Table Of ContentEngaging with the Past, c.250–c.650
Between c.250 and c.650, the way the past was seen, recorded and interpreted for a
contemporary audience changed fundamentally. Only since the 1970s have the key
elements of this historiographical revolution become clear, with the recasting of
the period, across both east and west, as ‘late antiquity’. Historiography, however,
has struggled to find its place in this new scholarly world. No longer is decline
and fall the natural explanatory model for cultural and literary developments,
but continuity and transformation. In addition, the emergence of ‘late antiquity’
coincided with a methodological challenge arising from the ‘linguistic turn’ which
impacted on history writing in all eras.
This book is focussed on the development of modern understanding of how
the ways of seeing and recording the past changed in the course of adjusting to
emerging social, religious and cultural developments over the period from c.250
to c.650. Its overriding theme is how modern historiography has adapted over the
past half century to engaging with the past between c.250 and c.650.
Now, as explained in this book, the newly dominant historiographical genres
(chronicles, epitomes, church histories) are seen as the preferred modes of telling
the story of the past, rather than being considered rudimentary and naïve.
Brian Croke is an honorary associate in ancient history at the University of
Sydney and an expert adviser in education. He is the author of over 100 articles
on various aspects of ancient, Byzantine and modern history and historiography,
as well as education, and a range of books including The Chronicle of Marcellinus
(1995), Christian Chronicles and Byzantine History (1992), Count Marcellinus
(2001), Roman Emperors in Context (2021) and Flashpoint Hagia Sophia (2022).
Also in the Variorum Collected Studies series
AVERIL CAMERON
From the Later Roman Empire to Late Antiquity and Beyond (CS1113)
ROBERTO TOTTOLI
Studies in Islamic Traditions and Literature (CS1112)
BRIAN CROKE
Engaging with the Past, c.250-c.650 (CS1111)
FELICE LIFSHITZ
Reading Gender
Studies on Medieval Manuscripts and Medievalist Movies (CS1110)
DOROTHEA MCEWAN
Studies on Aby Warburg, Fritz Saxl and Gertrud Bing (CS1109)
GAD G. GILBAR
Trade and Enterprise
The Muslim Tujjar in the Ottoman Empire and Qajar Iran, 1860–1914 (CS1108)
JEAN-CLAUDE HOCQUET
Le marchand et les poids et mesures (CS1107)
CHRISTOPHER ALLMAND
Aspects of War in the Late Middle Ages (CS1106)
PHILIP BUTTERWORTH
Staging, Playing, Pyrotechnics and Magic: Conventions of Performance in Early
English Theatre
Shifting Paradigms in Early English Drama Studies (CS1105)
ALEXANDER CALLANDER MURRAY
The Merovingians:
Kingship, Institutions, Law, and History (CS1104)
CRAIG KALLENDORF
The Virgilian Tradition II
Books and Their Readers in the Renaissance (CS1103)
TERENCE O’REILLY
Humanism and Religion in Early Modern Spain
John of the Cross, Francisco de Aldana, Luis de León (CS1102)
For more information about this series, please visit: https://www.routledge.com/
Variorum-Collected-Studies/book-series/VARIORUM
Engaging with the Past, c.250–c.650
Brian Croke
VARIORUM COLLECTED STUDIES
First published 2023
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British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Croke, Brian, author.
Title: Engaging with the past, c.250-c.650 / Brian Croke.
Description: Abingdon, Oxon ; New York, NY : Routledge, 2023. | Series:
Variorum collected studies | Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2022051075 (print) | LCCN 2022051076 (ebook)
Subjects: LCSH: History, Ancient—Historiography. | Middle Ages—
Historiography.
Classification: LCC D56 .C76 2023 (print) | LCC D56 (ebook) | DDC
909.07—dc23/eng/20230104
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022051075
LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022051076
ISBN: 978-1-032-23480-9 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-1-032-23481-6 (pbk)
ISBN: 978-1-003-27786-6 (ebk)
DOI: 10.4324/9781003277866
Typeset in Times New Roman
by Apex CoVantage, LLC
VARIORUM COLLECTED STUDIES SERIES CS1111
C O N T E N T S
Acknowledgments vi
Abbreviations vii
Introduction: organising history and historiography 1
1 Reflecting on an historiographical half-century, 1970–2020 14
2 Historiography in late antiquity: an overview 49
3 Latin historiography and the barbarian kingdoms 62
4 Historiography 93
5 Tradition and originality in Photius’ historical reading 119
6 Uncovering Byzantium’s historiographical audience 131
7 Momigliano’s historiographical contribution, c.250–c.650 154
Bibliography 183
Index 223
v
A C K N O W L E D G M E N T S
For their contributions to the chapters included here, and for several others that
have surrounded and succeeded these, on a variety of topics, I wish to grate-
fully acknowledge my willing critical friends Averil Cameron, Elizabeth Jeffreys,
Alanna Nobbs and Roger Scott. Over decades, when my time, my thinking and
my writing were otherwise engaged, they have each encouraged and challenged
me to keep indulging an interest in late antique historiography.
