Agathias or Agathias Scholasticus (c. AD 536-582/594), of Myrina, an Aeolian city in western Asia Minor, was a Greek poet and the historian who is a principal source for that part of the reign of Justinian I covered in his history. Events June 8 - St. ... Events Maurice I succeeds Tiberius II Constantine as Byzantine Emperor. ... Events Births Empress Kogyoku of Japan = Empress Saimei Deaths Gregory of Tours, bishop and historian Categories: 594 ... Anatolia (Greek: ανατολη anatole, rising of the sun or East; compare Orient and Levant, by popular etymology Turkish Anadolu to ana mother and dolu filled), also called by the Latin name of Asia Minor, is a region of Southwest Asia which corresponds today to the Asian portion of Turkey. ... A poet is a person who writes poetry. ... For other uses, see Historian (disambiguation). ... This article is about the Roman emperor. ...

He studied law at Alexandria, returned to Constantinople in 554 to finish his training and practised as an advocate (scholasticus) in the courts. Literature, however, was his favourite pursuit. This article is about the city in Egypt. ... This article is about the city before the Fall of Constantinople (1453). ...

He wrote a number of short love-poems in epic metre, called Daphniaca. He also put together an anthology of epigrams by earlier and contemporary poets and himself, under the title of a Cycle of New Epigrams. Agathias re-edited the Greek Anthology, which preserves about a hundred of his epigrams, showing considerable taste and elegance. He also wrote marginal notes on the Periegetes of Pausanias. Greek Anthology (also Anthologia Graeca) is a collection of poems, mostly epigrams, that span the Ancient and Byzantine periods of Greek Literature. ... Pausanias (Greek: ) was a Greek traveller and geographer of the 2nd century A.D., who lived in the times of Hadrian, Antoninus Pius and Marcus Aurelius. ...

After the death of Justinian (565), some of Agathias's friends persuaded him to write the history of his own times. This work in five books, On the Reign of Justinian, continues the history of Procopius, whose style it imitates, and is the chief authority for the period 552-558. It deals chiefly with the struggles of the Byzantine army, under the command of the eunuch Narses, against the Goths, Vandals, Franks and Persians. Events January 22 - Eutychius is deposed as Patriarch of Constantinople by John Scholasticus. ... Procopius of Caesarea (in Greek Προκόπιος, c. ... Events July - Battle of Taginae: The Byzantine general Narses defeats and kills Totila, king of the Ostrogoths. ... Events May 7 - In Constantinople, the dome of the Hagia Sophia collapses. ... Narses (478-573) was, along with Belisarius, one of the two great generals in the service of the Eastern Roman Emperor Justinian I. during the so-called Reconquest that took place during the Justinians reign. ... This article is about the Germanic tribes. ... Vandal and Vandali redirect here. ... This article is about the Frankish people and society. ... The Persians of Iran (officially named Persia by West until 1935 while still referred to as Persia by some) are an Iranian people who speak Persian (locally named Fârsi by native speakers) and often refer to themselves as ethnic Iranians as well. ...

"His pages abound in philosophic reflection. He is able and reliable, though he gathered his information from eye- witnesses, and not, as Procopius, in the exercise of high military and political offices. He delights in depicting the manners, customs, and religion of the foreign peoples of whom he writes; the great disturbances of his time, earthquakes, plagues, famines, attract his attention, and he does not fail to insert "many incidental notices of cities, forts, and rivers, philosophers, and subordinate commanders." Many of his facts are not to be found elsewhere, and he has always been looked on as a valuable authority for the period he describes." —Catholic Encyclopedia.

"The author prides himself on his honesty and impartiality, but he is lacking in judgment and knowledge of facts; the work, however, is valuable from the importance of the events of which it treats" (Enc. Brit. 1911). Gibbon contrasts Agathias as "a poet and rhetorician" with Procopius, "a statesman and soldier." Christian commentators note the superficiality of Agathias' nominal Christianity: "There are reasons for doubting that he was a Christian, though it seems improbable that he could have been at that late date a genuine pagan" (Catholic Encyclopedia). "No overt pagan could expect a public career during the reign of Justinian, yet the depth and breadth of Agathias' culture was not Christian" (Kaldellis). Not to be confused with New Catholic Encyclopedia. ... Supporters contend that the Eleventh Edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica (1910-1911) represents the sum of human knowledge at the beginning of the 20th century; indeed, it was advertised as such. ... Edward Gibbon (1737–1794). ...

Agathias (Histories 2.31) is the only authority for the story of Justinian's closing of the re-founded Platonic (actually neoplatonic) Academy in Athens (529), which is often cited as the closing date of Antiquity. The dispersed scholars, with as much of their library as could be transported, found temporary refuge in the Persian capital of Ctesiphon, and return— under treaty guarantees of security that form a document in the history of freedom of thought— to Edessa, where just a century later the forces of Islam encountered the classical Greek culture of Antiquity, especially its science and medicine. Neoplatonism (also Neo-Platonism) is the modern term for a school of religious and mystical philosophy that took shape in the 3rd century AD, founded by Plotinus and based on the teachings of Plato and earlier Platonists. ... The School of Athens by Raphael (1509–1510), fresco at the Apostolic Palace, Vatican City. ... For other uses, see number 529. ... Classical antiquity is a broad term for a long period of cultural history centered on the Mediterranean Sea, which begins roughly with the earliest-recorded Greek poetry of Homer (7th century BC), and continues through the rise of Christianity and the fall of the Western Roman Empire (5th century AD... Persia redirects here. ... Ctesiphon, 1932 Ctesiphon (Parthian and Pahlavi: Tyspwn as well as Tisfun, Persian: ‎, also known as in Arabic Madain, Maden or Al-Madain: المدائن) is one of the great cities of ancient Mesopotamia and the capital of the Parthian Empire and its successor, the Sassanid Empire, for more than 800 years... Freedom of thought (also called freedom of conscience and freedom of ideas) is the freedom of an individual to hold or consider a fact, viewpoint, or thought, regardless of anyone elses view. ... The heritage of Roman Edessa survives today in these columns at the site of Urfa Castle, dominating the skyline of the modern city of Åžanlı Urfa. ...

