[1] So Budde (_Richter u. Samuel_), who recovers certain old
fragments and arranges Josh. xvii. 14-18 (v. 18 read "hill-country of
Gilead"); Num. xxxii. 39, 41 seq.; Josh. xiii. 13.
MANASSES, CONSTANTINE, Byzantine chronicler, flourished in the 12th
century during the reign of Manuel I. (Comnenus) (1143-1180). He was the
author of a _Chronicle_ or historical synopsis of events from the
creation of the world to the end of the reign of Nicephorus Botaniates
(1081), written by direction of Irene, the emperor's sister-in-law. It
consists of about 7000 lines in the so-called "political" metre.[1]
There is little to be said of it, except that it is rather more poetical
than the iambic chronicle of Ephraim (about 150 years later). It
obtained great popularity and appeared in a free prose translation; it
was also translated into Slavonic. The poetical romance of the _Loves of
Aristander and Callithea_, also in "political" verse, is only known from
the fragments preserved in the [Greek: Rhodônia] (rose-garden) of
Macarius Chrysocephalus (14th century). Manasses also wrote a short
biography of Oppian, and some descriptive pieces (all except one
unpublished) on artistic and other subjects.
EDITIONS.--_Chronicle_ in Bonn, _Corpus scriptorum hist. Byz._, 1st
ed. Bekker (1837) and in J. P. Migne, _Patrologia graeca_, cxxvii.;
_Aristander and Callithea_ in R. Hercher's _Scriptores erotici
graeci_, ii. (1859); "Life of Oppian" in A. Westermann, _Vitarum
scriptores graeci minores_ (1845). A long didactic poem in "political"
verse (edited by E. Miller in _Annuaire de l'assoc. pour
l'encouragement des études grecques en France_, ix. 1875) is
attributed to Manasses or one of his imitators. See also F. Hirsch,
_Byzantinische Studien_ (1876); C. Krumbacher, _Geschichte der
byzantinischen Litteratur_ (1897).