Galen on the origins of soap

Posted on by Roger Pearse

I stumbled across an interesting claim this afternoon, in the Wikipedia article on soap, which I traced to a 1960 textbook on the history of Greek fire (!) by a certain J.R. Partington.[1]

The origin of the name sapo has been much discussed. Some think it is from the German saipjo, others from the English sepe (still used in Scotland), passing by way of Batavia to Gaul. Blumner says true soap was unknown to the ancients, Pliny’s sapo being a pomade made from unsaponified fat and alkali. When true soap was first made by boiling fats or oils with causticised lye seems to be unknown, but the use of causticised lye in making soap (σάπων) is mentioned by Galen,[145] perhaps from Asklepiades junior (c. A.D. 100), who says it is made from the fat of oxen, goats, or wethers, and causticised lye (sapo conficitur ex sevo bulbulo, vel caprino, aut vervecino, et lixivio cum calce). Galen says that the best soap was the German, since it was purest and in some ways the most fatty, that of the Gauls being next best, and that it acted as a medicine and removed all impurity from the body and from clothing. This is the first certain mention of the use of soap as a detergent. Galen [146] says soap is a better detergent than soda (λίτρον). If the mention of Gallic soap in Oreibasios [147] is from Rufus of Ephesus (c. A.D. 100) this would precede Galen’s in a Greek writer. Zosimos the alchemist [148] (c. A.D. 250) mentions both soap (σαπώνιον) and soap-making (σαπωναρικὲ τέκνη).

Sadly I was unable to access the page of the preview with the footnotes (p.333), so I couldn’t get Partington’s references.  I do not know where we might find the statements by Zosimos, therefore.

But a search on the Latin text of Galen, or rather “Asclepiades Junior” – why Latin? – produced some interesting results.  A volume from 1817 quoted that text exactly, and rather more of it:[2]

* Sapo conficitur ex sevo bubulo vel caprino, aut vervecino, et lixivio cum calce; quod optimum judicamus Germanicum; est enim mundissimum et veluti pinguissimum, deinde Gallicum. Verum omnis sapo acriter ralaxare potest, et omnem sordem de corpore abstergere, vel de pannis, et exsiccare similiter ut nitrum vel aphronitrum, mittitur et in caustica. (Soap is made from ox, goat or sheep’s tallow, and lye with lime; the best we think is the German [soap]; for it is the purest and almost the fattest, then the Gallic [soap].  Indeed soap can quickly loosen everything, and wipe away all muck from the body, or from clothes, and likewise dry up like nitre/soda or African nitre/sodium carbonate, and is also used as a caustic.) De simplicibus medicaminibus, p. 90. G.

In another book, ascribed to Galen, the greater part of which is taken from Aetius, and of which a Latin translation only remains, De dynamidiis, p. 28. G, according to Gesner’s edition stands: Recipe saponem spatarenticum, and p. 31. C, emplastrum de sapone spathulgno. These epithets, in my opinion, signified soap which was so soft that it could be spread.

But what is Galen’s De simplicibus medicaminibus?  It is unknown to the standard 20-volume edition of Galen’s works by Kuhn.[3]  Fortunately the answer is not far to seek – it is the title of an early printed edition of a pseudo-Galenic work, the Alphabet of Galen, recently edited and translated by Nicholas Everett.[4]  The editio princeps of this text was printed by Diomedes Bonardus under the title Liber Galieni de simplicibus medicinis ad Paternianum, and in the 16th century in the Opera Omnia of Galen[5] as Liber Galieni de simplicibus medicaminibus ad Paternianum.  Likewise I learn that De dynamidiis is also ps.Galenic, and also addressed to the same Paternianus, Paterninus or Paternus – Everett’s introduction is excellent on all these.

De simplicibus medicinis is listed in Fichtner’s modern Galen bibliography as #139: “Ad Paternum = De simplicibus medicinis ad Paternianum = Liber pigmentorum = De simplicibus medicaminibus ad Paternianum = Alfabetum Galieni” and “Nicht bei Kühn; Pseudo-Galen”.  Likewise De dynamidiis appears as #219, also spurious.[6]

But what of this editor “Gesner”?  He turns out to be the 16th century editor Conrad Gessner.  Curiously his edition includes a page listing Galenic spuria, and among them, De simplicibus medicinis![7]  His edition of the work is here, and we quickly see that the book is a list of simple things like aloe, etc.  Unsurprisingly we find a section De sapone here, and the entire entry is as above.

