Quotes About Written document

Without the authority of a written document, there was no way to compare the versions of a text, and we therefore cannot assume that a text recorded in a thirteenth-century source passed unchanged through centuries of oral transmission. This fact makes it extremely difficult to discuss with any authority the time or place of origin of many of the texts of Scandinavian mythology, especially eddic poetry.

we do not possess a single scriptural document written any less than twenty-one years after the crucifixion that purports to tell us anything about the historical life of Jesus of Nazareth! We then have to face the fact that, at the very least, there is absolute silence for twenty-one years.

practice of separation of powers, the modern idea of a constitution as a written document, the device of specially elected conventions for creating and amending constitutions, and the process of popular ratification.