II. Вспомогательные науки для церковной истории

The means for the initial development of historical sources and for establishing a correct attitude towards them, for the so-called lower criticism, are offered in the auxiliary sciences of history. They are even listed in educational manuals (for example, in Smirnov’s textbook), although without proper explanations and comparative assessment. To study a historical phenomenon, you need to read news about it in written monuments. And for a correct attitude towards these monuments, you need to know a whole range of sciences, depending on the type of monuments they belong to. When using documents, diplomacy is needed; if we are dealing with seals, we will need sphragistics; if the news is written on stone, epigraphy is needed; If we use coins, numismatics is necessary. The most necessary for a historian are paleography, philology, geography and chronology. In general, auxiliary sciences, contributing to the fulfillment of a critical task, a) find out whether a monument can be recognized by its appearance for what it is presented as, b) help to read it, c) understand it correctly, d) determine its position in space and time 2 Diplomacy gets its name from the word díplwma, which means “document folded in half.” Diplomacy should give such an acquaintance with the external appearance of a written monument that if it were offered to us for just two minutes without any opportunity to read or copy it, then, by its external forms alone, we could judge the authenticity or falsification of the document. Diplomacy must indicate how documents were written at a certain time, what their appearance was (whether it was like a book or a bundle), what the document began with (whether it was an address to the person to whom the document was written, or the name of the person giving the document), where the signatures were placed (whether at the top, as in signed documents, or at the bottom, as on the highest rescripts). The color of the ink with which the document is written is also important. Most often, chrysovules are found in the form of diplomas in the east. This was the name of the royal letters with a golden seal, signed in purple ink by the emperor himself, and the emperor did not inscribe his name, but the so-called mhnológhma, i.e. indict and month. These features of the chrysovules provide the basis for both establishing precise chronological dates and distinguishing a genuine document from a forged one. Previously, Roman emperors used (before Heraclius) when signing rescripts the formula: Divinitas te servet (“may the Divine protect you”). Instead of our “to be according to this” in ancient times they wrote: Legi (“read”). There was an anecdote about Emperor Justin that, due to his lack of literacy, he used a metal tablet with a carved “legi”, moving a pen over the carved letters. The Church knew its diplomacy. In written monuments there are indications of sociable letters. They were sent by the newly installed bishop of the famous see to other bishops of equal rights with him, with notification of his installation. Another kind of communion letters were given by the bishop to persons leaving for other dioceses to prove their Orthodoxy and communication with the church. We do not know what means the church used to witness its Documents during the period of persecution. Probably, even then there were some conventional signs, just as in trading communities secret signs were used to certify that a person belonged to a well-known company. Later, a well-known form of document began to be practiced. The charter was issued by a famous bishop in the name of one or more bishops. The content of such letters was to certify that the bearer of the letter was a member of the given church and had fellowship with it. As a secret, the number was displayed in numbers, representing a certain kind of value that the bishop receiving the letter could easily check; the number was made up of two values. One of them - a constant - consisted of the addition of the numerical values of the letters of the words amh'n ( a =1, m =40, h =8, n =50): the number 99. The other value - a variable - was composed of the addition of the digital values of the first letter of the name of the person giving the letter, the 2nd letter of the name of the bishop to whom the letter will be presented, the 3rd letter of the name of the person who received the letter, the 4th letter of the name of the city where the letter was issued, The 5th letter of the indiction of the year and, finally, the initial letters of the phrase: in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. The recipient of the document usually asked the contents of the document, translated the words into numbers, added the numbers of the words to the number obtained from addition: “in the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit,” and if the result was a number that agreed with the number on the document, then this was considered a guarantee of the truth of the document. The number could not be lower than 566 and indicated that the letter was fraudulent. Assuming that Athanasius the Great in Alexandria issues an epistola formata to some Gregory for presentation to Basil the Great in May 372, he would have to add: p [ ath'r ]=80; u [ íó_s ]=400; p[neu:'ma]=80; a[gion]=1; a[ fanásio_s ]=1; [ b ] a [ sí – leio_s ]=1; [ gr ] h [ gório_s ]=8; [ ale ] _ks [ ándreia ]=60; ind.XV(=372)=15 and in the epistola put xm_s =646, and finally, at the end of the letter put _sf =99 (= ámh'n). Eastern diplomacy has not yet been developed much, and there are only isolated studies on this subject. Bruns, for example, worked in this field, dealing with the issue of signatures (in Abhandlungen of the Berlin Academy of Sciences, 1876). Hardt-Hausen stated in his “Greek Paleography” (1879) that the time to write Byzantine diplomacy had not yet come, since little material necessary for this had been made public. Western diplomacy already has its own history. Diplomacy is presented in its entirety in Mabillon's work, De re diplomatica. Paris 1681, 1709 3. Further development is given by: Th. Sickel, Urkundenlehre. Wien 1867. J. Ficker, Beiträge zur Urkundenlehre. Innsbruck 1877–1878. F. Leist, Urkunderlehre. Munich 1882 [H. Bresslau, Handbuch der Urkundenlehre für Deutschland und Italien. I. Leipzig 1889. A. Giry, Manuel de diplomatique. Paris 1894]. Sphragistics, or sigillography, the science of seals, emerged from diplomacy. Sphragistics must indicate at what time and what seals were used, with what inscriptions and images. For the West, it is resolved into heraldry (the study of coats of arms). Sphragistics, in addition to the shape of the seals, must determine how and where the seal was attached and from what material it was made. Previously, wax seals were used. Sealing wax is a Spanish invention of the 16th century (the first letter with a wax seal appears in 1553). Wax was used for seals both in its natural form and in colored form. In the Middle Ages, sovereigns and popes used red wax for seals, while private individuals used green wax. Saints were often depicted on seals. The name of the person who applied the seal was also placed on the seals. Reading the inscriptions on seals is quite difficult, since the words on them were depicted in abbreviated form. On some materials (for example, parchment) wax cannot adhere, and therefore sigilla pendentia (hanging seals) were used. Persons who did not know how to write attached their seals to the document instead of signatures, which is why several seals were attached to some documents (up to 40). From the 7th century Popes use metal seals, usually lead. A lead ball (bulla) was taken into which the ends of the lace were inserted. The ball was then compressed between two metal plates, on which the front and back sides of the medal were cut out. Hence the papal charters received the name “bull”. Precious metals were also used for more important documents. Thus, the Byzantine emperors issued letters called “chrysobuls” from the gold seals attached to them. The cord on which the seal is hung is also of great importance in experienced hands. If a document was prepared in the papal office for an important, high-ranking person who was benevolent for something, and for a long period of time, then a silk cord was used. If the document was issued in a court case, or in a marriage, or in general, for some specific (ad hoc) occasion, then a hemp cord was used. In certain cases, in this way it is possible to guess from the string for whom the document was drawn up. In addition to suspended ones, ordinary wax attached seals were also used for papal documents. They were applied to decisions of lesser importance. These decrees were not written on parchment and were called not “bulls”, but “breves”. In such cases, the ap. was depicted on the papal seal. Peter throwing the mreju out of the boat, and the seal was called the technical expression “sub annulo piscatoris.” Instructions regarding inscriptions, or rather “writings” made on durable material, stone, metal, are given by epigraphy. Monuments with inscriptions, including seals and coins, are valuable as the most reliable sources in terms of authenticity. Numismatics deals with coins, which in ancient times represented a significant difference from the current ones and were a kind of medals. Most of all, the historian has to deal not with inscriptions on stone and metal, but with manuscripts written on papyrus, parchment and paper. Paleography deals with monuments of this kind. But diplomas are written on the same material, and diplomacy is also interested in questions about it. At the beginning of our era, papyrus was used as writing material. Papyrus was prepared from a special Egyptian plant, the trunk of which consists of tubes layered one on top of the other. If the trunk is cut off, you can spread it into thin plates; they are placed on the table next to each other and glued with a transverse layer of plates. In view of this preparation of papyrus, it can be foreseen that it will not withstand folding, and therefore the papyrus was stored in the form of bundles. Sheets of papyrus were glued to one another, and the first sheet was called πρωτόκολλον (hence the concept of “protocol”). This series of sheets of papyrus was rolled onto a rolling pin, and thus the book appeared in the form of a bundle; everyone who read this package unwrapped it. This form of book was called bíblo_s, liber; These packages were kept in round boxes. Since papyrus was cheap, it was also used instead of wrapping paper. They usually wrote on one side, since the other side was not so smooth. If you come across a book made of papyrus, written on both sides, this often means that it was not needed and was given to someone just to try the pen. Papyrus was very fragile, and if a significant number of papyri have survived, this is explained by the good climate of Egypt, which was a fertile country in this regard, characterized by dryness, while dampness could spoil them. In addition to papyrus, the material for writing was parchment, which has a later origin compared to papyrus. The Greek legend about the origin of parchment says the following: the Egyptian and Pergamon kings once argued about who would compile a richer library. Since Egypt was the main and almost the only supplier of papyrus, the king of Egypt issued a decree prohibiting the export of papyrus. The king of Pergamon had a bad time. Once the stock of papyrus was exhausted, he obviously had to stop compiling the library. Then one sensible person suggested to him that he prepare material for writing from leather. Such processed leather is parchment. This is a more advanced type of writing material. It is much stronger and more valuable than papyrus. Codexes were prepared from parchment - books in our sense that could be bent and not deteriorate. These "codices" of parchment were strictly different from the "libri" of papyrus. So, for example, regarding one will, Roman jurists raised the question of what to do with books that ended up in the library if the testator used the expression “omnes libros”, but did not mention “codices”. Parchment lists were also valuable because they were more convenient to preserve, and the text could be washed off and replaced with another, more valuable one. Thus, the so-called “palimpsests” appeared, parchment manuscripts containing two texts, and the later text can be removed and the original one restored using chemical reactions. Most of the oldest manuscripts were written on parchment. To determine the antiquity of parchment manuscripts, the way in which the parchment sheets were folded into notebooks is important. Manuscripts with notebooks of five sheets folded in half are much older than manuscripts of four sheets. Since the skin of the parchment could not be brought to such perfection that both sides were equally white and smooth, the sheets were folded so that the smooth side was adjacent to the smooth. The parchment has lines drawn with a knife, along which they were written so that they were at the top of the letters "abgd". Parchment, in which letters are written above a line - a line, is of later origin. After parchment, the material for writing was paper, "charta bombycina". The French and German nations retained the ancient name for papyrus "papier" for paper, and our word "paper" originates from Charta bombycina. This name is usually derived from “bombyx,” an eastern plant that produced fiber (cotton paper). And for centuries it was believed that after parchment, books were written on Charta bombycina, made of cotton paper. But it turned out that such a view rests on completely false principles. In 1887 prof. At the University of Vienna, Wiesner subjected the oldest types of paper to microscopic examination. There can be no question of bombyx fibers as a material for paper, since these fibers were found just as accidentally, just as hairs sometimes appear in ordinary paper. Ancient paper is also linen paper, but rougher and thicker. The difference between the common Charta linea and Charta bombycina is only in the variety, depending on the method of production. Assuming that an assessment has been made based on the external features of a famous manuscript, we have the task of reading an ancient manuscript. This is not as simple a matter as it seems right away. We are all spoiled by new print publications. On the contrary, old editions, for example, the Benedictine and Parisian royal printing houses, present the peculiarity that much of their type is introduced from manuscripts and is therefore not so easy to read. Reading manuscripts requires special guidance. Paleography provides the instructions necessary for this. Paleography - ancient writing - the name, in fact, does not explain the essence of the matter. According to its original purpose, it should only be a collection of various fonts; but over time it developed into a whole science. By establishing the characteristics of writing for different times and places, scientists come to conclusions about the time and place where a famous manuscript was written. Thus, paleography, in addition to its direct task of teaching how to read ancient manuscripts, also took on the task of determining their antiquity by the nature of the writing. Manuscript fonts went through several phases. First of all, you need to distinguish between Greek and Latin italics. Ancient cursive was used for quick notes written on wax tablets in a style. Tablets of this kind that have survived to us allow us to conclude what this cursive was like. This is a special font that an ordinary scientist cannot even take into account. It was not intended for publication - it was like a shorthand version of the author himself. They wrote in italics and on papyrus. Cursive writing was also used in later times. The normal letter began epigraphically. The original book script was majuscule, which distinguishes two forms: capital and uncial scripts. This distinction is especially important for Latin paleography. The majuscule letter consists of capital letters. It took different forms depending on the material (for example, stone is convenient for cutting both round and oblong letters; wood is only for oblong lines). In the history of type, two factors generally operate: utilitarian, when the scribe prefers speed of work to its beauty, and aesthetic, when he cares about the beauty of the letters. Therefore, the original angular letters (Phoenician traditions) were replaced by round ones, and then over time they began to be decorated. First, for example, "e" was depicted as E, then e, and then dotted e. The thickness of the ancient ink also encouraged this round design. These two factors, competing with each other, lead majuscule writing to change. Capital writing represented its oldest stage. Over time, simplifications of this letter were required. New letters began to appear in books - on papyrus and parchment. Thus, the uncial letter is created (in Latin paleography), so called because it appears in large books and is written in large letters (it was jokingly said that each letter represents a Latin ounce - the 12th part of a Roman foot). A particularly expressive feature of the uncial letter is the shape of the letter “m”: it represents the Greek omega (w) - inverted. The uncial letter took on smaller and smaller forms, turning into a minuscule script. In the West, due to the fact that the Latin script covered very many countries, it became very diverse. Various handwritings appeared: Latin-Lombard, Carolingian, Irish. The latter gives the Latin letters such a break that they are difficult to recognize. Professor de Lagarde stated this fact. When he was in Florence, he once read a Latin Bible in Lombard curly script. The assistant librarian asked what language the German professor would like to read? He answered with surprise: “in Latin.” The embarrassed Italian then said that it seemed to him as if the book was written in one of the Western Asian languages ​​(Malay). The Greek script also gradually turned from majuscule to minuscule. It is distinguished by an abundance of different ligatures and presents no less difficulties in comparison with Latin. Another task that paleography undertakes is to determine the antiquity of manuscripts and their place of origin. The antiquity of the manuscript is significant in the sense that if it was written a long time ago, then little time passed between the original and the manuscript, there were relatively few cases of correspondence and therefore little damage entered into it. But this meaning of antiquity is conditional. Let's say that a fourth-century manuscript was copied from a third-century original, and then a sixth-century manuscript was copied from the same original. This results in a difference of about two centuries. For a historian, this difference is negligible. If we assume that the scribe of the 4th century