Malalas’ Antioch

61

X15. “Four years after the resurrection and ascension of our Saviour Jesus Christ,
during the reign of Tiberius Caesar - after St Paul had left Antioch the Great
where he had first proclaimed the word with Barnabas in the street near the
Pantheon, known as ,of the (neighbourhoods) of Singon (.. ,).”9
In what follows, I will use the term “incidental occurrence” to refer to this kind of
mention. In most cases, however, the buildings built “by an emperor” (or a mythi-
cal founder, or a Hellenistic king) or during his reign are the main theme of some
narrative sequences. This is the case, for instance, with the narrative of Tiberius’ or
Domitians interventions in Antioch (X 8-10; X 50), or with the description of the “Fo-
rum of Valens”, embedded in the history of the reign of Valentinian (XIII 30, quoted
below). In what follows, I will use the term “focused occurrences”. In some cases, how-
ever, the focused references are mixed with incidental references, whose function is to
locate the new building referred to by Malalas in the urban space. These references can
be labelled as topological references. Such mixture can be observed for instance in the
account of Domitians activities in Antioch:
X 50. “Domitian built in Antioch the Great a public bath known as that of Medeia,
because he put a marvellous statue of Medeia in it, and so the citizens used to call
the public bath by this name and not the Domitianum. This public bath had been
built by the mountain, near the monomacheion and the temple of Aphrodite. The
emperor also built there a temple of Asklepios.”10
This passage contains two focused occurrences (Bath of Medeia, temple of Asclepios)
and two incidental (topological) references, whose function is to locate the Bath of
Medea: the amphitheatre and Aphrodite’s sanctuary.
From our point of view (“the view from Antioch”), we may distinguish three parts in
Malalas’Universal History.11 True, a fourth part would be the end of Book XVIII, after
the “Eternal Peace” of 532. In this last part of the text, Antioch appears only in three
9 Μετά δέ έτη τέσσαρα τής άναστάσεως καίάναλήψεως τού σωτήρος ήμών ’Ιησού Χριστού,
επί τής ΒασιΛείας τού αύτού Τιβερίου Καίσαρος, μετά τό έξελθειν τον άγιον Παύλον άπό
Αντιόχειας τής μεγάλης, κηρύξαντα εκεί πρώτον τον λόγον εν τή ρύμη τή πλησίον τού
Πανθέου τή καλουμένη των Σίγγωνος άμα Βαρνάβα (...).Transl.Jeffreys/Jeffreys/Scott, Chro-
nicle, p. 128.
ίο Ό δέ αύτός Δομετιανός έκτισεν έν Αντιόχεια τή μεγάλη δημόσιον λουτρόν τό λεγόμενον
τής Μήδειας, διότι άγαλμα έστησεν έν αύτω θαυμαστόν τή Μήδεια· καί ούτως αύτό τό
δημόσιον λουτρόν έκάλουν οί πολΐται, καί ούκέτι τό Δομετιανόν τό δέ αύτό δημόσιον ήν
κεκτισμένον παρά τό όρος πλησίον τού μονομαχίου καί τού ιερού τής Αφροδίτης, έκτισεν
δέ έκεΐ ό αύτός βασιλεύς καί ιερόν τού Ασκληπιού. Transl. Jeffreys/Jeffreys/Scott, Chronicle,
p. 139-
ιι Other readings are possible. Sandrine Agusta-Boularot proposes another scheme of organization, with
a separation between Books VI and VII, from the foundation of Rome onwards (Agusta-Boularot, “Les
livres I ä XII de la Chronique de Jean Malalas et leur apport ä la connaissance du paysage urbain
d’Antioche”, p. 136). See also the remarks by Brian Croke (“Malalas, the man and his work”, pp. 1-2,
pp. 7-8) and Roger Scott (“Malalas’view of the classical past”, pp. 147-164, reprinted, pp. 158-161).