The title page and Dedication from the Barberini MS. The texts read: "Valentinus, may you flourish in God" (top), "Furius Dionysius Filocalus illustrated this work" (in triangles), "Valentinus, enjoy reading this" (main in placard), on the left "Valentinus, may you live long and flourish", on the right "Valentinus, may you live long and rejoice".Portrait of Constantius II, dispensing largesse, from part 7 of the Barberini MSPersonification of June
TheChronograph,Chronography, orCalendar of 354 is a compilation of chronological and calendrical texts produced in 354 AD for a wealthy Roman Christian named Valentinus by the calligrapher andillustratorFurius Dionysius Filocalus. The originalillustrated manuscript is lost, but several copies have survived. It is the earliest knowncodex to have had full page illustrations.[1] The nameCalendar of Filocalus orFilocalian Calendar is sometimes used to describe the whole collection, and sometimes just the sixth part, which is the Calendar itself. Other versions of the names ("Philocalus", "Philocalian", "Codex-Calendar of 354", etc.) are occasionally used. The text and illustrations are available online.[2] It has had a variety of other names over the years; the historianTheodor Mommsen titled it "Chronica urbis Romae".[3]
Amongst other historically significant information, the work contains the earliest reference to the celebration ofChristmas as an annual holiday or feast, onDecember 25, although unique historical dates had been mentioned much earlier byHippolytus of Rome during 202–211.[4]
The original volume has not survived, but it is thought that it still existed inCarolingian times, by the 8th–9th centuries.[5] A number of copies were made at that time, with and without illustrations, which in turn were copied during the Renaissance.
The most complete and faithful copies of the illustrations are the pen drawings in a 17th-centurymanuscript from theBarberini collection (Vatican Library, cod. Barberini lat. 2154). This was carefully copied, under the supervision of the great antiquaryNicholas-Claude Fabri de Peiresc, from aCarolingian copy, aCodex Luxemburgensis, which was itself lost in the 17th century. These drawings, although they are twice removed from the originals, show the variety of sources that the earliest illuminators used as models for manuscript illustration, including metalwork, frescoes, and floor mosaics. The Roman originals were probably fully painted miniatures.
Various partial copies or adaptations survive from theCarolingian Renaissance[6] and Renaissance periods.Botticelli adapted a figure of the city ofTreberis (Trier) who grasps a bound barbarian by the hair for his painting, traditionally calledPallas and the Centaur.[7]
The Vatican Barberini manuscript, made in 1620 for Peiresc, who had the CarolingianCodex Luxemburgensis on long-term loan, is clearly the most faithful. After Peiresc's death in 1637 the manuscript disappeared. However some folios had already been lost from theCodex Luxemburgensis before Peiresc received it, and other copies have some of these. The suggestion ofCarl Nordenfalk that the Codex Luxemburgensis copied by Peiresc was actually the Roman original has not been accepted.[8] Peiresc himself thought the manuscript was seven or eight hundred years old when he had it, and, thoughMabillon had not yet published hisDe re diplomatica (1681), the first systematic work ofpaleography, most scholars, following Meyer Schapiro, believe Peiresc would have been able to make a correct judgement on its age. For a full list of manuscripts with copies after the originals, see the external link.