So this is indeed the source of the material given by Partington.  It is not by Galen, nor can he have used it.  It’s from a medieval handbook, at least in its current form, and attributed to Galen in general handbooks which are repeated uncritically throughout the 19th century.

Everett considers that the text incorporates a great deal of ancient medical knowledge.  No doubt it does, like many a medieval text;  but its value as evidence for the use of soap in Galen’s time, or indeed that of Asclepiades Junior, must be negligible.

The main mystery remaining is why Partington attributes the material to Asclepiades Pharmacion, known as Asclepiades Junior (ca. 100 AD).  This attribution is our only other possible reason to consider this material ancient.

It would be good to check the other references in Partington.

Update: A kind correspondent has now sent me the page of references, and I have decided that Partington is not quite as culpable as I first thought!  I have revised the post accordingly.

Now Partington does indeed give extra references, which are as follows:

145.  De compos. med. sec. loc., ii; Kuhn, xii, 586. (i.e. this is Galen)
146.  Method. medend., vii; Kuhn, x, 569. (and this)
147.  Synopseos, iii; in Stephanus, Medicae artis principes, 1567, 53.  (This is Oreibasios)
148.  Berthelot, Collection des anciens Alchemistes Grecs, 1888, vol. ii, 142.3, 143.7.  (This is Zosimos; French translation around here).

Interestingly there is no reference for the material from ps.Galen, although we have tracked it down above.

But let’s now look at those references in Galen and see what the man himself has to say.

Galen, De compositione medicamentorum secundum locos, book 2, in Kuhn xii, p.586, mentions a pound of “sapo” (“saponis libram unam”) as an ingredient, 3 lines from the bottom.  My limited knowledge of Latin words for lye does not allow me to find the reference to it in here, however.  Is there one?

Galen, De Methodo Medendi, book 8 (at least in my copy of Kuhn) of 14, p.569, does indeed contain a reference to “sapo”: “But it is also called soap [sapo/sapon] by those who want to clean most effectively.”  The discussion is about various types of “material for cleansing” the body before bathing, and references caustics like nitre and aphronitre.  The idea of soap is certainly here, if not the specifics, and it is contrasted with nitre / soda.

But is this evidence for soap in Galen’s time?

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  1. [1]J.R. Partington, A history of Greek fire and gunpowder, JHU Press, 1960, p.307.↩
  2. [2]Johann Beckmann, A history of inventions and discoveries, tr. by W. Johnston. Vol. 1-3; 4, 2nd ed, vol. 3, London: Longman &c, 1817, p.225.↩
  3. [3]Everett, p.11.↩
  4. [4]Nicholas Everett, The Alphabet of Galen: Pharmacy from Antiquity to the Middle Ages : a Critical Edition of the Latin Text with English Translation and Commentary, University of Toronto, 2012. See p.13-14.↩
  5. [5]Published in Latin by Junta in 1522, 1528, 1565 and 1586; also in Charterius in 1679 – see Everett p.11.↩
  6. [6]Online here.↩
  7. [7]Galeno Ascripti Libri, in Omnia Quae Extant, Froben, 1562. Online at Google books here.↩

The Annals of Eutychius of Alexandria (10th c. AD) – chapter 9 (Contd)

Posted on by Roger Pearse

Let’s continue with chapter 9 of this Arabic Christian work:

5. As for those who wonder why the patriarch of Alexandria is called “Bābā”, we answer: “Bābā” means “grandfather”.  But from the time when Ananias was made patriarch of Alexandria by the Evangelist Mark to the time of Demetrius, patriarch of Alexandria, who was the eleventh patriarch [of that place], there was never, in the province of Egypt, a bishop and the patriarchs who preceded him had never consecrated bishops.  But when he became patriarch, Demetrius consecrated three bishops and it was he, in truth, who was the first patriarch of Alexandria to consecrate bishops.  At his death there was made patriarch of Alexandria Heraclas, who consecrated twenty bishops.  One of these bishops, named Eumenius, transgressed the law, and the news came to the patriarch Heraclas who immediately convened a group of bishops, went to the city [where was] Eumenius, and made some inquiries about him; and he pondered the case thoroughly and worked out the truth.  It was then that, hearing the people call the bishops “Ab” [or “father”], the patriarch thought: “If we call the bishop “Ab” and the bishops themselves call the patriarch “Ab”, then we call the patriarch “Bābā”, or “grandfather”, for he is the father of fathers.”  The Patriarch of Alexandria was so called, from the time of Heraclas, “Bābā”, or “grandfather”.  Ananias, patriarch of Alexandria, whom the evangelist Mark had made the patriarch of that time,  remained in office for twenty-two years and died.  The evangelist Mark went to Barqah (8), exhorting the people to embrace the faith in Christ, Son of God.

6. Claudius Caesar died, and there reigned after him, in Rome, his son Nero Caesar for thirteen years. He was the first to procure serious evils and misfortunes for the Christians.  He was an extremely bad man and of wicked habits.  At the time of Nero Caesar, Peter, chief of the Apostles, wrote in the city of Rome the Gospel of Mark, at the hands of the latter, in Latin, and attributed it to Mark.

It was also at the time of this king that Luke wrote his gospel in Greek for a Roman nobleman named Theophilus and it was also he who wrote the “Praxis”, i.e. “The Acts of the Apostles” (9).  The evangelist Luke was the companion of the Apostle Paul, and remained with him for a long time. We know this because the apostle Paul says in his letter: “The doctor Luke greets you” (10).  Nero Caesar took Peter, crucified him with his head down, and had him put to death, because Peter had asked him: “If you want to crucify me, crucify me with my head down, because my death is not the same as that of Christ, my Lord, who was crucified in the upright position” (11).  Then [Nero] beheaded Paul.  Peter was put to deathtwenty-two years after Christ, our Lord, was put to death.  After Peter, Linus was made patriarch of Rome(12).  He held the office for twelve years and died. He was the first to be made patriarch of Rome.  The evangelist Mark preached to the people the faith in Christ, Son of God, in Alexandria and Barqah for seven years.  In the first year of the reign of the aforementioned Nero Caesar, Mark was put to death in Alexandria, and his body was set on fire (13).  In the twelfth year of the reign of Nero Caesar Ignatius was made Patriarch of Antioch.  He held the seat for thirty-two and was put to death.

7. Qistus, governor of Jerusalem, died and the city was without any authority or sovereign to govern it.  The Jews then arose and rioted and killed James, son of Joseph, known as the “brother of the Lord”, stoning him to death (14).  Then they harassed a group of disciples and expelled them from the city.  The Christians abandoned Jerusalem, crossed the Jordan and settled in those places (15).  Informed of this fact, Nero Caesar sent word to the commander stationed in the East, named Vespasian, to rally his troops and go to Judea with orders to kill all the inhabitants, sparing none, and to destroy the houses.  Having heard these things, the Jews gathered together and those who among them were wealthy offered their goods to build three citadels around the city.  They equipped them with towers, fortified them, and castellated them. Vespasian arrived in Judea after spreading destruction in every town of Galilee and burning it.  But against Jerusalem he could not do anything, because it was well fortified and strengthened.  He spent a year besieging it.  The Jews made nocturnal sorties, in secret, and spread death among the Roman soldiers.

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John the Lydian, On the Roman Months IV: January now online

Posted on by Roger Pearse

Mischa Hooker has come up trumps and sent me a translation of the section of John the Lydian, On the Roman Months, book 4, which covers January!  As with previous sections of John, this details the various Roman festivals in the month, together with other calendrical information, often from lost sources.  Dr Hooker has also added copious footnotes.  Here it is:

As usual, this material is public domain – use it in any way you like, personal, educational or commercial!

