Leningrad Codex - Name

Name

The Leningrad Codex (a codex is a hand-written book as opposed to a scroll) is so named because it has been housed at the National Library of Russia in Saint Petersburg since 1863. In 1924, after the Russian Revolution, Saint Petersberg was renamed Leningrad, and, because the codex was used as the basic text for the Biblia Hebraica since 1937, it became internationally known as the "Leningrad Codex". Although in 1991, after the dissolution of the Soviet Union, the city's original name was restored to St Petersburg, the National Library of Russia requested that "Leningrad" be retained in the name of the codex. Nonetheless, the Codex is occasionally referred to as the Codex Petersburgensis or Petropolitanus, or the St. Petersburg Codex. This should be avoided as, since 1876, these appellations refer to a different biblical codex (MS. Heb B 3) which is even older (916 CE), but contains only the later Prophets.