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616 COXL’S TRAVELS IN RUSSIA.
plored the curious colleGtion of Greek manulcripts in the library of the Holy Synod,
tHe greater part of which had, at the fuggeftion of the Patriarch Nicon, been collected
by the monk Arfenius from the monaftery of Mount Athos.
As acatalogue of thefe manufcripts, publifhed by Athanafius Schida, at the command
of Peter the Great, was exceedingly inaccurate, Matthei* was encouraged by Prince
Potemkin, the great patron of antient literature, who defrayed the expence of the pub-
lication, to undertake this work upona more extenfive plan. Accordingly, in 1776, the
learned editor gave to the public the firft part, in which he has laid down an accurate
and circumitastial detail of fifty-one manufcripts, accompanied with judicious remarks
and critical inquiries. He defcribes the materials upon which each manufcript is writ-
ten; fpecifies the age, contents, and author, the number of pages, and the firft and lait
words: he points out alfo the different proprietors. The author propofes to continue
the publication at different intervals, until he has finifhed the account. But as it would
require many years thus minutely to defcribe all the manufcripts, which amount to five
hundred and two; the learned author has, in the mean while, favoured the public with
a complete catalogue in a lefs circumf{tantial manner}. To this index is prefixed a
fatisfa€tory and comprehenfive introdu@ion ; in which, alter informing us that he ¢om-
piled it for the ule of Prince Yufapof, an enthufiaft in Greek literature, he gives a brief
account of the principal manufcripts. He enumerates feveral of the Septuagint, and one
in particular of the Books of Kings, which is of the ninth century, and contains, in fome
places, many various readings, materially differing from the printed editions. He men-
tions alfo feveral of the New Teftament ; fome accompanied with antient commentaries,
which have never been publifhed, and which the ingenious author has tran{cribed, col-
lated, and prepared for the prefs. The moft antient of thefe was written at different
periods ; the firft part fo early as the feventh or eighth century, and the remainder in
the twelfth or thirteenth. This colle€tion he adds, though chiefly confined to theolo-
gical fubjects, is by no means deficientin the claffics; among which he notices Homer,
ZEfchylus, Sophocles, Demofthenes, Ai{chines, Hefiod, Paufanius, Plutarch, and a moft
beautiful Strabo, which he has collated for the new edition of that author, preparing for
the Clarendon prefs by Mr. Falkener of Oxford f.
In this library of the Holy Synod Matthzi difcovered an antient hymn to Ceres in a
manu{cript of Homer, written about the conclufion of the fourteenth century, but which
he fuppofes a tran{cript from an ancient and valuable copy; this manufcript, befide a
fragment of the Iliad, contained the fixteen hymns ufually attributed to Homer, in the
fame order as they are generally printed. At the end of the fixteenth he found twelve
verfes of a hymn to Bacchus, and a hymn to Ceres, which, excepting the laft part, was
entire. Matthzei, well acquainted with the delays which would attend the publication
at Mofcow, fent a copy of the hymn to the celebrated Runkenius, of the univerfity of
Leyden, who gave it to the public in 1780; and twenty lines being omitted by miltake,
he put forth a fecond edition in the following year §. ;
* Harris has enumerated the editions publifhed by Matthxi. Philof. Inquiries, p. 564.
+ ‘© Index codicum manu(criptorum Graecorum Bibliothecarum Mofquenfium fanétiflimae Synodi eccle-
fiae orthodoxae. Graeco-Ruilicae ; edidit Chriftianus Fredericus Matthaei. Pretopoli, typis Academiae
Scientiarum, 1780,” ‘4to. -
{ It was a confiderable difappointment_to me, that Mr. Matthzi was abfent from Mofcow during my
continuance in that city, as I fhould have derived great information from his acquaintance, I have likewife
to regret, that, on account of his abfence, I could not obtain a fight of thefe manufcripts.
§ Homeri Hymnus in Cererem nunc primum editus a Davide Runkenio.
The
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