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The Annals of Eutychius of Alexandria (10th c. AD) – chapter 9

Posted on by Roger Pearse

Let’s continue looking at how the 10th century Melkite patriarch of Alexandria saw the events of the 1st century AD, by giving a translation of the start of chapter 9 of the Annals:

1.  Pilate wrote to king Tiberius speaking of Christ, our Lord, and of his disciples and of the many miracles that they did, of how the sick were healed and the dead raised.  He wanted to believe in Christ, our Lord, and to profess the religion of the Christians, but his advisors dissuaded him from doing such a thing.  He was then enraged against Herod, because he killed John on account of Herodias, his brother’s wife, whom he had taken by force and committed adultery with her,  and for allowing the messiah to be crucified for his convenience.  Tiberius sent word to Herod to appear in Rome, and exiled him to Spain, entrusting the government of his province to Pilate.  The city of Tiberias, which was simply called Tībāriyādah (1), after the name of king Tiberias, was founded in the time of this king.

2. Tiberius Caesar died after a reign of twenty-two years and one month.  After him reigned Gaius Caesar for four years and three months (2).  He was a unmanly man, arrogant and extremely perverted.  He recalled Pilate to Rome and had him killed.  The Jews rose up so to be more wicked than they had been at first.  The Romans attacked them, but [the Jews] made great slaughter of them.  Having received news of this, king Gaius Caesar took one of his men, named Yirūdus, son of Aristobulus, also called Aghriyān (3), and entrusted to him the government of Jerusalem.  He also entrusted him with the government of the four provinces which the sons of Herod, son of Antipater had divided among themselves.  This Aghriyān was of evil conduct, extremely malicious and a relentless persecutor of the disciples.  It was he who had Stephen killed, the first martyr and archdeacon, who was stoned to death. James the brother of John, son of Zebedee was also killed with the sword.  He then put Peter in prison with the intent to kill him, but God came to his rescue, saved him from his hands, and took him far away from him to Antioch.

Arcadius was made patriarch of Antioch, and he held the seat for twenty-seven years (4).  He was the first to be made patriarch of the city of Antioch.  In the second year of the reign of Gaius Caesar, Peter went to Rome.  Aghriyān was stricken with a serious disease, his flesh consumed him and his body was dehydrated until he died.  When the king heard that Gaius Aghriyān had died, he appointed in his place another man, also named Aghriyān (5), and sent him to Jerusalem.  In the second year of his reign there was made bishop of Jerusalem James, son of Joseph, called “brother of our Lord,” who was the first of the bishops who then followed in Jerusalem.  He held the seat for twenty-eight years. The disciples suffered great tribulations at the hands of the Jews and the Romans, and many of them were killed.

3. Gaius Caesar died, and after him reigned in Rome Claudius Caesar for fourteen years.  In his time there was a severe famine throughout the land and many people died from the great famine and pestilence.  In the times of Claudius Caesar, Matthew wrote his gospel in Hebrew in Jerusalem, which the evangelist John then expounded in Greek.  The Jews had meanwhile become much more wicked than they had been at first, to the point that they were killing each other in the markets and in the streets because of the evil and corruption which had come over them.  Aghriyān fled far far away from them and fled to Rome, leaving as governor in Jerusalem a man named Qistus (6).  Upon arriving in Rome, Aghriyān informed Claudius Caesar of the evil that the Jews were doing.  Claudius Caesar then sent a large army to Jerusalem.  Many Jews, men, women and children, were killed and [many] were deported to Antioch or Rome.

