Rediscovering the star-map of Hipparchus

Posted on by Roger Pearse

In Nature last month there was an extremely interesting article recording the discovery of a new text by Hipparchus in the palimpsest Codex Climaci Rescriptus, during – of all things! – a summer project led by Peter Williams of Tyndale Hall in Cambridge:

First known map of night sky found hidden in Medieval parchment – Fabled star catalogue by ancient Greek astronomer Hipparchus had been feared lost.

A medieval parchment from a monastery in Egypt has yielded a surprising treasure. Hidden beneath Christian texts, scholars have discovered what seems to be part of the long-lost star catalogue of the astronomer Hipparchus — believed to be the earliest known attempt to map the entire sky. …

 The extract is published online this week in the Journal for the History of Astronomy. Evans says it proves that Hipparchus, often considered the greatest astronomer of ancient Greece, really did map the heavens centuries before other known attempts. It also illuminates a crucial moment in the birth of science, when astronomers shifted from simply describing the patterns they saw in the sky to measuring and predicting them.

The manuscript came from the Greek Orthodox St Catherine’s Monastery in the Sinai Peninsula, Egypt, but most of its 146 leaves, or folios, are now owned by the Museum of the Bible in Washington DC. The pages contain the Codex Climaci Rescriptus, a collection of Syriac texts written in the tenth or eleventh centuries. But the codex is a palimpsest: parchment that was scraped clean of older text by the scribe so that it could be reused.

The older writing was thought to contain further Christian texts and, in 2012, biblical scholar Peter Williams at the University of Cambridge, UK, asked his students to study the pages as a summer project. One of them, Jamie Klair, unexpectedly spotted a passage in Greek often attributed to the astronomer Eratosthenes. In 2017, the pages were re-analysed using state-of-the-art multispectral imaging.

Nine folios revealed astronomical material, which (according to radiocarbon dating and the style of the writing) was probably transcribed in the fifth or sixth centuries. It includes star-origin myths by Eratosthenes and parts of a famous third-century-BC poem called Phaenomena, which describes the constellations. Then, while poring over the images during a coronavirus lockdown, Williams noticed something much more unusual. He alerted science historian Victor Gysembergh at the French national scientific research centre CNRS in Paris. “I was very excited from the beginning,” says Gysembergh. “It was immediately clear we had star coordinates.”

The surviving passage, deciphered by Gysembergh and his colleague Emmanuel Zingg at Sorbonne University in Paris, is about a page long. It states the length and breadth in degrees of the constellation Corona Borealis, the northern crown, and gives coordinates for the stars at its extreme north, south, east and west. …

The article is long and interesting.  The formal publication is Gysembergh, V., Williams, P. J. & Zingg, E., “New evidence for Hipparchus’ Star Catalogue revealed by multispectral imaging”, J. Hist. Astron. 53, 383–393 (2022), and it actually seems to be online here.  From this:

Ὁ στέφανος ἐν τῷ βορείῳ ἡμισφαιρίῳ κείμενος κατὰ μῆκος μὲν ἐπέχει μ̊ θ̅ καὶ δ̅ ́ ἀπὸ τῆς α̅ μ̊ τοῦ σκορπίου ἕως ι̅ <καὶ> δ̅ ́ μ̊ τοῦ αὐτοῦ ζῳδίου. Κατὰ πλάτος δ᾽ ἐπέχει μ̊ ς̅ C καὶ δ̅ ́ ἀπὸ μ̅θ̅ μ̊ ἀπὸ τοῦ βορείου πόλου ἕως μ̊ ν̅ε̅ C καὶ δ̅ ́.
Προηγεῖται μὲν γὰρ ἐν αὐτῷ ὁ ἐχόμενος τοῦ λαμπροῦ ὡς πρὸς δύσιν ἐπέχων τοῦ σκορπίου τῆς α̅ μ̊ τὸ ἥμισυ. Ἔσχατος δὲ πρὸς ἀνατολὰς κεῖται ὁ δ′ ἐχόμενος ἐπ᾽ ἀνατολὰς τοῦ λαμπροῦ ἀστέρος [. . .] τοῦ βορείου πόλου μ̊ μ̅θ̅· νοτιώτατος δὲ ὁ γ′ ἀπὸ τοῦ λαμπροῦ πρὸς ἀνατολὰς ἀριθμούμενος ὃς ἀπέχει τοῦ πόλου μ̊ ν̅ε̅ C καὶ δ̅ ́.
Corona Borealis, lying in the northern hemisphere, in length spans 9°¼ from the first degree of Scorpius to 10°¼8 in the same zodiacal sign (i.e. in Scorpius). In breadth it spans 6°¾ from 49° from the North Pole to 55°¾.
Within it, the star (β CrB) to the West next to the bright one (α CrB) leads (i.e. is the first to rise), being at Scorpius 0.5°. The fourth9 star (ι CrB) to the East of the bright one (α CrB) is the last (i.e. to rise) [. . .]10 49° from the North Pole. Southernmost (δ CrB) is the third counting from the bright one (α CrB) towards the East, which is 55°¾ from the North Pole.

