Reading Devresse last night, I was amused to discover that one author quoted in the medieval commentaries composed of chains of quotations from the Fathers is … Josephus! In fact Philo is also quoted.
Tag: Catena
The external appearance of catenas
A kind correspondant has sent me a PDF of R. Devreese’ article Chaines exégétiques grecques, in the French Dictionaire de la Bible – supplement. It’s around 80 pages long, and double columns, and very detailed even in the generalities. I thought I would give an English version of a portion of the introduction, starting on col. 1089.
g) Page layout of catenas — So far we have only examined the titles of compilations to which the name of exegetical catena is given. If we open one of these volumes, what do we see?
Most often, the text of scripture occupies the centre of the page, and is written in larger letters than the extracts which surround it. To these catenas the name of marginal catenas (Rahmencatene) is given. The names of the authors, sometimes written in red, precede each fragment of exegesis. (Cf. Vat. gr. 749 in Pio Franchi de’ Cavalieri -Lietzmann, Specimina codd. Vatic., tabula 8). To the same type of arrangement belong the types of catena which are formed around a commentary or an existing catena. There are no lack of examples, we could cite some covering almost all the books of scripture. We will only name Coislin 81, where the elements of the catena are found dispersed in the margin around the commentary of Theodoret on the Psalms; Reg. 40, where the centre of the page is occupied by the commentary of Hesychius on the Psalms; Paris 128, where a scribe was completing a commentary on the Octateuch; the beginning of Palat. 20 where the centre is filled by a catena on Luke and the margins by the catena of Nicetas on the same gospel… This manner of adding new scholia to compilations or finished treatises was continued to the end of the Middle Ages, because there are certain mss. commentaries of Euthymius on the Psalms where the procedure described is found still in use. This procedure was flagrantly inconvenient for later copyists; there was a risk that texts written in the margin could end up integrated into the commentary or existing catena, and that all this would be presented without distinguishing the elements of which it was comprised. Because of this, it happens that some of our commentaries are found in an interpolated state.
In the manuscripts that we are going to talk about, the glosses occupy the outer three margins of the page. Sometimes, but rarely, the biblical text occupies exactly the middle of the page and the scholia are presented on all four sides; we find this layout in Vallicell. E. 40, and in Monac. gr. 9 (cf. Lindl, Die Octateuckatene des Prokop von Gaza, which reproduces folio 20 of this last manuscript).
Another layout just as common as the last gives one or more verses of Scripture written in sequence and then, on the following lines, the scholia of various authors, each preceded by a proper name, that of the author. We call these catenas long-line catenas (Breitkatene).
Let us finally mention catenas in two columns. Many of those already mentioned of the eclogae of Procopius are in this format. An idea of their layout can be had from a reproduction of a page of Coislin 204, given by Swete, op. cit., p. xvii.
h) The lemmas — In these different catenas, whatever their layout, the name of the author is generally indicated, whether by the copyist himself or by a rubricator, either in the body of the text or in the margins. Just as in legal manuscripts, the name is given in the genetive (Eusebiou, Theodorou). It is customary to designate these by the word lemma, a convenient expression, if one that sometimes is found rather a long way from its original meaning.
Rarely — only in the most ancient manuscripts — the lemma is written in entirety. More often, it is abriged into contractions, which may lead to a mistake. A list of the most frequent abbreviations can be found in Montfaucon, Paleographica Graeca, p. 348. Cf. M. Faulhaber, Babylonische Verwirrung in gricchischen Namensigeln, dans Oriens christianus, vol. VII , 1907 , p. 370-387.
More than once, whether because the copyist intended to come back and add them later, or because he left the task to a rubricator, the lemmas are omitted, and the spaces that should have contained them are left empty. Scribes who copied these incomplete manuscripts found it easiest to run together the extracts presented to them without authors. Whether they didn’t find lemmas, or omitted them, the result is the same. When the lemmas were omitted and the scholia run together, the appearance was created of continuous exegesis. This is how some names are found with material added, and others diminished. This is how, for example, one part of the commentary of Eusebius on the Psalms (see below col. 1124) is in reality only a catena without lemmas. All this supposed commentary is distributed in fragments among a half-dozen authors, from Athanasius to Hesychius. It is probably for identical reasons that we possess pseudo-commentaries of Peter of Laodicea on the Psalms and Gospels, of Oecumenius on the Letters and Acts, which are really also just catenas without lemmas.
