The Greater Chronicle
T H E G R E A T E R C H R O N IC L E
T H E G R E A T E R C H R O N IC L E
T H E S I X T H A G E
T h e forty-second year of Caesar Augustus, and the twenty-seventh from the death of Cleopatra and Antonius, when Egypt was turned into a [Roman] province; third year of the one hundred the ninety-third Olympiad;* seven hundred and fifty-second from the foundation of the City [of Rome]; that is to say that year in which all the movements of peoples throughout the world were held in check, and by God's ordaining Caesar established a very real and lasting peace;
Jesus Christ the Son of God consecrated the Sixth Age of the world by his coming.
In the forty-seventh year of Augustus, Herod died appro priately awfully: sick with water under the skin and with worms swarming throughout all his body. In his place
Augustus established his son Archelaus, who ruled for nine years, up till the end of the reign of Augustus. Then he was exiled to the city of Vienne in Gaul because of the accusations made against him to Augustus concerning his cruelty towards the Jews. To reduce the power of the Jewish kingdom and its insolent behaviour, his four brothers—Herod, Antipater,
Lysias, and Philip—were set up as tetrarchs in his place; of these Philip and Herod (previously called Antipas) had already been appointed as tetrarchs while Archelaus was still alive.
Tiberius the stepson of Augustus, that is to say the son of the latter's wife Livia by a previous marriage, ruled for twenty-three years.
In the twelfth year of his reign Pilatus was sent by him to be procurator of Judaea.
Herod the tetrarch, who held the leadership of the Jews for twenty-four years, founded [the cities of] Tiberias and Livias in honour of Tiberius and his mother Livia.
In the fifteenth year of Tiberius, following his baptism which John had predicted, the Lord announced the kingdom
The Greater Chronicle of heaven to the world. As Eusebius indicates in his chronicle, this happened in the four thousandth year from the beginning of the world, according to the Hebrew system of years. It should also be noted that the sixteenth year of Tiberius was the eighty-first Jubilee, according to the Hebrews. Why our computation* should make it nineteen years less may easily be discovered by reading the previous parts of this book.
According to either version of that chronicle which Eusebius composed, it seemed to him that the years [from Creation] are five thousand two hundred and twenty-eight.
In the eighteenth year of Tiberius the Lord redeemed the world by his passion; and in order to preach throughout the regions of Judaea the Apostles ordained James the brother of the Lord to be bishop of Jerusalem together with seven deacons; after the stoning of Stephen the Church was scat tered throughout the regions of Judaea and Samaria.
Agrippa sumamed Herod, son of Aristobulus the son of king Herod, having arrived in Rome as the accuser of the tetrarch Herod, was thrown into prison by Tiberius; where many made friends of him, especially Gaius the son of Germanicus.
Gaius, known as Caligula, ruled for four years, ten months, and eight days.
He released his friend Herod Agrippa from chains and made him king of Judaea, where he ruled for seven years; which is to say until the fourth year of Claudius. Then, having been struck by an angel, he was succeeded on the throne by his son Agrippa, who continued in office for twenty-six years, right up to the destruction of the Jews.
Herod the tetrarch, who also sought the friendship of Gaius, came to Rome on the advice of Herodias. However, being accused by Agrippa he was deprived of his office of tetrarch; fleeing to Spain with Herodias he died there in poverty.
Pilatus, who had spoken the sentence of condemnation on Christ, was so subjected to vexations by Gaius that he killed himself.
Gaius, placing himself amongst the gods, prophaned the holy places of Judaea with the uncleanness of idols.
The Greater Chronicle Matthew, preaching in Judaea, wrote his Gospel.
Claudius [ruled for] thirteen years, seven months, and twenty-eight days.
Having first of all established the Church in Antioch, Peter the Apostle came to Rome, where for twenty-five years he held the episcopal throne; up to the last year of the reign of Nero.
Mark wrote his Gospel at Rome and was sent by Peter to preach in Egypt.
In the fourth year of Claudius a very severe famine oc curred, which is recorded by Luke.* In the same year the emperor conquered Britain, which no one had dared invade before Julius Caesar or since his time.
Without battle or bloodshed he brought the greater part of the island under his rule in the course of very few days. He also added the Orkney islands to the empire, and he returned to Rome in the sixth month after he had set out.
In the ninth year of his reign the Jews were expelled from Rome for rioting, as Luke reports.* The following year a great famine gripped Rome.
Nero [reigned for] thirteen years, seven months, and twenty-eight days.
In his second year Festus took over as procurator of Judaea from Felix, who had sent Paul to Rome. There he had been held in 'free custody' [house arrest] for two years, before being set free to preach; while Nero committed those great crimes that history records of him.
In the seventh year of Nero James the brother of the Lord, having ruled the Church of Jerusalem for thirty years, was stoned to death by the Jews, who revenged themselves on him because they had been prevented from killing Paul.
Albinus Florus succeeded Festus in the governorship of Judaea. Because they could not stand his extravagance and greed and other vices, the Jews rebelled against the Romans.
Vespasian was sent against them as Master of the Soldiers and captured many of the towns of Judaea.
On top of his other crimes Nero now persecuted the Chris tians; of their leaders in Rome he had Peter crucified and Paul killed by the sword.
The Greater Chronicle This emperor attempted nothing of a military kind, and even nearly lost Britain; where two of the finest towns were captured and sacked.
Vespasian [ruled for] nine years, eleven months, and twenty-two days.
He had been declared emperor by his army in Judaea, and leaving the war there to his son Titus, he returned to Rome via Alexandria. In the second year [of the reign] Titus de stroyed the kingdom of Judaea and also the temple, one thousand and eighty-nine years after it was first built. This war took four years: two while Nero was still living and two more after him.
Vespasian, amongst other mighty deeds while still a private citizen, was sent by Claudius to Germany and thence to Britain, fighting thirty-two battles. He added two powerful peoples, twenty towns, and the Isle of Wight, near Britain, to the empire.
He erected a Colossus one hundred and seven feet high.
Titus [ruled for] two years and two months.
He was a man so admirable in all forms of virtue that he might have been dedicated to the love of humanity.
He built the amphitheatre in Rome, and in its dedication killed five thousand wild beasts.
Domitian the younger brother of Titus [reigned for] sixteen years and five months.
He, after Nero, was the second emperor to persecute the Christians. Under his rule the Apostle John was exiled to the isle of Patmos, and Flavia Domitilla, niece by his sister of the consul Flavius Clemens, was exiled to the island of Pontia for her proclaiming of the faith.
That same John,* it is said, was placed in a vat of boiling oil, but had attained to such freedom from pain that he remained always immune to corruption of the flesh.
Nerva [ruled for] one year, four months, and eight days.
In his first edict he recalled the exiles; hence the Apostle John, freed in this general pardon, returned to Ephesus.
Because he saw that the faith of the Church had been attacked by heretics during his absence, he immediately made it firm
The Greater Chronicle by describing the eternal nature of the Word of God in his
Gospel.
Trajan [reigned for] nineteen years, six months, and fifteen days.
The Apostle John died peacefully at Ephesus in the sixtyeighth year after the Passion of the Lord and in the ninetyeighth year of his life.
When Trajan started a persecution of the Christians, Simeon (also known as Simon), the son of Cleophas, the bishop of Jerusalem, was crucified.