wrote carelessly, and the 6th century carefully, then the 6th century manuscript can easily be considered older than the 4th century manuscript. Thus, in determining value, the internal merit of the text plays a decisive role. For example, the Alexandrian Codex of the Bible, dating back to the 5th century, was written by the woman Thekla (not the first martyr). But this woman did her job quite like a woman: she wrote, indeed, beautifully, but was not particularly worried about her own names; so, for example, instead of Jael, who killed Sisera, she wrote “Israel.” Thus, although the handwriting in this manuscript is beautiful, nevertheless, in terms of the accuracy of the text, it is inferior to later manuscripts. In only one case can the antiquity of a manuscript be important, and that is when the text it contains has been subject to additions or even alterations. It must be remembered that the manuscripts were private property, which is why the owners sometimes wrote their notes in the margins. These notes were then entered into the text by copyists. One would expect that an older manuscript with a shorter version of the text would be closer to the original than a later one with a more common text, suggesting that there was no reason for the scribe to omit anything from the text. Thus, for the criticism of those manuscripts that have been subject to interpolations, antiquity matters. It’s a different matter if the alteration merges with the text and changes it. In relation, for example, to the acts of the Scilitan martyrs, there is a dispute regarding the antiquity of one or another edition. In the past, these acts were known only in the Latin text; in the last century, their Greek and full Latin texts have been discovered. They think that the Latin text is older than the Greek. Another argument is that in the Greek text the names of the martyrs are preceded by the word “ó dgio_s” (“holy”), while in the Latin there is no “sanctus”. This circumstance seems to indicate that the Greek text appeared later, when the church already revered the martyrs as saints. But the word “ó ágio_s” could have been added by any scribe 4 . Palaeography generally performs its secondary task of determining the time and place of writing of a manuscript. But so far the majuscular handwriting is poorly distinguished. The fact is that majuscule handwriting is more likely not writing, but drawing. The scribe wrote sometimes larger, sometimes smaller, sometimes obliquely, sometimes straight; he could not show his own individuality. Therefore, the difference within the majuscule script, although significant, is not enough to provide support for determining the date of the manuscript. In this regard, paleography is stronger when majuscule writing is replaced by minuscule writing. Here connections and flourishes appear and the writing becomes more diverse, as a result of which the individuality of the scribe is more obvious. By the way, when determining the time of writing of uncial manuscripts, forgeries can serve as a big obstacle. In this case, researchers must take into account the so-called “codices archaizantes”, imitation of ancient manuscripts that amaze with the beauty of their writing. Some book lover could order a literal copy (that is, reproduce the ancient script) from an ancient manuscript, so that in later times manuscripts of majuscule writing could appear. The skill for this has always existed. In Greece, the text was written in minuscule script, and capital letters in majuscule script. Thus, there were always enough skilled people to reproduce this handwriting. And in Russia today, among the schismatics, there are people who are well acquainted with the charter or half-rut. When majuscules were finally supplanted by minuscules, church books still continued to be written in the most ancient handwriting and seemed more ancient in origin than they actually were. There were imitations of ancient manuscripts for selfish purposes. The discovery of "codices archaizantes" constitutes one of the important finds of paleography. For example, previous scholars argued that the oldest manuscript of the Vulgate is the codex Amiatinus. But de Lagarde's research shows that this codex is of later writing. By his mistakes in mixing letters, the scribe showed that he was copying from an ancient minuscule manuscript, because such a mixture of letters is possible only in minuscule writing and is completely impossible in majuscule writing. In general, in order to protect itself from the influence of supposedly ancient manuscripts, paleography must take into account many little things. The abbreviations that predominate in minuscule writing provide a great service to paleography in this regard. Abbreviations were caused when the line ended but the letter did not fit. In these types, the scribe first signed it at the top, but then conventional signs appeared - the remains of tachygraphy. But these reductions also changed over time. The archaizer, reproducing ancient manuscripts, gave himself away by mixing the writing of different eras. When copying letters from the 8th and 9th centuries, scribes often used abbreviations and signs from the 10th and 11th centuries. and thus they gave away their counterfeits. Paleography also includes the question of the historical development of superscript notation, which, by the way, is a feature of the Greek text. In the experienced hands of a paleographer, data of this kind can serve to determine the antiquity of a document. Superscript signs are of late origin and became necessary for foreigners, as well as for Greeks in those cases when the philology of the word had already become incomprehensible to them. We can see an example of this in the correspondence between Basil the Great and Amphilochius of Iconium. Here Amphilochius posed the question: how should one read - fágo_s (“gourmet”) or wagó_s, and Basil the Great answers that one should read fágo_s. Consequently, there were doubts and there were no signs yet. Stresses in the Greek language appeared under the influence of grammar schools. For the Greeks themselves, each stress had its own special meaning, but for us only the place of stress in the word matters. One Greek scholar distinguishes 6 kinds of stress and gives rules regarding the pronunciation of each of them. However, only three remain. The Greeks distinguished a heavy accent very well from an acute one. As for the invested stress, it was placed on words that had two stresses. This is why the accent is especially placed on contractible verbs. This means that the word initially had two stresses, acute and heavy. In a word, the accents also indicate a certain degree of antiquity of the book. But in addition to stresses, there are also breaths in the Greek language. The sensitivity of different Greek dialects to breaths varied. It was especially great in southern Italy. There in the 4th century BC. a sign of thick breathing appears. Breathing appeared when this sensitivity began to decline. The sign of breathing was formed from the Latin N. Subsequently, they began to write not the entire letter N, but only half, and the right half was used to mean thin breathing, and the left half - thick. Afterwards, they began to use halves of only these signs, both upper and lower (-m I-G”). Then they began to write them in a rounded way. The angular breathing lasted for a long time - until the 10th century. according to R. Chr. In the 11th century there was a struggle between angular and rounded breaths, and in the 12th century. round breaths triumphed. Thus, this is an important paleographic indication. But here you need to pay special attention to whether these superscripts were placed on ancient manuscripts by a later hand. It is also important to breathe over two rфr). It appears only in the 10th century. and then only first one above the second r. When the scribes placed one Breath only above the second, it means that they understood it. When they began to put “subtle” over the first one, this means that they no longer understood the meaning of this breath. The thick breath over the r is explained by the fact that the Greeks could not pronounce the letter r purely, and the Romans in their language meant that they pronounced the word “Rome” Rhoma. This is why thick breathing over r is mandatory. This h in the word, for example, ári:'iwsto_s was assimilated into árrwsto_s, just as in the word sullambánw the letter before l is in l. An indicator of this assimilation was thick breathing. Subtle breathing over the first r is a sign of later time. It is also important to use both stress and breathing together at the beginning of a word. The use of these signs may indicate either ancient or later origin. At first they were written separately, and later together. Among the auxiliary sciences for history in general and church history in particular, paleography occupies one of the most important places. A historical scientist needs to become familiar with the elements of paleography, even if he uses printed publications, because corrections are always possible in printed publications. It must be borne in mind that proofreading is the fruit of ignorance of the language, but rather of guesswork. Every scientist has a duty to correct; but for this he must expand his horizons and be able to figure out how a famous word should be written in a manuscript of a certain time. Only the lack of information on paleography lay at the heart of the disputes between us and the schismatics. This is a debate about the writing of the name Jesus. All the schismatics’ objections are worthless to a person familiar with paleography. The fact is that the Greeks abbreviated words, for example, instead of ántrwpo_s (“man”) they wrote ΑΝΟΣ, instead of Feó_s (“God”) - ΘΖ, instead of Feou:' (“God”) - ΘΥ. There were two abbreviated spellings for the name Jesus Christ: one with two letters ΙΣ ΧΣ, and the other with three letters ΙΗΣ ΧΡΣ. The same abbreviated spellings of the Savior's name existed in the Coptic language; in upper Egypt - Thebaid - they kept a two-letter spelling, and in the lower Egypt a three-letter spelling. From this it is clear that the objections of the schismatics are of no importance. Considering the description of church services, one can also come across the following deviations: the troparion, which in the ancient Greek church was sung in the 4th tone, is now sung in the first, because the capital delta and alpha are similar and the copyist simply confused them. There are especially many such errors in endings. When the “Brief History” of Nikephoros of Constantinople was published, then one oddity appeared in its reproduction of the text of the manuscript. The reading was generally correct, but there were many errors not in words, but in endings. This matter seemed mysterious, but was explained simply when de Boor looked at the manuscript itself in the Vatican. It turned out that the scribe copied a manuscript that already had abbreviations, i.e. abbreviations, and he, not knowing how to parse them, skipped and left gaps. The later scribe turned out to be weak in grammar and completed the missing endings, which turned out to be uncommon. In the Easter chronicle, which was first published by Ducange and then Dindorf, there is one line that caused misunderstandings among philologists; precisely, it says here: in such and such a year, on the feast of the sweating of the canopy, on the 15th day, feoú bíwn Zacharias received a notice. The words feoú bíwn seemed incomprehensible: if bíwn is derived from the verb biów (“to live”), then it cannot be combined with the genitive case Feou:'. Meanwhile, the matter is explained in this way: the ancient mark was fumiw'n, i.e. censing, burning incense. The first line of m was erased, it turned out and, and this sign replaced b, which is why it was read Feoú bíwn. In the book of Esther, in a speech about the holiday of Purim, in chapter VIII of the 16th century, it is said in one manuscript that the Jews organized a holiday for the Lord God, and in another: they organized a holiday of rejoicing and joy. In the original text in both cases there was kwfw' ; kw is an abbreviation of kuríw (“To the Lord”), fw' is an abbreviation of Few’ (“To God”); but the dash on the word fw' sometimes replaced the letter n, and the translators read this spelling in the second case kw'fwn. For a paleographer, the very appearance of the book is important. The scribe sometimes wrote lines not from one end to the other, but in 2, 3 and 4 columns. When the text of a book written in this way presents something coherent, then the very meaning shows how to read it. But sometimes it happens that the entire page contains only proper names. In this case, there was a great difficulty in whether to read them down or line by line. Meanwhile, the order of reading the names, for example, of the fathers of the cathedral, is very important for the historian in the question of the time of origin of metropolitan power, the strength of this institution, etc. For example, if after the name of the chairman of the council you need to read the name of a simple bishop, known for his long service in the episcopal rank, then the document should be dated back to the time when the power of the metropolitan was not yet of great importance. The dispute about one Spanish bishop during the Gothic period and about an African during the life of St. is based on a double reading of the names in the cathedral lists. Cyprian. Among the outstanding authorities in the field of paleography, one can mention, first of all, W. Wattenbach, who owns short guides to Latin and Greek paleography: Anleitung zur lateinischen Paläographie. 4 Aufl. Leipzig 1886; Anleitung zur griechischen Paläographie. 3 Aufl. Leipzig 1895 [also Das Schriftwesen im Mittelalter. 3 Aufl. Leipzig 1896]. Next we should name the major work on Greek paleography by V. Gardthausen's Griechische Paläographie. Leipzig 1879. A comparatively short work by the Englishman E. M. Thompson's. Handbook of Greek and Latin Paläography. London 1893, can serve as a convenient compendium for getting acquainted with Latin and Greek palaeography. [Furthermore famous are the leadership of M. Prou, Manuel de paleographie latine et franchise du 6 au 17 siecle. 2 ed. Paris 1892. J. Reusens, Elements de paleographie. Louvain 1899]. Once the manuscript has been read correctly, the task is to understand what is written. In this regard, knowledge of Greek and Latin is especially important for the historian of the ancient church. Familiarity with philology should be twofold: firstly, grammatical, secondly, lexical, i.e. the reader of the manuscript must know the grammar of the language of the manuscript and be well acquainted with the meaning and significance of the words used in this manuscript. The need for a special grammar, for example for the Greek language, in addition to the general classical one, is caused by the fact that those who wrote on church history were often not natural Greeks, but wrote in Greek as the most famous and widespread. It is clear that they could deviate from the original purity of the classical language. That's one thing. Another thing is that the Greek language lost its purity over time, accepting, especially in later times, the time of the settlement of the Turks in Europe, many foreign words. This language is so different from the ancient one that it even received the special name Modern Greek and can only be understood by a natural Greek, or at least one living within the Turkish empire. According to a study by scientists, in manuscripts with the designated spoiled language, almost every 5-10 words are unfamiliar even to those who know the classical language. The main feature of this later language is the incorrect use of prepositions. In ancient Greek, the preposition ei_s, for example, means moving to a known place, and in later Greek it is used to mean staying at this place. With topographic information, such phenomena present significant difficulties. The church historian needs to understand these philological subtleties. For the Latin language, the task is complicated by the fact that the Latin language was processed into Romance languages. In the 8th century, for example, the Latin language is a disgusting phenomenon from the point of view of Cicero. The famous “Liber pontificalis” is written in this language. Therefore, if correct Latin is found in any work dating back to this time, then this is a clear sign of the later origin of the manuscript, the time of purification of the damaged Latin. To correctly understand the texts, you need to pay attention to the fact that religious views sometimes depend on the grammatical structure of the language, and, conversely, grammar changes under the influence of religion. Grammar underwent a similar change under the influence of Christianity. Suppose French society decided to send a letter to a famous person; it writes: monsieur, i.e. my lord, you... etc. We find a similar phenomenon in the Greek language. Athanasius the Great cites a letter from the Egyptian bishops in Tire to the committee Dionysius, in which they protested against the condemnation of St. Afanasia. In this letter, by the way, they write: they declared the same thing to the Orthodox bishops, “my masters” - toi_s kuríoi_s mou:' . Thus, the French feature is also found in the Greek language, many write, but they say “mine” and not “our”. The same feature is found in the Syriac language. The Syrian writes “mar” - my lord (mar-Ignatius, Nicholas, etc.) and when he addresses the saints in general, he calls them “mar”, but he already calls Christ “maran” - our Lord. When the French address a woman, they call her “madame” - my lady, but when applied to the Virgin Mary they say “Notre Dame” - our lady. Another kind of phenomenon is also noticeable. They address one person and say “you.” This polite “you” is not an invention of a later time - it is also found in ancient times. And then, when addressing one person, it was written: ímei:'_s kúrioi mou:' ("you, my gentlemen"). This is found in the letters of bishops one to another. This appeal is explained by the fact that the letter was written, in fact, not to one bishop, but to the entire assembly of Christians, before whom it was to be read. Protestants have worked more than others in modern times to study the Greek New Testament language; and the church historian has to use their works. In this case, you can point to: G. V. Winer, Grammatik des neutesta-mentlichen Sprachidioms. (8 Aufl. bearb. v. Schmiedel. Göttingen 1894–1898. F. Blass, Grammatik des neutest. Griechischen. 