(50. 1. 6–7)...the Quartodecimans too have departed from the prescribed path
(50. 1. 9).^159Epiphanius makes some use (without attribution) of theRefutatio’s comment
on‘those who observe Easter on the 14th of the moon’, which reminds us that
the practice had been listed already in early third-century Roman heresiologies
(as we have seen above). But what is new, and in my view significant, in
Epiphanius’Panarionis the name of the heresy—indeed, this is probably the
earliest attestation of the termTessareskaidekatitai—and its sudden preva-
lence in late fourth-fifth centuries sources. Indeed, from this point onwards
the Quartodecimans enter the stock list of the heresiological tradition. They
are listed, in the earlyfifth century, in Augustine’s heresiology, as well as in the
contemporary (or slightly earlier) heresiology of the northern Italian bishop
Philastrius; and again, in the mid-fifth-century heresiology of Theodoret.^160
Another relevant heresy in Ephiphanius’Panarionis that of the Audians,
who distinguish themselves in only two points: their belief in anthropomor-
phism, and their deviant calendrical practices:‘for they choose to celebrate the
Passover with the Jews—that is, they contentiously celebrate the Passover at
the same time that the Jews are holding their Festival of Unleavened Bread’
(70. 9. 2). This practice leads to disunity and often to a breach of the rule of the
equinox, which the Jews do not observe (70. 11). Epiphanius acknowledges
that following the Jews used to be the Church’s custom, when‘Passover was
celebrated at different times in the Church, occasioning ridicule every year’
(^159) Williams (1987–94) ii. 23–4. Observance of Easter on 25 March is deemed Quartodeciman
because this date is when the Passion supposedly occurred, onluna XIV,in29CE, or better
perhaps, because this date corresponds to 14 Teireix in the Cappadocian calendar (Talley 2003).
As Leofranc Holford-Strevens points out to me, the former explanation is less likely, because
whereas in theWest 25 March was taken to be the date of the Passion onluna XIV, in the East it
was that of the Resurrection (Grumel 1958: 26–9, Mosshammer 2008: 48–9, Nothaft 2011:
47 – 60). The Quartodeciman heresy is positioned in thePanarionimmediately after the Phry-
gians,aliasMontanists (48) and the Quintillianists,aliasPepuzians (49). Although the date of
Easter is not mentioned here in connection with these heresies, these heresies are frequently
grouped together in other sources and attributed deviant Easter practices (e.g. the Montanists in
the anonymous homily of 387, above mentioned). 160
Augustine,DeHaeresibus, 28 (his use of the Greek name in Latin transliteration,Tessar-
escaedecatitae, suggests either that, because of its recentness, the Latin equivalent‘Quartodeci-
mani’had not yet been coined, or that Augustine and his contemporaries regarded the
phenomenon to be specific to the Greek East); Philastrius,DiversarumHereseon Liber,58
(Heylen 1957: 241–2; he does not call them by name, but attributes to them observance of Easter
onluna XIVas well as only in the month of March; note the now familiar Nicene comment:non
cognoscunt diem paschae domini nostriveram et salutemunam, orbi terrarum statutam et
confirmatam; on the dating of this work, see ibid. 209–10); Theodoret,Haereticarum Fabularum
Compendium,3.4(PG83. 406; the Quartodecimans are preceded in 3. 2 by the Montanists, and
followed in 3. 5 by the Novatians, although Easter is not mentioned in the context of these; Millar
2004: 122 takes this sequence as evidence that the three groups belonged to the same geographi-
cal context, with a possibility of crossover between them; but it is equally possible that this
sequence, already attested in the anonymous homily of 387, had become a standard topos in the
heresiological tradition).
Sectarianism andHeresy 415