Philostorgius: Church History

by Philostorgius

Philostorgius (born 368 C.E.) was a member of the Eunomian sect of Christianity, a nonconformist faction deeply opposed to the form of Christianity adopted by the Roman government as the official religion of its empire. He wrote his twelve-book Church History , the critical edition of the surviving remnants of which is presented here in English translation, at the beginning of the fifth century as a revisionist history of the church and the empire in the fourth and early-fifth centuries. Sometimes contradicting and often supplementing what is found in other histories of the period, Christian or otherwise, it offers a rare dissenting picture of the Christian world of the time.

312 pages, Paperback

First published November 14, 2007

Reviews

[Andrew · Rating 2 out of 5]

Fine book but Philostorgius was a chud

[John Cairns · Rating 4 out of 5]

It's another scholarly achievement in reconstituting a book. The footnotes are also most instructive. Philostorgius has Valens hiding in a barn after the disaster of Adrianople and the Goths burning it as they did everything in their path. Gratian's death is also succinctly gone into, in another footnote, clearing up my ignorance. I like the historian's comment about two freaks, one tall, the other short, who did not die young, at twenty-five for one, nearly twenty-five for the other. The politicking of the empire is so detailed to read about and so complex it's no wonder no one involved saw what was happening and knew what to do. It's clearer though why Honorius had killed. The historian has a good anecdote of the barbarian wife of an emperor behaving as a woman seething with passion, using her feminine arts to have her way, an insulting dignitary's head. It gives a very good idea of the relationship of Romans with barbarians, some of whom were their best generals. Why Alaric sacked Rome is clear and the city's quick recovery remarked on.