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Philippe Blaudeau

ficial narrative (as shown by some quotations in the acts of the fifth ecumenical council
of 553). It added a little more flavor if the text contributed to the confusion of oppo-
nents to the imperial line (here, the reason for Justinian and the council of 553 to quote
the Ecclesiastical History ofTheodoret of Cyrus). This position of principle is arguably
one of the reasons why the defenders of the Three Chapters, having claimed them as
their highly Chalcedonian confession, could not easily engage in writing a history of
the Church. Such a project would have seemed immediately suspect of sedition, since
ipso facto it meant that an irreconcilable ecclesial conscience, however equally Chal-
cedonian, was at work. Thus the story of Liberatus of Carthage, probably finished and
published after Justinian’s death, is very close in many characteristics to an ecclesiasti-
cal history, without assuming its title or impact. This is much less the case for the work
of Victor ofTunnuna, a simple Chronicle. On Nestorian and miaphysite sides only, as
the awareness of the ecclesial otherness is now strong, one can find such an enterprise.
So the composition of John of Ephesus, as well as the more poorly preserved works of
diphysites as Basil of Cilicia (ending his remarks to 540) and Barhadbesabba (pushing
his story until 569), confirm this trend, because of the externality that characterizes
their de facto position with respect to the official Church.
Such a context was modified soon after Justinian’s death, in the moment in which
Malalas’ continuation is supposed to have been published.4 This is a reason why it
deserves a particular analysis of its features. It is to be first underlined that this work
keeps a certain consistency with its original line. Let’s describe it briefly: while having
no clear patron, Malalas draws specific outlines: he gives a very high significance to
the Christ Crucifixion in the year 6000. Malalas had most probably borrowed such
a computation from Eustathius of Epiphaneia.5 But he did more: he still faced the
challenge of giving a new sense of time (after the critical moment of 500 AD, con-
sidered to be the Annus mundi 6000 which should have matched the end of time).
Having distributed its argument skillfully to three moments of his story from book
X (Christological timeline) to book XVIII through the end of Book XV, the lesson
becomes more persuasive. In Chapter 8 of XVIII, due to the impact of earthquakes,
surely of Antioch (526 and 528) and the Christological controversy perhaps, Malalas
4 As is well known, the Chronographia ends with AD 563 in the only manuscript which provides the
continuous substance of the tale (from book II to book XVIII), the Bodleianus Baroccianus 182 (fol. 1-321
XIth-XIIth c. AD.). But, in the very last section, there is a lack of three pages that makes the fact that
the original ending was 565 very probable. See Croke, “Malalas, the Man and his Work”, p. 1; 24; Jeffreys,
“Beginnings”, p. 498.
5 See Meier, Das andere Zeitalter, pp. 459-460. Considering that the book covered the whole span of time
until the 12th year of Anastasius (502-503). See Evagrius, Historia ecclesiastica III 37 and Malalas, Chro-
nographia XVI 9. Recently, W. Treadgold, Early Byzantine Historians, pp. 726-727, said Eustathius had
probably made up his story in Antioch in the year 520 and died during the earthquake of 526. The
American scholar (ibid., pp. 715, 728-729) even thinks that the chronological Epitome of Eustathius,
written in the Attic language, is the only source of Malalas who would have paraphrased it in an urgent
manner in Antioch and had then continued the story. Treadgold also blames Malalas for lying about his
sources and popularizing the expression to hide its borrowing. This thesis, which challenges even to the
extent of scientific information, cannot be ignored but should be approached with extreme caution.