Very frequently, in recent manuscripts, we find omitted in sequence one or more lemmas. It is necessary then to go back and locate the first error and return to many what has been ascribed to one author.
Later, when the number of interpretations had multiplied, in the marginal chains and chains on long lines a system of reference signs was used, made up of various geometrical combinations. In this way, at a glance, one could see which scholia explained a given passage of the bible and conversely which biblical passage related to an exegesis one was looking at, just as with modern signs and notes.
I think we can all agree that this material is actually very interesting. The French of Devreese is not difficult — I was reading this in bed before I felt obliged to come and type it in — and the precision of his remarks is most useful and plainly derived from specific examples.
Testing the catenas – Carmelo Curti on Eusebius on the Psalms
We all know that medieval Greek commentaries on the bible were compiled by chaining together extracts from commentaries on the book in question by the Fathers. Often these catenas continue to exist, when the original works are lost. They are therefore a valuable source for retrieving early Christian comments on biblical verses.
But … to string these quotes together, the compilers had to adapt the quotations, if only slightly; they had to add bridging words, tweak tenses. They had to abbreviate, very often. So the question before us is whether we can rely on the quotations.
Eusebius of Caesarea wrote a monster commentary on the Psalms. Unusually, a third of it still exists, preserved in ms. Coislin 44. This means we can compare the original text with the catenas, and get an idea of the value of each. Carmelo Curti wrote an interesting article on this [1], from which I have translated a couple of passages:
Of the famous “Commentarii in Psalmos” of Eusebius of Caesarea, about a third, Pss. 51-95,3, has been transmitted to us directly in the manuscript Coislin 44, saec. X [1] and the rest of the work, Pss. 1-50 and 95,4-150, came to us through the catenas, i.e. a path which, as is well-known, is among the least easy for the editor of Christian texts in the Greek language. The importance of the Coislin manuscript does not end in giving us a text genuine, complete and, in principle, correct of one part of the commentary of Eusebius. The manuscript also allows us to determine through appropriate comparisons, the value of those catenas that, together with other fragments of the Eusebian commentaries, contain some passages related to Pss. 51-95,3, i.e. that part attested by Coislin 44. This is the case for two catenary codices, Patmos Monastery St. John 215, saec. XII-XIII and Ambrosianus F 126 sup. century. XIII, deriving independently from a common original and, according to the classification of Karo-Lietzmann, Catena-type XI [2]. Together with fragments of other exegetes of the Psalter, the first one transmits fragments of the commentary of Eusebius on Pss. 78,5-150, the other, fragments of the same comment that referring to Pss. 83,4-150 [3].
In my study published in 1972, comparing the text of these manuscripts with those witnessed by Coislin 44, I have demonstrated: first, that the compiler of the base catena, from which directly or indirectly our two witnesses derive, used a copy which belonged to the same branch of the tradition as the Coislin manuscript and secondly, that this compiler, while often omitting the comment of entire entries, has worked on the text under his eyes generally by abbreviating …, i.e. removing words or phrases or even whole periods not deemed essential to the meaning …. It follows that from Ps. 95.4 — as has been said, with Ps. 95.3 the Coislin manuscript unfortunately stops — the editor of the Eusebian commentary can be certain that the text given by the two catena codices is usually genuine, though mutilated and spoiled by the omission of words or phrases or even whole sentences in the passages relating to verses for which they have preserved the comment.
By contrast, the contribution of the two catenas for the constitution of the exegesis of the Eusebian text on Pss. 51-95,3 — for this section, as we have said, we are aided by Coislin 44 — is of course not as relevant but still not entirely negligible. They in fact, as we will show in this chapter, in many cases allow us to improve the text offered by the Coislin manuscript, some correcting obvious mistakes, others filling gaps, others attesting variants which may deserve more consideration.
As documentation of what we have stated above, we give some examples. We quote the text of Coislin, which generally corresponds to that reproduced in PG 23, noting the variations between the two catena manuscripts in parentheses. …
In conclusion, for the constitution of the text even in that part of the Eusebian commentary that is preserved in Coislin 44, the manuscripts Ambrosiano F 126 sup. and Patmos S. John Monastery 215 can not be ignored. They in fact, as we believe we have demonstrated, correct obvious errors in Coislin 44, restored to Eusebius words (or phrases) missing in this codex — both attributable to the copyist of the oislin ms. or that of his source –, and also offer alternative readings that are worthy, in some cases, of some attention. The mistakes of Coislin in truth are mostly of the sort that could easily be corrected by the action of a prudent, unhurried editor (but all those mentioned in the course of this chapter are found in the edition of de Montfaucon reproduced in PG 23). It is a different matter for omissions, which are always difficult to divine and are risky to infer in any text and, more importantly, in a text of prose. For these the testimony of the two catenary manuscripts becomes extremely important and irreplaceable.
