John of Antioch

John of Antioch was the author of Historia Chronike, a universal history written in Greek covering events from "creation" (Adam) to the death of the Byzantine Emperor Phocas in 610 CE. Except for one short fragment (Athos manuscript Iviron 812), this book only survives in fragments copied and/or redacted into later works ( Mariev, 2008:3). A complete extant manuscript is not known to exist. A scholarly debate exists over what would constitute a critical edition - that is if it were even possible to produce a critical edition. Van Nuffelen (2012:438) suggests that the original John may be beyond reconstruction and Mariev (2008:30*) notes that an absolutely “correct” text of John of Antioch may never have existed.. The most reliable fragments according to scholars of the past – and also those scholars who have dealt with the “Johanneische-Frage [Johannine question]” in recent years – is that of the Excerpta historica Constantiniana [Constantinian Excerpts] ( Roberto, 2016:267). Van Nuffelen (2012:437) noted that two recent editions of the fragments of Historia Chronike by Roberto in 2005 and Mariev in 2008 diverge profoundly in their treatment of the fragments and produced a debate that led to mutual accusations of incompetence by both editors.

John of Antioch was a monk and a contemporary of Byzantine Emperor Heraclius (r. 610-648 CE). Roberto (2016:271) suggests that John of Antioch composed his chronicle at the beginning of Heraclius' reign. There is a scholarly debate over whether John of Antioch used the Chronographia of Johannes Malalas (c. 491-578 CE) as a source.