Ignatius the bishop of Antioch was brought to Rome and thrown to the wild beasts.
Alexander the bishop of Rome was also crowned by martyr dom. He was buried on the Via Nomentana at the seventh milestone from the city, where he was beheaded.
The younger Pliny, the orator and historian from Como, lived at this time; many works of his genius have survived.
The Pantheon at Rome, which Domitian built, was burnt by lightning; it received this name because it was intended to be the dwelling-place of all the gods.
The Jews, plotting a revolt throughout many lands, suffered a much-deserved slaughter.
Trajan extended in all directions the frontiers of the Roman empire, which since Augustus had been defended rather than nobly expanded.
Hadrian the son of Trajan's female cousin [ruled for] twenty-one years.
Because he had read the books composed on the Christian religion, thanks to Quadratus the disciple of the Apostles and to Aristides the Athenian, both men full of faith and wisdom, and to the legate Serenus Granius, he ordered in a letter that the Christians should not be condemned without proper accusation of criminal offences.
He completely vanquished the Jews, in rebellion for the second time, with a final slaughter, and also denied them permission to enter Jerusalem. He restored the walls of the city to their finest state, and ordered it to be called Aelia after himself.
The Greater Chronicle He himself, being most learned in both languages [Latin and Greek], built an extraordinarily fine library in Athens.
Mark was the first non-Jew to be made bishop of Jerusalem, thus ending the line of fifteen Jewish bishops extending for one hundred and seven years from the Passion of the Lord.
Antoninus, called Pius, together with his sons Aurelius and Lucius, [ruled for] twenty-two years and three months.
The philosopher Justin gave Antoninus the book that he had composed on the Christian religion, and made him benevolent towards the Christians. Not long after, being per secuted by Crescens the Cynic [philosopher], he shed his blood for Christ.
In the time of Pius bishop of Rome, Hermes wrote the book called The Pastor, in which is contained the command of the Angel that Easter should be celebrated on Sunday.
Polycarp, on coming to Rome, censured for their heretical stain those many people who had recently been corrupted by the teachings of Valentinus and Cerdo.
4 131 Marcus Antoninus Verus [ruled] with his brother Lucius Aurelius Commodus for nineteen years and one month.
From the first they administered the empire with equal authority, although until that time there had only ever been single emperors.
They carried on war against the Parthians with great skill and success.
Persecution having broken out in Asia, Polycarp and Pionius were martyred; in Gaul too, many also gloriously shed their blood for Christ.
Not long after a plague, the avenger of evil deeds, devas tated many provinces, especially Italy and the city of Rome.
His brother Commodus having died, Antoninus made his own son [also called] Commodus his colleague as emperor.
Melitus of Asia, the bishop of Sardis, gave the emperor Antoninus his Apology for the Christians.
Lucius the king of Britain* sent a letter to bishop Eleutherius of Rome, seeking to be made a Christian.
At this time there lived Apollinaris of Asia the bishop of Hierapolis, and Dionysius bishop of Corinth.
The Greater Chronicle 4 131 Lucius Antoninus Commodus ruled for thirteen years after the death of his father.
He carried out a successful war against the Germans, but otherwise he was given over to all forms of extravagance and obscenity and had none of his father's virtue and piety.
Irenaeus the worthy bishop of Lyons lived at this time.
The emperor Commodus ordered the head of the Colossus removed and replaced it with a copy of his own.
Aelius Pertinax [ruled for] six months.
He was treacherously killed in the palace through the wicked plot of Julian, a lawyer, who seven months after he had begun to rule was [himself] defeated in battle by Severus at the Milvian bridge and killed.
Victor the thirteenth bishop of Rome sent pamphlets every where, ordering that Easter should be celebrated on the Sunday falling between the fifteenth and the twenty-first day of the lunar month, as [had been the practice] in the time of his predecessor Eleutherius.
Supporting this decree, Theophilus bishop of Caesarea in Palestine together with other bishops present at the same council, wrote a very useful synodical letter against those who celebrated Easter on the fourteenth day of the lunar month alongside the Jews.
Severus Pertinax [ruled for] seventeen years.
Clement a priest of Alexandria and Panthenus a Stoic philosopher held a very eloquent debate concerning the doctrines of our faith.
Narcissus bishop of Jerusalem, Theophilus bishop of Caesarea, and Polycarp and Bachylus, both bishops of the province of Asia, were all notable at this time.
There were many persecutions of the Christians through out various provinces; amongst those receiving the crown of martyrdom was Leonidas the father of Origen.
After Clodius Albinus, who had made himself Caesar, was killed at Lyons, Severus campaigned in Britain; where in order to make the provinces more secure from barbarian incursions he built a great ditch and wall,* closely set with watch-towers, that stretched for one hundred and thirty-two miles from sea to sea. He died at York.
The Greater Chronicle Perpetua and Felicitas were thrown to the beasts for Christ in the arena at Carthage in Africa on 7 March.
Antoninus called Caracalla, the son of Severus, [ruled for] seven years.
When Alexander bishop of Cappadocia came to Jerusalem out of desire [to visit] the holy places, at the time that Nar cissus, then in extreme old age, was still bishop, he was installed as bishop there, following a revelation from the Lord that this should happen.
Tertullian the African, son of a centurion of [the province of Africa] Proconsularis was praised in the report of all of the churches.
Macrinus [reigned for] one year.
Abgar the holy man ruled at Edessa, as Africanus wanted.
Macrinus together with his son Diadumenian, with whom he had usurped the empire, were killed in a military revolt at Archilaides.
Marcus Aurelius Antoninus [ruled for] four years.
In Palestine the city of Nicopolis, previously called Emmaeus, was [re] founded; Julius Africanus, a writer of that period, was given the commission to do so. This is that Emmaeus which the Lord thought worthy to sanctify by his entry [i.e. presence] after his resurrection, as Luke records.*
Bishop Hippolytus was the author of many works; he brought the Measure of Time which he wrote up to the present.
His discovering of the sixteen-year Easter cycle gave Eusebius the opportunity to compose a nineteen-year cycle on the basis of it.
Aurelius Alexander [reigned for] thirteen years.
He was devoted to his mother Mammaea and most likeable in all respects.
Urban the bishop of Rome led many to the faith of Christ and to martyrdom.
Origen of Alexandria was renowned throughout the world.
Hence Mammaea the mother of Alexander wished to hear him and received him at Antioch with the highest honour.
Maximin [ruled for] three years.
He carried out a persecution of the bishops and clergy of the churches, that is to say of the teachers, largely because the
The Greater Chronicle family of Alexander, whom he had succeeded, and of his mother Mammaea, were Christian; above all thanks to the priest Origen.
Pontianus and Antherus, bishops of the city of Rome, were crowned with martyrdom and buried in the cemetery of Calixtus.
Gordian [reigned for] six years.
Julius Africanus was notable amongst the authors of the Church, who in the chronicles that he wrote referred to himself as hastening to Alexandria on account of the very celebrated reputation of Heraclia, who was said to be most learned in divine and philosophical studies and in all Greek learning.
In Caesarea in Palestine Origen taught divine philosophy to the [two] young brothers from Pontus: Theodore (known as Gregory) and Athenodorus, who later became most noble bishops.
Philip together with his son Philip [ruled for] seven years.
He was the first of all emperors to be a Christian,* and the third year of his reign marked the thousandth year from the founding of Rome. Thus, this most august of all anniversaries of past events was celebrated with magnificent games by a Christian emperor.
