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Raf Praet

origins and use of the colour purple. I shall end this paper by interpreting the possible
implications of these biographical and textual links for the existence of a shared con-
temporary culture of erudite education and research.1
I. Three contemporaries
One of the main causes of the elusiveness surrounding the person of John Malalas
(ca. AD 490 - ca. AD 570) is the lack of direct biographical evidence. Since the publi-
cation of the seminal edited volume Studies in John Malalas in 1990,2 scholars, mainly
from the English-speaking tradition, have projected several aspects of Malalas’ Chrono-
graphia onto the person of Malalas in the hopes of filling this gap. B. Croke used the
following characteristics of the chronicle to make a reconstruction of Malalas’life:3 the
chronicle’s initial focus on the city of Antioch and its administrative jargon4 suggest
that Malalas was a rhetorically trained bureaucrat active in Antioch, possibly in one of
the scrinia of the comes Orientis, who was a subordinate of the praetorian prefecture of
the East. The abrupt change in focus in the chronicle, from Antioch to Constantino-
ple, implies that Malalas at some point in time commuted to the capital of the Eastern
Roman Empire-perhaps after the reform of the diocese of the oriens. This shift also
seems to imply that Malalas wrote his chronicle in at least two redactions, one exe-
cuted in Antioch and one in Constantinople.5
Since the 1990’s, scholars have elaborated on this inferential hypothesis to flesh
out Malalas’biography.6 E. Jeffreys proposed, next to the reform of the diocese of the
oriens in AD 535, the Sasanian sack of the city of Antioch in 540 as a possible trigger
for Malalas’ relocation to Constantinople.7 W. Treadgold in his work8 took this infer-
ential hypothesis one step further, by assuming that detailed mentions of specific of-
ficials from Antioch in the chronicle implied that Malalas functioned in their retinue

I One of the first analyses of the commonality in sources, networks and audience between authors such
as Procopius, Malalas and John the Lydian was conducted by Greatrex (2016).

2 Meier/Radtki/Schulz (2016b), pp. 9-11; cf. Jeffreys/Croke/Scott (1990).

3 Croke (1990).

4 Scott (1981).

5 Croke (1990), pp. 17-25.

6 Malalas is a rhetorically trained bureaucrat active in Antioch, possibly in one of the scrinia of the comes
Orientis according to Thurn (2000), p. I, Métivier (2006), p. 156, Treadgold (2007), p. 236-237), Bjornlie
(2013), pp. 117-118, Greatrex (2016), pp. 175-176), Thesz (2016), p. 28. Treadgold (2007) considers Malalas
to be part of the lower bureaucracy, whereas Croke (1990) places Malalas higher on the bureaucratic
ladder. On the social status of Malalas and its implications for his Bildung, see Thesz (2016), pp. 28-29.
On Malalas’bureaucratic background and his interest in legislation, see Métivier (2006), p. 156. On the
redactions of the chronicle, see Treadgold (2007), pp. 239-240). On his relocation from Antioch to
Constantinople between AD 528 and AD 540, see Treadgold (2007), p. 238, Bjornlie (2013), p. 117. On the
reform of the Diocese of the oriens in AD 535, see Honoré (1978), p. 59, Jeffreys (2003), p. 505, Kelly
(2004), pp. 71-76.

7 Jeffreys (2003), p. 505.

8 Treadgold (2007), pp. 237-238.