The eleventh century marks the rise of the Normans. From their involvement with the anti-Byzantine ‘resistance movement’ of Melo of Bari (1016) to the final acquisition by Robert Guiscard of the Kingdom of Sicily (1091) they played an increasingly important part in the power-politics centred on the Italian peninsula. More than once during the struggle with the German Emperor the Pope was forced to rely on their aid (only to regret it). The energy, forcefulness and ruthlessness of the conquerors of South Italy and Sicily was seen also in the bastard son of Robert I of Normandy, who succeeded as a minor when his father died on pilgrimage to Jerusalem in 1035. William survived attempts to oust him when, with the help of the French king he defeated the rebel barons at Val-des-Dunes in 1047 and took a firm grip on his duchy. In 1051 he visited England, and returned with what he later claimed was a promise from his kinsman King Edward that he would be named to succeed him. He defied a papal ban to marry Matilda of Flanders (1053) and strengthened his position in the ensuing attacks by Henry I of France by defeating the aggressors in 1054 and 1058. By 1062 he was in a position to lay claim to the French county of Maine.

The extraordinary explosion of Latin literary activity in the later twelfth century was a consequence of many factors, chief among them perhaps being the more settled political conditions, which allowed population growth, the rise of the towns and sustained economic development. This was a period of new movements, especially in religious life, which is marked by a proliferation of new monastic orders such as the Cistercians. Heresies, such as that of the Cathars, also abound. The advance in the status of the cathedral schools already noticeable in the eleventh century, continues, and is especially marked in France at Chartres, Orléans, Rheims, Laon and Paris. The growing idea of nationhood brought with it the desire for centralization and hence an expansion in the courts of monarchs. A steady supply of clerics educated to the highest level in Latin learning became essential to the sustaining of this new system. Such men formed with their peers in religious houses an intellectual élite which could take and give pleasure by the production of sophisticated works in the traditional language. Production of such material could in this climate be valuable in attaining positions of considerable emolument, so that literary patronage became important once more, as it had been in Charlemagne's day (see section 9), except that now it was far more widely spread.

On 27 November 1095 at Clermont Pope Urban II delivered his call for Christians to take up the crusade against the Muslims. The immediate reason for the announcement was an appeal in 1094 by the hard-pressed Byzantine emperor Alexius (1081–1118). He asked the Pope as head of Western Christendom for help against the advance of the Turks. The defeat at Manzikert (1071) had left Asia Minor open to the enemy, and they duly overran the territory. They were now established not far from Constantinople itself. But the emotive issue for Christians was rather the grip of the infidel upon the holy places of Palestine, which were established in the tradition as objects of veneration and in practice by the institution of pilgrimage (see above sections 2.4 and 7.4). There was a third factor. The northern Italian trading cities (Genoa, Pisa and Venice) and the Normans under Robert Guiscard had by the early 1090s pushed back substantially the sphere of Muslim influence in the Mediterranean. It was certainly in their interests to push it back further. Moreover, the possibility of carving out Latin kingdoms in the East, despite the ostensible purpose of aiding the Byzantines, was a very real inducement to impoverished nobles. This coincidence of religious zeal, economic interest and political opportunity accounts for the success of Urban's call.

The Jewish idea of sacred texts was carried over into Christianity, which set the ‘New Covenant’ between God and his people alongside the ‘Old Covenant’. The ‘New Covenant’ was embodied by Jesus and expressed in the – at first fluctuating – body of writings which we call the ‘New Testament’. The ‘Old Covenant’ was expressed in the law of Moses and the other books which make up what we call the ‘Old Testament’ (not excluding what some parts of the Christian Church now set aside as the ‘Apocrypha’). This body of writings was translated into Latin by the second century. Then the factors mentioned in the general introduction to this part (above, pp. 5–6) led to the retention of this form of the text, despite the spread of the gospel message well outside the area of the Roman Empire. Here we will focus on two important aspects of the Bible, its language and its interpretation.