The Histories are similarly a important source on Pre-Islamic Iran, including - in very summary form - "our earliest substantial evidence for the Khvadhaynamagh tradition" (Cameron) that later formed the basis of Ferdowsi's Shahname and provided much of the Iranian material for al-Tabari's History. Tomb of Ferdowsi in Tus Hakīm Abol-Qāsem Ferdowsī Tūsī (Persian: ), more commonly transliterated as Ferdowsi, (935–1020) was a highly revered Persian poet. ... Shahnameh Shahnameh Scenes from the Shahnameh carved into reliefs at Tus, where Ferdowsi is buried. ... Balamis 14th century Persian version of Universal History by al-Tabari Abu Jafar Muhammad ibn Jarir at-Tabari 838–923 (father of Jafar, named Muhammad, son of Jarir from the province of Tabaristan, Arabic الطبري), was an author from Persia, one of the earliest, most prominent and famous Persian...

Editions of the Histories

• Bonaventura Vulcanius (1594)
• Barthold G. Niebuhr, for the Corpus Scriptorum Historiae Byzantinae, Bonn, 1828
• Jean P. Migne, Patrologia Graeca, vol. 88, Paris, 1860, col. 1248-1608 (based on Niebuhr's edition above)
• Dindorf, Historici Graeci Minores, vol. II, Leipzig, (1871), p. 132-453.
• Rudolf Keydell, Agathiae Myrinaei Historiarum libri quinque in Corpus Fontium Historiae Byzantinae, vol. 2, Series Berolinensis, Walter de Gruyter, 1967
• Salvator Costanza, Agathiae Myrinaei Historiarum libri quinque, Universita degli Studi, Messina, 1969
• Joseph D. Frendo, Agathias: The Histories in Corpus Fontium Historiae Byzantinae (translation with an introduction and short explanatory notes), vol. 2A, Series Berolinensis, Walter de Gruyter, 1975

Bonaventura Vulcanius of Bruges (1538-1614). ... Jacques Paul Migne (25 October 1800 - 25 October 1875) was a French priest who published inexpensive and widely-distributed editions of theological works, encyclopedias and the texts of the Church Fathers. ... The Patrologia Graeca is an edited collection of writings by the Christian Church Fathers in the Greek language in 161 volumes, produced in 1857–1866 by J.P. Migne It includes both the Eastern Fathers and those Western authors who wrote before Latin became predominant the West in the 3rd... Karl Wilhelm Dindorf (January 2, 1802 - August 1, 1883), German classical scholar, was born at Leipzig. ... This article or section does not cite its references or sources. ... This article or section does not cite its references or sources. ...

References

• Averil Cameron, "Agathias on the Sasanians" in Dumbarton Oaks Papers, 23 (1969) pp 67-183.
• Averil Cameron, Agathias Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1970. ISBN 0-19-814352-4.
• Anthony Kaldellis, "Things are not what they are: Agathias Mythistoricus and the last laugh of Classical " in Classical Quarterly, 53 (2003) pp 295-300.
• Kaldellis, "The Historical and Religious Views of Agathias: A Reinterpretation," in Byzantion. Revue internationale des etudes byzantines, 69 (1999) pp 206-252.
• Kaldellis, "Agathias on history and poetry," in Greek, Roman and Byzantine Studies, 38 (1997), pp 295-306
• W. S. Teuffel, "Agathias von Myrine", Philologus (1846)
• C. Krumbacher, Geschichte der byzantinischen Litteratur (2nd ed. 1897)

This article incorporates text from the Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition, a publication now in the public domain. This article incorporates text from the public-domain Catholic Encyclopedia of 1913. Encyclopædia Britannica, the eleventh edition The Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition (1910–1911) is perhaps the most famous edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica. ... The public domain comprises the body of all creative works and other knowledge—writing, artwork, music, science, inventions, and others—in which no person or organization has any proprietary interest. ... The public domain comprises the body of all creative works and other knowledge—writing, artwork, music, science, inventions, and others—in which no person or organization has any proprietary interest. ... Not to be confused with New Catholic Encyclopedia. ...

External links

• Encyclopædia Britannica 1911:Agathias
• Catholic Encyclopedia: Agathias
• Agathias on the Persians: excerpts from History (English)
• Gerald Bechtle, Bryn Mawr Classical Review of Rainer Thiel, Simplikios und das Ende der neuplatonischen Schule in Athen, Stuttgart, 1999 (in English).
• "Encyclopedia of Past Events