4. In the ninth year of the reign of Claudius Caesar, the evangelist Mark was in the city of Alexandria, preaching to the people the faith in Christ, our Lord.  But as Mark was walking through the city of Alexandria he ripped, suddenly, a strip of leather from his sandal.  So he stopped at a shoemaker, named Ananias, so that he could repair the sandal.  Ananias took an awl to perforate the sandal, and in so doing wounded his finger, which began to issue a lot of blood with a throbbing pain.  He asked Mark to heal him, but Mark said:  “If you believe in Jesus Christ, the son of God, your finger will heal.”  Mark then took the finger of Ananias and said: “In the name of Jesus Christ, may your finger be healed!”  The finger healed instantly and the blood ceased to flow.  At the same time, Ananias believed in Christ, and Mark baptized him and made him patriarch of Alexandria.  He was the first to be made patriarch of Alexandria (7).  The evangelist Mark appointed, together with the patriarch Ananias, twelve other priests who joined with him [in his ministry] and on the death of the patriarch could nominate, in his place, one of the twelve, the other eleven placing their hands on his head and blessed him and consecrating him patriarch.  Their task was then to choose a man of proven virtue and ordain him priest with them, to replace the one that had been made patriarch, because they were always twelve in number.  The twelve priests of Alexandria continued to elect the patriarch, by following this rule, from among the twelve priests, until the time of Alexander, Patriarch of Alexandria, who was one of the Three Hundred and Eighteen.  In fact he forbade the priests to elect the patriarch, and also ordered that on the death of the patriarch the bishops should gather and elect the Patriarch.  He ordered that on the death of the patriarch, there should be elected a man of proven virtue, no matter from what country, or one of the twelve priests, or another that had been found worthy, and that he should be consecrated as patriarch.  In this way the old rule of electing the patriarch from the priests was interrupted, and the election went to the bishops.

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Conference: Syriac intellectual activity in late antiquity. Oxford, 30th-31st January 2015.

Posted on by Roger Pearse

Today I became aware of a two-day conference in Oxford that sounds rather interesting.  It takes place in three weeks time.

The title is Syriac intellectual culture in late antiquity: translation, transmission and influence and the abstracts are here.  The cost is negligible – £5 / $8 – and accomodation is possible for a rather more serious sum.

Here’s a list of papers from the abstracts:

  • The Sources of the Syriac Apocalypse of Daniel. 
  • The exegetical  Activity  of  Mar  Aba  I (d.  552).  He was a promoter of the exegesis of Theodore of Mopsuestia.
  •  The Syriac Odes and the Syrohexapla
  • Greek exegetical traditions in the Syriac commentary on the Diatessaron 
  • Human weakness: Isaac of Nineveh and the Syriac Macarian corpus.  And how the transmission of both from/to Greek happens.
  • The Syriac Vorlage and Translation Technique of the Arabic Version of Acts in Sinai Ar. 154.  This Arabic version of Acts is hardly studied, apparently.  
  • Dialogues in Syriac translation: Theodotus of Ancyra Contra Nestorium 
  • The Harclean Syriac, the Coherence-Based Genealogical Method, & the Development of the Byzantine Text: The State of Their Union
  • The Old Testament and Invention of Holy Places in Syria-Mesopotamia during Late Antiquity
  • A paper on Ephrem’s Commentary on Genesis (title seems to be missing from the page of abstracts), discussing connections with both Greek and Jewish sources.
  • Eusebius’ Historia Ecclesiastica in Syriac and Latin: a first comparison.  This one about why the HE got translated into each language.  The manuscripts of the Syriac version are 5th century!
  • The Syriac Nachleben of Jewish Apocrypha: The case of Joseph and Aseneth 

It’s all cutting-edge stuff, from the look of it, addressing areas well outside the normal run of patristic or biblical studies, but closely connected to things that we’d all like to know about.

Oxford in late January will be cold and grey and full of students.  I don’t know whether I’ll go; if I’m not busy “tent-making”, then I might go.  But if you’re in the area, it sounds certainly worth your time.

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Anthony Alcock, Third part of Coptic Sayings of the Fathers now online

Posted on by Roger Pearse

Dr Alcock has now sent me the third part of his translation of this work!  It’s here with the others.

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Matti Moosa, RIP

Posted on by Roger Pearse

Armeniologist Robert Bedrosian writes:

On Tuesday, December 30, 2014, the great U.S. Syriac scholar and historian, Matti Moosa, passed away.

Although we never met in person, he and I became close friends via the Internet. He heard from somewhere that I was translating into English the medieval Armenian versions of Michael the Syrian’s Chronicle. Matti was translating the sole-surviving Syriac manuscript of this work, which was published in 2014. It was the crowning achievement of his long and scholarly life. We corresponded frequently, and I became more and more familiar with, and impressed by, his works.

He allowed me to put some of his important writings online, and the Internet became for us a new kind of printing press, lecture hall, and museum:
http://rbedrosian.com/mmoosa.html

God rest his immortal soul.

I corresponded a number of times with Dr Moosa, and he was invariably a kind and courteous correspondent.