The technical details are of interest mainly to specialists.

The manuscript itself left Mount Sinai sometime in late 19th century, and ended up in the hands of the Cairo book dealers.  Agnes Lewis Smith, one of the “Sisters of Sinai” who discovered the Old Coptic Syriac gospels, was able to use her wealth and connections to purchase most of it between 1895-1906.  She left it to Westminster Hall, a theological college in Cambridge, where it snoozed away for a century.  But manuscripts have few long-term homes.  Indeed I recall that there was a minor scandal in 2010 when the college, pressed for money, decided to sell off the treasure at Sothebys for ready cash.

It seems that the book ended up in the hands of the American Steve Green, owner of Hobby Lobby, who was using his wealth, much as Agnes Lewis Smith had done, to retrieve valuable articles from the art trade.  He created a Museum of the Bible to house his collection, not without incredible vitriol from some papyrologists.  The purchase brought it into a quite different circle of scholars, with the results that we see.

It’s always a shame when an old collection is broken up.  Yet it is not always a bad thing.  Had the manuscript remained in Cambridge, would these contents still be unknown?  There is irony here, forTyndale Hall is also in Cambridge.  Yet the study could take place only once the manuscript had passed to the USA, and into the hands of a man wealthy enough to fund multi-spectral imaging, and inclined to do so.

Perhaps more collections need to be broken up?

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The November Poems in the Chronography of 354

Posted on by Roger Pearse

Four manuscripts of the Chronography contain an image for this month.  This includes the Barberini manuscript, with the poems.

Here is the 4-line poem (tetrastich):

Carbaseos post hunc artus indutus amictus
Memphidos antiquae sacra deamque colit.
A quo vix avidus sistro compescitur anser
Devotusque satis incola, Memphi, deis.

After this, arms limbs clad in a linen cloak,
He worships the sacred things and goddess of ancient Memphis:
The greedy goose is hardly kept in check by him with a sistrum,
And has been entirely devoted by the householder to the gods, O Memphis.
And, just enough, the ‘dweller’ devoted to the gods, O Memphis.

The “dweller” is perhaps the sacred snake in the temple, depicted in the image.

The 2-line verse (distich) is as follows:

Frondibus amissis repetunt sua frigora mensem
Cum iuga Centaurus celsa retorquet eques.

Gone are the leaves, and its frosts reclaim the month,
When the rider Centaurus turns the great plough the centaur-knight Sagittarius shakes off the lofty yoke Plough.

I’m not sure of the sense of the second line here.

Probably the most faithful of the renaissance copies is R1, Ms. Vatican Barberini lat. 2154 B, fol. 22r.  The tetrastich is in the margin at the right – plainly a later addition -, the first line of the distich at the bottom.

MS. Vatican Barberini lat. 2154 part B, folio 22r. November.

Here’s the obviously redrawn image in the 16th century Vienna manuscript 3416, folio 35 (online here):

MS Vienna 3146 f.35. November.

The Brussels Ms, fol.202r:

And finally the Berlin copy:

From Divjak and Wischmeyer, I learn that November is associated with the cult of Isis and the festival of the Isaia.  The depiction is of a bald-headed priest of Isis, wearing a linen robe and holding a sistrum in his right hand.  On either side of the arm are two pomegranates, with stalks and leaves.  Below these is a goose.  In his left hand he holds a plate, from the middle of which a sacred snake rears up.  There are objects on the plate – possibly leaves or fruits. To the left is another pomegranate, and then an altar, on top of which stands an animal head, a jackal, as in Anubis, with a cloth base and some kind of plate in the middle of the neck, perhaps a hinge?  Is it perhaps an Anubis mask, worn over the head?

(For more information on this series of posts, please see the Introduction to the Poems of the Chronography of 354).

