Lost History of Peter the Patrician

The Lost History of Peter the Patrician is an annotated translation from the Greek of the fragments of Peter’s History, including additional fragments which are now more often considered the work of the Roman historian Cassius Dio's so-called Anonymous Continuer. Banchich’s annotation helps clarify the relationship of Peter's work to that of Cassius Dio. Focusing on the historical and historiographical rather than philological, he provides a strong framework for the understanding of this increasingly important source for the third and fourth centuries A.D. With an introduction on Peter himself - a distinguished administrator and diplomat at the court of Justinian – assessing his literary output, the relationship of the fragments of Peter's History to the fragments of the Anonymous Continuer, and the contentious issue of the place of this evidence within the framework of late antique historiography, The Lost History of Peter the Patrician will be an invaluable resource for those interested in the history of the Roman world in general and of the third and fourth centuries A.D. in particular.

"Banchich is to be commended for a very valuable contribution ... his rendering of Peter’s fragments into English has been shaped in such a way that it will not only fill the existing gap of an English translation of all early Byzantine fragmentary historians, but will permit English-speaking scholars to advance their research with an enigmatic set of fragments whose final provenance and nature has still a long way to go before it is finally solved."- Panagiotis Antonopoulos, University of Ioannina (Greece), in the Bryn Mawr Classical Review"This is a very welcome book, enabling a wider readership to gain easy familiarity with Petrus’ work. This is by no means a minor feat, bearing in mind the fragmentary nature of the original Greek and the still ongoing debate regarding Petrus’ merits as a historian."- Kai Juntunen, University of Helsinki, in Arctos

Thomas M. Banchich is Professor of Classics and History at Canisius College, Buffalo, New York. His research interests include ancient philosophy, history, and historiography. He is the author of The History of Zonaras (Routledge, 2009).