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Geoff R. Webb, Mark at the Threshold: 'this is the chosen text by the UBS committee, on the basis of the strength of external attestation'.

The account then describes how Herod's daughter Herodias (NRSV; other translations refer to the girl as the daughter of Herodias) dances before Herod, who is pleased and offers her anything she asks for in return. When the girl asks her mother what she should request, she is told to demand the head of John the Baptist. Reluctantly, Herod orders the beheading of John, and his head is delivered to her, at her request, on a plate. John's disciples take the body away and bury it in a tomb.

There are a number of difficulties with this passage. The Gospel wrongly identifies Antipas as 'King' and the ex-husband of Herodias is named as Philip, but he is known to have been called Herod. Although the wording clearly implies the girl was the daughter of Herodias, many texts describe her as "Herod's daughter, Herodias". Since these texts are early and significant and the reading is 'difficult', many scholars see this as the original version, later corrected in the Matthew and Luke gospels. Josephus says that Herodias had a daughter by the name of Salome, a name not given in any of the New Testament accounts.

Scholars have speculated about the origins of the story. Since it shows signs of having been composed in Aramaic, which Mark apparently did not speak, he is likely to have got it from a Palestinian source. There is a variety of opinions about how much actual historical material in contains, especially given the factual errors. Many scholars have seen the story of John arrested, executed, and buried in a tomb as a conscious foreshadowing of the fate of Jesus.