The earliest Latin translations were those known as the Vetus Latina (‘Old Latin’). Their renditions of the Old Testament were made directly from the Septuagint, the Greek version of the Hebrew scriptures made in the third century bc at Alexandria. St Jerome (d. 420) produced a new, partially revised, text, the so-called Vulgate, which eventually became the standard text. Some of the books he left unrevised (Wisdom, Ecclesiasticus, 1 and 2 Maccabees, Baruch).

It is difficult to produce for the twelfth century a meaningful categorization of what we might today call literary works. Poetry served a number of purposes, including as well as entertainment the presentation of historical narrative, theological controversy and philosophical reflection (see section 18.4). Prose also crossed the boundary between the utilitarian and the amusing (e.g. Walter Map's De nugis curialium ‘Courtier's trifles’). The best that can be said is that the more vigorous intellectual atmosphere provided space for the production and consumption of literary material which aimed to divert rather than primarily to instruct (though this object was never far away). It was in the regal and the episcopal courts that writers found their talents welcome and a society which would reward the effort of composition of lighter as well as more profound works in the traditional language. The lyric poetry of the period, composed to be sung, contains much of real value. The satirical verse is often pungent and at the same time unspecific. Epic poetry of classical depth is produced. However, the primary impression one gets is of a highly sophisticated society which understands very well how and when to make jokes about subjects (such as the sin of lust) which everyone knew were circumscribed by very clear theological laws.

The main types of historical work already evident in earlier periods, that is the chronicle, the annal and the saint's life, all continued to be composed during the twelfth century. But the increasing importance of education is manifest in the strong development of deliberate ideological manipulation of personalities and events. More and more in the wake of the investiture contest, rulers and churchmen alike needed to win battles with the word and so to have writers in their circle who could perform the task persuasively. The large number of biographies of Thomas Becket shows what a golden opportunity for the proponents of the Church was his murder. Secular rulers were also interested in how images of themselves and the past of their nation could help them in the task of retaining and increasing power. Otto of Freising's Gesta Friderici (completed by Rahewin) is a good example of the selective use of data to produce such an effect. The growing activity and diversity of life in Europe is reflected in the greatly increased numbers of narratives dealing with brief episodes or particular events. Often, as for example with Giraldus Cambrensis' account of the conquest of Ireland, an ideological purpose is also clearly visible. Increasingly, especially in the Italian communes, the Norman kingdoms and the papal Curia, records began to be kept. From this point on, then, we are less at the mercy than in earlier periods of the particular circumstances, interests and biases of the historiographers.

In every collection of books there are some which get more or less put on one side. If there is one subject which is more austere than any other, even in a library like the ‘Bibliothèque catholique des sciences religieuses’, it is surely textual criticism. The most cultured minds do not always derive great pleasure from delving into the intricacies of this science. Some professional exegetes happily make do with a mere passing knowledge of it. It is something left to bookworms! Textual criticism is a stern character to whom much homage is paid but with whom close dealings are not often sought. But it also has a habit of paying back those who neglect it: their work always bears the stamp of lazy imprecision. ‘Latin without tears’ or ‘Simple steps in Greek’ may be all right but ‘Textual criticism made easy’ is an impossible challenge and we make no claim to have carried it out.

It has to be said that certain factors have not made the task any easier. There has been the unavoidable necessity of restricting the book to a limited length and of making it available to a wide public. To be honest, there are no gleanings for the specialist in this popularised work other than a few rather unusual ideas which it will amuse him to criticise.

At the present time, the number of editions of the Greek New Testament is estimated to be more than one thousand. But it is not as difficult as might be thought to trace their history, for there are major works along the way whose dates act as landmarks. There are four main periods. First of all, there is the period of the haphazard formation of what was later called the ‘textus receptus’ and of its enthronement, which was as swift as it was unwise. Then followed the reign of the ‘textus receptus’, which was long though not particularly splendid, and during which time the true precursors of textual criticism strengthened their attacks against it, without, however, daring to free themselves of its control. Its downfall came in the third period, with the triumph of methods which were scientific, even though still tainted with individualism. The final period has seen the creation of some major projects, which have been greatly helped by the organisation of research in teams, and at the same time by the arrival of computer technology. The realisation of a major critical edition is still, however, a hope which belongs to the future.

