Not only were these readings not confined to Alexandria, but a local name suggests erroneous associations when applied to a text which owes its comparative isolation to the degeneracy of its neighbours. On the laxity with which existing MSS are themselves often called Alexandrian we shall have occasion to remark hereafter.
C. 181—184. Alexandrian characteristics
181. There is moreover, as we have already intimated, a class of ancient readings to which the name 'Alexandrian' of right belongs. They are brought to light by a considerable number of variations among those documents which have chiefly preserved a Non-Western Pre-Syrian text, and which are shown by the whole distribution of documentary evidence to have nothing to do with variations between Western and Non-Western texts. They enter largely, as we shall see presently, into the texts of various extant uncial MSS, and with the help thus afforded to the recognition of documentary grouping it is usually easy to see which variants in successive variations have the distinctively 'Alexandrian' attestation, and thus to arrive at a comparative view of the general internal characteristics of the two series of readings.
182. The differences of type are by no means so salient here as in the previous comparison of Western with Non-Western texts; but on due consideration the case becomes clear. On grounds of Intrinsic and Transcriptional Probability alike, the readings which we call Alexandrian are certainly as a rule derived from the other Non-Western Pre-Syrian readings, and not vice versa. The only documentary authorities attesting them with any approach to constancy, and capable of being assigned
