Because the scans available to me are sometimes faint or subject to printing errors, many characters in the transcripts are bracketed, as w[o]sketomp. This may mean a number of things, such as a suspected typo, missing diacritic or letter of uncertain identity. [a] and [o], in particular, most often indicate that there is a diacritic or suspected diacritic whose identity is not entirely certain. In many cases brackets indicate little other than a shorthand to myself to go back and check the letter during future proofreading.
The "double-o" ligature ꝏ is displayed with a macron, as ꝏ̄, although no such macron is used in the texts (I have found no token of the ligature with any diacritic whatsoever and, given the constraints of 17th-century printing, it seems almost certain that none exists). This orthographic choice was originally motivated by my own misrecollection of its usage in the 1829 published version of Josiah Cotton's Massachusett Vocabulary. Upon taking another look when writing this page, it became clear that it is only used sparingly (and with unclear meaning). Nevertheless, the macron makes it easier to distinguish the ligature from double oo and, in my experience, makes the text easier on the eyes, so I have decided to keep it.
As of February 2024, Eliotweb includes the texts of about half of the 1661/1663 first edition Eliot Bible, the 1685 second edition, and Experience Mayhew's 1709 translation of the Psalms and Gospel of John. By and large, the texts have not been proofread. In the text search, the first edition has the shorthand α, the second edition β, and Mayhew M. The text of the not-yet-added 1655 "zeroth-edition" Genesis will have the shorthand א.
Eliot's and Mayhew's translations are generally based on the King James Version, or Authorized Version (abbreviated on this site as KJV), so this is what is given as the parallel text; I have used Project Gutenberg's transcript, which may be found here. Somewhat surprisingly, this was by no means unusual in the context of Puritan New England, whose clergymen regularly used the KJV in addition to the nonconformist Geneva Bible and their own translations from Hebrew or Greek2.
There are a number of places where Eliot and/or Mayhew have drawn from the Hebrew of Ben Hayyim's Masoretic Text or the Greek of the Textus Receptus, as at Leviticus 24:12:
| First Edition (α) | Second Edition (β) | KJV | Hebrew |
|---|---|---|---|
| Kah ukkupshagkinóuh, woh noh ꝏ̄wahteauwaheónat nashpe wuttꝏ̄n Jehovah. | Kah ukkupshagkinóuh, woh noh ꝏ̄wahteauwaheónat nashpe wuttꝏ̄n Jehovah. | And they put him in ward, that the mind of the LORD might be shewed them. | וַיַּנִּיחֻהוּ בַּמִּשְׁמָר לִפְרֹשׁ לָהֶם עַל־פִּי יְהוָה׃ |
John 1:43 provides an example of a verse where Eliot has translated from the KJV (with would left untranslated, as much modal and tense marking in English tends to be), but Mayhew has drawn on the Greek of the Textus Receptus3:
| First Edition (α) | Second Edition (β) | Mayhew (M) | KJV | Greek |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Na wonk kesukok, Jesus sohham en Galile, kah naméheau Philip, kah wuttinuh, asuhkah. | Na wonk kesukok, Jesus sohham en Galile, kah nameheau Phillip, kah wuttinuh, Asuhkah. | Na wonk kasukohk, Jesus kesanumꝏ̄p suhhomunnát en Galilee, kah nameheau Philipoh, kah wuttunuh ohsuhkah. | The day following Jesus would go forth into Galilee, and findeth Philip, and saith unto him, Follow me. | Τῇ ἐπαύριον ἠθέλησεν ὁ Ἰησοῦς ἐξελθεῖν εἰς τὴν Γαλιλαίαν· καὶ εὑρίσκει Φίλιππον, καὶ λέγει αὐτῷ, Ἀκολούθει μοι. |
As of February 2024, the Hebrew/Greek text is not yet available on Eliotweb, but given its relevance to understanding Eliot's and Mayhew's translations, I intend to add it in the near future.
1The orthography of the King James Version often deviates from that of modern English, which can frustrate attempts at searching for a word in English. I am on the lookout (as of February 2024) for a version with updated orthography, at least for the word search.↩
2See Harry Stout's 1982 study "Word and Order in Colonial New England," from Mark A. Noll, ed., The Bible in America: Essays in Cultural History; many thanks to Michael Winship for his knowledge of the historical context.↩
3Drawn from the text of Beza's 1598 Textus Receptus as given on www.textus-receptus.com and checked against a scan of the original, where this verse is 1:44. There are occasional versification discrepencies elsewhere which may turn out to line up with the Hebrew/Greek. There are minor differences among the various major editions of the Textus Receptus (Stephanus's 1551 edition, Beza's 1598 edition, and the 1624 and 1633 Elzevir editions); a complete list may be found in the appendices of Hoskier 1890. Given that Eliot arrived in America in 1631, it seems most likely that he was drawing on Beza or the 1624 Elzevir, but this has yet to be checked (if indeed it's possible to tell).↩