From: Unknown sender
To: Unknown recipient (unknown)
Date: ~515-523 AD
Context: Part of the papal correspondence surrounding the Acacian Schism (484-519), the major breach between Rome and Constantinople over the condemnation of the Monophysite patriarch Acacius. Pope Hormisdas (514-523) worked tirelessly to resolve this schism, which was finally healed in 519 under Emperor Justin I.
[This letter is part of the extensive diplomatic correspondence generated by the resolution of the Acacian Schism. The schism had divided the Eastern and Western churches for thirty-five years over the condemnation of Patriarch Acacius of Constantinople, who had promoted a compromise formula (the Henotikon) that Rome rejected as insufficiently orthodox. Hormisdas conducted negotiations through multiple embassies to Constantinople, exchanging letters with emperors, patriarchs, imperial officials, and powerful aristocratic women at court. The correspondence reveals the machinery of late antique ecclesiastical diplomacy: formal theological demands, careful diplomatic language, networks of lay and clerical allies, and the constant anxiety of a pope trying to manage events happening months away by letter.]
S6U
(a. 516 ,.
^ Indiculus perM Fullionem subdiaoonum.
19 Nov.) ^
Quid in Nicopolitana ecclesia agendum sit.
Cum Dei adjutorio et orationibus sanctorum apostolorum Petn
et Pauli veniens ad Nicopolim, sic debes agere, ut postquam episco-
pus Nicopolitauus acceperit litteras nostras, episcopos, quos in sua
19 ^) Videlicet duabus epistolis superioribus subter annexam, nt in epdoh
sequenti planius declaratur, quique in cditiouibus conciliorum cpistolae huiciab'
jicitur veluti data XV. Kal, Aprilis Agapito v, c, cons, Kcet Agapitog anno tan-
tum 517 consulatum adeptus sit. Nos eum, vestigia G* secuti, epistolae 7 n. ^
subjccimus; eumdem nobis epistola 26 suspeditabit.
•) Nominatim Illyrici, ad quod Epiri veteris provincia pertinebat^ paw OBffl^
sacerdotes inter eos, qui ad communionem sedis apostolicae eo pacto zedieW
epist. 9 n. 1 memorantur.
20 ^) Seu potius datus Pullioni suhdiacono, ut Bupra epist. 7 imdiemlms fid dMif ^
Ennodio , non per Ennodium legitur. Hunc indicidum una cnm saperioci epif^
conscriptum ao datum fuisse, cx cadcm cpistola liquet.
EPI8T0LAE 19 — 21. 781
ecia habet; coUigat, et faciat subscribere libellum; quem in epi- (a. 516.)
) ^) suis habent annexum. Si tamen dixerit praedictus episcopus
laboriosum episcopos colligere, dirigat tecum personas per sin-
3( episcopos, ut te praesente subscribant^) in praedictum libel-
Sic tamen cum Dei misericordia facere debes, ut epistolae,
a nobis missae sunt, publice legantur; aut si videris prae timore
episcopos facere nolle, saltem clericis suis haec relegant. Quae
n in ipsorum dimitte potestatem, et scripta episcoporum et
i episcopi, hoc est Johannis metropolitani, ad nos cum miseri-
la reporta. Post hoc factum nullas moras te volumus ibidem
•€; propter insidias et calliditates inimicorum. Per Johannem
>num ejus.
◆
From:Unknown sender
To:Unknown recipient (unknown)
Date:~515-523 AD
Context:Part of the papal correspondence surrounding the Acacian Schism (484-519), the major breach between Rome and Constantinople over the condemnation of the Monophysite patriarch Acacius. Pope Hormisdas (514-523) worked tirelessly to resolve this schism, which was finally healed in 519 under Emperor Justin I.
[This letter is part of the extensive diplomatic correspondence generated by the resolution of the Acacian Schism. The schism had divided the Eastern and Western churches for thirty-five years over the condemnation of Patriarch Acacius of Constantinople, who had promoted a compromise formula (the Henotikon) that Rome rejected as insufficiently orthodox. Hormisdas conducted negotiations through multiple embassies to Constantinople, exchanging letters with emperors, patriarchs, imperial officials, and powerful aristocratic women at court. The correspondence reveals the machinery of late antique ecclesiastical diplomacy: formal theological demands, careful diplomatic language, networks of lay and clerical allies, and the constant anxiety of a pope trying to manage events happening months away by letter.]
Modern English rendering for readability. See the 19th-century translation or original Latin/Greek for scholarly use.