DIONYSIUS TELMAHARENSIS ("of d. 848, patriarch or supreme head of the Syrian Jacobite Church during 818-848, was born at Tell-Mahre near Rakka (ar-Rakkah ) on the Balikh. He was the author of an important historical work, which has perished except for some passages quoted by Barhe braeus and an extract found by Assemani in Cod. Vat. 144 and published by him in the Bibliotheca orientalis (ii. 7 7) . He spent his earlier years as a monk at the convent of Ken-neshre on upper Euphrates, and later moved to that of Kaisum in the district of Samosata. At the death of the Jacobite patriarch Cyriacus in 817, the Church was disputing the phrase "heavenly bread" in connection with the Eucharist. An anti-patriarch had been appointed in the person of Abraham Kartamin, who insisted on the use of the phrase in opposition to the recognized authorities of the Church. The council of bishops at Rakka in 818 elected Dionysius to the patriarchal chair, but the ecclesiastical schism continued unhealed during the 3o years of his patriarchate. The details of this contest, of his relations with the caliph Ma'mun, and of his many travels—including a journey to Egypt—are to be found in the Ecclesiastical Chronicle of Barhebraeus. He died in 848, his last days having been especially embittered by Moham medan oppression.
In addition to the lost Annals, covering the years from the accession of the emperor Maurice (582-583) to the death of Theophilus (842-843), Dionysius was credited with the authorship of a Chronicle narrating the history of the world from the crea tion to the year A.D. but on the completion of its publica tion by M. Chabot in 1895, Noldeke (Vienna Oriental Journal, x. 16o-17o), and Nau (Bulletin critique, xvii. 321-327), clearly proved that the chronicle was the work not of Dionysius but of an earlier writer, a monk of the convent of Zuknin near Amid (Diarbekr) on., the upper Tigris. Though the author had limited intelligence and little historical skill, the last part of his work has considerable value as a contemporary account of events during the middle of the 8th century.