2. Character. — The exact literality of the Old ver- sion was not confined to the most minute observance of order and the accurate retiection of the words of the original; in many cases the very forms of Greek con- struction were retained in violation of Latin usage. A few examples of these singular anomalies will convey a better idea of the absolute certainty with wliich the Latin commonly indicates the text that the transla- tor had before him than any general statements :
Matt, iv, 13, "hahitavitin Capliarnanm ■nfarrt/'mam." 15, "terra Neptalim viam maris." 25, "ab Jerosolymis . . . et trans Jordauera." v, 22, " reus erit in fieliennarn ignis." vi, 19, "ubi tinea et comcsturn exterminat." Markxii, 31, ^'majns horum pra'ccj'torum aliud non est." Lnke x, 19, "nihil »;o.<t nocebit."
Acts xix, 26, "non solum Ephesi sed ptene totuts Asnm." Rom. li, 15, "inter se coijitationutn accusantium vel etiam
defendentinm." 1 Cor. vii, 32, "solliciins est quiB sunt Domini."
It is obvious that there was a constant tendency to alter expressions like these, and in the first age of the version it is not improbable that the continual Grajcism which marks the Latin texts of D, {Cod. Bezce) and E^ {Cod. Laud.) had a wider currency than it could main- tain afterwards.
3. Canon. — With regard to the African canon of the New Test,, the Old version offers important evidence. From considerations of style and language, it seems cer- tain that the Epistle to the Hebrews, James, and 2 Pe- ter did not form part of the original African version, a conclusion which falls in with what is derived from historical testimony (comp. The Hist, of the Canon of the N. T. p. 282 sq.). In tlie Old Test., on the other hand, the Old Latin erred by excess, and not by defect; for, as the version was made from the current copies of the Sept., it included the Apocryphal books wiiich are commonly contained in them, and to these 2 Esdras was early added.
4. Jievision, — After the translation once received a
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dofiiiitp shape in Africa, which could not have been long after tlie middle of the '2d century, it was not publicly revised. The old text was jealously {juardod by eccle- siastical use, and was retained there at a time when Je- rouit's version was elsewhere almost iniivcrsally receiv- ed. The well-known story of the disturliancc! caused hy tlie attempt of an African bisiiop to introduce Je- rome's cucuMtd for the old hedera in the history of .Jo- nah (August. A/), civ, ap. Hieron. A'pp. quoted by Tre- gelles, I lit rodiiction. p. 212) shows how carefully inten- tional changes were avoided. But, at the same time, the text suffered by tlic natural corru]itions of copying, especially by interpolations, a form of error to which the gospels were i)artic\darly exposed. In the Old Test, tlie version was made from the unrevised edition of the Sept., and tiius from the first include<l many false readings, of which Jerome often notices instances (e. g. A';), cvi, ad Sun. et Fret.).
The Latin translator of Irenieus was probably con- temporary with Tertidlian. and his renderings of the (piotations from .Scri|)ture confirm the conclusions which have been already drawn as to the currency of (substan- tially) one Latin version. It does not appear that he had a Latin ^IS. before him during the execution oY ids work, but he was so familiar with the common translation that he reproduces continually character- istic phrases which he cannot be supposed to have de- rived from any other source (Lachmaini, X. T. i, p. x,xi). Cyprian (died A.I). "2o7) carries on the chain of testi- mony far through the next century; and he is followed by Lactantius, Juvencus, J. Firmicus Maternus, Hilary the Deacon (Ambrosiaster), Hilary of Poitiers (died A.D. 419), and Lucifer of ('agliari (died A.U. 370). Ambrose and Augustine exhibit a peculiar recension of the same text, and Jerome offers some traces of it. From this date iNISS. of parts of the African text have been pre- served, and it is unnecessary to trace the history of its transmission to a later time.
But while the earliest Latin version was preserved generally unchanged in North Africa, it fared different- ly in Italy. There the provincial rudeness of the ver- sion was necessarily more offensive, and the compara- tive-familiarity of the leading bishops with the Greek texts made a revision at once more feasible and less startling to their congregations. Thus, in the 4th cen- tury, a definite ecclesiastical recension (of the gospels, at least) appears to have been made in North Italy by reference to the (ireek, which was distinguished by the name of liciftt. This Augustine recommends on the ground of its close accuracy and its perspicuity (De I)octr. Christ. 1.5, "In ipsis interpretationibus Itala ce- teris pr;eferatur, nam est verborum tenacior cum perspi- cuitate sententiaj"), and the text of the gospels which he follows is marked by the latter characteristic when compared with the African. In the other books the difference cannot be traced with accuracy; and it has not yet been accurately determined whether other na- tional recensions may not have existed (as seems cer- tain from the evidence which scholars have recently collected) in Ireland (Britain), Gaid, and Spain.
The Itnlii appears to have been made in some degree with authority; other revisions were made for private use, in which such changes were introduced as suited the taste of scribe or critic. The next stage in the de- terioration (if the text was the intermixture of these various revisions; so that at the close of the 4th cen- tury tiie gospels were in such a state as to call for that final recension which was made by Jerome.