International congress of byzantine studies belgrade, 22 27 august 2016

Varduhi Kyureghyan
University of Basel, Basel, Switzerland; 
[e-mail] 
Armenian Commentaries on Canon Tables: Analysis of the Sources
At the beginning of the fourth century Eusebius of Caesarea invented an ingenious exegetical 
device with the purpose of locating parallel pericopes in the four Gospels. These Canon Tables 
proved both handy and beautiful, hence they became standard features of Gospel manuscripts, 
not only in the original Greek, but also in numerous translations: Latin, Syriac, Coptic, Armenian, 
Slavonic, Ge’ez, and others. 
The Armenian Canon Tables, which are of great interest both as a document in its own right 
and in relation to the Greek original, became an object of exegesis. Commentaries on the Canon 
Tables are a highly innovative literary genre, an ‘exegetical literature at a second degree’, so to speak. 
The Commentaries on Canon Tables, called in Ancient Armenian Meknut῾iwn Xoranac῾, have 
developed in the eighth century. Amongst the authors of the commentaries are some of the most 
significant Armenian theologians, such as Step῾anos Siwnec῾i (eighth century), Nersēs Šnorhali 
(twelfth century), Grigor Tatevac῾i (fifteenth century). 
The paper focuses on the sources of Commentaries on Canon Tables. First, I shall address the 
question of the identification of these sources: can any Armenian or Byzantine text be identified as 
a source of the commentators? I shall also explore the influence of philosophical works upon the 
commentators. Furthermore, the question of interdependence of different Commentaries will be 
examined. Finally, I shall try to explain the reason of using these sources, as well as of composing the 
Commentaries. This last question will be examined with the hindsight of the religious and political 
background of iconoclastic controversies of the eighth – ninth centuries in the Byzantine Empire.

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