2 Aufl. Göttingen 1902. H. Moulton, A Grammar of New Testament Greek. I. Edinburgh 1906). To understand the lexical composition of the later Greek language, Ducange’s old work can be a guide - Ducange, Glossarium ad scriptores mediae et infimae graecitatis. Lugduni 1688 2 volumes (reprinted in Breslau 1891). [An important textbook for the Byzantine period is N. Stephani, Thesaurus graecae linguae. Paris 1572 (5 volumes); ed. tertia 1831 – 1865 (8 volumes). It is supplemented by E. A. Sophocles, Greek Lexicon of the Roman and Byzantine Periods. Ed. 3. New-York 1888. A special church dictionary for the Greek language was compiled by Schweitzer - J. S. Suicerus, Thesaurus ecclesiasticus e patribus graecis. Amstelodami 1682 (1728, 1738:1746). For the Latin language there is also a dictionary by Ducange, revised and supplemented subsequently by other scientists. Ducange, Glossarium ad scriptores mediae et infimae la-tinitatis. Paris 1678 (3 volumes); ed. Henschel, Paris 1840–1850 (7 volumes); ed. Favre, Paris 1882–1887 (10 volumes). [Currently, Thesaurus linguae latinae has been published since 1900 in Leipzig by the joint efforts of Western scholars, in which ecclesiastical Latin up to and including the 6th century will be exhausted. On ecclesiastical Latin cf. G. Koffmane, Geschichte des Kirchenlateins. I-II. Breslau 1879–1881. There are special studies on the language of some individual Latin church writers]. Recently, when publishing one or another ancient author, a lexicon of the special words and characteristic expressions they used is usually included. The further task in relation to monuments that have the significance of historical sources is to determine their position in space and time as accurately as possible. If a manuscript does not have a title or beginning, then very often the name of the author remains forever unknown; but you can try to determine where and when it appeared. In this case, in addition to direct dates, proper and semi-proper names can serve as reliable support. With the help of these auxiliary disciplines, paleography and philology, we can determine the time and place of writing of the document in general. But neither paleographic features, nor grammar and lexicon can give precise indications regarding particulars. General philological aids apply only to common nouns (improper nouns). To determine the time and place of appearance of a well-known document by proper names, one should turn to other manuals, primarily to manuals on geography in general and church geography in particular. Geography is an indispensable tool for reading church historical documents. It helps to determine not only the place, but also the time of appearance of this or that monument, and this for two reasons: 1) cities either appeared or disappeared, or, while remaining, changed their names; 2) cities that were under the jurisdiction of one metropolitan passed into the jurisdiction of another. Thus, if in a well-known document there is an Indication of the dependence of a famous bishop on the metropolitan of a particular locality, then from this indication we can determine the time of its origin. However, the question regarding the dependence of bishops is the least established question; it can often itself only be the subject of research, instead of serving as a means for verifying information from other sources. Much more important is the data that is presented in the very names of the cities. Some cities arose later, others changed their names. So, everyone knows well that there was a small town of Byzantium on the Bosporus, but Constantine the Great rebuilt it and called it Constantinople, or the new Rome. Consequently, any document speaking about Constantinople or about the new Rome can be attributed to the time of Constantine or later. Apparently, one would have to conclude the other way around, but such a conclusion would be problematic. As relations between the Western and Eastern churches worsened and the importance of the East fell more and more, Greek scholars thought to express their patriotism by beginning to use the names of cities, read from the classics; Thus, they often talk about Byzantium, when this city already bore the name of Constantinople. Thus, this archaization can serve as a reason for errors. It got to the point that the Greeks wanted to abolish the calendar because it was Roman, and they began to use the ancient Greek names of the months. The names of cities also changed for Christian reasons. In the diocese of Asia there was a city called Aphrodisias, which was renamed Stavropolis due to the inconvenience of the previous name in the eyes of Christians. Thus, at the V Ecumenical Council, the Metropolitan of this city signed Aphrodisiac, and at the Trullian Council - Stavropol. Especially many cities were renamed by Emperor Justinian; cities appeared under the names of Justinianopolis, Justinian, and others. Documents with such city names show that they appeared no earlier than Justinian. The place of origin of a monument or the occurrence of the events described in it is generally determined on the basis of the geographical indications found in it. If we are talking about well-known names, then, of course, there cannot be any doubts. But since we are talking about small names, which may not always be known to scientists, then we have to look for where this geographical name is located. Almost to this day, in such cases, the ancient work on geography by Keller - Ch. Cellarius, Notitia orbis antiqui, modified by Schwartz'eM (Lipsiae 1732). In this work, using the alphabetical index at the end, you can find all the names found in the ancient classical world, and epigraphic data is also taken into account. Of the newer works on the historical geography of the ancient world, one can point to A. Forbiger, Handbuch der alten Geographie. I-III. Leipzig 1842–1850; IIP 1877. A short manual given by H. Kiepert, Lehrbuch der alten Geographie. Berlin 1878. [His large atlas on the geography of the ancient world is now published, edited by R. Kiepert, Formae orbis antiqui. Berlin 1901 onwards]. For the geography of Asia Minor, the works of Ramsay, W. M. Ramsay, The historical geography of Asia Minor are important. London 1890; The cities and bishoprics of Phrygia. I-II. Oxford 1895–1897. But sometimes they also need to be supplemented with the latest epigraphic data. If you have to deal with primary sources and it is desirable to have accurate and authoritative instructions, then the main source of geographical data is the geography of Claudius Ptolemy, which indicates the geographical location of cities, latitude and longitude. Further mention should be made of the Itinerarium provinciarum Antonini Augusti - a description of the postal routes of the Roman Empire, the Itinerarium Burdigalense (Hierosolymitanum), The Bordeaux Traveler (ed. Parthey und Pinder 1848, the latter republished by our Palestine Society in 1882), and the Tabula Peutingeriana (ed. Miller 1888), a medieval map indicating the distances between cities. One can finally make reference to Pliny's natural history. If we are talking about church departments, then for easy information about departments the best guide is 77g. Wiltsch, Handbuch der kirchlichen Geographie und Statistik. Berlin 1846 (his Atlas sacer 1843 is already outdated). Wilch himself could not do much again, but his work consists in the fact that he thoroughly revised the signatures of bishops under the councils and supplemented the work of Lekien. He gives lists of departments and essays that perfectly explain the relationships between them. Here everything is located evenly, there is nothing superfluous; under the line it is indicated where confirmation of this thought can be found. [For the first three centuries, a summary of the information currently available in science on church geography was made by A. Harnack, Mission und Ausbreitung des Christentums in den ersten drei Jahrhunderten. 2 Aufl. Leipzig 1906. A special church-historical atlas intended for educational purposes was recently compiled by K. Heussi und H. Mulert, Atlas zur Kirchengeschichte. Tübingen 1905]. The work of Hierocles - Sinecdemus (Companion) and the so-called Notitiae episcopatuum (ed. Parthey 1866, the work of Hierocles was also published by Burckhardt 1893) are important primary sources for the church geography of the East. The Greek scientists tried to collect all the information about how many cities there were in the known province. This list of cities was presented to us by Hierocles. Although he pursued purely state goals, his work is also important for a church historian: the most important church departments are indicated here. Notitiae episcopatuum are special lists of departments indicating their relationships. Geltser has recently devoted his works to the study and publication of this type of monuments. In connection with geography, we can also mention statistics, since the latter is too weak to be singled out in this case as a special science. Usually, statistics means the totality of accurate information about any individual events occurring in order to determine, on the basis of mass data, the internal nature of events of a certain kind. But church statistics cannot even dream of presenting for ancient times the mathematically precisely necessary figures that general statistics provide. This latter often presents to us with sufficient accuracy such phenomena as, for example, how many deaths or births there were in a given area. Church statistics will give a lot, a lot if it determines how many episcopal sees there were in a given area at a certain time. But assuming that each bishopric contains an equal number of believers, it makes it possible to approximately determine how many believers there were at a given time. The more difficult work is not on geographical names, of which small ones may turn out to be unknown, but on personal ones. If this is the name of the emperor, then there is no reason to talk about him. It is a different matter if the name of the bishop appears, which is very often unknown. The best manuals on church geography are the most suitable for clarifying the issue of the personal names of bishops. This is based on the following: for church geography, the main source is the lists of names of bishops who signed ecumenical and local councils. But, while writing down geographical names, scientists also found the names of the bishops of those cities in which their sees were located. Thus, they immediately became familiar with church geography and with the proper names of bishops. The consequence of this was the desire to combine church geography with church onomatology (prosopography). An excellent guide in this case can be the work of the Dominican Michael Lequien “The Christian East, divided into 4 patriarchates”, M. Lequien, Oriens christianus in quatuor patriarchatus digestus. Paris 1740, 3 T. fol. This is a work of enormous erudition. Lekien re-read everything related to church geography. Before beginning the description of each patriarchy, he gives a historical outline based on the collected material; Next comes the order of calculation of metropolitan and episcopal sees, indicating the persons who occupied them, about whom brief information is provided. The section on the Alexandrian Patriarchate was handled worse than others, which is explained by the fact that half of the sources relating to the Alexandrian Patriarchate are written in Arabic, and the Latin and ancient Greek names that passed into Arabic are completely changed, and Lekien, given the then state of Orientology, found it very difficult to use such sources; Therefore, he sometimes ends up confused, and the continuation of the episcopacy must often be sought in a place other than where Lekien indicates. But in general, this scientist should be considered a leading figure in church geography and statistics for his work. Lekien's work embraces the history of the Eastern Church. The continuator of Lequien's work for the Western Church is the Benedictine Boniface Gams, R. W. Gams, who in 1873 published the Series episcoporum ecclesiae catholicae in Würzburg. "A number of bishops of the Catholic Church." The difference between this work of Gams and the indicated work of Lekien is that the latter in his work not only names persons, but also reports information about them, sometimes in the words of historical monuments, whereas in Gams only names are reported. But even in this form, Gams’s work is a very useful guide, especially in bibliographical terms: Gams indicates the sources he used. But along with this, Gams has a disgustingly narrow Catholic point of view. Lekien is so broad in his views that he continues to take a census of bishops who have deviated into heresy or schism. Gams ends the lists as soon as one or another region has fallen into heresy, so that the historian who turns to Gams’s work for information often does not find the desired name precisely because this person is omitted by Gams as heretical from his point of view. When publishing his work, Gams gives it the meaning of almost church commemoration. By this narrow view, Gams has weakened much of the significance of his work, and Lekien's work remains indispensable. Gams's work represents an enormous amount of work, which he completed as an 80-year-old man. When compiling it, he took advantage of the invention of letters with a paid response: he sent such letters to different persons and, thanks to this, collected the necessary information. One must then point to the index to all ecumenical and local councils in the last eleventh volume of Hardouini’s “Collectio conciliorum” (1715). If the name does not belong to the bishop, but to some other person, then one has to turn to other manuals. If you can suspect a writer in the name of a person, then you need to turn to patrol manuals; from old works one can point to the work of Wilhelm Cave, W. Cave, Historia litteraria scriptorum ecclesiasticorum. I-II. London 1688–1698 (Oxford 1740–1743). When it comes to officials of the Byzantine era, one can turn to prosopography, borrowed from the Code of Theodosius and Justinian, in the old edition of Gothopfred (1736). A colossal index was compiled for the first ten months of the Ada sanctorum of the Bollandists, Rigollot, Ad Acta Sanctorum Supplementum. Paris 1875. [In Russian there is a major work by Archbishop Sergius, Complete Monthlies of the East. I-II; 2nd ed. Vladimir 1901]. The experience of collating all personal names for a given era was published by the Berlin Academy of Sciences, Prosopographia imperil Romani saec. I. II. Ill von Dessau, Klebs und Rohden. I-III. Berlin 1897–1898. But he covers only the first three centuries of the Roman Empire and rarely mentions persons related to the church. In general, for the names of persons found in ancient church history, the English Dictionary of Christian Biography by Smith and Wace, Dictionary of Christian Biography, is important. I_IV. London 1877–1887, distinguished by its completeness. However, this completeness is relative. The fact is that the authors did not have a specific program and, obviously, worked by chance. Therefore, if there is no name in this manual, then one cannot yet think that this person is completely unknown. The publishers promised to release their work in four volumes. Having published the first three volumes, they saw that it was impossible to do this while maintaining the accepted volume; nevertheless, they decided to complete the enterprise with the fourth volume, as a result of which the fourth volume is very voluminous and can replace two volumes. However, the publishers were forced to make abbreviations in it and omitted the names of bishops who were present at some councils. As a useful guide for references in general regarding names, one can also point to the bibliographic work of U. Chevalier, Repertoire des sources histori-ques du moyen age. Bio-bibliographie. 2 ed. I-II. Paris 1903–1907. The second part of this work is Topo-bibliographie. I-II. Paris 1894–1903]. The importance of information regarding names can be seen in an example from 1880. In Latin literature, the opinion has long been established that the guide to the interpretation of Holy Scripture, known under the name Junilius, belongs to the African bishop. The question is, in what city was he a bishop? They held different assumptions until a professor at the University of Breslav, Kinn, took up the work. Reading the epistles of Fulgentius Ferrand, a Carthaginian deacon, he noticed that in his epistles to bishops and presbyters Ferrand uses the formulas: “saneto patri filius”, “saneto iratri”, and calls himself “Ferrandus exiguus”, but in his epistle to Junilius he calls him only “the son of the holy mother of the Catholic Church” and assigns him the title “illustris”. The number of persons who had this title under Justinian was certain. For a long time, Kin searched for Junilius among these individuals and turned to other scientists, but to no avail. He lost hope of reaching his goal. Finally, in Procopius of Caesarea in the Historia arcana, he found a quaestor, who was a minister under the Emperor Justinian. Thus, instead of the bishop, the author of this interpretation was the minister. It can be assumed that someone deliberately added the word “bishop” to the name of Junilius in order to elevate the author in the eyes of readers. Such cases happened often; for example, in the debate between Maximus the Confessor and Pyrrhus, Maximus was called the Archbishop of Carthage, while it is known that he was hardly even a deacon. In addition to geographical and personal names, technical names also present difficulties. There are a lot of technical names for each science, and it would be strange to try to indicate a general guide for them. It is necessary to keep in mind, first of all, the names of the various positions of that time, which is embraced by ancient church history, and for this to become familiar with the legal relations and structure of the Roman Empire. This is far from unnecessary, because in Russian literature we have a developed fear of taking into account the exact meaning of these names. Usually they try to translate them into Russian names, which does not make them understandable, because the system of that time differs from the modern one. It is obvious how important titles can be in determining the place and time of a document. Since Russian documents mention the title of general, then we can conclude that this monument belongs to post-Petrine Rus'. The church historian has to reckon with the structure of the Roman Empire in three periods. 1st period - imperial - from Augustus to Constantine the Great, when the system remained classical. The manuals here are guides to classical antiquities. [In this case, one should especially call Handbuch der römischen Alterthümer von J. Marquardt (Römische Staatsverwaltung. 1-II. 3 Aufl. 1884. III. 2 Aufl.) und Th. Mommsen (Römisches Staatsrecht. I-II. 3 Aufl. 1887. III. 1 Aufl. 1887); This benefit is partly relevant for the next period. As a special study, one can mention O. Hirschfeld, Die kaiserlichen Verwaltungsbeamten bis auf Diokletian. 