Page "Ammianus Marcellinus" Paragraph 14

His work has suffered terribly from the manuscript transmission.

Aside from the loss of the first thirteen books, the remaining eighteen are in many places corrupt and lacunose.

The sole surviving manuscript from which almost every other is derived is a ninth-century Carolingian text, V, produced in Fulda from an insular exemplar.

The only independent textual source for Ammianus lies in M, another ninth-century Frankish codex which was, unfortunately, unbound and placed in other codices during the fifteenth century.

Only six leaves of M survive ; however, the printed edition of Gelenius ( G ) is considered to be based on M, making it an important witness to the textual tradition of the Res Gestae.