His work was invaluable.  He translated the Scattered Pearls, a history of Syriac literature by Aphram Barsoum, thereby making this Arabic handbook available to western scholars.  It is a fascinating read!  At one point he offered his translation of Michael to me to publish, but I was weighed down with Origen and unable to do so.  His church published it in the end; the institution that he intended to benefit by his work.  But he very kindly sent me a complimentary copy anyway.

It is fashionable at the moment to look down efforts of translation and handbook-compilation or translation in favour of “original research”.  But this work is the sinews of scholarship and far more valuable to far more people than yet another trivial paper to add to the litter of learning.  This is because such books open up the way.  I have today responded to a correspondent, wanting to know about an Arabic author, and baffled by accessing the information in Brockelmann’s appalling mess of a History of Arabic Literature (where every entry is scattered across 7 volumes, in German, highly abbreviated, with useless indexes).  A translation of Brockelmann ought to be the first thing any scholar of Arabic literature endeavours to bring into existence.  Instead … people struggle.

Well done Matti Moosa for a lifetime of quiet, virtuous effort to make material available to us all.

 

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The Annals of Eutychius of Alexandria (10th c. AD) – the remainder of chapter 8.

Posted on by Roger Pearse

(Continuing our translation from the Italian, itself a very scarce book):

6.  From the time when the star appeared to the Magi, to the time when they knelt before Christ, our Lord, and then returned to their country, was two years.  It was told in a dream to Joseph, Mary’s husband, to take the child and his mother and escape into Egypt.  Joseph did as he was told.  Herod saw that the Magi were slow to return to him, and decided that they were mocking him.  So he fell into a rage and ordered that all the boys in Bethlehem aged two years and under should be killed.  So they slew all the children without sparing even one.  But God poured out his anger and struck Herod with a grave illness.  The pain did not leave him until he died, having reigned thirty-seven years.  He left four children.  The first was called Arshīlāwus, the second Hīrūdus, the third Fīlippus and the fourth Usāniyūs (17).   They divided the kingdom between them, and each took a quarter of Judaea.  Bethlehem and Bayt al-Maqdis belonged to Archelaus.

When Joseph heard that Herod was dead, he left Egypt, together with Christ, our Lord, and his mother.  Christ, our Lord, was four years old.  Joseph was afraid to dwell in Bethlehem because of Archelaus, and went to live in Nazareth (18).  So Christ was called a Nazarene.  In the eighth year of Archelaus, Christ, our Lord, was twelve years old, and sat in the temple among the doctors [of the law] and learned and taught.

7.  Joseph, who raised the messiah, died (19).  Archelaus also died, after a reign of nine years, leaving no-one to inherit the kingdom.  Caesar Augustus also died, having reigned fifty-six years and six months.  After him reigned over Rome his son Tiberius Caesar.  Christ, our Lord, was then fifteen.  The king Tiberius had a friend named Pilate, a native of an island in the sea near Rome.  This island was called Buntah, so he was called Bīlātus al-Buntī (20).  [Tiberius] entrusted him with the government of Judaea in place of Archelaus.  In the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar appeared John the son of Zechariah, called the Baptist, who baptised the Jews in the Jordan for the forgiveness of their sins.  Christ, our Lord, presented himself to John and John baptised him in the Jordan.  Christ, our Lord, was then thirty.  Herod, son of Herod, son of Antipater, had put aside his wife, named Aritā (22), daughter of the king of the Arabs (in another text it says “the Ghawr”), and took the wife of his brother Philip instead, even during his lifetime, by force.  The woman’s name was Herodias.  But John said, “It is not lawful to take your brother’s wife while he is still alive.” (22)  So he commanded him to be  thrown in jail.  Then it happened that Herod gave a banquet for his friends, where they ate and drank.  The daughter of Herodias danced in the middle of the room.  He liked it a lot and said, “Ask of me whatever you like.” (23)  And she asked him to give her on a platter the head of John the Baptist.  So he ordered John to be beheaded and handed her his head.  As for his wife Aritā, she went to her father.  He was angry, gathered his men, and went out against Herod who fought back, killing many men and making many others prisoner and burning their villages.  This happened in the eighteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar.