It is always good to test our theories about what is happening in catenas. It is a relief to learn that they really do have value to the editor. That lesson should be applicable well beyond the specific case of Eusebius on the Psalms.
1. C. Curti, I “Commentarii in Psalmos” di Eusebio di Cesarea: tradizione diretta (Coislin 44) e tradizione catenaria. In: Eusebiana 1, 2nd ed, 169-179.
An Armenian catena on the Catholic epistles
My learned Armenian correspondant Seda Stamboltsyan has been looking in the electronic catalogue of the Matenadaran at Yerevan for us. She reports at least one Armenian catena in the catalogue, which includes material by Eusebius.
Doing so was not entirely straightforward, as the search tool is somewhat cranky. You have to get the exact word correct — searching for “euseb” will not bring up “eusebius”. Since the endings will vary, depending on case, this is a little bit of a pain. But typing “eusebi” (genitive case) gave 53 results; “eusebios” produced 14. Among them was this entry:
667662
Խմբագիր մեկնութիւն է. վկայութիւններ են բերուած հետեւեալ հեղինակներից՝ Կիւեղ Աղեկսանդրացի, Պիմեն, Սեւեռիտոս, Ներսէս, Յովհան Ոսկէբերան, Բարսեղ Կեսարացի, Իսիքիոս Երուսաղէմացի, Դիոնեսիոս Աղէկսանդրացի, Որոգինես, Թէոդորիտոն, Ապողինար Լաոդիկեցի, Եւսեբիոս Կեսարացի, Դիդիմոս, Ամոն, Տիմոթէոս, Աթանաս, Եփրեմ Ասորի։
Translated:
“[Manuscript number] 667662
This is a collective commentary [i.e. catena]. Testimonies are brought from the following authors: Cyril of Alexandria, Pimen, Severitos, Nerses, John Chrysostom, Basil of Caesarea, Hesychios of Jerusalem, Dionysius of Alexandria, Origen, Theodoriton, Apolinarius of Laodicea, Eusebius of Caesarea, Didimus, Amon, Timothy, Athanasius, Ephrem the Syrian.”
Clicking through gave more info. Folios 1-235 are commentaries on the Catholic epistles, and the authors above are for this. Plainly this is a catena. There was also a bit of bibliography: “cf. Vienna N 48 (Tashian, Bibliography, 234-243). Also: PO, t43, N193.” The shelfmark is Mashtots Matenadaran ms. N 1407. Date: 1596. The place where it was written is not mentioned. Scribe: Priest Pawłos (Paul).
Seda reminds us that not all the manuscripts in the Matenadaran have been catalogued to this level of detail yet. Four volumes were published, and the electronic catalogue is based on these. The fifth volume has just been published, but not yet incorporated into the online catalogue. However there are about 17,000 mss. in the Matenadaran. Each volume is around 500 mss, so there is a considerable distance still to go.
There is a brief catalogue of all the mss, but it doesn’t go to this level of detail.
PO 43 does indeed contain a publication of an Armenian catena on the Catholic epistles:
Volume 43. La chaîne arménienne sur les Épîtres catholiques. I, La chaîne sur l’Épître de Jacques / Charles Renoux…
So there is a publication with French translation in PO 43/1 (N193), Turnhout 1985; 44/2 (N198), 1987; 44/1-2 (205-206), 1994; 47/2 (N210), 1996. I queried the manuscript numeral, as that didn’t look like a shelfmark to me. (It’s probably the electronic catalogue’s database primary key!)
Seda Stamboltsyan tells me that she has been doing translations from Classical Armenian into modern Armenian, also editing and proofreading texts in Armenian, preparing critical editions of Classical Armenian texts. I think those of us that are illiterate, at least in Armenian, can be very grateful to her for her efforts!
More Armenian info
I’m still trying to find out about Armenian catenas and biblical commentaries.
