Eusebius/Jerome’s Chronicon in Iberia up to the Year 1000

Abstract

Either in Greek, or translated into Latin by Jerome (and later into Armenian by an unknown author), until at least the 13th century, few books have had a greater and more lasting influence on Mediterranean historiography than the Chronicon of Eusebius of Caesarea (CPG 3494). For almost a thousand years, this Chronicon was continuously referred to as a literary model, and it was expanded, abridged, truncated, adapted, or completely rewritten, giving rise to new texts that, in a closer to or more distant way from its model, became, in turn, new models and sources for other new works.In Iberia, this enormous text, in the Latin version made by Jerome, was known from the second half of the 5th century (with Hydatius’ Chronicon; CPL 2263) onwards. In this paper, I will make an history of the the reception of Eusebius/Jerome’s text in Iberia up to year 1000. This paper will be divided in two parts: in the first, I will review the concrete evidence one has today for the circulation of manuscripts transmiting the Chronicon. Even If I have to refer to some more recent examples, they witness the existence of an older tradition whose origin may be traced back into the sixth century. In the second part, I will analyse the evidence for the use of Eusebius/Jerome’s Chronicon by Iberian authors, from Hydatius up to the Christian and Mozarabic authors of the end of the frist millenium.