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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 13 January 2016
Compared with other apologetical works from the early Christian period, the Consultationes zacchaei et Apollonii are surprisingly little discussed. One reason for this is that a lack of scholarly consensus regarding both the author and the period when the text was written has clearly limited its usefulness as a source for historians and theologians. But there is a second problem too: the Consultationes appear to belong to a number of different genres. The work, in different parts, has aspects of a standard apologetic treatise, in which the basic doctrines of Christianity are explained to a sympathetic pagan; of a sometimes rather specialised exposition of systematic theology, which is especially concerned with the relationship between the persons of the Trinity; of a rather mean-spirited attack on various kind of Christian enemies, from pagans to heretics to Jews; of an ascetic, or perhaps even monastic, tractate, which seeks toexplain certain Christian practices.
1 The more recent edition by Feiertag, J. L. and Steinmann, W., Questions d'un païen à un Chrétien, Paris 1994Google Scholar, appeared too late to be consulted. All citations here are from Morin's, GermainIvli Firmici Materni Consultationes Zacchaei et Apollonii, Bonn 1935Google Scholar(hereinafter cited as CZA) ; the best examination of the text is Feiertag, Jean-Louis, Les Consultationes Zacchaei et Apollonii: étude d'histoire et de sotériologie, Freiburg 1990.Google Scholar See also A. Reatz, , Das theologische System der Consultationes Zacchaei et Apollonii, Freiburg-im-Breisgau 1920Google Scholar; Cavallera, Ferdinand, ‘Un exposé sur la vie spirituelle et monastique au IVe siècle’, Revue d'ascétique et de mystique xvi (1935), 132-46Google Scholar; idem, ‘Consultationes Zacchaei et Apollonii’, Dictionnaire de spiritualité, ii. 1641-3Google Scholar; Columbás, G., ‘El concepto de monje y vida monastica hasta fines dei siglo V’, Studia monastica i (1959), 257–342Google Scholar; and idem, ‘Sobre el autor de las Consultationes Zacchaei et Apollonii’, Studia monastica xiv (1972), 7–15.Google Scholar
2 See below, pp. 600–10, for a fuller discussion on the dating of the text.
3 Berger, Adolf, Encyclopaedic dictionary of Roman law, Philadelphia 1953, s.v.‘consultatio’.Google Scholar
4 CZA i. 38, p. 46–7.
5 Ibid. ii. 1-3, pp. 49–53.
6 Ibid. ii. 14, pp. 78–80.
7 Ibid. ii. 4–5, pp. 53–7.
8 Ibid. ii. 20, p. 93.
9 ‘Tertium…struentes libellum conversationis catholicae formam loquemur’: ibid. iii, pref. p. 94.
10 Ibid. iii. 1, p. 95.
11 Ibid. p. 96.
12 Ibid. p. 97.
13 Ibid. pp. 97–8.
14 Luke ii. 4; CZA iii. 1, p. 98.
15 Cf. John xiv. 2.
16 CZA iii. 2, p. 98.
17 Matt. xix. 21; Luke xiv. 27, 33; CZA iii. 2, p. 99.
18 Ibid.
19 Ibid.
20 Ibid.
21 Vita Melaniae iunioris ed. Gorce, Denys, Vie de Sainte Mélanie, Paris 1962, chs viii, xi, pp. 140–2, 146–8.Google Scholar See also Palladius, , Historia lausiaca, ed. Butler, Dom Cuthbert, in The Lausiac History of Palladius, Cambridge 1904, lxi. 3–4, p. 156Google Scholar; and Jerome, ep. lxvi. 13, ed. Isidore Hilberg, CSEL liv, pp. 663–5, on the radical change in clothing that signified the initial conversion of Paula and Eustochium.
22 CZA iii. 3, p. 100.
23 ‘Unde professio inreprehensibilis et sancta est’: ibid.
24 Ibid. pp. 100-1.
25 Ep. xxii, Ad Eustochium,CSEL liv. 143–211.
26 On this, see Hunter, David G, ‘Resistance to the virginal ideal in late fourth century Rome: the case of jovinian’, Theological Studies xlviii (1987), 45–67CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Brown, Peter, The body and society: men, women, and sexual renunciation in early Christianity, New York 1988, 359–63,377Google Scholar,
27 Ambrose, , Epp. extra collectionem, ed. Zelzer, Michaela, xiv. 7, CSEL lxxxii/iii., 238-9 [= ep. lxiii. 7, 8–9, PL xvi. 1242].Google Scholar The translation is from de Romestin, H., The Nicene and post-Nicene Fathers (2nd ser.), New York 1896, x. 457–8.Google Scholar
28 ‘et promissa ad integrum praestolantes, praecepta ad integrum implere nituntur’: CZA iii. 3, p. 101.
