198 Part Two: Epigrams in Context
tion (if he presents the book to a third party) in a dedicatory book epigram.
The author of the text or texts found in the manuscript may be praised
abundantly for his literary talents: such poems are laudatory book epigrams.
The first two categories, colophon verses and dedicatory book epigrams, are so
closely related to the process of copying and manufacturing manuscripts that
they hardly ever manage to break away from their original contexts and gain
recognition as purely literary texts. Colophon verses are never found in Byzan-
tine collections of poems; dedicatory book epigrams only rarely. Since the
literary quality of some of the dedicatory epigrams is fairly high, it is reason-
able to assume that they were written by professional poets working on com-
mission for a wealthy patron. And yet, whereas the collections of the major
Byzantine poets contain numerous dedicatory epigrams on works of art or
other pieces of occasional poetry, dedicatory book epigrams are extremely rare.
The book epigrams that we do find in Byzantine collections of poems are
almost always laudatory texts praising literary figures of high esteem, such as
the evangelists, David the psalmist, the church fathers (especially Gregory of
Nazianzos) and the ancient authors.
Since accomplished poets like Pisides and Geometres are known to have
composed laudatory book epigrams, there is a clear tendency on the part of
Byzantine scribes to attribute anonymous texts to famous authors. Unless a
book epigram is also found in a collection of poems, such ascriptions are highly
suspect. In some Byzantine Gospels, for example, a number of epigrams on the
evangelists are attributed to Niketas David Paphlagon, a prolific writer in the
first half of the tenth century: three epigrams on Matthew, Mark and Luke that
belong to a set of four (including John), and two epigrams on Luke, one in
hexameter and the other in dodecasyllable^4. These epigrams are ascribed to
Niketas only in manuscripts dating from the twelfth century and later. In the
earliest manuscripts, however, they do not bear a heading mentioning their
author: the set of four epigrams on the evangelists is anonymous in Lips.Bibl.
Univ. 6 (s. X)^5 ; the hexametric epigram on Luke can be found in many
manuscripts, dating from the tenth century and later, of which only a few
Palaeologan ones mention Niketas^6 ; and the dodecasyllabic epigram on Luke
does not bear a heading in Baltimore, Walters Art Gallery cod. W 524 (s. X
in.)^7. Seeing that the earliest manuscripts, some of which were copied during
(^4) For the three epigrams on Matthew, Mark and Luke, see KOMINIS 1951: 264 (no. 5), 267
(no. 5) and 271 (no. 3); for the complete set, see SODEN 1902: 380–381 (nos. 24–27). For
the two epigrams on Luke: see KOMINIS 1951: 270–271 (nos. 2 and 4).
(^5) See C. TISCHENDORF, Anecdota Sacra et Profana. Leipzig 1855, 20–29.
(^6) See FOLLIERI 1956: 72–75.
(^7) See NELSON 1980: 77–78.