Hermias, an ecclesiastical historian of the fifth century, was born at Gaza or Bethelia, in Palestine. He was educated for the law, and became a pleader at Constantinople. He wrote an abridgment of Ecclesiastical History, in two books, from the ascension of our Saviour to the year 323. This compendium is lost; but a continuation of it in nine books, written at greater length, down to the year 439, is still extant. He seems to have copied Socrates, who wrote a history of the same period. The style of Sozomenus is perhaps more elegant; but in other respects he falls far short of that writer, displaying throughout his whole book an amazing credulity, and a superstitious attachment to monks and the monastic life. His work, with those of Eusebius and Socrates, was published by R. Stephanus in 1544, by H. Valesius at Paris in 1668, and by Reading at Cambridge in 1720. All these editions are in folio. Several others have likewise appeared.