Works devoted entirely to Constantine are legion, but A. H. M. Jones, Constantine and the Conversion of Europe (London, 1948), remains of great value. The best introduction to earlier literature is contained in the notes of N. Baynes, ‘Raleigh Lecture on History: Constantine the Great and the Christian Church’, Proceedings of the British Academy (1929): 341–442. Great scepticism about the sincerity of Constantine’s conversion was earlier evinced in J. Burckhardt, Die Zeit Constantins des Grossen (Basel, 1853), and his views were made more widely known and enduring by more recent translations of the work. In contrast, T. D. Barnes, Constantine and Eusebius (Cambridge, MA and London, 1981) presents Constantine as a proselytizing convert from 312, enhancing the sympathetic Christian portrait painted by A. Alföldi, The Conversion of Constantine and Pagan Rome, trans. H. Mattingly (Oxford, 1948). Two excellent recent interpretations are: in German, T. Grünewald, Constantinus Maximus Augustus. Herrschaftspropaganda in der zeitgenössischen Überlieferung, Historia Einzelschriften 64 (Stuttgart, 1990); and in English, C. M. Odahl, Constantine and the Christian Empire (London and New York, 2004). Recent edited collections include S. N. C. Lieu and D. Montserrat, eds, Constantine. History, Historiography and Legend (London and New York, 1998); and N. Lenski, ed, The Cambridge Companion to the Age of Constantine (Cambridge, 2006). The latter has been invaluable in writing this book, and individual chapters are referred to frequently below. An impressive new analysis of Constantine’s empire appeared when most of the research and writing for this project was complete: R. Van Dam, The Roman Revolution of Constantine (Cambridge, 2007), but not too late for me to incorporate some fine comments and observations where these supported my own interpretation (on family and hair).
Introduction
On Constantine and Christianity in Britain, one might start now with E. Hartley et al, eds, Constantine the Great. York’s Roman Emperor (York, 2006). See also J. P. C. Kent and K. S. Painter, Wealth of the Roman World, AD 300–700 (London, 1977); J. M. C. Toynbee, ‘A new Roman pavement found in Dorset’, JRS 54 (1964): 7–14; Katherine M. D. Dunbabin, Mosaics of the Greek and Roman World (Cambridge, 1999); and M. W. Herren and Shirley A. Brown, Christ in Celtic Christianity: Britain and Ireland from the fifth to the twelfth century (Woodbridge, 2002). Essential inscriptions are collected in RIB. For those in Britain, Constantine has always exerted a fascination, such that in 1951, for the Colchester Cathedral Festival, part of the Festival of Britain, Dorothy L. Sayers penned a play relocating the emperor to Colchester. Colchester’s coat of arms features a cross sprouting shoots, an allusion to the legend that Constantine’s mother, Helena, discovered the True Cross, Christ’s crucifix, a life-giving relic. The story first emerged half a century after Helena’s death, and has persisted to the present day, so that when one sees statues and paintings of Helena she is inevitably holding a cross. Colchester’s claim goes still further: that Helena was the daughter of a Celtic king, born in Colchester. Her alleged father, ‘Old King Cole’, is the ‘merry old soul’ of nursery rhyme, and the story entered the literate imagination through Evelyn Waugh’s novel of 1950, simply called Helena. So potent was her legacy that more than a hundred churches and chapels were devoted to Helena throughout England and Wales. See J. W. Drijvers, Helena Augusta: The Mother of Constantine the Great and Her Finding of the True Cross (Leiden, 1992); A. Harbus, Helena of Britain in Medieval Legend (Cambridge, 2002).
In the centuries that followed Helena’s death, many other places laid claim to her birth and her body. Trier, in particular, where she had first lived as the mother of a reigning emperor, was advanced through the Middle Ages as the place of her birth, seeking to displace Drepanum. This was no easy task, as Constantine had renamed that town Helenopolis. Depictions of St Helena, together with her son, featured in churches throughout medieval Europe, notably in a town in Bulgaria, now named simply Constantine and Helena. See H. A. Pohlsander, Helena: Empress and Saint (Chicago, 1995), which provides chapters on Helena in later religious literature and art.
Chapter 1: Religion in the Later Roman Empire
To find a definition for religio and much else one might now start with C. Ando, The Matter of the Gods: Religion and the Roman Empire (Berkeley, Los Angeles and London, 2008). I thank Anthony Kaldellis for this reference and others (and apologize that I did not follow his insistence that I call Salonica either Thessalonica or Thessalonike). Roman army religion has generated a fairly large but far from comprehensive bibliography. The standard work before the publication of the Feriale Duranum was A. von Domaszewski, Die Religion des römischen Heeres (Trier, 1895). The Feriale Duranum is considered in great detail by A. D. Nock, ‘The Roman army and the Roman religious year’, Harvard Theological Review 45 (1952): 187–252; J. F. Gilliam, ‘The Roman military Feriale’, Harvard Theological Review 47 (1954): 183–96. The full text is published at R. O. Fink, A. S. Hoey and W. F. Snyder, ‘The Feriale Duranum’, Yale Classical Studies 7 (1940): 1–222. It is revised at R. O. Fink, Roman military records on papyrus (Cleveland, 1971), pp. 422–9, and reproduced by J. Helgeland, ‘Roman army religion’, in ANRW II 16.3, pp. 1470–1555, at 1481–7. The date of the papyrus is considered at H. W. Benario, ‘The Date of the Feriale Duranum’, Historia 11 (1962): 192–6. On the calendar as a means to Romanize recruits, see I. P. Haynes, ‘The Romanisation of religion in the auxilia of the Roman imperial army from Augustus to Septimius Severus’, Britannia 24 (1993): 141–57. I discovered Georgia L. Irby-Massie, Military Religion in Roman Britain (Leiden, 1999), only after I had completed this chapter, but would recommend it highly, not least for its catalogue of pertinent inscriptions.
The most important source collection for Roman Britain is R. G. Collingwood and R. P. Wright, The Inscriptions of Roman Britain, I. Inscriptions on Stone, 2nd edn with addenda and corrigenda by R. S. O. Tomlin (Stroud, 1995), cited throughout by its standard abbreviation RIB. On the Maryport altars, see RIB, pp. 274–80, 774, nos. 815–35; R. Davis, ‘Cohors I Hispanorum and the garrisons of Maryport’, Transactions of the Cumberland and Westmoreland Antiquarian and Archaeological Society, 2nd series 77 (1977): 7–16; S. S. Frere, ‘M. Maenius Agrippa, the “Expeditio Britannica” and Maryport’, Britannia 31 (2000): 23–8. Frere counts twenty altars to Jupiter Optimus Maximus, and re-dates the foundation of Maryport to 125. See also D. J. Breeze, ‘The regiments stationed at Maryport and their commanders’, in R. J. A. Wilson, ed., Roman Maryport and its Setting (Kendall, 1997), pp. 67–89. New altars were evidently made annually over a period of around fifteen years, with only one altar ascribed to the unit but not its commander (no. 815 in the RIB). Four are inscribed with the name of the tribune Marcus Maenius Agrippa (AD 124–7; nos. 823–6), another four with that of the tribune Gaius Caballius Priscus (128–31; nos. 817–20), and three more with that of the prefect Lucius Cammius Maximus (133–5; nos. 827–9). The sixth and last commander, the prefect Helstrius Novellus, set up one altar in 137 (no. 822). The brief tenure of the prefect Marcus Censorius Cornelianus is not represented by an altar to Jupiter Optimus Maximus (IOM), although he dedicated one to Jupiter Augustus (no. 814) in 132. The fifth commander, Lucius Antistius Lupus Verianus (136), is not represented, although the inscriptions on two altars (nos. 834, 835) are largely illegible.
On the imperial cult, one might start with A. D. Nock, ‘The emperor’s divine comes’, JRS 37 (1947): 102–16. The literature is now vast, and a comprehensive bibliography is contained in the multiple volumes by D. Fishwick, The Imperial Cult in the Latin West. Studies in the Ruler Cult of the Western Provinces of the Roman Empire (Leiden, 1987– ). Many of the articles cited are by Fishwick himself, including several on the numina, including D. Fishwick, ‘Imperial sceptre heads in Roman Britain’, Britannia 19 (1988): 399–400. For the cult in the east, see S. Price, Rituals and Power. The Roman Imperial Cult in Asia Minor (Cambridge, 1984), and G. Bowersock, ‘The imperial cult: perceptions and persistence’, in his Selected papers on Late Antiquity (Bari, 2000), pp. 43–56.
For devotion to military standards, one might start with A. S. Hoey, ‘Rosaliae Signorum’, Harvard Theological Review 30 (1937): 15–35; M. P. Speidel and A. Dimitrova-Mileva, ‘The cult of the genii in the Roman army and a new military deity’, in ANRW II 16.2, pp. 1542–55. The Corbridge relief was examined by I. A. Richmond, ‘Roman legionaries at Corbridge’, Archaeologia Aeliana, 4th series, 21 (1943): 163ff. The Vardulli, an auxiliary force temporarily stationed at Corbridge (probably in AD 161–3), have earned a fair amount of attention. Veterans of the unit ‘and their children for posterity’ were granted citizenship in AD 98 (CIL xiii. 3606). A vexillation of the Vardulli was present at milecastle nineteen on Hadrian’s Wall (later second century), where it erected an altar to the Matres, before moving to High Rochester. Certainly by c.175, the cohort was in garrison at Lanchester (Longovicium) in Co. Durham, where they erected an altar to Jupiter. See P. J. Casey, M. Noel and J. Wright, ‘The Roman fort at Lanchester, Co. Durham: a geophysical survey and discussion of garrisons’, Archaeological Journal 149 (1992): 69–81.
A willingness to use modern sociological insights into war was evinced by R. MacMullen, ‘The legion as a society’, Historia 33 (1984): 440–56, and has since become fashionable. Seminal works are E. Shils and M. Janowitz, ‘Cohesion and disintegration in the Wehrmacht in World War II’, The Public Opinion Quarterly 12 (1948): 280–315; M. Janowitz, The Professional Soldier. A Social and Political Portrait, revised edn (New York, 1971); A. Kellett, Combat Motivation (Boston, 1982). On more recent developments, I have used T. P. Odom et al, ‘Transformation: victory rests with small units’, Military Review (May–June 2005): 81–5.
Useful overviews of Roman military standards are provided in G. Webster, The Roman imperial army, 3rd edn (Norman, OK, 1998); and P. Southern and K. Ramsey Dixon, The late Roman army (London, 1996). On the eagle standard, one can turn with great profit to M. P. Speidel, ‘Eagle-bearer and trumpeter. The eagle-standard and trumpets of the Roman legions illustrated by three tombstones recently found at Byzantion’, Bonner Jahrbücher 176 (1976): 123–63. Speidel also lists inscriptions commemorating another thirty-two known aquiliferi (four only partial names or anonymous), which show that it was possible to become eagle-bearer with less than one year of service, but which indicate more clearly that the office was attained later in a career, as a reward for bravery and service. Four men held the position of signifer before promotion to aquilifer. It is very likely that duties were shared, and this appears to be confirmed by the fact that Surillio’s tombstone was raised by his colleague Aurelius Zanax, surely also an aquilifer. One might compare Surillio’s with the tombstone of Pintaius, the signifer of the Cohors V Asturum, an infantry cohort of the auxilia. The carved relief is now to be found in Bonn (CIL xiii. 8098; ILS 2580; mid-1st cent AD), and is ably described by Webster, Roman Imperial Army, p. 149: ‘He [Pintaius] appears to be wearing a bear-skin head-dress with a pair of arms ending with extending claws across his chest; the standard terminating in a spear-head bears two wreaths, the lower a plain disc similar to those on the centurial standards of legions, below which is an eagle with extending wings holding a lightning flash in its talons, while below the hand is a thin crescent above a globe. The whole thing would seem to be too elaborate for a centurial standard and may be that of the unit itself.’
Besides the depictions of vexilla at Benwell and Corbridge, a third relief from Britannia was found at Ramshawfield, a mile from the fort of Chesterholm (Vindolanda) on Hadrian’s Wall. This is no longer extant, and all that remains is a dubious sketch by J. Horsely from 1732, of a standard between a Pegasus (winged horse, left) and a Capricorn (goat-fish, right), the flag of which appears to bear the inscription III CH VEXI. However, the legend given by Collingwood and Wright, RIB, p. 537, no. 1707, text is ‘leg(ionis) II vex[illum]’, attributing the discrepancy to a preference of Collingwood for a variant reading by Huebner. See also M. Speidel, ‘The army at Aquileia, the Moesiaci Legion, and the shield emblems in the Notitia Dignitatum’, Saalburg-Jahrbuch 45 (1990): 68–72, at 68–9; reprinted in M. Speidel, Roman Army Studies II (Stuttgart, 1992), pp. 414–18, where carved reliefs on the sarcophagus of M. Aurelius Sossinus, a vexillarius of the legio IV Flavia, shows two signiferi, each bearing a vexillum marked ‘EX AQUIL’, which Speidel interprets as ‘Exercitus Aquileiensis’ (not ‘ex Aquileia’). If the reliefs illustrated actual vexilla, these will have identified a composite force drawn partly from Sossinus’ legion. The bronze roundel from Gaul is discussed at Southern and Dixon, Late Roman Army, p. 125, which includes a sketch and a reference to P. J. Casey, The Legions in the Later Roman Empire, Fourth Annual Caerleon Lecture (Cardiff, 1991). See also R. Tomlin, ‘The legions in the late empire’, in R. J. Brewer, ed., Roman fortresses and their legions (London and Cardiff, 2000), pp. 159–78.
