Bero'sus
（
Βηρωσός or
Βηρωσσρός), a priest of Belus at Babylon, and an historian. His name is usually considered to be the same as Bar or Ber Oseas, that is, son of Oseas. (Scalig.
Animadr. ad Euseb. p. 248.)
He was born in the reign of Alexander the Great, and lived till that of Antiochus II. urnamed
Θεός (B. C. 261-246), in whose reign he is said to have written his history of Babylonia. (Tatian,
ad v. Gent. 58; Euseb.
Praep. Evang. x. p. 289.) Respecting the personal history of Berosus scarcely anything is known; but he must have been a man of education and extensive learning, and was well acquainted with the Greek language, which the conquests of
Alexander had diffused over a great part of Asia. Some writers have thought that they can discover in the extant fragments of his work traces of the author's ignorance of the Chaldee language, and thus have come to the conciusion, that the history of Babylonia was the work of a Greek, who assumed the name of a celebrated Babylonian.
But this opinion is without any foundation at all.
The fact that a Babyloaian wrote the history of his own country in Greek cannot be surprising; for, after the Greek language had commenced to be spoken in the East, a desire appears to have sprung up in some learned persons to make the history of their respective countries known to the Greeks: hence Menander of Tyre wrote the history of Phoenicia, and Manetho that of Egypt.
Works
Babylonian History
The historical work of Berosus consisted of three books, and is sometimes called
Βαβυλωνικά, and sometimes
Χαλδαϊκά or
ἱστορίαι Χυλδαϊκαί. (
Athen. 14.639;
Clem. Al. Strom. i. p. 142,
Protrept. 19.)
The work itself is lost, but we possess several fragments of it, which are preserved in Josephus, Eusebius, Syncellus, and the Christian fathers, who made great use of the work, for Berosus seems to have been acquainted with the sacred books of the Jews, whence his statements often agree with those of the Old Testatement.
Other histories
We know that Berosus also treated of the history of the neighboring countries, such as Chaldaea and Media. (Agathias, 2.24.)
He himself states, that he derived the materials for his work from the archives in the temple of Belus, where chronicles were kept by the priests; but he appears to have used and interpreted the early or mythical history, according to the views current in his time. From the fragments extant we see that the work embraced the earliest traditions about the human race, a description of Babylonia and its population, and a chronological list of its kings down to the time of the great Cyrus.
The history of Assyria, Media, and even Armenia, seems to have been constantly kept in view also.
There is a marked difference, in many instances, between the statements of Ctesias and those of Berosus; but it is erroneous to infer from this, as some have done, that Berosus forged some of his statements.
The difference appears sufficiently accounted for by the circumstance, that Ctesias had recourse to Assyrian and Persian sources, while Berosus followed the Babylonian, Chaldaean, and the Jewish, which necessarily placed the same events in a different light, and may frequently have differed in their substance altogether.
Editions
The fragments of the Babylonica are collected at the end of Scaliger's work
de Emendatione Temporum, and more complete in Fabricius,
Bibl. Graec. xiv. p. 175, &c., of the old edition.
The best collection is that by J. D. G. Richter. (
Berosi Chald. Historiae quae supersunt; cum Comment. de Berosi Vita, &c. Lips. 1825, 8vo.)
Astronomy, Astrology and Similar Subjects
Berosus is also mentioned as one of the earliest writers on astronomy, astrology, and similar subjects; but what Pliny, Vitruvius, and Seneca have preserved of him on these subjects does not give us a high idea of his astronomical or mathematical knowledge. Pliny (
7.37) relates, that the Athenians erected a statue to him in a gymnasium, with a gilt tongue to honour his extraordinary predictions; Vitruvius (
9.4,
10.7,
9) attributes to him the invention of a semicircular sun-dial (
hemicyclium), and states that, in his later years, he settled in the island of Cos, where he founded a school of astrology.
By the statement of Justin Martyr (
Cohort. ad Graec. 100.39; comp.
Paus. 10.12.5; and Suidas,
s. v. Σίβυλλα), that the Babylonian Sibyl who gave oracles at Cuma in the time of the Tarquins was a daughter of the historian Berosus, some writers have been led to place the real Berosus at a much earlier date, and to consider the history which bore his name as the forgery of a Greek.
But there is little or no reason for such an hypothesis, for Justin may have confounded the well-known historian with some earlier Babylonian of the name of Berosus; or, what is more probable, the Sibyl whom he mentions is a recent one, and may really have been the daughter of the historian. (Paus.
l.c.) [SIBYLLA.] Other writers again have been inclined to assume, that Berosus the historian was a different person from the astrologer; but this opinion too is not supported by satisfactory evidence.
The work entitled
Berosi Antiquitatum libri quinque cum Commentariis Joannis Annii, which appeared at Rome in 1498, fol., and was afterwards often reprinted and even translated into Italian, is one of the many fabrications of Giovanni Nanni, a Dominican monk of Viterbo, better known under the name of Annius of Viterbo, who died in 1502.
Further Information
Fabric.
Bibl. Graec. iv. p. 163, &c.; Vossius,
De Hist. Graec. p. 120, &c., ed. Westermann; and Richter's Introduction to his edition of the Fragments.
[
L.S]
