Chapter VI: Chronology

In the following chronological table of the life of Cassiodorus I have, for convenience sake, assumed 480 as the year of his birth, and 575 as that of his death. It is now, I think, sufficiently proved that if these dates are not absolutely correct, they cannot be more than a year or two wrong in one direction or the other.

[Sidenote: Consular Fasti.]

As dates were still reckoned by Consulships, at any rate through the greater part of the life of Cassiodorus, I have inserted the Consular Fasti for the period in question. It will be seen that several names of correspondents of Cassiodorus figure in this list. As a general though not universal practice, one of the two Consuls at this time was chosen from out of the Senate of Rome and the other from that of Constantinople. We can almost always tell whether a chronicler belongs to the Eastern or Western Empire by observing whether he puts the Eastern or Western Consul first. Thus, for A.D. 501, Marcellinus Comes, who was an official of the Eastern Empire, gives us 'Pompeius et Avienus, Coss.;' while Cassiodorus, in his 'Chronicon,' assigns the year to 'Avienus et Pompeius.' Pompeius was a nobleman of Constantinople, nephew of the Emperor Anastasius; while Avienus was a Roman Senator[186]. Again, in A.D. 490, Marcellinus gives the names of Longinus and Faustus, which Cassiodorus quotes as Faustus and Longinus. Longinus was a brother of the Emperor Zeno, and Faustus was for many years Praetorian Praefect under Theodoric, and was the receiver of many letters in the following collection.

[Footnote 186: See Usener, p. 32.]

I have endeavoured to give the priority always to the _Western_ Consul in the list before us, except in those cases where an Emperor (who was of course an Eastern) condescended to assume the Consular _trabea_.

[Sidenote: Indictions.]

Another mode of reckoning the dates which the reader will continually meet with in the following pages is by _Indictions_. The Indiction, as is well known, was a cycle of fifteen years, during which, as we have reason to believe, the assessment for the taxes remained undisturbed, a fresh valuation being made all round when the cycle was ended. Traces of this quindecennial period may be found in the third century, but the formal adoption of the Indiction is generally assigned to the Emperor Constantine, and to the year 312[187]. The Indiction itself, and every one of the years composing it, began on the 1st of September of the calendar year. The reason for this period being chosen probably was that the harvests of the year being then gathered in, the collection of the tithes of the produce, which formed an important part of the Imperial revenue, could be at once proceeded with. What gives an especial importance to this method of dating by Indictions, for the reader of the following letters is, that most of the great offices of State changed hands at the beginning of the year of the Indiction (Sept. 1), not at the beginning of the Calendar year.

[Footnote 187: Compare Marquardt (Römische Staatsverwaltung ii. 237). He remarks that the Indiction seems to have been first adopted in Egypt, and did not come into universal use all over the Empire till the end of the Fourth Century.]

To make such a mode of dating the year at all satisfactory, it would seem to us necessary that the number of the cycle itself, as well as of the year in the cycle, should be given; for instance, that A.D. 313 should be called the first year of the first Indiction, and A.D. 351 the ninth year of the third Indiction. This practice, however, was not adopted till far on into the Middle Ages[188]. At the time we are speaking of, the word Indiction seems generally to have been given not to the cycle itself, but to the year in the cycle. Thus, 313 was the first Indiction, 314 the second Indiction, 315 the third Indiction, and so on. And thus we find a year, which from other sources we know to be 313, called the first Indiction, 351 the ninth Indiction, 537 the fifteenth Indiction, without any clue being given to guide us to the important point in what cycles these years held respectively the first, the ninth, and the fifteenth places.

[Footnote 188: The Twelfth Century, according to Marquardt.]