UPDATE: 10 Nov 2022: Correction to translation of Distich, thanks to Suburbanbanshee.
UPDATE: 28 Nov 2022: More corrections to both, thanks to Alexander MacAulay.
UPDATE: 29 Nov 2022: And resolution on the tetrastich from Diego – thank you.

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The Last Hieroglyph

Posted on by Roger Pearse

The late Roman state was far more loosely organised than any modern state.  The abolition of official paganism at the end of the fourth century did not mean that all the temples were shut down.  Many continued to exist, so long as the local population wanted them to.  Near Alexandria at the start of the 6th century, a temple of Isis was in full operation at Menouthis, as we learn from the Life of Severus of Antioch by Zacharias Rhetor, and was destroyed by Peter Mongus after a scandal involving a temple prostitute.

The temple complex at Philae, on the southern border of Egypt, or beyond it, remained open later still, until it was closed in 535-7 by Justinian.  The sources are included and translated in volume 3 of the rather remarkable Fontes Historiae Nubiorum (=FHN).  Procopius tells us in his De bello Persico 1.19.37:

Both these peoples, the Blemmyes and the Nobatai, revere all the other gods in which pagans [Hellenes] believe, as well as Isis and Osiris, and not least Priapus. But the Blemmyes even have the custom of sacrificing human beings to the Sun.  These barbarians retained the sanctuaries on Philae right down to my day, but the Emperor Justinian decided to pull them down. Accordingly Narses, a Persarmenian by birth, whom I mentioned before as having deserted to the Romans, and who was in command of the troops there, pulled down the sanctuaries on the on the Emperor’s orders, held the priests under guard, and sent the images to Byzantium.[1]

The temples at Philae still stand, however, even today, so this is not entirely accurate.

19th century view of Philae from here.

When David Roberts visited in the 1830s, the preservation of the interior of the temple was really quite extraordinary.  Sadly these brilliant colours were destroyed by the waters of the first Aswan dam in 1911.

Philae, by David Roberts RA

Justinian’s expedition does mark an ending point.  Around the same time, or possibly even before then, a church is built within the precincts of the temple.

There had been strong political reasons for the temple to remain open.  Isis was worshipped well beyond the Roman frontier.  No doubt it suited the prefect of Egypt in far away Alexandria to keep this connection with the tribesmen to the south.  In 452 or 453 we find the historian Priscus, an eyewitness, writing (fragment 21) about the Roman treaty with the Blemmyes and Noubades, after defeating them:

In this it was agreed …that, in accordance with the ancient custom, their crossing to the temple of Isis be unhindered, Egyptians having charge of the river boat in which the statue of the goddess (Isis) is placed and ferried across the river. For at a stated time the barbarians bring the wooden statue to their own country and, after having consulted it, return it safely to the island.  Therefore Maximinus decided that it was appropriate that the text of the compact be ratified in the temple of Philae.[2]

Philae is also the location of the latest-dated hieroglyphic inscription known to us; and likewise the latest-dated demotic inscription.  These also are listed in the FHN 3, section 306 (p.1121).

The last known hieroglyphic inscription is apparently known as the “Graffito of Esmet-Akhom”, and was inscribed in both hieroglyphic and demotic on 24 August 394. The wikipedia article includes a redrawing.  The figure is of the Nubian god, Mandulis.  To the right are the hieroglyphs, and the demotic (=GPH 436, or IDemPhilae 436) is in a panel under the hand of the god:

IDemPhilae 436 – the last hieroglyphic inscription, with demotic panel under the hand, the “graffito of Esmet-Akhom”. 24 August, 394.

There does not seem to be a database of demotic inscriptions, so we are reliant on older book-form publications.  I find that F.L.Griffith published a collection of demotic graffiti in 1937, under the title of Catalogue of the Demotic Graffiti of the Dodecaschoenus, so the graffiti at Philae are GPh 436, or IDemPhilae 436, etc.

The hieroglyphs in this last inscription read (translation via Wikipedia):

Before Mandulis, son of Horus, by the hand of Nesmeterakhem, son of Nesmeter, the Second Priest of Isis, for all time and eternity. Words spoken by Mandulis, lord of the Abaton, great god.

The demotic adds a date:

I, Nesmeterakhem, the Scribe of the House of Writings(?) of Isis, son of Nesmeterpanakhet the Second Priest of Isis, and his mother Eseweret, I performed work on this figure of Mandulis for all time, because he is fair of face towards me. Today, the Birthday of Osiris, his dedication feast, year 110.