It seems that there are not many references to books in Armenian on the net. Apparently the Mesrop Mashtots Matenadaran, the Institute of Old Manuscripts, Yerevan (not the same as the Armenian National Library) has a new website. Unfortunately it is only in Armenian now. But you may see there many beautiful miniatures. One can search on that site in the bibliographies too, to find what is there in the Matenadaran collection (although presumably only if you know Armenian and can type Armenian text).
There is also a website of publications by the Gandzasar Theological Centre where my contact works and the Publishing House of Holy Etchmiadzin. She adds:
I’m still adding annotations in that section of the website and there are still many books that need to be added there. I think I’ll put there also that bibliography of biblical commentaries when I get it. So you’ll have more references for published Armenian texts. You may check our website from time to time to see the additions. http://www.vem.am/en/topics/books-1/
The bibliography of biblical commentaries and catenas in Armenian is something we should all be interested in, and I will add more details as I find out more.
UPDATE: some commentaries in classical Armenian are available here and here. There is also a critical edition of the classical Armenian translation of Gregory of Nyssa, On the making of man!
Catenas on the Psalms: the “Palestinian catena”
There may be 29 different types of catena on the Psalms. All of them contain quotations from works by the Fathers on the exegesis of the Psalms. But the most important of these by far is the catena known to modern specialists as the “Palestinian catena”. This catena was apparently originally compiled in 6th century Palestine, directly from a bunch of mostly now lost texts.
It stands out for the size and quality of the extracts that are preserved in it. These are mainly taken from the commentaries of Eusebius of Caesarea, Didymus the Blind, and Theodoret. In some of the psalms, there is also material from Apollinaris of Laodicea, Asterius the Sophist, Basil of Caesarea, and — of course — Cyril of Alexandria, Chrysostom, and Origen. For psalm 118 there is also material from Athanasius.
Psalms is a long book. A catena on the psalms is also a long book. Some time after composition, the catena was turned into two editions. The first of these was in three volumes; on Psalms 1-50, 51-100, and 101-150. The other was a two volume edition; on Psalms 1-76 and 77-150.
Naturally the volumes of each version have travelled down the centuries independently.
The three volume edition
Volume 1 of this edition is preserved in good condition in the catena of type VI (Karo and Lietzmann). This is found in he following manuscripts:
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Oxford, Bodleian Library, Barroci gr. 235 (9-10th century)
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Mt. Athos, Iviron monastery 597 (1st half of 11th c.)
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Bucharest, Romanian Academy Library gr. 931 + Constantinople, Panaghia Kamariotissi Patristic Library 9 (1st half of 11th century)
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Munich, National library gr. 359 (10-11th c.)
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Vatican Library gr. 1789 (10-11th c.).
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Oxford, Bodleian, Auct. 1.1 (= Misc. 179) (17th c.), pp.169-262 containing Pss.10-50 and pp.262-284 (Ps. 9)
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Oxford, Bodleian, Barocci gr. 154 (late 15th c.), a copy of Barocci 235.
These are all derived from the Barocci ms., and the other mss. serve only to supplement some passages today missing from the Barocci (I presume this means leaves have been lost down the years).
Marcel Richard made a check on the value of the material using the text for Ps. 37. The whole commentary of Eusebius on this psalm happens to be extant, under the name of Basil, and is accessible in PG 30, col. 81-104 (now I ought to commission a translation of that!). Origen’s two homilies on this psalm have reached us, in a version in Latin by Rufinus. Theodoret’s Interpretatio in Psalmos is extant, and in PG 80. The work of Didymus has perished.
Richard found that all the extracts from extant sources were reproduced correctly, and attributed to the correct authors. The remaining extracts, from Didymus, were not found in any of the other authors, so are presumably also corrected quoted. This gives us great confidence in using the catena.
The second volume existed in a single manuscript in Turin, Cod. 300 (C.II.6, 10th c.). Unfortunately this was destroyed in the fire on 26th January 1904, without ever being photographed or printed. No doubt the librarians who watched it burn had congratulated themselves just as modern ones do, that they had never allowed it to be photographed, thereby preserving it from “damage”. Some leaves remain, and the Institut de Recherches et Histoire de Textes did their best, but the majority of the material from this excellent source is lost.
Fortunately this matters less for the Commentary of Eusebius. A portion of this massive commentary has reached us in direct transmission, and contains Pss.51-95:3. It’s in Cod. Coislin 44 (10th c.).