Origen replied in eight volumes to a certain Epicurean philosopher called Celsus, who had written against our books.
He, if I may put it briefly, was so prolific in writing that Jerome somewhere indicates* that five thousand books of his are available for reading.
Decius [ruled for] one year and three months.
He launched a persecution of the Christians out of hatred of the Philips, both father and son, whom he had killed. In this, Fabian the bishop of Rome was crowned with martyr dom. He left his see to Cornelius, who was also martyred.
Alexander the bishop of Jerusalem was killed at Caesarea in Palestine and Babylas at Antioch. This persecution, as Dionysius bishop of Alexandria indicates, did not arise from an imperial command, but, as he says, 'A servant of the demons, who in our city was considered to be divine, stirred
The Greater Chronicle up the pagan crowds against us for a whole year before the imperial edicts were issued.'
Gallus with his son Volusian [ruled for] two years and four months.
Of this emperor, Dionysius the bishop of Alexandria re ported that he was neither able to see or to guard against Decius' mistake, but tripped up over the same stone. Just when his reign was prospering in its opening stages and every thing was going according to his will, he persecuted the holy men who were praying to Almighty God for the peace of his rule, and with them both peace and his prosperity took flight.
Origen, not having quite completed the seventieth year of his age, died and was buried in the city of Tyre.
Cornelius the bishop of Rome, at the request of a certain lady called Lucina, moved the bodies of the Apostles from the catacombs at night. On 29 June he reburied the body of Paul on the road to Ostia where he had been beheaded, and that of Peter in the place in which he had been crucified, among the bodies of the holy bishops in the temple of Apollo on Monte
Aurelio in the Vatican palace of Nero.
Valerian [ruled] with his son Gallienus [for] fifteen years.
He, having started a persecution of the Christians, was almost immediately captured by Shapur [I] king of the Persians. There, deprived of light, he grew old in miserable slavery. Hence Gallienus, terrified by so clear a sign of divine judgement, restored peace to us [the Christians]. However, thanks to his own libidinous nature and his father's war against God [i.e. the persecution], the Roman empire suf fered numerous losses from barbarians and rebels. In that persecution Cyprian the bishop of Carthage, whose writings are most learned, was crowned with martyrdom; his life and passion were recorded by his deacon Pontius, who up to the day of his death had shared his exile.
Theodore, called Gregory, the bishop of Neocaesarea in Pontus, of whom we wrote above, shone in a great glory of miracles. One of these involved his moving of a mountain by his prayers to provide the space needed for the foundation of a church.
The Greater Chronicle Stephen and Sixtus, bishops of Rome, died as martyrs.
Claudius [reigned for] one year and nine months.
He overcame the Goths, who had been ravaging Illyria and Macedonia for the previous fifteen years. For this a golden shield was erected to [honour] him in the Senate house and a golden statue of him set up on the Capitol.
Marcion, a most fluent priest of the church of Antioch, who also taught rhetoric in the same city, argued against Paul of Samosata the bishop of Antioch, who was teaching that Christ had the same nature as man; this dialogue, recorded by notaries, still survives today.
Aurelian [ruled for] five years and six months.
After he had initiated a persecution of us, lightning struck the ground in front of him, to the great terror of the by standers, and not long after he was killed by some soldiers while travelling on the old road between Constantinople and Heraclea, at a place called Caenofrurium.
Eutychius bishop of Rome was crowned with martyrdom and buried in the cemetery of Calixtus, where he himself had buried three hundred and thirteen martyrs with his own hand.
Tacitus [reigned for] six months.
After he had been killed in Pontus, Florian held the im perial office for eighty-eight days and was killed at Tarsus.
Anatolius, an Alexandrian by birth and bishop of Laodicaea in Syria, who was very learned in the disciplines of phil osophy, was widely renowned. The greatness of his genius may most easily be learnt from the book that he wrote on Easter and from his ten books on the principles of mathematics.
The crazy heresy of the Manichees was bom at this time.
Probus [mied for] six years and four months.
Through many severe battles he finally freed the Gallic provinces, which had long been occupied by the barbarians.
The second year of his reign, as we can read in the chron icle of Eusebius, was equivalent to the three hundred and twenty-fifth year of the Antiochenes, the four hundred and second of the Tyrians, the three hundred and twenty-fourth of the Laodicaeans, the five hundred and eighty-eighth of the Edessans, the three hundred the eightieth of the city of
The Greater Chronicle Ascalon, and the beginning of the eighty-sixth Jubilee for the Hebrews, which means their four thousand seven hundred and fiftieth year.
Archelaus bishop of Mesopotamia wrote an account in Syriac of the debate he had with a Manichee who had come from Persia; translated into Greek, this became known to many.
Cams [reigned] with his sons Carinus and Numerian [for] two years.
Gaius, who later died as a martyr under Diocletian, was an illustrious bishop of Rome.
Pierius priest of Alexandria under bishop Theon taught the people with great distinction; so eloquent were his words and his various treatises, which have survived to the present, that he was called 'the younger Origen'. He was very frugal and desirous of personal poverty; after the persecution he spent the rest of his life in Rome.
Diocletian [mied] with Herculius Maximianus for twenty years.
Carausius, having assumed the purple, took control of the British provinces; Narseh king of the Persians began a war in the East; the 'Five Peoples' invaded Africa; Achilleus seized power in Egypt; for these reasons Constantius and Galerius
Maximianus were made co-emperors.
Constantius married Theodora the stepdaughter of Herculius, by whom he had the six half-brothers of Con stantine. Galerius married Valeria the daughter of Diocletian.
After ten years the British provinces were regained by the praetorian prefect Asclepiodotus.
In the seventeenth year of their reign Diocletian in the East and Maximian in the West ordered the churches to be de stroyed and the Christians killed.
In the second year of the persecution Diocletian abdicated at Nicomedia and Maximian at Milan. However, once begun the persecution did not cease to rage until the seventh year of the reign of Constantine. Constantius, a man of great affa bility and mildness, died in Britain, at York, in the sixteenth year of his reign.
3 1 8
The Greater Chronicle This persecution was so savage and cruel that in the course of a single month it was found that seventeen thousand had died as martyrs for Christ.
It even crossed the Channel to Britain, where Alban, Aaron, and Julius, together with many other men and women, were condemned to that happy fate.
The priest Pamphilus, a relative of bishop Eusebius of Caesarea, was martyred; the latter wrote a life of him in three books.
In the third year of the persecution, after the death of Constantius, Maximin and Severus were made Caesars by Galerius Maximianus. Of these, Maximin in his malice and debauchery extended the persecution of the Christians.
In this tempest Peter bishop of Alexandria was martyred along with many other Egyptian bishops; as was Lucianus a priest of Antioch, who was outstanding in his character and in his erudition, and Timothy, who was killed at Rome on 22
June.
Constantine, the son of Constantius by his concubine Helena, was made emperor in Britain; he ruled for thirty years and ten months.
In the fourth year from the beginning of the persecution Maxentius, the son of Herculius Maximianus, was made
Augustus in Rome.
Licinius, the husband of Constantia the sister of Constantine, was made emperor at Carnuntum.
Constantine turned* from a persecutor into a Christian.
