[2]: 79 He produced a History in twenty-two volumes, written in Greek, dedicated to the Emperor Theodosius II, detailing events in the Western Roman Empire between 407 and 425.
He was a "convinced but discreet" pagan,[3]: 709 who flourished in a Christian court, and whose work influenced several subsequent historians, including writers of ecclesiastical history.
Around 399/400 he acquired a pet parrot, his faithful companion for the next twenty years, which spoke beautiful Greek and could "dance, sing, call its owner's name, and do many other tricks".
During his several journeys over the next thirteen years, he recorded a wide variety of facts, statistics, geographical observations, etymological musings, and opinions on the political situation in the west.
[1] The official purpose of the visit may have been to gather information about the Blemmyes of Nubia, a group of barbarians living south of the Great Oasis and the Thebaïd, who frequently raided both.
They referred the decision to their "prophets", who applied divination to the question, and decided in favour of allowing Olympiodorus into their territory: they "were eager to meet him owing to his reputation.
This is read as the local kings' refusal, in Freese's translation of Photius, but Treadgold thinks it much more likely that it was the Emperor's decision: Olympiodorus was commissioned to travel for five days and no further, and the emerald mines could obviously not be reached within this time.
His final recorded journey was to Rome in 424/5, in the company of the magister officiorum Helio, for the installation of the six year old Valentinian III as Western Emperor, in place of the usurper Johannes (423-5).
One hexameter, presumably his own, appears in the description of the residences of the wealthy on his visit to Rome, which contained hippodromes, fountains, shrines, and many of the other attributes of a town: The history itself is now lost, but many of its structures and features can be established from the works of other writers.
the response to Stilicho's request to the Senate for the money to pay off Alaric I: non est ista pax, sed pactio servitutus ("This is not a peace, but a bond of servitude")[6]: 5.29.9 .
his account of Constantius III: The accuracy of personal details was often corroborated: Stilicho's nemesis, “the cruel and inhuman Olympius”,[1] is described as a pious Christian; this is confirmed by letters from Saint Augustine of Hippo.
[1] It also showed a predilection for gruesome details: “Olympius, who intrigued against Stilicho.. is beaten to death by order of Constantius, the husband of Placidia, after his ears have first been cut off”; the heads of usurpers (Jovinus and his brother Sebastian, Constantine and his son Julian, Maximus and Eugenius) are exposed outside Carthage; Attalus, city prefect of Rome, declared Emperor by Alaric “is captured, and, after the thumb and forefinger of his right hand have been cut off, is banished”.
[5]: 45 Events were often narrated topographically (a practice shared with Ammianus Marcellinus).In his account of his trip to the Blemmyes, there are digressions on the weather, wells, agriculture and fossils.
[2]: 91 He did not like Galla Placidia, telling us that her second husband, the emperor Constantius III, was “generous and open-handed” till he married her, after which he descended into "parsimonious ways".
The work has been seen as a piece of travel-writing, in which the wandering poet goes in search of “themes, patrons and rewards”;[4]: 213 however, Matthews points out that the style is more in keeping with an official document, designed to inform and make policy recommendations based on the situation in the west.
[8]: 17/18 Thompson points out that Olympiodorus’ idiosyncracies of style: the Latinisms, slang (vernacular Greek),[3]: 730 statistics and dating systems, which did not have to conform to the conventions of contemporary historical writing, were appropriate for such a work.
Thompson is an advocate of an early date (427 at the latest), as Olympiodorus gives a favourable account of “the most noble”[1] general Boniface, declared a public enemy in 427 by Placidia.
Gillett also offers, as evidence of a date of publication of 450, the “common and prudent practice” among historians to refrain from writing about events in the reigns of living emperors.
[2]: 88 Thompson suggests that Olympiodorus had read and digested Ammianus Marcellinus: the works of the two historians being similar in scale, and in their use of geographical and social detail.
Heliocrates, appointed confiscator of Stilicho's partisans by Honorius, who carried out his job so moderately that he had to seek sanctuary from the emperor in a church,[6]: 5.45.4 was another possible informant.
The sometime Praetorian Prefect, Palladius, who had the task of raising Alaric's tribute from the aristocracy in 408, was another possible source, and may have provided Olympiodorus with his knowledge of public and private wealth.
[2]: 82 Sozomen notes the powers of Stilicho,[7]: IX Ch.4 but does not present Olympiodorus’ favourable view of him, merely mentioning (twice) that he was killed by soldiers in Ravenna.
Sozomen tells of the besieging of Rome by Alaric, and mentions “certain Tuscans, who… promised to drive out the barbarians with thunder and lightning; they boasted of having performed a similar explit at Larnia”.
(When the emperor refused to put Alaric in charge of the army, Sozomen tells us that Jovius thought it prudent to side with Honorius “compelling the principal officers to swear that they would never consent to any terms of peace with Alaric.”)[7]: IX Ch.7 Sozomen refers to the three usurpers in Britain at this time (Mark, Gratian and Constantine III), and gives an account of the latter's adventures on the continent.
Olympiodorus advocated support for the western empire by the East, highlighting the detrimental effects of earlier conflicts between the emperor Arcadius and Stilicho.
[2]: 79 Olympiodorus was addressing a Christian court, but there was a certain amount of tolerance for pagan ideas: both Theodosius II and the Empress Eudocia were patrons of Hellenistic learning.
He credits the downfall of Stilicho and his wife to their plundering of pagan temple treasures, and blamed the Romans’ capitulation to Alaric on their having melted down a statue of Virtus, who then abandoned Rome.
[4]: 217 Olympiodorus suggests that Attalus incurred the wrath of the gods by his arrogant words to the Senate "in which he told them with great ostentation that he would subdue the whole world to the Romans, and even perform greater things than that".
[5]: 43 However, he did not allow his religious beliefs to cloud his impartiality: he took a dim view of the neoplatonist thaumaturge (magician) Libanius, who promised to repel a barbarian incursion using magic, without the aid of soldiers,[1] but who was put to death by order of Placidia in 421.
[3]: 716 Another fragment details a statue, endowed with a magic spell, which stood at Rhegium (Reggio Calabria), and which protected Sicily from the fires of Mount Etna (Aetna) and from barbarians attempting to cross the Strait of Messina.