The impressive Nile Scribes blog here details the exact location.  The FHN comments that the author may have dedicated this inscription to a Nubian god, rather than to Isis, on 24 August 394, just after the abolition of the temples, in order to safeguard his position in the cold new world.  That’s the end of hieroglyphics.  Soon after, no doubt, the script became unintelligible.

Philae also contains the last known demotic inscription.  Outside of Philae, the script had ceased to be used before 300 AD.  Carved on the 12 December 452, on the second pylon, is GPH 365,[3] of which Griffith gave the following drawing:

GPh365 – the last demotic inscription

Our graffito is the one on the left, which reads:

Esmeyt senior, son of Pakhom, the first prophet of Isis, his mother’s name Tshenesmet, the daughter of a chief priest of Isis Esmet junior the second prophet of Isis, son of Haretyotf; today, day 12, Choiak, year 169.

The day was given by Griffith as “day 6”, i.e. 2 December, but Eugene Cruz-Uribe states that it should be read as “sw 16″, i.e. the 12 December.[4].

And that’s it.  That’s the end of demotic too.  The future belonged to Coptic.

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  1. [1]FHN 3, section 328, p.1190-1↩
  2. [2]Translated in Fontes Historiae Nubiorum, 4 vols, Bergen (1994-2000); vol. 3, section 318, p.1153.  Via Dijkstra.↩
  3. [3]F.L. Griffith, Catalogue of the Demotic Graffiti of the Dodecaschenenus, vol. 1: text (1937), p.102-3; vol. 2 plates here.  See also this preview at Brill here for a correction on the date.↩
  4. [4]Eugene Cruz-Uribe, “The Last Demotic Inscription”, in Hieratic, Demotic and Greek studies and text editions: Festschrift in honour of Sven P. Vleeming, Brill (2018)↩

The October Poems in the Chronography of 354

Posted on by Roger Pearse

For October, the images are preserved in four manuscripts of the Chronography.  The verses are preserved in R1, and in other, unillustrated copies of the text.

Here is the 4-line poem (tetrastich):

Dat prensum leporem cumque ipso palmite foetus
October; pingues dat tibi ruris aves.
Iam Bromios spumare lacus et musta sonare
apparet: vino vas calet ecce novo.

The captured hare and with the vine itself the fruits,
October gives; it gives the fat birds of the country.
Now Bromios appears, to fill with foam the basins, and the fermenting juice make sounds;
See, the cask is warming up from the new wine!

“Bromios” is Bacchus.  The heat of fermentation is referred to in line 4.

The 2-line verse (distich) is as follows:

Octobri laetus portat vindemitor uvas,
Omnis ager, Bacchi munera, voce sonat.

In October the harvester happily carries the grapes,
Every field celebrates in sound the gifts of Bacchus.

Corrections are very welcome!

Probably the most faithful of the renaissance copies is R1, Ms. Vatican Barberini lat. 2154 B, fol. 21r.  The tetrastich is at the right, the first line of the distich at the bottom.

MS. Vatican Barberini lat. 2154 part B, fol. 21r. Chronography of 354. October.

Here’s the obviously redrawn image in the 16th century Vienna manuscript 3416, folio 25 (online here):

Vienna ms (V)

The Brussels Ms, fol.202r:

Brussels MS. October.

The Berlin Ms, f.230, formerly f.235:

Berlin Ms. October

From Divjak and Wischmeyer, I learn that the depiction is of a stocky male figure holding a  braided basket trap in his left hand.  He holds a live hare in his right hand.  There is a tray at the upper right with leaves or flowers.  Behind the figure is a bird-trap, with an animal skin on which is perched a bird of prey.  A small pot of glue hangs from a cord.  The picture shows the hunting for birds and small animals.  The figure is not realistic, but the personification or genius of the month.

(For more information on this series of posts, please see the Introduction to the Poems of the Chronography of 354).

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From My Diary

Posted on by Roger Pearse

For the last six weeks my attention has been fully engaged in dealing with pointless and annoying domestic matters.  So there has been no time for anything important.  I hope to be able to post the October images and poems from the Chronography of 354 shortly, however, since I drew up a draft of the remaining posts when I did the September post.

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“Amongst all savage beasts none is found so harmful as a woman” – a quote from John Chrysostom?

