Some of those (up to Couchoud) who say Mark's Gospel was written in Latin.

By David Bruce Gain

author of: Proof that the gospel of Mark was written in Latin (http://www.scribd.com/doc/56082592).
(Those who did not write in English are given in English translation).

The authors of the colophons of some early Peshitta (Syriac) MSS: "This is the end of the Holy Gospel preached by Mark, who preached in Latin at Rome", of the colophons of several Arabic and many Armenian MSS, of the colophons of Greek MSS 160 (of 1123) and 161 (10th century) and 124 (11th century). Ephraem Syrus (306?-373) in his commentary on Tatian's Diatessaron (written in Syriac) App 1.1: "Mark wrote the Gospel in Latin". Gregory Nazianzen (329-390) (wrote in Greek) AP 319: "Matthew wrote of the wonderful works of Christ for the Hebrews, Mark for Italy, Luke for Greece" (i.e. Matthew in Hebrew, Mark in Latin, Luke in Greek). Anastasius bibliothecarius (810?-878?) in the life of Peter in his "Liber pontificalis" (Account of the Popes): "He {Peter} wrote two letters which are called "catholic" and the Gospel of Mark (because Mark was his listener and son through baptism) ... one {Evangelist} wrote in Greek, one in Hebrew, one {Mark} in Latin". Eutychius (877-940) Patriarch of Alexandria, pp 35-6 of the edition of John Selden (London 1642); Selden entitles the work "Ecclesiae suae origines" (Origins of his church) (the work is in Arabic): "In the time of Nero Caesar Peter, the leader of the apostles, wrote, with Mark, the Gospel of Mark in Latin at Rome, but he ascribed it to Mark". Agapius of Hierapolis (?-941) "Universal History" (written in Arabic) Part 2: "Mark wrote the Gospel in Latin for the inhabitants of greater Rome" (i.e. Rome, not Constantinople). Dionysius bar Salibi (?-1171) "Commentaries on the Gospels" (written in Syriac): "Mark wrote his Gospel at Rome in Roman,

that is Latin". Jacobus de Voragine (1230?-1298) Archbishop of Genoa, in "Sermones de Sanctis per totius anni circulum" (Accounts of the Saints celebrated throughout the year) page 193 of the 1573 edition, under "St Mark the evangelist": "He went to Aquileia... He left there a great treasure, namely the work which he wrote in Greek at Rome but there in Latin". Ricaldo da Monte di Croce (1243?-1320) in "Confutatio Alcorani seu legis Saracenorum" (Refutation of the Koran or the law of the Saracens): "Matthew wrote in Hebrew in Judaea, John in Greek in Asia, Luke in the same language in Greece, Mark in Latin in Italy". Joannes Cantacuzenus (1292?-1383) Byzantine emperor, in his "Nine Books against the Jews" (written in Greek). Richard Fitzralph (1295?-1360) Archbishop of Armagh and Primate of Ireland, in Book 9 of his "Quaestiones Armenorum" (Quesions concerning the Armeni): "Matthew wrote the Gospel in Hebrew, John in Greek, Mark in Latin ... each without doubt taught that the consecration should be made in those languages in which they wrote). Mar Odisho (?-1318) Metropolitan of Nisibis and Armenia, who wrote in Syriac, on page 95 of Mar Eshai Shimm "Book of Marganitha" (2007): "Mark who wrote in Latin at Rome". Ibn Kaldun (1337-1406) in "Muqaddima" (written in Arabic) 1.476-7 (translated by F. Rosenthal, 1958) says Mark wrote in Latin. Ibrahim al Barradi (14th century) in "Kitab al Jawahir..." (written in Arabic) volume 1, book 1, chapter 19, says Mark wrote in Greek and Latin. Pietro di Natale (?-1406?) Bishop of Aquileia in "Catalogus Sanctorum et gestorum eorum" (An account of the Saints and their works) book 4, chapter 86 (1543 edition): "Peter ordained that Mark should be the Protobishop of Aquileia; it was there that his Gospel, which he had previously written in Latin at Rome, was fashioned again, in Greek utterance". Fino Fini di Adria (1431?-1517) in "In Judaeos flagellum ex sacris scripturis excerptum" (Excerpts from sacred scripture whipping the Jews), 1538, Book 6 chapter 80: "Mark wrote his Gospel twice, first at Rome in Latin from the Blessed Apostle Peter, the shepherd of the church, when he talked of the Lord's passion and other things concerning him; and, begged by his friends, he wrote this Gospel again in Aquileia, but in Greek, and it is this Greek version that the Blessed Jerome talks of when he says: 'Or we do not understand Mark's meaning', because the Blessed Peter saw it in Latin". Pedro Anton Beuter (1490-1554) in "Adnotationes decem ad

