Page:Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire vol 6 (1897).djvu/563

 APPENDIX 541 The credit of having made this clear belongs to Karapet Ter-Mkrttschian, who published in 1893 a treatise entitled '' Die Paulikianer in byzautinischen Kaiser- reiche und verwandte ketzerisehe Erscheinungen in Armenien". This investiga- tion, although it is ill arranged and leads to no satisfactory conclusion, has yet been of great use in opening up the whole question, as well as by publishing out- of-the-wa.v evidence on various obscure Armenian sects. While Gieseler held that the treatise of the "Abbot Peter" was simply an extract from the work of Peter Sikeliotes, Ter-Mkrttschian tries to prove that the Abbot Peter is the oldest of our existing sources — the source of George Monachus, and Photius (Bk. 1 («)). [The Armenian scholar further propounded (p. 122 sqq.) the impossible theory that Peter Sikeliotes wrote in the time of Alexius Comnenus — when the Paulician and Bogomil question was engaging the attention of the court and the public. It is impossible, because the date of the Vatican Ma. of the treatise of Peter is earlier. As to the Pseudo-Photian account, Ter-Mkrttschian holds that its author utilised the work of Euthymius Zigabenus (p. 8-9).] After Ter-Mkrttschian came J. Friedricli (Der ursprtiugliche bei Georgios Monachos nur theilweise erhaltene Bericht liber die Paulikianer, published in the Sitzungsberichte of the Bavarian Acadeny, 1896, p. 07 sqq.). Friedricli denied that the Abbot Peter's tract was the source used by George Monachus ; and he l^ublished (p. 70-81), as the original source of all the extant accounts, the passage of George Monachus as it appears in the Madrid Ms. of the chronicle. In this Ms. the passage is more than twice as long as in other Mss. , the additional matter consisting chiefly of directions to Christians how they were to refute a Paulician heretic when they met one. According to Friedricli, the work of the Abbot Peter is an extract from this treatise, preserved in the Madrid Ms. ; and the accounts in the other Mss. of George Monachus are likewise extracts. But the view of Friedrich has been upset conclusively by C. de Boor, the only scholar who is thoroughly master of the facts about the Mss. of George Monachus. In a short paper in the Bj-zantinische Zeitschrift, vii. p. 40 sqq. (1898), de Boor has shown that the additional matter in the Madrid Ms. conies from an inter- polator. George seems to have made a second version of his chronicle, and in revising it he consulted his sources, or some of them, again. This seems to be the onl}^ hypothesis on which the peculiarities of one Ms., Coislin. 305, can be explained. In the case of the Paulician passage, de Boor points out that in the first form of his work (represented by Coislin. 305) he used an original source ; from which he again drew at more length on a second revision (represented by the other Mss.). It is therefore the second revision which we must compare with the work of the Abl)ot Peter in order to determine whether the Abbot Peter is the original source. De Boor does not decide this ; but calls attention to two passages which might seem to show that the Abbot used the second revision of George the Monk, and one passage which rather points to the independence of the A})bot. On the whole, the second alternative seems more probable. The present state of the question may be summed up as follows: The (1) original sketch of the Paulician here.sv, its origin and liistor}- — whereon all our extant accounts ultiniatel}' depend — is lost. This original work was used by (2) George the Monk (in the 9th centur}-) for his chronicle ; {a) in Coislin. 305 we have a shorter extract, (b) in the other Mss. (and Jluralt's text) we have a fuller extract. (3) The tract of the Abbot Peter was either taken from the second edi- tion of George the Monk, or was independently extracted from the original work ; but it was not the original work itself. (4) It is not quite certain whether the treatise of Photius was derived from the derivative work of the Abbot Peter (so Ter-Mkrttschian ; and this is also the opinion of Ehrhard, ap. Krumbacher's Byz. Litt. p. 76 ; but Friedricli argues against this view. oj). cit. p. 85-6) ; perhaps it is more likely that Photius also used the original work. (5) The position of Peter Sikeliotes is quite uncertain (see below). (6) The interpolation in the Madrid Ms. of George the Monk (see above) was added not later than the 10th century, in which period the Ms. was written. Then come (7) Euthymius Zigabenus in the Panoplia, c. 1100 a.d., and (8) Pseudo-Pliotius. The unsolved problem touching Peter Sikeliotes would have no historical