TEODORO il LETTORE. - Thus surnamed from his office as reader in the church of S. Sofia at Costantinopoli: he lived in the 6th century.
He was the author of an epitome of the historical works of Socrate, Sozomeno, and Teodoreto, generally called the Historia tripartita, upon which Book I and the beginning of Book II of Cassiodoro’s Historia ecclesiastica tripartita depend. T.’s second work is the continuation of the Historia tripartita (in 2 books), covering the period from 450 to 527. Whereas the Historia tripartita has not yet been published, the text of the second work has been lost. An epitome of this second work, likewise lost, served as a source for later historians, especially Teofane Confessore (d. 817). The basis of T.’s work was a chronicle by Eustazio di Epifania (in Siria) and the ecclesiastical history of the Monophysite Giovanni Diacrinomenos.