Alma 51:20 Textual Variants

Royal Skousen
and the remainder of those dissenters ... yielded to the standard of liberty and were compelled to hoist the title of liberty [upon 1ABCDEFGIJLMNOPQRST|on HK] their towers and in their cities

There are a number of instances in the history of the text where the prepositions upon and on have been mixed up; for a list of examples, see under Alma 2:38. Here in Alma 51:20, the 1874 RLDS edition replaced upon with on; the 1908 RLDS edition restored the original upon (the reading in 𝓟). In this case, upon is definitely correct since that is the preposition that consistently occurs with the noun tower:

The example in Alma 46:36 strongly supports the use of upon here in Alma 51:20 since it also refers to the hoisting of the title of liberty.

Summary: Maintain in Alma 51:20 the preposition upon, the reading of the earliest extant sources; elsewhere the text consistently uses upon rather than on when referring to towers.

Analysis of Textual Variants of the Book of Mormon, Part. 4

References