As the Indiction began on the 1st of September a question arises whether the calendar year is to be named after the number of the Indiction which belongs to its beginning or its end; whether, to go back to the beginning, A.D. 312 or A.D. 313 is to be accounted the first Indiction. The practice of the chroniclers and of most writers on chronology appears to be in favour of the latter method, which is natural, inasmuch as nine months of the Indiction belong to the later date and only three to the earlier. Thus, for instance, Marcellinus Comes calls the year of the Consulship of Belisarius, which was undoubtedly 535, 'Indictio XIII:' the thirteenth Indiction of that cycle having begun Sept. 1, 534, and ended August 31, 535. But it is well that the student should be warned that our greatest English authority, Mr. Fynes Clinton, adopts the other method. In the very useful table of comparative chronology which he gives in his Fasti Romani[189] he assigns the Indiction to that year of the Christian era in which it had its beginning, and accordingly 534, not 535, is identified with the thirteenth Indiction.

[Footnote 189: Vol. ii. pp. 214-216. See his remarks, p. 210: 'The Indictions in Marcellinus and in the Tables of Du Fresnoy are compared with the Consulship and the Julian year in which they end. In the following Table they are compared with the year in which they begin, because the years of the Christian era are here made the measure of the rest, and contain the beginnings of all the other epochs.']

In order to translate years of Indiction into years of the Christian era it is necessary first to add some multiple of 15 (_what_ multiple our knowledge of history must inform us) to 312. On the 1st of September of the year so obtained the Indiction cycle began; and for any other year of the same cycle we must of course add its own number minus one. Thus, when we find Cassiodorus as Praetorian Praefect writing a letter[190] informing Joannes of his appointment to the office of Cancellarius 'for the _twelfth_ Indiction,' as we know within a little what date is wanted, we first of all add 14 x 15 (= 210) to 312, and so obtain 522. The first Indiction in that cycle ran from September 1, 522, to August 31, 523. The twelfth Indiction was therefore from September 1, 533, to August 31, 534, and that is the date we require.

[Footnote 190: Var. xi. 6.]

On the other hand, when we find a letter written by Cassiodorus as Praetorian Praefect to the Provincials of Istria[191] as to the payment of tribute for the _first_ Indiction, we know that we must now have entered upon a new cycle. We therefore add 15 x 15 (= 225) to 312, and get 537. As it happens to be the _first_ Indiction that we require, our calculation ends here: September 1, 537, to August 31, 538, is the answer required.

[Footnote 191: Var. xii. 22.]

If anyone objects that such a system of chronology is cumbrous, uncertain, and utterly unscientific, I can only say that I entirely agree with him, and that the system is worthy of the perverted ingenuity which produced the Nones and Ides of the Roman Calendar.

In the following tables I have not attempted to mark the years of the Indiction, on account of the confusion caused by the fact that two calendar years require the same number. But I have denoted by the abbreviation 'Ind.' the years in which each cycle of the Indictions _began_. These years are 492, 507, 522, 537, 552, and 567.

