A Social and Cultural History of Late Antiquity

by Douglas Boin

  Exploring Culture 12.1 The Mash‐Up Poem

  Standout female writers did not emerge from the Greek and Latin literary scene. Sappho, who sang poignantly about the power of female love in the sixth century BCE, takes the lone prize of a woman who set down her vision in verse – and became famous in antiquity for it. Yet only two complete poems of hers survive.

  In order to find another strong, female literary voice, we have to look ahead to the mid‐ to late fourth century CE when a poet known as “Proba” rocked audiences with an experiment that would win her literary acclaim throughout the Middle Ages. Following in the footsteps of a loose artistic movement that created new works by recycling old verses, line for line, from classic Latin and Greek poets, Proba set to work on composing a life of Jesus. Her artistic creation is one of the best examples of an ancient mash‐up text known as a “cento,” or “patchwork.” It is also the only full‐length poem authored by a Christian woman to outlive antiquity.

  For her source material, Proba had used the iconic Latin text of the epic poet Virgil (d. 19 BCE). Other examples of the literary mash‐up, drawing upon Virgil, survive; Tertullian remarks that such chimerical works were common in his day, the turn of the third century CE (On the Prescription against Heretics 34.3–4). Poets working in Greek would use Homer as their starting point. In neither language, however, could the “patchwork” poem ever be called a specifically Christian practice. In fact, far from being the thoughtless exercise which some later commentators made it out to be – the Christian writer Jerome loathed the tediousness of the form, calling it “puerile” (Letter 53.7) – it demanded high linguistic creativity.

  Proba’s talent cannot be dismissed. Latin, like Greek, is a language in which nouns and adjectives have specific genders (male or female) and number (singular or plural), and writers and speakers use word endings to specify the function of a noun within a sentence; there are distinct ways of identifying a subject and entirely different ways of identifying an object. Poets like Virgil, who wrote his Aeneid over the course of a decade, worked obsessively to make sure their sentences not only fit the meter of their poem but that the end product surprised their listeners.

  By extracting these lines from their original context, Proba was skirting disaster. Subjects of classical sentences might need to be changed to fit the Christian plot, and each of Virgil’s carefully tooled lines might break if forced, against its will, into another rhythmic scheme. The fact she succeeded in combining them into something provocative and new speaks to her artistic prowess.

  Her poetry made a forceful political statement. Consider the cento’s final lines, addressed to her husband: “… And if we are deserving because of our pietas,/then let our virtuous descendants continue worshipping in this way” (Proba, lines 693–694, borrowing Aeneid 2.690 and 3.409). Pietas is the central value of Virgil’s epic. It conveyed a Roman’s sense of duty towards his or her family, to the gods, and to the state. By appropriating these ideas for her life of Jesus, Proba showed her readers that being a Christian in fourth‐century Rome was entirely consistent with centuries of traditional Roman values.

  Today, some scholars are intensely skeptical of “syncretism” as an idea, and historians of Late Antiquity need to be aware of their vocal displeasure with it. As Rosalind Shaw and Charles Stewart have reminded researchers in a volume of essays on the topic, Syncretism/Anti‐Syncretism: The Politics of Religious Synthesis (London: Routledge, 2014), not everyone at all times wants to blend their beliefs with others or find ways of mixing them into a shared, or common, value system. Oftentimes, individuals can be adamantly defensive about the details of their own beliefs, even a non‐Christian one. For people who fit this profile in the fourth‐, fifth‐ or sixth‐century Mediterranean, Plotinus’ ideas would not have been appealing at all. They probably would have been insulting.

  12.2 Literature and Ideas after the “Vanishing” of Rome

  For the Roman Empire of the sixth century CE, the geography of power was far reduced from memories of Trajan or Augustus. The people of the city of Rome, which had formerly controlled the entire Mediterranean basin – and then, by the Rule of Four, only one half of it –now lived as exiles from their own empire. The “Roman world,” as its citizens knew it, had been reduced to the territory of modern Greece, the Balkans, Asia Minor, the Levant, and Egypt. For the residents of this radically reduced Roman world, political life was now centered in Constantinople.