Besides the new book by Ando, cited above, works by Ramsay MacMullen are excellent places to start when considering the religious devotion of Romans. His Paganism in the Roman Empire (New Haven and London, 1981), pp. 5–7, supplies the chart of, and commentary on, dedicatory inscriptions. Dionysus features there as Liber Pater. The cult of Dionysus forms the denouement of R. Turcan, The Cults of the Roman Empire (Oxford, 1996), pp. 291–327. There are several well-illustrated studies of the mosaics of Paphos, Cyprus. For the House of Aion, see W. Daszewski, Dionysos der Erlöser: griechische Mythen im spätantiken Cypern (Mainz, 1985). The argument is summarized in English in W. Daszewski and D. Michaelides, Mosaic Floors in Cyprus (Ravenna, 1988). On the House of Dionysus, see C. Kondoleon, Domestic and Divine: Roman Mosaics in the House of Dionysos (Ithaca, NY, 1995). She focuses on the second-century mosaics. For an excellent overview one can now turn to K. Dunbabin, Mosaics of the Greek and Roman World (Cambridge, 1999), which has a chapter on Hellenistic pebble mosaics. G. Bowersock, Mosaics as History (Cambridge, MA, 2006), has recently argued that one must view the popularity of Dionysus and Heracles as a reflection of the popularity of mime and pantomime in the late antique world.
The seven Walters sarcophagi, all from the tomb of the Calpurnii, were studied by K. Lehmann-Hartleben and E. C. Olsen, Dionysiac Sarcophagi in Baltimore (Baltimore, 1942). This identifies the trophies on the so-called Victory sarcophagus as vexilla, suggesting an equivalence with ships’ ensigns, which were apparently loosely associated with Bacchus. For a broader context see R. Turcan, Les sarcophages romains dionysiaques (Paris, 1966), where the victorious message is made manifest, especially at pp. 456–72; and the massive F. Matz, Die dionysischen Sarkophage, 4 vols (Berlin, 1968–75), in the ongoing German Archaeological Institute corpus of sepulchral sculpture, Die antiken Sarcophagreliefs. Two useful overviews of twentieth-century work (early and late) on sarcophagi, are provided by A. D. Nock, ‘Sarcophagi and Symbolism’, and B. C. Ewald, ‘Review article: Death and Myth: new books on Roman sarcophagi’, both in the American Journal of Archeology: 50 (1946): 140–70; 103 (1999): 344–8. A large bibliography is provided by B. Andreae, in ANRW II 12.2 (1981), pp. 3–64.
The brief surveys of Cybele and Isis are provoked by MacMullen’s analysis, and by R. Stark, Cities of God (for which see the following chapter). A more recent two-volume general interpretation of great use is M. Beard, J. North and S. Price, Religions of Rome, 1: A History; 2: Sources (Cambridge, 1998). One can read far more in L. Roller, In Search of God the Mother: the Cult of Anatolian Cybele (Berkeley, 1999), who disassociates the arrival of Cybele in Rome and the end of the Punic Wars, but acknowledges the force of the later myth that she was a bringer of victory. For Christian attacks on Cybele, see A. T. Fear, ‘Cybele and Christ’, in E. Lane, ed., Cybele, Attis and related cults (Leiden, 1996), pp. 37–50, and in the same volume K. Summers, ‘Lucretius’ Roman Cybele’, pp. 337–65, assesses that author’s account of the ecstatic rites in the first century BC. On Isis see R. Witt, Isis in the Ancient World (Baltimore, 1997), a reprint of a 1971 classic (Isis in the Greco-Roman World), and John Ferguson, The Religions of the Roman Empire (London, 1970), where one may also find the prayer to Asclepius. A survey of the sites devoted to Isis is provided by R. A. Wild, ‘The known Isis-Serapis sanctuaries from the Roman period’, ANRW II 17.4, pp. 1739–1851.
The classic studies of the cult of Jupiter Dolichenus are by P. Merlat: Répertoire des inscriptions et monuments figurés de culte de Jupiter Dolichenus (Paris, 1951), and Jupiter Dolichenus. Essai d’interprétation et de synthèse (Paris, 1960). Of the more than two hundred and fifty inscriptions Merlat collated from across the empire, he found that four-fifths were military. Merlat’s interpretation has been superseded by M. Speidel, The Religion of Jupiter Dolichenus in the Roman Army (Leiden, 1978), who argues instead for greater emphasis on the unity of the civilian and military aspects of the cult, and suggests that only forty percent of the extant inscriptions mention soldiers or units. One might also read with profit the German essay by M. Hörig, ‘Iupiter Dolichenus’, ANRW II 17.4, pp. 2136–79, which provides a survey of the cult’s presence in various provinces. On the temple at Ribchester, see I. Richmond, in Archaeologia Aeliana (1945), where the inscription is considered at greater length. On the phrase ‘ex responsu’, at p. 25: ‘Indeed, the only [god] whose cult supplies evidence of a frequent and almost regular habit of thus communicating behests is Iuppiter Dolichenus, whose temples were of elaborate Mesopotamian type and whose worship was introduced into Britain in the second century and became popular among the soldiery in the third.’
The widespread fascination with the mysteries of Mithras – it has its own Journal of Mithraic Studies – is in inverse proportion to the amount of solid evidence for the cult’s practices and rites. A very full collection of papers from a seminar held in Rome, and with special reference to the evidence for the cult and its rites from Rome and Ostia, Mysteria Mithrae, ed. E. Bianchi (Leiden, 1978), attempts a definition of the faith, which contains the following observation: ‘[Mithra was] a deity who establishes for mankind an intra-cosmic and extra-cosmic soteriological perspective, expressed through a symbology not unconnected with fertility, within a structure of initiation functioning in a particular kind of appointed sanctuaries [sic], on the basis of the esoteric principle.’ Indeed. The follow-up to that learned symposium convened in 1990, and the papers were published as Studies in Mithraism, ed. J. R. Hinells (Rome, 1994). These include, among several very useful studies, J. H. W. G. Liebeschuetz, ‘The expansion of Mithraism among the religious cults of the second century’, pp. 195–216, which presents a sensible and clear introduction, and P. Beskow, ‘Tertullian on Mithras’, pp. 51–60, which sets out all relevant information provided by that Christian apologist. Invaluable, but highly contentious, is W. M. Brashear, A Mithraic catechism from Egypt <P. Berol. 21196>, Supplementband Tyche (Vienna, 1992). This is not the infamous Mithras Liturgy, published by Dieterich in 1903 and later debunked by F. Cumont. For that, see now H.-D. Betz, The ‘Mithras Liturgy’. Text, translation and commentary. Studien und Texte zu Antike und Christentum 18 (Tübingen, 2003).
On Mithraea, one must read E. Sauer, The end of paganism in the north-western provinces of the Roman Empire. The example of the Mithras cult, BAR International Series 634 (Oxford, 1996). For a fascinating attempt to demonstrate that Roman Mithraism was not of Persian origin but was developed from the Orion cult, a ‘truly Greek religion … in Iranian garb’, see M. Speidel, Mithras – Orion. Greek hero and Roman army god (Leiden, 1980). D. Ulansey, The Origins of the Mithraic Mysteries (Oxford, 1989), provides a different outline, and a useful map of the distribution of Mithraea (p. 5), albeit in print almost too tiny to read. Most recently, see R. Beck, The Religion of the Mithras Cult in the Roman Empire. Mysteries of the Unconquered Sun (Oxford, 2006), a monographic synthesis of thirty years of articles (collected as Beck on Mithraism (Aldershot, 2004)) in which the author places himself in the initiate’s boots. Beck’s survey of Mithraic scholarship, ‘Mithraism since Franz Cumont’, ANRW II 17.4, pp. 2002–2115, is comprehensive (to 1984), and contains 22 excellent plate illustrations.
Chapter 2: The Rise of Christianity
The chapter’s title is descriptive and ostensibly generic, but echoes the titles of two works of great importance: R. Stark, The Rise of Christianity: A Sociologist Reconsiders History (Princeton, 1996), and W. Frend, The Rise of Christianity (Philadelphia, 1984). Stark’s vision is teased out in a series of essays, most delivered as lectures. The book met with a vociferous critical response, not least in a series of rather narrow articles published in the Journal of Early Christian Studies 6/ii (1998). Stark has since developed his ideas on the urban character of early Christianity – initially sketched in his chapters 6 and 7, perhaps the weakest in The Rise of Christianity – in Cities of God: The Real Story of How Christianity Became an Urban Movement and Conquered Rome (San Francisco, 2006). He recounts the familiar explanation of the term pagan. A less attractive explanation suggests that Christians considered themselves to be soldiers of Christ, and hence were drawing a contrast with rustics who did not fight. Other estimates of the numbers of Christians at the end of the third century are far lower, for example only ten percent proposed by H. Drake, Constantine and the Bishops: The Politics of Intolerance (Baltimore, 2000). Those who count fewer earlier will attribute far more to Constantine, as does M. Edwards, ‘The Beginnings of Christianization’, in Lenski, ed., Age of Constantine, pp. 137–58. A detailed study in support of one of Stark’s assertions can be found in W. V. Harris, ‘Child-exposure in the Roman empire’, JRS 84 (1994): 1–22.
There are many other general accounts of the role of Christianity in the late Roman world, and of the process of Christianization. The following is merely a representative sample of the most recent: G. Clark, Christianity and Roman Society (Cambridge, 2005); M. Humphries, Early Christianity (New York, 2006); M. Salzman, The Making of a Christian Aristocracy (Cambridge, MA, 2002); and some classic studies: P. Brown, Authority and the Sacred. Aspects of the Christianisation of the Roman World (Cambridge, 1995); R. Lane Fox, Pagans and Christians (Harmondsworth, 1986); R. MacMullen, Christianizing the Roman Empire (AD 100–400) (Yale, 1984).
On Christian attitudes to warfare, and Christians in the military, the classic works cited are C. John Cadoux, The Early Christian Attitude to War. A Contribution to the History of Christian Ethics (London, 1919; repr. New York, 1982) and Adolf von Harnack, Militia Christi. Die christliche Religion und der Soldatenstand in den ersten drei Jahrhunderten (Tübingen, 1905), translated into English as Militia Christi. The Christian Religion and the Military in the First Three Centuries, by D. McInnes Gracie (Philadelphia, 1981). More problematic is J.-M. Hornus, Evangile et labarum (Geneva, 1960). More recently, see J. Helgeland, ‘Christians and the Roman Army, AD 173–337’, Church History 43 (1974): 149–63; J. Kreider, ‘Military service in the Church Orders’, Journal of Religious Ethics 31 (2003): 415–42. Tertullian’s views are well covered in many of these, and also by S. Gero, ‘“Miles Gloriosus”: The Christian and Military Service according to Tertullian’, Church History 39 (1970): 285–98. On Origen, see in addition Homilies on Joshua: Origen, Homilies on Joshua, trans. Barbara J. Bruce, ed. Cynthia White, The Fathers of the Church 105 (Washington, DC, 2002). An accessible introduction to Origen is now offered by Anthony Grafton and Megan Williams, Christianity and the Transformation of the Book: Origen, Eusebius, and the Library of Caesarea (Cambridge, MA, 2006). The extensive quotations from Origen presented in this chapter are slightly modified from P. Schaff’s translations in volumes in the Ante-Nicene Fathers series.
Martyrdom has a vast literature, but one might usefully start with the Wiles lectures by G. W. Bowersock, Martyrdom and Rome (Cambridge, 1994), a slim volume that complements the classic paper by G. E. M. de Ste Croix, ‘Why were the early Christians persecuted’, Past & Present 26 (1963): 6–38. A useful overview of the Decian persecution is provided by G. Clark, in CAH 12, pp. 625–35. J. B. Rives, ‘The decree of Decius and the religion of empire’, JRS 89 (1999): 135–54, argues for the originality of Decius’ decree, as a measure to restructure state religio. David Woods maintains a marvellous website on the military martyrs, now infrequently updated. For an art-historical overview of major and minor military saints in the eastern canon, one can turn to C. Walter, The Warrior Saints in Byzantine Art and Tradition (Aldershot, 2003).
Chapter 3. The Unconquered Emperor and his Divine Patron
The idea that there was a third-century ‘Crisis of Empire’ has been explored, revised and restored, such that it still retains sufficient force to provide the title of volume 12 of the CAH (2nd edn, 2005), retained from A. Alföldi’s sixth chapter of its predecessor. General works on the third century are plentiful, and one might recommend: D. Potter, The Roman Empire at Bay, AD 180–395 (London and New York, 2004); P. Southern, The Roman Empire from Severus to Constantine, 2nd edn (London and New York, 2001); M. Christol, L’empire romain du IIIe siècle. Histoire politique 192–325 après J.-C., 2nd edn (Paris, 1997).