The Catholic faith was set forth at the Council of Nicaea in the six hundred and thirty-sixth year after Alexander, on the nineteenth day of the Greek month of Desi, which is 22 June, in the consulship of Paulinus and Julian, viri clarissimi.
Constantine built in Rome, where he was baptized, the basilica of St John the Baptist, which was called the Constantinian basilica. He also built a basilica dedicated to the blessed Peter on the site of the temple of Apollo; and also to the blessed Paul; whose bodies he surrounded with copper five feet thick. He built another [basilica] in the Sosorian
Palace, which became known as the basilica of Jerusalem,
The Greater Chronicle where he deposited a piece of the wood of the Lord's cross.
He built a basilica dedicated to the holy martyr Agnes at the request of his daughter, together with a baptistery in the same place, where his sister Constantia was baptized together with the emperor's daughter. He built another basilica dedicated to the blessed martyr Laurence in the field of Veranus on the Via Tiburtina, and another, between two laurel trees on the Via Levicana, was dedicated to the blessed martyrs Peter and Marcellinus; he also built a mausoleum where he placed his mother in a purple sarcophagus. He built another basilica, dedicated to the holy Apostles Peter and Paul and John the Baptist, in the town of Ostia, next to the port of the city of Rome. He dedicated another basilica in the town of Alba to St John the Baptist, and built another one in the city of Naples.
Constantine, restoring the town of Deprana in Bithynia in honour of the martyr Lucian, who was bom there, renamed it Helenopolis after his mother. He also wished to make the city in Thrace which he had given his own name [i.e.
Constantinople] the seat of the imperial government and the capital of the East.
He ordered the temples of the pagans to be closed, without any killing.
Constantius ruled for twenty-four years, six months, and thirteen days, with his brothers Constantine and Constans.
James bishop of Nisibis was widely known; by his prayers the city was often saved from disaster.
The Arian heresy, sustained by the leadership of the em peror Constantius, persecuted Athanasius first of all and then all bishops not of its party with exile, imprisonment, and various types of affliction.
Maximinus bishop of the Treveri [of Trier] was outstand ing; he received bishop Athanasius of Alexandria with honour at the time that Constantius wished to punish him.
The monk Anthony died as a solitary in his one hundred and fifth year.
The relics of the Apostle Timothy were brought to Constantinople.
The Greater Chronicle After Constantius had visited Rome, the bones of the Apostle Andrew and of Luke the Evangelist were received by the Constantinopolitans with extraordinary excitement.
Bishop Hilary of Poitiers who had been driven from his see by the Arians and exiled to Phrygia, returned to Gaul when a book was presented for him to Constantius in Constantinople.
4316 Julian [reigned] for two years and eight months.
Julian, having converted to the worship of idols, persecuted the Christians.
The pagans broke into the tomb of John the Baptist in the city of Sebaste in Palestine and scattered his bones; after these had been collected up again they burnt them and scattered them more widely. But by the providence of God there were some monks from Jerusalem there, who, gathering together whatever they could, brought them, all mixed together, as an offering to their father [i.e. abbot] Philip. He at once sent them by his deacon Julian to the senior bishop, who was then
Athanasius [of Alexandria]. Inspired by the spirit of prophecy he preserved what he had received for future generations by burying the relics in a hole under the sanctuary wall in the presence of a few witnesses.
4317 Jovian [ruled for] eight months.
A synod was held at Antioch by Melitius and his sup porters, in which, having rejected homousion as a compromise, they upheld the homoeousion of the Macedonians.
Jovian, warned by the fall of his predecessor Constantius, in most courteous and respectful letters requested Athanasius to advise him on the nature of his beliefs and on the manner in which the Church should be organized. But an early death put an end to his pious and happy tenure of the imperial throne.
432» Valentinian [ruled] with his brother Valens for eleven years.
Apollinaris bishop of Laodicaea composed a variety of works on our religion, but later deviating from true belief he created the heresy that bears his name.
Damasus bishop of Rome built the basilica of Saint Laurence next to the theatre, and another in the catacombs
The Greater Chronicle where the holy bodies of the Apostles Peter and Paul had lain.
In that place he ornamented with verses the tomb covering itself where the holy bodies had lain.
Valens persecuted us, having been baptized by Eudoxius, a bishop of the Arians.
Gratian, the son of Valentinian, was made emperor at Amiens in his third year.
The Martyrium of the Apostles at Constantinople was dedicated.
After the peaceful death of Auxentius, Ambrose was made bishop of Milan; he converted all Italy to the true belief.
Hilary bishop of Poitiers died.
Valens, together with Gratian and with Valentinian, the son of his brother Valentinian, [ruled for] four years.
Valens issued a law that monks should serve in the army; those who refused he ordered to be beaten to death.
The people of the Huns, who had long dwelt secluded in inaccessible mountains, struck by madness, suddenly broke out against the Goths, and scattering them hither and thither expelled them from their ancient settlements. Having crossed the Danube, the Goths were received by Valens as fugitives, without being made to surrender their arms; soon they were driven to rebel because of the greed of duke Maximus, and having defeated Valens' army they spread themselves throughout Thrace with massacres, burnings, and rapine.
Gratian [ruled] with his brother Valentinian [for] six years.
Theodosius was made emperor by Gratian, and in many fierce battles defeated the greatest of those Scythian peoples, that is to say the Alans, the Huns, and the Goths.
Being unable to win his support, the Arians relinquished the churches which they had held by force for forty years.
A synod of one hundred and fifty bishops under bishop Damasus of Rome was held in the Augustan city against Macedonius.
Theodosius made his son Arcadius his colleague as em peror. In the second year of Gratian's reign, in his sixth consulship* [recte fifth] and that of Theodosius, Theophilus wrote his paschal computus.
The Greater Chronicle Maximus, a most active and upright man, who would have been worthy to be an emperor if he had not broken his oath of allegiance to make himself one by usurpation, was invited to Britain and there made emperor in that fashion by the army. He crossed into Gaul, and there deceived and killed the emperor Gratian at Lyons, and expelled his brother
Valentinian from Italy. The latter very justly underwent the penalty of exile together with his mother Justina, because he had polluted himself with the Arian heresy and had harassed Ambrose, the most eminent bulwark of the Catholic faith, by a treacherous siege; not until the relics of the blessed martyrs Gervasius and Protasius were revealed by God and discovered incorrupt did he abandon his wicked undertakings.
Theodosius, who had already ruled the East for six years while Gratian was alive, reigned for eleven years after his death.
He received Valentinian, who had been expelled from Italy, kindly. They killed the usurper Maximus at the third milestone from Aquileia.
He [Maximus] had also despoiled Britain of almost all of its armed youth and military forces, who had followed in the footprints of the tyrant to Gaul. Seeing them not returning, some very savage overseas nations—the Irish from the north west and the Piets from the north— came into the island thus abandoned by its soldiers and defenders, and oppressed, devastated, and pillaged it.* Jerome, the interpreter of sacred history, wrote a book about the most illustrious men of the Church, which he brought up to the fourteenth year of Theodosius' reign over the empire.
Arcadius, the son of Theodosius [ruled] with his brother Honorius for thirteen years.
The bodies of the holy prophets Habacuc and Micah were uncovered by divine revelation.
The Goths entered Italy and the Vandals and Alans entered the Gallic provinces.
Innocent bishop of Rome dedicated the basilica of the blessed martyrs Gervasius and Protasius, out of the
The Greater Chronicle testamantary bequest of a certain illustrious lady called Vestina.