29 ‘Hii, inquam, rebus communis conversationis intersunt, et secreta non expetunt, vitae huius consuetudinum ritentes’: ibid.
30 Ibid.
31 He describes it as a ‘consuetudo potiorum’: ibid.
32 Ibid. pp. 101–2.
33 Ibid. p. 102.
34 Ibid. iii. 4, p. 103.
35 For the earliest, and probably best, answer to this objection, see Vila Antonii 14, ed. Bartelink, G. J. M., Vie d'Antoine, Paris 1994Google Scholar, where Athanasius shows that the years as a solitary in the desert have accomplished for Antony the same thing a classical education was meant to: not only is he eloquent, persuasive, wise and apathetic (in the stoic sense), he can also perform miracles of healing.
36 ‘quibus voluntas in proposito recta est, actus alius esse non possit’: CZA iii. 4, p. 103.
37 Ibid. iii. 5, p. 105. Note the interesting metonymy, where the language that would normally be applied to reproductive sexuality - fruit, labour - is applied here to the sterility of practising virginity, were it not sanctioned.
38 On the use of the Adam and Eve story in the early and late antique Church, see in general Pagels, Elaine, Adam, Eve, and the serpent, New York 1988.Google Scholar
39 ‘mulier prius solatio quam coniugio fuit’: CZA iii. 5, p. 105.
40 Ibid. p. 105.
41 Cf. Jerome ep. xxii. 2, where he describes the drawbacks of marriage and running a household; xxii. 19, on the general uncleanliness of marriage; De perpetua virginitate b. Marine adversus Helvidium 18–21, PL xxiii. 202–6 on the constant ills of the married state.
42 See Brown, , Body and society, 5–17Google Scholar, and ‘Late antiquity’, in Veyne, Paul (ed.), A history of private life, I: From pagan Rome to Byzantium, Cambridge 1987, 239–51Google Scholar, on the obligation of marriage in late antiquity.
43 CZA iii. 7, pp. 109–11.
44 Ibid. iii. 8, pp. 111–13.
45 Ibid. iii. 9, pp. 113–17.
46 Ibid. iii. 10, pp. 117–18.
47 James, William,The varieties of religious experience, New York 1958, 22–4, 157–206Google Scholar; Darby Nock, Arthur,Conversion: the old and the new in religion from Alexander the Great to Augustine of Hippo, Oxford 1933, 7–16.Google Scholar
48 Luckman, Thomasand Berger, Peter, The social construction of reality, Garden City, NJ 1966, 158.Google Scholar
49 Gallagher, Eugene V, ‘Conversion and community in late antiquity’, Journal of Religion lxxiii (1993), 1–15.CrossRefGoogle Scholar See also Rambo, Lewis R., Understanding religious conversion, New Haven 1993, 102–41, esp. pp. 113–18, 121–3.Google Scholar
50 CZA ii. 4, pp. 10–11.
51 Ibid. i. 27–33, pp. 33–41.
52 On this question in general see Markus, Robert, The end of ancient Christianity, Cambridge 1990Google Scholar, chs xi–xii, and, more generally, Rousseau, Philip, Ascetics, authority and the church in the age of Jerome and Cassian, Oxford 1978.Google Scholar
53 CZA iii. 3, p. 100.
54 Ibid. p. 100. See also Elliot, Dyan, Spiritual marriage: sexual abstinence in medieval wedlock, Princeton, NJ 1993, 25–63.Google Scholar
55 In the alphabetical collection see the saying attributed to Eucharistos the Secular (translated by Ward, Benedicta, The sayings of the desert Fathers: the alphabetical collection, Kalamazoo 1975, 60Google Scholar). See also Elliot, , Spiritual marriage, 51–73.Google Scholar For an interesting contrast, see Jerome, ep. xxii. 14.
