Codex Alexandrinus

The Codex Alexandrinus is a manuscript of the Greek Bible, written on parchment. It is designated by the siglum A or 02 in the Gregory-Aland numbering of New Testament manuscripts, and δ 4 in the von Soden numbering of New Testament manuscripts. It contains the majority of the Greek Old Testament and the Greek New Testament. It is one of the four Great uncial codices (these being manuscripts which originally contained the whole of both the Old and New Testaments). Along with Codex Sinaiticus and Vaticanus, it is one of the earliest and most complete manuscripts of the Bible. Using the study of comparative writing styles (palaeography), it has been dated to the fifth century. It derives its name from the city of Alexandria (in Egypt), where it resided for a number of years before it was brought by the Eastern Orthodox Patriarch Cyril Lucaris from Alexandria to Constantinople (modern day Istanbul in Turkey). It was then given to Charles I of England in the 17th century. Bishop Brian Walton assigned Alexandrinus the capital Latin letter A in the Polyglot Bible (a multi-language version of the Bible with the different languages placed in parallel columns) of 1657. This designation was maintained when the New Testament manuscript list system was standardized by Swiss theologian and textual critic Johann J. Wettstein in 1751. Thus Alexandrinus held the first position in the manuscript list. Until the later purchase of Codex Sinaiticus, biblical scholar and textual critic Frederick H. A. Scrivener described it as the best manuscript of the Greek Bible deposited in Britain. Today, it rests along with Codex Sinaiticus in one of the showcases in the Sir John Ritblat Gallery of the British Library in London, U.K. A full photographic reproduction of the New Testament volume (shelf number Royal MS 1. D....