On the Roman conflict with Parthia and then the Persians, one might start with F. Millar, The Roman Near East, 31 BC–AD 337 (Cambridge, MA, 1994), and the pertinent chapter (ch. 14, pp. 461–80) of the new CAH 12, by R. Frye, ‘The Sassanians’. The preceding chapter (ch. 13, pp. 440–60), by M. Todd, introduces ‘The Germanic peoples and Germanic society’. Recent studies of barbarian ‘ethnogenesis’ abound. Two of the best are: M. Kulikowski, Rome’s Gothic Wars. From the Third Century to Alaric (Cambridge, 2006); and John F. Drinkwater, The Alamanni and Rome 213–496. Caracalla to Clovis (Oxford, 2007). These are both wonderfully written, and the former is particularly accessible. Occasionally, modern policy wonks venture into ancient – although hardly ever medieval – history and offer useful provocations to specialists. E. Luttwak’s Grand Strategy of the Roman Empire (Baltimore, 1976), is one such foray, and Luttwak promises to publish a ‘Grand Strategy of the Byzantine Empire’ soon. One might not consider in quite the same category an essay by B. Bartlett, ‘How excessive government killed ancient Rome’, The Cato Journal 14/ii (1994): 287–303, which argues that the third-century crisis owed much to a failure to pursue Reaganesque policies promoting supply-side economics. For another perspective see K. Hopkins, ‘Taxes and trade in the Roman empire (200 BC–AD 400)’, JRS 70 (1980): 101–25. Recent overviews are presented by M. Corbier in CAH 12, pp. 327–439.
My analysis of the emperor and the army follows closely J. B. Campbell, The Emperor and the Roman Army (Oxford 1994). This is supplemented by insights from J. Stäcker, Princeps und miles. Studien zum Bindungs- und Nahverhältnis von Kaiser und Soldat im 1. und 2. Jahrhundert n.Chr., Spudasmata 91 (Hildesheim, 2003). S. Wood, Roman Portrait Sculpture, AD 217–260 (Leiden, 1986), offers descriptive commentary on all the imperial sculptures mentioned, without making mention of triumphal connotations. In contrast to the nude of Gallus, one might enjoy the rather ridiculous placement of Decius’ old head on the youthful nude body of Mars (her fig. 46). For the opposite effect, E. Kantorowicz, ‘Gods in uniform’, Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 105 (1961): 368–93, demonstrates that gods were now increasingly portrayed like emperors, wearing military uniforms and carrying arms.
The titles invictus and victor are addressed by R. Storch, ‘The “absolutist” theology of victory’, Classica et Medievalia 29 (1968): 197–206; R. Storch, ‘The trophy and the cross: pagan and Christian symbolism in the fourth and fifth centuries’, Byzantion 40 (1970): 105–18; S. Weinstock, ‘Victor and invictus’, Harvard Theological Review 50 (1957): 211–47. Essential in German is P. Kneissl, Die Siegestitulatur der römischen Kaiser. Untersuchungen zu den Siegerbeinamen des ersten und zweiten Jahrhunderts, Hypomnemata 23 (Göttingen, 1969). More generally on Roman and Byzantine imperial titles, one might start with M. Peachin, Roman Imperial Titulature and Chronology, AD 235–284 (Amsterdam, 1990). See also the essential G. Rösch, Onoma Basileus. Studien zum offizielen Gebrauch der Kaisertitel in spätantiker und frühmittelalterlicher Zeit, Byzantina Vindobonensia 10 (Vienna, 1978).
The traditional view of Sun worship in the Roman empire, established at the end of the nineteenth century largely by Franz Cumont and his disciples, is that it marked the culmination of a process of ‘orientalization’ of Roman religion. A century of scholarship was condensed and reconsidered in a monograph by G. Halsberghe, The Cult of Sol Invictus (Leiden, 1972). One should read also G. H. Halsberghe, ‘Le culte de Deus Sol Invictus à Rome au 3e siècle après J.C.’, ANRW II.17.4, pp. 2181–201, a summary of the monograph. That traditional view has now been demolished, starting with S. Hijmans, ‘The Sun which did not rise in the East: The Cult of Sol Invictus in the Light of Non-Literary Evidence’, Bulletin Antieke Beschaving 71 (1996): 115–50, which takes issue with Halsberghe, arguing for continuity between a native Roman Sun god, Sol Indiges and Sol Invictus, and against the equivalence of Sol Invictus and Elagabal. Hijmans presents an excellent survey of the iconography of Sol, which is expanded and augmented by P. Martens, Helios und Sol. Kulte und Ikonographie des griechischen und römischen Sonnengott (Istanbul, 2002), which concludes with an extensive typological catalogue of images. This is among the wave of recent, and excellent, scholarship on the worship of Sol. A comprehensive overview is offered by S. Berrens, Sonnenkult und Kaisertum von den Severern bis zu Constantin. I (193–337 n. Chr.), Historia Einzelschriften 185 (Stuttgart, 2004). Imperial and divine gestures, for example Sol’s raised right hand, may be considered in a broader context by turning to R. Brilliant, Gesture and Rank in Roman Art (New Haven, 1963).
A recent ‘Routledge imperial biography’, A. Watson, Aurelian and the Third Century (London and New York, 1999), updates the classic study in French by L. Homo (1904). It also presents an excellent summary of research on the third-century ‘crisis’. An accessible study which covers Aurelian’s victory over Zenobia, R. Stoneman, Palmyra and its Empire: Zenobia’s Revolt against Rome (Ann Arbor, MI, 1992), has now been supplemented by the French work of a Polish scholar: T. Kotula, Aurélien et Zénobie (Warsaw, 1997).
The information presented in the complex and compelling Historia Augusta can never be taken at face value. Keys to understanding the text can be found in several works by the late Sir Ronald Syme, and now in the papers collected in the published proceedings of a regular colloquium, the Historiae Augustae Colloquia. Although there is no consensus, a convincing line of argument posits a single author for the whole work, which is presented as the collected writings of six separate writers. The author is perhaps merely the redactor of the first part of the work, and the author of those parts attributed to Trebellius Pollio and Flavius Vopiscus, which include the lives of Claudius II Gothicus and Aurelian. He was writing in the 390s, but presents the work as one composed in the later third century. He draws on a posited lost compilation of imperial biographies, the so-called Kaisergeschichte, and much contemporary panegyric, and has a penchant for inventing documents and letters to insert in his narrative. See T. D. Barnes, ‘The sources of the Historia Augusta (1967–92)’, Historiae Augustae Colloquium Maceratense (Bari, 1995), pp. 1–28; and D. den Hengst, ‘The discussion of authorship’, Historiae Augustae Colloquium Perusinum (Bari, 2002), pp. 187–95. Many of our author-redactor’s sources are contemporary with events they describe, including a lost panegyrical life of Claudius upon which he clearly draws. On this see A. Lippold, ‘Claudius, Constantius, Constantinus. Die V. Claudii der HA. Ein Betrag zur Legitimierung der Herrschaft Konstantins aus stadtrömischer Sicht’, ibid., pp. 309–43, who argues further that one must view the original life as part of a programme devised by the senate in Rome to flatter Constantine’s attempts to link himself to Claudius. The contrasting visions of Aurelian and Constantine are discussed by H. Brandt, ‘Die “heidnische Vision” Aurelians (HA, A 24, 2–8) und die “christliche Vision” Konstantins des Grossen’, Historiae Augustae Colloquium Maceratense, pp. 107–17, who determines that the author wrote a conscious rejoinder to Eusebius’ account, thus inventing the whole affair. I prefer to follow Berrens, Sonnenkult, pp. 89–126, in seeing a more complex relationship between the texts, and noting that Aurelian’s actions are entirely consistent with claims that he had a vision, if not quite in the form reported in the HA. Constantine was far from the first emperor to have, or to claim to have, such a vision.
Chapter 4. The Tetrarchy
One might now most easily start with R. Rees, Diocletian and the Tetrarchy (Edinburgh, 2004), which offers a brief but insightful overview as an introduction to a collection of translated sources and images. The pertinent chapters of D. S. Potter, The Roman Empire at Bay, AD 190–395 (London, 2004), are typically excellent. S. Corcoran, The Empire of the Tetrarchs. Imperial Pronouncements and Government, AD 284–324 (Oxford, 1996), offers a careful articulation of the nature of Tetrarchic government through the study of extant documents, notably rescripts (replies to petitions, letters sent to individuals) and edicts (general pronouncements). W. Seston, Dioclétien et la Tétrarchie, I, Guerres et réformes (284–300) (Paris, 1946), never proceeded to a second volume, but presents an elegant narrative so far as it goes. One must also read parts of F. Kolb, Diokletian und die erste Tetrarchie (Berlin, 1987), which is as forbidding as S. William, Diocletian and the Roman Recovery (London, 1985), is approachable.
Tetrarchic art once received short shrift, but now has more sympathetic commentators. Jutta Meischner, ‘Die Porträtkunst der ersten und zweiten Tetrarchie bis zur Alleinherrschaft Konstantins: 293 bis 324 n. Chr.’, Archäologischer Anzeiger (1986/i): 223–50, sketches the stylistic development of portrait busts from the accession of the Caesars (traditionally called ‘expressive realism’) through the second Tetrarchy (‘a harmonization and consolidation of form’) to the final defeat of Licinius by Constantine. She offers fresh insights into the portraits of Constantine in Basel, Licinius in Istanbul, and the square-jawed Tetrarch of Malibu. Catherine Walden, ‘The Tetrarchic Image’, Oxford Journal of Archaeology 9 (1990): 221–35, offers a rather tepid overview with no original insights, but it is in English. R. Rees, ‘Images and image: a re-examination of Tetrarchic iconography’, Greece and Rome 40 (1992): 181–200, places necessary emphasis on the homogeneity of images and the concordia implied thereby. The classic study by H. P. L’Orange, Art Forms and Civic Life in the Later Roman Empire (Princeton, 1965), retains great value, although I have diverged from his judgement on numerous occasions. L’Orange, and many following him, claim that the Venice and Vatican Tetrarchs are all the same height, but this is, at least to my sight, quite wrong: there is a clear difference, clearest at eye level, between Augusti and Caesars. For the heavenward-gazing Alexander, see H. P. L’Orange, Apotheosis in Ancient Portraiture (Oslo, 1947).
In addition to the general works listed above, important commentary on the Caesars at war is provided by: T. D. Barnes, ‘Imperial campaigns, AD 284–311’, Phoenix 30 (1976): 174–93; E. Eichholz, ‘Constantius Chlorus’ invasion of Britain’, JRS 43 (1953): 41–6; P. J. Casey, Carausius and Allectus: the British Usurpers (London, 1994); and R. C. Blockley, ‘The Romano-Persian treaties of 299 and 363’, Florilegium 6 (1984): 28–49. The sculptures on the Arch of Galerius are treated by H.-P. Laubscher, Der Reliefschmuck des Galeriusbogens in Thessaloniki (Berlin, 1975), who relied on photographs from the 1930s, as the reliefs today are so badly abraded. (Indeed, between my taking the pictures included in this book in 2003/4 and returning in 2007, the reliefs were encased in perspex for restoration work. They are now once again uncovered.) The scenes described in this chapter are all from the triumphal, rather than the narrative, sequence according to Laubscher’s typology: B II 20 (‘Triumphales Siegesbild’), B II 21 (Triumphale Repräsentation der Tetrarchen’), B II 22 (‘Victorien’), and B II 17 (‘Siegesopfer Diocletians und des Galerius’). See also the long and important article by H. Meyer, ‘Die Frieszyklen am sogennanten Triumphbogen des Galerius in Thessaloniki. Kriegschronik und Ankündigung der zweiten Tetrarchie’, Jahrbuch des deutschen archäologischen Instituts 95 (1980): 374–444, for a reconstruction of the narrative of the campaign. He suggests that the triumphal procession, in which one sees a quadriga pulled by elephants (Laubscher’s B III 23), was an element of the vicennalia celebrations of 303, allowing us to date that structure precisely to 304. In English, see M. S. Pond Rothman, ‘The Thematic Organization of the Panel Reliefs on the Arch of Galerius’, American Journal of Archaeology 81/iv (1977): 427–54, which insists on viewing the arch within its broader context, the imperial palace complex. She is more traditional in dating the dedication of the arch to 303. Her broader argument, and its potency, may be seen in two pithy sentences: ‘Galerius’s victory over Narses was both an event in time and place and a foreordained revelation of the Tetrarch’s invincibility. The scenes of the barbarian migration and the victor’s clemency and of the imperial adventus, adlocutio, and sacrifice, for example, recall both particular occurrences and the rich historical and representational traditions of official ceremonies.’
A comparandum for the battle scene, and indeed for a second eroded virtus augusti panel, was offered by R. Garucci, ‘Brass medallion, representing the Persian Victory of Maximianus Galerius’, Numismatic Chronicle, 2nd series, 10 (1870): 112–18, on the reverse of which a mounted emperor’s horse rears over a representation of various Persians in diverse states of submission and defeat. A Victory flutters over the emperor, placing a wreath on his head, while he wields a spear. Although the emperor in this scene on the arch also has a raised right arm, it is impossible to imagine that he once held a spear. Rather, he was surely empty-handed, like the emperor of the Ludovisi Sarcophagus.