2 Aufl. Berlin 1905]. Then in the 2nd period, from the time of Diocletian and especially Constantine, this ancient system underwent very serious changes. To become familiar with positions and relationships during this period, work is a good tool. Manso, Das Leben Constantin des Grossen. Breslau 1827. Then we can point to the legal work of Bethmann-Hollweg, Der Civil-Process des gemeinen Rechts in geschichtlicher Entwicklung. 6 Bde Bonn 1864 et seq., where various positions, especially those related to the judicial institution, are discussed in detail and in detail. An indispensable guide is also Kuhn's book, E. Kuhn, Die städtische und bürgerliche Verfassung des Römischen Reichs bis auf die Zeiten Justinians. I-II. Leipzig 1864. After Justinian, this system again began to undergo significant changes, so that by the end of the Byzantine period almost nothing remained of it. These later changes were studied in great detail in the doctoral dissertation of N. A. Skabalanovich, The Byzantine state and the Byzantine church in the 11th century. St. Petersburg 1884. Another type of technical names are metrological names. The Russian scientist is afraid to reckon with this department even more than with the names of officials. In fact, it is strange to see how in a Russian work, for example, in one place where it is said that at that time so many nomisms were used, it is noted: by them one should mean a coin in general, and not a gold coin - “solid”, as known and specific. Here one should seek clarification on the Greek and Roman metrology of Gulch, F. Hultsch, Griechische und römische Metrologie. 2 Aufl. Berlin 1882. Gulch can be considered the most prominent luminary in this field, because he was engaged in this department for several decades and he published all the Greek and Roman works on metrology. It is clear how semi-proprietary metrological names can serve the above purpose. For example, if the manuscript mentioned Russian measures (pud, pound), then it would undoubtedly be that we are talking about Russia here. Proper and technical names are followed by numbers - chronological names. History cannot stand without chronology, and chronology should be considered the most prominent guide to history in general and church history in particular. Chronology is essentially a science and an art to such an extent that there are few hunters in this area, and no more competent people. As a tool for history, chronology can take many forms. First of all, it cannot help but diversify in the processing method. It can appear either as a light reference book or as a solid work of serious scholarship, varying in depth and nature of processing. Then, the chronology can also diversify in the direction and task it pursues. From this side, chronology has to be divided into 1) material, or, what is the same, historical and 2) formal. The oldest capital allowance does not present such a distinction in this regard. This manual is given by Dionysius Petavius ​​(Petaü) in his Opus de doctrina temporum (1627). Petavius ​​was a Jesuit theologian, but also a fairly prominent astronomer. One of his weaknesses is that he stood for the Ptolemaic system against Copernicus. He is, in fact, in the field of chronology, a successor to the works of Scaliger (De emendatione temporum 1583, 1598, Thesaurus temporum 1606), although his hostile attitude towards Scaliger forces him not to recognize the valuable aspects of the latter’s works. Petavius ​​gives very thorough studies on formal chronology - he establishes the mathematical and astronomical basis for the calculation of this or that people, indicates what year they had, solar or lunar, how the folk calendar was compiled, etc. But Opus de doctrina temporum concludes with a material chronology, presenting a whole series of events arranged by year. The Benedictines followed the same mixed direction when they published an essay on “The Art of Verifying Historical Dates” Clemencet et Durand, L'art verifier les dates des faits historiques. Paris 1750. 21.; 4 ed. par St. Allais 1818–1844.441. 80, also 111. 40. Here both chronologies are combined. But as knowledge developed, it became necessary to distinguish between one and the other. 1 1) Works on chronology of a historical and material nature present a list of dated events. These are chronological works of this kind, where the entire set of facts of one or another department of history is processed and summarized under certain years. Their natural type is ancient chronographs and chronicles, where events are recorded under known years. Later scholarly works follow the same custom. The type of this chronology is given in Russian literature in the famous work of Archimandrite (then bishop) Arseny, Chronicle of Church and Civil Events, Explaining Church Events. 3rd ed. St. Petersburg 1900. Here events are arranged in order of years, and the entire work is in the form of a chronicle. Chronology may here vary in scope and exhibit varying degrees of scholarship. Extremely brief chronological manuals are possible, such as Weingarten's chronological tables, Zeittafeln und Überblicke zur Kirchengeschichte (6 Aufl. bearb. von Arnold. Leipzig 1905), but extensive and thorough research is also possible. According to this method, the Annales ecclesiastici of Baronia were compiled, in which church events are arranged by year. Corrected and supplemented by Pagi, they still serve as a guide for chronological references (ed. Theiner 1864–1883). Tillemont's works, Tillemont, Memoires pour servir l'histoire ecclesiastique des six premiers siecles, are of lasting value. 16 t. Paris 1693–1712. 2 ed. 8 t. Bruxelles 1707–1719; Histoire des empereurs et des autres princes qui ont regne durant les six premiers siecles de l'eglise. 6 t. Paris 1690–1738. They can only be ignored when there are other new studies. Unfortunately, Tillmon's work stops at an interesting point, ending in the sixth century. Somewhat further than Tillmon comes the work of the Englishman Clinton, F. Clinton, Fasti Romani. I-II. Oxford 1845–1850, the most comprehensive textbook of this kind, covering the chronology of the Greco-Roman Empire from Augustus to Heraclius inclusive. This is a huge publication in English, listing events in year order, but at the same time giving textual extracts from the authors who speak about them, and providing brief but valuable explanations of why one source is preferred over another in cases of disagreement. At the same time, Clinton provides data on the location of the Byzantine emperors, based on laws collected in the codes of Theodosius and Justinian. Clinton's Fasti are especially valuable because in them the author cites the very texts on the basis of which he establishes the dates. This is quite important. Some chronologists have a harmful way of omitting their preliminary work, and therefore, although the book gains authority and popularity, their work is lost in vain, because there are too few people who would take the trouble to delve deeper into the reasons that led the scientist to establish this or that date. In any case, Clinton's work was so extensive that he considered it necessary to make an extract from it, An Epitome of the civil and literary Chronology of Rome and Constantinople from the death of Augustus to the death of Heraclius. Oxford 1853. Unfortunately, apparently not knowing this work, Muralt at one time worked on his “Experience in Byzantine Chronography,” published by our Academy of Sciences: E. Muralt, Essai de Chronographie byzantine de 395 ä 1057. St. Petersbourg 1855. This work is more modest than Clinton’s work, but has the advantage that the events in it are brought up to a later date time. Here events are listed and dated in the most abbreviated words - it is indicated which author is talking about a famous event, and italics indicate that the famous author also gives the date of the event. Muralt worked on the vast expanse of Byzantine history and could not conduct his research with such depth as Clinton. His chronology is therefore not complete, especially in the last sections, and sometimes presents mistakes that Clinton knew how to avoid. With regard to church history, the department of chronology of Egypt proved fatal for Muralta. If Lekien found it difficult to cope with the names of Egyptian cities, then for Muralta it turned out to be fatal that he got down to business without learning to count in Coptic, and in the dates about the Alexandrian patriarchs he often encountered falsehood. He could not understand that in Egypt the year did not begin on September 1, but on the 29th, and in some cases on the 30th of August. Thus, his date translation always presents some error of 2–3 days. That is why Muralt could not relate the days of the week with the numbers of the months. In general, although Muralt was not an eagle of chronology, his dates are not always true, but his work is venerable not only in size, but also because, although the texts are not copied out, the authors who speak about one or another date are listed. Obviously, material chronology, on the one hand, is a more expensive tool than formal one, since a good study of this type (like Clinton) provides historical material in a more or less processed form. But this chronology can never be brought to the height of perfection that is possible for a formal one. Here the chronologist must also be a historian; he must be critical of the news. Since material chronology is a processed series of conclusions, and is not limited to general formal instructions, works on it can always contain a significant percentage of errors. 2) Formal chronology has a more modest task: to make it possible to translate the ancient date encountered to the date of the newest chronology, Julian or Gregorian. But depending on how this translation is carried out, chronology can become both a very modest and a very broad matter. It is natural to set the goal not only to translate a known date, but at the same time to prove that such a translation is correct. In a word, formal chronology can be substantiated with a certain greater or lesser depth, and it can be brought to the perfection of the mathematical sciences. Formal chronology manuals can take various forms; sometimes it turns into a manual like the Paschal, indicating mathematical rules for the translation of dates and its basis, then into manuals similar to the sighted Easter, which is placed, among other things, in the Trebnik, i.e., in a series of tables with the help of which you can easily determine the required dates. In general, works of this kind do not establish specific chronological dates, but teach how to deal with dates that may appear in sources. These are rather chronological logarithms, which do not solve anything in particular, but are suitable for everything. Depending on the purpose pursued by works on formal chronology, the element a) technical or b) mathematical predominates in them. Technical chronology is a branch of chronology that deals with the explanation of those forms of chronology that a famous people had, and indicates the rules for how to transfer the numeration of a known people to our calendar (similar to how the old style numeration is transferred to the new one). Technical chronology also cannot free itself from the duties of Easter, i.e. it must determine on what month and what day of a given year this or that Easter fell, and also by this Easter determine the year of the event. The technical element is of particular importance in relation to the Middle Ages, when a peculiar manner of marking dates prevailed. A secular person feels here as if in a forest. Instead of designating time by the numbers and days of the month, they designated it by the days of remembrance of saints. Thus, the researcher needs to have a good knowledge of both the calendar of the known area and the manner of expression. The most common custom was, for example, to designate Sunday with the first words of the holiday hymn (introitus). Thomas Sunday was designated by the words: Quasi modo geniti, because with these words the apostolic reading began on this day. Mathematical, or astronomical, chronology deals with the basis of those things on which technical chronology is based. It must correctly determine the course of the moon, since it is known that some peoples reckoned time according to the lunar year (for example, the Jews), so the chronology depends on the course of the moon. Its task also includes reporting information about solar and lunar eclipses, because this is important for establishing those events that are not indicated by a year. The work of L. Ideler's Handbuch der mathematischen und technischen Chronologie can be considered a hitherto unreplaced manual on formal mathematical and technical chronology together. Berlin 1825–1826. Ideler was a Berlin astronomer, but in the interests of science he considered it necessary to become acquainted with Arabic and Turkish; in addition, he had solid knowledge of mathematics and history. His two volumes, published in 1825–1826, represent a work of such colossal scholarship that it has to be taken into account until recently. [The task of revising again and replacing Ideler’s work was recently undertaken by the astronomer F. K. Ginzel, Handbuch der mathematischen und technischen Chronologie. V. I. Leipzig 1906. The published volume contains a general introduction and chapters on the chronology of the Babylonians, Egyptians, Mohammedans (Arabs and Turks), Persians, Indians, some small Asian and American peoples, Chinese and Japanese. The entire work spans three volumes]. a) There are special works on technical chronology. One should mention in this area Unger's work on Greek and Latin chronology, Zeitrechnung der Griechen und Römer, placed in the Handbuch der klassischen Altertums-Wissenschaft v. Iwan Müller in Volume I. Unger has been involved in the recent controversy over Roman chronology. Perhaps many people do not know that the Roman year of Titus Livy did not correspond to the years of the imperial era. To truly establish the Roman year, one must take into account quite a lot, for example, the time of ripening of fruits, etc. This scientist gives very respectable instructions regarding ancient Roman and Greek chronology. In general, special formal chronologies are written for individual peoples. As an example, you can point to a study on Armenian chronology, E. Dulaurier, Recherhes sur Chronologie Armonienne. Paris 1859. Not only is the translation of Armenian dates given here, but its basis is also indicated. Academician Brosset of St. Petersburg also worked very much in this area (Armenian chronology) in his translation of Armenian historians. A short but comprehensive guide to the Middle Ages and modern times was given by F. Rühl, Chronologie der Mittelalters und der Neuzeit. Berlin 1897. Information regarding Christian chronology is also given by N. Grotefend, Handbuch der historischen Chronologie des Mittelalters und der Neuzeit. Hannover 1872 (2 Aufl.: Zeitrechnung des deutschen Mittelalters und der Neuzeit. Hannover 1891–1892). Grotefend wrote his work to develop medieval history itself, but his work is also important for the church. Christian holidays, as already noted, represent an important element in determining the timing of church events. They often determine the time of a particular event in historical news. Grotefend gave at the end of the book 35 tables on the number of days on which the Easter holiday can fall. These tables, called “non-original calendars,” show which day of the week a certain date falls on in each of the 35 years. Grotefend's tables contain brief but sufficient instructions on how to find Easter in all years after the Council of Nicaea; All the Sundays and moving holidays of the year determined by Easter also determine the events. In this regard, something similar is presented by the Russian Monthly Book of the Orthodox Catholic Church by I. Kosolapov (2nd ed. Simbirsk 1880), which gives a list of Sundays in each of the 35 years. Kosolapov's work presents the inconvenience that it deals only with two calendars - Julian and Gregorian. There are special works of this kind with a purely mathematical character, the raison d'etre of which is their convenience and their small volume. They offer a means of converting the chronological dates of one chronology to the dates of another chronology. In this regard, the work of the Viennese associate professor Schram, R. Schräm, Hilfstafeln für Chronologie is especially important. Wien 1883. It is enough to know the first two operations of arithmetic to convert any date to the Julian or Gregorian calendar using this work. This small quadrant represents an abyss of mathematical material. Having Scar's small volume in your hands, you will be able to accurately establish the Greek Olympiads, the chronology of the Indians, the Chinese, and, if your interest is so great, then the chronology of the Mexicans and Egyptians. There is also an index with the help of which anyone can easily determine on what day the spring or autumn equinox, the summer and winter solstices and the entry of the sun into one or another sign of the zodiac occurred in one year or another. This indication is necessary because some writers, especially Greek, instead of designating the month, use, for example, the expression: “it was when the sun entered the sign of Scorpio.” At the same time, aids are immediately given for determining the new moon, full moon, and data for concluding whether there could or could not be a solar or lunar eclipse in a certain year. b) Here we raise the question of the significance of astronomy for chronological research. Actually, for the most distant times, the only completely reliable dates are astronomical dates. Fortunately for history, people in the old days were afraid of solar eclipses and recorded them, like a miracle, in their chronicles. And since this was also combined with the ravings of astrologers, who saw omens in eclipses and established a false connection between astronomical phenomena and events in human life, it is easy to understand why eclipses can be important for history. They form an immovable boundary that no copyist can spoil. Such dates form the cornerstone of any chronology. Hence, in a number of chronological manuals, a prominent place is occupied by those books that deal with astronomical chronology. They calculate lunar and solar eclipses that are mentioned in history. The significance of astronomical chronology is determined by the ability to establish through them dates that are not indicated by anything, or, in the case of insufficient accuracy of dates, to determine events that are only partially dated. This last circumstance becomes clear from the fact that different writers use different eras when calculating chronology, and difficulties are encountered in translating these eras to ours. So, for example, the Feofan chronograph counts by years from the creation of the world, but from time to time it transfers this reckoning to years from the