The Influence of Julius Africanus’ Chronographiae 55
καί όστισοϋν τή Εβραίων συνεχρόνισεν έπισημειούμενος, ίσως αν του
σκοπού τύχοιμί.
Until the time of the Olympiads, nothing accurate has been recorded by the Greeks
in their histories, all their accounts before that time being muddled and in no point
agreeing among themselves. The Olympiads, however, have been accurately record-
ed by many, because the Greeks kept registers of them that were not separated by
a long span of time, but rather by an interval of four years. For this reason, I shall
give a cursory treatment to my selection of the most notable of the legendary nar-
ratives up until the first Olympiad. But those narratives after that time, if any of
them are noteworthy, I shall combine together chronologically one to the other, the
Hebrew with the Greek, carefully investigating the affairs of the Hebrews while
only touching upon those of the Greek. And I shall fit them together in the fol-
lowing manner: By taking up a single event in Hebrew history contemporary with
an event recorded by the Greeks, and basing myself on it, and by either subtracting
from or adding to it, I shall indicate what noteworthy person - whether Greek or
Persian or whoever - was contemporary with the Hebrew event. And in this way I
shall perhaps accomplish my objective.15
From a methodological point of view, the influence of Africanus on Malalas’ treatment
of Greek archaic history is clear. On the other hand, in inserting his universal interpreta-
tion of history into a Christian frame, Africanus uses the mechanism of translatio imperii
- that is transfer of world hegemony from one empire to another - to explain the politi-
cal unfolding of world history. Obviously, the history of archaic and classical Greece, the
history of thcyWm, lays outside this viewpoint. It is for this reason that, both for the part
of Greek history prior to the first Olympiad - itself a mythical tale - and for the part
between the first Olympiad and Alexander the Great, Africanus is only interested in the
Greeks for their cultural history. From a political point of view, Greek history down to
Alexander emerges as a series of episodes recounted in connexion with the events of the
Persian Empire, or inserted in synchronisations with Hebrew history. Such a view is - as
indicated by Elizabeth Jeffreys and Roger Scott - also characteristic of Malalas’ archaio-
logia and - it should be added - of historians who took Malalas as a model.16
A further significant example of this view is provided by John Malalas in Chrono-
graphia VI 12. This text deals with the thalassocracy of the Samians, but only because
of its close connexion with the end of the Lydian kingdom - which caused the he-
gemony over the seas to pass to the Samians - and with the attempt by the Lydians’
destroyer, the Persian king Cyrus, to defeat the Samians’ power as well. The Samian
15 lulius Africanus, Chronographiae F34, i-n Wallraff/Roberto. This passage formed probably the proe-
mium to book three of the Chronographiae. Synchronism in Africanus’universal history: Roberto (2011),
pp. 88-95. On the problem of the origin of history from the Greek and Hellenistic tradition to the
Christian universal history see Adler (1989), pp. 20-42.
16 Greek history in Malalas: see Scott (1990), pp. 148-151; in general Jeffreys (1979)· For Africanus’ treat-
ment of Greek history see, e.g, lulius Africanus, Chronographiae F8ia-b Wallraff/Roberto; see also
Roberto (2011), pp. 160-162; Caire (2006). On the concept of translatio imperii see Momigliano (1984),
pp. 85-92.