  There were significant continuities, though. During the fifth and early sixth centuries CE, Latin would remain the language of government, just as it had been when the empire was based in Italy. Greek, a language traditionally spoken and used in the eastern Mediterranean, would come to be the official language only in the mid‐sixth century CE. The Roman government in Constantinople during this time also remained structured around an authority figure who ruled with prestige and consent. Called in Greek a basileios, the Latin equivalent of “emperor,” his position can also be translated as “king.” The Senate and people of Constantinople ruled with him, in effect preserving the kind of Republican‐model of government which Emperor Augustus had tried to institute in the aftermath of the divisiveness of Julius Caesar’s day.

  For many reasons, however, some scholars prefer to use a new label, “Byzantine,” to distinguish this new political and cultural world in Constantinople from its predecessor. It is a word choice that must be justified, not assumed. The people of this metamorphosing Roman world, with their only capital Constantinople, conceived of themselves as “Romans,” regardless of the fact that many of them increasingly spoke and wrote only in ancient Greek. They also referred to their state as Romania, “the territory of Rome,” a label that played off many people’s understanding of their capital city, Constantinople, as a “New Rome.”

  The reasons why many Christians had begun to conceive of this city as a replacement for Rome is a fascinating topic and one which we will treat in a moment. For now, it is important to note that this teleological belief – that the world of “Old Rome” would eventually come to end and a rising “New Rome” would replace it – has biblical roots. In the Book of Revelation, written at the time when Christians were a paltry minority, “Rome” is presented as a den of iniquity, the “whore of Babylon,” whose empire must be toppled before God returns to reign on earth. To Jesus’ followers of the late first century CE, that worldview may have offered a degree of comfort during a period when their own fate as citizens of the Roman Empire was precariously insecure.

  Three centuries later, after Theodosius I had established Nicene Christianity as the official worship of the Roman Empire, that scriptural story about the “whore of Babylon” must have had a much different resonance. Christians were now politically in charge of this new “Rome,” a government entity which many within their community had been fulminating against since the first century. The invention of Constantinople as a “New,” which is to say now Christian “Rome,” may have helped ease many Christian anxieties about working with, and collaborating with, a state that had long been defamed as one of the beasts of Revelation.

  It may also explain why some modern scholars, using a delicate sleight of hand, subtly change all references to “New Rome” and the “Eastern Roman Empire” to “Byzantium” and the “Byzantine Empire” at precisely this point in their stories. This casual switch wipes out all traces of the end‐time thinking, faith‐driven cultural anxiety, and apocalyptic preoccupations which were a significant aspect of Christian thought during the fourth through sixth centuries CE (Key Debates 12.1: Why Should Historians Read Tales of “Angels” and “Demons”?). Interestingly, however, these symptoms of an apocalyptic worldview would not be limited to the Christian communities of the Roman Empire. Other manifestations of them would soon be revealed elsewhere.

  Key Debates 12.1 Why Should Historians Read Tales of Angels and Demons?

  Evagrius, who grew up in the Roman territory of Pontus, needed a change of scenery. Born around 345 CE, havin
g worked in Constantinople as an assistant to the bishop, he later moved to Jerusalem. There, he fell frustratingly in love with a married woman and suffered a devastating breakdown. When a Christian ascetic recommended he should self‐care by retreating to the desert, Evagrius left right away to confront his demons, literally.