Pelagius the Briton impugned the grace of God.
Honorius [ruled] with Theodosius the Younger, the son of his brother, for fifteen years.
Alaric the king of the Goths broke into Rome and burnt part of it on 24 August in the one thousand one hundred and sixty-fourth year from its foundation; on the sixth day after his entry he left the looted city.
In the seventh year of the reign of Honorius, God revealed to the priest Lucian the place of burial of the relics of the blessed protomartyr Stephen and of Gamaliel and Nicodemus, about whom it is possible to read in the Gospel and in the Acts of the Apostles. He wrote an account of that discovery in Greek for the whole Church.
The priest Avitus, a man of Spanish birth, translated that account into Latin, and adding a letter of his own sent it to the West by the priest Orosius. That Orosius had been sent by Augustine to Jerome to learn about the nature of the soul; when he came to the holy places he received the relics of the blessed Stephen and returning home was the first to bring them to the West.
The Britons,* unable to put up with the problem of the Irish and the Piets, sent to Rome and, promising their sub mission, begged for help against the enemy. A legion was immediately sent to them which overthrew the great horde of barbarians and expelled others from the borders of Britain.
On preparing to return home it ordered the allies [i.e. the Britons], for the purpose of keeping out the enemy, to build a wall across the island between the two seas. Lacking a master builder, this was built from turf rather than stone and the work was not carried out by trained men. Soon, when the Romans had departed, the former enemy came in ships and trampled on anything that stood in their way, devouring it like ripe com. Their help having been sought again, the Romans rushed across [the Channel] and defeating the enemy, put them to flight across the seas. From fear of this enemy, they gathered together the Britons and built [another] wall from sea to sea, not as before out of crumbly earth but in solid
The Greater Chronicle stone, between the towns that were sited there. But on the southern shores, because they also feared the enemy coming from the sea there, they established towers at intervals over looking the sea. Then, saying farewell to their allies, they left, not intending to return again.
Boniface bishop of Rome built a chapel in the cemetery of Saint Felicitas, and decorated her sepulchre and that of Saint
Silvanus.
The priest Jerome died on 30 September in the twelfth year of Honorius in his ninety-first year.
Theodosius the Younger, the son of Arcadius, [ruled for] twenty-six years.
Valentinian the younger, son of Constantius, was made emperor at Ravenna.
His mother Placidia was entitled Augusta.
The savage race of the Vandals, the Alans, and the Goths, crossing from Spain into Africa, overturned everything with iron, flames, and rapine, and also with the Arian heresy.
But, lest he see the ruin of his city, the blessed Augustine, bishop of Hippo and foremost doctor of the Church, went to the Lord on 28 August in the third month of the siege, having lived for seventy-six years and having completed nearly forty years in the clergy and as a bishop. At this time, the Vandals, having captured Carthage, also destroyed Sicily.
Paschasinus bishop of Lilybaeum referred to its capture in the letter which he sent to pope Leo about the calculation of Easter.
In the eighth year of Theodosius, Palladius was ordained and sent by pope Celestine to the Irish who believed in Christ, to be their first bishop.
When the Irish and the Piets discovered that the Roman army had left Britain with no intention of returning, they came back again themselves and captured the whole of the island from its indigenous inhabitants, from the far north right up to the wall. Without delay, and with the guardians of the wall defeated, captive, or fugitive and it itself broken, the savage pirates also proceeded through it. In the twenty-third year of the reign of the emperor Theodosius, a letter was sent bearing their [i.e. the Britons'] tears and groans to the most
3 2 5
The Greater Chronicle powerful of the Romans, Aetius thrice consul, seeking help.
Meanwhile a terrible and very notorious famine attacked the fugitives. Because of this some were forced to surrender to the enemy, but others fought back vigorously from the moun tains, caves, and forests, and gave the enemies a defeat. The Irish returned home, though shortly to come back again. The Piets kept hold of the far [i.e. northern] part of the island for the first time and inhabited it thereafter. The above-men tioned hunger was followed by a great opulence of the fruits of the earth, the opulence by luxury and neglect, the neglect by a very severe pestilence, and soon a fiercer plague of new enemies, that is to say the Angles. These they [the Britons] had chosen, by unanimous agreement with their king Vortigem, to invite in as defenders of [their] homeland; but they soon realized that the men they had chosen were attackers and conquerors.
Sixtus the bishop of Rome built the basilica of Saint Mary the mother of the Lord, which the ancients called that of Liberius.
Eudoxia the wife of the emperor Theodosius returned from Jerusalem, bringing with her the relics of the most blessed
Stephan the first martyr, that had been placed for veneration in the basilica of Saint Laurence.
The brothers Bleda and Attila, kings of many peoples, depopulated Illyria and Thrace.
Marcian and Valentinian [ruled for] seven years.
The people of the Angles or of the Saxons came to Britain in three longships; as their undertaking prospered, the fame of it was carried back home. They sent for a stronger army, which, joined to the previous one, first of all drove away the enemy that they were seeking [i.e. the Piets and Irish]. Next, turning their arms on their allies, they subjugated virtually the whole of the island by fire or the sword, from the eastern shore as far as the western one, offering as their excuse that the Britons had given them less than sufficient salary for their military services.
John the Baptist revealed [the location of] his head, next to a former dwelling of king Herod, to two eastern monks who
The Greater Chronicle had come to Jerusalem to pray. It was then taken to the city of Emesa in Phoenicia and venerated with appropriate honour.
The Pelagian heresy* disturbed the faith of the Britons, who having sought help from the Gallic bishops, received
Germanus the bishop of Autun and Lupus, equally by apos tolic grace, bishop of Treves as the defenders of the faith. The bishops strengthened the faith by the word of truth and at the same time by miraculous signs. Having gathered some men they checked the campaign of the Saxons and Piets against the Britons by a divine miracle; with Germanus himself as their war-leader, the enemy was forced to flee panic-striken, not by the noise of the tuba but by the crying of Alleluia by the voice of the whole army raised to the stars. He [Germanus] then came to Ravenna, where having been received with the utmost reverence by Valentinian [III] and Placidia, he mi grated to Christ. His body was brought to Autun in a proces sion of honour, accompanied by the working of miracles.
The patrician Aetius, the saviour of the Western empire and the terror of king Attila, was killed by Valentinian; with him fell the Western realm,* and up till today it has not had the strength to be revived.
Leo [ruled for] seventeen years.
He sent individual letters in support of the Chalcedonian Tome to all the bishops throughout the world, requesting them to write to him. He received the written agreement of them all concerning the true Incarnation of Christ— as if all had been written at one time and at one command.
Theodoret, bishop of the city called Cyrus, after its founder the Persian king Cyrus, wrote about the true Incarnation of the Saviour against Eutyches and Dioscorus, bishops of Alexandria, who denied the human in the flesh of Christ. He also wrote an Ecclesiastical History [covering the period] from the end of Eusebius' work up to his own time; which is to say up to the reign of Leo, under whom he died.
Victorius, at the request of pope Hilarius, wrote a paschal cycle of five hundred and thirty-two years.
Zeno [ruled for] seventeen years.
The Greater Chronicle The body of the Apostle Barnabas and the Gospel of Matthew written by his own hand were found through their own revelation.
Odoacer king of the Goths gained control of Rome, which their kings then held for a long time.
