chronicon orientale, chronicle of world history composed by an unknown thirteenth-century author who put events he thought important into a table of secular and ecclesiastical rulers. Its chronological bases are the Old Testament for the pre-Christian era, the Roman emperors for the period from the time of Christ to Muhammad, and thereafter the Arab regimes in Syria and Egypt, along with a history of the caliphs to his own time (1260). It includes a section that gives an outline history of the Alexandrian patriarchs from Saint mark (43-68) to athanasius iii (1250-1261). The dates are in good order but untrustworthy as to actual calendar years.
The Copt abu shakir ibn Butrus al-Rahib has been taken to be the author since the Chronicon's first translation into Latin was done by a Maronite, Abraham Ecchelensis (Chronicon orientale, nunc primum latinitate donatum . . . , Paris, 1651; Paris, 1685). This translation was revised by J. assemani and published with four added dissertations in Corpus Scriptorum Historiae Byzantinae (Vol. 17, Venice, 1729).