Because of the uniformity of the text, NT papyri are well suited to codicological reconstruction. If there are two or more pieces of papyrus from the same codex, sound reconstructions are often possible. But good methodology will account for the fibre orientation of the fragments. Flawed conclusions are the inevitable result of neglecting such analysis. Skeat erred in this direction as regards ∏ 64ϩ67 and ∏ 4 . Nevertheless, his contribution in the area was substantial and enduring. It only remains for scholars to appreciate the insights that codicology can bring to the study of the NT text.Towards the end of his long life, T. C. Skeat attempted to bolster a theory he had advanced several years earlier: that Christians adopted the codex around 100 ce because it could hold the four gospels in a format that delimited them against heterodox rivals. 1 While conceding that without any fragments of an early second-century, four-gospel codex the theory remained conjectural, he now claimed to have proved that ∏ 64ϩ67 and ∏ 4 came from a four-gospel, single-quire codex whose ancestors 'must go back well into the second century'. 2 Throughout his article Skeat avoids 'any mention of recto or verso, terms which cause hopeless confusion when used in connection with a papyrus codex, since to papyrologists they inevitably suggest the sides with horizontal and vertical fibres respectively, which is irrelevant and confusing [in]. . .the case of a codex'. 3 While it 582 New Test. Stud. 53, pp. 582-604. Printed in the United Kingdom is true that confusion can easily result from trying to account for fibre orientation in codicological reconstructions, or from the different traditional and papyrological meanings of recto and verso (the reason why → and ↓ as indicators of fibre direction are to be preferred), 4 this methodological dictum is misleading. 5 Analysis of fibre direction is an essential part of codicology 6 and when ignored the inevitable result is inaccurate conclusions.The Codicology of ∏ 67

Based on numbers alone, Greek had as much currency in first- as it did in second- and third-century Galilee. But measuring the use of Greek by calculating the number of inscriptions in each century is flawed methodology. This is because the inscriptional evidence is patchy and unrepresentative (as the very few inscriptions in Aramaic/Hebrew demonstrate). Scholars must first understand the various kinds of ancient bilingualism, then look for indications of these, including (written) Greek literacy. Literary and other evidence, especially factors that might encourage bilingualism, such as the influence of the administrative cities of Sepphoris and Tiberias and the surrounding Hellenistic cities, the state of the Galilean economy, and rural-urban dynamics, can then help to fill in the gaps. On the basis of all of the extant evidence, knowledge of Greek was probably quite common, with most people picking it up by force of circumstance rather than through formal instruction.

In a recent book Goodacre observes that in the early days of scholarship on the Gospel of Thomas "the majority view was that Thomas knew the Synoptic Gospels. These days, essays on the state of the question tend to represent the debate as a scholarly split, half on the side of Thomas's independence, half on the side of its dependence on the Synoptics."1 While this may be true quantitatively, the independence view, with its easy dismissal of dependence by means of an appeal to orality, has probably been more influential. Even though Goodacre argues that the Gospel of Thomas knew the synoptics, he avoids the word "dependence" because it associates "a text that is apparently so oral in nature" with "literary dependence" (sc. slavish derivation from the synoptics).2 Instead, he suggests that the Gospel of Thomas accessed the synoptic materials through memory. "While it is not impossible" that the author had manuscripts on hand, "the logistical efforts involved in that enterprise are far greater than those involved with recalling texts from memory."3 Goodacre thinks that his attempt to chart a via media might also explain what is happening in other "second-century texts that are familiar with but not necessarily dependent on the canonical Gospels."4 Despite its many good points, this approach-just like the independence view with which it takes issue-underestimates the impact of literacy on the transmission of gospel tradition in the second and third centuries. The papyrological evidence often points to the physical consultation of manuscripts of the synoptic gospels or, at the very least, of synoptic or thematic compilations of the same. That adds up to dependence, albeit very creative dependence.

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