Nativity of Christ. True, the era that Theophanes uses is Alexandrian, i.e., the 5492 years from the creation of the world, which it assumes, must be subtracted from the known chronological date in order to obtain the years of our era; but Feofan does not always use this era, but changes it, and therefore he has to subtract sometimes more, sometimes less. This is where astronomical chronology helps matters. For ancient times, establishing the dates when exactly a given eclipse occurred is difficult, because there solar eclipses were associated with the event, but the time (year, month and day) when they occurred was not determined. Later monuments indicated the month and day of the eclipse, or at least the month. Muralt records such data when he finds mention of them in Byzantine history. They are also included in Clinton’s “Fasti Romani” to this extent. But it is important to know about all past eclipses, and by indicating them, astronomers try to make the work of historians easier. The French Benedictine edition of The Art of Verifying Dates contains a list of solar and lunar eclipses. But scientists of the present time would be ashamed to use this publication. In 1882, tables were published in Berlin with the calculation of solar and lunar eclipses by Lehmann, R. Lehmann, Tafeln zur Berechnung der Mondphasen und der Sonnen und Mondfinsternisse. Berlin 1882. Above them are “Tables of conjunctions of the moon with the sun” by the Viennese professor and director of the observatory von Oppolzer, Th. von Oppolcer, Syzygientafeln für den Mond. Leipzig 1881. They make it possible to know whether a famous eclipse was visible or not in a particular area. From an earthly point of view, only lunar eclipses are real because the earth is larger than the moon and the earth's shadow completely covers the moon. Solar eclipses are to a certain extent fictitious. The moon is an insignificant body compared to the sun, so the shadow of the moon covers only a certain surface of the earth. If a lunar eclipse occurs where there is night, then it is certainly visible. It's a completely different matter with solar. If we recall the newspaper news about the solar eclipse that took place in January 1898, we will see that in one place it was magnificent and edifying for astronomers, but in another it did not exist. Therefore, in relation to solar eclipses, it is necessary to determine whether it was visible in a certain place. Scientists using older editions run the risk of associating an event with a solar eclipse that was not visible. Thus, a solar eclipse turns into a means of geographical news. Let us assume that in Constantinople they might have known about the Antioch event vaguely from rumors. If the Antioch event is narrated according to news from Constantinople, and if the solar eclipse with which this event is associated was not visible in Constantinople, then we can not attach high value to this news. "Syzygientafeln" make it possible to calculate a solar eclipse quite accurately. But this work is not entirely accurate. The fact is that the moon is such a capricious body that astronomers know up to 200 arguments to calculate its movement. When they calculate the full moon or new moon to within 0.1 minute, they adjust the calculations 200 times based on other considerations. At first, a few arguments are selected, and the rest are discarded - namely those that, although they influence the phases of the moon, do not have a noticeable effect in a short time; over a long period of time, these arguments amount to numbers of significant magnitude. Therefore, no scientific system turns out to be reliable several decades after its publication. With the assistance of the English Admiralty, Hansen published lunar tables, on the basis of which amendments can be made, R. A. Hansen, Tables de la lune. Londres 1851. When calculating eclipses that occurred over thousands of years, Oppolzer had to make, on the basis of historical information, empirical corrections in his theoretical reasoning, although he does not give an account of these corrections. These amendments constitute the advantage of Oppolzer's work over others. Oppolzer's talented student, Ginzel, proposed more precise amendments. This is followed by the work of Schram, who simplified the Syzygientafeln in his Tafeln zur Berechnung der näheren Umstände der Sonnenfinsternisse. Wien 1886. Having published his tables, Oppolzer undertook a new grandiose undertaking with his students. They calculated all the lunar and solar eclipses that history can be interested in, over a huge period of time before and after Christ. All these eclipses were numbered. This is the “Canon of Eclipses” (Canon der Finsternisse. Denkschriften der Kaiserlichen Akademie der Wissenschaften. B. LII. Wien 1887), which appeared in Vol. LII of the “Memoirs of the Vienna Academy of Sciences”. The word “canon” means a list of facts established in the field of astronomy; the word was used primarily by Ptolemy and later adopted by scientists. This huge work presents a list of solar and lunar eclipses over a vast space of time from 1208 BC to 2161 AD. In this space of time there are 8,000 solar and 5,200 lunar eclipses. Attached to the tables are 160 maps showing the course of solar eclipses, so that a historian, faced with an astronomical phenomenon in one or another area during a certain period, can easily use this work: a geographical map showing the course of a solar eclipse will show the historian whether a solar eclipse could have happened and how long it lasted in a given area. Anyone who has Oppolzer's work in hand can easily check the records of eclipses mentioned in the chronicles. But Oppolzer’s grandiose work does not free the historian from independent work: it is still necessary to adapt the elements of the record to certain places in order to decide whether a given eclipse took place in a known place. The inconvenience of this work is that it is too capital and cannot be publicly available. Therefore, syzygy tables cannot be forced out of use. The appearance of the “canon” caused the work of Schram, Reductionstafeln für den Oppolzerschen Finstemiss-Kanon zum Übergang auf die Ginzelschen empirischen Korrectionen. Wien 1889. In general, thanks to the Viennese astronomers, astronomical chronology can consider itself firmly established. A brief guide to this branch was given by the Strasbourg professor W. Wislicenus, Astronomische Chronologie. Leipzig 1895. Wislicenus chooses more practical manuals and gives preference to the works of Oppolzer. It remains to give from the chronological field a few practical instructions for calculating chronological dates in a particular country. The fulcrum for any chronological study is the era, that is, the year from which this or that chronology begins. There are different eras, and we must choose the appropriate ones: we need to know those eras that serve to determine church historical events. Ancient ecclesiastical history, as representing the totality of facts that occurred mainly within the boundaries of the Roman Empire, must deal with the chronology of Rome. It goes without saying that a historian must know the Kalends, Nones, and Ides. It should be noted that Rome did not have a specific era. The era from the founding of Rome is of significance only to scholars. But in fact, in general, it did not have the same meaning that the era has in our calculation. The true and authentic reckoning of Rome was carried out according to the consuls. Although reforms took place under Emperor Augustus, it is only in secondary school textbooks that it can be stated that the republic ceased to exist. Scholars speak only of the Roman Principate. Since the empire was under siege and the old republican order was maintained (until Diocletian), there was no change in the account of the consuls. At the end of each year, the Roman Republic called elections in which a new pair of consuls was elected to replace the two consuls who had ruled during the year. The newly elected ones were called "designati" (consules) until January 1 of the following year, and from that day - "ordinarii". The honor of the consulate was so great and there were so many candidates that the emperor was at a loss to appoint only two consuls; hence the fact of the existence of ordinary consuls and “suffecti” (substitute) consuls: instead of one pair, there were several pairs each year. After a few months, the consules ordinarii resigned their positions and the consules suffecti took over. Those and other consuls did not differ in power, but chronologically; the first - ordinarii - only gave the name to the account. If the name of the consuls suffecti appeared on the inscription, then it is clear that the inscription was built on the estate of the consul and contains crude flattery. When, after Constantine the Great, the Roman Empire became double-capital, an agreement took place between the eastern and western emperors, according to which one consul was declared in Rome, and the other in Constantinople. Sometimes both consuls were from the East or West. If there was no preliminary agreement, then Rome did not know who would be consul in Constantinople and vice versa. Hence the need for conventional dates. In Rome, for example, they wrote: to the consulate of such and such who will be announced (et qui pronunciatus erit) in Constantinople. This uncertainty could last for several months. Consuls were announced on January 1st. In order for the news to penetrate into the most remote parts of the Roman Empire about which dignitaries were appointed in Rome for a certain year, in the complete absence of convenient communication, it took a lot of time, and several months passed before the names of the new consuls became known in provinces remote from Rome. Meanwhile, in everyday practice, precise designation of consuls was required. Therefore, they resorted to the following dating: post consulatum (the name of the rivers, i.e. e. last year) virorum clarissimorum. Thus, the chronological term "post consulatum" for the first season of the year was at least inevitable in the provinces. If such a dating was found in a document for the month of May, then this is explained either by the negligence of the notary’s office or the remoteness of this province from the capital. Obviously, with this method of dating events, the chronologist needs to be especially careful not to mistake a false document for a true one. So, for example, if an event that happened on January 7th is dated in the name of a consul already appointed on January 1st of the same year, then the truth or falsity of a historical document so dated will be determined by geographical indications: an event dated on January 7th by the new consul could have happened near Rome and not further than the borders of Italy; if it is listed as having taken place in such distant cities as, for example, in Edessa or Thebes, where, obviously, they could not find out the name of the new consul in such a short time, then, consequently, a historical document testifying to the occurrence of this event was planted. Some documents, including church ones, are drawn up in such a way that they want to show their devotion to the reigning house in the notes. In 430, Flavius ​​Theodosius and Flavius ​​Valentinianus, both emperors, were consuls, and in the next year, 431, private individuals, Antiochus and Vasya. In 431, the 3rd Ecumenical Council took place in Ephesus, and although the meetings took place in June and July, the acts date back to post consulatum (i.e., emperors). The council of 448 (November) presided over by Flavian and the bandit council of 449 are dated correctly (consulibus). But in 451, the Council of Chalcedon, as a result of the invasion of the Huns, which complicated relations between Constantinople and Rome, in October mentions only one consul, Emperor Marcian, and dates it: “Flavio Marciano Augusto consule et qui fuerit nuntiatus,” although Adelphius had already been appointed. In 419, the fathers of the Council of Carthage, headed by Aurelius, sent on November 26 the lists of the definitions of the 1st Council of Nicaea to Pope Bonificius with the note: “post consulatum” (emperors Honorius and Theodosius). Dating post consulatum can sometimes force an event to be incorrectly attributed to the previous year, because with such dating only the initial R. and S were put; meanwhile, these letters often served among the Romans as the initials “praenomen” Publius and Cajus, with which praenomen the consuls of one or another year could end up, while it can be interpreted in the sense of p(ost) c(onsulatum). The most important inconvenience of dating by consuls, reminiscent of the dating of the ancient Assyrians by dignitaries, was that since no human memory was able to remember the series of all “consules ordinarii,” it was necessary to have a list of consuls in front of one. But it was very easy to make a gap in a long row, and the scribe could not guess about it, even skipping up to 10, because there was no exact starting point (era). The lists of consuls suffered the fate of all kinds of chronicle works - damage, omissions, insertions. Epiphanius of Cyprus made every effort to accurately determine the dates of the Nativity of Christ and suffering. But his work is a concatenation of errors, since he had spoiled lists of consuls at hand. The number of consuls increased not due to consuls suffecti, but due to the negligence of the scribes. So, instead of L. Rubellio Gemino et C. Fufio Gemino consulibus (29 AD) they wrote duobus Geminis consulibus, and Epiphanius understands Gemini as the second pair of consuls along with Rubellius and Fufius. Added to this were economic calculations for saving papyrus. So, firstly, Roman chronology presents the inconvenience that it obliges us to have accurate lists of consuls. It was even more inconvenient when it came to dating in the future. Here it was necessary to add numerical values ​​to the names of the consuls. At the same time, we have to take into account the fact that the Romans kept count somewhat differently than we do. Our 8 years after the 98th year means 98+8, and among the Romans it means 98+7, because the first of 8 years was considered 98, not 99, so to speak, inclusive, not exclusive. This feature also affected the life of the Romans. Market days were called nundinae i.e. noveni dies - "ninth days". But the Roman week did not consist of 9 days, as it should have, but of 8. As a result of these orders, the calendar of Julius Caesar was confused by the priests themselves. Namely, they considered a leap year not the fourth, as it should be according to the formula in quarto anno, but the third. Only Augustus, with his power, corrected the mistake. Therefore, when a date is set, the question arises for the historian: what did the author think - exlusive or inclusive (“exclusively” or “inclusive”) Consequently, in this regard, the Roman numeral was inconvenient. Despite all this, the Roman numeral system offers an indispensable advantage to the historian. Any letter is more faithfully preserved than numbers. Roman numerals especially allow for confusion. Each sign represents an element for damage. The Arabic number nine represents one element for corruption (for example, 9 reversed gives 6); Roman 9 (VIII) represents five signs for corruption. And names are damaged, but not to the same extent. The dates for the two consuls leave a strong trace and can easily be restored if damaged. Here is an example of such a restoration. On July 17, the Latin Church commemorates the martyrs of Scili; information about them is preserved in the Acta martyrum Scilitanorum. The martyrs were interrogated by the African proconsul Saturninus. But the dating distorted by the scribes according to the consuls led to misunderstandings; it turned out that the martyrs suffered in the year 200. The date is: praesidente bis Claudiano consule (when the consul Claudian presided twice) - - Saturninus proconsul dixit. This is as incongruous as saying that the Minister of Justice presided over a village meeting. Feeling this inconsistency, other lists instead of praesidente put praestante, praesente and existente. Consequently, only the existence of a consul is already assumed. But, having to deal with the fact that Claudian's name does not appear in the lists of that time (the consul of the year 200 was Claudius Severus), the scholar Leon Renier came to the conclusion that the year 180 was meant, when the consuls were Lucius Fulvius Bruttius Praesens and Sextus Quintilius Condianus. The Greek acts issued by Usener in 1881 confirmed Rainier's amendment, although here too the names of the consuls were distorted: épí Pérsanto_s tó deúteron kai Klaudia – nou: 'twn upátwn. Then Robinson in 1890 found a Latin edition, which read: Praesente bis et Claudiano consulibus. This was important for history. According to the old date, the year of martyrdom (200) fell on the reign of Septimius Severus, and according to the new date, on the reign of Commodus. The corrected date revealed the fact that the persecution of Marcus Aurelius continued even after him, under Commodus. Thus, thanks to the impossibility of completely distorting the name, it is possible to restore the date. Consular dating provided an important service in exposing the so-called false Isidorean decretals. The popes dated their messages not only by date, but also by the year according to the consuls. False Isidore, when composing his decretals, had to date his decretals in the same way in relation to the messages of the popes. But he did not have an authentic list of consuls, which is why he dated at random. This circumstance helped to expose the fake; trend analysis completed the matter. A good guide for converting consular dates (from nominal to numerical) is Schram's table in his Hilfstafeln für Chronologie. He put things together so well that with the help of breviations one can guess the pairs of consuls in his alphabetical list. The Italian scientist Borghesi spent almost his entire life trying to correct the lists of consuls. J. Klein, Fasti consulares. Lipsiae 1881, published lists of consuls from the death of Julius Caesar to Diocletian. This work brought attention to previously unsuspected phenomena and provides an introduction to Roman nomenclature. Here we find the full names of the consuls ordinary, consuls suffecti, as far as can be determined from the available data. The author indicates the sources of the information provided throughout. Upon taking office, during the consular procession, the new consul threw money at the people. Under Justinian, it was realized that this custom was harmful and absurd, because among the mob there were dumps, mutilations, etc. Having prohibited this custom for consuls, Justinian retained it, however, as a privilege of the emperors. In 541, the last consul was Flavius ​​Basilius Junior, and then they began to designate the years: 1st, 