56 See Cassian, , Collationes xviii. 7–8Google Scholar, in Jean Cassien : Conférences XVIII–XXIV, ed. Pichery, Dom E., Paris 1959, 18–22.Google Scholar
57 Jerome, ep. xxii. 13, 29. See also Brown, , Body and society, 76–82, 341–86Google Scholar, for this theme.
58 CZA iii. 2, p. 99.
59 Ibid. iii. i, pp. 97–8.
60 Ibid. iii. 4, p. 103.
61 Horace, , Odes 3. 2Google Scholar; Augustine, , De civitate Dei i. 15, CCL xlvii. 16.Google Scholar
62 The absolute date by which the CZA must have been written is 484, when it is quoted in Eugenius of Carthage's libellus fidei, recorded in Victor of Vita's Historia persecutionis afiricanae provinciae ii. 77–8, CSEL vii. 56–9. See Courcelle, Pierre-Paul, Histoire littéraire des grandes invasions germaniques, 3rd edn, Paris 1964, 261Google Scholar, and Feiertag, Les Consultationes, 57–64.
63 For the early history of the text, see Morin, Germain, ‘Ein zweites christliches Werk des Firmicus Maternus: die Consultationes Zacchaei et Apollonii’, Historisches Jahrbuch xxxvii (1916), 229–66 at pp. 229–32.Google Scholar See also Feiertag, , Les Consultationes, 1–13.Google Scholar
64 Harnack, Adolf, Die Altercatio Simonis Iudaei et Theophili christiani, Leipzig 1883.Google Scholar
65 Morin, ‘Ein zweites christliches Werk’.
66 Axelson, Bertil, ‘Ein drittes Werk des Firmicus Maternus? Zur Kritik der philologischen Identifizierungsmethod’, Årsberättelse 1936–1937: Bulletin de la société royale des lettres de Lund (1936–7), 107–32Google Scholar
67 Courcelle, , Histoire littéraire, app. 1, 261–75Google Scholar
68 CZA iii. i, p. 112.
69 See Fl. Marcellinus 10, in J. R. Martindale, , The prosopography of the later Roman Empire (hereinafter cited as PLRE), Cambridge 1980, ii. 711–12.Google Scholar
70 Feiertag, Les Consultationes, 143–5.
71 See Columbas, , ‘Sobre el autor de las Consultationes’, 7–15.Google Scholar
72 See Sanchis, Dominique, ‘Pauvreté monastique et charité fraternelle chez saint Augustin’, Augustiniana viii (1958), 5–21Google Scholar; Verheijen, Luc, ‘Spiritualité et vie monastique chez saint Augustin‘, in Charles Kannengiesser, (ed.), Jean Chrysoslome et Augustin : actes du colloque de Chantilly, Paris 1975, 93–123;Google Scholar idem, Saint Augustinis monasticism in the light of Acts 4:32–35, Villanova 1979; Vogüé, Adalbert de, ‘Monachisme et église dans la pensée de Cassien’, in Théologie de la vie monastique, Paris 1961, 213–40.Google Scholar
73 See Cassian, , Collatio xviii. 8Google Scholar; Jerome, ep. xxii. 34–6.
74 Ambrose, , Epp. extra collectionem xiv. 66, CSEL lxxxii/iii. 270 = ep. lxiii. 66, PL xvi. 1258–9.Google Scholar
75 See Gordini, G. D., ‘Origine e sviluppo del monachesimo a Roma’, Gregorianum xxxvii (1956), 220–60, at pp. 233–8Google Scholar, and Lorenz, Rudolf, ‘Die Anfänge des abendländischen Mönchtum im 4 Jahrhunderts’, Zeitschrift für Kirchengeschichte lxxvii (1966), 1–62 at pp. 3–12.Google Scholar
76 Jerome, ep. xxii. 19-21, deals with this same material, and presents the same ideas as does CZA iii. 5. The differences are of two sorts. The first relates mainly to the structure of the material. In a word our author makes a much more systematic and organised argument than does Jerome. For instance, on the matter of sources, of the fifteen scriptural citations in CZA iii. 5, all but three are found in chs xviii-xxi of the letter. Of these, one (1 Cor. vii. 28) is found in the next section of the letter; the remaining - 2 Rev. xiv. 4 (‘ Hii sunt, qui sequuntur agnum quocumque venit’) and Matt. xxiv. 19 (‘vae pregnantibus et nutrientibus’) - alone are not used by Jerome. More telling are the following texts, which point to the way our author and Jerome are related:
This sort of parallelism is typical of the relationship between the two texts. Robert J. O’Connell noted, when comparing a similar use of Porphyry by Augustine, that we need not find exact textual reproductions to discuss how one text influences another: St Augustine's early theory of man: AD 386–331, Cambridge 1968, 14–15. I would argue that here our author is responding to Jerome's letter on virginity, but - as is typical for him - offering a middle way between the extreme positions of Jerome (that all should be virgins) and Jovinian (that none need be). Our author has taken ep. xxii. 18–21 as his source, and after organising it rather more coherently, has moderated both Jerome's language and his argument, perhaps to build bridges amid a divided Christian community.