  In Egypt, Evagrius compiled a study guide for monks who were tormented with demons. In eight books, originally written in ancient Greek, he reflected on 498 Bible passages that could provide spiritual solace to tortured souls. Each was prefaced by a situation that might have been causing a monk some consternation. “Against the thoughts that taunt us because our parents have forsaken us and will not send us gold to meet our needs,” one begins, Evagrius recommends reading the Psalms: “‘For my father and mother have forsaken me, but the Lord has received me’” (Evagrius, Talking Back 3.3, trans. by D. Brakke [Collegeville: Liturgical Press, 2000]). The way Evagrius documents his demonic thoughts and imaginatively matches them with Bible passages illustrates how seriously he and Christians like him tried to ward off the chief demon – “Satan,” in Evagrius’ worldview – from their everyday life (Evagrius 3.19).

  These are certainly not the kinds of protagonists one expects to see in a history book. “Angels” and “demons” are the sort of cast members you usually find in heady, spiritual dramas. They are also such a natural part of the story of religion, we might even be led to assume that all people, at all times throughout history, must have believed in these kinds of mystical beings – or at least some version of them. This is far from true, and it’s essential for social and cultural historians to recognize why.

  The belief that “angels” and “demons” are waging a cosmic war on behalf of humanity is not found in the Psalms which Evagrius quotes, nor is it found in any of the Hebrew Scriptures written before the Hellenistic age. The origins of this potent pair of spiritual beings come later.

  Many people will probably know the basic outline of Satan’s fall from heaven and how the good archangel Michael battled to defeat him. Tales of Satan and the archangel shaped later Jewish and Christian belief; they clearly influenced Evagrius. Yet the idea of angelic warriors battling Satan, who is equated with the Devil, does not exist in any piece of ancient literature before the third century BCE. The anonymous Jewish text known as 1 Enoch, written in the third century BCE and edited over time, is the source for this well‐known drama. 1 Enoch tells of angels who rebelled against God and were punished as a result. The writer presents this battle as a warning to his readers that the suffering of their present, evil times will be overcome and that hope will prevail.

  As one of the first expressions of a dualistic worldview found in all of Jewish literature, 1 Enoch holds a privileged place in collections of apocalyptic writing. Even though it was excluded from Jewish and Christians Bibles, the author’s vision of angels fighting demons would also have far‐reaching impact, teaching many Jews and Christians to see the world around them in warlike, dualistic terms.

  12.3 The Literary Culture of Justinian’s Roman Empire

  Justinian’s Latin Laws

  Emperor Justinian would leave his mark on the capital in many ideological ways. Under his reign, he used legal mechanisms to prop up Nicene Christianity. In a law of 544 CE, which forms part of the “new laws,” or novels, of the collection called the Justinianic Code, the emperor set forth the requirements for worship throughout the territory he controlled.

  “We believe the first and greatest good for all men to be the right confession of the true and pure Christian faith,” Justinian explained, “so that it may be strengthened thereby in every respect and all holy priests may be joined in concord and with one accord profess and preach the right Christian faith.” The law continues on this theme, emphasizing Justinian’s strict sense of Christian identity and the need to quash all theological opposition: “Every pretext invented by heretics may be destroyed, as is shown by the books and the different edicts written by us.” It also attributes the belief of “heretics” to “the work of the Devil” and castigates these suspicious folks for holding assemblies “not in accord with the holy catholic and apostolic church of God” (The New Laws [Novels] of Justinian, no. 132, trans. by F. Blume and T. Kearley). This law was read to the people of Constantinople on April 4, 544 CE.

  Justinian’s Constantinople, like the shrunken Roman Empire over which he ruled, was not a society that tolerated creative thinking about God. As this law makes clear, the emperor was determined to root out problematic beliefs and practices; the decree itself makes a mysterious reference to the threat of “secret baptism.” But policing the public meant having eyes and ears into people’s own houses.

  “We want everyone to know,” the emperor continued, “that if hereafter there are found those who hold unlawful assemblies or come together therein, we shall not suffer that to be done in any manner. But the houses where anything of the kind takes place, shall be given to the holy church, and the penalties specified by law shall in every respect be inflicted upon those who hold unlawful assemblies or who come together therein.” Such behavior was deemed to be “heretical insanity” which could “destroy the souls of others,” translated by Blume and Kearley, whose work, The Annotated Justinian Code, is housed on‐line at the University of Wyoming Law Library, 2016.)