After the death of Theoderic the son of Triarius, another Theoderic, known as Valamer, obtained the kingdom of the Goths, having depopulated both Macedonia and Thessaly.
Having set various parts of the royal city [of Constantinople] on fire, he also invaded and occupied Italy.
Huneric the Arian king of the Vandals in Africa exiled or caused to flee more than three hundred and thirty-four
Catholic bishops; he closed their churches and afflicted the populace with various torments. Although he cut out innumerable tongues he could not, however, take away the words of the Catholic confession [of faith].
The Britons, under the leadership of Ambrosius Aurelianus (a man of modest means, who alone of the Romans had survived the disaster of the Saxons in which his parents, who had worn the purple, had been killed), provoked the victors to battle and defeated them. From then on first one side then the other had the palm [of victory], until such time as the foreigners [i.e. the Saxons] became the more powerful throughout the whole island, which they have now possessed* for a long while.
Anastasius [ruled for] twenty-eight years.
Trasamund the king of the Vandals closed the Catholic churches and sent two hundred and twenty bishops into exile in Sardinia.
Pope Symmachus, amongst the many acts of the founding or restoring of churches that he performed, constructed a dwelling for the poor, dedicated to Saints Peter, Paul, and Laurence; and each year he sent money and clothes to the bishops who were in exile throughout Africa or in Sardinia.
Anastasius, who supported the heresy of Eutyches, op posed the Catholics, and perished by a divine thunderbolt.*
4480 Justin the Elder [ruled for] eight years.
John bishop of the Roman Church, when he came to Constantinople, met a great crowd that had come out to meet
The Greater Chronicle him at the gate called 'golden', and there, in the sight of all, he restored the sight of a blind man who asked [to be cured].
When he returned to Ravenna, Theodoric ordered him and his companions to be imprisoned, out of annoyance that Justin, the defender of Catholic piety, had received him with so much honour.
In that year,* which was that of the consulship of Probus the Younger, he killed the patrician Symmachus at Ravenna.
The following year he himself died of a sudden death, and was succeeded in the kingship by his grandson Athalaric.
Hilderic king of the Vandals ordered the bishops to be brought back from exile and the churches to be restored, after seventy-four years of heretical profanation.
Abbot Benedict was outstanding in the glory of his mira cles, about which the blessed pope Gregory wrote in his book of Dialogues.
4518 Justinian, nephew by a sister of Justin [ruled for] thirty-eight years.
The patrician Belisarius, sent to Africa by Justinian, defeated the Vandals. Carthage was recovered in the ninety-sixth year after its loss; the defeated Vandals were expelled, and their king Gelimer was sent as a captive to Constantinople.
The body of Saint Anthony the monk was found by divine revelation, brought to Alexandria, and buried in the church of the blessed John the Baptist.
Dionysius wrote some paschal tables, beginning in the five hundred and thirty-second year from the Lord's incarnation, which is the two hundred and forty-eighth year of Diocletian
[i.e. from his accession in ad 284].
After the consulship of Lampadius and Orestes; in which year the Code of Justinian was promulgated to the world.
Victor bishop of Capua wrote a book about Easter, making clear the errors of Victorius.
4529 Justin the younger [ruled for] eleven years.
The patrician Narses overcame and killed Totila king of the Goths in Italy.
Next, due to the malice of the Romans,* for whom he had long laboured against the Goths, he [Narses] was accused
The Greater Chronicle before Justin and his wife Sophia of seeking the enslavement of Italy as his reward. He retired to Naples in Campania, and wrote to the people of the Lombards [telling them] that they should come and possess Italy.
John bishop of the Roman Church completed and dedi cated the church of the Apostles Philip and James, which his predecessor Pelagius had begun.
Tiberius Constantine [ruled for] seven years. Gregory, then apocrisarius in Constantinople and later pope, began his books of exegesis on Job. He also showed, in the presence of the emperor Tiberius, that bishop Eutychius of Constanti nople had erred in his teaching on resurrection. Thereupon the emperor ordered his book on the subject, which was damaging to Catholic teaching, to be burned. For Eutychius had taught that our human bodies would be impalpable in the glory of resurrection, and would be more subtle than the winds of the air; contrary to that statement of the Lord:
'Touch me and see, because a spirit does not have flesh and bones in the way that you see that I have.'*
The people of the Lombards, accompanied by famine and plague, seized hold of all Italy, and besieged the city of Rome, once herself the devastator; at this time Alboin was their king.
Maurice [ruled for] twenty-one years.
Herminigild, son of Leuvigild the king of the Goths, be cause of his unshakeable adherence to the Catholic faith, was deprived of his kingdom by his Arian father, and was thrown into prison in chains, until he was struck on the head and killed at the very end of the night of Easter Sunday. He thus exchanged an earthly kingdom for the heavenly one, which he entered as a martyr. His brother soon after took over the kingdom, succeeding their father, and converted all of the Goths under his rule to the Catholic faith, under the direction of Leander bishop of Seville, who had also taught
Herminigild.* In the thirteenth year of the reign of Maurice and the thirteenth year of the indiction Gregory, the bishop of Rome and outstanding teacher, called together a synod of twentyfour bishops around the body of the blessed Apostle Peter, to discuss the needs of the Church.
The Greater Chronicle He also sent to Britain Mellitus, Augustine, and John, and many other God-fearing monks with them, to convert the Angles to Christ. And when Æthelberht was soon converted to the grace of Christ, together with the people of the Cantuarii over whom he ruled, together with those of neigh bouring kingdoms, he gave him Augustine to be his bishop and teacher, as well as other holy priests to become bishops.
However, the people of the Angles north of the river Humber, under kings Ælle and Æthelfrith, did not hear the Word of life at this time.
Gregory, in the eighteenth year of Maurice and the fourth indiction, writing to Augustine, decreed that the bishops of London and York should receive a pallium from the apostolic see and be metropolitan bishops.
Phocas [ruled for] eight years.
In his second year and the eighth of the indiction, pope Gregory went to the Lord.
At the request of pope Boniface, he [Phocas] proclaimed that the see of the Roman and apostolic Church was the head of all other churches, because the Church of Constantinople was writing about itself as being the first of churches.
The same emperor, also at the request of pope Boniface, ordered that the old temple called the Pantheon, having been cleared of all filthy traces of idolatry, should be converted into a church dedicated to the blessed and ever virgin Mary and all the martyrs; so that where once the cult of all the gods or rather demons was practised, there should thenceforth be a memorial to all the saints.
The Persians in a very severe war against the state overran many Roman provinces, even taking Jerusalem itself. They destroyed churches and profaned the holy furnishings of the places of the saints and of ordinary people, carrying them off; they also stole the standard of the Lord's cross.
Heraclius [ruled for] twenty-five years.
Anastasius the Persian* monk nobly suffered martyrdom for Christ. Bom in Persia, he leamt the magic arts from his father when a boy, but when he heard the name of Christ from Christian captives, he soon came to believe in him with all his heart. He left Persia, and came to Chalcedon and then
The Greater Chronicle Hierapolis in search of Christ, going thence to Jerusalem.
Having received the grace of baptism, he entered the monas tery of abbot Anastasius, at the fourth milestone from the city.
