Antiquité Tardive - Late Antiquity - Spätantike - Tarda Antichità

This paper emphasises the great importance for the study of Late Antiquity of the availability of a large range of material which is «documentary» in character, but is preserved in later manuscripts. It then takes as an example the dossier of documents relating to the beginning of the reign of Justin I in CE 518, and the reversal of the favour shown by Anastasius to the monophysites, a dossier which was presented before the Synod of Constantinople of CE 536. Within this dossier, it sets out the structure and nature of the very detailed documentation submitted by the Chalcedonian bishops of Syria II to the governor of the province in order to secure the eventual deposition by the Emperor of their monophysite metropolitan, Peter of Apamea. In an Appendix Denis Feissel sets out a precise chronology of these exchanges.