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This thesis seeks to further research into Prosper’s chronicle and to counter Theodor Mommsen’s conclusions that Prosper made no editorial changes between the 445 and 455 editions of his chronicle. The ultimate result will be to prove that there were significant and deliberate alterations made by Prosper and to create a critical edition and translation of the chronicle of 445. The methodology includes establishing Prosper’s place in the Latin chronicle tradition, his alleged role as secretary to Pope Leo, his supposed residence in Rome and his theological views. Mommsen’s edition will then be used to compare the manuscripts of the 445 and 455 editions and to determine what differences exist. This comparison will show that Prosper not only continued his own chronicle but also edited it between 445 and 455. We will then fill the void left by Mommsen when he created only one edition by providing a critical edition and translation of the 445 chronicle for the first time.

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The objective of this research project is to build a sound defense of the hypothesis that Genesis 22, the story of the testing of Abraham, functioned in Persian Period Judah to benefit the systematic socio-religious reforms implemented by Ezra the priestly scribe. It is argued in this dissertation that the “Book of the Law” Ezra read to the Temple community is a version of the Pentateuch, which under Ezra’s care had become the holy writ of Judaism. Based on Ezra’s scribal abilities, priestly status, royal commission to teach God’s Law to the people of the Trans-Euphrates Satrapy, and his impetus to reform the apostate Temple community, it is argued that Ezra is the final redactor of the Book of the Law of Moses. Being deeply immersed in the Pentateuch, it is most likely that Ezra would have used the narrative material in the corpus that would best effect socio-religious reform. It is shown in this dissertation that there could be no better text than Genesis 22 to instill that ideology in the apostate Temple community. It is further postulated that Genesis 22 would have been used at that time to instill in the apostate members of that community a sense of reverence for God, obedience to the tenets of the Book of the Law, which overwhelmingly advocates a lifestyle of socio-religious separateness. It is also argued that embracing that ideology was paramount to the survival of the Temple community as a distinct religious entity in the Persian Empire, as well as to regaining their autonomy over the Land. A redaction critical analysis, an examination of key words and phrases, a consideration of separateness as the ideology of the postexilic period, and a study on cultic reform in Ancient Israel are used to support the argument that Genesis 22 was used to impact the wayward fifth-century Jews. Furthermore, it is shown that divine testing, the fear of God, covenant, and socio-religious separateness expressed in the Abraham cycle (all of which culminate in Genesis 22) are the main concerns of Ezra, making the narrative an indispensable didactic in the reform and indoctrination of the apostate elders, priests and Levites of the Jerusalem Temple community. It is shown that Abraham’s demonstration of utter reverence and radical obedience to God’s directives would have best set the standard of the God fearing Jew at that time. Having apparently lost their identity as the people of Yahweh, whose original vocation it was to bless the nations with the revelation of the one true God of creation and his Law, it has been argued in this dissertation that Genesis 22 would have been used in the effort to restore that identity to the Temple community in the fifth-century reform movement.

<p>Among the numerous commitments late ancient Christians throughout the Roman Empire shared with their non-Christian neighbors was a preoccupation with justice. Not only was the latter one of the celebrated characteristics of God, the New Testament had charged Christians, particularly those who served as bishops or elders, with ensuring and maintaining justice in their communities from the tradition's very origins. In the early fourth century, this aspect of episcopal responsibilities had received an unexpected boost when the Emperor Constantine not only recognized bishops' role in intra-Christian conflict resolution, but expanded their judicial capacity to include even outsiders in the so-called audientia episcopalis, the bishop's court. </p><p>Christians had, of course, never resolved the question of what constituted justice in a vacuum. Yet bishops' increasing integration into the sprawling and frequently amorphous apparatus of the Roman legal system introduced new pressures as well as new opportunities into Christian judicial discourse. Roman law could become an ally in a minister's exegetical or homiletical efforts. Yet it also came to intrude into spheres that had previously regarded themselves as set apart from Roman society, including especially monastic and clerical communities. The latter proved to be particularly permeable to different shades of legal discourse, inasmuch as they served as privileged feeders for episcopal sees. Their members were part of the Christian elites, whose judicial formation promised to bear disproportionate fruit among the laity under their actual or eventual care. This dissertation's task is the examination of the ways in which Christians in these environments throughout the Latin West at the turn of the fifth century thought and wrote about justice. I contend that no single influence proved dominant, but that three strands of judicial discourse emerge as significant throughout these sources: that of popular philosophical thought; that of biblical exegesis; and that of reasoning from Roman legal precept and practice. Late ancient Christian rhetoric consciously and selectively deployed these threads to craft visions of justice, both divine and human, that could be treated as distinctively Christian while remaining intelligible in the broader context of the Roman Empire.</p> / Dissertation