Furius Dionysius Filocalus was the leading scribe or calligrapher of the period, and possibly also executed the original miniatures. His name is on the dedication page. He was also a Christian, living in a moment that lay on the cusp between a pagan and aChristian Roman Empire.[9]
The Chronography, like all Roman calendars, is as much analmanac as a calendar; it includes various texts and lists, including elegantallegorical depictions of the months. It also includes the importantLiberian Catalogue, alist of popes, and the Calendar of Filocalus, from which copies of eleven miniatures survive. Among other information, it contains the earliest reference to Christmas (see Part 12 below) and the dates of Roman Games, with their number ofchariot-races.[10]
The contents are as follows (from the Barberini Ms. unless stated). All surviving miniatures are full-page, often combined with some text in various ways:
Part 1: title page and dedication - 1 miniature
Part 2: images of the personifications of the cities of Rome, Alexandria, Constantinople and Trier - 4 miniatures
Part 3: images of the emperors and the birthdays of the Caesars - 2 miniatures
Part 4: images of the seven planets with a calendar of the hours - 5 surviving miniatures. Copies of the emblematic drawings appear in a Carolingian text that portrays Mercury and Venus inheliocentric orbits.[11]
Part 5: the signs of the Zodiac – no miniatures surviving in this manuscript; four in other copies
Part 6: the Philocalian calendar – seven miniatures of personifications of the Months in this MS; the full set appears in other copies On December 25: "N·INVICTI·CM·XXX" – "Birthday of the unconquered, games ordered, thirty races" – is the oldest literary reference to the pagan feast ofSol Invictus
Part 7: consular portraits of the emperors – 2 miniatures (the last in the MS)
Part 8:list (fasti) of theRoman consuls to AD 354 At AD 1: "Hoc cons. dominus Iesus Christus natus est VIII kal. Ian. d. Ven. luna xv." – "When these [Caesare and Paulo] were consuls, Lord Jesus Christ was born 8 days before the kalends of January [December 25] on the day of Venus Moon 15" – is a historical reference
Part 11: commemoration dates of past popes from AD 255 to 352
Part 12: commemoration dates of the martyrs Line 1: "VIII kal. Ian. natus Christus in Betleem Iudeae" – "Eighth day before the kalends of January [December 25] Birth of Christ in Bethlehem of Judea" – is the oldest reference to Jesus' birth as an annual feast day
^Schmidt, Tom (November 21, 2010),Hippolytus and the Original Date of Christmas, chronicon.net,archived from the original on March 3, 2013, retrievedDecember 29, 2018. Schmidt is translator ofHippolytus of Rome: Commentary on Daniel and 'Chronicon'.
^The LeidenAratus, a Carolingian manuscript ofPhaenomena edited byHugo Grotius in 1600, is illustrated in part with figures drawn from the Codex-Calendar of 354 (Meyer Schapiro, "The Carolingian Copy of the Calendar of 354"The Art Bulletin22.4 (December 1940, pp. 270-272) p 270).
^A. L. Frothingham, who noted Botticelli's source, in "The Real Title of Botticelli's 'Pallas'"American Journal of Archaeology12.4 (October 1908), pp. 438-444, reidentified the subject asFlorentia and unruly civic strife.
^Nordenfalk, "Der Kalendar vom Jahre 354 und die lateinische Buchmalerei des IV. Jahrhunderts" (Göteborg) 1936, noted in Schapiro 1940:270, reprinted in Schapiro,Selected Papers: volume 3, Late Antique, Early Christian and Mediaeval Art, 1980, Chatto & Windus, London,ISBN0-7011-2514-4On line at JSTOR
^Ramsay MacMullen,Christianizing the Roman Empire A.D.100-400 (Yale University Press) 1984, ch. VIII "Conversions of intellectuals".
^The date of theNativity of Jesus is given as December 25th in considerably earlier sources, but this is the first reference to a holiday orfeast day being celebrated. Thefeast of the Epiphany had been celebrated for some time at this date.
^University of Leiden,Ms. Vossianus Q79, noted in Salzmann 1991.
^The author probably confused Marcius withLucius Marcius Philippus, who claimed ancestry from Marius and struck silverdenarius in his honor.
^This is a list of famous men (in no particular order) rather than a list of actual dictators. Only 10 names held the position ofRoman dictator.
Salzman, Michele Renee.On Roman Time: The Codex-Calendar of 354 and the Rhythms of Urban Life in Late Antiquity (The Transformation of the Classical Heritage 17). Berkeley: University of California Press, 1991.
Weitzmann, Kurt.Late Antique and Early Christian Book Illumination. New York: George Braziller, 1977.
Pfund, Günther (2021).Von Picus bis Licinius: historischer Kommentar zu den „Chronica urbis Romae“ im Chronographen von 354. Stuttgart: Franz Steiner,ISBN978-3-515-12875-9.
Stern, Henri (1953).Le calendrier de 354. Étude sur son texte et ses illustrations. Paris: Geuthner.