On the Tetrarchic army, see A. H. M. Jones, The Later Roman Empire, 284–602, 3 vols (Oxford, 1964), esp. II 607–86; P. Southern and K. Ramsey Dixon, The Late Roman Army (London, 1996); M. Nicasie, Twilight of Empire. The Roman army from the reign of Diocletian until the Battle of Adrianople (Amsterdam, 1998); D. Hoffmann, Das spätrömische Bewegungsheer und die Notitia Dignitatum, 2 vols, Epigraphische Studien 7/i-ii (Düsseldorf, 1969–70). My brief account of organizational changes is a synthesis, far too neat in places, of a number of vexed questions and debates. M. Speidel, ‘Raising new units for the late Roman army: auxilia palatina’, DOP 50 (1996): 163–70, is particularly useful on the Regii.
The currency edict of September 301 survives in just a single inscription from Aphrodisias, published with commentary as K. Erim, J. Reynolds and M. Crawford, ‘Diocletian’s currency reform: a new inscription’, JRS 61 (1971): 171–7. The edict of maximum prices is translated by Rees, Diocletian, pp. 139–46, and a version from Aphrodisias is published by K. Erim et al in JRS 60 (1970): 120–41. J. P. Roth, The Logistics of the Roman Army at War (264 BC–AD 235) (Leiden, 1998), posits that one army modius was the daily ration of a contubernium, and consequently that a cohort required 60 modii, and a legion 600 modii, of pulses and grains each day.
In the suggestion that all four Tetrarchs met in 303, and that here it was determined to promote Maxentius and Constantine, I have followed T. D. Barnes, ‘Emperors, panegyrics, prefects, provinces and palaces (284–317)’, Journal of Roman Archaeology 9 (1996): 532–52, correcting his own account in The New Empire of Diocletian and Constantine (Cambridge, MA, 1982). On the celebrations of 303 see M. McCormick, Eternal Victory, pp. 19–20. The statues are considered by H. Kähler, Die Fünfsäulendenkmal für die Tetrarchen auf dem Forum Romanum (Berlin, 1964), and more recently by P. Bruggisser, ‘Constantin aux rostres’, Historiae Augustae Colloquium Perusinum, eds G. Bonamente and F. Paschoud (Bari, 2002), pp. 73–91.
The intellectual climate of Nicomedia in 302–3 is explored articulately by E. DePalma Digeser, The Making of a Christian Empire. Lactantius and Rome (Ithaca, NY, 2000), pp. 1–17. The contribution of Hierocles and a response by Eusebius are considered by T. D. Barnes, ‘Sossianus Hierocles and the antecedents of the “Great Persecution”’, Harvard Studies in Classical Philology 80 (1976): 239–52, which also supplies the date for Diocletian’s rescript against the Manichaeans. Further works on the persecution abound. The most perspicacious and original analysis of Lactantius’ On the Deaths of the Persecutors is A. Søby Christensen, Lactantius the Historian (Copenhagen, 1980). This proposes that, contrary to the standard view, Lactantius did not compose his work in the west, having fled Nicomedia, but rather used a Latin historiographical source, the notorious lost Kaisergeschichte identified as a common source for Aurelius Victor and the Historia Augusta. There are also many useful insights into the employment of quotations from Virgil and 2 Maccabees, although one must turn to Creed’s introduction to his English translation for fuller commentary on the latter.
Chapter 5. Constantine Invictus
The events of the second Tetrarchy are recounted in the general works listed above. Of those works devoted to Constantine, Odahl, Constantine and the Christian Empire, is strong on these early years, although his commentary tends to attribute more to Constantine’s various merits and virtues than to luck and chance. The suggestion that Constantine and Maxentius were to be designated Caesars owes much to Barnes, Constantine and Eusebius. The claim that both Severus and Maximinus Daia were related to Galerius must also be credited to T. D. Barnes, ‘The wife of Maximinus’, Classical Philology 94 (1999): 459–60. However, I have not seen it suggested elsewhere that Galerius obliged Diocletian to bring forward the date of his abdication, nor that the original plan was to allow Maximian to celebrate his own vicennalia. Scholars have hitherto wavered between trusting Lactantius’ claims, that Galerius forced Diocletian to step down, and the implications of several panegyrics, that a plan was in place before 305. My hypothesis allows both to be true. I extend this original line of reasoning to suggest that Galerius had sanctioned Constantine’s succession when he allowed him to join the dying Constantius. The only bone of contention between the two men, therefore, was the rank at which Constantine acceded, and his willingness to accept recognition as Caesar, not as Augustus, speaks volumes. The panegyrist of 307 will shortly afterwards praise him for such humility.
The essential panegyrics are translated with full commentary by Nixon and Rodgers, In Praise of Later Roman Emperors, relevant parts of which draw upon C. Nixon, ‘The panegyric of 307 and Maximian’s visits to Rome’, Phoenix 35 (1981): 70–6. On Maximian more generally, those with Italian can read A. Pasqualini, Massimiano Herculius (Rome, 1979). The essential starting point for those interested in Maxentius is M. Cullhed, Conservator Urbis Suae. Studies in the politics and propaganda of the emperor Maxentius. Acta Instituti Romani Regni Sueciae, 8 (Stockholm, 1994). The date of the final rebellion of Maximian against Constantine is disputed. Most now favour 310, and dispense with the notion that the father-in-law was pardoned, then later killed. However, there seems to be no good reason to dispose of Lactantius’ explicit testimony that this occurred, even if we must dispense with the story he supplies. It would surely have been unnecessary to propagate an elaborate fiction involving a second plot if time had not passed between Maximian’s rebellion and his death, and had there been no need to explain away Constantine’s apparent willingness to renege on an agreement. Thus I have suggested that the pardon was, in fact, a negotiation, the terms of which Constantine violated by killing his father-in-law. Opting for 309 as the date of the rebellion also fills an awkward gap in coverage of events, for without this plot, Constantine and Maximian appear to have done nothing at all in the year after the meeting at Carnuntum.
Trier staged a magnificent exhibition in 2007, to mark the 1700th anniversary of Constantine’s elevation in the city. The catalogue showcases many of the pieces displayed at York in 2006, but also much more besides, notably many pieces from the Balkans. See Imperator Caesar Flavius Constantinus. Konstantin der Grosse (Mainz, 2007), with accompanying CD-ROM and colloquium volume. Roman Trier has, as one would expect, a large literature in German, and even a journal devoted to it: Trierer Zeitschrift. An elegant, if dated, English overview is offered by Edith M. Wightman, Roman Trier and the Treveri (London, 1970). R. Van Dam, The Roman Revolution of Constantine (Cambridge, 2007), pp. 62–78, is now important. More broadly, but still with great emphasis on Trier, see R. Krautheimer, ‘The Constantinian basilica’, DOP 21 (1967): 115–40. On the paintings of the imperial residence, one might start with I. Lavin, ‘The ceiling frescoes in Trier and illusionism in Constantinian painting’, DOP 21 (1967): 97–113, which conveys the wonder of the discovery, and the state of play when fewer than half the images had been restored. A fuller account is to be found in E. Simon, Die konstantinische Deckengemälde in Trier (Mainz, 1986), with colour photographs, and a convincing demonstration that this was Fausta’s chamber, not that of the younger Helena, Crispus’ wife, as has also been maintained. The Eagle Cameo, also called the Ada Cameo, has been interpreted variously, as is shown schematically by H. Pohlsander, ‘Crispus: brilliant career and tragic end’, Historia 23 (1984): 79–106, at 93–5. It is interpreted differently to our preferred solution by M. Henig, in Hartley et al, eds, Constantine, pp. 71, 73, following Diana E. E. Kleiner, Roman Sculpture (New Haven and London, 1992), pp. 430, 441–2. Both suggest that the two sons are Constantine II and Constantius II. But if the gem were produced between 318 and 324 as they argue, the absence of Crispus is glaring and inexplicable. Constantine made no attempt to distinguish between his sons by Fausta and his son by Minervina, despite the encouragement offered by the orator of 307 that he might do so. Indeed, after the deaths of Maximian and Maxentius, Constantine had no reason to honour the ‘Herculians’ over his firstborn heir. This is reflected in his actions, raising Crispus to the rank of Caesar on the same day as Constantine II. Crispus’ absence from a family portrait, therefore, would have been unthinkable before 326. His presence to the side of Fausta, the mother, on a cameo celebrating an occasion specific to Constantine II (his birth) makes perfect sense. The same identifications were made long ago by J. M. C. Toynbee in Trierer Zeitschrift 20 (1951): 175–7, and again in the JRS 50 (1960): 271–3, refuting a suggestion by A. Alföldi that the cameo was re-cut from a first-century original. Odahl, Constantine and the Christian Empire, also in agreement, offers further bibliography at p. 327.
Constantine’s vision has a vast literature. For scepticism on the need to find a rational or natural explanation for Constantine’s vision, see Averil Cameron, ‘Constantine and Christianity’, in Hartley et al, eds, Constantine, pp. 96–103, and O. Nicholson, ‘Constantine’s vision of the cross’, Vigiliae Christianae 54 (2000): 309–23. We shall trust these for now, and turn to the larger body of literature when considering the later re-vision, in chapter 7. The road to Rome and the fateful Battle of the Milvian Bridge is equally well covered, and I have restricted my account for the most part to following that presented nearest to the events themselves, by the panegyrist of 313. To this I have added some insights from an account offered by a second panegyrist, Nazarius, reflecting on the outcome in 321. One might use far more, although with care. Among Nazarius’ flights of fancy is the suggestion that Constantius, Constantine’s father, was seen leading an army of heavenly beings who declaimed ‘We seek Constantine, we go to help Constantine.’ Eusebius reports, a decade or more afterwards, a quite different vision, and I have made only limited use of his account here. The sixth-century pagan historian Zosimus recounts additional useful details, which clarify some confusion about when and how the Milvian Bridge was cut, and its relationship to the pontoon bridge.
Chapter 6: Constantine and Rome
My analysis of Maxentius’ Rome owes much to M. Cullhed, Conservator Urbis Suae. Studies in the politics and propaganda of the emperor Maxentius. Acta Instituti Romani Regni Sueciae 8 (Stockholm, 1994), ch. 3, incorporating observations and alternatives suggested by J. Curran, Pagan City and Christian Capital. Rome in the Fourth Century (Oxford, 2000), ch. 2. The chapter heading is taken from the revelatory study, R. Ross Holloway, Constantine and Rome (New Haven, 2004), which expands upon that author’s earlier works. One might also consult H. Lepin and H. Ziemssen, Maxentius. Der letzte Kaiser in Rom (Mainz, 2007), which has excellent colour photos. There is now also a useful but rather derivative article in honour of Averil Cameron, by J. W. Drijvers, ‘Eusebius’ Vita Constantini and the construction of the image of Maxentius’, in From Rome to Constantinople, eds H. Amirav and B. ter Haar Romeny (Leuven, 2007), pp. 11–27. Just as recently, R. Van Dam, The Roman Revolution of Constantine (Cambridge, 2007), pp. 79–97, offers interesting commentary, and his line complements that taken here, stressing the importance of establishing a new Flavian imprint on the established cityscape. On the colossal statue, and the theory of extramission whereby beams were believed to project forth from the eyes, see L. Safran, ‘What Constantine Saw. Reflections on the Capitoline Colossus, Visuality and Early Christian Studies’, Millennium 3 (2006): 43–73. Anthony Kaldellis drew this to my attention.
On the triumph in Late Antiquity, one must start with M. McCormick, Eternal Victory. Triumphal rulership in late antiquity, Byzantium, and the early medieval West (Cambridge and Paris, 1986), and Sabine MacCormack, Art and Ceremony in Late Antiquity (Berkeley, Los Angeles and London, 1981). A critical reflection on ceremonial as portrayed in medieval sources is offered by P. Buc, The Dangers of Ritual. Between Early medieval Texts and Social Scientific Theory (Princeton, 2001). A similarly critical stance informs M. Beard, The Roman Triumph (Cambridge, MA, 2007), who writes of ‘rituals in ink’ and the futility of searching for the standard triumph, its route and requirements.
My analysis of the Arch of Constantine draws heavily on Holloway, Constantine and Rome, pp. 19–56. More expansive thoughts on the re-use of sculpted materials, spolia, are offered by J. Elsner, ‘From the culture of spolia to the cult of relics: the Arch of Constantine and the genesis of Late Antique forms’, Papers of the British School at Rome 68 (2000): 149–84, although Elsner makes much of Constantine’s choices that I, following Holloway, have attributed to Maxentius. Elsner’s essential point, that this was an age in which the appropriation of the past was advanced, is well taken and one cannot but relish his observation that ‘the designers of Constantine’s monuments employed this new style of syncretistic bricolage to brilliant and incremental effect’. Elizabeth Marlowe, ‘Framing the sun: the Arch of Constantine and the Roman cityscape’, Art Bulletin 88 (2006): 223–42, presents a compelling new view of the significance of Sol Invictus, identifying the alignment of the colossal statue with the arch. The suggestion that the Capitoline bronze of Constantine formed part of the Colossus is advanced by S. Ensoli, ‘I colossi di bronzo a Roma in età tardoantica’, in S. Ensoli and E. La Rocca, eds, Aurea Roma (Rome, 2000), 66–90. Information on the discovery of the marble plinth of Maxentius’ earlier colossus of Romulus, which was discovered incorporated into the arch’s roof, was initially provided by P. Peirce, ‘The Arch of Constantine. Propaganda and Ideology in Late Roman Art’, Art History 12 (1989): 387–418. That paper argues generally for Constantine’s appropriation of older sculpture in order to present his reign as a new ‘Golden Age’, which intention can easily be transferred to, or have been absorbed from, Maxentius.
