Revisions of Theophanes Chrysobalantes De Curatione.

Background Theophanes Chrysobalantes' De curatione is a little known but highly relevant therapeutic manual dating to the tenth century AD. The text has come down to us in  an unusually large number of manuscripts, most of which transmit a mainstream version of the text. Methods In the present article, three versions deriving from the mainstream text are being examined. For this, these versions are being compared to the mainstream text, in order to understand the aim behind the alterations and additions they were subjected to. The overarching goal is to understand, why these changes were made, and how skilled the editors were. It is a rather unusual approach, as divergent versions are usually not examined in research literature, since they are secondary to the original text. Results and conclusions The results clearly show that the text was redacted several times, but not by highly sophisticated editors. The general aims of the redactions were to make the text easier to understand.