The third part of this important Syriac historiographical work from the end of the 8th century is based on the otherwise lost second part of the "Ecclesiastical History" of John of Ephesus (died circa 588), which relates events of the reigns of Zeno, Anastasius, Justin I and Justinian. The work is written from the point of view of a religious dissident, a Monophysite, and incorporates his personal experience as a persecuted monk in his native Mesopotamia, as well his later life in Constantinople. John had direct access to the imperial court and, notwithstanding his opposition to Justinian's pro-Chalcedonian policy, was entrusted by the emperor with various missions, whether to christianize regions of Asia Minor which were still pagan at the time, or to summon Monophysite ecclesiastics to the emperor in his attempt to unite the Church.