_Chronological Tables._

Private Public Rulers of
A.D. Consuls. Events. Events. Italy. Popes. Emperors.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
480 Basilius Magnus Assassination ODOVACAR SIMPLICIUS ZENO
Junior. Aurelius of Nepos, (from 476). (from 468). (from 474).
Cassiodorus formerly
Senator, Emperor of
born at the West.
Scyllacium
(?).
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
481 Placidus. Odovacar
avenges the
murder of
Nepos. Death
of
Theodoricus
Triarii.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
482 Trocondus Accession of
and Clovis.
Severinus.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
483 Faustus. Zeno issues FELIX II
the Henoticon. (or III).
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
484 Theodoricus Illus revolts
and against Zeno.
Venantius. Schism between
Eastern and
Western
Churches.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
485 Q. Aurelius
Memmius
Symmachus.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
486 Decius and
Longinus.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
487 Boethius War between
(_Father of Odovacar and
the great the Rugians.
Boethius_).
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
488 Dyanamius Theodoric
and starts for
Sifidius. Italy. Death
of Illus.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
489 Anicius Theodoric
Probinus descends into
and Italy. Battles
Eusebius. of the Isonzo
and Verona.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
490 Flavius Battle of the
Faustus Adda.
Junior and
Longinus (II).
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
491 Olybrius Battle of ANASTASIUS.
Junior. Ravenna.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
492 Flavius GELASIUS.
(Ind.) ANASTASIUS
Augustus and
Rufus.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
493 Eusebius Surrender of THEODORIC.
(II) and Ravenna.
Albinus. Death of
Odovacar.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
494 Turcius
Rufus
Apronianus
Asterius and
Praesidius.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
495 Flavius
Viator.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
496 Paulus. Clovis ANASTASIUS.
defeats the
Alamanni. His
conversion.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
497 Flavius SYMMACHUS
ANASTASIUS (Antipope
Aug. (II). Laurentius).
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
498 Paulinus
and Joannes
Scytha.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
499 Joannes
Gibbus.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
500 Patricius Cassiodorus War between
and Senior, Gundobad and
Hypatius. Patrician, Clovis.
Praefect. Theodoric's
His son visit to
becomes his Rome.
_Consili- Conspiracy of
arius_. Odoin.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
501 Rufius About this Synodus
Magnus time Palmaris at
Faustus Cassiodorus Rome.
Avienus pronounces Symmachus
and his confirmed in
Flavius panegyric the
Pompeius. on Pontificate.
Theodoric,
and is
rewarded by
being
appointed
Quaestor.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
502 Flavius
Avienus
Junior and
Probus.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
503 Dexicrates
and
Volusianus.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
504 Cethegus. War of Sirmium.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
505 Theodorus War between
and Theodoric and
Sabinianus. Anastasius
(affair of
Mundo).
Battle of
Horrea Margi.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
506 Messala and
Areobinda.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
507 Flavius Clovis
(Ind.) ANASTASIUS defeats
Aug. (III) Alaric II at
and Campus
Venantius. Vogladensis.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
508 Venantius Tulum
and Celer. endeavours to
raise siege
of Arles.
Byzantine
raid on
Apulia.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
509 Importunus. Mammo invades
Burgundy.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
510 Anicius Ibbus defeats
Manlius Franks and
Severinus Burgundians.
Boethius
(_Author
of the
'Consolation'_).
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
511 Felix and Death of
Secundinus. Clovis.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
512 Paulus and
Muschianus.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
513 Probus and
Clementinus.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
514 Senator, Cassiodorus HORMISDAS.
_solus as Consul
Consul_ restores
(Cassio- harmony
dorus). between
clergy and
people of
Rome.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
515 Florentius Cassiodorus Marriage of
and receives Eutharic and
Anthemius. the Amalasuentha.
Patriciate
(?).
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
516 Petrus.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
517 Agapitus
and Flavius
Anastasius
(_nephew
of the
Emperor_).

