Socrates of Constantinople

Who is Socrates of Constantinople?

Socrates of Constantinople, also known as Socrates Scholasticus, not to be confused with the Classical Greek philosopher Socrates, was a Greek Christian church historian, a contemporary of Sozomen and Theodoret, who used his work; he was born at Constantinople c. 380: the date of his death is unknown. Even in ancient times nothing seems to have been known of his life except what can be gathered from notices in his Historia Ecclesiastica, which departed from its ostensible model, Eusebius of Caesarea, in emphasizing the place of the emperor in church affairs and in giving secular as well as church history.

Socrates' teachers, noted in his prefaces, were the grammarians Helladius and Ammonius, who came to Constantinople from Alexandria, where they had been pagan priests. A revolt, accompanied by an attack on the pagan temples, had forced them to flee. This attack, in which the Serapeum was vandalized and its library destroyed, is dated about 391.

That Socrates of Constantinople later profited by the teaching of the sophist Troilus is not proven. No certainty exists as to Socrates' precise vocation, though it may be inferred from his work that he was a layman.

In later years he traveled and visited, among other places, Paphlagonia and Cyprus.