautiful papyrus at Berlin, containing a commentary on the Theaetelus of Plato, written in delicately formed See also:uncials of excellent type of the 2nd century; and of the same age is the Panegyricus of Isocrates from Oxyrhynchus, in a round uncial hand. Three important papyri of the Iliad, written in large round uncials, of the 2nd century, are noticed below. With regard to the later literary works on papyrus that have been recovered, the period which they occupy is somewhat uncertain. The following are, however, placed in the 3rd century, during which a sloping literary hand seems to have been developed, curiously anticipating a similar See also:change which took place in the course of development of the uncial writing of the vellum MSS., the upright hand of the 4th to 6th centuries being followed by a sloping hand in the 7th and 8th centuries: a MS., now in the British Museum, of portions of bks. ii.-iv. of the Iliad, written on eighteen leaves of papyrus, put together in book-form, but inscribed on only one side; on the verso of some of the leaves is a See also:short grammatical treatise attributed to Tryphon: portion of Iliad v., among the Oxyrhynchus papyri (No. ccxxiii.): a fragment of Plato's See also:Laws (Ox. pap. See also:xxiii.): a papyrus of Isocrates, in Nicodem, now at See also:Marseilles: a fragment of See also:Ezekiel, in book-form, in the Bodleian Library: a fragment of the " Shepherd " of See also:Hermas at Berlin: and a fragment of See also:Julius See also:Africanus, the Hellenica of See also:Theopompus or See also:Cratippus, and the See also:Symposium of Plato, all found at Oxyrhynchus. Of the 3rd century also are some fragments which are palaeographically of interest, as they are written neither in the' recognized literary hand nor in simple cursive, but in cursive characters moulded and adapted in a set form for literary use—thus anticipating the early stages of the development of the minuscule book-hand of the 9th century from the cursive writing of that time. With the 3rd century the literary hand on papyrus appears to lose most of its importance. We are within measurable distance of the age of vellum, and of the formal uncial writing of the vellum MSS. which is found in some existing examples of the 4th century and in more abundant See also:numbers of the 5th century. We have now to see how the connexion can be established between the literary See also:handwriting of the papyri and the firmer and heavier literary uncial writing of the vellum codices. The literary hands on papyrus which have been reviewed above are distinctly of the style inscribed with a light See also:touch most suitable to the comparatively frail material of papyrus. In the Bankes Homer, however, one may detect some indication of the fullness that characterizes the vellum uncial writing. But it now appears that a larger and rounder hand was also employed on papyrus at least as early as the 1st century. In See also:proof of this we are able to cite a non-literary document (fig. 1o) bearing an actual date, which happens to be written in characters that, exclusive of certain less formally-made letters, are of a large uncial literary type. This writing, though not actually of the finished style familiar to us in the early vellum MSS., yet resembles it so generally that it may be assumed, almost as a certainty, that there was in the 1st century a full literary uncial hand formed on this See also:pattern, which was the See also:direct ancestor of the vellum uncial. The tendency to employ at this period a calligraphic style, as seen in the fragments: of the Odyssey and one of the Hesiodic poems mentioned above, supports this See also:assumption. The document now referred to is a See also:deed of sale written in the seventh year of See also:Domitian, A.D. 88 (Brit. Mus. pap. cxli.). The letters still retaining a, cursive See also:element are alpha, upsilon, and in some instances epsilon. 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