{"id":18476,"date":"2018-10-10T21:19:45","date_gmt":"2018-10-10T20:19:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.roger-pearse.com\/weblog\/?p=18476"},"modified":"2018-10-10T21:19:45","modified_gmt":"2018-10-10T20:19:45","slug":"a-bibliography-of-the-various-collections-of-the-apothegmata-patrum-sayings-of-the-fathers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/roger-pearse.com\/weblog\/2018\/10\/10\/a-bibliography-of-the-various-collections-of-the-apothegmata-patrum-sayings-of-the-fathers\/","title":{"rendered":"A bibliography of the various collections of the Apothegmata Patrum (Sayings of the Fathers)"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Apothegmata Patrum<\/em> is a collection of around 2,500 sayings in total.\u00a0 These are attributed in the manuscripts to one or another of the Desert Fathers; monks and hermits living in the Egyptian deserts from the mid-4th century onwards.\u00a0 Originally passed from mouth to mouth, they were then gathered into small collections which appear in manuscripts, and then gathered into larger collections and translated into all the languages of ancient Christianity.\u00a0 A volume of sayings may be known as a Paterikon<\/em>, or even a Gerontikon<\/em>!<\/p>\n

The sayings\u00a0date from the mid-4th century onwards.\u00a0 The attributions may be imperfect, and the wording may have been polished in transmission.\u00a0 Like all “sayings” literature, the nearest analogy is the modern joke book, where every saying tends to be attributed to Churchill or Groucho Marx, and the wording varies as the editor thinks fit to improve it.<\/p>\n

The original sayings were\u00a0transmitted orally, in many languages.\u00a0 But\u00a0the first written form of these was in Greek, and all the other language versions are derived from the Greek written material.<\/p>\n

There are two major Greek collections.\u00a0 These\u00a0are\u00a0distinguished by the order in which the material is presented:<\/p>\n