[1]: 42 References to both the Kentaeans and Mandaeans, who are always mentioned together with each other, can be found in three 6th-century Syriac Christian texts, namely the Cyrus of Edessa's Explanation for the Fasts, the Acts of Symeon bar Ṣabbāʿe, and the title of a lost work by Nathaniel of Šahrazur (d. 611 or 612), namely "A polemic against the Severans (Jacobites), Manichaeans, Kentaeans, and Mandaeans" (Drāšā haw d-luqbal Seweryāne w-Mənenāye w-Kentāye w-Mandāye).
The Acts of Symeon bar Ṣabbāʿe warns readers to stay away from "the Manichaeans, the Marcionites, the Gangaeans (glyʾ < gngyʾ), the Purified [= Elchasaites], the Kentaeans (kntyʾ), the Mandaeans (mndyʾ), and the rest of the pagans (ḥanpe).
"[1]: 26–34 Van Bladel (2017) argues that both the Mandaeans and Kentaeans likely originated during the mid or late 5th century in the Sasanian Empire.
This date range is based on the fact that names for the Mandaeans and Kentaeans were directly attested in works by Cyrus of Edessa (fl.
[1]: 34–36 Theodore bar Konai (c. 792 in the Book of the Scholion) considers the Mandaeans, whom he refers to as the Dostaeans, to be an offshoot of the Kentaeans.