THE RISE OF THE ‘TEXTUS RECEPTUS’ (1514–1633)

There was no Greek New Testament among the incunabula, and even sixty years after the invention of printing only a few fragments of it had been edited: the Magnificat and the Benedictus, the Prologue to John's Gospel and its early chapters (1:1 – 6:58), the Lord's Prayer and the Annunciation of the Angel.

This English translation of the second edition of Léon Vaganay's Initiation à la critique textuelle du Nouveau Testament, revised and updated by Christian-Bernard Amphoux, carries some further modifications made by the reviser and the translator, with the agreement of Les Editions du Cerf. These modifications concern, in particular, the first chapter, where the type of text has been added to the description of the manuscripts, and the Bibliography, which has been considerably amplified and re-arranged. Much help and advice has been gratefully received from Professor J. N. Birdsall whose extensive knowledge and soundness of scholarship have been greatly appreciated in the revisions he proposed on reading the French original. Dr. J. K. Elliott's skilful expertise has been equally valuable. Many thanks are due to him for writing the Foreword to this English edition; and for his patient and thorough reading of the translation and for the amendments he suggested. His encouragement throughout has been highly valued.

Christian Amphoux is employed by the French research body CNRS and is based at the Protestant Faculty of Theology in Montpellier, where he set up the ‘Centre de documentation sur les manuscrits de la Bible’ in 1984. In 1988 I was privileged to be present at a ceremony held at that institution to mark its change of name to that of the ‘Centre Jean Duplacy pour l'étude des manuscrits de la Bible’, in memory of the well-known Roman Catholic scholar from Dijon, who had died in 1983, and whose pupil Amphoux had been.

This was more than an ecumenical gesture. It reflected a continuity in textual criticism in France. This continuum is reflected in the present book. Vaganay's Initiation appeared in 1934. Duplacy had intended to revise that work but his untimely death prevented this happening. Instead, Christian Amphoux, whose institute has inherited the Duplacy library, eagerly undertook the revision, and it was a happy thought that when he published the work in 1986 it was dedicated to his former tutor. Another ecumenical link is that Amphoux, like Duplacy before him, continues to teach for the Faculté de théologie catholique at Lyons, and that faculty has been a partner in the Montpellier ‘Centre’ since 1988.

THE PERIOD OF RELATIVE FREEDOM (to AD 313)

The history of the text during this period is as important as it is difficult to reconstruct. The ecclesiastical writers give very few clues. The historian finds himself like someone trying to do a jigsaw puzzle which has most of the pieces missing and some of the rest damaged. He has to settle for a rough outline, much of it guesswork. With admirable good sense, most authors skim lightly over this period of the text, but, as long as the use of hypothesis is acknowledged as legitimate, there is no need to follow their example. Bearing that in mind, the reader is asked to forgive the numerous question marks in the pages which follow; there could doubtless be many more still.

COMPOSING A TEXT AND COMMITTING IT TO WRITING

When a piece of prose is produced today, its composition and its setting down in written form tend to be one and the same act. It starts off as a rough draft; then it becomes an autograph manuscript, that is, one written by the author himself; this, in turn, is used to produce the proofs of a book which is finally published in a (first) edition.

THE PURPOSE AND THE ARRANGEMENT OF THIS BOOK

By ‘textual criticism’ is meant any methodical and objective study which aims to retrieve the original form of a text or at least the form closest to the original. Even in a modern book there are nearly always printing errors despite careful checking by the author and proof-readers, so it is not surprising that early writings, copied as they were many times over the centuries, should have frequently undergone alteration. And indeed, from time to time in the old manuscripts of a work different forms of the text can be observed. These different forms are known as ‘variants’; they may also be referred to as divergent or erroneous readings.

The goal of textual criticism as applied to the New Testament is thus a very specific one, namely to select from among the many variants transmitted by the manuscript tradition the one which most likely represents the primitive reading. It is only when the contents of the whole text have been established that the other disciplines can operate: literary criticism, to decide the origin of each book and to locate the sources used by the author; historical criticism, to assess the value of the books as historical documents; exegesis, to define the exact meaning of the text.