Page:The English Historical Review Volume 20.djvu/138

130 Jan. Le Christianisme dans l'Empire Perse sous la Dynastie Sassanide. Par J. (Bibliothèque de rEnseignement de l'Histoire Ecclésiastique.) (Paris : Lecoffre. 1904.) De Timotheo I Nestorianorum Patriarcha (728-823) et Christianorum ''Orientalium Condicione sub Chaliphis Ahhasidis. Thesim Facultati'' Litterarum Parisiensi proponebat (Paris: Lecoffre. 1904.) history of the church of the further East is a subject on which very little has hitherto been written; and indeed until the recent publication of the Acts of the eastern synods in a complete form by M. Chabot, and of the lives of various eastern saints, very little could be known about it. The appearance, therefore, of M. Labourt's book on Christianity under the Sassanids, in which full use is made of the new sources of information, is very opportune. The historical narrative is followed by an interesting account of the theology of the Persian church, in which it is shown that the establishment of Nestorianism was a gradual process, not an immediate consequence of the synod of 431. There is also a description of the ecclesiastical organisation, and the book concludes with an index and a reproduction of the map given in M. Duval's Littérature Syriaque. As the ordinary maps are not made from the ecclesiastical point of view, this last is a specially commendable feature. Excellent as is the author's use of the Nestorian sources, he has unfortunately, like many specialists, somewhat neglected other authorities. For instance, his account of Sergius of Khesaina is cited from M. Duval only, and, if he had consulted the so-called Zacharias Bhetor, he would have been able to add to his description of the patriarch Joseph. Again, a reference to the same author or to Procopius would have shown him that the Theodosioupolis taken by Kawad was not Khesaina, but the Armenian city of the name. It is apparently a similar neglect of non-Nestorian sources which leads him to think that the pretender maintained by Khosrau was the real son of Maurice, and to confuse the chronology of the campaigns of Heraclius (p. 233). Inaccurate also is the statement that no territorial concessions were made by Khosrau in 590; the districts ceded are mentioned by Sebeos. The date 614 for the fall of Alexandria (618 is the earliest possible) is perhaps a confusion with Jerusalem. Somewhat startling again are the statements that from the time of Justinian to that of Maurice the imperial government showed