Overview of "The Twelve"
(1 page, landscape)(last rev 97.08.04)
The "Big Five" .............(1 page, landscape)(last rev 98.03.21)
The "Little Seven" ........(1 page, portrait)...(last rev 98.03.21)
Close-up of Codex II ....(1 page, landscape)(last rev 97.08.04)
Notes:
1. A "codex" was formed by taking a number of sheets of papyrus, folding them in half,
and attaching them at the center to a leather cover. Each sheet of papyrus thus formed
four writing surfaces. Not all of the surfaces were necessarily used, however, so the
number of written pages might be less than the number of surfaces. In the above graphs
(except for the "close-up"), sizes are given in terms of the number of papyrus sheets.
2. The tractate-sizes shown in the graphs should be taken as approximate only, whether
given explicitly, as a number of pages (a), or implicitly, as a graphic representation (b):
... (a) The number of pages in a text is based on the line-numbers shown in
Robinson's NHLE, divided by an average page-size of 36 lines. (A much better number
could be derived from an examination of the codex-facsimiles not currently available to
me.)
... (b) The graphic representation of tractate-sizes is accurate only to within four
pages, because of the method used, owing to a desire to limit each graph to a single
page.
3. Notations used:
... An asterisk appended to a title means that that title also occurs elsewhere within
the codices. (I have deliberately not so marked On the Origin of the World.)
... An extra-wide black line separating two tractates means that the second tractate
begins (on) a new page of the codex. These cases are worthy of note, since the more
usual situation is for the beginning of a second tractate to be on the same page as
the end of the previous one.
4. The short version of The Apocryphon of John in III,1 takes up more space than the long version in II,2 because of differences in writing style. (Not all codices were written in Uncial, as was Codex II.)
5. The so-called "Codex XIII" is treated for what it is: namely, a loose tractate (Trimorphic Protennoia) found tucked into Codex VI (although apparently having no connection to it). These pages were part of another codex originally, but were separated from it in antiquity, for reasons unknown.
-MWG, 97.08.04
