Tönnes Kleberg (1904–1984)

This is about a book that isn't even one of a kind. More like half of a kind.

Students of the New Testament text are always looking for additional materials, and one of the things they would like to have is a complete copy of the Gothic Bible, translated from the Greek by Wulfilas. Unfortunately, Gothic is a dead language, and all we have of it are scattered writings. Of which the Codex Argenteus -- a beautiful copy in silver ink on purple-stained parchment -- is the most substantial. It contains a large fraction of the Gothic gospels, but much has been lost. And, like most purple codices, the silver ink is pretty badly faded and hard to read. So it's neither as useful nor as pretty as it once was.

This book doesn't give you the text of the Argenteus. But it does tell you a lot about its history, with an image to show what a portion of the text looks like. One can only wish it were longer. But at least it's accurate as far as it goes, and it is a nice overview of a manuscript we can only wish we had more of.… (mehr)