8.  In the twenty-ninth year of the reign of Herod, son of Herod, son of Antipater, Christ, our Lord, was crucified.  This was on Friday, March 23, i.e. 27 Baramhāt.  Christ, our Lord, was celebrating the passover with his disciples on the Friday night, the day of Easter.  One of his disciples, named Judas Iscariot, went to the Jews and said, “What will you give me if I deliver him to you?” (24) They gave him thirty dirhams.  He then went with them in the night to the place where [Christ] was with his disciples.  They took him, and carried him to the priests Annas and Caiaphas, their leaders, who disputed with him.  The next day they handed him over to the governor, Pontius Pilate.  But Pilate found no charge against him, and said to them, “You say that this man is the king of the Jews.”  They answered, “We have no king but Caesar.”  He replied, “What shall I do with him?”  They told him, “Crucify him, because he has profaned our religion, has dissolved our law, and proclaimed himself son of God.” (25)  Pilate was saddened and washed his hands with water, declaring himself innocent of his blood.  But the Jews invoked his blood on them and their children.  Then [Pilate] ordered him to be crucified, and crucified with him were two robbers, one on his right and one on his left, at the sixth hour of Friday.  There was a great darkness, or night, all over the earth.  The sun was darkened and the stars appeared and the rocks were opened and many of the dead rose from their graves.  Christ, our Lord, died on the cross; they opened his side with a spear and blood and water gushed out.

9.  After his death, a man named Joseph went to Pilate and asked for his body.  He was taken down from the cross, wrapped in a shroud, and buried in a new tomb that Joseph had had dug for himself, and he blocked the door with a stone boulder.  The next day the Jews stood before Pilate and said, “We have good reason to fear that his disciples may come at night and take him away and tell people that he is risen.  Would you order that the stone at the entrance to the sepulchre be sealed.”  But Pilate replied, “Go and do whatever you like.” (26)  So they got some guards and placed them to guard the tomb, then they sealed the stone and left.  At midnight on Sunday some women came, bringing spices and incense to fumigate the tomb.  They found before them an angel descended from heaven, who had rolled the stone away from the entrance of the tomb, and was sitting on it.  [The angel] said to them, “Fear not; he is risen.  Tell his disciples to go to Galillee, for there they will meet him.” (27)  The women came to the disciples and told them what they had heard from the angel.  The guards who were responsible for monitoring the tomb fell into a deep sleep, like that of the dead, when they saw the angel and what he had done.  Then they arose and told the Jews what had happened.  [The Jews] tried to bribe them, saying, “Tell anyone who asks, ‘His disciples took him away.'” (28)  As for the disciples, they went to Galillee, and there they met Christ, our Lord.  He blessed them, and sent them into all the world, to preach to the nations faith in the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.

10.  Forty days later, he ascended into heaven.  He was thirty-three.  Ten days later, while the disciples were gathered in the upper room of Zion (29), the Holy Spirit came upon them and they spoke in every language.  The disciples used to go every day to the tomb and the place of crucifixion.  When the Jews say what the disciples did, they said, “This place will not stay hidden [long] and they will certainly erect a building.  Cover it with earth, so that nobody can see it and not a trace remains.  If the people can actually see the empty tomb, they will believe and embrace the faith [of the disciples], making vain our religion.” (30) So they covered the  place with earth and turned it into a garbage dump.

(A few of the notes may be useful:)

17.  Archelaus, Herod Antipas, Philip are the first three; is Lysanias perhaps the fourth?
20.  Pilate belonged to the gens of the Pontii.  Ponza is an island in the Tyrrhennian sea.
21.   Aretas was the father’s name, in fact; in this case it means the Nabatean king Aretas IV.

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Cassiodorus “Chronicle” now online in English

Posted on by Roger Pearse

Bouke Procee has kindly sent me a copy of his translation of this 6th century chronicle (CPL 2269), and made it public domain so that we can all use it.  A text is also included.  Here it is:

Much of the material is reused from earlier Chronicles; the impact of Jerome’s Chronicle is obvious here, as in every subsequent chronicle.  But the most interesting material is from his own time – the account of the games given in Rome in 519 AD by Eutharic, and the statement that the audience were now quite unaccustomed to such shows.

