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Armenian Manuscripts of St. Athanasius of Alexandria

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 October 2011

Robert P. Casey
Robert P. Casey
Affiliation:
University of Cincinnati
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Extract

The Armenian version of the works of Athanasius is known to European scholars from four sources: (1) the list in Karekin's catalogue of early Armenian translations, (2) Conybeare's edition of the pseudo-athanasian “Dialogue between Athanasius and Zacchaeus,” (3) an article by the same scholar, ‘On the Sources of the Text of St. Athanasius,’ with accompanying collations of the Armenian of De Incarnatione et contra Arianos and Qvod unus sit Christus, and (4) the Venice edition of Armenian Athanasiana made by E. Tajezi and published with Conybeare's help at the Mechitarist press in 1899. This edition contains all the material then available in the Mechitarists' library at Venice but is not based on a complete survey of the sources. Furthermore, the manuscripts employed are (with the one exception of Cod. Venet. 818) collections of various patristic writings, and do not contain corpora of Athanasius's works such as are commonly found in Greek.

Type
Research Article
Information
Harvard Theological Review , Volume 24 , Issue 1 , January 1931 , pp. 43 - 59
Copyright
Copyright © President and Fellows of Harvard College 1931

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References

1 Karekin, Zarphanalian, Catalogue des anciennes traductions arméniennes siècles IV–XIII (in Armenian), Venice, 1889, pp. 278 ffGoogle Scholar. A shorter list is given in Quadro delle opere di vari autori anticamente tradotte in armeno, Venezia, 1825, pp. 11—13.

2 Anecdote Oxoniensia, Classical Series, Part VIII, Oxford, 1898.

3 Journal of Philology, XXIV, pp. 285–300.

4 Works of St. Athanasius (in Armenian), Venice, 1899.

5 Tajezi, pp.

6 I am greatly indebted to the Mechitarists at Vienna and Venice for access to the manuscripts and especially to Fr. Mesrop Hopazian, who secured me photographs, and to Fr. Akinian, who gave me invaluable assistance in using them. My thanks are also due to Professor R. P. Blake for kind suggestions.

7 This is also the spelling of Cod. 648 and the colophon. See below.

8 Wallis, F., ‘On Some Manuscripts of the Writings of St. Athanasius,’ Journal of Theological Studies, III (1901), pp. 101, 106Google Scholar; K. Lake, ‘Some Further Notes on the MSS. of the Writings of St. Athanasius,’ ibid. V, 1904, pp. 110–111.

9 The title reads somewhat differently in Cod. 648: Still another form appears in the colophon (No. 14), discussed below.

10 Cod. 648 adds

11 Cod. 648 omits

12 Cod. 648 reads

13 Cod. 648 adds

14 Cod. 648 reads

15 Cod. 648 omits

15a It is described briefly by N. Akinian (Eine neu-entdeckte Schrift des Katholikos Johannes Odznetzi De Incarnatione Verbi, Huschardzean, Festschrift aus Anlass des 100–jährigen Bestandes der Mechitaristen-Kongregation in Wien, Vienna, 1911, pp. 336–344), who believes it to have been written at Metzob in the fourteenth century.

16 These are two works ascribed to Gregory of Nazianz, one (ff. 3a–4a) on Ezekiel (P. G. xxxvi, 665–669), the other (ff. 4a–6b) a letter to Evagrius on divinity (P. G. xlvi, 1101 ff.; cf. xxxviii, 383), and a series of short anonymous pieces (ff. 7a–14b).

17 Pages

18 Pages 287–288.

19 Pages

20 Dialogue between Athanasius and Zacchaeus, p. x.

21 The person here referred to as the instigator of Stephen's translation is undoubtedly John Odznetzi, Armenian Catholicos, A.D. 717–728. It is possible that the translations were made as part of the preparations for the synod of Managkert, A.D. 726. See Ter-Minassiantz, E., Die armenische Kirche in ihren Beziehungen zu den syrischen Kirchen (Texte und Untersuchungen, N. F. XI, 4), Leipzig, 1904, pp. 71Google Scholar, 80 ff.; Tournebize, Fr., Histoire politique et religieuse de l'Arménie, I, Paris, 1910, p. 140Google Scholar.

22 It was perhaps this work which was translated from Armenian into Georgian by Gregory of Usči (cf. Peeters, P., “Traductions et traducteurs dans l'hagiographie orientale,’ Analecta Bollandiana, XL, 1922, p. 278, n. 4Google Scholar), but there is also a quotation from III Oratio contra Arianos in the See note 26 below.