There he lived under a monastic rule for seven years, until he came by grace of prayer to Caesarea in Palestine, where he was captured by the Persians. By the sentence of the Marzban, he was kept for a long time among the prisoners, subject to chains and many whippings before being sent back to Persia, to their king Chosroes. By whom over a period of time he was almost whipped to death, suspended by one hand for three hours a day, before he was beheaded and his martyrdom completed, along with seventy others. Soon after, a man possessed by a demon was cured by putting on his tunic; he was amongst those who survived until the emperor
Heraclius defeated the Persians with his army and brought the Christian captives back rejoicing. The relics of the blessed martyr Anastasius were first of all venerated in his own mon astery, and then after they had been brought to Rome, in the monastery of the blessed Apostle Paul, called 'By the Salvian
Waters'.
In the sixteenth year of Heraclius' reign and the fifteenth indiction, also being in the eleventh year of his own reign, and more or less the one hundred and eightieth year from the arrival of the Angles in Britain, Edwin, the most excellent king of the Northumbrian Angles in Britain, received with his people the Word of salvation through the preaching of bishop
Paulinus, whom the venerable archbishop Justus had sent from Kent. He established Paulinus' episcopal seat in York.
As an auspice of the coming of the faith and of the heavenly kingdom, the power of this king's earthly kingdom was in creased: thus, unlike any of the Angles before him, he brought all the bounds of Britain, wherever either the Angles or the Britons dwelt, under his authority. At this time pope
Honorius condemned in a letter the Quartodeciman error concerning the observance of Easter, which had appeared amongst the Irish. Also John, who came after Honorius' suc cessor Severinus, wrote to them, while pope-elect, about this same problem of Easter and about the Pelagian heresy, which was coming to life again amongst them.
The Greater Chronicle
Heraclonas [ruled] with his mother for two years.
Cyrus of Alexandria, and Sergius and Pyrrhus bishops of the royal city (of Constantinople), instigators of the Acephalite heresy, taught that there was one divine and hu man operation in Christ and one will. Of these, Pyrrhus came to Rome from Africa in the time of pope Theodore, and displayed what turned out to be a false penitence, when in the presence of the pope and all the clergy and people he pre sented a signed statement in which he condemned everything that he or his predecessors had done either in their writings or by their actions against the Catholic faith. Hence he was very well received by pope Theodore, as if he really were the bishop of the royal city, but when he had returned home and repeated his former error, the pope, having called together the bishops and clergy in the church of the blessed Peter,
Prince of the Apostles, condemned him under the bond of anathema.
Constantine the son of Heraclius [ruled for] six months.
Paul the successor of Pyrrhus showed himself to be not only as committed as his predecessors to their insane beliefs, but also more overt in the persecution of the Catholics. Some of the envoys of the holy Roman Church, who had been sent to correct him, were imprisoned, some were exiled, and some were flogged. He also overturned and destroyed their altar, which had been consecrated in the venerable oratory of the house of Placidia, forbidding them from celebrating mass there. Thus he, like his predecessors, was condemned by the apostolic see by a just sentence of deposition.
Constantine the son of Constantine [ruled for] twentyseven years.
He was deceived by Paul in the way that his grandfather Heraclius had been misled by Sergius, bishop of that same royal city. He promulgated a Typos against the Catholic faith, laying down that neither one nor two wills or oper ations in Christ should be professed, as if Christ should be believed neither to have willed nor to have acted. In con sequence pope Martin convened a synod in Rome of one hundred and five bishops, and under anathema condemned
The Greater Chronicle the aforementioned Cyrus, Sergius, Pyrrhus, and Paul as heretics.
Following this, the exarch Theodore was sent by the em peror. He carried off pope Martin from the Constantinian basilica and sent him to Constantinople; afterwards he was exiled to Cherson, where he died, shining in that place in many signs of miracles right up to today. The above-men tioned synod was held in the month of October, in the ninth year of the emperor Constantine, in the eighth indiction.
Soon after the ordination of pope Vitalian the emperor Constantine sent to the blessed Peter a golden Gospel book, decorated on the cover with pearls of great size.
Some years later, in the sixth indiction, he came to Rome and laid on that altar a cloak made of cloth of gold; while all of his army entered the church carrying wax candles.
In the following year there was an eclipse of the sun, which is still remembered in our days, around the fifth hour on 3
May.
Archbishop Theodore and the equally learned abbot Hadrian were sent to Britain by pope Vitalian, and they fertilized many of the churches of the Angles with the fruit of ecclesiastical doctrine.
Constantine, after many and unheard-of raids had been made on the provinces, was killed in his bath in the twelfth indiction. Not long after this, pope Vitalian also sought the heavenly kingdom.
Constantine, the son of the previous Constantine [ruled for] seventeen years.
The Arabs invaded Sicily, and returned to Alexandria with an enormous quantity of loot.
Pope Agatho, at the request of the most pious rulers Constantine, Heraclius, and Tiberius, sent envoys to the royal city, amongst whom was John, then a deacon but who not long after became bishop of Rome, to bring about the reunification of the holy churches of God. They were most benevolently received by Constantine, the most reverend de fender of the Catholic faith, and were ordered to put aside all philosophical debates in order to search for the true faith in peaceful discussion, and various works of the Fathers that
The Greater Chronicle they were seeking were given to them from the library of Constantinople. One hundred and fifty bishops were present there, under the presidency of the patriarchs George of Constantinople and Macarius of Antioch. And they were convinced that those who asserted that there was one will and one operation in Christ were falsifying very many statements of the Catholic Fathers. With the conflict settled, George was set right, and Macarius with his followers, together with their predecessors Cyrus, Sergius, Honorius, Pyrrhus, Paul, and Peter were anathematized. In Macarius' place Theophanius, an abbot from Sicily, was made bishop of Antioch. So great was the gratitude expressed to the envoys of the Catholic peace, that John bishop of Porto, who was one of them, publicly celebrated mass in Latin in the presence of the em peror and the patriarch in the church of Santa Sophia, on the Sunday of the octave of Easter.
Thus was the sixth universal synod held in Constantinople and [its acts] written in Greek, in the time of pope Agatho, by order of and in the presence of the most pious prince
Constantine; in his palace, with the legates of the apostolic see and one hundred and fifty bishops taking part. The first universal synod was held in Nicaea against Arius, with three hundred and eighteen bishops, in the time of pope Julius and under the emperor Constantine. The second was in Constantinople with one hundred and fifty bishops, against Macedonius and Eudoxius in the time of pope Damasus and the emperor Gratian, when Nectarius was ordained bishop of Constantinople. The third was held in Ephesus under the emperor Theodosius the Great and pope Celestine, with two hundred bishops present, against Nestorius, the bishop of the imperial city. The fourth was in Chalcedon, with six hundred and thirty bishops under pope Leo and in the time of the emperor Marcian, against Eutyches the most villainous leader of the monks. The fifth was also in Constantinople in the time of pope Vigilius and under the emperor Justinian, against Theodore and all heretics. The sixth is that of which we have just spoken.
The holy and perpetual virgin of Christ Æthelthryth, daughter of Anna king of the Angles, was given as wife firstly
The Greater Chronicle to one great man and then to king Egfrid. After she had preserved the marriage bed uncorrupted for twelve years, having taken the holy veil she was transformed from a queen into a consecrated virgin. Without delay she also became a mother of virgins and the pious nourisher of holy women, and received the place called Ely in order to build a monastery.
