Dioscorus of Alexandria

Dioscorus followed Cyril as bishop of Alexandria and presided over the council of Ephesus in 449, which restored Eutyches and deposed Flavian of Constantinople (Evagrius, Ecclesiastical History 1.10). At the Council of Chalcedon he was made to sit as an accused. He told the council that he accepted the phrase “of two” natures but not “two” (Council of Chalcedon session 1). He refused three summonses to a later session and was deposed, in the words of the sentence, for disregarding the canons, for disobedience to the council and for other offences (Council of Chalcedon session 3, sentence on Dioscorus). He was exiled to Gangra in Paphlagonia (Evagrius, Ecclesiastical History 2.5).

The two sides remembered him differently. The council’s supporters held him responsible for the death of Flavian after the council of 449 (Evagrius, Ecclesiastical History 2.2). Zachariah, who wrote from the other side, says that his faith was that of Athanasius and Cyril, that Anatolius of Constantinople himself admitted he was not deposed for the faith, that he went into exile as a confessor, and that the clergy and monks of Egypt who would not accept his successor went on proclaiming his name (Zachariah, Chronicle 3.1–2).