2nd, 3rd, etc. post consulatum Basilii. Justinian's successors restored the custom of declaring themselves consuls on the first of January after their accession to the throne and throwing in money. From here they were also considered postconsulata, which lasted until the century, until the emperor Leo the Philosopher (886–912). Leo issued a decree that abolished the use of chronology by consuls. As for the era ab urbe condita, the learned authorities themselves differed on the question of the time of the founding of Rome. Marcus Porcius Cato argued that Rome was founded on April 21, 4th year of the 6th Greek Olympiad, and Marcus Terentius Varro, a famous historian-archaeologist, pointed to the 3rd year of the 6th Olympiad. When translated into modern chronology, it turns out that, according to Cato, Rome was founded in 753 BC, and according to Varro - in 754. At first, scientists adhered to the point of view of Cato, then - Varro. Emperor Claudius, that antiquary on the throne, spoke in favor of Varro, celebrating the 800th anniversary of the existence of Rome in 47 A.D. But, despite this, the issue was not finally resolved. Under Emperor Philip in 248, the 1000th anniversary of Rome was celebrated, i.e. from Varro’s point of view - the 1001st anniversary. The chronology from the foundation of Rome is based, in fact, as a basis, on the Greek chronology according to the Olympiads. The Greeks celebrated the Olympic Games every 4th year: the interest in the heroes of the games was so great that they honored them and therefore kept accurate and consistent lists of them (starting with Koriv). This chronology was verified according to the testimony of Eratosthenes and according to astronomy, for Thucydides preserved indications of eclipses in the famous Olympiads. The chronology of the Olympiads is carried out from the summer solstice of 776 BC, 4733 after the creation of the world. Translating the dates of the Olympiads presents some difficulties. Let us tell you the formula for this translation. The Olympiad is denoted by λ, the year of the Olympiad by ε. When translating, one should subtract 1 from λ, multiply the remainder by 4 and add ε to the product, i.e. the year designated during the Olympiad; Let's say it turns out to be "z". If you subtract this number from 777 or subtract 776 from it, you will get the year before or after the Olympiad corresponding to this Olympiad. Eastern (Syrian) chronology The church historian does not have to deal with the Greek calculation of the Olympiads. The most ancient era that he encounters is the era of the Seleucids, found in Syrian monuments and in Greek ones taken from the east: October 1, 312 BC. It is called differently: “the years of King Alexander”, “the years of the Ionians” (Greeks). Its origin is “x” -th. If the Syrians thought that this reckoning came from Alexander the Great, then it was a grave mistake. They usually consider the beginning of this era to be the victory of Seleucus Nicator over Demetrius Poliorcetes at Gaza in the fall of 312 BC. But Unger doubts the accuracy of this dating and gives his own explanation. It is difficult to explain how to count the years of the reign of Seleucus Nicator. Seleucus Nicator bore the title basiléw_s (“king”) even earlier, and Babylon was taken by him in the summer of 312, and this event therefore cannot be the beginning of an era. Therefore, it is more correct to consider, Unger thinks, the beginning of this era to be the year of death of Alexander IV of Macedon, i.e. 311, after which Seleucus Nicator could rightfully be called king. If the reckoning from 312 is Antedatirung, then the reckoning from 311 is Postdatirung. A church historian almost never has to deal with dates before Christ. In order to convert the years of this era to our calendar, you need to subtract 312 years from the chronological date for this era for October, November and December, and if we are talking about the months from January to September - 311, and you get the year of the Dionysian era. The usual beginning of this era should be considered October 1st. It should be noted that this term does not have sufficient firmness. The lunar year in Antioch was identified with the solar year, while the lunar year differs from the solar year by 11 days. The New Year began on the 1st of Tishri; thus, most of the month occurred after the autumnal equinox. It is not easy to tinker with ancient Syrian monuments, since chronology is almost always calculated by lunar months, not solar ones. This constitutes one of the knots in the question of when to celebrate Easter. The Syrian chronology subsequently, under the influence of Byzantium, gave a deviation: the Byzantine indictions penetrated to the Syrians. Writers began to identify the Seleucid years with the indictions, i.e. consider September, not October, as the beginning of the year. The Seleucid era became widespread throughout the east, but local eras also existed alongside it in different cities. There was, for example, a special local era, quite widespread, which was used by the capital of Syria - Antioch. The beginning of this era also fell in autumn, precisely 48 BC; 705–706 from the founding of Rome, 49–48 BC and 264 of the Seleucid era coincide with the first Antiochene era. To translate this era, you just need to add 263 to the Antiochian era, then you get the Seleucid era, which we already know how to translate into our chronology. This era is found in Evagrius and John Malala; the latter also has the key to it. Egypt had its own number of years. There they used a mobile solar year (always 365 days), so that 4 years were equal to 1460 days, whereas our 4 years contain 1461 days, or 1460 years of our reckoning are equal to 1461 Egyptian years. When Egypt was annexed to Rome, the government tried to put the Egyptian numeral in a certain relationship with the Roman numeral. Then the Julian year, called the Alexandrian year, was introduced in Egypt. It was customary to consider August 1 to always be equal to 8 “mesori”, which is the key to the Egyptian year. This number is still used by the Copts (with Egyptian names) and the Abyssinians (with their own names). The beginning of this year falls on August 29 three times every 4 years, and on August 30 in the year preceding a leap year; thus the term was firmly established. In Egypt they are accustomed to counting the years of their sovereigns; but for astronomers such a calculation was inconvenient. Alexandrian astronomers used the era of Nabonassar, borrowed from the Chaldean astronomers, and then the era of Philip (the brother of Alexander the Great) and the era of Augustus and, finally, the era of Diocletian. As for the meaning of the first three eras, 1st fwu:'f 5 of the first year of Nabonassar = February 26, 747 BC. " Eto_s apó Фilíppou + 424 = éto_s apó Nabonassárou. The following equality is quite accurate: éto_s ápó Naß + 6 = éto_s apó Фil + 430 = annus ab urbe condita; ' éto_s ápó Фil - 12th year of the era Seleucids. 1st fwu: 'f 295 of the era of Philip, or August 31, 30 BC. There were canons or lists of reigns for the calculation of years. The canon of Claudius Ptolemy is known, which he uses in his Megísth súnta_ksi_s (Almagest). These lists were continued by subsequent astronomers. the time of Diocletian and beyond. Counting by consuls did not have time to take root in Egypt during Roman rule. The 20-year reign of Diocletian taught people to count by the years of his reign. After Diocletian's abdication, it was difficult to find out who retained control of the empire; as a result, they continued to date the reign of Diocletian. Among astronomers, the era of Augustus was gradually replaced by the era of Diocletian. This chronology according to the years of Diocletian’s reign came into practice and was maintained with great convenience also because the Alexandrian saints, when publishing Easter tables in their epistles, used the Egyptian chronology according to the era of Diocletian. Subsequently, Christians found it inconvenient to introduce the name of the persecutor of Christians into the chronology, and although they retained the previous chronology according to the era of Diocletian, its name was changed: instead of “ápó Dioklhtianou: xrónoi” they began to use the expression “xrónoi ápó twn martúrwn”, “the year of the pure martyrs”. This chronology passed from Egypt to Ethiopia and was recognized as normal there for a long time. The date of Diocletian's accession to the throne is known with certainty; It is undoubtedly known that he assumed the crown in Chalcedon on September 17, 284, 15 days before the Kalends of October, and on September 27, 5 days before the Kalends of October, he entered Nicomedia. The beginning of the Egyptian year was shortly before this (August 29), so that Diocletian was elected emperor on the 20th of the 1st Egyptian month, and entered the capital on the 30th, and the Egyptian year, which began on August 29, 284, was the first year of Diocletian's reign. The difference between the first month and the beginning of Diocletian’s reign was completely insignificant (August 29-September 17), and therefore it was accepted that the 1st year of Diocletian’s reign began on August 29, 284. Hence, there is a simple, easy possibility of converting the chronology according to the era of Diocletian to our chronology. If we are talking about the time lasting from September (from August 29 or 30) to January, then 283 should be added to the era of martyrs; if we are talking about the time from January to August, you need to add 284 to get the year from R. X. According to the Orthodox Easter, the great indiction contains 532 years, after which the days of Easter go in the same order, for example, 533 = 1st, 1064 = 532. But writing an Easter for 532 years is a huge job, which requires a lot of papyrus, ink and labor. In Alexandria there was a simplified practice. The fact is that after 95 years, Easter repeats in approximately the same order, although leap years create confusion, so corrections have to be made. In practice there was a shortened cycle. The calculation of Easter by Cyril of Alexandria using a simplified method ended in 531 AD. It was necessary to calculate Easter for a further time and make an adjustment for leap years. This work was undertaken by the Western monk Dionysius the Lesser in 525. He carried out a grandiose revolution and laid the foundation for our reckoning, that is, from R. X. The motives for this were low: he was a bigot. The Alexandrian bishops, no less Orthodox than Dionysius, did not see anything shameful in the use of the Diocletian era for Easter tables, but Dionysius was indignant at this. Instead of continuing the counting from Diocletian, he began counting from R. X. St. Cyril of Alexandria compiled a cycle of Easter celebrations for 95 years - from 153 to 247 of the Diocletian era. Dionysius the Small says: “since only 6 years remain from this circle, we decided to continue for the next 95 years.” At the same time, in his Easter circle he did not want to continue counting according to the era of Diocletian “tyranni potius, quam principis, impii et persecutoris” (“a tyrant rather than a leader, wicked and persecutor”) and replaced the years of Diocletian with the years “ab incarnatione Domini nostri Jesu Christi” (“from the incarnation of our Lord Jesus Christ”), putting together the year 248 Diocletian 532nd year. This is the first date known to history, set according to our calendar from R. X., which replaced the calendar according to the era of Diocletian. 532 A.D. is the year 1285 ab urbe condita. Since 19x28 = 532 a, it is obvious that 1285-(532–1) = 753 a. U.S. The year 753 from the founding of Rome marks the first year of the 19-year circle; this year, according to Dionysius, the Annunciation (the incarnation of Christ) followed. Probably for Dionysius the question about the year of the Nativity of Christ was due to this coincidence 753 a. U.S. with 1 year of a 19-year cycle and was allowed. His calculation was based on no scientific data about the year A.D. He assumed that the Alexandrian Paschalia was accurate. She was guided by the movement of the moon, and in 532 the 19-year cycle was supposed to end. Meanwhile, according to his account, it ended not in 532, but in 531, therefore, obviously, Dionysius began counting not from R. X., but from the Annunciation. The era of Dionysius the Less - from R. X. (ours), therefore, has no objective scientific significance. It is only approximately accurate. Dionysius based his calculations on Paschalistic data, not historical ones. With the era of Dionysius the Less, the aera Hispanica is similar. It consists in the fact that every year from R. X. is taken 38 years higher (38 = 19x2); 1st year = 716 a. U.S. This circumstance indicates the Paschalistic nature of this era. Question about the time of the birth and death of Christ 6 There is little definite, undoubtedly correct historical data about the time of birth and the time of the suffering and death of Christ; the establishment of these two facts, meanwhile, should lie at the basis of a specifically Christian era. As for the time of the birth of Christ, it must be recognized first of all that civil history does not give definite indications of the year of the census, which took place in the year R. X. Thus, there is a gap in civil history that chronology still cannot cope with. Of course, those who, taking advantage of the silence of history, think to reject the authenticity of the Gospel events, are acting unfairly. It is known that for Jewish history we have authority in the person of Josephus (prisoner of Emperor Vespasian). He lived very close to the time of Christ and regarding the most important dates of Jewish political life had the opportunity to use very accurate and definite information. He presents such information about the time of the reign of Herod, the reliability and accuracy of which is difficult to doubt. Herod's accession took place in the year when he was in Rome, during the consulate of Cneius Domitius Calvinus and Caius Asinius Pollio. It was 714 from the founding of Rome. Herod died in the 37th year of his reign. If 714 was the first year of his reign, then, adding 36 to 714, we get 750. From the Gospel it is known that Herod’s death was preceded by the massacre of Bethlehem infants from 2 years of age and below. When the beating took place, Jesus Christ was less than two years old on earth. When Herod died, Jesus Christ was at least two years old, and perhaps more. This means that our chronology does not correspond to the actual one, but goes several years (5-6 years) ahead. Astronomy confirms this. Josephus says that Herod died after a 37-year reign, in the year when there was a lunar eclipse before the Passover, which made a strong impression. Astronomy shows that there were three lunar eclipses during the corresponding time period. One was on January 20, 752; it apparently was in America, and not in Jerusalem. Another was in 753 from the founding of Rome; it occurred on the night of January 9-10 - the middle of the eclipse fell by 1 hour 16 1/3 minutes after midnight; this eclipse apparently took place in Jerusalem and it would be very convenient to consider it as the eclipse that happened in the year of Herod’s death before the Passover - if it had not been too late: Herod died in 750. The third eclipse took place in 750 from March 12 to 13; its midpoint fell at 3 hours 11 8/10 minutes after midnight. It was private and visible in Jerusalem. It was this that preceded the Passover, which took place in the year of Herod’s death. Numismatic data also encourages us to prefer the date of 750 to the date of 753: the successor of Herod is indicated on the coins of 753, which means that Herod died at that time. From this it clearly follows that Jesus Christ was born before 750, perhaps in 748 and even earlier, in 747. There is also no firm data regarding when He died. It can be said that no legend has been preserved about the year of the Savior’s death on the cross; for in order for a tradition to be preserved, it is necessary, first of all, for it to be understandable, and for this there must be unity of chronology between the one who tells the tradition and the one who accepts it. The apostles could say that the resurrection of Christ was on the 16th of Nisan, but for the Romans this was an incomprehensible date, and the first Christians were hardly scientifically prepared enough to translate it into Roman notation. Yes, they did not attach much importance to this: the apostles served the cause of faith, and not scientific curiosity. In order to convey the time of the Savior’s death in the Roman reckoning, it would be necessary to make inquiries in the praetorium, where the day of Christ’s condemnation to the cross could be recorded in Roman. But even this cannot be insisted on with particular confidence: Pilate may not have considered the death penalty of a Jew a majus negotium (“big deal”) within the limits of his authority, and therefore may not have ordered the drawing up of a special act on this. And if contemporaries did not record this day in Roman dates, it was already very difficult for subsequent generations to calculate this day. Let's imagine that there will be some time and our chronology will be replaced by the Chinese one. October 17, 1888 AD, of course, is clear to everyone. But, of course, none of the contemporaries of the event considered it necessary to transfer this date to the Chinese calendar, and in the future (under Chinese chronology) this date may be lost. After this, it is clear that among Christians there could not be an exact legend about the time of the Savior’s death on the cross. In the first times, it seemed completely sufficient to know that He died under such and such bishops and Pontius Pilate; The preachers of Christianity, the apostles, were not ministers of chronology. The later testimony about this is only scientific guesswork and should not confuse us with the confidence with which the writers declare them. Tertullian, for example, passes testimony about this as indisputable truth; but this is his manner of presentation. What indisputable data is there about the year of Christ’s death on the cross? In the Gospel and Creed we read that He was crucified under Pontius Pilate. The years of Pilate's reign are fairly well defined by Josephus. Pilate ruled Judea for 10 years; when he, having been deprived of power under Tiberius, arrived in Rome, he found Tiberius dead. But Tiberius died on March 16, 790 a. U.S., 37 R. X. That turns out to be years 27–36. As a result, the choice of years is significantly reduced. Jesus Christ rose on the first day of the week, in the morning, on our Sunday. This Sunday then fell on the 16th of Nisan, and this is the significant difference between our Orthodox views and Western European ones; therefore, the most accurate research of Western European scientists about the year of the resurrection of Jesus Christ is not suitable for us. The fact is that all Western learned theologians are obsessed with some kind of belief that Jesus Christ was crucified on the 15th of Nisan, that is, on the first day of unleavened bread, and not on the 14th. In Russian literature, this issue is discussed quite clearly in Khvolson’s “Christ. Readings" for 1875, 1877 and 1878. and in the “Notes of the St. Petersburg Academy of Sciences” in volume 41 of the 7th series (Das letzte Passamahl Christi und der Tag seines Todes. St. Petersburg. 