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 free from redundancy" (Cod. 31). The history is learned and generally impartial, "though it is occasionally one-sided and runs off into a theological treatise." An Eng. trans. was pub. by Baxter in 1847. (2) The Religious History, φιλόθεος ἱστορία, is devoted to the lives of 30 celebrated hermits and ascetics, his contemporaries, and was written from personal knowledge and popular report before his Ecclesiastical History. It excites our wonder at what Dr. Newman calls the "easy credence, or as moderns would say large credulousness," which appears more astonishing as he had been brought up in the most matter-of-fact, prosaic, and critical school of ancient Christendom. "What," writes Dr. Newman, "made him drink in with such relish what we reject with such disgust? Was it that, at least, some miracles were brought home so absolutely to his sensible experience that he had no reason for doubting the others which came to him second-hand? This certainly will explain what to most of us is sure to seem the stupid credulity of so well-read, so intellectual an author " (Hist. Sketches, iii. 314). The whole subject presents a very curious intellectual problem.

V. Epistolary.—No portion of Theodoret's literary remains exceeds in interest and value the large collection of his letters. As throwing light on his personal history and character, and as helping us to understand the perplexed relations of the principal actors in that stormy period of theological strife and their various shades of theological opinion, their importance cannot be over-estimated. They give us a heightened esteem of Theodoret himself, his intellectual power, theological precision, warm-hearted affection, and Christian virtues. An Eng. trans. of this remarkable series of letters, arranged according to date and subject, is much to be desired.

The Auctarium of Garnier also contains the following: (1) Prolegomena and Extracts of Commentaries on the Psalms, probably derived from Catenae. (2) A Short Extract from a Commentary on St. Luke. (3) Sermon on the Nativity of S. John Baptist. (4) Homily spoken at Chalcedon in 431. (5) Fifteen additional letters of Theodoret. (6) Seven dialogues composed a little before the council of Ephesus, 2 each against Anomoeans and Apollinarians, and 3 against Macedonians. Their authorship is doubtful; they have been ascribed to Athanasius or Maximus, but Garnier claims them for Theodoret.

Editions.—There are 2 edd. of his complete works in Gk. and Lat.; the first in 4 vols. fol. (Paris, 1642 ), by the Jesuit Jac. Sirmond, to which a 5th vol. was added after Sirmond's death by his fellow-Jesuit, J. Garnier (Paris, 1684), containing an auctarium, comprising fragments of commentaries and sermons and some additional letters, together with Garnier's 5 learned but most one-sided dissertations on (1) the life, (2) the writings, (3) the faith of Theodoret, (4) on the fifth general council, and (5) the cause of Theodoret and the Orientals. This was succeeded by another ed. based on it, with additions and corrections by Lud. Schulze and J. A. Noesselt (Halae Sax. 1769–1774), in 5 vols. and in 10 parts. To this edition our references are made. The ed. of T. Gaisford is pub. by the Clarendon Press. There is a trans. of Theodoret's works in Bohn's Lib. (Bell), and by Blomfield Jackson in ''Lib. of Post-Nicene Fathers.'' Cf. N. Ghibokowski, ''The Blessed Theodoret, bp. of Cyrus (Moscow, 1890, 2vols.); Harnack in Theol. Literatur Zeitung'' (1890), p. 502.

[E.V.]

Theodoricus (1) I. (Theodericus), chosen king of the Visigoths on the death of Valia, 419. He was the real founder of the West Gothic kingdom. On his accession the Visigoths held nothing in Spain, but occupied in Gaul Aquitania Secunda, the region lying, roughly speaking, between the Loire and the Garonne, with some neighbouring cities, of which Toulouse, their capital, was the most important. This territory had been ceded to Valia as the price of the foedus with Rome. The history of Theodoric's reign consists of a series of endeavours to extend this territory when the Romans were otherwise occupied, with intervals of renewal of the foedus, the Goths, however, retaining what they had won. In the great battle of the Mauriac plains Theodoric, who was advanced in life, fell from his horse and was trampled to death by his own troops ( 451). Salvian (de Gub. Dei, vii. 154) praises him for his piety, to which he attributes the defeat of the self-confident Litorius. Though, like the rest of his race, an Arian, he did not persecute the Catholics. Prosper and Idatius, Chronica; Jordanes, Get. 34–40; Isidorus, ''Hist. Goth., Hist. Suev., Dahn, Die Könige der Germanen,'' v. 71.

[F.D.]

Theodoricus (3) (Theodericus), the Ostrogoth, king in Italy. The second is the spelling of all inscriptions (Mommsen, Jordanes, 144). He was the son of Thiudimer by his concubine Erelieva, and was born probably in 454. His father was the second brother of Valamir, king of the Ostrogoths, Vidimer being the third. The three lived in amity, occupying N. Pannonia, the part of the tribe under Thiudimer being settled near Lake Pelso at Theodoric's birth. He succeeded his father in 474 or 475 and assisted in 477 in Zeno's restoration. In 487 Zeno induced Theodoric to undertake an expedition to Italy for the purpose of overthrowing Odoacer. Theodoric willingly consented; his people, who in the course of their wanderings had mostly settled in Lower Moesia, Nova near Rustchuk being his capital, were discontented with their settlements; and in the autumn of 488 they started. It was not the march of an army, but the migration of a whole people. Their progress by Sirmium and Pannonia was slow, impeded by the winter weather and the opposition of the Gepidae and Sarmatians; not till the summer of 489 did they force their way through the Julian Alps into Italy. For the events of the war, terminated in Mar. 493 by Theodoric's complete victory, see D. C. B. (4 vols. 1900), art. "Odoacer." After Theodoric had shut up Odoacer in Ravenna in autumn 490, he sent Faustus, the chief of the senate, and Irenaeus (Gelasius, Ep. 8) to Zeno to ask his permission to assume the royal robes. Zeno died in Apr. 491, and, no answer having come from his successor Anastasius, on the fall of Ravenna the army proclaimed Theodoric king (An. Val. 53, 57). Already