Posted on by Roger Pearse

A regular visitor to this blog also runs her own blog at suburbanbanshee.wordpress.com. She has been looking into a supposed quotation from John Chrysostom.

“Among all savage beasts none is found so harmful as a woman.” – John Chrysostom

The quotation circulates on the web, but predates the internet.  It forms part of a dossier of anti-Christian quotes, made in the feminist interest.

With all such quotes, it is advisable to locate a reference, and this she has done in admirable fashion.  It turns out – as too often – to be a bad-faith misquote from one of the pseudo-Chrysostom texts.

A quick explanation for those unfamiliar with the pseudo-Chrysostomica. John Chrysostom is the greatest of the Greek fathers, and manuscripts of his genuine works are incredibly numerous.  Works whose author had been lost in transmission often were attributed to him in these same manuscripts, and are known as “pseudo-Chrysostom”.

The text is “In decollationem s. Iohannis”, “On the decapitation of St John”. The reference number CPG 4570.  The incipit is: “Πάλιν Ἡρωδιὰς μαίνεται”. The Greek text (online here) is printed in the Patrologia Graeca vol. 59, columns 485-490; and also in Henry Savile’s generally superior edition of the works of Chrysostom (at Archive.org), volume 7, p.545-549.  There is also an ancient Latin translation, CPL 931, printed in PL 95, 1508-1514.  Dom Andre Wilmart’s “La collection de 38 homelies latines de Saint Jean Chrysostome”, JTS 19 (1918), 305-327, lists it as number 15 in the collection of “Chrysostom” sermons translated into Latin in antiquity.

But “suburbanbanshee” has gone a step further.  She has made a translation into English of the whole work, from the Greek text, in two parts.  Here is the introduction, and the translation:

She has also found a useful article by Maia Barnaveli, in the journal Phasis, 2014, “Motivations for the Beheading of John the Baptist in Byzantine and Old Georgian Writings”.  From this we learn of a Georgian translation of the text, found in the “Sinai Polycephalon” – sounds like a manuscript, but a printed version exists.  There are probably translations into other ancient languages also.

The Greek for the supposed quote (l.12 of the link) is

Ἐμοὶ μὲν δοκεῖ μηδὲν εἶναι ἐν κόσμῳ θηρίον ἐφάμιλλον γυναικὸς πονηρᾶς.

Indeed, it seems to me that no evil wild animal in the world is comparable to evil women.

So we immediately can tell that the quotation with which we started – “Amongst all savage beasts none is found so harmful as a woman” – is not accurate in any way.  This is not about “woman”, about all women in general, at all.

In fact, when we look at the text as a whole – about Herodias – then we quickly see that it isn’t even  a fair quotation of the sense.  For the next words are:

Surely the sermon by me now is in regards to evil women, not about virtuous and sensible [ἀγαθῆς καὶ σώφρονος] women. And indeed, I know many women to be honestly behaved and virtuous [εὐσχήμονας καὶ ἀγαθὰς], whose lives I have recounted, along with the reward of their works — for edification, and for stirring up a love of good things.

The author is taking pains NOT to express the opinion that the quote attributes to him.

Suburbanbanshee:

There’s a longish list of supposed quotes from the Fathers that shows up repeatedly in supposedly feminist works. The quotes are almost always in identical wording of an English translation, and they never provide citations from the Fathers. Rather, they cite other feminist authors, who also turn out to have cited other feminist authors as authorities. It shows up in the Congressional Record, in Irish letters to the editor, and in the Antioch Review from 1954… but with never a citation.

And rightly concludes:

Not a Chrysostom quote.  Not quoted correctly.

It is marvellous to have a translation of another pseudo-Chrysostom sermon as a by-product of the investigation!  Thank you!

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From my diary

Posted on by Roger Pearse

I’ve been clearing my inbox a little today, since I had a bit of time, and popping out a couple of blog posts.  Things are still not back to normal, but it is wonderful to be able to blog a bit.  I need to get back to doing proper Latin again too, but the pressure of mundane stuff still forbids.

Sitting in a cafe this morning, I was thinking about the two different texts of John the Deacon.  Chapters 12 and 13 deal with the legend of the three generals, sent by Constantine to put down a revolt among the Taifal Goths settled in Asia Minor, and then accused of treachery in a palace intrigue.  St Nicholas appears to save the day.  In Greek this particular story predates the full-length lives of St Nicholas, and circulated independently.

