Ancient Greek Chronography

The paper picks up the question what country Cyrus was attacking in 547 BC, therefore dealing with the broken toponym of the Nabonidus Chronicle obv. ii 16. The reading of the sign(s) has been highly influenced by later classical sources, which place Croesus' defeat against Cyrus somewhere around the corresponding year 547 BC. A collation has made it clear that no reliable reading can be inferred with absolute certainty. Instead of placing a cornerstone of Anatolian and early Persian-Teispid history exclusively on this ambiguous evidence, a new approach to this vexed topic is suggested. The contextualisation of the whole text passage leads to the conclusion that the region of Urartu depicts the most convincing hypothesis so far.

The chronography of Josephus, as presented in his major work the Jewish Antiquities, with significant additions in his Against Apion, covered the entire past of his nation. The antiquity of the Jews was defended by use of Graeco-Oriental chronographical sources, beginning with Manetho. Josephus claimed that Jacob lived some 1000 years (and Moses nearly 500) before the Fall of Troy, the earliest event thought as historical by Greeks. This event he placed at c. 1120 BC, lower than Eratosthenes’ canonical 1183 BC, but within the wider Greek estimates extending from 1335 to c. 937 BC. Given Josephus’ dating of the beginning of Solomon’s reign to 1129 BC, the king had to be contemporary with Troy. This synchronism, recorded in the Tyrian Annals, is not explicitly spelt out by the Jewish historian for understandable reasons. The Annals followed a ‘low’ chronology, placing the Trojan War in the 10th century, incompatible with the ‘high’ chronology originally employed by Josephus placing it in the 12th. The problem of absolute chronology was intensified by the internal difficulties of Biblical dating, such as the Fall of Jerusalem to the Babylonians, the baseline for all calculations back in time, which had been set higher than reality, producing an error of 73 years. To this Josephus added various erroneous time-lengths back to Moses, including the addition of 40 years to the reign of Solomon. Such inflations in the ‘absolute’ chronology meant that significant ‘relative’ links, previously discussed in the Antiquities, had to be downplayed in Apion. This included the friendship of Solomon with the ‘Queen of Sheba’ and the identity of king ‘Shishak’ who invaded Jerusalem after Solomon’s death. Manetho placed the Fall of Troy in the reign of ‘Thouoris’, i.e. the female pharaoh Tausret. Had Josephus known the gender of Thuoris, he would have jumped to the opportunity to identify her with the Queen of Sheba, instead of the remote Nitocris. This would have provided him with the desired synchronism of Solomon with Troy from the Phoenician record. It would also have provided him with a powerful pharaoh following Thuoris, to identify with ‘Shishak’, namely ‘Rhampsinitos’ – almost certainly Ramesses III.

Inscribed some time after 264 BCE, the Parian Marble offers a chronological list of events with an exceptional emphasis on literary matters. Literary History in the Parian Marble explores the literary and historiographical qualities of the inscription, the genre to which it belongs, and the emerging patterns of time. Endorsing the hypothesis that the inscription was originally displayed at a Parian shrine honoring Archilochus, Andrea Rotstein argues that literary history was one of its main concerns. Though it may be conventional in its focus on the chronology of poets, their inventions and victories, the Parian Marble is nonetheless idiosyncratic in the range of authors displayed. By reconstructing the methods by which information might have been obtained, Rotstein contributes to an understanding of the way literary history was practiced within the local communities of ancient Greece, away from the major Hellenistic centers of scholarship.

The Parian chronicle has not been the subject of a comprehensive study for almost a century. Literary History in the Parian Marble brings to the English-speaking audience up-to-date information about the inscription, including a revision of Felix Jacoby’s Greek text and a complete translation.

Olympic victor lists are critical to our understanding of the chronological underpinnings of Greek history. Over 100 fragments from roughly twenty different Olympionikai have come down to us, but Eusebius' Chronika supplies the only extant, complete list. The last critical edition of Eusebius' Olympic victor list is that of Alfred Schoene, Eusebi Chronicorum libri duo (Berlin, 1866-1875). A revised critical edition of this list - based on Paris, BNF, gr. 2600 and on an Armenian translation made ca. A.D. 450 - is here given together with an English translation and an array of relevant background information.