The third volume, on Pss.101-150, did not reach us, and no traces of it are known.
The two volume edition
The first volume of this edition, covering Pss.1-76, has been lost. No copy of it came down to our times.
The second volume, however, covering Pss. 77-150, is extant. This is fortunate, as it complements the losses in the three volume edition.
This volume was classified by Karo and Lietzmann as type XI. No single copy is entire, although it probably once existed complete in Milan, Ambrosian Library F 126 sup. (=A, 13th century) which is now mutilated at the start and end. Fortunately Ms. Patmos, St. John’s Library 215 (=P, 12-13th c.) is complete at the end, and has only lost a couple of leaves at the front. The material at the start of the catena is found in Ms. Vienna theol. gr. 59 (13th c.).
A and P both descend from a copy in uncial. A is the better, as P has been contaminated with material from the commentary of Theodoret. Fortunately this is usually placed in the same places, and can be readily identified.
Indirect tradition
The material contained in the Palestinian catena is good, but the same material also appears in secondary catenas; catenas that used the Palestinian catena as a source. This means that this indirect tradition can be a control on mistakes in the text.
The catenas that form this tradition appear in two forms; either a condensed version of the whole catena, or else a collection of extracts from across the catena.
Printed editions
It was always obvious to scholars that it should be possible to recover the commentary of Eusebius in almost complete form from these materials. B. de Montfaucon printed an edition of his commentary on Pss.1-118, which is reprinted in PG 23, cols. 71-1396. J.-B. Pitra reedited this in Analecta sacra Spicilegio Solesmensi parata, 3: Patres antenicaeni, Venice: S. Lazaro (1883), p.365-529.
Angelo Mai added the remainder, from Pss. 119-150, which is reprinted in PG 24, 9-78. Unfortunately the materials used were printed with insufficient care, and are contaminated by material from Origen.
Carmelo Curti wrote a series of articles on this subject, all reprinted in Eusebiana 1: Commentarii in Psalmos, Catania 1989 (2nd ed). Unfortunately I have never managed to see this, but I’ve just put in an ILL for it.[1]
- [1]Update, 5th June, 2015. I came across this post this week, which I had entirely forgotten about. I wish that I had added the sources at the time. I think that the main source was Angelo di Berardino, Patrology: The Eastern Fathers from the Council of Chalcedon (451) to John of Damascus (d.750), 2006, p.618 f.↩
Catenas on the Psalms in print
Karo and Lietzmann’s Catenarum Graecarum Catalogus lists 28 different medieval Greek catenas on the psalms. These are not 28 different copies, but 28 different types. I confess that I have not yet read through all this material, and am awaiting the printed copy that I made and ordered.
Fortunately the printed editions of whatever exists appear at the front of each entry in K&L. This is meagre enough.
First there is a volume by the inevitable Balthasar Corderius, in three folio volumes: Expositio Patrum Graecorum in psalmos, a. Balthasare Corderio Soc. Iesu ex vetustissimis Sac. Caes. Maiestatis, & Sereniss. Bauariae Ducis mss. codicibus … concinnata; in Paraphrasin, Commentarium et Catenam digesta; Latinitate donata. & Annotationibus illustrata . . . Antverpiae, ex officina Plantiniana Balthasaris Moreti M. DC. XLIII- VI. 3 vol. fol.
This appeared at Antwerp in 1643-6 at the Plantin-Moretus press. I had not known that Corderius was a Jesuit, but so it appears. He printed his text from manuscripts belonging to the Emperor and the Duke of Bavaria. He also translated what he gathered into Latin.
The mss he used were Vienna 298 and 8 (possibly also Vienna 294 on Psalm 1-50). He also used Munich 12 and 13 to fill in what he considered to be gaps. The edition is plainly a collection of whatever Corderius thought useful, rather than based on an edition.
The second catena in printed form listed by K&L is this: Aurea in quinquaginta Davidicos Psalmos doctorum Graecorum catena. Interprete Daniele Barbaro electo Patriarcha Aquileiensi. cum privilegio. Venetijs, apud Georgium de Caballis. MDLXIX. fol. So this is earlier, 1569, in Venice. It looks as if it may only be a Latin translation. K&L give a list of authors and where the materials came from.