In the very week that the typescript of this book was finished, I received in pre-publication form from the author a compelling new study on the arch, and in particular on its inscription, that I would have wished to incorporate more than I have. N. Lenski, ‘Evoking the pagan past: Instinctu divinitatis and Constantine’s capture of Rome’, Journal of Late Antiquity 1 (2008): 206–59, assigns the arch to the senate, which seeks to persuade the emperor that his victory has been awarded by a pagan deity. The inscription is the key, and the phrase instinctu divinitatis, translated as ‘by divine instigation’, is shown to recall the Republican war ritual of evocatio, whereby a city’s (here Rome’s) tutelary deity is summoned in anticipation of an assault. Lenski also draws attention to the coincidence between the end of Tarquin and of Maxentius ‘by instigation of the god(s)’, and evaluates critically the article by L. J. Hall, ‘Cicero’s instinctu divino and Constantine’s instinctu divinitatis: The Evidence of the Arch of Constantine for the Senatorial View of the “Vision” of Constantine’, Journal of Early Christian Studies 6 (1998): 647–71.
The development on the Appian Way is addressed by A. Frazer, ‘The iconography of the emperor Maxentius’ buildings in Via Appia’, The Art Bulletin 48 (1966): 385–92. The damnatio memoriae of Maxentius is summarized well in Grünewald, Constantinus Maximus Augustus, pp. 64–71, with very useful commentary on the orations by Nixon and Rodgers, In Praise of Later Roman Emperors, pp. 288–385. On Constantine’s use of the term ‘tyrant’ I have not followed suggestions by T. D. Barnes, ‘Oppressor, persecutor, usurper: the meaning of “tyrannus” in the fourth century’, Historiae Augustae Colloquium Barcionense (Bari, 1996), pp. 55–65, that this was imbued with an overtly Christian meaning, preferring the more general analysis of A. Wardman, ‘Usurpers and internal conflicts in the 4th century AD’, Historia 33 (1984): 220–37. Nor have I followed Holloway especially closely in his analysis of Rome’s Constantinian churches, at Constantine and Rome, pp. 57–119.
Licinius’ clash with Maximinus Daia is covered in most general accounts of Constantine’s reign; that between Constantine and Licinius is covered in all. The fact that no coins celebrating Constantine’s decennalia were minted in lands under Licinius’ control indicates two things: first, that relations between the two men had soured considerably between 313 and 315; and second, that the battles between them at Cibalae and on the Plain of Arda, which would deliver certain mints in the Balkans to Constantine, did not take place until after his decennalia year, which ended in July 316. This is significant, for many written sources date the breach between Constantine and Licinius to 314. P. Bruun was the first to propose that one must re-date the breach to 316. The arguments for and against are well summarized by T. G. Elliot, The Christianity of Constantine the Great (Scranton, PA, 1996), pp. 121–7, although one cannot accept his observation (p. 121) that the matter has been concluded in favour of 316 by reference to images of Licinius on the Arch of Constantine (C. Ehrhardt, ‘Monumental evidence for the date of Constantine’s first war against Licinius’, Ancient World 23 (1992): 87–96), for these sculptures have since been shown to be of Constantius Chlorus, not Licinius. Coins from the ephemeral reign of Valens, the border general, suggest he held the title Augustus, not merely Caesar (RIC VII, ed. Bruun, pp. 644, 706). (The same goes for Martinianus, Licinius’ creation in 324, suggesting that Licinius may have intended the promotions to replace Constantine as Augustus.) Odahl, Constantine and the Christian Empire, pp. 163–5, 338–9, gets to grips with Balkan geography and the itineraries of the protagonists. The inscription at Arycanda in Lycia is CIL III. 12132.
Chapter 7. Constantine’s Conversion
The growth of the Moonies, and the observations that altered the manner in which we understand conversion, are contained in J. Lofland, Doomsday Cult. A Study of Conversion, Proselytization, and Maintenance of Faith (Englewood Cliffs, NJ, 1966). Karl F. Morrison, Understanding Conversion (Charlottesville and London, 1992), presents a compelling critique of the ‘peripety paradigm’, setting up very useful distinctions between the experience of conversion as a phenomenon, the name by which it is called (‘conversion’), and the process of thinking that went into the naming (hermeneutics: the study of understanding). The redemption tale of George W. Bush was famously expounded in a profile by Nicholas Kristof, ‘How Bush came to tame his inner scamp’, New York Times, 29 July 2000. Barack Obama’s conversion story appears more sociologically informed, as related by Andrew Sullivan, ‘Goodbye to all that’, The Atlantic Monthly, December 2007, quoting from the stump speech.
It is perhaps unwise to introduce here the Life of Antony, for the date of its composition and its authorship are both vexed, and have generated a large secondary literature. A direct comparison with the Life of Constantine, positing interesting similarities, is offered by Averil Cameron, ‘Form and Meaning: the Vita Constantini and the Vita Antonii’, in Greek Biography and Panegyric in Late Antiquity, eds T. Hägg and P. Rousseau (Berkeley and Los Angeles, 2000), pp. 72–88. One might note that the disputed author of the Life of Antony, Athanasius, was an enemy of Eusebius and a central figure in the disputes over Arius, and also those following Constantine’s death, in which context the Life of Constantine was revised and completed.
J. H. W. G. Liebeschuetz, Continuity and Change in Roman Religion (Oxford, 1979), pp. 277–91, offers a concise, nuanced and convincing summary interpretation of Constantine’s gradual conversion, with references to earlier literature. The most important guide to Constantine’s Christian education is now Elizabeth DePalma Digeser, The Making of a Christian Empire. Lactantius and Rome (Ithaca and London, 2000). This brilliant study shows quite how much Constantine owed to Lactantius, most clearly to the ideas set out in his Divine Institutes. Constantine emerges from her pages no longer either the righteous Christian advocated by T. D. Barnes, or the equivocating politician of J. Burckhardt, but rather as an advocate of concord, insisting that the path to salvation be open to all who venerated a summus deus. Her endnotes are replete with remarkable insights and fuller commentaries than can be supplied in the succinct text, notably a wonderful summary of the secondary literature devoted to Constantine’s alleged prohibition of sacrifice.
The influence of Lactantius’ language and thought is shown clearly in Constantine’s letter to the bishops after Arles. Here Constantine wrote that the ‘Eternal and incomprehensible goodness of our God will by no means allow the human condition to continue to stray in darkness (divitius in tenebris oberrare), nor does it permit the abhorrent wishes of certain men to prevail to such a degree that he fails to open up for them with his most brilliant beams of light (praeclarissimis luminibus) a path to salvation.’ In the very first page of the Divine Institutes (I.1.6), devoted similarly to false religion, Lactantius had expressed similar sentiments in similar, often identical terms: ‘God has not allowed man in his search for the light of wisdom to continue to stray (divitius errare), wandering in inescapable darkness (tenebras) … [but] opened man’s eyes and made him a gift of the acquisition of truth … then to show the errant wanderer the path to salvation.’ On all this see C. Odahl, ‘Constantine’s Epistle to the Bishops at the Council of Arles: A Defense of Imperial Authorship’, Journal of Religious History 17 (1993): 274–89; and the recent translation of the letter in M. Edwards, trans., Optatus: Against the Donatists (Liverpool, 1997). One must see also, of course, the full translation of Lactantius. Divine Institutes, trans. A. Bowen and P. Garnsey (Liverpool, 2003). A translation of, and full commentary on, Constantine’s Oration to the Saints is included in M. Edwards, Constantine and Christendom (Liverpool, 2003). Edwards’s preferred date and location, 315 in Rome, are quite different to those proposed by others, most notably Barnes, who in his Constantine and Eusebius, pp. 73–6, favoured either Sardica or Salonica in a year between 321 and 324, but later determined it was given at Nicomedia in 325, in his ‘Constantine’s speech to the Assembly of the Saints: place and date of delivery’, Journal of Theological Studies 52 (2001): 26–36. H. A. Drake, Constantine and the Bishops: the Politics of Intolerance (Baltimore, 2000), pp. 292–7, argues that the true value of the speech is its ‘timelessness’.
Constantine’s legislation is to be found principally in the Theodosian Code, trans. C. Pharr (Princeton, 1952), with many subsequent reprints. It is approached in the round by Elliot, The Christianity of Constantine the Great, pp. 97–114, and C. Humfress, ‘Civil law and social life’, in Lenski, ed., Age of Constantine, pp. 205–25. Extremely useful articles are collected in J. Harris and I. Wood, eds, The Theodosian Code (Ithaca, NY, 1993), especially D. Hunt, ‘Christianising the Roman Empire: the evidence of the code’, pp. 143–58, and J. Evans Grubbs, ‘Constantine and imperial legislation on the family’, pp.120–42, which provides a summary of her book, Law and Family in Late Antiquity: the Emperor Constantine’s marriage legislation (Oxford, 1995). Specific points are addressed by Digeser, The Making of a Christian Empire, pp. 121–4. For a brief restatement of the traditional view, see J. Rodalnus, The Church in the Age of Constantine. The Theological Challenges (London, 2006), pp. 41–4.
For Sol on coins, one must start with the many and varied works of P. Bruun, most notably his seventh volume of RIC, which is essential (Constantine to Licinius: AD 313–337), but see also C. H. V. Sutherland and R. A. G. Carson, RIC VI. I was greatly helped by Bruun’s ‘The victorious signs of Constantine: a reappraisal’, Numismatic Chronicle 157 (1997): 41–59, a copy of which he gave me in Helsinki in 1999, but which I subsequently mislaid in Madison, WI. On specific issues one must consult A. Alföldi, ‘The helmet of Constantine with the Christian monogram’, JRS 22 (1932): 9-23; K. Kraft, ‘Das Silbermedaillon Constantins des Grosses mit dem Christusmonogramm auf dem Helm’, Jahrbuch für Numismatik und Geldgeschichte 5-6 (1954-5): 151-78; and the collected articles by Maria R.-Alföldi, Gloria Romanorum. Schriften zur Spätantike, Historia Einzelschriften 153 (Stuttgart, 2001). The helmet badge showing the chi-rho discovered in the Meuse Valley in the Netherlands can be seen in the Trier exhibition catalogue (cited in full above) at p. 154, being catalogue no. I.13.124.
Rather than select those issues or features which appear to support a particular interpretation, for example that Constantine rapidly embraced Christianity and its symbols (the chi-rho, or a cross-sceptre), one must be willing to consider multiple messages conveyed by the whole extant coinage of the period, and reflect on how these related to or diverged from earlier coin types. Numerous detailed studies by Patrick Bruun have established beyond doubt that one cannot identify Constantine the Christian on his coins. On the delayed disappearance of Sol from Constantine’s coins, Bruun posits that the lag of a year or two even after the defeat of Licinius can be explained by an absence of close supervision of the bronze coinage before c.324, and the habit of mints, particularly those distant from the emperor, of using dies until they were worn out. Gold and silver were always more closely monitored, and often produced in the presence of the emperor and his court by mobile mints. Alföldi, Conversion of Constantine, pp. 57-9, offers an alternative interpretation for the disappearance of Sol, observing instead a reversal of roles, where the Sun is magnified through Constantine’s glory, and a perceived equivalence of Sol and Christ is gradually eliminated. R. Leeb, Konstantin und Christus: die Verchristlichung der imperialen Repräsentation unter Konstantin dem Grossen als Spiegel seiner Kirchenpolitik und seines Selbstverständnisses als christlicher Kaiser (Berlin, 1992), expands and revises these arguments.
All major secondary works include an account of the campaign that culminated at Chrysopolis. Odahl, Constantine, pp. 162-201, styles it an ‘Eastern Crusade’. The Origo (V.21) suggests that it was the Goths, not the Sarmatians, who invaded while Constantine was at Salonica. The suggestion that Constantine defeated both the Goths in 322 and the Sarmatians in 323 has been dispensed with by T. D. Barnes, ‘The victories of Constantine’, Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik 20 (1976): 149-55. See also M. Kulikowski, ‘Constantine and the northern Barbarians’, in Lenski, ed., Age of Constantine, pp. 347-76, at p. 359 (in contrast to Lenski’s own preference for two campaigns, p. 75); and M. Kulikowski, Rome’s Gothic Wars (Cambridge, 2007), pp. 81-4. The inscription from Salsovia is ILS 8940.
