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Michael the Syrian and His Sources: Reflections on the Methodology of Michael the Great As a Historiographer and Its Implications for Modern Historians*

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Michael the Syrian and His Sources: Reflections on the Methodology of Michael the Great As a Historiographer and Its Implications for Modern Historians* ________________________________________________________________________________________________________ MICHAEL THE SYRIAN AND HIS SOURCES: REFLECTIONS ON THE METHODOLOGY OF MICHAEL THE GREAT AS A HISTORIOGRAPHER AND ITS IMPLICATIONS FOR MODERN HISTORIANS* J.J. VAN GINKEL LEIDEN UNIVERSITY atriarch Michael the Syrian (d. soll der Leser aus der Geschichte 1199) wrote his famous Chrono- lernen, daß ein echter Gottesglaube 1 seine Hoffnung nicht auf Menschen, graphy as a universal history. J. Ideologien (Astrologie) etc. setzt und Tubach describes the work and daß die Gleichgültigkeit in religiösen Pauthor as follows: Dingen nur ein Glaube zweiter Wahl Bleibenden literarischen Ruhm wider besseren Wissens ist. Implizit erwarb sich Michael durch seine ist die Kirchengeschichte Michaels Weltgeschichte, die von der Schöp- letztlich eine Apologie des Christentums.2 fung bis ins Jahr 1194/5 reicht. Michael teilte die riesige Stoffmenge In order to write this enormous work in drei Kategorien: Kirchen- Michael had to rely, for the most part, on geschichte, Profangeschichte und other historiographical works of the previ- Verschiedenes. Nach chronologischen Gesichtspunkten geordnet, berichtet ous centuries. Due to the method used by er über die geschehenen Ereignisse in many Syriac authors of quoting and excerpt- drei parallelen Kolumnen. Sein Ideal ing their sources in order to create their own bei der Darstellung ist Objektivität account—a technique once referred to by und chronologische Präzision. Die Larry Conrad as a layering technique— Beschäftigung mit der Vergangenheit many otherwise lost works have now been geschieht allerdings nicht um ihrer preserved, at least partially, in Michael’s selbst willen. In der Geschichte sieht Chronography and in similar works, most Michael Gott am Werk. Sein Walten notably the Anonymous Chronicle of 1234.3 in der Welt steht in enger Korrelation The study of Michael’s selection and editing zum ethischen Verhalten der Menschen. Die Abwendung von Gott process will help us in our study and use of bringt nur Unglück. Erdbeben, these fragments as reflections of the preced- Mißernten etc. sind eine unmittelbare ing works. In the following study some Folge menschlicher Sünden. Durch more general remarks on the use of these die Lektüre vergangener Ereignisse fragments will be presented. ______________________________________________________________________________________________________ Journal of the Canadian Society for Syriac Studies 6 (2006) - Page 53 Michael the Syrian and his Sources _______________________________________________________________________________________________________ The need for a study like this has been and particular goal in mind; that of instruct- indicated by Dorothea Weltecke, who has ing his audience! As a result Andrew Palmer described the scholarly interest in Michael adapts the description of the layering tech- and his Chronology up until her own time as nique as follows: follows: They [Syriac chroniclers] present Nach hundert Jahren Text- und themselves as objective analysts, but Quellenkritik lässt sich folgende … they compiled or composed their Bilanz ziehen: Michaels Chronik texts in retrospect to serve moral, reli- scheint eine recht bunte, wenn auch gious and political purposes. ... By “wertvolle Materialsammlung” zu careful selection and significant juxta- sein, wie es Wolfgang Hage 1992 position of events they led the reader formulierte. Der Steinbruch erscheint to draw conclusion by his own intelli- noch lange nicht erschöpft, und der gence, with a minimum of didactic Abbau wird bis in die Gegenwart intrusion of the author’s part.5 weiter vorangetrieben. ... Die voll- What are the implications of this new ständige Chronik als gewolltes Werk eines Einzelnen wird seit Langlois assessment of Michael’s Chronography and und Chabot nicht mehr untersucht. his use of sources, especially for scholars Eine Monographie ist nie erschienen. who try to use these fragments to gain an Es scheint, dass dem die Annahme insight into the ideas and ideology of the zugrunde liegt, Michaels Chronik sei authors of these fragments? Can we extrapo- mehr oder weniger ohne einen late any guidelines for the historical useful- willentlichen Akt entstanden, habe ness of fragments as a source for the period sich zufällig aus dem Material of the original work and the original author? ergeben und spiegele höchstens die The aim is eventually to present a more materiell oder intellektuell eingesch- structured account of Michael’s working ränkte Recherchierfähigkeit des Autors. Dass die Weite seines method