Most interesting of these to us are fragments of Eusebius of Caesarea’s Commentary on the Psalms. These are contained in this, and were edited by Montfaucon in his edition of that work. It looks as if he may have made use of manuscripts in Turin, which would be rather important as that manuscript was destroyed in 1904.
How do you solve a problem like… Karo and Lietzmann?
I’m still too unwell to go back to work, which is a pain because I only get paid when I’m in the office. I thought I was well enough to go in tomorrow, but a walk to a shop this frosty evening speedily taught me otherwise. So … another day at home, in which I can probably read but not much else. Maybe I should have ordered some novels and some cartoon books!
But I have discovered Karo and Lietzmann’s catalogue of Greek catenas. Now how do I get it in a form in which I can actually use it? I need something printed, in the hand.
At the moment I am trying to turn it into a Lulu.com book. I downloaded the Lulu settings for Adobe and I printed the PDF to PDF, thereby changing the page size and preparing it for Lulu. (It also made the PDF 10 times larger!) If I can just print this Google Books PDF in book form, then that would do. I can then slump on the sofa with a coke and a pencil and work through it.
If not, I need to power up the laser printer and just print selected bits of it. It’s 189 pages, after all!
UPDATE: I have created a book-form of K&L, which is available here. It’s £7.60, or about $10, if you want one. I’ve ordered one for me, so it will be interesting to see what the print quality is like.
Catalogue of catenas
I have referred previously to G. Karo and I. Lietzmann, Catenarum Graecarum Catalogus, published in the appallingly difficult to obtain Nachrichten der K. Gesellschaft der Wissenschaften zu Gottingen, Philologisch-historische Klasse, 1, 3, 5 (1902). In pp. 119-151, they classify catenas as types I-VII, following a scheme drawn up by E. Preuschen. This really should be online. Does anyone have a copy?
UPDATE: Apparently that volume of the Nachrichten is here. Thanks to Andrew Eastbourne for the tip.
UPDATE2: I’ve now edited that PDF, removed everything except the Catalogus, and uploaded it to archive.org by itself. It’s here. That should make it easier to find, and more accessible.
Of course now I need to read it…
What is a catena?
An email recently reminded me that many people reading this will not know what a catena is. I thought a post on this would be useful.
The word catena is Latin, and means chain. It is used to refer to a book which is made up entirely of quotations from older writers, arranged to make a continuous text. Usually it is a commentary on some book; first the main text is quoted, and then the opinions of older commentators in a chain underneath.
The catenas that we are concerned with are exegetical catenas; that is, catenas on the bible. These tend to look like this:
<bible verse in large text>
Chrysostom. <quotation from some work or other by John Chrysostom, probably a sermon or commentary on this book, one or more sentences>. Eusebius. <quote from Eusebius of Caesarea>. Marcion. <quote from long dead heretic> Chrysostom. <another quote from C.> Theodore <quote from Theodore of Mopsuestia> <<and so on>><bible verse in large text>
Cyril. <quotation from Cyril of Alexandria>. O. <quotation from Origen>. <quotation where the author’s name has dropped out, so looks like Origen because it follows immediately after>
and so on. The bible verses follow in the sequence in the bible.
The actual arrangement of the text and the commentary can vary; the commentary can be in a very wide margin around a large column of central text of the bible, even above and below it sometimes; or a two column arrangement, text and commentary. Catenas can surround a commentary, even.
The author name is the only division between the extracts. The names of the authors are often abbreviated, or lost, which can cause a real problem, and in copying quickly leads to fragments being attributed to the preceding author. The author names — technical term is lemmas — are often in red, which means if the rubricator didn’t do his bit, there are just gaps in the text. (Anyone who has handled more than a manuscript or two knows that the red bits are added last, and often not at all).
I would post a real sample, but as far as I know none of the catenas have been translated into English.
What we have, then, is the biblical verse, and then a series of comments by older authorities, making up a text. The quotations are often ‘adjusted’ at each end, in order to make the text flow.
These sorts of books were compiled during the 6th century onwards in the Greek church, using collections of sermons and commentaries on the bible by older writers. Chrysostom is used a LOT! But often writers are quoted whose works have perished; for, once the handy catena existed, what need of the full text?
Consequently the catenas are a gold-mine of material otherwise lost.
The term catena is modern. The Greek terms for a catena were things like exegetikai eklogai, exegetical extracts.
Catenas can be primary or secondary. Primary catenas are compiled from the works they quote. Secondary catenas are compiled from other catenas.