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
518 Magnus. JUSTIN I.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
519 JUSTINUS Composition End of schism
Augustus of the between
and 'Chroni- Eastern and
Eutharicus con,' Western
Cillica. dedicated Churches.
to
Eutharic.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
520 Rusticus Composition
and of the
Vitalianus. Gothic
History
(?).
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
521 Valerius
and Flavius
Justinianus.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
522 Symmachus
(Ind.) and Boethius
(_sons of
the great
Boethius_).
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
523 Flavius Franks invade JOHN I.
Anicius Burgundy.
Maximus. Imprisonment
of Boethius.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
524 Flavius Death of
JUSTINUS Boethius.
Aug. (II)
and Opilio.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
525 Anicius Death of
Probus Symmachus.
Junior and Pope John's
Flavius Mission to
Theodorus Constantinople.
Philoxenus.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
526 Olybrius. Cassiodorus Pope John ATHALARIC. FELIX III
Master of dies in (or IV).
the prison (May
Offices. 25). Death of
Theodoric
(Aug. 30).
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
527 Vettius Death of JUSTINIAN.
Agorius Amalafrida,
Basilius Queen-dowager
Mavortius. of the Vandals.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
528 Flavius
JUSTINIANUS
Aug. (II).
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
529 Decius BONIFACE II.
Junior.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
530 Flavius
Lampadius
and
Orestes.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
531 _Post
Consulatum
Lampadii et
Orestis._
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
532 _Post Final invasion
Consulatum of Burgundy by
Lampadii et the Franks.
Orestis.
Anno II._
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
533 Flavius Cassiodorus The Vandal War JOHN III.
JUSTINIANUS Praetorian of Justinian
Aug. (III). Praefect (June, 533-
(Sept. 1), March, 534).
which
office he
holds till
he retires
from public
life.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
534 Flavius Death of AMALASUENTHA.
JUSTINIANUS Athalaric THEODAHAD.
Aug. (IV) (Oct. 2).
and Flavius Association of
Theodorus Theodahad with
Paulinus Amalasuentha.
Junior.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
535 Flavius Death of AGAPETUS.
Belisarius. Amalasuentha.
The Gothic War
begins.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
536 _Post Belisarius WITIGIS. SILVERIUS.
Consulatum takes Naples
Fl. and enters
Belisarii._ Rome.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
537 _Post Siege of Rome VIGILIUS.
(Ind.) Consulatum by Witigis.
Fl.
Belisarii
Anno II._
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
538 Flavius Collection Siege of Rome
Johannes of the raised.
(John of 'Variae.'
Cappa- Composition
docia). of the 'De
Animâ.'
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
539 Flavius Cassiodorus Mediolanum
Appion. about this taken by the
time lays Goths.
down his Belisarius
office and takes
retires to Auximum.
his
birthplace
(Scyllacium),
where he
founds the
Monastery
of
Vivaria.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
540 Flavius Ravenna ILDIBAD.
Justinus surrendered
Junior. to
Belisarius.
Captivity of
Witigis.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
541 Flavius He writes ERARIC.
Basilius Commentary BADUILA
Junior. on the (TOTILA).
Psalms as
far as
Psalm 20.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
542 Years " Totila twice
reckoned defeats the
Post Imperial
Consulatum generals, and
Basilii. retrieves the
fortune of the
Ostrogoths.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
543 " Composition
of the
'Institutiones
Divinarum et
Humanarum
Litterarum.'
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
544 " Belisarius
returns to
Italy.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
545 " Rome taken by
Totila.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
546 " Continues
and
completes
his
Commentary
on the
Psalms.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
547 " " Rome
re-occupied by
Belisarius.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
548 " " Death of
Empress
Theodora.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
549 " " Rome again
taken by
Totila.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
550 " " Death of
Germanus.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
551 " Narses
Commander of
Italian
Expedition.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
552 " Writes the Narses TEIAS.
(Ind.) 'Complexi- defeats
ones in Totila
Epistolas near
Apostolo- Tadinum.
rum,' and
compiles
the
'Historia
Tripartita'
(the
precise
date of
these
works
unknown).
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
553 " " Teias NARSES,
defeated and Governor of
slain near Italy under
Mons the Emperor.
Lactarius.
The Ostrogoths
leave Italy.
Invasion of
the Alamannic
brethren.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
554 " "
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
555 " " PELAGIUS.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
556 " "
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
557 " "
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
558 " "
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
559 " " Belisarius
defeats the
Huns under
Zabergan.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
560 " " JOHN III.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
561 "
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
562 " Disgrace of
Belisarius.
Belisarius
restored to
favour.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
563 "
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
564 "
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
565 Post JUSTIN II.
Consulatum
Basilii
XXIV.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
566 Flavius Death of
JUSTINUS Belisarius
Augustus. and of
Justinian.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
567 Years Narses LONGINUS,
(Ind.) reckoned recalled by Exarch.
Post Justin.
Consulatum Alleged
Justini. invitation to
the Lombards.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
568 " The Lombards ALBOIN,
under Alboin King of the
enter Italy. Lombards.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
569 " Milan taken
by the
Lombards.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
570 "
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
571 " Ticinum
taken
by the
Lombards.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
572 "
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
573 " Composition Assassination CLEPH, Death of
of treatise of Alboin. King of the John III.
'De Lombards.
Orthographia'
in 93rd
year of
Cassiodorus.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
574 " Death of BENEDICT I.
Cleph.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
575 " Cassiodorus
dies in
his 95th
year (?).
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

THE

LETTERS OF CASSIODORUS.