# British Library, Add MS 12150

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**British Library, Add MS 12150** is the second oldest extant [Syriac](/source/Syriac_language) [manuscript](/source/Manuscript)[1] and the oldest [codex](/source/Codex) bearing a date in any language.[2]

According to the original partially damaged [colophon](/source/Colophon_(publishing)), the manuscript was copied in [Edessa](/source/Edessa,_Mesopotamia) in the year 723 of the [Seleucid era](/source/Seleucid_era), that is, AD 411. In AD 1086 (Seleucid 1398), the colophon was copied onto a different folio. This copy preserves the name of scribe, Jacob.[3] The manuscript was brought at some point to [Baghdad](/source/Baghdad) and from there in 931 to the [Deir al-Suryani](/source/Deir_al-Suryani) in Egypt among some 250 manuscripts collected by [Moses of Nisibis](/source/Moses_of_Nisibis).[4] It was among the manuscripts sent to Britain from Deir al-Suryani by [Paul de Lagarde](/source/Paul_de_Lagarde) in 1838 and 1843.[1] The codex is currently housed at the [British Library](/source/British_Library), catalogued as number 12150 in the [additional manuscripts](/source/Additional_manuscripts) collection.[5]

The codex contains text of [Pseudo-Clement](/source/Pseudo-Clement)'s *Recognitiones*; [Titus of Bostra](/source/Titus_of_Bostra)'s *Four Discources Against the Manichaeans*; [Eusebius of Caesarea](/source/Eusebius_of_Caesarea)'s *On the Theophany*, *On the Confessors of Palestine* and *Eulogy of the Confessors' Virtue*; and [an anonymous martyrology](/source/Martyrology_of_411). It has 255 parchment leaves (). The writing is in three columns per page, in 38–42 lines per column, in [*ʾesṭrangēlā* script](/source/Syriac_alphabet). The ink is black and brown.[5]

## References

1. F. S. Jones (1992), "Evaluating the Latin and Syriac Translations of the Pseudo-Clementine Recognitions", *Apocrypha*, 3, 237–258. [doi:10.1484/j.apocra.2.301265](https://doi.org/10.1484/j.apocra.2.301265) There is a "dated Syriac deed of sale found at [Dura-Europus](/source/Dura-Europus), which was evidently written in Edessa in the year 243".

1. James F. Coakley, ["Manuscripts"](https://gedsh.bethmardutho.org/Manuscripts), in Gorgias Encyclopedic Dictionary of the Syriac Heritage: Electronic Edition, edited by Sebastian P. Brock, Aaron M. Butts, George A. Kiraz and Lucas Van Rompay (Gorgias Press, 2011; online ed. Beth Mardutho, 2018).

1. Tony Burke (2017), [London, British Library, Add. 12150](https://www.nasscal.com/manuscripta-apocryphorum/london-british-library-add-12150/) at North American Society for the Study of Christian Apocryphal Literature (NASSCAL).

1. Oliver Nicholson (2018), "Martyrology of 411, Syriac", in Oliver Nicholson (ed.), *[The Oxford Dictionary of Late Antiquity](/source/The_Oxford_Dictionary_of_Late_Antiquity)*, Vol. 2 (Oxford University Press), p. 976, and Christopher Kelly, "Deir al-Suryani", in *op. cit.*, pp. 470–471.

1. [Hatch, William](/source/William_Hatch_(theologian)) (1946). *An album of dated Syriac manuscripts*. Boston: The American Academy of Arts and Sciences, reprinted in 2002 by Gorgias Press. p. 52. ISBN 1-931956-53-7.

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