  Justinian’s Greek‐speaking Christian state

  Justinian’s ideological commitment to promote a Christian state can be put in a larger context if we look at the story of the empire’s Jewish communities – and the Jewish communities on the empire’s borders – during the same time. Inside Justinian’s empire, synagogue construction boomed, particularly in cities near the Sea of Galilee, a fact that attests to the vibrancy of Jewish communities in a state that was particularly concerned to legislate a Christian worldview. Many of these synagogues also preserve mosaic artwork and inscriptions written in the dominant language spoken by residents of the East Roman Empire: ancient Greek (Political Issues 12.1: The Value of Learning a Second Language in Changing Times).

  Political Issues 12.1 The Value of Learning a Second Language in Changing Times

  Emperor Majorian (r. 457–461 CE) was eager to reclaim territory in Roman Spain and Gaul that previous administrations had ceded to Goths and Germans. Ultimately, Majorian failed. But for his brave attempt, Sidonius Apollinaris would forever thank him.

  A Roman, born c.430 CE at Lyon in southern Gaul, Sidonius Apollinaris had watched the world around the Rhône River valley change quite dramatically in the middle of the fifth century CE. Like Rutilius Namatianus before him, Sidonius had sought a career in Rome. After Emperor Majorian was murdered, in 461, Sidonius returned to his estate in Gaul. By 476 CE, the cities along the upper Rhône River had come under the control of Germanic kings, Burgundians.

  Sidonius was at his writing desk during this time, composing Latin letters to family and friends, even if no one ever wrote back right away (or at all). “It was right that my loquacity should be checked by the revenge of silence on your part,” he bashfully begins one note to a relative (Sidonius Apollinaris, Letters 5.3, LCL trans. by W. Anderson [1965]). “The fact that I received no reply to the letter I sent you seems to be a discredit to your friendship,” he starts in another (Letters 5.4). Amusing as the apparent snubs and rejections may be, Sidonius’ writings, collected in nine books c.477 CE, provide some of the most intimate, important glimpses of life in late fifth‐century Gaul – as the Roman Empire vanished and as new opportunities appeared.

  Sidonius’ letter to his friend Syagrius is one such document. In it, Sidonius marvels how nimbly Syagrius has adapted to the times. “I am … inexpressibly amazed that you have quickly acquired a knowledge of the German tongue with such ease,” he tells Syagrius. “I should like you to tell me how you have managed to absorb so swiftly into your inner being the exact sounds of an alien race” (Letters 5.5). The results of this new skill set were manifest immediately. “You are loved, your company is sought, you are much visited, you delight, y
ou are picked out, you are invited, you decide issues and are listened to,” Sidonius writes. So impressed was he by Syagrius’ meteoric rise in the new court, he compared it to watching “a young falcon [bursting forth] from an old nest (ex harilao)” (Letters 5.5). With his vocabulary even Sidonius may have been trying to adapt.

  Language scholars have long been puzzled by that last word. Translated into English as the word “nest,” it is wholly unknown in any Latin writings before Sidonius’ time. One social and linguistic hypothesis about its origins is that it may have been a bit of the language spoken by the Burgundians which Sidonius has recently picked up.

  The fact that Syagrius was acquiring the language of the new government is revealing for a second reason, however. Not all the new kingdoms of the rapidly changing western Europe were rushing to eliminate Latin from their daily culture. Sixth‐century Italy, the kingdom founded by Theoderic, prided itself on its Latin heritage and its Roman traditions. Theoderic’s spokesman, the quaestor sacri palatini – the same office that had existed in Rome prior to the take‐over – was a Latin‐speaking official, Cassiodorus. In addition to communicating the king’s message, Cassiodorus wrote a history of the Goths in Latin, now lost. His knowledge of this “classical” language ensured that he became a valuable member of the new Ostrogothic government.