On Eusebius the literature is vast. The best place to start is with the many articles by T.D. Barnes, and his books, cited above. One might then turn for some
discussion or disagreement on particular works to: A. Louth, ‘The date of Eusebius’ Historia ecclesiastica’, Journal of Theological Studies 41 (1990): 111-23; R. W. Burgess, ‘The dates and editions of Eusebius’ Chronici canones and Historia ecclesiastica’, Journal of Theological Studies 48 (1997): 471-504. The recent Cambridge History of Early Christian Literature, ed. F. Young et al (Cambridge, 2004), is excellent, but one should also consult relevant chapters in the CAH 12 and 13, and now the second part of Anthony Grafton and Megan Williams, Christianity and the Transformation of the Book: Origen, Eusebius, and the Library of Caesarea (Cambridge, MA, 2006).
On the labarum, one might still usefully start with M. Rostovtzeff, ‘Vexillum and victory’, JRS 32 (1942): 92-106, which discusses earlier developments of military standards (vexilla), including the addition of crowns, eagles and victories at the lance tip, where Constantine was to incorporate the chi-rho. H. Grégoire, ‘L’étymologie de «Labarum»’, Byzantion 4 (1927-8): 477-82, first suggested that the odd name labarum was derived from laureum, a vulgar Latin name used in the camps for the vexillum. Barnes, Constantine and Eusebius, pp. 44, 306, favoured a Celtic etymology, noting the origins of many of Constantine’s troops. Weiss, ‘Vision of Constantine’, 255 (see immediately below), also suggests a Gallic word, labaros, meaning something like ‘resounding, eloquent, speaking, talkative, loud’. Leeb, Konstantin und Christus, argued convincingly that the labarum should be dated no earlier than the final war against Licinius.
If one believes in the veracity of Constantine’s vision, then the place to start is now P. Weiss, ‘The vision of Constantine’, Journal of Roman Archaeology 16 (2003): 237-59, a revised translation of a German article published in 1993, which has reinvigorated debate by proposing a single ‘vision’ of a solar halo in 310. His conclusions differ from those of an earlier proponent of a single vision, H. Grégoire, ‘La vision de Constantin «liquidée»’, Byzantion 14 (1939): 341-51, reprising and defending an earlier paper. Baynes, ‘Constantine the Great and the Christian Church’, cited above, draws attention to letters sent to The Times between April 1929 and April 1930, regarding a cross visible ‘athwart the sun … when the sun was high in the sky’. An alternative and far less likely explanation is offered by M. DiMaio, J. Zeuge and N. Zotov, ‘Ambiguitas Constantiniana: the caeleste signum Dei of Constantine the Great’, Byzantion 58 (1988): 333-60 at 341-50, developing F. Heiland, ‘Die astronomische Deutung der Vision Kaiser Konstantins’, in Sondervertrag im Zeiss-Planetarium-Jena (Jena, 1948). These papers suggest that the vision took place in September 312 when the planets Jupiter, Saturn and Mars were aligned in the constellations of Capricorn and Sagittarius. Later in October 312, Venus was also virtually in line with Jupiter, Saturn and Mars. A fixed line of visible stars crossed this axis, creating a cross, and one could discern at the end of this line Vega, the brightest star in the configuration, at which point the line would have appeared to curve out and back towards itself. It was this configuration of planets and stars, it
is argued, that Constantine saw and turned in his favour as he approached Rome, claiming to have had an explicatory dream. Although such a configuration would have been visible to all at night, it would not have been clear during the day. Eusebius maintained that the vision took place during the afternoon, while the sun was high in the sky, which would have obscured, not illuminated, an alignment of planets. Weiss’s interpretation is far better, as it offers a longer time-frame and contradicts none of the key elements of the various accounts. As he notes, no source states that the vision took place immediately before the Battle of the Milvian Bridge, although Constantine’s dream, which offered him the means to interpret it, did.
Chapter 8. Constantinople
On Constantinople the two scholars to follow are Cyril Mango and Gilbert Dagron, in numerous contributions over half a century. One might start with the papers in their co-edited volume, Constantinople and its Hinterland (Aldershot, 1995), and with G. Dagron, Naissance d’une capitale: Constantinople et ses institutions de 330 à 451 (Paris, 1974; 2nd edn 1984), which omits archaeology. This is remedied by C. Mango, Le développement urbain de Constantinople (IVe – VII siècles) (Paris, 1990), a short book which is nonetheless usefully summarized in his important paper ‘The development of Constantinople as an urban centre’, most easily accessed in his collection Studies on Constantinople (Aldershot, 1993). Most recently, see Mango’s provocative essay ‘Constantinople: capital of the oecumene?’, in E. Chrysos, ed., Byzantium as Oecumene (Athens, 2005), pp. 319-24. The street plan of Constantinople is studied by A. Berger, ‘Streets and public spaces in Constantinople’, DOP 54 (2000): 161-72, to which I owe the revelation (not spelt out therein) that Licinius was responsible for developing Byzantium. All references to Septimius Severus’ building campaigns post-date the fourth century, as was shown by Dagron (Naissance d’une capitale, pp. 15-19). Fergus Millar, The Emperor in the Roman World, 2nd edn (Ithaca, NY, 1992), pp. 40-57, offers a useful introduction to Tetrarchic capitals and the special status of Constantinople. The telling example of Aphrodisias, to which I refer later in the chapter, is at pp. 342-3.
My preferred plan for the Daphne Palace follows M. J. Featherstone, ‘The Great Palace as reflected in the De Cerimoniis’, in F.-A. Bauer, ed., Visualisierungen von Herrschaft, Byzas 5 (2006): 47-61, and J. Kostenec, ‘The heart of the empire: the Great Palace of the Byzantine emperors reconsidered’, in K. Dark, ed., Secular Buildings and the Archaeology of Everyday Life in the Byzantine Empire (Oxford, 2004), pp. 4-36. Kostenec suggests that the best comparison to be drawn is with the so-called palace of Maximian in Cordoba. But as M. Kulikowski (Late Roman Spain and its Cities, pp. 116-20) has observed, following Barnes (New Empire, pp. 56-60), there is no evidence for Maximian’s protracted presence in Spain during his war to recover North Africa in the 290s. Moreover, drawing upon the Spanish excavation reports and research by Javier Arce, Kulikowski’s description of the palace highlights quite how dissimilar it was to the Daphne, except for the superficial resemblance of their enclosed semi-circular courtyards. Nonetheless, the complex at Cordoba, now called the Cercadilla Palace, is clearly a Tetrarchic undertaking. G. Dagron, Emperor and Priest. The Imperial Office in Byzantium (Cambridge, 2003), pp. 85-7, supplies excellent illustrations of the imperial palace in its more developed form, proposing a plan for the Daphne quite different from Kostenec’s. The juxtaposition of the hippodrome and palace in all imperial residences of the Tetrarchs was noted by M. Vickers, ‘The hippodrome at Thessaloniki’, JRS 62 (1972): 25-32, and the role of the hippodrome as imperial space has been elaborated by C. Heucke, Circus und Hippodrom als politischer Raum (Hildesheim and Zürich, 1994), and many others.
On the statues gathered in the city, one must start with C. Mango, ‘Antique statuary and the Byzantine beholder’, DOP 17 (1963): 55-75, and proceed to S. G. Bassett, ‘The antiquities in the hippodrome of Constantinople’, DOP 45 (1991): 87-96, and S. G. Bassett, ‘Historiae custos: sculpture and tradition in the Baths of Zeuxippos’, American Journal of Archeology 100 (1996): 491-506; both refined in Bassett, The Urban Image of Late Antique Constantinople (Cambridge, 2004). The catalogue there provided is invaluable, but one must be wary of the historical commentary. Bassett attributes the pre-Constantinian rebuilding to Septimius Severus with reference to two sixth-century and two twelfth-century sources, without considering whether these might be inaccurate or skewed. One can turn for more sophisticated correctives to Bassett’s sometimes literal readings to A. Kaldellis, ‘Christodoros on the statues of the Zeuxippos Baths: a new reading of the ekphrasis’, Greek, Roman and Byzantine Studies 47 (2007): 361-83. On the statue of Constantine standing on his column and its alleged association with Sol, see G. Fowden, ‘Constantine’s porphyry column: the earliest literary allusion’, JRS 81 (1991): 119-31, which also posits that the later fourth-century life of Elagabalus, contained in the Historia Augusta, was composed as a satire on the life of Constantine.
The idea that Constantinople was a new Christian capital was most eloquently expounded by R. Krautheimer, Three Christian Capitals (Berkeley and Los Angeles, 1982), before it was demolished by Mango. On the senate, one should start with Dagron, Naissance, pp. 119-210, then turn to an insightful article by P. Heather, ‘New men for new Constantines? Creating an imperial elite in the eastern Mediterranean’, in P. Magdalino, ed., New Constantines (Aldershot, 1994), pp. 11-33. These ideas are incorporated into P. Heather, ‘Senators and Senates’, in CAH 13, pp. 184-210.
On the new image forged by Constantine, one might usefully start with a sceptical survey of the limitations of assessing the small and uncertain oeuvre, by J. Elsner, ‘Perspectives in art’, in Lenski, ed., Age of Constantine, pp. 255-77. All the works here mentioned are addressed by Kleiner, Roman Sculpture, and the three
works in the Met are explored further in C. A. Picon et al, Art of the Classical World in the Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York, 2007). For busts of the Tetrarchs, see Jutta Meischner, ‘Die Porträtkunst der ersten und zweiten Tetrarchie bis zur Alleinherrschaft Konstantins: 293 bis 324 n. Chr.’, Archäologischer Anzeiger (1986/i): 223-50. On Alexander, see H. P. L’Orange, Apotheosis in Ancient Portraiture (Oslo, 1947), and on Constantine’s incipient baldness, Van Dam, Roman Revolution of Constantine, pp. 17-18. Constantine the new Moses is considered by E. Becker, ‘Konstantin der Grosse, der “neue Moses”. Die Schlacht am Pons Milvius und die Katastrophe am Schilfmeer’, Zeitschrift für Kirchengeschichte 31 (1910): 161-71. See also two articles by Claudia Rapp: ‘Imperial Ideology in the Making: Eusebius of Caesarea on Constantine as “Bishop”’, Journal of Theological Studies 49 (1998): 685-95; and ‘Comparison, paradigm and the case of Moses in panegyric and hagiography’, in M. Whitby, ed., The Propaganda of Power: The Role of Panegyric in Late Antiquity (Leiden, 1998), 277-98. The Red Sea sarcophagi are studied in detail by Clementina Rizzardi, I sarcophagi paleocristiani con rappresentazione del passaggio del Mar Rosso (Faenza, 1970), who provides a descriptive catalogue with extensive bibliography for each piece. More generally, see J. Lassus, ‘Représentations du «Passage de la Mer Rouge» dans l’art Chrétien d’Orient et d’Occident’, Mélanges d’archéologie et d’histoire 46 (1929): 159-81. The Arles sarcophagi are best seen in the catalogue of the Musée de l’Arles Antique, ed. C. Sintès (Arles, 1996). Most recently, Jas Elsner has considered the scenes on these sarcophagi in an as yet unpublished paper entitled ‘“Pharaoh’s army got drownded”: some reflections on Jewish and Roman genealogies in early Christian art’, presented at the 3rd Lavy Colloquium, ‘Jewish and Christian Art’, at Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore on 11 October 2007. I disagree with his conclusions.
T. F. Mathews, The Clash of Gods. A reinterpretation of early Christian art, 2nd edn (Princeton, 1999), pp. 75-7, too easily dismisses Eusebius and neglects the other sources compiled by Becker. Mathews, arguing against the notion that Christian art drew upon imperial models, prefers to see Moses as prefiguring Christ in defeating the evil Pharaoh. Focusing on a most striking sarcophagus, one of four from the Church of St Trophîme in Arles, Mathews suggests that it belongs stylistically to the reign of Theodosius I (379-95), thus far later than Constantine’s reign and Becker’s proposed model, the battle scene on the Arch of Constantine. ‘Becker made an ideological muddle of the subject,’ Mathews suggests, and since the scene departs from scripture in portraying Pharaoh’s death, therein lies the clue to its interpretation: Pharaoh is dressed as the Roman emperor, whereas Moses is dressed like Christ as citizen philosopher, thus striking blows against imperial oppression. But here Mathews fails to acknowledge that Maxentius was also a Roman emperor, so he may indeed be Pharaoh, whose troops were driven into the Tiber by Constantine. One would expect him to be dressed in a ‘military tunic and cuirass … covered by a chlamys’. Becker may very well have been correct.
Chapter 9. Victor Constantine
On Constantine as Victor, see H. A. Drake, In Praise of Constantine: A Historical Study and New Translation of Eusebius’ Tricennial Orations (Berkeley, 1976). There is little else. On imperial power and Christianity, one must now start with G. Dagron, Emperor and Priest. The Imperial Office in Byzantium (Cambridge, 2003), which devotes a chapter to Constantine. Seminal work on triumphal rulership in Rome was undertaken by G. C. Picard, Les trophées romains. Contribution à l’histoire de la religion et de l’art triomphal de Rome (Paris, 1957), whose thesis built on extensive foundations laid in numerous articles by J. Gagé, notably his ‘Stavros Nikopoios. La victoire impériale dans l’empire chrétien’, Revue d’histoire et de philosophie religieuses 13 (1933): 370-400. Here and elsewhere, one cannot ignore M. McCormick, Eternal Victory. Triumphal rulership in late antiquity, Byzantium, and the early medieval West (Cambridge and Paris, 1986). On triumphal art and architecture, one must start with Sabine MacCormack, Art and Ceremony in Late Antiquity (Berkeley, Los Angeles and London, 1981).