It is excellent to have such texts accessible in English.  The task of translating most of the entries is a humdrum one, which is perhaps often shirked on the basis that most of those interested can just as well read it in Latin.  But it is far easier still for many people to skim down the text in a translation, and, of course, for Google to find it.  I think we can all be grateful to Mr Procee for taking this one on.  It just makes life easier.

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The Annals of Eutychius of Alexandria (10th c. AD) – chapter 8, continued

Posted on by Roger Pearse

The story continues… (and, accidentally, rather seasonably!)

2.  From the reign of Alexander to the end of the reign of Cleopatra there were 289 years.  While Caesar Augustus was returning to Rome from Egypt, Herod met him a second time, in ar-Ramlah (11), bringing many gifts.  Caesar Augustus gave him power over the whole territory of Judah, and its provinces, and over Galilee, placing on his head the royal crown.  Learning that Herod was in the Bayt al-Maqdis as king, the Jews refused to recognise him as their king.  So Herod came upon them and made great slaughter; he threw down the wall of the city and the temple, and took the books that Ezra had rewritten, with their lineages, and had them burned, so that no-one would know any longer from which tribe he originated or who his ancestors were (12).  Then he took all the furnishings and utensils of the priests, and sold them, and the vestments of the priests and placed his seal on them.  Then he started to sell the office of priest, so that, if anyone wanted to become a priest, he demanded a lot of money from them before the charge could be conferred upon them.  He administered the kingdom with cruelty and despotism.

3.  In the 40th year of his reign, Caesar Augustus issued an edict which ordered that the name of every man in his kingdom throughout the world should be registered, together with his wife.  This was an ancient custom, and he also took a census of the population of his kingdom.  So he sent his general, named Quirinius, to undertake the census of the population of Syria and Judaea (13).  In the 41st year of his reign there was announced, to the Lady Mary the virgin, pure and immaculate, [the nativity] of Christ, our Lord.  In the 42nd year of the reign of Caesar Augustus and the 33rd year of the reign of Herod, son of Antipater, in the land of Syria [in another text “of Israel”], was born Christ, our Lord, on the 25th December, or the 29th Kīhak.

 4.  From the end of the reign of Cleopatra, to the birth of Christ, our Lord, had passed 30 years; from the reign of Alexander to the birth of Christ, our Lord, 319 years; from the deportation by Bakhtanassar of the Jews to Bābil, to the birth of Christ, our Lord, 582 years; from the reign of David to the birth of Christ, our Lord,  1059 years; from the Exodus of the Israelites out of Egypt to the birth of Christ, our Lord, 1665 years; from Abraham to the birth of Christ, our Lord, 2172 years; from Fāliq to the birth of Christ, our Lord, 2713 years; from the flood to the birth of Christ, our Lord, 3244 years; from Adam to the birth of Christ, our Lord, 5500 years.

5.  In the 44th year of the reign of Caesar Augustus and the 35th of the reign of Herod, son of Antipater, there came from the east into the land of Judah three magi, astrologers, who asked where the great king had been born. Herod felt afraid, and the whole land of Judah was troubled.  Herod summoned the Magi, and asked them about what they had said.  They answered, “We saw a great star in the east, and we have learned that a great king was born.  We therefore come to worship him.  The star has gone before us and walked with us always, but just as we arrived here we lost sight of it.”  Herod then questioned the Jews, asking, “Where will the messiah be born?”  They told him, “In Bethlehem, of Judah.” (14)  Then Herod summoned the Magi secretly and sent word to them asking in what place and time the star had appeared to them.  They answered, “It appeared in the east, two years ago.” (15)  Then he said to them, “Go and look for this newborn king.  When you have found him, worship him, and then come back to me to let me know, so that I may go to worship him.” (16)  The Magi left Herod, and the star appeared and went before them until they came to Bethlehem, the place where Christ our Lord was, with the Lady Mart-Maryam, his mother.  They worshiped him, and offered him gifts of gold, myrrh and incense.  They were then told in a dream to return to their country by another path, and not to return to Herod.

To be continued…

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