1892), where evidence is presented that it is impossible to consider Nisan 15 as the day of Christ’s crucifixion. Thus, we have to look for the year in the series of years of Pilate’s reign when, according to astronomical data, Sunday falls on the 16th of Nisan. Such a year turns out to be, first of all, the 30th year of our chronology, 783 from the founding of Rome, then 33 AD, 786 from the founding of Rome. All the probabilities are for the fact that Jesus Christ was resurrected on April 5, 786. Thus, it turns out that Jesus Christ died in 33. But this rests on provisions that are very difficult to substantiate historically. As for the indication from the Gospel that when Christ was about 30 years old, it was the 15th year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar (Luke 3:1,23), the main question here is not how to count the years of Tiberius’s reign (assuming that the Jewish chronology could diverge from the Roman one and for the 15th year we could count not 29, but 27), but that the value is “about 30 years” ( w'seí etw'n triákonta ) the date in question is approximate. And despite all the chronological authority of Eusebius of Caesarea, we cannot insist with him that Christ died precisely at the 34th year of birth, because there was other news coming from Irenaeus of Lyons, that Christ sanctified by his stay on earth all ages of human life (Adv. haer.2, 23:2) And it is known that Irenaeus was a disciple of St. Polycarp of Smyrna, who had John the Theologian as his teacher; therefore, it is possible that this news comes from John the Theologian, and in this case this is an authority before which the authority of Eusebius can crumble to dust. Irenaeus says that Christ was presbútero_s (“an old man who had reached old age”). But is it convenient to call a 30-year-old person this way? And that Christ’s appearance was not one of flourishing, there is evidence of this in the Gospel itself (John). Thus, the Pharisees objected to Christ: “You are not even fifty years old, and you say that you saw Abraham” (John 8:57). It is obvious that He looked to be much more than 30 years old. No doubt they would be happy to say, “You’re not even thirty years old,” if it were possible. No solid historical tradition has been preserved about the time of Christ's public ministry. The usual view that His ministry lasted 3 years and His life ended in the 34th year is based on the authority of Eusebius. We do not find complete confirmation of this tradition in the text of the Gospel; Thus, the holiday to which the healing of the paralytic refers, from a textual point of view, allows for various interpretations. Maybe it wasn't Easter. But Easter determines the time of Christ’s public ministry. And in ancient (pre-Eusebian) times another view was stubbornly held, that the ministry of Christ lasted one pleasant year of the Lord (Hippolytus of Rome, etc.); in this case, Christ died at the age of 31, and based on the year of the crucifixion, one has to calculate the year of Birth. Thus, the birth of Christ far precedes our era; His death can most likely be attributed to the year 33. The usual idea of ​​33 years of Christ's earthly life does not have sufficient grounds, and Irenaeus already assumed at least 40 years of age for Christ; this seems to be implied in the Gospel of John. Calculation from the creation of the world In ancient times, incomparably more than the era from R. X., the reckoning from the creation of the world was widespread - eth apó tou:' kósmou, ápó tou: _'Adám. Everyone is well aware that from the usually Byzantine era, 5508 must be subtracted from the universe in order to obtain the year from R. X. according to the era of Dionysius. The chronology of ápó tou kósmou or the era from the creation of the world is based not only on scientific research, but also on arbitrary guesswork. That the era from the creation of the world cannot be scientifically established is evident from the fact that accurate biblical digital data ceases from the time of the Babylonian captivity, and we do not have stable data to determine the period of time from the return from captivity to the reign of Herod. Therefore, when determining this period of time, chronologists, not being able to use the Bible, must turn to non-biblical sources: to the lists of Babylonian, Persian kings, Syrian or Egyptian diadochi, and then move on to the years of the Roman emperors. And when using biblical dates, it is not indifferent which biblical text the scientist will use, since the texts differ in numbers. In order to have an approximate idea of ​​the sum of years from the creation of the world to Christ, they resorted to an aprioristic theory. It is based on mystical views. According to the Bible, man was created on the 6th day; It was assumed that the creation of man occurred at noon. It is undoubtedly known that Christ died on Friday (6th day) around noon. Thus, there was a complete analogy between the creation of man and his recreation. But they didn't stop there. The psalm says that before the Lord “a thousand years are as one day” (Ps. 89:5; 2 Peter 3:8). Based on this, they decided that next to the human day there is the day of God, equal to a thousand years. If Christ recreated man at half of the 6th day, then it was assumed that this should also coincide with the order of the days of God. This gave us a round figure of about 5,500 years from the creation of the world to the death of Christ. But since chronologists, being smart people, understood that this date should not be understood in an absolutely precise sense, they used it only as an approximate one. This theory was first expressed by Julius Africanus; Hippolytus of Rome is also adjacent to it. So 5500 years represents the traditional date. It was necessary to reconcile biblical and extra-biblical dates with this figure. Ancient chronological works were reduced to this task. Since in the 15th year of the reign of Tiberius Christ was approximately 30 years old, it means that Christ was about 15 years old when Augustus died. And the death of Augustus followed on August 19, 14th year according to the era of Dionysius, in 767 according to the conventional era of Varro ab urbe condita. Therefore, Christ was born around 752 ab urbe condita. These are the hard data. For Julius Africanus 752 annus ab urbe condita is the 5500th from Adam. Eusebius of Caesarea subjected this chronology to serious criticism. Eusebius approached his work with objective historical concepts. He decided not to serve any theories, even if there was a lot of beauty in them. Thus, apologists, refuting pagan scientists who looked at Christianity as a barbaric religion, since it comes from the Jews who did not contribute anything to the general culture, said that the Old Testament culture is more ancient than all cultures that began after Moses. This theory did not seem entirely tenable to Eusebius. Based on an objective calculation of the dates of the Greek Bible, he considered it necessary to shorten the biblical chronology. The traditional number of years from the settlement of the Jews in Egypt to the exodus, 430 years, does not fit, in his opinion, with the genealogy of Moses and the longevity of man at that time. After all, he shortened the Africanus chronology by 300 years. For his era, Eusebius chooses the years from Abraham. Before Abraham, he does not find it possible to write universal history. But he firmly calculated that 3184 years had passed since the creation of the world before Abraham. Then, according to his calculations, 2015 years passed from Abraham to R. X., therefore, Christ was born in 5199. With such summary calculations, an error of one year was very possible, and the round figure of 5200 years from the creation of the world BC probably appeared before his eyes. This is how shocking the generally accepted traditional figure of 5500 years was. But in current views, the previous figure of 5500 years stood firmly. The date 5508, according to the Byzantine reckoning or katá nwmaíou_s, was only a simple, albeit very common modification of it. The change in the number 5500 to 5508 did not occur as a result of any deep research, but in the interests of chronology: thanks to this addition of 8 years, the year from the creation of the world katá rwmaíou_s, divided by 15, gives the remainder an indict, so important in Byzantine chronology. For example, the year 1899 = 7407 from the creation of the world, R (7407/15) = 12 indicta. The Byzantine scientists themselves, in their works, preferred the kat_' ále_ksandrei:'_s ("Alexandrian era") reckoning to the katá rwmaíou_s reckoning, considering this latter to be especially accurate. This reputation, however, was completely wrong. By the Alexandrian chronology, Byzantine scholars understood the Annian era, which is still used today in Egypt and Ethiopia. Therefore, the years from R. X. in modern Abyssinian documents are considered 8 less than in ours - according to the era of Dionysius. In essence, the Annian era has an absurd origin. Annian himself lived at the beginning of the 5th century A.D. and was able to perfectly calculate the day of Easter (according to the Alexandrian Paschal), but he was a scientist of very low rank. And if his era became widespread, it was mainly because people usually do not know how to understand numbers (as Mommsen correctly noted, numbers have a depressing effect on most heads). In addition, Annian so persistently denounced Eusebius of Caesarea, an Arian, for his deviations from the Bible, and shouted so loudly that his, Annian’s, reckoning was in accordance with the Word of God, that probably many were afraid to criticize his chronological system. Everything that was scientific in Annian’s objections to Eusebius, Annian borrowed from the work of his contemporary Panodorus. An Egyptian monk, like Annian, Panodorus, apparently, was very fond of the past of his fatherland, cherishing both its glory and its legends. One of the reasons for Panodorus's opposition to Eusebius's chronological system was Eusebius's contemptuous attitude towards the legendary figures in the Egyptian chronology of pseudo-Manetho [Manetho]. Panodorus, however, understood that these colossal figures cannot be reconciled with the data of the Bible; and he managed to save their credibility by shortening them and thereby eliminating their contradictions with the Bible. Otherwise, Panodorus conducted the matter like a scientist. He highly valued Ptolemy's astronomical canon and his dates, which Julius Africanus did not accept into his chronology, to Annianus' chagrin. Panodorus also used purely astronomical dates. Annian's system is, in essence, only an attempt to correct Panodorus' system and supposedly bring it into agreement with “church tradition.” Panodorus departed from Africanus's assumption and concluded that Jesus Christ was born in 5493, and not in 5501. Annian did not agree and restored the previous date. In reality, Annianus became confused during the reign of Augustus and created a colossally absurd system. Between the death of Julius Caesar and the death of Augustus, 57 years and 157 days passed. It was not all this time that Augustus ruled over Rome (he was Augustus for only 40 years and 215 [more precisely, 214] days); but the chronographs that entered the years of Augustus into their canons were forced - depending on the system - to give him either 56 or 57 years of rule over Rome. And when Irenaeus, Tertullian, Clement of Alexandria and Epiphanius say that Christ was born in the 41st or 42nd year of Augustus, they mean precisely these (conditional) years of his rule over Rome. But Augustus ruled over Alexandria for only 43 Egyptian years (anni vagi), and these 43 years were included by Ptolemy in his canon, and Panodorus borrowed them from Ptolemy. Not understanding the meaning of this difference of 14 years in counting the years of Augustus’ reign, Annianus was confused by the fact that Panodorus, giving Augustus only 43 years of rule (over Egypt), believes that this implies that Augustus died when Christ was not 15, but only 5 years old. Therefore, Annianus decided to correct Panodorus and corrected him so that it turned out that, according to Annianus, Christ died and rose again in 42 according to the era of Dionysius, i.e. under Emperor Claudius - not under Tiberius; and therefore not under Pontius Pilate. There was no other outcome for Annian: he was sure that Christ had risen on March 25; but on March 25, Easter fell in the year 31 according to the era of Dionysius = 5523 according to Annian (when Christ was only 23 years old from birth) and in 42 according to the era of Dionysius = 5534 according to Annian. The last year was the only possible one for him, like 34 AD. Hence the difference (42–34) of 8 years between the reckoning of Dionysius the Less and the reckoning of Annianus (= Copto-Abyssinian). Table of dates for various eras for the time from 44 BC to 42 AD. a) Idibus Martiis (March 15) S. Julius Caesar occisus in Capitolio. b) “K[alendis] Aug[ustis] (actually August 3rd = 8 meswri: '294 ápo Philippou) Aug[ustusAlexandr[iam] recepit.” And since by the end of 294 Cleopatra committed suicide, then the 295th year of ápo Filippou is eto_s A_' Augoústou (the first year of Augustus) in the canon of Ptolemy, is the first year of Roman rule over Egypt. c) “Ante diem XVI kalendas Februarias (January 17) imperator Caesar, Divi filius, sententia L. Munati Planci a senatu ceterisque civibus avgvstvs appelatus est se vij et M. Vipsanio Agrippa iij conss” (i.e. a. U. S. 727, in 27 BC) γ) This year Herod died after a lunar eclipse (on the night of March 12-13). d) “Anno Abraham 2015”, according to Eusebius, “Jesus Christus nascitur”; in the same year, according to Hippolytus, ΓΕΝΕΣΙΣ Х (ristou:'); according to Irenaeus (3, 24:2) and Tertullian, Christ was born in 41 August; according to Clement of Alexandria and Epiphanius - in 42 August. The same year corresponds to the year 5500 from Adam according to Julius Africanus, the year of the incarnation of Christ. e) The first year AD according to the era of Dionysius. f) Caius Julius Caesar Octavianus Augustus obiit duobus Sextis, Pompeio et Appuleio, conss. XIII cal. Septemb. (August 19 in the 5th epagomenon (i.e. on the last day) of 337 (Egyptian) ápo Filippou. Consequently, the principate of Augustus in Egypt lasted mathematically exactly - 43 years (from s_se to tlz). g) This year, according to Hippolytus, ΠΑΘΟΣ X (ristou:') (“the suffering of Christ”) on Friday March 25 and, therefore, on March 27 His resurrection from the dead. Tertull.: hujus (Tiberii Caesaris) quinto decimo anno imperil passus est Christus – coss. Rubellio Gemino et Fufio Gemino [therefore: duobus Geminis consulibus] die VIII kalendarum Aprilium. h) According to Chronicon paschale and other later Byzantines, this year on March 25th Christ was resurrected. 5532 from Adam according to S. Africanus, 16th [sic!] year of Tiberius, the year of Christ’s death on the cross (Olumpiá_s SB, 2). 5472nd year from Adam = last year of Macedonian (Cleopatra) rule + 60 years of Roman rule (hence 44 [sic!] year of Augustus + 16 of Tiberius) = 5532. – Therefore, earthly life of Christ: full 30 years before baptism + full year of the Lord pleasant = 31 years + crucifixion early next (32nd) year. i) According to Eusebius, anno Abr. 2048 J. Chr. ad passionem venit; no Panodoro, He is risen tw eфke_' etei tou:' kósmou – kat_' aiguptíou_s famenw'f k_' (March 16). k) Tiberius obiit anno tertio et vicesimo imperii, XVII kl. App Cn. Acerronio Proculo With Pontio Nigrino conss. (=March 16, 37 P. X., 790 a. U.S. = 5 farmoufi 360 étou_s ápó Filíppou). It is known that Pontius Pilate was deprived of his procuratorate and was sent to Rome for the terrible trial of Tiberius, but upon arriving in the capital, he learned that the emperor had already died. Track. sub Pontio Pilato is chronologically certainly the same as sub Tiberio Caesare. l) According to Annian, Christ was resurrected on March 25 kósmou eth efld _' = 42 AD (March 25 was on a Sunday in the 25th, 31st, 42nd and 53rd AD, it fell on the day of St. Easter (according to the Alexandrian Paschal) only in the 31st, 42nd and 53rd year). Annianus believed the birth of Christ to be either 5500 or 5501, that is, either 761 or 762 ab urbe condita. Abyssinian, Georgian and Armenian chronology Under the influence of Europeans, Abyssinia is now usually dated in years from AD, but according to the Annian reckoning, therefore, 8 years less against the era of Dionysius; the year begins on August 29. These years from R. X. they usually call “amata myhrat” = “year of goodness” (from the words of Ps. 54:11: bless the crown of the summer of Thy goodness, tou éniautou: 'th_s xrhstóthto_s sou). This can be called every year; but in the previous monuments of Ethiopian writing this was the name of a special reckoning corresponding to the reckoning by years of our great indiction or period of 532 years; therefore, the figure for the “year of grace” could never exceed 532. Dillmann translated gpgga low (amata myhrat) through annus gratiae = year of grace and made the erroneous assumption that this is the chronology from the conversion of Abyssinia to Christianity. If we denote the “summer of goodness” by x, and the year from the creation of the world according to Annian by k, then the formula will be: k- 532x = x or (k 532)R = x, meaning by x the largest integer of the possible factors, and by R the remainder: the year of goodness is the remainder from the division of the year from the creation of the world according to Annian by 532. The year of our chronology 1898 (1891 according to Annian) translated into Abyssinian counting will be: k = 1891+5500 = 7391; 7391-(13x532 = 6916) = X = 475. They also count according to the great indiction in Georgia. There this reckoning is known as “chronicon”, xronikón (“kronikoni”). Its point of departure (annus nullus) is the year 780 A.D. according to the era of Dionysius. In fact, this is the counting from the millennium of the city of Rome, which was celebrated in 248 A.D. (248 + 532 = 780). The Armenian chronology is peculiar. The Armenians have their own national chronology, according to which the starting point is considered to be the beginning of the rule of the Armenians near the Caucasus (2107 BC). But this chronology does not have solid foundations. Their church chronology dates back to 532 AD. This beginning of the Armenian chronology, obviously, was made after the Council of Chalcedon. Previous scholars (for example, Schaff) suspected that by introducing a new era in 552, the Armenians wanted to mark their final separation from the Greco-Roman Catholic Church. In reality, this era arose completely by accident. In the Armenian state, the solar annus vagus was used for 365 days. Therefore, every four years their new year rose - in the Julian fixed year - one day higher (from autumn to summer - spring - winter - autumn). Therefore, the young Armenian Church was deprived of the opportunity to take advantage of the Easter tables of the Greek Church, which were all set to the Julian (Roman or Alexandrian) fixed year, and a certain Andrew, brother of Bishop Magnus, rendered an important service to the Armenians by compiling for them a “bicentennial canon” (tomárion). It is clear that this was not an Easter circle (with annus vagus, no Easter circle is possible), but simply a list of Easters for 200 years. It began in 353 AD (Easter border on April 4, Easter on April 11) and therefore ended in 552 (Easter border on March 2, Easter on March 31). The end of St. Andrew’s “canon” plunged the Armenians into even greater confusion because in the next year, 553, the Easter border apparently fell on April 13, and not on April 4, which St. Andrew’s list began. 