Anecdota Graeca of Immanuel Bekker (1785-1871), a scholar of vast attainments and profound learning in classical literature.  These Anecdota are excerpts made from various Greek manuscripts found in the course of travels extending through France, Italy, England, and Germany.  There were three volumes, appearing from 1814 to 1821.

Antonio Melissa.—­A Greek monk living between 700 and 1100 A.D.  He collected two books of quotations from early Christian Fathers (one hundred and seventy-six titles) on the general subject of Virtues and Vices.

Arsenius.—­Archbishop of Monembasia:  age of the Revival of Learning.

Cedrenus.—­A Greek monk of the eleventh century who compiled a historical work ([Greek:  Synopsis historion]) the scope of which extended from the creation to 1057 A.D.  He gives no evidence of historical knowledge or the critical sense, but rather of great credulity and a fondness for legends.  His treatise is, moreover, largely plagiarized from the Annals of Ioannes Scylitzes Curopalates.

Cramer, J.A.—­An Oxford scholar who published two collections of excerpts (similar to those of Bekker) between 1835 and 1841.  The collection referred to in our text had its source in manuscripts of the Royal Library in Paris.  It was in three octavo volumes.

Etymologicum Magnum.—­A lexicon of uncertain date, after Photius (886 A.D.) and before Eustathius.  This dictionary contains many valuable citations from lost Greek works.  First edition, Venice, 1499.

Eustathius.—­Archbishop of Thessalonica and the most learned man of his age (latter half of the twelfth century).  His most important composition is his Commentary on Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey in which he quotes vast numbers of authors unknown to us now except by name.  First edition, Rome, 1542-1550.

Glossary of C. Labbaeus, the editor of Ancient Glosses of Law Terms, published in Paris, 1606.

John of Antioch.—­Author of a work called “Chronological History from Adam” quoted in the Excerpts Concerning Virtues and Vices (vid. supra).  Internal evidence indicates that the book was written after 610 and before 900 A.D.

John of Damascus.—­A voluminous ecclesiastical writer belonging to the reigns of Leo Isauricus and Constantine VII. (approximately from 700 to 750 A.D.).  He was an opponent of the iconoclastic movement.  The best edition of his works was published at Paris in 1712.  The passage cited in our Fragments is from [Greek:  peri Drakonton], a mutilated essay on dragons standing between a “Dialogue Between a Saracen and a Christian” and a “Discussion of the Holy Trinity.”

John Laurentius Lydus.—­A Byzantine writer, born at Philadelphia (the city of Revelation, III, 7), in 490 A.D.  Although he was famed during his lifetime as a poet, all his verses have perished.  The work cited in our Fragments,—­“Concerning the Offices of the Roman Republic, in Three Books,”—­had a curious history.  For centuries it was regarded as lost, but about 1785 nine tenths of it was discovered by De Villoison in a MS. in the suburbs of Constantinople.  It was published in Paris, 1811.—­Laurentius in the course of his career held important political posts and received two important literary appointments from the Emperor Justinian I.