Chronicle of Edessa

Not to be confused with Chronicle of Matthew of Edessa.

Vatican Syr. 163 folio

The Chronicle of Edessa (Latin: Chronicon Edessenum) is an anonymous history of the city of Edessa written in the mid-6th century in the Syriac language. "Chronicle of Edessa" is a conventional title; in the manuscript it is titled Histories of Events in Brief (Syriac: ܬܫ̈ܥܝܬܐ ܕܣܘܥܪ̈ܢܐ ܐܝܟ ܕܒܦܣܝ̈ܩܬܐ, Tašʿyātā d-suʿrāne a(y)k da-b-pāsiqātā).^[a]

The Chronicle of Edessa is generally agreed to have been written around 540–550 CE.^[b] The Chronicle primarily used old Edessan royal archives as its source, as well as some more recent church records,^[1] and accordingly is thought to be historically reliable.^[2][3][4] It may make use of a lost history of Persia.^[5]

It is extant only in an abbreviated version in a single manuscript, Vatican Syriac 163 (Vat. Syr. 163).^[6][7] This manuscript, from the Syrian Convent of Our Lady in the Wadi El Natrun,^[5] was acquired by Giuseppe Simone Assemani during a trip to the Near East from 1715 to 1717 taken at the request of Pope Clement XI.^[6] Some excerpts of the lost full version of the text—sometimes called the Original Chronicle of Edessa—are preserved in other Syriac chronicles.^[7]

The Chronicle covers the period from the founding of the kingdom of Osrhoene in 133/132 BCE until 540,^[7] but few events are recorded before the 3rd century.^[5] The Chronicle picks up with a record of a flood of the river Daysan during the reign of Abgar VIII in November 201, which damaged a Christian church building in Edessa.^[8][9] This is the earliest mention of a building dedicated exclusively to Christian worship,^[10] as well as one of few records of Christianity in Edessa at this time.^[11][9] Unlike other Syriac literature, the Chronicle does not contain any legends of the Apostle Thaddeus.^[3][4]

Published editions

Syriac

• "Vatican Syriac 163" (PDF). Brigham Young University. 2004. Retrieved 26 December 2017.
• Guidi, Ignatius, ed. (1903). Chronica minora. Corpus scriptorum christianorum orientalium. Leipzig/Paris: Harrassowitz. pp. 1–13. Archived from the original on 6 November 2017. Retrieved 26 December 2017.

English

• Cowper, Benjamin Harris (1865). "The Chronicle of Edessa". Journal of Sacred Literature and Biblical Record. 5 (9): 28–45. (Transcription by Robert Pearse)

Notes

1. Per Griffith 1991; Witakowski 2018, p. 336, translates it as Stories of Events in Brief.
2. Dates given are: mid-6th century (Ferguson 1999, p. 267), 540 CE (Palmer 1999, p. 421), 550 CE (Schnabel 2004, p. 899; Yamauchi 1983, p. 85). Samuel, Santiago & Thiagarajan (2008) claim without explanation that it was written in 590 CE (p. 97).

Citations

1. Palmer 1999, p. 421.
2. Teixidor 2015, p. 148.
3. Baum & Winkler 2003, p. 13.
4. Yamauchi 1983, p. 85.
5. Cross & Livingstone 2009.
6. Brigham Young University 2004.
7. Witakowski 2018, p. 336.
8. Ferguson 1999, p. 267.
9. Schnabel 2004, p. 899.
10. Myers 2010, p. 35.
11. Frenschkowski 2015, p. 464.

References

• Baum, Wilhelm; Winkler, Dietmar W. (2003). The Church of the East: A Concise History. London-New York: Routledge-Curzon. ISBN 9781134430192.
• Cross, F. L.; Livingstone, E. A., eds. (2009) [2005]. "Chronicon Edessenum". Chronicon Edessenum (Edessene Chronicle). The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church (3rd rev. ed.). Oxford University Press. ISBN 9780192802903.
• Ferguson, Everett (1999). Doctrinal Diversity: Varieties of Early Christianity. Doctrinal Diversity: Varieties of Early Christianity. Vol. 4. Garland Pub. ISBN 978-0-8153-3071-4.
• Frenschkowski, Marco (2015). "Christianity". In Stausberg, M.; Vevaina, Y.S.D.; Tessmann, A. (eds.). The Wiley Blackwell Companion to Zoroastrianism. Wiley Blackwell Companions to Religion. Wiley. p. 457ff. ISBN 978-1-118-78627-7.
• Griffith, Sidney H. (1991). "Chronicle of Edessa". In Kazhdan, Alexander (ed.). The Oxford Dictionary of Byzantium. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-504652-8.(subscription required)
• Myers, S.E. (2010). Spirit Epicleses in the Acts of Thomas. Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament. Coronet Books Incorporated. ISBN 978-3-16-149472-7.
• Palmer, Andrew (1999). "Edessa". In Bowersock, G.W.; Brown, P.; Grabar, O. (eds.). Late Antiquity: A Guide to the Postclassical World. Harvard University Press Refer. Belknap Press of Harvard University Press. p. 421. ISBN 978-0-674-51173-6.
• Samuel, G.J.; Santiago, J.B.; Thiagarajan, P. (2008). Early Christianity in India: (with parallel developments in other parts of Asia). Madras, India: Institute of Asian Studies. ISBN 978-81-87892-40-3.
• Schnabel, Eckhard J. (2004). Early Christian Mission: Jesus and the Twelve. Early Christian Mission. InterVarsity Press. ISBN 978-1-84474-045-1.
• Teixidor, J. (2015). The Pagan God: Popular Religion in the Greco-Roman Near East. Princeton Legacy Library. Princeton University Press. ISBN 978-1-4008-7139-1.
• Witakowski, Witold (2018). "Chronicle of Edessa". In Nicholson, Oliver (ed.). The Oxford Dictionary of Late Antiquity. Oxford: Oxford University Press. p. 336. ISBN 978-0-19-866277-8.
• Yamauchi, E.M. (1983). Pre-Christian Gnosticism: A Survey of the Proposed Evidences. Twin brooks series. Baker Book House. ISBN 978-0-8010-9919-9.

Further reading

• Brock, Sebastian P. (2011) [1991]. "Chronicle of Edessa". In Daniel, Elton (ed.). Encyclopædia Iranica. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns.
• Ginkel, Jan van (2016). "Chronicon Edessenum". In Dunphy, Graeme; Bratu, Cristian (eds.). Encyclopedia of the Medieval Chronicle. Brill. doi:10.1163/2213-2139_emc_SIM_00506.
• Witakowski, Witold (1984). "Chronicles of Edessa". Orientalia Suecana. 33: 487–498.