Everything about Theophanes The Confessor totally explained
Saint
Theophanes Confessor (c. 758/760 –
March 12, 817/818) was an aristocratic but
ascetic Byzantine monk and
chronicler. He is venerated on
March 12 in the
Roman Catholic and the
Eastern Orthodox Church (
March 25 in those churches that follow the
Julian calendar).
Biography
Theophanes was born at
Constantinople, of wealthy and noble
iconodule parents: Isaac, imperial governor of the islands of the White Sea, and of Theodora, of whose family nothing is known. As he was orphaned at an early age, the
Byzantine emperor Constantine V Copronymus (740-775) saw to his education and upbringing at the imperial court; he'd hold several offices under this patron. His chronicle preserves a vibrant childhood memory of
icebergs created from the thawing of the frozen
Black Sea, and floating past
Constantinople in February of
764.
He was married at the age of twelve but induced his wife to lead a life of virginity, and in 799, after the death of his father-in-law, they separated with mutual consent to embrace the religious life, she choosing a convent on an island near Constantinople, while he entered the monastery called Polychronius in the district of Sigiane (
Sigriano), near
Cyzicus on the Asian side of the
Sea of Marmora. Later he built a monastery on his own lands on the island of
Calonymus (now Calomio).
After six years he returned to Sigriano, founded an abbey known by the name "of the great acre", and governed it as abbot. As such he was present at the
Second General Council of Nicaea in
787, and signed its decrees in defense of the sacred images.
When the emperor
Leo V the Armenian (813-820) resumed his iconoclastic warfare, he ordered Theophanes brought to Constantinople and tried in vain to induce him to condemn what had been sanctioned by the council. Theophanes was cast into prison and for two years suffered cruel treatment; he was then banished to
Samothrace in 817, where overwhelmed with afflictions, he lived only seventeen days and is credited with many miracles after his death, probably
12 March, the day he's commemorated in the
Roman Martyrology.
Chronicle
At the urgent request of his friend
George Syncellus, Theophanes undertook the continuation of his chronicle, during the years 810-15 (P.G., CVIII, 55), making use of material already prepared by
Syncellus, probably also the extracts from the works of
Socrates Scholasticus,
Sozomenus, and
Theodoret, made by Theodore Lector, and the city chronicle of Constantinople.
Theophanes' chronicle of world events, covering events from the accession of
Diocletian in
284 (the point where the chronicle of
George Syncellus ends) to the downfall of
Michael I Rhangabes in
813, is valuable for preserving the accounts of lost authorities on Byzantine history that would be otherwise lost for the
seventh and
eighth centuries. The language occupies a place midway between the stiff ecclesiastical and the vulgar Greek.
The work consists of two parts, the first giving the history, arranged according to years, the other containing chronological tables, full of inaccuracies. It seems that Theophanes had only prepared the tables, leaving vacant spaces for the proper dates, but that these had been filled out by someone else (
Hugo von Hurter,
Nomenclator literarius recentioris I, Innsbruck, 1903, 735). In chronology, in addition to reckoning by the years of the world and the Christian era, Theophanes introduces in tabular form the regnal years of the Roman emperors, of the Persian kings and Arab caliphs, and of the five oecumenical patriarchs, a system which leads to considerable confusion, and therefore of little value.
The first part, though lacking in critical insight and chronological accuracy, which could scarcely be expected from a man of such ascetical disposition, greatly surpasses the majority of Byzantine chronicles (Krumbacher, "Geschichte der byzant. Litteratur," 1897, 342). Theophanes's Chronicle becomes valuable with the reign of
Justin II (565) the point in his work he drew upon sources that have not survived his times.
His Chronicle was much used by succeeding chroniclers, and in 873-875 a
Latin compilation (published in vol. ii. of De Boor's edition) was made by the
papal librarian
Anastasius from the chronicles of
Patriarch Nicephorus, George Syncellus, and Theophanes for the use of a deacon named Johannes in the second half of the
ninth century, and thus was known to Western Europe.
There also survives a further continuation, in six books, of the Chronicle down to the year 961 written by a number of mostly anonymous writers (called
Theophanes Continuatus or
Scriptores post Theophanem), who undertook the work at the instructions of
Constantine Porphyrogenitus.
Sources and references
(incomplete)
C. Krumbacher, Geschichte der byzantinischen Litteratur (1897); Ein Dithyrambus auf Theophanes Confessor (a panegyric on Theophanes by a certain protoasecretis, or imperial chief secretary, under Constantine Porphyrogenitus) and Eine neue Vita des Theophanes Confessor (anonymous), both edited by the same writer in 'Sitzungsberichte' of the Royal Bavarian Academy of Sciences (1896, pp. 583-625; and 1897, pp. 371-399)
Gibbon's Decline and Fall of the West (ed. Bury), v. p. 500.
Editions of the Chronicle:
Editio princeps, Jacques Goar (Paris, 1655)
Combefis (Venice, 1729), with annotations and corrections.
J. P. Migne, Patrologia Graeca, cviii.
J. Classen in Bonn Corpus Scriptorum Hist. Byzantinae (1839-41)
C. de Boor (Leipzig, 1883-85), with an exhaustive treatise on the manuscript and an elaborate index, and an edition of the Latin version by Anastasius Bibliothecarius
Jules Pargoire, "Saint Theophane le Chronographe et ses rapports avec saint Theodore studite," in VizVrem, ix. (St Petersburg, 1902).
Editions of the Continuation:
J. P. Migne, Pair. Gr., cix.
I. Bekker, Bonn Corpus Scriptorum Hist. Byz. (1838). Further Information
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