200 years cannot be divided without a remainder by 19. Here the 19-year circle was taken only 10 times and another 10 years were added, and therefore the cycle was not completed. The Armenians valued this circle, since it made it possible to determine the celebration of Easter, and this is very important, because if not everyone in our country can cope with the question of when Easter will be, then even more so with them, given the existence of special difficulties in calculating chronology. Armenian Catholicos Moses II convened a council in Dvina to decide on the issue of when to celebrate Easter and other moving holidays in the following years; the imagination of Armenian writers depicts it almost in the form of a world congress of Paschalists. The cathedral and continued the table. The reason for the difficulty of the Armenians regarding the calculation was mainly that they did not know and could not understand in any way the idea that a cycle of 200 years could not be correct for Easter calculations. Nevertheless, it was entrusted to the abbot of the Baptist Monastery, Athanasius, to draw up a table of numbers for the following years. Athanasius fulfilled the order, compiled a reckoning cycle, but only for 9 years, until the return of the 14th moon on April 4, 562. Therefore, in subsequent times it was necessary to agree with the Alexandrian chronology. July 11, 552, or 6 Hoi:ák 1300 of the era of Nabonassar, is the 1st Navasard of the 1st year and serves as the starting point of the Armenian chronology. In 1616 (according to our reckoning) it was possible to reduce the Armenian chronology by a multiple: 532. Then Azaria compiled a new small reckoning, known under the name of the Azariev era, which has a constant starting point on March 21 and serves as an excellent indication of the celebration of Easter. Thus, the Armenians have their own era of “goodness”, differing only in the starting point 7. Muslim chronology When working chronologically, the church historian is forced to deal even with the Muslim Hijra calendar, which begins on July 15 (Thursday) 622. Unlike the Greek and Hebrew lunar year, the Muslim lunar year is an annus vagus (movable year). Mohammed recognized the intercalary month as inconsistent with the nature of things and considered the insertion of the 13th month to be wicked, because God has only 12 months. Because of this, in the Muslim year, which, like every lunar year, is shorter by 11 days than our Julian year, the 1st Muharram (day of the new year) travels throughout the entire Julian year in order to return after 33 years to approximately its original place: 33 Muslim years are almost equal to 32 Julian (33 Muslim = 11693 days, 32 Julian = 11688 days). The Muslim cycle, established by mathematicians and astronomers, represents perfection in logical methods, but, like the lunar cycle, it diverges from the solar circle. And the historian faces a difficulty here. An example of this is one scientist who, not assuming that the Muslim year was shorter than ours, translated the dates of the Muslim era, adding 622 years, and received strange results that did not correspond to other chronological dates, which he noted in the margins. In order to get correct results, you need to multiply the year according to the Muslim era by 32, divide the product by 33, add the resulting quotient with 622 1/2, and the sum will almost always give the corresponding year of our era with sufficient accuracy. To convert the Muslim chronology to ours, there are excellent tables compiled by prof. Wüstenfeld, F. Wüstenfeld, Vergleichungstabellen der mohammedanischen und christlichen Zeitrechnung. Leipzig 1854. It should be noted that Muslim writers designated events in addition to years and numbers and days of the week. This designation was a matter of necessity for them. Although they had a technically developed calendar, life did not know such a calendar. In fact, the Arabs kept count, just like the Jews. Once two Muslims saw the new moon and declared it, then this night was considered the first day of the month. Obviously, in different places the same number did not fall on the same days. Without indicating the days of the week, Arab writers would have difficulty understanding each other. That's why Muslim chronologists set the days. This is precious for the historian. If the digit of the year or day of the month is damaged, then the damage to the date remains invisible; but the days of the week in such a case serve as a useful control and often allow the correction of an incorrect date. A fairly common source of confusion in Muslim chronology is the popular practice of calculating at the end of the month in the Roman manner: namely, indicating how many nights remain until the end of the month. Byzantine chronology according to indictions It remains to be said about the official Byzantine reckoning according to indictions, 15-year periods starting from 312 AD (indictio, índiktíwn, h' i:ndikto_s, épinémhsi_s). Its importance can be judged by the fact that it was part of the so-called mhnológhma (the Byzantine emperors, when approving a well-known decree, wrote on it instead of the “to be according to this” that is now used in Russia mhnológhma = month book, that is, they marked the month and the indictment of the edict issued in purple ink); this was the most official Byzantine calendar. The Byzantine indiction began on September 1; therefore, in order to calculate which indiction a given year belongs to, you need to add to the given year from R. X. 3 - if the indicated time falls between the first day of January and the first of September - and divide this amount by 15, the remainder will show the indiction [(a/15)R = ind]; if the remainder is zero, then it means the indiction is 15th. If we are talking about the time from September 1 to December 31, then you should add not 3, but 4 and perform the same operation. These indictions are usually called the indictions of Constantine V. The beginning, September 1, 312, was chosen well: on October 12, 312, Constantine defeated Maxentius and in March 313 issued the Edict of Mediolan. However, it is unlikely that Constantine introduced indictions into use, and there is debate about their nature. The famous Mommsen made a very unfortunate assumption. He produced indictions from indictio paschae. But this is incorrect, because indiction is equal to 15 years, and in the east there was a 19-year cycle for Easter, and in the west there was an 84-year cycle. Savigny's lawyer made a more plausible assumption, based on some facts. Indictio meant the designation of the number of taxes that should have been collected in a given year. The financial year in the Roman state thus began with an “indication” (indictio) from the emperor how much taxes needed to be collected to satisfy state needs. This decree passed to the prefects, vicars and presids, who successively divided the share of taxes falling on their prefectures, dioceses, and provinces into smaller units of taxation. And in order for the estimate to correspond to reality, a revaluation of land property was undertaken from time to time. But it did not coincide with the first indictions, and therefore Savigny’s guess does not explain everything about the origin of indictions. Apparently, the indictions are not of Roman or Byzantine origin, but were borrowed from Egypt. In modern times, mainly Viennese scholars, thanks to the large number of Egyptian papyri from the time of the conquest of Egypt, found out that the indictions are hardly a purely Roman invention, but are probably an imitation of an institution that existed even earlier in Egypt. There existed a certain thirty-year period: half of it constituted the indiction. Viennese scientists, and among them one young Slavic scientist, Wessely, thanks to their work on Egyptian papyri, came across one curious and interesting thing for church history. They noticed that when it comes to approximately our month of May, it was usually added: “at the end of the indiction”; if it is said about July, and sometimes about June, then it was written: índiktiwn arxoménh_s - “at the beginning of the indiction.” This suggested that indiction began in Egypt not on September 1, but somewhat earlier. May 25 is the earliest period of indiction. Indictions were considered special in Egypt; in one entry they are called “Nile” - indiktiwno_s Neílou arxoménh_s; they were of a purely agrarian nature, aimed at correctly determining the productivity of the land. The productivity of the land is naturally determined upon completion of agricultural work and grain harvesting, and this work is usually completed by September. But in Egypt, agricultural work ended much earlier and usually by the 12th day of the month of Pawnee (in our opinion - by the 6th day of June), on the night on which, according to the Egyptians, the first drop of dew falls, the rise of the Nile waters begins, the complete overflow of which occurs at the end of August. In this case, the Nile is an indicator for this agricultural chronology in Egypt. In Byzantium, it was natural to begin indictio in September, when the harvest ended there and state revenues were determined, and it was also determined what taxes (indictio) the country could bear. Thus, the harvest in Egypt preceded the Byzantine one, and the indiction therefore began here earlier. It is impossible to define this term precisely, but in any case, our July and August (Epifi and Mesori) and almost all of June (Pawnee) belonged to the future Byzantine indiction, while the Egyptian indiction began earlier. Thus, if we are talking about some event that took place during these months, and its time is determined by indiction, then, since it is unknown by what indiction the event is considered, the time cannot be determined accurately. If the document is of Egyptian origin, then it must be dated according to Egyptian indiction. It is curious that this discovery, made in the last decade of the 19th century, turned out to be useful for church history. The third ecumenical council was in 431 and met in July; to find out which indiction a given year belongs to, you need to add 3 to it and divide the sum by 15, the remainder of 14 will show that the meetings of the council took place during the 14th indiction. But among the documents of the council there is a letter from the Egyptian bishops, from which it is clear that the council continued its meetings on the 20th of Mesori on the 15th indiction (the 20th of Mesori corresponds to the 13th of August), and the matter, therefore, refers not to 431, but to 432. But this difference in chronology is difficult to explain by error: the numbers d_' and e_' (tetárth and pémpth, or - tessarakaidekáth and pentekaidekáth) are not so similar to each other that they can be mixed. This oddity was also noticed by Tillmon, who said that here we must assume the existence of a local chronology. The Egyptian indictions of the Nile explain this phenomenon perfectly. The Council of Ephesus took place when Byzantium counted 14 indictions, and in Egypt there were already 15 indictions. In general, with all those dates that fall in our June, July and August months, some confusion may arise. If there is reason to think that the document is from Egypt, then it must be assumed that the known event took place one year earlier than is usually accepted. It should also be noted that for the East, the indiction seemed such a state-owned Byzantine institution that in Syria it was not translated into the native language, but was only written in Syriac letters. It often turns out that the Greek words pémpth, ékth are rendered in Syriac letters - where the years of indiction are meant. If these indictions had been implemented by the church, then such a strange form of dating would not have appeared. The actual Greek form of dating according to indictions was that only the year within a given indiction was noted, but it was not indicated which indiction was from the beginning of reckoning according to indictions (from 312). This aspect of the matter presents quite significant inconveniences for determining the time of historical facts. Since the Byzantines were accustomed to determining events only by years of indictions and in no other way, then, due to the fact that a 30-year period in the life and activity of an individual is quite common, we may find it difficult with such dating to accurately determine the time of various events of his life. All attempts by the biographers of Maxim the Confessor to establish the chronology of his life do not lead to the desired result. In my opinion, the reason is that Maximus' activity exceeded a period of 15 years, and researchers confuse the disasters from the Persians and from the Arabs. Thus, if we do not have another, more accurate definition than the date of indiction, then we sometimes have to speak vaguely about the time of certain events. General information about sciences auxiliary to history, with bibliographical instructions, can be found in E. Bernheim, Lehrbuch der historischen Methode und der Geschichtsphilosophie. 3 and 4 Aufl. Leipzig 1903. A more or less detailed presentation of these disciplines is given, in addition to the special works on them indicated below, in various collective works. This is especially the case in the multi-volume manual for the study of classical antiquity, published in Munich by Iwan von Müller, Handbuch der klassischen Altertumswissenschaft herausgeg. Its first volume contains, among other things, paleography (Blass), Greek epigraphy (Larfeld) and Roman (Hübner), chronology (Unger) and metrology (Nissen). Special volumes, subdivided into separate, sometimes very large parts, are devoted to classical philology (second volume: 1. Greek grammar and lexicography - Brugmann and Conn, and Latin - Stolz-Schmalz and Heerdegen, 3. rhetoric and metrics - Volkmann-Hammer and Gleditsch) and geography and history of the ancient world (third volume: 1. geography and history of the ancient east - Hommel, 2. geography of Greece and its colonies - Oberhummer and topography of Athens - Judeich, 3. geography of Italy and Orbis Romanus - Jung and topography of Rome - Richter, 4. Greek history - Pöhlmann, and 5. Roman - Niese). Further volumes cover Greek and Roman antiquity (IV), the history of ancient philosophy, religion and cult (V), the archeology of the arts with numismatics (VI), the history of literature in Greek and Latin (VII-IX). For the church historian, the most important component in this series is part 1 of volume IX of Geschichte der byzantinischen Litteratur von Justinian bis zum Ende des oströmischen Reiches (527–1453) von K. Krumbacher. 2 Aufl. München 1897, by the way, due to the only detailed bibliographical instructions on Byzantine ancient and later history, in particular regarding the sciences auxiliary to it. The newest enterprise, Einleitung in die klassische Philologie und Altertumswissenschaft herausgeg, sets itself more modest goals. von A. Gercke und E. Norden (in two volumes, Leipzig und Berlin, Teubner). The auxiliary disciplines should receive a detailed development, in relation to Western medieval and modern history, in the recently launched series of Handbuch der Mittelalterlichen und Neueren Geschichte herausgeg. von G. von Below und F. Meinecke (München und Berlin). The condensed Grundriss der Geschichtswissenschaft zur Einführung in das Studium der deutschen Geschichte des Mittelalters und der Neuzeit herausgeg is limited to the same chronological limits, but only in relation to German history. von A. Meister (in two volumes), V. I. Leipzig und Berlin 1906. A special propaedeutics for church history with information about the sciences auxiliary to it was compiled by J. Nirschl, Propädeutik der Kirchen-geschichte. Mainz 1888; but now especially his bibliographical instructions turn out to be partly outdated. By the way, as a special auxiliary science for history, in addition to the branches of knowledge usually subsumed under this concept, historical bibliography can also be considered in the sense of a discipline that gives general necessary instructions for methodological mastery of the field of historical sources and manuals. The manual was compiled by Ch. V. Langlois, Manuel de bibliographie historique. Paris 1901–1904. (A.B.) – 42. The significance for history of the data represented by sphragistics, epigraphy and numismatics will be discussed below, in the section on monumental sources of history. Then the corresponding literature will be indicated. (A.B.) – 46. Wed. V.V. Bolotov, On the issue of Acta martyrum scilitanorum. Christ. Thurs. 1903, I, 884–885 approx. (separate print. 23–24). (A.B.) – 51. "Toit" is a month of the Egyptian calendar, approximately equal to September. (A.S.) – 86. Wed. on this issue V.V. Bolotov, Bibliographic note on the research of R. Schegg, Das Todesjahr des Königs Herodes und das Todesjahr Jesu Christi. Munich 1882. Christ. Thurs. 1882, II, 808–815. - Day and year of the martyrdom of St. Evangelist Mark. Christ. Thurs. 1893, II, 155–167 (department reprint 293–305). – Journals of the meetings of the Commission on the reform of the calendar at the Russian Astronomical Society in 1899. Appendix II, pp. 7–18. (A.B.) – 89. On the question of the relationship of the Armenian calendar to the Persian calendar, see V.V. Bolotov, From the history of the Syro-Persian Church. Excursion D: Persian calendar. Christ. Reading, 1901, 1, 439–515 (separate reprint 127–167). Wed. ibid., excursion E: Church Year of the Syrochaldeans. 937–949 (169–199). (A.B.) – 102. You might be interested in: