Polygenetic Errors in the Ethiopic Witnesses of The Epistle to the Galatians

Abstract

As part of the preparation of a critical edition of the Epistle to the
Galatians in its Ge’ez version one needs to examine various
manuscripts. Exploring 16 Ge’ez manuscripts the author has collated all
types of variants and come up with the hypothesis of three different
groups of Ethiopian manuscripts as far as the Epistle to the Galatians is
concerned. Just as some variants like Galatians 6:14 help to identify
groups of manuscripts, the majority of variants are not caused by scribal
dependence on earlier manuscripts. In other words, the innovations and
errors are polygenetic, namely the fruit of independent scribal activities.
This article presents such variants, classified according to transposition,
banalization, incongruity of grammatical number, omission of letters,
polar errors, and metathesis.