EXEGETICAL CULTURES 1 | 141possibly himself an Armenian.^64 These translations tended, like Boethius’s,
toward the literal, full of calques both syntactical and lexical^65 —Armenian
had acquired its own alphabet only c. 400. Building on these foundations,
and especially on David’s definition of the subdivisions of philosophy, Ana-
nias of Shirak (d. 685), Isidore of Seville’s younger contemporary and fellow
spirit, was able to complete by the year 666 an encyclopedia of Greek science
called the K ‘nnikon (from the Greek Kanonikon or Chronikon), covering the
basic quadrivium of arithmetic, music, geometry (including geography), and
astronomy, along with calendrical studies.^66 This compilation became one of
the pillars of subsequent Armenian erudition. yet, for all that he had pupils
and influenced later Armenian thought, “Ananias appears to have been an
isolated figure with no one comparable to him in Armenian intellectual his-
tory known to have been working before, during or after his time.”^67 What-
ever its intrinsic vigor and durability, the Armenian learned tradition did not
feed into and nourish either the larger Christian world or the sphere of Islam.
Its early interest in Aristotle ran along lines closely similar to those we ob-
serve in the Syriac sphere;^68 yet it was the Syriac tradition, through its linkage
to the Arabic translation movement, which became not just a beneficiary of
but a contributor to mainstream intellectual history.
While Ephrem of Nisibis (d. 373) still warned against the poisoned wis-
dom of the Greeks (yet deployed philosophical concepts in his work), the
disputes arising from Chalcedon forced thinkers like Philoxenus of Mab-
bug (d. 523) to develop a more systematic Christolog y founded on Aristo-
telian metaphysics.^69 The Organon began to be translated into Syriac in the
mid- sixth century, and with increasing impetus and literalness in the sev-
enth, so that two or even three versions were made of the earlier, more fre-
quented treatises. Some commentaries were translated too, or composed in
Syriac.^70 In the preface to an exposition of the Categories, Sergius of Reshʿaina
64 On both see J.- P. Mahé, “David l’Invincible dans la tradition arménienne,” in I. Hadot (ed.),
Simplicius, Commentaire sur les Catégories 1 (Leiden 1990) 189–207; R. Goulet, “Elias,” D PA 3.57–66;
and various contributions in V. Calzolari and J. Barnes (eds), L’oeuvre de David l’Invincible et la transmis-
sion de la pensée grecque dans la tradition arménienne et syriaque (Leiden 2009).
65 V. Calzolari, “Aux origines de la formation du corpus philosophique en Arménie,” in D’Ancona
(ed.), Libraries [3:3] 259–78.
66 J.- P. Mahé, “Quadrivium et cursus d’études au VIIe siècle en Arménie et dans le monde byzantin
d’après le “K‘nnikon” d’Anania Širakac‘i,” Travaux et mémoires (Collège de France, Centre de recherche
d’histoire et civilisation de Byzance) 10 (1987) 159–206; Hewsen, Geography [4:35].
67 Hewsen, Geography [4:35] 14; T. Greenwood, “A reassessment of the life and mathematical
problems of Anania Širakac‘i,” Revue des etudes arméniennes 33 (2011) 131–79.
68 M. Hugonnard- Roche, “La tradition gréco- syriaque des commentaries d’Aristote,” in Calzolari
and Barnes (eds), David l’Invincible [5:64] 166–73.
69 K. Pinggéra, “Syrische Christen als Vermittler antiker Bildung an den Islam,” Ostkirchliche Stu-
dien 58 (2009) 36–56.
70 Hugonnard- Roche, Logique d’Aristote [3:8] 5–20 (and 29–33, 37, 83–86, on translation style);
id., “Le corpus philosophique syriaque aux VIe- V I Ie siècles,” in D’Ancona (ed.), Libraries [3:3] 279–91; id.
[5:68], in Calzolari and Barnes (eds), David l’Invincible [5:64] 153–73; King, Earliest Syriac translation