The Great Cameo is addressed by A. N. Zadoks Josephus Jitta, ‘Imperial messages in agate, II’, Bulletin Antieke Beschaving 41 (1966): 91-104; and by F. Baster, ‘Die grosse Kamee in den Haag’, Bulletin Antieke Beschaving 43 (1968): 2-22. More generally, see F. Althaus and M. Sutcliffe, eds, The Road to Byzantium. Luxury Arts of Antiquity (London, 2006), and the art historical papers in Hartley et al, Constantine (cited above), which place the cameos discussed here in a broader context. The quotation from Peter Brown, on the Calendar of 354, is from Authority and the Sacred, pp. 12-13.
The lives and deaths of Crispus and Fausta are considered in all general accounts of Constantine’s reign, but especial attention is accorded by H. Pohlsander, ‘Crispus: brilliant career and tragic end’, Historia 33 (1984): 79-106; and by D. Woods, ‘On the death of the empress Fausta’, Greece and Rome 45 (1998): 70-86, who displays his familiar careful attention to the sources. I have adopted his translations and followed his suggestion on Fausta’s possible abortion.
The Goths receive far fuller coverage than the Sarmatians, thanks to their later ‘successes’. See M. Kulikowski, ‘Constantine and the northern Barbarians’, in Lenski, ed., Age of Constantine, pp. 347-76; and also his Rome’s Gothic Wars, pp. 83-102. P. Heather, ‘Goths and Huns, c.320-425’, in CAH 13, pp. 487-515, summarizes earlier work. On Libanius’ testimony on the Goths (Oration 59.39) and Sarmatians (59.29), see M. Wiemer, ‘Libanius on Constantine’, Classical Quarterly 44 (1994): 511-24, who further suggests that in Oration 59 Libanius was drawing on Eusebius’ Life of Constantine. See also P.-L. Malosse, ‘Libanius on Constantine again’, Classical Quarterly 47 (1997): 519-24, whose reading presents Libanius as far more slippery and pointed in his allusions in Oration 59. A full translation of the oration is provided in S. Lieu and D. Montserrat,
From Constantine to Julian: Pagan and Byzantine Views (London and New York, 1996), pp. 147-209.
On excavations at Sirmium, see I. Popović, ‘Marble sculptures from the imperial palace in Sirmium’, Starinar 56 (2006): 153-66. There is far less commentary on the Belgrade Rider than one might expect. Good pictures can be seen in Imperator Caesar Flavius Constantinus, the catalogue of the Trier exhibition, where it was recently displayed. G. Bruns, Staatskameen des 4. Jahrhunderts nach Christus Geburt (Berlin, 1948), observed wisely that we cannot date the cameo any more precisely than the fourth century, although she preferred the second half of that century.
On the army in the fourth century there are many important and provocative essays, some already cited, including: A. D. Nock, ‘The Roman army and the Roman religious year’, Harvard Theological Review 45 (1952): 187-252; R. MacMullen, ‘The legion as a society’, Historia 33 (1984): 440-56; R. Tomlin, ‘Christianity and the late Roman army’, in Lieu and Montserrat, eds, Constantine (cited above), pp. 21-51; and the collected papers of M. Speidel. Archaeological surveys used here include: H. von Petrikovits, ‘Fortifications in the north-western Roman Empire from the third to the fifth centuries AD’, JRS 61 (1971): 178-218; P. Petrović, ‘Les fortresses du Bas-Empire sur les limes danubiènnes en Serbie’, in W. S. Hanson and L. J. F. Keppie, eds, Roman frontier studies 1979 (Oxford, 1980): 757-74; and now J. J. Wilkes, ‘The Roman Danube: an archaeological survey’, JRS 95 (2005): 124-225. Most recently, see M. Kulikowski, ‘Constantine and the northern Barbarians’, in Lenski, ed., Age of Constantine, pp. 347-76; H. Elton, ‘Warfare and the military’, ibid., pp. 325-46. The quotation from Peter Brown can be found in his Authority and the Sacred, p. 45.
Chapter 10. Constantine Maximus Augustus
The administrative reforms initiated by Diocletian and developed under Constantine are addressed very succinctly by E. Lo Cascio, ‘The Emperor and his Administration’, in CAH 12, pp. 170-83; and C. Kelly, ‘Emperors, Government and Bureaucrats’, CAH 13, pp. 138-83. More fully on Constantine, see C. Kelly, ‘Bureaucracy and Government’, in Lenski, ed., Age of Constantine, pp. 183-204, which I have followed closely, although I have not adopted his position that the Praetorian Prefects did not yet administer regional prefectures. Barnes, New Empire, pp. 201-8, supplies an edition of and commentary on the Verona List; at pp. 199-200, he supplies a list of dioceses and their emperors; at pp. 91-109, an annotated list of ordinary consuls, from which my own abbreviated list is drawn. The careers of many are traced in the PRLE, where Ablabius is Ablabius 4, pp. 3-4. Eunapius, in his Lives of the Sophists (VI.3.1-7), suggests that at his (humble) birth in Crete there was a prophecy that his mother had almost given birth to an emperor. He was appointed vicar of Asiana (324-6), and promoted to Praetorian Prefect in 329, which office he held until his exile by Constantius II. His daughter Olympias was betrothed (as an infant) to Constans, and later married to Arasces, king of Armenia (see Ammianus Marcellinus XX.11.3), certainly before 358, probably in 354. His son Seleucus (= PLRE: Seleucus 1, pp. 818-19) was, therefore, father of a second Olympias, b. 361. Evagrius (= PLRE: Evagrius 2, pp. 284-5), who probably replaced Ablabius as Constantine’s Praetorian Prefect in 336, when Ablabius was seconded to Constantius, had earlier been Praetorian Prefect in 326 and 329, and then was seconded to Constantine II in Gaul in 330-1. On the administration of the east, and the Antioch statue base, see F. Millar, The Roman Near East, 31 BC-AD 337 (Cambridge, MA, 1994), p. 210; D. Feissel, ‘Une dédicace en l’honneur de Constantin II César et les préfets du prétoire de 336’, Travaux et Mémoires 9 (1985): 421-34. On the comites, see Millar, Emperor in the Roman World, pp. 117-20, from which I have taken the examples of Acacius and Strategius.
On Indian gems and jewels, see A. Ghosh, An Encyclopaedia of Indian Archaeology (Leiden, 1990), pp. 216-24. On diamonds, and their uses in engraving, see L. Gorelick and A. J. Gwinnett, ‘Diamonds from India to Rome and beyond’, American Journal of Archeology 92 (1988): 547-52. On elephants and tigers, see G. Jennison, Animals for Show and Pleasure in Ancient Rome (Manchester, 1937), and D. F. Lach, Asia in the Making of Europe, II: A Century of Wonder (Chicago, 1977), pp. 172-4. Both consider the Barberini Diptych to be of Constantine, which is no longer believed to be the case, although the emperor clearly resembles other portraits of Constantine. Elephants appear on another famous diptych of the late fourth century depicting the apotheosis of an emperor (possibly Julian), now in the British Museum, for which see J. Elsner, Imperial Rome and Christian Triumph (Oxford, 1998), pp. 30-2.
The war with the Persians is covered in all general accounts, and the broader context sketched elegantly by E. Key Fowden, ‘Constantine and the Peoples of the Eastern Frontier’, in Lenski, ed., Age of Constantine, pp. 377-98. For the various versions of events, see G. Fowden, ‘The last days of Constantine: oppositional version and their influence’, JRS 84 (1994): 146-70, at 146-53, which offers more detail than in his equally compelling account of Constantine’s path to ‘crusade’ in G. Fowden, Empire to Commonwealth. Consequences of Monotheism in Late Antiquity (Princeton, 1993), pp. 80-99. On Aphrahat, see T. D. Barnes, ‘Constantine and the Christians of Persia’, JRS 75 (1985): 126-36. For the later legendary victories, see S. Lieu, ‘Constantine in legendary literature’, in Lenski, ed., Age of Constantine, pp. 298-321.
The Tricennial Oration is translated by H. A. Drake, In praise of Constantine: a historical study and new translation of Eusebius’ Tricennial Orations (Berkeley, 1976). Helena’s life, death and legacy are treated exhaustively by H. Pohlsander, Helena: Empress and Saint (Chicago, 1995). On her pilgrimage, see E. D. Hunt, Holy Land Pilgrimage in the Later Roman Empire, AD 312-460 (Oxford, 1982), pp. 28-49; and especially J. W. Drijvers, Helena Augusta: The Mother of Constantine the Great and the Legend of her Finding of the True Cross (Leiden, 1992). Drijvers believes Eusebius’
claim that Constantine converted his mother, and posits that she died in Trier. There seems no good reason to accept either suggestion. Drijvers explores in great detail the sources for the legend of Helena and the invention of the True Cross, although the excerpts I quote from Rufinus are taken from P. Amidon, trans., The Church History of Rufinus, Books 10 and 11 (Oxford, 1997). It is rather far-fetched to suggest, as Drijvers does, that Constantine relied on his aged mother to enforce an unpopular policy of Christianization in Palestine. However, elsewhere Drijvers has made a very strong case for correlating the rise of the significance of the True Cross and that of the status of Jerusalem in the later fourth century: J. W. Drijvers, Cyril of Jerusalem. Bishop and City (Leiden, 2004).
Egeria’s pilgrimage has long been available in translation, and many appear online. The fullest recent guide to Constantine’s building activity in the Holy Land and to pilgrimage is G. Stemberger, Jews and Christians in the Holy Land. Palestine in the Fourth Century (Edinburgh, 2000), pp. 48-85, 86-120. E. D. Hunt, Holy Land Pilgrimage, pp. 3-27, presents a neat summary, although one might beware the observation that the mosaic at Santa Pudenziana in Rome presents an accurate representation of the churches in Jerusalem and Bethlehem. If the scene does strive for accuracy, the mosaic, traditionally dated to the 390s, may be a little later, as it shows a bejewelled golden cross upon Golgotha, which was placed there only in the reign of Theodosius II, for which see K. Holum, ‘Pulcheria’s Crusade AD 421-2 and the ideology of imperial victory’, Greek, Roman and Byzantine Studies 18 (1977): 153-72. For a debate on the mosaic, compare T. F. Mathews, The Clash of Gods. A reinterpretation of early Christian art, 2nd edn (Princeton, 1999), pp. 92-114, and J.-M. Spieser, ‘The representation of Christ in the apses of early Christian churches’, Gesta 37 (1998): 63-73. The classic account of Christ’s tomb is C. Coüasnon, The Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem (London, 1941), which must now be read alongside M. Biddle, The Tomb of Christ (Stroud, 1999).
Chapter 11. Constantine and the Bishops
This chapter takes its title, and much of its inspiration, from the marvellous book by H. A. Drake, Constantine and the Bishops: the Politics of Intolerance (Baltimore, 2000). Drake considers the ‘real significance’ of Constantine’s reign to be the relationship he established with the bishops, which was still subject to negotiation in 335, where he chooses to start. A key argument he advances, which I have chosen not to develop explicitly, is that access was key: all power structures operate through access, and Constantine now granted that to bishops. Bishops, rather like senators, had greater prestige, but they also had constituencies whose views were now represented in a bottom-up fashion; but as importantly, from the top down, Constantine now had influence with powerful lobbying groups and one of the most fervent, vocal groups in contemporary society. Drake emphasizes that his manipulation of
bishops was crucial to Constantine’s agenda, since they had a right to impose his will on their flocks, and hence could affect how the parishioners acted, including how they carried out official duties if and when they entered public life. Drake rehearses some arguments more succinctly in his ‘The Impact of Constantine on Christianity’, in Lenski, ed., Age of Constantine, pp. 111-36.
Equally important, and in some regards a corrective to Drake, is Claudia Rapp, Holy Bishops in Late Antiquity. The Nature of Christian Leadership in an Age of Transition (Berkeley, 2005), despite being ‘a study that deemphasizes the reign of Constantine and that, instead of treating it as a watershed … follows the continuous flow of developments, both in Christian culture and in the Roman empire’. At pp. 125-31 Rapp also suggests: ‘Moses was considered the biblical model par excellence for bishops, especially among Greek authors.’ Here she summarizes her ‘Imperial Ideology in the Making: Eusebius of Caesarea on Constantine as “Bishop”’, Journal of Theological Studies 49 (1998): 685-95; and ‘Comparison, paradigm and the case of Moses in panegyric and hagiography’, in M. Whitby, ed., The Propaganda of Power: The Role of Panegyric in Late Antiquity (Leiden, 1998), 277-98. But we cannot go so far as she in supposing that in taking Moses as the model of leadership one can explain away Eusebius’ comment that Constantine was a ‘bishop’. The references are ‘no longer puzzling’ thanks to G. Dagron, Emperor and Priest. The Imperial Office in Byzantium (Cambridge, 2003), pp. 133-4, who from a close reading of Eusebius’ Greek observes: first, that Constantine’s claim was no more than a claim, demonstrated by the use of the conditional tense and the telling ‘perhaps’; and second, that in a very real sense, Constantine, as yet unbaptized, was outside the Church. Dagron also observed that Eusebius’ clever use of the verb ‘to watch over’ (episkopein) with the noun ‘bishop’ (episkopos) serves not to assert Constantine’s priestly status, but rather to undermine it, ‘making the [ostensibly Christian] words commonplace and diffusing their charge’. Older studies, which establish the broad context for Constantine’s quips, include J. Straub, ‘Constantine as koinos episkopos. Tradition and innovation in the representation of the first Christian emperor’s majesty’, DOP 21 (1967): 37-55; and his older (1957) paper ‘Kaiser Konstantin als episkopos ton ektos’, republished in J. Straub, Regeneratio Imperii (Darmstadt, 1972), pp. 119-33.
