Carl Gottfried Woide (german: Karl Gottfried Woide) (4 July 1725 – 9 May 1790), also known in England as Charles Godfrey Woide, was an Orientalist, a biblical scholar and a pastor.

Career

Woide began his career as a pastor at the

Reformed Reform is beneficial change Reform may also refer to: Media * ''Reform'' (album), a 2011 album by Jane Zhang * Reform (band), a Swedish jazz fusion group * ''Reform'' (magazine), a Christian magazine *''Reforme'' ("Reforms"), initial name of the ...

church in

Leszno Leszno (german: Lissa, 1800–1918 ''Lissa in Posen'') is a historic city in western Poland, within the Greater Poland Voivodeship. It is the seventh-largest city in the province with an estimated population of 62,200, as of 2021. Previously, it ...

, Poland. In 1750 he transcribed the manuscript of the ''Lexicon Ægyptiaco-Latinum'' of

Mathurin Veyssière de La Croze Mathurin is a French given name that may refer to: *Mathurin (given name), includes a list of people with the name *Mathurin (surname), includes a list of people with the name *Mathurin, an early member of the Trinitarian Order based in the church ...

in Leiden, which incorporated Sahidic words by Christian Scholtz. Woide learnt Coptic and became an expert in the Sahidic language. Woide lived in Britain from 1768 until his death in 1790, serving as pastor of the German Reformed Church at the Savoy and the Dutch Reformed Chapel at

St James's Palace St James's Palace is the most senior royal palace in London, the capital of the United Kingdom. The palace gives its name to the Court of St James's, which is the monarch's royal court, and is located in the City of Westminster in London. Altho ...

. He later become a librarian at the

British Museum The British Museum is a public museum dedicated to human history, art and culture located in the Bloomsbury area of London. Its permanent collection of eight million works is among the largest and most comprehensive in existence. It docum ...

, first in the Department of Natural History, then in the Department of Printed Books, in charge of its Oriental manuscripts. He was one of the first scholars to work on the Egyptian

Sahidic Coptic (Bohairic Coptic: , ) is a language family of closely related dialects, representing the most recent developments of the Egyptian language, and historically spoken by the Copts, starting from the third-century AD in Roman Egypt. Coptic w ...

texts. He examined the

Codex Alexandrinus The Codex Alexandrinus (London, British Library, Royal MS 1. D. V-VIII), designated by the siglum A or 02 (in the Gregory-Aland numbering of New Testament manuscripts), δ 4 (in the von Soden numbering of New Testament manuscripts), is a manu ...

and the published text of the

New Testament The New Testament grc, Ἡ Καινὴ Διαθήκη, transl. ; la, Novum Testamentum. (NT) is the second division of the Christian biblical canon. It discusses the teachings and person of Jesus, as well as events in first-century Christ ...

from this codex in 1786. Woide was described in 1782 by C. P. Moritz as living "not far from

Paddington Paddington is an area within the City of Westminster, in Central London. First a medieval parish then a metropolitan borough, it was integrated with Westminster and Greater London in 1965. Three important landmarks of the district are Paddi ...

, in a very salubrious quarter on the edge of the town, where he breathes cleaner and fresher air than in the city. Although well known as a learned authority on Oriental languages, he is nevertheless a sociable and not unworldly man." Woide possessed some leaves of a Greek-Coptic diglot manuscript of the New Testament known as the ''Fragmentum Woideanum''. These cover a portion of the

Book of Luke The Gospel of Luke), or simply Luke (which is also its most common form of abbreviation). tells of the origins, birth, ministry, death, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus Christ. Together with the Acts of the Apostles, it makes up a two-volu ...

. Woide suggested that the fragment was created in the 7th century. The leaves belong to

Uncial 070 Uncial 070 (in the Gregory-Aland numbering), ε 6 ( Soden), is a Greek-Coptic diglot uncial manuscript of the New Testament. Palaeographically it has been assigned to the 6th century. Uncial 070 belonged to the same manuscript as codices: 0110 ...

and other leaves of this manuscript are kept in different locations.

Personal life and legacy

Woide studied in

Frankfurt an der Oder Frankfurt (Oder), also known as Frankfurt an der Oder (), is a city in the German state of Brandenburg. It has around 57,000 inhabitants, is one of the easternmost cities in Germany, the fourth-largest city in Brandenburg, and the largest German ...

and in

Leiden Leiden (; in English and archaic Dutch also Leyden) is a city and municipality in the province of South Holland, Netherlands. The municipality of Leiden has a population of 119,713, but the city forms one densely connected agglomeration wit ...

, and held a doctorate of divinity from the University of Copenhagen. He was elected a fellow of the Royal Society in 1785, created D.C.L. by the University of Oxford in 1786, and appointed a fellow of many foreign societies. He and his wife had two daughters. He was struck by apoplexy while in conversation at the house of Sir

Joseph Banks Sir Joseph Banks, 1st Baronet, (19 June 1820) was an English naturalist, botanist, and patron of the natural sciences. Banks made his name on the 1766 natural-history expedition to Newfoundland and Labrador. He took part in Captain James ...

in 1790, and later died in his rooms at the British Museum. Woide's papers are held at the British Library. The ''Fragmentum Woideanum'' is kept at the

Clarendon Press Oxford University Press (OUP) is the university press of the University of Oxford. It is the largest university press in the world, and its printing history dates back to the 1480s. Having been officially granted the legal right to print books ...

Oxford Oxford () is a city in England. It is the county town and only city of Oxfordshire. In 2020, its population was estimated at 151,584. It is north-west of London, south-east of Birmingham and north-east of Bristol. The city is home to the ...

.British History Online.
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Works

''Lexicon Ægyptiaco-Latinum''
1775.
''Grammatica aegyptiaca utriusque dialecti''
(1778) *''Novum Testamentum Graecum e codice ms. alexandrino'', London 1786.
''Appendix ad editionem Novi Testamenti graeci… in qua continentur fragmenta Novi Testamenti juxta interpretationem dialecti superioris Aegypti quae thebaica vel sahidica appellatur''
Oxford 1799.

References

External links

Linnean Correspondence
Karl Gottfried Woide to Carl Linnaeus (27 June 1775) {{DEFAULTSORT:Woide, Carl Gottfried 1725 births 1790 deaths 18th-century Polish people 18th-century German people 18th-century British people Polish librarians German librarians British librarians German biblical scholars Polish orientalists German orientalists British orientalists Fellows of the Royal Society British people of German descent German male non-fiction writers Polish Protestants Polish Calvinist and Reformed Christians