MarkDavidNJ wrote:

I have been searching for a while and I thought I'd ask if there is any consensus on what manuscripts were the earliest out of Mark, Mathew, Luke, John, Thomas along with the rest of the New testament(Acts, Pauline and General epistles and Revelation). I am familiar(vaguely) with when these books were claimed to have been written, but I am wondering rather what are the earliest full manuscripts and fragments in existence. I'm trying to prepare an essay and I would appreciate being steered in the right direction.

For example:

Gospel of Mark - (Date written), (Earliest Fragment name and its date), (Earliest full manuscript name and its date),

David, I am just pasting through and noticed your post. Maybe this is a bit late. For essay purposes I would suggest that you go to your university library and pick up a Greek New Testament. Check the introduction, there should be a textual apparatus section. In the section they have listed number/name of manuscript, content, location (that being where you can actually go and see the manuscript if on display) and date.

So, for instance, the copy I am looking at lists P38 (papyri 38) containing Acts housed in Ann Arbor Mich at about 300 AD. As I skim through the list I also see a few others papyri late 3 century. These are not complete texts, Acts is found complete with 4 century uncials. There is also a fragmented uncial I notice 0189 that dates 2/3 century. You can do an Internet search on that one.

If you are doing this essay to learn how to research, I would suggest this method, on the other hand, if you just want to make a passing remark on the subject, some links have been provided already that might give you that quick answer.