ABSTRACT
In June 1985 a manuscript fragment was auctioned for £82,500 by Sotheby's, the famous London auctioneers. It was described as coming from “what is possibly the oldest manuscript written in England,” and “perhaps used by the Venerable Bede,” 1 who wrote an Ecclesiastical History of the English people in the early eighth century. It consists of one cut-down bifolium from Book 10 of Rufinus' continuation of Eusebius' Ecclesiastical History and contains part of chapter 1 on the Council of Nicea and part of chapter 11 on the Conversion of Georgia. 2 The first page starts with the last of the chapter headings and the beginning of Book 10, marked by a large initial ‘C’. The second page3 concludes with the conversion of the king of Georgia, the instruction of the people and construction of a church. The fragment was bought by the British Rail Pension Fund and sold again by them in May 1989 to the American billionaire Paul Getty Junior, who paid over £ 3 million for the collection of 34 manuscripts which included it. 4