Les textes sont des objets fragiles et compliqués. Cette notice veut attirer l'attention des lecteurs et des étudiants sur diverses composantes du « texte » dont il est préférable d'être conscient. Le premier point est que, contrairement à un vue glorieuse mais fausse, nous n'avons que certains textes, pas tous, et que c'est important ; qu'ensuite quand nous les avons, nous ne les voyons qu'après de nombreux filtres, dont ceux des éditeurs ; qu'ils sont entourés de commentaires, et d'un important matériel éditorial : division en chapitres, numéros de pages, etc. dont l'histoire et les présupposés sont essentiels ; que souvent ils sont traduits. Et que toutes ces contraintes, qui ont une histoire passionnante, pèsent aujourd'hui sur nous plus que jamais.

È opportuno esordire con un chiarimento, programmatico: questa ricerca non tratterà della cronologia di Ibico, o di Anacreonte, e neppure di quella di Policrate. Non ci occuperemo, in altre parole, né della storia di Ibico, o dei personaggi testè menzionati, né della verosimiglianza delle informazioni a essi riferibili, né infine della compatibilità storica delle loro tradizioni.

In a nutshell: 1. I believe that Ekloge Chronographias of George Syncellus and Chronographia of Theophanes the Confessor should be treated as a single project, undertaken in turn by two authors; 2. There are important stylistic differences between the two parts, noticeable in the fragments, in which the authors deliver some editorial remarks or disclose their personal opinions; from a wider selection of such phrases, references to the past or future such as ‘as I have mentioned / as I said / as have been said / as we demonstrated above, etc.’, being diverse and individual, are especially helpful. 3. This observation is of great use not only for the texts analysed here, it may be used to confirm authorship of many other texts. 4. As for George and Theophanes, the TLG search of such structures in all extant classical Greek and Byzantine output confirms the statement nr 1, with clauses like ὡς προέφην / καθὼς καὶ προέφην / ὡς προέφημεν / καθὼς προέφημεν both rare in the whole preserved corpus, and relatively often used by the author of Chronographia. The style of the proemium of Chronographia fits the rest of the work and differs from Ekloge Chronographias. 5. Precise analysis of a wider group of similar clauses shows that Ekloge Chronographias and Chronographia were written by two different authors; Chronographia was created by one author, distinctive and independent, no matter how reproductive at the same time he was. I see no convincing arguments not to call this author Theophanes. Some later and partial editiorial interventions to Chronographia, conceivable (rubrics?) and in some instances even certain, do not challenge this view. 6. Only a few entries from the initial parts of Chronographia fit more the George’s work; their style and content bear much more similarities with Ekloge (in AM 5796, 5814, 5818, 5827, 5828). These paragraphs, George’s aphormai, probably in form of loose notes, were inserted to Chronographia by its author the same way as he used his sources for the subsequent parts; they did not reach beyond the times of Constantine I. 7. I do not dismiss the message of the proemium to the Chronographia as it is much more credible than the discussion, sometimes hypercritical, on the vitae and the scraps of the Confessor’s biography. I see no reason not to believe that the idea established and developed by George was then taken over by his friend; the differences result from the independent work of the former and then of the latter, presumably with only rudimentary guidance at the beginning. 8. The ‘genuine friendship’, the crucial relation between the two authors is still the most useful key to understand the history of the tripartita – therefore, I analyse it in the final part of the paper.

This paper reconsiders Vitruvius’s attitude toward literary auctoritas (“authority”) in the context of two related types of historiographical writing: so-called “universal” or “world” history and chronography. In short, I want to know what it means that de Architectura shares so many of the alleged aims, benefits, and programmatic features of these particular kinds of history writing, especially when Vitruvius’s architectural subject matter is neither clearly universal nor traditionally historical.

Questi Sincronismi giambici proseguono le ricerche sulla cronografia dei poeti arcaici inaugurate con I Policrati ibicei, pure apparsi negli Annali online di Ferrara -sezione Lettere ( , vol. I = Ornaghi [2008). I presupposti metodologici sono sostanzialmente gli stessi esplicitati in modo più dettagliato nell'introduzione a quella ricerca, a cui dunque si rimanda per brevità e facile reperibilità, oltre che per evitare un eccessivo appesantimento dell'apparato bibliografico: cf. Ornaghi (2008,(16)(17)(18)(21)(22)(23)(24)(25)(26)(27)(28)(29).

