Moreover, when the chronographer dates the year of Christ’s birth in the consulship of “Cæsar and Paulus” (754 U.C.), he anticipates the Dionysian era some two hundred years before Dionysius, and, further, when, in accordance with a very ancient tradition, he places the year of Christ’s death in the consulship of the “_duo gemini_” (29 A.D.), he thus only allows twenty-eight and a quarter years for Christ’s earthly life, while St Luke (iii. 23) speaks of Him as having wellnigh thirty full years. Whoever he may have been who inserted this notice under the consulship of Cæsar and Paulus in the chronology, he certainly made a mistake. He also stands alone in placing Christ’s birth in the year 754 U.C., for the writers and annalists who wrote at a later date, such as Sulpicius Severus, Orosius, Prosper, Hydatius, and even Cassiodorus, give other dates. The anonymous compiler of this chronology differs also, both as to contents and form, from those who preceded him. While Irenæus, Clement of Alexandria, Tertullian, the pseudo-Cyprian, etc., fix the year of Christ’s birth by a year of the emperor, _i.e._ the forty-first or forty-second of Augustus, it is given in this document in the form of a consular year, and while the former give 751-752 U.C. as the year, the latter gives 754. All this creates great difficulty in accepting the evidence of the compiler.[311] We must now deal with the day of the month given in the chronology, the 25th December, which, strictly speaking, alone is of importance in connection with the end we have in view, although it cannot well be separated from the previous question as to the year. It has recently been thought that Hippolytus afforded some very early evidence on this point, owing to a passage in his commentary on Daniel bearing upon the subject. However, this hope has proved deceptive,[312] since the passage in Hippolytus proves to be the addition of a much later hand; we are thus left with the chronology of 354 as the earliest evidence for placing the birth of Christ on the 25th December.