Event · 451

Council of Chalcedon

The fourth ecumenical council, called by Emperor Marcian at Chalcedon, near Constantinople, in 451.

It issued a definition that Christ is one person “in two natures”, the basis of Chalcedonian Christology. It deposed Patriarch Dioscorus of Alexandria and condemned Eutyches. The churches of Egypt, much of Syria and Armenia rejected it, and became the Oriental Orthodox family. Its rulings are accepted by the Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox churches and by most Protestants.