Out of the blue, I found myself wondering whether the same was true in Latin.  Is there an independent chunk of text of this sort?  If so, I wondered, did Falconius interpolate it into his text?  It is pretty clear that Mombritius simply printed the manuscript before him.  But Falconius prints two alternative lists of chapters at the end, many from the Life of St Nicholas of Sion.  So it is indeed clear that Falconius was messing with his text.  Unfortunately I could not work out from the BHL whether such an item did circulate independently.

I’m coming round to the view that Mombritius is the basic text of John the Deacon, and that Falconius is a rogue, the product of a pre-critical scholar accumulating materials from several sources.  This is unfortunate, since my translation was made from Falconius, but it will have to be faced once I can get back to it.  I’m not going to collate manuscripts.  This would involve half a lifetime of study of the western tradition of St Nicholas, which I do not have to give, nor wish to.

It’s a reminder of the risks of scholarship.  Give me any day an innocent humble copy, errors and all, over some too-clever “corrected” text by someone who isn’t as clever as he thinks.  The first duty of scholarship is to transmit to the future what we have received.

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The September Poems in the Chronography of 354

Posted on by Roger Pearse

A number of manuscripts contain an image for September.  But here again it is the Vatican Barberini manuscript that gives us the 4-line poem, the tetrastich:

Turgentes acinos, varias et praesecat uvas
September, sub quo mitia poma iacent.
Captivam filo gaudens religasse lacertam
Quae suspensa manu mobile ludit opus.

The swelling berries and the different coloured grapes,
September cuts them down; beneath him lie the ripe fruit.
Delighted to have tied up the captive lizard with a string;
Which suspended from a raised hand plays an active game.

September 5 is Vindemia, the start of the grape harvest.  The lizard can be a pest (Pliny, Natural History 30, 89), but on a thread in a container it produces medicine (NH 30, 52).

The 2-line verse (distich) is as follows:

Tempora maturis September vincta racemis
Velate e numero nosceris ipse tuo.

The season of September, covered September, temples girded with ripe grapes;
Blindfolded Concealed, you will be recognised by your number.

I made these translations months ago, and I cannot remember if I revised them, so I apologise for any errors.

The 17th century R1 manuscript, Vatican Barberini lat.2154B (online here), fol. 20r, gives us the most accurate version of the drawing, complete with the tetrastich in the right margin, and the first line of the distich at the bottom:

Vatican Barberini lat. 2154 pt. B, f.20r – September

The redrawn16th century Vienna manuscript 3416 (V), folio 10v (online here):

MS Vienna 3146, f.10v – September

Divjak and Wischmeyer give us an image from the important (but offline) Brussels manuscript 7543-49, fol. 201r.

Brussels MS 7543-49, fol. 201r. (B)

They also give an image from the Berlin manuscript, f.234:

Berlin, f.234 – September

From Divjak and Wischmeyer, I learn that the depiction is of the wine harvest.  The cluster of grapes, the figs on a tray at the top left, and the two large amphoras / jars, set in the ground, to hold the new wine, seem clear enough.  The lizard on a thread is of uncertain meaning, as is the basket with skewers on top.

(For more information on this series of posts, please see the Introduction to the Poems of the Chronography of 354).

UPDATE: Thank you Diego for correcting the distich!  And to Michael Gilleland for pointing out that “suspensa” must have a short “a” and so be nominative and agree with lacerta.

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Should we bring back Gelasius of Cyzicus?

Posted on by Roger Pearse

The publication of an English translation of Gelasius of Cyzicus (see here) brings us back to the question of just who was the author.  All the editions until recently attributed this work to “Gelasius of Cyzicus”.  In the recent GCS NF 9 edition, the editor, G. C. Hansen, reviews the origin of this, and roundly dismisses it as a mistake.  He suggests that the author is now unknown.  Consequently he calls it the Anonyme Kirchengeschichte, or AKG.  Under this rather awkward title it has appeared in subsequent literature, although often with “Gelasius of Cyzicus” in brackets.