The classic study of the Donatists is W. H. C. Frend, The Donatist Church. A Movement of Protest in Roman North Africa (Oxford, 1952; repr. 1970). More recently, and in contrast, M. Tilley, The Bible in Christian North Africa (Minneapolis, 1997), ‘privileges the specifically religious character of the Donatist controversy’. Tilley also translated Donatist Martyr Stories (Liverpool, 1997), including the Sermon on the Passions of Saints Donatus and Advocatus. The ‘Catholic’ side before Augustine is set out in M. Edwards, trans., Optatus: Against the Donatists (Liverpool, 1997), from which quotations from the translated letters of Constantine to the bishops Aelafius and Celsus are taken. Shorter translations of these and much else can be found in Stevenson, A New Eusebius, pp. 297-312. J. Rodalnus, The Church in the Age of Constantine. The Theological Challenges (London, 2006), pp. 37-41, offers a useful summary, and Drake, Constantine and the Bishops, pp. 212-21, is excellent.
The literature on Arianism is substantial, that on Arius somewhat less so. An excellent place to start is C. Haas, ‘The Arians of Alexandria’, Vigiliae Christianae 47 (1993): 234-45, which explores social, topographical and urban contexts with extensive but not exhaustive bibliography. Constantine’s treatment of heretics and schismatics is traced by Drake, Constantine and the Bishops, building upon observations from his ‘Lions into Lambs’, Past and Present 153 (1996): 3-36, at 29-31. I do not see, as Drake does, that Constantine became less tolerant even as he professed toleration for all, but rather that his intolerance was directed in different directions. Perspicacious commentary on Eusebius is provided, as ever, by Cameron and Hall, Life of Constantine, pp. 306-8. For the role of Ossius of Cordoba, see H. Chadwick, ‘Ossius of Cordova and the presidency of the Council of Antioch’, Journal of Theological Studies 9 (1958): 292-304; and more fully, V. C. de Clercq, Ossius of Cordova. A Contribution to the History of the Constantinian Period (Washington, DC, 1954). The ecclesiastical politics of Constantine’s last decade, to which I have devoted too little space, are covered in a sophisticated manner by Drake, Constantine and the Bishops, pp. 3-9, 258-352, who avers that in his dealings with the bishops in this period ‘Constantine lost control of the agenda, and, ultimately, he lost control of the message’. The details can best be gleaned from Barnes, Constantine and Eusebius, pp. 224-44. Barnes’s position is set out well and briefly in his ‘Constantine, Athanasius and the Christian Church’, in S. Lieu and D. Montserrat, eds, Constantine. History, Historiography, Legend (London, 1998), pp. 7-20.
If one might be permitted to conclude with another’s words, no judgement on Constantine’s dealings with the Church is more astute than that of F. Millar, The Emperor in the Roman World, 2nd edn (Ithaca, NY, 1992), pp. 551-607, at 551: ‘If we look back from the end of Constantine’s reign over the relations of church and emperor, we can see mirrored in them almost every one of the distinct features of the imperial monarchy which we have observed in operation in other contexts: the emperor’s personal pronouncement of decisions and verdicts; the addressing of accusations and petitions to him; his conferment of privileges, and his decisions on the exclusion or inclusion or marginal cases; confiscation and restoration of property; the issuing of edicta and general epistulae, and before that for a long period only of rescripta in answer to consultationes by governors, or to letters from koina or cities.’
Chapter 12. Death and Succession
On Constantine’s death, the commentary by Cameron and Hall on Eusebius, Life of Constantine, pp. 339-50, is a superb guide to the issues. See also R. Burgess,
‘“Achyron” or “proasteion”. The location and circumstances of Constantine’s death’, Journal of Theological Studies 50 (1999): 153-62. For the various later sources that treat of Constantine’s baptism and death, see G. Fowden, ‘The last days of Constantine: oppositional version and their influence’, JRS 84 (1994): 146-70, at 153-70.
On travel by road in the Roman empire, see L. Casson, Travel in the Ancient World (Baltimore, 1974), pp. 176-96. On the cursus publicus, see A. M. Ramsay, ‘The speed of the Roman Imperial Post’, JRS 15 (1925): 60-74; and especially C. W. J. Eliot, ‘New evidence for the speed of the Roman Imperial Post’, Phoenix 9 (1955): 76-80, which examines the rate of dissemination of news of the death of Pertinax. I used online moon phase and sunrise/sunset calculators to determine conditions in Turkey in May 337. On the Antonine Itinerary, see N. Reed, ‘Pattern and purpose in the Antonine Itinerary’, American Journal of Philology 99 (1978): 228-54, who suggests it shows routes by which military provisions should be transported. J. Wilkes, ‘Frontiers and Provinces’, CAH 12, pp. 212-68, makes full use of the Antonine Itinerary, with the section pertinent here at p. 240.
I have in my description of Constantine’s apotheosis diverged from the clearest analysis, by S. Price, ‘From noble funerals to divine cult: the consecration of Roman emperors’, in D. Cannadine and S. Price, eds, Rituals of Royalty. Power and Ceremonial in Traditional Societies (Cambridge, 1987), pp. 56-105. I have followed Price in drawing from Cassius Dio and Herodian, but sought out standard translations. Price suggests that Constantine had no pyre, whereas I believe Eusebius has suppressed that aspect of the ceremonial. For more on the afterlife and the symbolism of consecratio, see MacCormack, Art and Ceremony, pp. 93-127; Dagron, Emperor and Priest, pp. 135-8.
Helena’s mausoleum is reported in F. Deichmann and A. Tschira, ‘Das Mausoleum der Kaiserin Helena und die Basilika der Heilige Marcellinus und Petrus an der Via Labicana vor Rom’, Jahrbuch des deutschen Archäologischen Instituts 72 (1957): 44-110; with insights and images in Holloway, Constantine and Rome, pp. 86-109; J. Elsner, Imperial Rome and Christian Triumph (Oxford, 1998), pp. 20-2, 160-1.
The origins of the Church of the Holy Apostles in Constantinople is discussed most convincingly by C. Mango, ‘Constantine’s mausoleum and the translation of relics’, Byzantinische Zeitschrift 83 (1990): 51-61. For once I have not used the translation by Cameron and Hall, but rather have followed Mango. He argues for the attribution of the mausoleum to Constantine, and of the adjacent basilica to Constantius. Confusion may have arisen, he notes, because Constantius repaired his father’s mausoleum following an earthquake. This develops the detailed study by G. Downey, ‘The builder of the original Church of the Apostles at Constantinople. A contribution to the criticism of the Vita Constantini attributed to Eusebius’, DOP 6 (1951): 51-80, esp. 69-71, and the long note 58, which maintains that the mausoleum and basilica were contemporaneous constructions by Constantius. Most recently, traces of the Church of the Holy Apostles, which was hitherto imagined to have been eradicated by Mehmet the Conqueror after 1453, were discovered at the foundation of Mehmet’s mosque: K. Dark and F. Özgümü, ‘New evidence for the Byzantine Church of the Holy Apostles from Fatih Camii, Istanbul’, Oxford Journal of Archaeology 21 (2002): 393-413.
That Eusebius was clearly willing to compare Constantine to Christ is noted by Drake, Constantine and the Bishops, pp. 304-8. Dagron, Emperor and Priest, pp. 132, 135-43, also notes this and expands on the notion that the emperor was ‘equal to the apostles’. The comparison with Christ is most fully developed by R. Leeb, Konstantin und Christus: die Verchristlichung der imperialen Repräsentation unter Konstantin dem Grossen als Spiegel seiner Kirchenpolitik und seines Selbstverständnisses als christlichen Kaiser (Berlin, 1992). A more succinct overview is afforded by K. M. Setton, Christian Attitudes towards the Emperor in the Fourth Century (New York, 1941), pp. 40-56.
On the wars of succession, see now the succinct overview by D. Hunt, ‘The Successors of Constantine’, in CAH 13, pp. 1-43; and R. Frakes, ‘The Dynasty of Constantine down to 363’, in Lenski, ed., Age of Constantine, pp. 91-107. M. Di Maio and W. H. Arnold, ‘“Per vim, per caedem, per bellum”: a study of murder and ecclesiastical politics in the year 337’, Byzantion 62 (1992): 158-211, offers a thorough review of all pertinent literature, although I find much of the conjecture unconvincing (viz., a forged will discovered by Eusebius of Nicomedia). On the events of 340, see generally A. Wardman, ‘Usurpers and internal conflicts in the 4th century AD’, Historia 33 (1984): 220-37, which offers an excellent analysis. T. D. Barnes, Constantius and Athanasius (Cambridge, MA, 1993), pp. 218-28, provides a remarkably useful summary of known imperial itineraries, 337-61. I have not incorporated the interesting analysis of W. Portmann, ‘Die politische Krise zwischen den Kaisern Constantius II. und Constans’, Historia 48 (1999): 301-29, for reasons of space.
Constantius’ wars with Magnentius and his triumph are addressed well and concisely by Potter, Roman Empire at Bay, pp. 471-6, and at greater length by J. Drinkwater, ‘The revolt and ethnic origin of the usurper Magnentius (350-353), and the rebellion of Vetranio’, Chiron 30 (2000): 131-59; B. Bleckmann, ‘Constantina, Vetranio und Gallus Caesar’, Chiron 24 (1994): 29-68. On the coins see K. Shelton, ‘Usurpers’ coins: the case of Magnentius’, Byzantinische Forschungen 8 (1982): 211-35; P. Bastien, Le monnayage de Magnence (350-353) (Wetteren, 1953 and 1983); and A. Dearn, ‘The coinage of Vetranio: imperial representation and the memory of Constantine the Great’, Numismatic Chronicle 163 (2003): 169-91.
In J. W. Drijvers, Cyril of Jerusalem. Bishop and City (Leiden, 2004), one can read more on Cyril’s letter of 351, which is edited and translated in E. Bihain, ‘L’épître de Cyrille de Jérusalem à Constance sur le vision de la croix (BHG3 413)’, Byzantion 43 (1973): 264-96; and E. Yarnold, Cyril of Jerusalem. The Early Church Fathers (London, 2000), pp. 68-70. On Ammianus Marcellinus, see J. Matthews, The Roman Empire of Ammianus (London, 1989); J. W. Drijvers and D. Hunt, eds,
The Late Roman World and its Historian. Interpreting Ammianus Marcellinus (London and New York, 1999), which contains the important paper by D. Woods, ‘A Persian at Rome. Ammianus and Eunapius, Frg. 68’, pp. 156-65. The largitio bowl is illustrated in context in J. P. C. Kent and K. S. Painter, eds, Wealth of the Roman World (London, 1977), pp. 15-62.
For the non-Arian opinion on the Battle of Adrianople, see Ambrose, De Fide II, 136-43; trans. P. Schaff, Ambrose, Selected Works and Letters (Grand Rapids, MI, 2004), pp. 431-3; cited by F. Heim, La Théologie de la victoire de Constantin à Théodose (Paris, 1992), p. 127. There were also ‘pagan’ reactions: Libanius (Oration 34.1) saw the defeat as divine retribution for the demise of Julian, whereas Ammianus Marcellinus (XXXI.4.9) blamed the officers ‘with stained reputations’, who ‘as if at the command of some adverse deity, were … given command of armies’. See J. Straub, ‘Die Wirkung der Niederlage bei Adrianopel auf die Diskussion über das Germanenproblem in der spätrömischen Literatur’, in his Regeneratio Imperii (Darmstadt, 1972), pp. 195-219. Other key sources: Orosius, The Seven Books of History against the Pagans, trans. R. Deferrari (Washington, DC, 1964), pp. 345-6; The Church History of Rufinus of Aquileia, Books 10 and 11, trans. P. Amidon (Oxford, 1997). The Christian military oath is preserved at Vegetius: Epitome of military science, trans. N. P. Milner (Liverpool, 1993), p. 35. On Corripus, see Flavii Cresconii Corippi Iohannidos seu de bellis Lybicis libri VIII, eds J. Diggle and F. Goodyear (Cambridge, 1970), pp. 173-8; G. Shea, trans., The Iohannis or De Bellis Lybicis of Flavius Cresconius Corippus (Lampeter, 1998), pp. 196-8; Maurice’s Strategikon, trans. G. Dennis (Philadelphia, 1984). Excellent commentary is contained in M. McCormick, Eternal Victory, pp. 245-6. More recently, see the first chapter of D. Bachrach, Religion and the Conduct of War, c.300-1215 (Woodbridge, 2003).