Pseudo-Basil

Pseudo-Basil is the designation used by scholars for any anonymous author of a text falsely or erroneously attributed to Basil of Caesarea. Pseudo-Basilian works are usually known by Latin titles. They are often misattributed only in translation. They include:

• Ad Caesarienses apologia de secessu, a letter actually by Evagrius Ponticus[1]
• Ad Chilonem discipulum suum[1]
• Admonitio ad filium spiritualem, a Latin text and a partial Old English translation[1]
• Admonitio ad iuniores[1]
• Canones, an Arabic text and some Coptic fragments[1]
• Constitutiones asceticae[1]
• Contra Eunomium 4–5 (books 1–3 are authentic)[1]
• De consotatione in aduersis[1]
• De reliquis Dionysii, the sequel to an authentic letter to Ambrose of Milan[1]
• De spiritu[1]
• De virginitate ad Letoium, an Old Church Slavonic translation from Greek, actually by Basil of Ancyra[1]
• De vita in Christo, a Coptic translation from Greek, also misattributed to Athanasius[1]
• Dialogus IV de sancta Trinitate, an Armenian translation from Greek and Syriac fragments, also misattributed to Athanasius[1]
• Doctrina, quoted in the Georgian Ethika of Euthymius the Athonite[1]
• Epitimia[1]
• Epitimia diversorum sanctorum de refectorio[1]
• Erotapokriseis Basilii et Gregorii, an Arabic translation from Greek of an erotapokriseis sometimes also misattributed to John Chrysostom[1]
• Liturgia sancti Basilii alexandrina, a Greek liturgy of the Alexandrian rite, also known in Arabic, both Bohairic and Sahidic Coptic and Ethiopic versions[1]
• Transitus de dormitione Deiparae, a Georgian translation from Greek[1]

Numerous apocryphal Basilian letters exist: to Bishop Eusebius of Samosata; to Eustathius, archiatrus and son of Oribasius; to Bishop Innocent of Tortona; to the Emperor Julian the Apostate; to Libanius; "to a lapsed monk" (ad monachum lapsum); to the Emperor Theodosius I; to the monk Urbicius on continence; and "to a widow" (ad viduam).[1]