and—hopefully—provide some ad- Horizontes an die Fülle der ihm zur ditional insights in the “usefulness” of Verfügung stehenden Quellen “fragments” for modern research, and on gebunden ist, versteht sich natürlich. how to handle these fragments. Although Doch zeichnet sich in der Diskussion similar work has been done for Western Me- um die verlorenen Geschichtswerke dieval Historiography, this will probably be eine Erkenntnis ab, die für unsere a first for Syriac Historiography. In this arti- Fragestellung von einiger Bedeutung cle some first preliminary thoughts will be ist: Michael hat seine Quellen 6 presented. bearbeitet.4 Methodologically this aspect of Syriac The technique of quotations and excerpts is historiography can best be studied for the partly to blame for this use of Michael as a period from the 6th century until the “Steinbruch”. However, Michael may well 11th/12th century. The main reason is that have preserved fragments from his sources, we can assume that Michael had access to but he did rework (“bearbeitet”) them. As the original source text and did not have to stated before, Michael did have a plan, and rely on go-between texts. For the preceding he did write his Chronography with a clear period, however, he could only access his ______________________________________________________________________________________________________ Journal of the Canadian Society for Syriac Studies 6 (2006) - Page 54 Michael the Syrian and his Sources _______________________________________________________________________________________________________ sources through intermediaries, which may AD 1234.13 In addition to the comparison have adapted the original text.7 between Michael and the real text of his For the 6th century Michael used the source, a comparison of the two compila- works of Pseudo-Zachariah of Mitylene (ca. tions from the late 12th/early 13th century 568)8 and John of Ephesus (d. 588).9 For could help establish some insights on how later centuries Jacob of Edessa (d. 708), “representative” of the real work these two Dionysius of Tel Mahre (d. 845) and Igna- collections of fragments are. In addition, a tius of Melitene (d. 1095) are the most im- comparison of the anonymous Chronicle portant sources for his work.10 Sadly these and John and Pseudo-Zachariah can shed works have been lost and only fragmentary light on the technique of the Anonymous traces can be found in later Syriac historiog- chronicler. raphy, which has prompted the interest in My preliminary comparison of Michael some form of evaluation in the appreciation and John of Ephesus was published in 1998. of these fragments in the first place. From this comparison it first became clear Of special interest to us are Pseudo- that Michael had reduced his source by Zachariah, John of Ephesus and Dionysius. about 75 percent. In order to adapt his mate- Ignatius and Jacob are problematic because rial to his needs, Michael excerpted and re- they do not seem to have written a narrative arranged it. At times, he also added brief text like the other three authors. As a result statements to his excerpts, sometimes within Michael lifted only short remarks from these the excerpts and quotations. His more gen- texts, which are very difficult to attribute to eral aim of instructing his audience also any particular source and are not very infor- came into sharper focus. Part of his instruc- mative about the ideology and perception of tion seems to have been to arouse his lethar- history of their original author.11 gic community and to show them that their A study of Michael’s use of the works church, the Syrian Orthodox community, of John and Pseudo-Zachariah—texts that had always been the heirs of God’s commu- have, in part, been preserved through an in- nity and had always triumphed under pres- dependent manuscript tradition—will help sure. As a result, I made the following state- to establish Michael’s method of use of his ment in my concluding remarks: “Therefore major sources, including some indications I would argue against attempts to ‘recon- towards his selection process. These find- struct’ sources on the basis of these frag- ings may then help interpret some of the ments.”14 This statement has drawn some larger fragments of Dionysius of Tel Mahre, criticism,15 and I would argue that some and especially help to show the potential use clarification might be useful. of these fragments for historical research but It was never my intention to deny that also the limitations forced upon this kind of these fragments have their use for historians research.12 who aim to set forth the history of the pre- As stated before, fragments from these ceding centuries. My main objective was to sources, most particularly from the Church argue against “reconstructing” those History of Dionysius, have also been pre- sources, which gives the impression of a served by another so-called compiler / “real”, coherent text, to be used as if
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