The first half of the Laterculus (chs. 2–11) follows the Chronographia of John Malalas almost exactly, with one or two minor additions, and an introduction. It may help the reader here if I briefly describe what the Chronographia is: it is a universal history, beginning with Adam, and going down to the reign of Justinian, conforming to a familiar type of early Byzantine historical writing. Its author, about whom nothing is known, was probably a rhetor of Syrian extraction, connected with Antioch, though he seems also to have spent time in Constantinople. In his forward sweep through the history of the world, he devotes one of his eighteen books (bk 10) to the life and times of Jesus. It is this book which forms the basis of the first half of the Laterculus. This is what it contains. The text begins with the Annunciation, and a discussion of the various important events which have fallen on this date (25 March). Most of this material is additional to Malalas. Then the text returns to straight translation from the Chronographia for an account of the division of historical time: the reader is told that there were 3,000 years between Adam and Phalech, and 2,967 years from Phalech to the birth of Christ, which of course makes 6,000 years from the creation of Adam to the Crucifixion. Most of this is straight from Malalas, and very odd it is too: the only addition is a gratuitous, parenthetic remark about the stupidity of the Irish.