05 — Sources and History
The documentary centerpiece: the Greek Passio of Panteleimon (BHG 1412z–1418), its recensions, date, and reliability; and the source-critical layering of the tradition — the early, securely attested cult of a martyr-healer named Pantoleon set against the developed Passio and its tenth-century Metaphrastic polishing. This section establishes what is early and what is late, and on what authority each rests.
Tradition: Pan-Orthodox (Great Martyr; Unmercenary Healer)
This is the section in which the collection states its evidence and grades it. The first file surveys the Passio tradition as a body of texts: the several Greek recensions catalogued in the Bibliotheca Hagiographica Graeca, their genre as a developed martyr-legend, the tenth-century rewriting by Symeon Metaphrastes that fixed the canonical form, and the honest verdict on what such a text can and cannot bear as history. The second file does the source-critical work directly: it separates the layers — the bare early cult (the name Pantoleon, the Nicomedian commemoration, the sixth-century feast) from the narrative superstructure (the named parents, Hermolaos, the unmercenary healings, the torture-cycle) — and shows which claims are early and which developed, following Delehaye’s method and the repository’s.
Files in This Section
| File | Description |
|---|---|
| The Passio Tradition | The Greek Passio (BHG 1412z–1418), its recensions and manuscript spread; its genre and date; the Metaphrastic rewriting; the synaxaria and menaia; and a sober assessment of the Passio’s reliability as history. |
| Pantoleon to Panteleimon | The source-critical layers: the securely early cult of Pantoleon the Nicomedian martyr-healer versus the developed biographical narrative; what is early, what is late, and how Delehaye’s method grades them. |
See Also
- The Historical Core — the securable minimum this section grounds
- Reading the Martyr-Healer — the method built on this source-criticism
- The Tortures and the Olive Tree — the torture-cycle whose genre is analysed here
- The Name Panteleimon — the name-change as a source-critical datum
- The Church Fathers — the patristic context of the menologia
References
- Bibliotheca Hagiographica Graeca, 3rd ed., ed. François Halkin. 3 vols. Brussels: Société des Bollandistes, 1957. (BHG 1412z–1418, the Passio Panteleemonis.)
- Symeon Metaphrastes. Vita et passio S. Panteleemonis, in Patrologia Graeca 115, where verified.
- Delehaye, Hippolyte. Les légendes hagiographiques. Brussels: Société des Bollandistes, 1905.
- Delehaye, Hippolyte. Les origines du culte des martyrs. 2nd ed. Brussels, 1933.
- Høgel, Christian. Symeon Metaphrastes: Rewriting and Canonization. Copenhagen: Museum Tusculanum Press, 2002.