77 Feiertag, , Les consultationes, 126–35.Google Scholar
78 Ferrua, A., Epigrammata damasiana, Vatican 1942, n. 35.Google Scholar
79 Feiertag, , Les consultationes, 38–42Google Scholar, traces the history of the Sabellians. He also notes a number of literary parallels between CZA ii. 14 and Ambrose's De spiritu sando, chs xliv–xlvii.
80 Pietri, Charles, Roma Christiana : recherches sur l’Eglise de Rome, son organisation, sa politique, son idéologie de Miltiade à Sixte III(311–440), Rome 1976, i. 833–40.Google Scholar
81 Brown, Peter, ‘Pelagius and his supporters: aims and environment’, Journal of Theological Studies n.s. xix (1968), 93–114 at pp. 113-14.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
82 CZA iii. 1, pp. 97–8, ‘crebaque ieiunia et adsiduae in supplicationibus preces iustitiam aut mereantur aut faciant ‘ ; iii. 4, p. 103, ‘quibus voluntas in proposita recta sint, actus alius esse non possit’.
83 In his 397 reply to Simplicius (Ad Simplicium i. 2. 7, CCL xliv. 31-2), Augustine enunciated his basic position regarding his theology of grace and salvation, a position only slightly modified (and then made more pessimistic) in his works written during the Pelagian controversy. Augustine claims in Retractiones i. 1.9. 6, CCL lvii. 28-9, that he was an opponent of Pelagianism long before the 411 council at Carthage where Aurelius condemned Coelestius for his errors on grace, free will and infant baptism. A second rather un-Augustinian position our author takes is in respect to marriage: he says in iii. 5 that intercourse and procreation happened only after Adam's and Eve's sin, and that Eve was initially Adam's solatium, not his wife. Augustine argues the opposite in De bono coniugali, written around 401.
84 Jerome reports that he knew Pelagius before he left the city in 385 (In Hieremiam vi. i, CC lxxiv. 175). See also de Plinval, Georges, Pélage, ses écrits, sa vie, et sa réforme, Lausanne 1943, 47–55.Google Scholar
85 It is certainly clear that Pelagius was patronised by the great Christian family of the Anicii : Epistolae ad Demetriadem, PL xxx. 15–46, and more generally, Brown, Peter, ‘ The patrons of Pelagius: the Roman aristocracy between East and West’, Journal of Theological Studies n.s. xxi (1970), 56–72.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
86 CJA i. 33, p. 41.
87 The controversy began in 392, when Epiphanius attacked John of Jerusalem as a protector of the Origenists, and as a crypto-Arian. Jerome took the part of Epiphanius, and Rufinus, of course, that of the bishop. The argument did not really have an impact on the west until the appearance of Rufinus in 397 with his translation of the Peri archon. See Jerome, ep. lxxxiii from 399, wherein Pammachius and Oceanus express their concern about Origen's ideas to Jerome. See also Clark, Elizabeth A., The Origenist controversy: the cultural construction of an early Christian debate, Princeton, NJ 1992.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
88 Jerome, ep. xlix. 2. On the book in general, see Fraioli, Deborah, ‘The importance of satire in Jerome's Adversius Jovinianum as an argument against the authenticity of the Historia Calamitatum’, in Fälschungen im Mittelalter Teil V: Fingierte Briefe, Frömmigkeit und Fälschung, Realienfälschungen (Monumenta Germaniae Historica Schriften 33), Hanover 1988, 167–200 at pp. 169–84.Google Scholar
89 Siricius, ep. vii, PL xiii. 1168–72.
90 Ambrose, ep. xlii, PL xvi. 1172–7.
91 In this way, our author bears great similarities to Ambrosiaster. See Hunter, David G., ‘ On the sin of Adam and Eve: A little-known defense of marriage and childbearing by Ambrosiaster’, Harvard Theological Review lxxxii (1989), 283–99CrossRefGoogle Scholar, and idem, ‘The paradise of patriarchy: Ambrosiaster on woman as (not) God's image’, Journal of Theological Studies n.s. xliii (1992), 447–69.Google Scholar
92 Paxton, Frederick S.,Christianising death: the creation of a ritual process in early medieval Europe, Ithaca 1990, 37–46Google Scholar, notes how this sort of optimism was characteristic of the Roman Church's anointing rites in late antiquity.