En année 408 après J.-C., l’Espagne, malgré sa position péninsulaire à la fin de l’Europe, était intégrée à une culture pan-Méditerranéenne qui s’étendait du Portugal jusqu’à la Syrie. Trois décennies n’étaient pas encore passées depuis l’instauration du Christianisme comme religion de l’état romain et l’Eglise Catholique était en pleine croissance. L’année suivante, l’Espagne entra sur une voie de transformation irrémédiable alors que les païens, avec leurs langues barbares Germaniques franchirent les Pyrénées portant la guerre et la misère aux Hispano-Romains et fondant leurs royaumes là où auparavant gouvernait l’état romain. Dans le désarroi du Ve siècle, les évêques Catholiques luttèrent pour imposer leur dominance dans les communautés et dans les coeurs des pieux. À la lumière des progrès dans l’archéologie et la qualité des éditions critiques de nos sources littéraires est venu le moment d’identifier les évêques ibériques avec une attention aux conditions régionales. Ce mémoire caractérise les évêques de l’Espagne et du Portugal et démontre les épreuves auxquelles ils firent face comme intermédiaires entre indigènes et envahisseurs, comme évangélistes parmi les païens, persécuteurs des apostates et gardiens de la romanitas à la fin du monde Antique. / In Anno Domini 408, Spain, despite its peninsular location at the ends of Europe, was part of a pan-Mediterranean culture which spread from Portugal to Syria. Christianity had been adopted a mere 28 years prior and the Catholic Church was growing across the Roman world. The following year, Spain entered on a course of irreversible transformation as pagan Germanic speaking 'barbarians' crossed the Pyrenees bringing war and strife to the Hispano-Romans and establishing new kingdoms where the Roman state had once governed. In the turmoil of the fifth century, Catholic bishops laboured to assert their dominance over their communities and over the hearts of their flock. In light of advances in archaeology and quality critical editions of the literary sources, the time has come to identify the traits of the Iberian bishops with attention to regional variation. This thesis characterises the bishops of Spain and Portugal and demonstrates the challenges they faced as intermediaries between natives and newcomers, as proselytizers of pagans, persecutors of heretics and retainers of romanitas at the end of the Antique world.

No / Considerable debate persists concerning the origins of those involved in the adventus Saxonum: the arrival of Germanic peoples in Britain during the fifth century AD. This question was investigated using oxygen and strontium isotope ratios obtained from archaeological dental samples from individuals in the ¿Migration Period¿ cemetery, Ringlemere, Kent (n = 7) and three continental European sites (n = 17). Results demonstrated that strontium alone is unable to distinguish between individuals from south-eastern England and north-western Europe. Although 87Sr/86Sr values from Ringlemere fell within local biosphere parameters and suggest a spatially and temporally related group, ¿18O values were inconsistent with origins in eastern England or on the North German plain. Results from the European sites negate past climate change as an explanation. It is possible that culturally mediated behaviour has obscured geographical relationships. Further work to characterize water sources and human ¿18O values in the putative European homelands is required. / NERC

My thesis offers a comparison of the Minor Prophets commentaries of Theodore of Mopsuestia and Cyril of Alexandria, isolating the role each assigns (1) the Twelve Prophets in their ministry to Old Testament Israel and (2) the texts of the Twelve as Christian scripture. While the two produce radically different commentaries in terms of quantity and detail of christological interpretation, the source of their divergence cannot be reduced to Cyril's admitting messianic prophecy whereas Theodore does not. Rather, I argue that Theodore does acknowledge christological prophecies, as distinct from both retrospective accommodation and typology. Further, a careful reading of Cyril's Commentary on the Twelve limits the prospective christological revelation he ascribes to the prophets and reveals the positive role he grants the Mosaic law prior to Christ's advent. My thesis secondly explores the Christian significance both Theodore and Cyril assign to Israel's exile and restoration, the pivotal event to which the Twelve bear witness. I here argue that Theodore's reading of the Twelve Prophets, while not attempting to be christocentric, is nevertheless self-consciously Christian. Cyril, unsurprisingly, offers a robust Christian reading of the Twelve, yet this too must be expanded by his focus on the church and concern to equip the church through the ethical paideusis provided by the plain sense of the prophetic text. Revised descriptions of each interpreter lead to the claim that the label “christocentric” obscures more than it clarifies and polarizes no less than earlier accounts of Antiochene/Alexandrian exegesis. I advocate rather for an approach that takes seriously Theodore's positive account of the unity and telos of the divine economy and the full range of Cyril's interpretation, in order to move beyond a zero-sum assessment and offer instead a positive account that appreciates the strengths of each Christian reading of the Twelve.