What does codices mean?
Codices is the plural of codex, a term for a bound manuscript book — typically a handwritten ancient or medieval volume — as distinct from a scroll or roll. The codex format, adopted by Romans around the early centuries CE, replaced the scroll by gathering pages within covers, making texts easier to consult, store, and protect. Today the word appears almost exclusively in scholarly contexts: historians of the book, biblical scholars, classicists, and archivists speak of Greek, Latin, Hebrew, or Maya codices when describing specific surviving manuscripts. Famous examples include the Codex Sinaiticus and the few pre-Columbian Mesoamerican codices that escaped destruction. Because each surviving codex can be a unique witness to a lost text, the word carries connotations of rarity, scholarship, and careful preservation. It is formal vocabulary, but its story — the technology that shaped how humanity reads — makes it well worth knowing.
nounCodices is the plural of codex: a bound manuscript book, especially an ancient or medieval handwritten volume, as opposed to a scroll.
- Plural of codex: bound handwritten manuscripts, especially ancient or medieval ones.
"The monastery library houses one of the finest collections of illuminated codices in Europe."
"Scholars spent decades cataloguing the Greek codices discovered in the desert monastery."
"Only four Maya codices survived the Spanish conquest of the Yucatán."
"Codices" is already the standard Latinate plural of "codex"; avoid the anglicized "codexes" in formal writing.
"The burned library once held thousands of codices."
Before the codex, readers scrolled — the simple act of flipping pages was a Roman innovation that helped preserve the very texts we read today.
Reviewed by Deb Chak, Editor. AI-assisted content curated by RJS Tech Solutions LLP.
Etymology of codices
Codex comes from Latin codex, meaning a bound book or manuscript, originally a tree trunk or block of wood (related to caudex). The word entered English in the late Middle Ages via scholarly Latin. Its diminutive form codicillus gave English "codicil," and modern scholarship coined "codicology" for the study of manuscripts.
Related word forms
How codices is actually used
Formal and scholarly in register; found mainly in academic writing about history, palaeography, theology, and archaeology. The singular is "codex"; the anglicized plural "codexes" occasionally appears but "codices" is strongly preferred.
Easily confused with codices
"Codes" are systems of symbols or laws, while "codices" are bound handwritten manuscript books — the two look similar but share only a distant etymological connection through Latin.