Outline: I.—Primary materials. II.—Secondary materials. III.—Sketch of the writing of Church history. IV.—Most important collections of primary sources. V.—Most important general Church histories. VI.—Dictionaries and encyclopedias. VII.—Atlases and chronologies. VIII.—Text-books. IX.—Sources.
All our information about the origin, life, and growth of the Christian Church comes from the revelation of evidence which is termed sources. These sources are partly original, or primary, and partly secondary. For the student of history both kinds of sources have a definite character and value, and are, therefore, of peculiar interest. Some knowledge about the scope and nature of the sources is necessary for an intelligent view of any field of history. At the same time it is clear that any person presuming to pose as an authority on a given phase of history must not only be thoroughly acquainted with the varied contributions of all secondary works, but must also be a master of the character and worth of all first-hand materials.
The primary sources are simply the records and remains left by the people who lived at any given time. Such materials, it will be readily seen, give the nearest and truest account of the ideas, feelings, motives, and beliefs, as well as of the deeds and actions, of man. An original source is, therefore, merely a source back
of which one cannot go for historical information. It is apparent, consequently, that the primary sources are the more important because they are the very foundations of history. "No documents, no history," tersely declared Langlois. The primary sources put us in vital connection with the thoughts, doings, and institutions of past times. In them one sees reflected the spirit of the age. Every line, every word, is a revelation. The student is led to feel history, to actually know men and women of the past, and thus to comprehend our own civilisation in the earlier periods of its evolution. The primary sources cannot be accepted and assigned their true value, however, until their authenticity and genuineness are determined, and the element of personal equation is taken into account. Even then final judgment can never be absolute.
For the sake of giving a clear conception of the range of the primary sources the following classification may be of assistance:
- A.—Written sources of the subjoined kind:
- I.—Public official documents:
- 1. Acts of councils and synods.
- 2. Letters, bulls, briefs, rescripts, and regests of popes, patriarchs, and bishops.
- 3. Confessions of faith.
- 4. Liturgies, hymns, etc.
- 5. Church canons and laws, and monastic rules.
- 6. Decrees and letters of kings, nobles, and civic assemblies.
- 7. Laws of states.
- II.—Private writings of personal actors and observers:
- III.—Inscriptions on churches, public buildings, tombs, monuments, coins, seals, etc.
- I.—Public official documents:
- B.—Unwritten sources of the following character:
- I.—Buildings:
- 1. Churches and baptisteries.
- 2. Tombs and monuments.
- 3. Civic edifices.
- 4. Private dwellings.
- II.—Art:
- 1. Sculpture—images and emblems.
- 2. Painting and fresco.
- 3. Mosaics.
- 4. Ecclesiastical vestments and ornaments.
- 5. Church furniture and vessels.
- III.—Rites and ceremonies.
- IV.—Oral traditions.
- I.—Buildings:
The secondary sources are those that are compiled from a study of the original sources, or from other secondary works, or from both, as is more likely to be the case. This class of material is very abundant, and varies greatly in character and value because of the striking difference in authorship, style, and purpose. It is always necessary, therefore, carefully to discriminate the wheat from the chaff and to be able easily to recognise the "earmarks" of a reliable authority. Many of the works produced by modern scientific
scholarship are excellent in every respect, and, in many fields of historical study, absolutely indispensable. Secondary sources may be divided as follows:
- A.—Written works:
- I.—History:
- 1. General treatises based upon either primary sources, or secondary materials, or both.
- 2. Encyclopedias and dictionaries.
- 3. Monographs, essays, and articles.
- II.—Fiction:
- 1. Novels.
- 2. Poetry.
- 3. Drama.
- I.—History:
- B.—Unwritten:
- I.—Oral traditions and reports.
- II.—Transmitted rites and ceremonies.
- III.—Works of art copied from originals.
The earliest account of the history of the Christian Church extant is the New Testament. The "Memoirs" of Hegesippus, a converted Jew of the second century, is the first known effort to record the growth of the Church, but all his books are lost.[15:1] Eusebius, the Greek bishop, called the "Father of Church history," wrote a comprehensive Ecclesiastical History to 324. Socrates, Sozomen, and Theodoret, each after his own ideal, continued the narrative of Eusebius. Rufinus translated the work of Eusebius into Latin and continued it to 395, while Epiphanius translated Socrates, Sozomen, and Theodoret into Latin and brought the record to 518. Theodorus and Evagrius were also continuators of these early works.