23 See note 7 above, and Lake, K. and Casey, R. P.“The Text of the De Incarnatione of Athanasius,’ Harvard Theological Review, XIX, 1926, pp. 259–270CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Stegmann, A., Die pseudo-athanasianische ‘IV. Rede gegen die Arianer’ als ‘κατὰ ‘Aρειανῶν λόγος’ ein Apollinarisgut, Rottenburg, 1917, pp. 9 ffGoogle Scholar.

24 Even this method, however, is not without its uncertainties, and it must be admitted that a secure basis for the chronology of early Armenian literature has not as yet been established. Affinities and developments in language and style are evident and well recognized in the texts, but widely divergent views are held about their dating. These differences have emerged with great clearness in the discussion of the age of the Armenian version of the Bible, particularly of the New Testament. See Macler, F., Le texte arménien de l'évangile (Anales du Musée Guimet, XXVIII), Paris, 1919Google Scholar, with full bibliography; Blake, R. P. in Harvard Theological Review, XXI, 1928, pp. 286 ff.Google Scholar; Zarphanalian Karekin, pp. 1 ff.; and also Manandean, J., Vienna, 1928Google Scholar.

25 Karekin, pp. 286. A colophon in a manuscript described in Erevak, IV, pp. 40–47 (cf. Dashian, Catalogue, p. 2), attributes the Armenian version of this piece to the middle of the fifth century. With the exception of Athos, Vatopedi 6, the Vita Antonii does not figure in the Greek corpora; see K. Lake, Journal of Theological Studies, V, p. 112, note 1.

26 Lebon, J., ‘Les citations patristiques grecques du Sceau de la foi,’ Revue d'histoire ecclesiastique, XXV, 1929, pp. 8–9Google Scholar. There are several quotations of doubtful origin and the spurious De sancta trinitate dialogus IV (P. G. xxviii, 1249 ff.) is attributed to Basil of Caesarea. This evidence should, however, be used with some caution, for, so far as I am aware, no thorough investigation has been made of the sources of this catena. Some of its quotations may have been rendered directly from the Greek or derived from Greek catenae.

27 Tiflis, 1901.

28 I have found none in other catalogues of European libraries, and neither Fr. Akinian, who has examined a large part of the collection at Etschmiadzin, nor Professor R. P. Blake, who had the kindness to look at Jerusalem and on Mt. Sinai for me, could report others. The following Athanasiana in Armenian manuscripts at the Bibliothèque Nationale deserve special mention: De incarnatione dei verbi (P. G. xxviii, 25–29; Tajezi, pp. 281–283), B. N., Cod. Arm. 201 (paper, notragir, 17th–18th century), ff. 79a–80a; Cod. Arm. 311 (paper, notragir, 17th–18th century). Ad Jovianum de fide (P. G. xxviii, 531; Tajezi, p. 344), B. N., Cod. Arm. 201, ff. 80a–80b; Cod. Arm. 311, ff. 154b–155a. (It is notable that De incarnatione dei verbi is followed by the Letter to Jovian in Codd. Vind. 629 and 648 and in Karekin's colophon, but not in the Greek manuscripts.) De sancta trinitate (Tajezi, pp. 239–242), B. N., Cod. Arm. 110 (paper, erkathagir, 12th century), f. 4a 1. Vita Antonii (P. G. xxvi, 835–976; Tajezi, pp. 533–614), B. N., Cod. Arm. 110, ff. 106a 2–112a 2; Cod. Arm. 115 (paper, bolorgir, 18th–14th century), ff. 2b–6b. (In many Armenian as well as in Syriac manuscripts this last piece is abbreviated. A study of the Armenian corresponding to F. Schultess’ study of the Syriac [Probe einer syrischen Version der Vita S. Antonii, Leipzig, 1894] is needed.) Epistula ad Justinum Africae (Tajezi, pp. 345–346), B. N., Cod. Arm. 110, ff. 184b 2–185a 1. (Two of Tajezi's manuscripts describe this as a letter to Augustine of Africa, one to Justin. The Paris codex reads simply: ) De spiritu sancto (Inc. ), B. N., Cod. Arm. 116 I (paper, bolorgir, 14th century), f. 326. (Macler has failed to notice that this treatise does not run to the end of the volume, but ends on f. 330a 3 and is followed by another work on a similar theme by Gregory the Illuminator: Inc. , etc.).