History of Apollonius, king of Tyre. Recension A

Along with the so-called Recensio B, the Recensio A is the most ancient version of the History of Apollonius, king of Tyre. The novel achieved great success in the Middle Ages and was copied, translated and read in all of Europe (Peters 1904; Archibald 1991).

The two variants present some differences. The Recensio A is more detailed and more reliable than Recensio B and its language is almost poetic. It shows many Greek elements in vocabulary and syntax as well as late Latin expressions (see Kortekaas 2004: esp. 25-30, 73-82; Panayotakis 2012: 9-10).  

According to Klebs (1899), the Recensio A and the Recensio B of the History of Apollonius derive from a lost original Latin work of the third century. It was a pagan novel, epitomized and slightly Christianized in the fifth century. The two variants we have are dependent on this epitome. The idea of a Latin original has been expressed by Schmeling (1988: xxix-xxx) too. Kortekaas (2004: 13-16), on the other hand, suggests that the two versions derive from an original Greek work, written in Asia Minor in the middle of the third century. According to him, this pagan work was epitomized in the first half of the fifth century. On the basis of this strongly Christianized epitome, an anonymous author wrote the Recensio A. The Recensio B depends on it, but also draws on a different tradition (the Greek original, probably through a larger epitome). The idea of a Greek source is prevalent among the scholars.