Her merits while living were also testified to when her body and the clothes in which it had been wrapped were found uncorrupted* sixteen years after her burial.
4649 Justinian the second, the son of Constantine, [ruled for] ten years.
He made a ten-year peace on land and at sea with the Arabs, but the province of Africa that was subject to the Roman empire was assaulted by the Arabs, and Carthage itself was also captured by them and destroyed.
This emperor ordered his protospatharius Zacharias to deport to Constantinople the Roman bishop Sergius, of blessed memory, because he was unwilling to approve of and sign [the acts of] the heretical synod that he was holding in Constantinople. But the militia of the city of Ravenna and of the surrounding regions opposed the evil orders of the em peror and expelled Zacharias from Rome with insults and injuries.
The same pope Sergius ordained the venerable man Willibrord, called Clement, as bishop of the Frisians, where up to the present day he is achieving innumerable daily losses for the devil and gains for the Christian faith, as a pilgrim for the eternal homeland (for he is one of the people of the Angles from Britain).
Justinian was deprived of the glory of his kingdom by the crime of treason, and withdrew to Pontus as an exile.
Leo [ruled for] three years.
By divine revelation, Pope Sergius found a silver box in the sanctuary of the blessed Apostle Peter, where it had long lain hidden in a very dark comer; in it was a cross adorned with many precious stones. Inside this, having removed four metal plates in which the gems were embedded, he discovered a piece, of considerable size, of the life-giving cross of the Lord. From then on each year, on the day of the Exaltation of the Cross, this is kissed and adored by all
The Greater Chronicle the people in the basilica of the Saviour, known as the Constantinian.
The most reverend bishop Cuthbert, who from being an anchorite became bishop of the church of Lindisfame in Britain, spent all his life most worthily, from infancy to old age, as shown by his miracles. His body remained buried but uncorrupted for eleven years, after which it was found, together with the clothes by which he was covered [in the same state] as in the hour of his death, as I have described in the book of his life and miracles; both in the recent prose version and in that which I wrote some years ago in hexameter verse.
Tiberius [ruled for] seven years.
A synod held at Aquileia out of ignorance of the faith was reluctant to accept the [authority of the] fifth universal council, but instructed by the salutary warnings of the blessed pope Sergius it agreed to approve it along with [all] the other churches of. Christ.
Gisulf, the duke of the Lombards in Benevento, laid waste Campania with fire and sword and the [taking of] captives.
Because there was no one who could resist his advance, the apostolic pope John, who had succeeded Sergius, sent priests to him and very many gifts; he redeemed all of the prisoners and made the enemy return home.
He was succeeded by another John, who amongst many notable deeds, built the oratory of the holy Mother of God inside the church of the blessed Apostle Paul in the most beautiful style.
Aripert,* the king of the Lombards, restored to its pos session many farms and estates in the Cottian Alps which had previously belonged to the apostolic see but which had been stolen by the Lombards a long time before; he sent this deed of gift to Rome written in letters of gold.
Justinian [reigned] for a second time, with his son Tiberius for six years.
Receiving help from Terbellius,* the king of the Bulgars, he killed those who had expelled him. These were the patricians
Leo, who had usurped his place and also his successor Tiberius, who ejected him [i.e. Leo] from the throne and kept him a captive in Constantinople during all of his reign. He
The Greater Chronicle sent the patriarch Callinicus to Rome with his eyes tom out, and gave the bishopric [of Constantinople] to Cyrus, who had been an abbot in Pontus and had supported him when in exile. He ordered pope Constantine to come to him, and received and saw him off him with great honour; requesting him to say mass on Sunday so that he might receive com munion from his hand. He prostrated himself on the ground
[before the pope] asking intercession for his sins, and renew ing all the privileges of the Church [of Rome]. When, against the advice of the apostolic pope, he sent a large army into Pontus in order to apprehend Philip whom he had exiled there, the whole army went over to Philip's side, and made him emperor. Philip returned with the army and fought with Justinian at the twelfth milestone from the city [of Constanti nople] . Having defeated and killed Justinian, Philip took over the empire.
Philip [mied for] one year and six months.
He ejected Cyrus from the bishopric and ordered him to return to being abbot of his monastery in Pontus. The em peror sent letters containing heretical doctrine to pope
Constantine, which the latter rejected with the council of the apostolic see; and because of this he set up pictures in the porticus of Saint Peter depicting the acts of the six holy universal synods. For Philip had ordered similar pictures in the royal city [of Constantinople] to be removed. He ordered the people of Rome not to recognize the name of the heretical emperor or his written decrees or gold coins bearing his image. Hence, neither were portaits of him carried into church, nor was his name mentioned in the solemnities of the mass.
Anastasius [ruled for] three years.
He captured Philip and blinded but did not kill him.
He sent letters to pope Constantine in Rome via the pa trician Scholasticus, the exarch of Italy, in which he proved himself to be a supporter of the Catholic faith and an up holder of the sixth holy council.
Liutprand, the king of the Lombards, confirmed the gift of the estates in the Cottian Alps, which king Aripert had made and he had repeated, at the request of pope Gregory.
The Greater Chronicle In the seven hundred and sixteenth year from the Incar nation of the Lord, Egbert, a holy man and bishop in monas tic life of the people of the Angles, having adopted the life of a pilgrim for the sake of the celestial homeland, converted through his pious preaching many provinces of the Irish to the correct observance of the timing of Easter, from which they had long strayed.
Theodosius [reigned for] one year.
Having been chosen emperor, he defeated Anastasius in a severe battle at the city of Nicaea, and having given him an oath, he forced him to become a cleric and be ordained a priest. In order truly to receive the imperial office, since he was a Catholic, he soon restored to its former position, where it might be venerated, that picture in which six holy synods were depicted, which had been tom down by Philip.
The River Tiber breaking its banks caused many to leave the city of Rome; the flooding was so great that it formed a single broad way, one and a half times the normal height [of the river], extending from the gates of Saint Peter as far as the Milvian bridge. It remained there for seven days, until, with the citizens performing frequent litanies, it at last receded on the eighth day.
At this time many of the people of the Angles, both nobles and commoners, men and women, leaders and led, made a practice of coming from Britain to Rome, by the inspiration of divine love. Amongst these was my abbot Ceolffid, aged 74 and having been a priest for forty-seven years and an abbot for thirty-five. Having reached Langres, he died and was buried there in the church of the blessed twin martyrs. Amongst other gifts which he had arranged to take with him, he sent to the church of Saint Peter a pandect* of the blessed Jerome's
Latin translation [of the Bible] from the Hebrew and the Greek.
Leo [mied for] eight years.
The Arabs, coming with an immense army, besieged the city of Constantinople for three years; during which time many of the citizens, calling on God on numerous occasions, died of starvation, cold, and disease; until wearied of the siege the Arabs* withdrew. After they had retired, the people of the
The Greater Chronicle Bulgars, from the River Danube, started a war, from which they also withdrew defeated, and returned to their ships.
When they were on the high sea, a storm suddenly blew up and many of them were killed by their ships being sunk or being broken up on the shore.
Liutprand,* hearing that the Arabs had depopulated Sar dinia and had dug up the place whither the bones of the holy bishop Augustine had once been moved (on account of the ravaging of the barbarians) and where they had been honour ably buried, he sent, and paying a great price for them, he received the bones and transported them to Pavia, and reburied them there with the honour due to so great a Father.
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