Manuscript

Codex Alexandrinus

Also known as Alexandrinus · A (Gregory-Aland) · 02 · British Library Royal MS 1 D. V–VIII

great-codicesnew-testamentseptuagintcanon

Summary

A fifth-century Greek Bible in four volumes — with two letters of Clement bound in at the end, and a lost book still listed in its own index.

Copied c. AD 400–440 (fifth century).
Written in greek on parchment.
Kept at British Library, London (Royal MS 1 D. V–VIII, four volumes).
Contains Septuagint (most), New Testament (most), 1 Clement.
Named in 6 of the places your Bible carries a footnote.

A parchment page of Codex Alexandrinus in two columns of Greek capitals, with a decorated tailpiece — Codex Alexandrinus at the end of Luke, with its decorative tailpiece: British Library, public domain

Sources (3)

F. G. Kenyon, The Codex Alexandrinus in Reduced Photographic Facsimile (British Museum, 1909–57) · accessed 2026-08-06The full facsimile. Public domain.
Royal Collection Trust, record for Codex Alexandrinus · accessed 2026-08-06The record of the 1627 presentation to Charles I.
Metzger & Ehrman, The Text of the New Testament: Its Transmission, Corruption, and Restoration, 4th ed. (Oxford University Press, 2005) · accessed 2026-08-06The standard handbook of New Testament textual criticism.

What it is

It carries most of the Greek Old Testament and most of the New, with gaps, and then keeps going: 1 Clement and 2 Clement are bound in after Revelation.

The index at the front lists one more book after those — the Psalms of Solomon. Those leaves were torn out and are gone. But the scribe's own list separates them from the rest by a space, which is contemporary evidence that the person who compiled this Bible did not rank that book with the others. Extra texts could be bound into a fifth-century Bible without being counted as Scripture.

It was brought to Alexandria in the early fourteenth century and presented to King Charles I in 1627.

Manuscript details

Date: c. AD 400–440 (fifth century)
Language: Greek
Script: Uncial (majuscule)
Material: Parchment
Held at: British Library, London (Royal MS 1 D. V–VIII, four volumes)
Found at: Alexandria; presented to King Charles I of England in 1627
Contains: Septuagint (most) · New Testament (most) · 1 Clement · 2 Clement · Psalms of Solomon (listed in the index; leaves lost)

Why it matters

One of the four great whole-Bible codices, and the best single answer to the question "who decided what was in the Bible?" — because here you can watch a fifth-century compiler bind in extra reading and quietly mark it off from Scripture in his own table of contents.

Where this witness is read

The words used here: uncial, codex

uncial: a book hand of Greek capital letters, used for the oldest whole Bibles.
codex: a book with leaves and a spine, the form that replaced the scroll.

The KJV and the ASV translate the Hebrew Masoretic Text. Where Codex Alexandrinus reads differently, the footnote in your Bible is pointing here.

Where the manuscripts differ, all 15 places →Every handwritten copy, shelved and in date order →