40. ETHIOPIC. From the original matrices.
41. SYRIAC. From the original matrices.
42. SAMARITAN. From the original matrices.
The matrices of three of these founts, the Samaritan, the Ethiopic, and the Syriac, have survived to the present day, and in the course of this work we shall have occasion to trace their descent from the original makers to the present owners. Meanwhile, it is with great satisfaction that we are able here to show a specimen of types actually cast from these venerable relics as they now exist.[323] Of the Arabic fount, some of the punches and matrices also exist, but in too incomplete and dilapidated a state to allow of their being used.
Of the Orientals, the Hebrew is, perhaps, the least good. The Syriac and Arabic are fine bold characters. The Greek is neat, though somewhat insignificant. The Ethiopic[324] and Samaritan[325] are both good and elegant faces. The Italic is particularly neat. As might be expected from founts procured from various foundries in that day, there is a certain absence of uniformity in the {175} bodies on which the different founts are cast. This only makes the more remarkable the accuracy and precision with which the columns are arranged. In most copies the columns are divided by red lines, ruled by hand—in itself an enormous task.
Nine languages are used in the Polyglot, but no single book is printed in so many. The following is the arrangement of texts according to volumes:
- VOL. 1.—
- Prolegomena.
- Pentateuch. Hebrew, Greek, Latin, Syriac, Arabic and Samaritan.
- VOL. 2.—
- Joshua to Esther. Hebrew, Greek, Latin, Syriac and Arabic.
- VOL. 3.—
- Job to Malachi. Hebrew, Greek, Latin, Syriac, Arabic, and Psalms also in Ethiopic.
- VOL. 4.—
- Apocrypha. Greek, Latin, Syriac, Arabic (some of the books, however, have not the Arabic. Tobit is in a two-fold Hebrew). An appendix to this volume contains two Chaldee Targums and a Persic Pentateuch.
- VOL. 5.—
- New Testament, Gospels in Greek, Latin, Syriac, Arabic, Ethiopic and Persian; other books, Greek, Latin, Syriac, Arabic and Ethiopic.
- VOL. 6.—
- Various readings.
It will thus be seen that the Greek, Latin, Syriac and Arabic texts run throughout the work. The Chaldean text and Targums are all given in Hebrew type. The Hebrew text is printed throughout masoretically.