mend themselves on internal grounds. It can hardly be doubted that many of them are individualisms of the scribe himself, when his bold and rough manner of transcription is considered; but some doubtless are older. Little encouragement however to look favourably upon them is given by an examination of the subsingular readings. Many of these, as has been already noticed (§ 205), are clearly Western corruptions, of which οἶνον οὐκ εἶχον ὅτι συνετελέσθη ὁ οἶνος τοῦ γάμου in John ii 3 is an example; and many others are probably of Alexandrian origin: but, whatever may be the sources, the prevalent internal character where it can be known is such as to raise a strong presumptive suspicion where it is obscure. There are however a few subsingular readings of א which recall the predominant character of subsingular readings of B, and are possibly or even probably genuine. Such are the omission of υἱοῦ θεοῦ in Mark i 1, and of ἡ πύλη in Matt. vii 13; the insertion of Ἠσαίου in Matt. xiii 35; μηδένα (for μηδὲv) ἀπελπίζοντες in Luke vi 35; ᾔτησαν τὸν (for ᾐτήσαντο) Πειλᾶτον in Acts xiii 28; ἔδωκα for ἔδωκαν in Matt. xxvii 10. The fact that Origen's name occasionally stands among the accessory authorities is a warning against hasty rejection; and though subsingular readings of א attested by Origen are doubtless often only Alexandrian, this is probably not always the case.
327. These various characteristics of the singular and subsingular readings of א are easily explained in connexion with the relation between the texts of Β and of א described above, and at the same time enable this relation to be ascertained with somewhat greater precision. The ancestries of both MSS having started from a common source not much later than the autographs,