Since we first met at Dumbarton Oaks in Washington DC in 1976, the inimitable
Ruth Macrides (1949–2019) stimulated me to look more closely at the Byzantine
historians and chroniclers beyond the 6th century, in particular to see Byzantine
historiography as a natural extension of Greek and Roman historiography. Later,
she provided the direct impetus for both Chapters 5 and 6 in this book.
vi
A B B R E V I AT I O N S
CHAP Clavis Historicorum Antiquitatis Posterioris, eds. P. Van Nuffelen
and L. Van Hoof. 2020, Turnhout.
CFHB Corpus Fontium Historiae Byzantinae
CSCO.Scr.Syr. Corpus Scriptorum Christianorum Orientalium, Scriptores Syri,
1903+, Paris.
CSHB Corpus Scriptorum Historiae Byzantinae
EKG Enmann, Kaisergeschichte
FHG Fragmenta Historicorum Graecorum, ed. C. Müller, vol. 4,
1851, Paris.
FHistLA The Fragmentary Latin Histories of Late Antiquity (AD 300–
620), eds. L. Van Hoof and P. Van Nuffelen, 2020, Cambridge.
HA Historia Augusta
HE Historia Ecclesiastica
ILS Inscriptiones Latinae Selectae, ed. H. Dessau, 3 vols. 1892–1916,
Berlin.
KFHist Kleine und Fragmentarische Historiker der Spätantike, eds. M.
Stein and B. Bleckmann. 2015+, Leiden.
LCL Loeb Classical Library
MGH.AA Monumenta Germaniae Historica. Auctores Antiquissimi
ODLA Oxford Dictionary of Late Antiquity, ed. O. Nicholson, 2 vols.
2018, Oxford.
PLRE 2 The Prosopography of the Later Roman Empire, vol. 2, ed. J. R.
Martindale, 1980, Cambridge.
PO Patrologia Orientalis
RE Realencyclopädie der klassischen Altertumswissenschaft, ed.
G. Wissowa et al., 1893–1978. Stuttgart.
SC Sources Chrétiennes
TTH Translated Texts for Historians
vii
INTRODUCTION
Organising history and historiography
The straightforward title Engaging with the Past, c.250–c.650 is not as straight-
forward as it looks. It embraces all the essential stages in the production of what
is invariably called ‘history’ and ‘historiography’ in most languages and cultures
across the period c.250–c.650, namely interpreting, reading, writing and commu-
nicating about the past. For the 21st-century historian, however, two further stages
need insertion: (1) ‘research’, which generally precedes ‘interpreting’ and is based
on systematic documentary/archival analysis, thereby determining the evaluation
and professional fate of any historical volume; (2) ‘publication’, the authoritative
mode of communicating any interpretation or writing about the past.1 The very
need to explain a simple title and to justify a specific time span demonstrate the
difference made to the historian’s craft in the past half-century, roughly 1970 to
2020. Above all, the conceptualisation and writing of history itself has been partic-
ularly impacted since the 1970s by the so-called ‘linguistic turn’, which has made
it easier to appreciate the nature and purpose of historiography in the Graeco-
Roman and medieval worlds, with Byzantine historiography catching up fast.
For the years c.250–c.650 in particular, the construction and interpretation of
the past viewed from that time, and from different geographical locations, has
been both enriched and complicated by the way the whole period has been refor-
mulated under the rubric of ‘Late Antiquity’. The creation of ‘Late Antiquity’
has necessitated consideration of how changes in the production and use of his-
torical accounts can be traced and explained. Across the past half-century, new
historiographical vistas have been opened up and new questions proposed, while
fresh insights have arisen from new sources of information. Fuller understanding
of relevant historiographical developments in the period c.250–c.650 therefore
requires prior attention to the difference made by the way the past is currently
organised and subdivided, as well as to changes in interpreting, reading, writing
and communicating for historiographical purposes. The organisational assump-
tions and imperatives of any period inevitably impact the way the past is viewed
and described. ‘Late Antiquity’ is no exception.
1 Banner (2012), 99–102.
DOI: 10.4324/9781003277866-1 1