Hansen’s arguments are not easy to follow unless your German is better than mine.  This is not helped by a page of untranslated Greek quotations from Photius.  But the argument is as follows:

  1. There is no manuscript with an incipit with the author or title.
  2. Nobody ever refers to the work by that name during the centuries in which it was around.
  3. Photius, who quotes it, says it’s by Gelasius of Caesarea.  But his quotations are not conclusive.
  4. The name of “Gelasius of Cyzicus” first appears on the first printed edition, the editio princeps, in 1599, edited by the Scotsman Robert Balfour.
  5. Balfour actually explains where he gets the name from!  He prints on page 16, the last page of the introduction, here, a letter from his publisher, Federic Morel, telling him to put an author on it, and offering a suggestion from Pierre Pithou, based on extracts from Photius which he sticks on the bottom.
  6. The only manuscript that contains the name is a Vatican manuscript, where there’s a note in the margin in the hand of Leo Allatius.  But Allatius only went to Rome after Balfour’s edition came out.  So this is probably based on seeing Balfour’s edition.  It’s not an independent witness.

This is well reasoned, as far as it goes.  Hansen doesn’t quote the letter of Morel, but it reinforces his point.

I couldn’t transcribe the Greek, but here’s my attempt at a transcription:

Narro tibi, mi Balforee. Libros sine autore miseras, ut liberos nullo certo patre, vindiciis obnoxios. Placuit clarissimo & eruditissimo I. C. Fr. Pithoeo, patrem acciri e castris Photii, cuius testimonium mox subiiciam,ut quiuis lege agere possit.

Alium etiam accersivi vindice iniuriae quam iisdem libris intulerant notarum praepetes ministri, ut taxu?afoij vocat Ausonius:

Codicem inquam docta & laboriosa manu exaratum, quem e locuplete Bibliotheca sua ornatissimus & doctissimus Senator Petrus Stella nobis deprompsit, liberaliter communicavit, & saepe una mecum, qua humanitate est, cum exemplo tuo Schedisque nostris contulit. Nullus opinor pietatis & literarum amans erit qui gratiam non sciat, habeat, & si possit referat. Quod si haec nondum ex animi sententia castigata sunt, aequi bonique consulendum, & pa\r diwamin nihil audendum. Vale,& nos quod facis, ama. Lut. IX Kal. Ian. 1598.

I don’t have time to translate this properly, but, ignoring the fluff, we perhaps get something like this:

Listen, Bob.  You sent me books without an author, like fatherless children, liable to be attributed to anyone.  So I got the really serious scholar Pithou to take a look, who pulled out an author from Photius – quoted below – so that anyone who wants to do legal stuff can do so.  I’ve also hauled up another, rather more carefully written, manuscript for you, thanks to our friend Petrus Stella (Pierre de l’Estoile), whom everyone says is a good guy.

Let’s remember just who Morel is.  As the title page tells us, he’s the publisher of Balfour’s edition.  He’s the guy who’s got to sell it.  Editions of patristic authors were printed for money.

Clearly Morel is not keen on trying to publish an anonymous text, and no blame to him (and I bet the GCS publishers might have felt the same, if anyone had asked them!).  Balfour has told him earlier that the manuscript is rather rubbish.

It’s telling that Balfour prints the letter, rather than taking responsibility himself.  Hansen is right to be wary.  This looks like a commercial consideration, not a scholarly one.  We only have Morel’s word as to what Pithou thought.

What Hansen fails to do is to examine whether there is a case for keeping the name “Gelasius of Cyzicus”.

I think we’d better take a look at what Photius has to say.  These can easily be found in the English translation here by doing a Ctrl-F and searching for “Gelasius” on the web page.

88.  Read an account of the Proceedings of the Synod of Nicaea, in the form of a history, in three volumes. The author states that …  Such is the contents of this book. In another copy, containing the same account, the title gives the name of the author as Gelasius, bishop of Caesarea8 in Palestine. The style is mean and common. Who this Gelasius was, I have been unable to discover for certain, since up to the present I have met with three bishops of Caesarea named Gelasius, and have at least read the works of two. One of these works is a polemic Against the Anomoeans, the two others, one of which we have just referred to, deal with ecclesiastical matters. The title, where we have found it, is Three Books of Ecclesiastical History by Gelasius, Bishop of Caesarea in Palestine.  The work begins as follows : The proceedings of the holy, great, and universal synod of bishops, assembled, so to speak, from all the provinces of the Roman empire and Persia, and so on. … The writer states that he lived in the time of Basiliscus, who seized the throne after Zeno had been driven out, and that he found and read the account of the proceedings of the council written on an old parchment, while living in his father’s house. From his recollections of this, and with the aid of other writings which supplied him with useful information, he compiled his history. He also mentions and cites some passages from a certain Gelasius, whom he also calls Rufinus. He says that he was a native of Cyzicus, and that his father was a priest in the same place. So says the author of this work, and such is its contents.

