Testi in contesto: Eusebio, Quadrato-Aristide e gli inizi dell'apologetica cristiana

Abstract: "Eusebius’Chronici Canones (ChCan) and Ecclesiastical History (HE) are a valuable collection of data for all scholars of antiquity and for many he is the only source .But in this case: a) their chronology may be different in the two works, implying either the use of different sources, or a process of functional transformation by the author himself in the transition from chronographic to the historical narrative; b) Eusebius’data become canonical tradition , which feeding up on itself until the creation of a narrative core, may be popularized , through concordist methodologies , as real history and chronology. The case of the founders of the so-called christian 'apologetics' , Quadratus and Aristides - that Eusebius dates in ChCan and HE in different years of Hadrianus’ principate - is an example of how the chronographic construction of the ChCan can in turn become in the HE a source that the author uses and manages in view of a given memory of Christian origins. Neither one nor the other of Eusebius’ two chronologies of Quadratus and Aristides should automatically be taken as the true chronology.In fact, it is possible to date Aristides in the first years of Antoninus Pius and, given Athens as the author’s origin and workplace , to suppose a significant influence of Panhellenion’s language and ideas in defining and communicating the Christian identity ."