The description of this celebrated manuscript, the Codex Palatinus or
Vaticanus, as it has been named from the different places of its
abode, is as follows: it is a long quarto, on parchment, of 710 pages,
together with a page of contents and three other pages glued on at the
beginning. There are three hands in it. The table of contents and
pages 1-452 and 645-704 in the body of the MS. are in a hand of the
eleventh century; the middle of the MS., pages 453-644, is in a later
hand; and a third, later than both, has written the last six pages and
the three odd pages at the beginning, has added a few epigrams in
blank spaces, and has made corrections throughout the MS.

The index, which is of great importance towards the history not only
of the MS. but of the Anthology generally, runs as follows:--

{Tade enestin en tede te biblo ton epigrammaton

A. Nonnou poirtou Panopolitou ekphrasis tou kata Ioannen agiou
euaggeliou.
B. Paulou poirtou selantiariou (sic) uiou Kurou ekphrasis eis ten
megalen ekklesian ete ten agian Sophian.
G. Sullogai epigrammaton Khristianikon eis te naous kai eikonas kai
eis diaphora anathemata.
D. Khristodorou poietou Thebaiou ekphrasis ton agalmaton ton eis to
demosion gumnasion tou epikaloumenou Zeuxippou.
E. Meleagou poietou Palaistinou stephanos diaphoron epigrammaton.
S. Philippou poietou Thessalonikeos stephanos omoios diaphoron
epigrammaton.
Z. Agathiou skholastikou Asianou Murenaiou sulloge neon epigrammaton
ektethenton en Konstantinoupolei pros Theodoron Dekouriona. esti