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The Church Fathers · c. 190; survives in fragment
Letter to Victor of Rome
Polycrates of Ephesus · c. 130–196
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What it is
A courteous refusal: the churches of Asia will keep Easter on the fourteenth of Nisan as their fathers did, whatever Rome prefers, and Polycrates lists the graves that prove it.
Why it lasted
The Quartodeciman controversy in the words of the losing side, and the earliest recorded resistance to a bishop of Rome imposing practice on other churches.
Where to read it
Public domain and free to read in full, though not held here. The archives below have it.
These open a search on each archive rather than a direct link, which is the honest way to point at an edition nobody here has checked line by line.
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