Photius quotes the opening words of the book, and so we can see that this is definitely our work.

89.  The other book [by the same author, on “ecclesiastical matters”], which I have referred to above, is entitled Preface of the Bishop of Caesarea in Palestine to the Continuation of the History of Eusebius Pamphili. It begins, as follows: …

The author states that he was encouraged to write the work by his uncle Cyril, bishop of Jerusalem. I have read elsewhere that this Cyril and Gelasius translated the history of Rufinus the Roman into Greek, but did not compose any history of their own.

It is evident that this Gelasius was older than the other, if he flourished in the time of Cyril of Jerusalem.  He also certainly differs from him in the greater eloquence of his language, although both are inferior to the author of the treatise Against the Anomoeans, also called bishop of Palestine. For the latter Gelasius, by his diction, learning, and logical methods, his use of which, however, is somewhat inept, leaves the other two far behind, whose style appears to be much inferior. I have not yet been able to learn whether any of these is the author of the [first] work referred to, or who compiled it and supplemented it by his own additions.

So … we have two works, by “Gelasius of Caesarea”.  The second one is clearly a real continuation of Eusebius, based on Rufinus.  The first one, however, is not by the same author – the “eloquence” is pretty limited – but by some other “Gelasius of Caesarea” who says in his work that he was born in Cyzicus.

In cod. 102, Photius also reads the real Gelasius of Caesarea’s Against the Anomoeans, but sheds no more light on our text.

Finally, in the AKG itself, we find this passage:

1.8.1 So far, Eusebius. However, Rufinus, or rather, Gelasius records these things as follows: “After these events, the Roman Senate asked Licinius (who became the Godloving Constantine’s brother-in law by marrying his sister Constantia) to rule together with Constantine. Soon after, Constantine sent Licinius to the east against the tyrant there, in order to see to the safety of the Christians there. For since he enjoyed such great favors from God, the pious Constantine was eager to offer thank-offerings to his benefactor.

This makes perfect sense, now that we know (from Photius) that a Gelasius translated Rufinus into Greek and produced a continuation of Eusebius, along with his uncle Cyril.  This passage becomes evidence that the AKG is using this Gelasius-Rufinus text.

So what do we have?

  • The author of the AKG comes from Cyzicus – he says so in his own work.
  • His work circulated under the name of “Gelasius of Caesarea”, at least in the 9th century.  One of the two manuscripts Photius had gave it that title.
  • Photius knows three different authors of that name; the author of the AKG, the author of the (lost) continuation of Eusebius, and the author of Against the Anomoeans.  He doesn’t know who the author of the AKG was, tho.

So Photius tells us that the AKG in his time was attributed in a manuscript to an otherwise unknown Gelasius of Caesarea.  We can tell that the author was born in Cyzicus.  He is not the same guy as the chap who wrote a continuation of Eusebius.

From this, it seems reasonable to say that the author was a chap called Gelasius, who lived in Caesarea but who came from Cyzicus.  Isn’t it reasonable to call him “Gelasius of Cyzicus” so we don’t get mixed up with either of the other two Gelasius’?

The problem here is that, quite obviously, the name “Gelasius of Caesarea” may be a bogus ascription in a manuscript, even in the time of Photius.  One of his manuscripts had no ascription.

It’s a thought, anyway.  It’s not very satisfactory, but it is what is in the historical record.  Should we just stick with Gelasius of Cyzicus?  For convenience, and in honour of Photius?

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Euthymius Zigabenus, Commentary on the Epistles

Posted on by Roger Pearse

Nicholas Antzaras writes to say that he has started a blog to report his progress, working on a text and translation of the Commentary on the Epistles by the Byzantine bible commentator Euthymius Zigabenus. It’s at https://zigabenusepistles.com/

So far he has collected the manuscripts and is busy collating them to produce a critical text.  This is extremely necessary work, and very hard work too.

He is also, quite rightly, translating the pre-critical text (by Kalogeras) already available to him into English.   It sounds strange, in a way, doing the translation first; but this is often how scholars work.  The reason for doing so is that there is no finer way to get familiar with every word of a text, and discovering where it is deficient, than to make a translation.  Anybody can print a text.

He’s also blogging about what he’s doing, and the tools that he is using to do it.  I think that a few of us might find a few tips from this!  Compared to my own lackadaisical approach, his schedule for translation is very organised indeed!

I’m sure that we all wish him all the best with the project.  Whatever he does will be useful to everyone.

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