Electronic Texts
The transcript facilitates extensive and varied searches of the manuscript. The results of these searches always identify the folios and folio-lines for ease of reference. The presence of the manuscript facsimile obviates the need for a strictly diplomatic transcription, and readers may well disagree over fine distinctions in word division, and the like, but will have the electronic facsimiles, including close-up ultraviolet and backlit images, as arbiters.
A Thorkelin A
B Thorkelin B
AB Both Thorkelin A and B
...) reading lost to manuscript at left margin but supplied by A or AB.
(...) reading lost to manuscript within a line but supplied by A or AB.
(... reading lost to manuscript at right margin but supplied by A or AB.
...] reading lost to manuscript at left margin but supplied by B.
[...] reading lost to manuscript within a line but supplied by B.
[... reading lost to manuscript at right margin but supplied by B.
Square brackets are also used for rare readings supplied by other sources.
text expanded abbreviation.
[text] uncertain reading.
[:::] erased or otherwise illegible reading, one colon for the space of an average letter.
The edition attempts to draw attention back to the manuscript, not to provide definitive solutions to problems that exist in the manuscript. The glossary incorporates textual notes through its definitions, as glossaries always do without directly acknowledging it. The edition and its glossary also draw attention to their source in the manuscript by providing citations to folios, folio-lines, and verse-lines.
The verse-lines differ from standard editions wherever the manuscript poses doubts about the way standard editions have resolved manuscript problems (single half-lines, hypermetrical lines, apparent gaps, and other anomalies). For this reason the total number of lines in this edition is 3184, instead of 3182 as in other editions.
Restorations from the Thorkelin transcripts are shown with parentheses for A readings and for AB readings, and with square brackets for B readings. Square brackets around readings in italics indicate editorial emendations or conjectural restorations; these are directly linked to the glossary, where they are identified as either emendations or restorations.
The new editorial emendations and conjectural restorations are not meant to replace, but rather to supplement or challenge previous editorial changes that have become ingrained in modern editions. Anglo-Saxon readers of this manuscript did not have access to any modern changes and perhaps devised different solutions each time they encountered problems that demanded emendations. The conjectural restorations are informed guesses that try to fill gaps in paleographically and linguistically plausible ways.
A note on folio 179: my latest opinion of this folio, a palimpsest, is that it exhibits the handwriting of a third scribe, contemporary with the two main scribes, and that the text on 179 reflects a late revision-in-progress of the poem. Much of this new text failed to adhere to the poorly prepared vellum. I now believe that C.L. Wrenn was right when he proposed that someone in modern times applied a reagent to these faded areas (the reagent fluoresces strongly under ultraviolet).
The text on 179r is further obscured by an offprint from 178v. If Photoshop is available, a user can examine the effects of this offset image. With 179 recto open, click MS179r, BL no. 182 on the toolbar, and then Offprint from 178v.
A link with detailed instructions opens in Photoshop an interactive overlay image of these folios.
By moving the Opacity slide-bar back and forth, one can study the areas of the offset from 178v to 179r.
A Thorkelin A
B Thorkelin B
AB Both Thorkelin A and B
| beginning of a new folio
(text) reading dependent on A or AB. If emended, the changed text is also italicized.
[text] reading dependent on B. Also used for rare readings from other sources.
[text] editorial restoration or emendation with direct links to the glossary.