HKB
T
Turonensis 879, written around the year 1200, was first fully collated by André for his edition; Lenz had earlier reported its readings for IV xvi and part of I i. At ix 119 only T and F2 of the manuscripts collated have the correct laeuus, although other manuscripts come close, and the reading could have been recovered by conjecture. At xv 40 T reads transierit saeuos for transit nostra feros; clearly nostra was at some point lost from the text, and metre forcibly restored.
P
I have also collated the thirteenth-century Parisinus lat. 7993, Heinsius' codex Regius. At ix 46 P offers the correct cernet for credet; cernet is also the reading of M after correction by a later hand and of the thirteenth-century Gothanus membr. II 121. At vi 7 P alone of collated manuscripts agrees with C in reading praestat for the correct perstat. P agrees with L in reading niuibus for the other manuscripts' nubibus at v 5, adeptum for ademptum at vi 49, signare for signate at xv 11, and in the orthography puplicus for publicus at ix 48, ix 102, xiii 5, and xiv 16. The manuscript has many corruptions: a few examples are i 30 igne for imbre, ii 18 supremo for suppresso, iv 6 pace for parte, vi 34 uirtus for uirus, vii 15 piacula for pericula, ix 42 praeterea for praetextam, x 63 in harena for marina, xiv 39 conuiuia for conuicia, and xvi 24 sacri for scripti. However, P has no unique variants with any probability of correctness. To have given a full report of P would have involved a considerable expansion of an already long apparatus, and I have cited the manuscript only occasionally, where a reading is only weakly attested by the other manuscripts.
Titles
MF and B2H2I2T2 usually supply titles for the poems. As will be seen from the apparatus, there is considerable variation among the titles, and there is no reason to suppose that they form an authentic part of the transmitted text.
The manuscript authority for the text of Ex Ponto IV
By and large the manuscripts of the fourth book of the Ex Ponto offer a remarkably uniform text of the poems, and one which, considering the late date of the manuscripts, is in surprisingly good condition. I believe that all the manuscripts, with the exception of G, are descended from a single archetype. B and C are the best witnesses to the text of the archetype, although the other, more heavily contaminated and interpolated manuscripts are indispensable, since they correct the peculiar errors of B and C.
The present edition
The apparatus of this edition is intended to be a full report of BCMFHILT and of the fragmentary G; some reports are also given of P. It includes corrections by original and by later hands.
When no manuscripts are specified for the lemma in an entry, the lemma is the reading for those manuscripts not otherwise specified. For instance, the entry
deductum carmen] carmen deductum M
indicates that deductum carmen is the reading of BCFHILT, while carmen deductum is the reading of M.
I have from time to time cited from earlier editions readings of manuscripts which I have not collated. To make it clear that I have not personally verified these readings, I have added in parentheses after the citation the name of the editor whose report I am using. Professor R. J. Tarrant has inspected some nine manuscripts to see what readings they offered in some particularly vexed portions of the poems; I have similarly indicated when I am obliged to him for information on a manuscript.