John of Antioch (chronicler)

John of Antioch was a late antique historian, who wrote AD in the 6th or 7th century.

Life and work

About John's life is very little known. He probably came from the Syrian city of Antioch, one of the most important cities of the Eastern Roman Empire, was formed and may have been active in the imperial administration. By the beginning of the 7th century (see the remarks below), he wrote, probably in Constantinople Opel, a Chronicle of the World, for which he heranzog several good sources. This clearly described the events of the "creation " to the throne of the emperor Heraclius in 610 Unlike in many other late ancient chronicles, found in John Church history largely ignored. Rather, he was interested in political issues, in addition, be linguistically quite challenging work also contains important information, probably partly from now lost works (see also Leoquelle ).

In research, however, many points are controversial. As the Chronicle of John is only fragmentary, so about quotations in later authors, receive, mainly produces the question of whether certain fragments can be ever actually assigned to the John, the research with considerable problems. Umberto Roberto has submitted a new, first complete edition in 2005 (and thus the old edition of Karl Müller from the 1851 and 1870 replaced), in which also some opinions of the older research be modified or denied. So Roberto is about the view that John, who wrote under Heraclius, was by no means a Miaphysit and also can not be equated with the Antiochian Patriarch John.

However, as well as his text edition several conclusions have not gone unchallenged Roberto, (specifically the assignment of certain fragments of John) was partly criticized. 2008 Sergei Mariev has submitted a further edition (including an English translation ), in which he came to different conclusions regarding the fragments and their allocation. Mariev believes, as previously some other researchers (especially Sotiroudis ) that John had lived in the 6th century and makes use of a sophisticated style. His work has served only until the death of the Emperor Anastasius in 518; those fragments that report subsequent events were either attributed to or been assigned simply wrong by modern research a less talented continuator of John. The outcome of the debate is currently still open.

The American historian Warren Treadgold has also been suggested that John of Antioch was in turn itself largely followed a single main source in which there had been to the now lost historical work by Eustathius of Epiphaneia, but is also very controversial. Michael Whitby in 1990 represented the position that John had only been a compiler and therefore his style varies depending on the source used.

Expenditure

• Sergei Mariev (ed.): Ioannis Antiochian fragmenta quae super sunt. Corpus fontium historiae Byzantinae 47th Berlin-New York 2008. ( New text with English translation; Mariev represents well partly clear positions other than Roberto review by Mark Whittow, Bryn Mawr Classical Review 2009.12.06. ).
• Umberto Roberto ( Ed.): Ioannis Antiochian Fragmenta ex Historia Chronica. Introduzione, edizione critica e traduzione. Berlin 2005 ( = Texts and Studies on the History of Early Christian Literature 154). (. Important new text with Italian translation and a detailed introduction Roberto, however, used a different from the preceding editions count of fragments review (PDF, . 94 kB) by Bruno Bleckmann, Göttingen Forum for Classical Studies 9 (2006 ), pp. 1071-1075 ).