Pachymeres was born at
Nicaea, in
Bithynia, where his father had taken refuge after the capture of
Constantinople by the Latins in 1204. Upon the recovery of Constantinople from the
Latin Empire by
Michael VIII Palaeologus, Pachymeres settled there, studied law, entered the church, and subsequently became chief advocate of the church and chief justice of the imperial court. His literary activity was considerable, his most important work being a Byzantine history in thirteen books, in continuation of that of
George Acropolites from 1261 to 1308, containing the history of the reigns of
Michael and
Andronicus II Palaeologus. Pachymeres was also the author of
rhetorical exercises on philosophical themes; of a
Quadrivium (arithmetic, music, geometry, astronomy), valuable for the history of music and astronomy in the
Middle Ages; a general sketch of
Aristotelian philosophy; a paraphrase of the speeches and letters of
Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite; poems, including an autobiography; and a description of the square of the
Augustaeum, and the
column erected by
Justinian in the church of
Hagia Sophia to commemorate his victories over the
Persians. The
History was first published in print by
I. Bekker (1835) in the
Corpus Scriptorum Historiae Byzantinae; also by
J. P. Migne, in
Patrologia Graeca (vol. cxliii, cxliv); for editions of the minor works see
Karl Krumbacher,
Geschichte der byzantinischen Litteratur (1897). A more recent edition with French translation of the
History by
Albert Failler (editor) and
Vitalien Laurent (translator) was published in 1984. An English translation of Books I and II (up to the recovery of Constantinople in 1261), with commentary, exists in the form of a Ph.D. thesis by Nathan John Cassidy held in the Reid Library of the University of Western Australia. ==Notes==