Clement of Alexandria

Clement of Alexandria (c.150-c.215).

Some works attributed to him are; Protrepticus, Paedagogus, Stromata, & Quis dives salvetur.

“What do we know about the provenance and dates of Clement’s writings? Unfortunately, the lack of clear evidence makes any attempt at establishing the provenance of Clement’s writings difficult (this may explain why this issue is largely ignored today, though it was a center of debate at the turn of the twentieth century).” – Carl P. Cosaert (2008) [6, p15]

Attention to MS L appears to have taken more serious roots in the 19th century (1884) [5], and particularly in the 20th century [6, p15].

The MSS for Clement are:

P – Codex Parisinus graecus, 451 (The Arethas Codex). Contains Protrepticus & Paedagogus. Dated 10th century. It’s currently being held in the Bibliothèque nationale de France. [4, p736], [6, p13].

M – Codex Mutinensis III D 7. Contains Protrepticus & Paedagogus. Dated 10th or 11th century. [4, p736].

L – Codex Laurentianus V 3. Contains Stromata. Dated 11th century. It’s currently being held in the Laurentian Library, Florence. [2], [4, p737], [6, p13].

F – Codex Laurentianus V 24. Contains Paedagogus. Dated 12th century. [4, p736].

G* – Codex Genuensis Miss. Urb 28. Contains Paedagogus. [4, p736].

S – Scorialensis W III 19. Contains Quis dives salvetur. Dated 11th or 12th century. [6, p14].

V – Vaticanus Gr. 623. Contains Quis dives salvetur. Dated 16th century. [6, p14].

Parininus Supplementum Graecum 250. Dated 16th century. [2].

Paris. Suppl. Graec. 254. Contains Protrepticus & Paedagogus. [4, p736].

The MSS with asterisks after their siglums were given siglums by me.

Editions of the complete works of Clement:

1550, Florence – “The first edition of the complete works of Clement is that by Petrus Victorinus” [4, p737].

1592 – Friedrich Sylburg [4, p737].

1703 – Le Nourny [4, p737].

1715 – John Potter [4, p737].

1831 – Klotz [4, p737].

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Clement and Josephus:

“Flavius Josephus the Jew, who composed the history of the Jews, computing the periods, says that from Moses to David were five hundred and eighty-five years; from David to the second year of Vespasian, a thousand one hundred and seventy-nine; then from that to the tenth year of Antoninus, seventy-seven. So that from Moses to the tenth year of Antoninus there are, in all, two thousand one hundred and thirty-three years.” – Stromata, Book 1, Chapter 21.

The Wikipedia article [2] for Stromata falsely cites page 15 of [3] as saying, “The Stromateis survives in an eleventh-century manuscript from Florence (L = Laurentianus V 3), which has been supposed to have belonged, like Parisinus 451 (preserving Protrepticus) to Arethas, Archbishop of Caesarea. It is carelessly written, with errors of names and numbers, phrases omitted and the like. The only other manuscript is the sixteenth-century Parininus Supplementum Graecum 250, which is in the direct line of descent from the earlier manuscript and of no independent value.” I haven’t found that quote in [3] yet. Maybe it is in there somewhere, but it’s definitely not on page 15.

Based on the fact that MS L is named after the place it is currently being held, which was established in 1571, and that the first complete edition wasn’t created until 1550, I assign this MS 16th century provenance at the earliest.

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References:

[1] – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clement_of_Alexandria. Accessed 24 July 2020.

[2] – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stromata. Accessed 24 July 2020.

[3] – https://archive.org/details/clementofalexand00ferg. Accessed 24 July 2020.

[4] – Muss-Arnolt, W. “A New Edition of the Works of Clement of Alexandria.” The American Journal of Theology, vol. 10, no. 4, 1906, pp. 735–738. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/3154443. Accessed 24 July 2020.

[5] – https://shwep.net/podcast/the-writings-of-clement-of-alexandria/. Accessed 24 July 2020.

[6] – Carl P. Cosaert’s The Text of the Gospels in Clement of Alexandria. Accessed 24 July 2020.

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