In his monumental Histories Herodotus offers insights into the political and geographical landscape of Archaic Greece, thereby forming the basis of our modern historical understanding. In addition, Herodotus has drawn the fundamental framework for the traditional chronology of Ancient Greece. He places Homer and Hesiod roughly 400 years before his time, which in turn allows modern scholarship to define this as the beginning of the Archaic period. The end of the Archaic era is identified by using Herodotus’ account of the Persian Wars. As a Panhellenic calendar system was lacking in Archaic and early Classical times, Herodotus relied upon the lineage of the Persian kings from Cyrus to Xerxes as the chronological backbone for his Histories. This circumstance underlines Herodotus’ impressive achievement to offer a relative and absolute chronology for the related events of the ancient world. Despite this, difficulties emerge in instances, where Herodotus only offers imprecise dates for events such as the Cylonian affair or the fall of Croesus. Later authors – especially from Hellenistic times onwards – develop a concise chronology for early Greece mainly by applying Olympiad and Athenian archon dates. These chronographic dating conventions seemingly resemble our modern BC dates, but require further contextualisation. For this reason, the methodology of how later authors arrived at more precise dates than Herodotus, will be discussed. While Herodotus’ and the chronographers’ chronologies by and large conform, the presentation will examine cases for which Herodotus implies a lower chronology of roughly 30 to 50 years. His dates for some early Greek poets (e.g. Sappho and Alcaeus), Periander and the Cypselids as well as Solon have surprisingly not been given the appropriate attention by modern scholars so far. Specifically regarding the linchpin 480 BC for the end of the Archaic period and possible shifts in the chronological view, this issue urges further investigation. While the paper therefore addresses crucial questions belonging to an exclusively text-based chronology, it also aims to scrutinise the connections with archaeological dating methods. Hence, it presents an outlook on Herodotus’ evidence for the absolute chronology of the material remains of the 6th century BC including an analysis of potential deviations from the conventional dates. Thus, the presentation will be a valuable addition to the multifaceted and interdisciplinary discussion about the chronology of late Archaic and early Classical Greece.

This paper reconsiders Vitruvius' attitude toward literary auctoritas in the context of two, related types of historiographical writing, so-called universal or "world-history" and chronography.  Vitruvius' own subject matter, architectura as a whole, is neither clearly universal nor traditionally historical; but De architectura shares many of the alleged aims, benefits, and programmatic features of these particular kinds of historiography.

Classical archaeologists have established the conventional chronology of the Archaic period (c. 776-490/480 B.C.) nearly 100 years ago and assigned precise dates to historical events and archaeological findings. A relative chronology for pottery and sculpture has been devised based on art historical criteria. By combining the relative sequence with written sources an absolute chronological framework was established.

Un poeta senza età. Note di cronografia stesicorea (e alcmanico-saffico-simonidea) Con questo studio della tradizione cronografica (e biografica) di Stesicoro si completa una breve serie di ricerche dedicate appunto alla cronografia dei poeti arcaici, e sempre ospitate negli Annali online di Ferrara. A questi interventi, dunque, si rimanda per inquadrare la prospettiva di analisi dei dati adottata anche nelle pagine seguenti: cf. in particolare Ornaghi (2008, 16ss.) e Ornaghi (2010,(18)(19)(20) * .

This paper gives the first specific source analysis of one of the longest and most interesting chapter of Malalas’ Chronicle (Chronographia XVII 16 Thurn), devoted to the ruinous earthquake in Antioch in May 526 AD. Through a close reading of some stylistic striking passages it is argued that among the sources used by Malalas to draw up his powerful description of this event was also a rhetorical monody. It is suggested that this rhetorical monody was the one composed by the contemporary Gazan rhetor Procopius to commemorate that very same earthquake. This monody is now almost completely lost except for a couple of brief fragments. Finally some observations on Malalas’ level of culture in the light of his use of, and interest for, such a kind of recherché work are offered.

The aim of this paper is to analyze a fragment by Porphyry concerning Seleucid history and transmitted by Eusebius of Caesarea's Chronicon. A short introduction on this work (par. 1) will be followed by a defense of the authorship of the fragment as Porphyrian, and by a cautious suggestion to assign it to the Contra Christianos (par. 2). In the last section, the fragment will be examined at length and its ideological background will be highlighted. In particular, the account of Seleucid kings' deaths shows that Porphyry turned to sources favorable to that dynasty. A critical voice seems to raise only when the author recounts of Demetrius I and of his descendants.