Antiochus

An obscure correspondent attested under the common Greek name Antiochus, who appears as a recipient of letters in three distinct collections spanning the 4th and 5th centuries (Basil of Caesarea, the sophist Libanius, and Isidore of Pelusium). Because Antiochus was an extremely common name in the later Roman East, these references almost certainly do not all denote the same man: Basil's and Libanius's correspondents belong to the mid-to-late 4th-century world of Cappadocia, Antioch, and the rhetorical schools, while Isidore's belongs to 5th-century Egypt. No specific office, dates, or biography can be reliably reconstructed; the figure (or figures) is known only as an addressee, plausibly a literate provincial notable, official, or churchman within the milieu of these correspondences. This entry is best treated as a name shared by one or more minor correspondents rather than a single documented individual.