sanctam scripturam" (Ten annotations on sacred scripture), 1547 p.116: "Mark wrote his Gospel at Rome ... this Gospel is said to have been given in Latin, reproducing what he had heard from Peter". Cardinal Gugliemo Sirleto (1514-1585) Volume 15 of Cornelius a lapide (1567-1637)(1891 edition) p.666 (introduction to Mark) (written in Latin): "Cardinal Sirleto, a very learned man, had noticed several strange words in the Greek text of Mark's Gospel which appeared from the Latin exemplar or, as they {Sirleto and Baronius} say, the Latin original, to have been translated into half-Latin Greek" (see "Cardinal Caesar Baronius" below). Onofrio Panvinio (1529-1568) in "Epitome pontificum Romanorum a S. Petro usque ad Paulum llll" (A brief account of the Roman pontiffs from Saint Peter to Paul 4th) 1558 p.1: "Matthew wrote in Hebrew, Luke in Greek, Mark in Latin". Cardinal Caesar Baronius (1538-1607) in "Annales ecclesiastici" (Annals of the church) (1593) on the year 45: "One with a good knowledge of Greek who reads the Greek text of Mark carefully will find several strange words which he will easily recognize as translated from Latin into half-Latin Greek". Alphonsus Ciaconius (1540-1601) in "Vitae et res gestae summorum pontificum a Christo Domino usque ad Clementem VIII" (Lives and deeds of the supreme pontiffs from the Lord Christ to Clement 8th) 1601, in the life of Peter: "All the Syrians and reason persuade that a Gospel written for the use of Latin speakers was written in Latin". Robert Bellarmine (1542-1621) in "Controversiae de verbo Dei" (Controversies concerning the word of God), 1607, book 2, chapter 8: "It is clearly indicated that Mark's Gospel was originally written by him in Latin". Jacobus Gretser (1562-1625) in "Defensio controversiarum Roberti Bellarmini" (A defence of Robert Bellarmine's "Controversies") (1609) Book 2, chapter 7. Petrus Kirstenius (1577-1640) in "Vitae evangelistarum quatuor nunc primum ex antiquo codice manuscripto Arabico Caesario erutae" (Lives of the four evangelists now for the first time extracted from an old Caesarian Arabic manuscript), 1608, p.36: "I do not find in these writings any clear statement about the language in which Saint Mark wrote his Gospel, but the general opinion seems to be correct, that it was in Latin. If he wrote at Rome, there is no doubt that he wrote primarily for Romans, and so in Latin, and so Saint Peter first proclaimed it in Rome". Jacobus Tirinus (1580-1636) in "Commentarii in sacram scripturam" (Commentaries on sacred scripture), 1632, Volume 3

p.86 (introduction to Mark): "He wrote his Gospel from what he had heard from St Peter his teacher, in Latin, since he was at Rome". Melchior Inchofer (1584?-1648), one of Galileo's adversaries at his trial, in "Historia sacrae Latinitatis" (The story of sacred Latin), 1638, Book 5, chapter 8, p.147: "We think that there was one of the evangelists who wrote for the Romans and in Latin. He was Mark. Not only the authority of many but also reason itself indicate that he must be most renowned among Latins on this account". Joao da Sylveira (1592-1637) in "Opuscula varia" (Various works) 1728, the first work, section 5 (the Evangelists), enquiry 5 (on Saint Mark the evangelist and his Gospel): "Since he wrote it for the Romans, he wrote it in Latin". Paganino Gaudenzio (1595-1649), a friend of Galileo's. Cornelius a lapide (see quotation under "Cardinal Gugliemo Sirleto): "Pagnini Gaudentius, a professor at the University of Pisa, has written a dissertation on this question, dedicated to the Grand Duke of Tuscany, in which he maintains that Saint Mark first wrote his Gospel in Latin at Rome". Jean Harduin (1646-1729) in "Commentarius in Novum Testamentum" (Commentary on the New Testament), 1741, beginning of preface: "Latin, in which we consider and know that the writers of the New Testament wrote"; p.142: on Mark 15.15: the learned know that the Greek IKANON POIHSAI comes from the Latin satisfacere; FRAGELLWSAS is made up from the Latin flagellis caesum; on 15.39: KENTURIWN has been inexpertly made up from the Latin centurio. John Black (1783-1855), editor of the "Morning Chronicle", in "Palaeoromaica, or historical and philological disquisitions inquiring...whether the many new words in the Elzevir Greek testament are not formed from the Latin" (1822). On p.86: "What is singular, on the hypothesis that Mark wrote in Greek, is, that he should have thought it necessary to explain Greek by Latin words: chap. xii 42: LEPTA DUO O ESTI KODRANTHS; xv 16: ESW THS AULHS O ESTI PRAITWRION, 42: PARASKEUH O ESTI PROSABBATON". L'Abbe Blaviel in "La Tribune sacree" (The sacred Tribune) 1863, p. 106 (from "A speech given by the Abbe Blaviel, vicar general of the diocese" {of Montauban}: "The Gospel ... of St Mark, written in Latin". John Barber Lightfoot (1828-1889), Bishop of Durham, in "St Clement of Rome" (Apostolic Fathers, Vols. 1 & 2), 1890, excursus on St Peter at Rome, pp. 481-502: "When Mark is called the ERMHNEUTHS 'the interpreter' of Peter, the reference must be to the Latin not the Greek language. The evid-

ence that Greek was spoken commonly in the towns bordering on the Sea of Galilee is ample, even if this had not been the necessary inference from the whole tenour of the New Testament". Cardinal James Gibbons (1834-1921), Archbishop of Baltimore and Primate of the United States, in "The light of the cross in the twentieth century" (1905) Vol 3: "St Mark, who wrote the second Gospel, followed him {Peter} to Rome ... It was written in Latin, the common language of the Romans at that time". Edgar Simmons Buchanan (1872-1932), an editor of Old Latin Gospel texts, in "The search for the original words of the Gospel" (1914) pp.12-13: "St Mark, I believe, was originally written in Latin ... I believe myself that the Roman legionaries ,the men who served under Caesar and the men who served under Augustus, did not speak Greek. I believe they spoke in Latin, and I believe that St Mark - Marcus is a downright Latin name - I believe that St Mark wrote in the Latin tongue for those ordinary people of Roman Italy". Paul-Louis Couchoud (1879-1959) in "L'evangile de Marc a ete ecrit en Latin" (The Gospel of Mark was written in Latin), Revue de l'histoire des Religions 94 (1926) 161-92.