93 Brown, , Body and society, 359.Google ScholarPubMed
94 For the historical background on the rebellion of Eugenius, I have relied on Jones, A. H. M., The later Roman empire, 284–602, Baltimore 1986, i. 156–69Google Scholar, and Matthews, John, The western aristocracies and the imperial court, AD 364–425, Oxford 1990, 183–252.Google Scholar
95 On Maximus’ usurpation, and Theodosius’ slow reaction to it, see ibid. 95–6, 173–82, 223–5.
96 In May 389, against Eunomians (Codex Theodosianus 16. 5. 17), and in June, against the Manicheans (ibid. 16. 5. 18).
97 On Albinus and Flavianus see PLRE i. 37. 15; i. 345. 14.
98 But see Salzman, Michelle Renée, ‘Aristocratic women: conductors of Christianity in the fourth century’, Helios xvi (1989), 207–20.Google Scholar
99 On the date of the Saturnalia, see Cameron, Alan, ‘The date and identity of Macrobius’, Journal of Roman Studies lvi (1966), 25–38CrossRefGoogle Scholar; on whether Albinus was a pagan see PLRE, above, and more generally, Brown, Peter, ‘Aspects of the Christianisation of the Roman aristocracy’, Journal of Roman Studies lxi (1961), 1–11 at p. 7.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
100 Codex Theodosianus 16. 10. 10
101 Ibid. 16. 7. 4–5.
102 See Matthews, , Western aristocracies, 229–30Google Scholar, on Theodosius’ exercise of imperial clementia in pardoning senators who had supported Maximus.
103 Ambrose, , Epp. extra collectionem x. 5, CSEL lxxxii/iii. 207 = ep. lvii, PL xvi. 1226.Google Scholar
104 On Eugenius see Straub, J., ‘Eugenius’, Reallexikon für Antike und Christentum vi (1966), 860–77Google Scholar; PLRE, i. 293, Eugenius 6; and Matthews, Western aristocracies, 238–41.Google Scholar
105 The poem is edited by Mommsen, Theodor, ‘Carmen Codicis Parisini 8084’, Hermes iv (1870), 350–63.Google Scholar See also Bloch, H., ‘A new document of the last pagan revival in the west’, Harvard Theological Review xxxviii (1945), 199–241CrossRefGoogle Scholar, for the traditional interpretation of this last pagan renaissance in the west. More recently, Matthews, John, ‘The historical setting of the “Carmen contra paganos” (Cod. Par. Lat. 8034)’, Historia xix (1970), 464–79Google Scholar, has argued against Manganaro for the traditional date. But see Cameron, Alan, ‘The Latin revival of the fourth century’ in Treadgold, Warren (ed.), Renaissances before the Renaissance: cultural revivals in late antiquity and the Middle Ages, Stanford, Ca. 1984,42–58.Google Scholar
106 See Ambrose, , Epp. extra collectionem x. 12, CSEL lxxxii/iii. 211 = ep. lvii. 12, PL xvi. 1228, on his relationship with EugeniusGoogle Scholar; and x. 6, CSEL lxxxii/iii. 208 = lvii. 6, PL 16. 1226, on the re-establishment of paganism.
107 Matthews, , Western aristocracies, 240Google Scholar
108 CZA iii. 8, p. 112. I follow here Courcelle's felicitous translation of insuspicabiles as inattendus, ‘unexpected’. For his translation of the text see Histoire littéraire, 50.
109 On his relationship to Ricomer see Symmachus, epp. iii. 61 of 385, and iii. 60 of 389. On his earlier service see Zosimus, , Historia nova, ed. Bekker, Emmanuel, Bonn 1837, iv. 33, 47, 53) PP 211, 231, 237 (Zosimus: Historia nova-the decline of Rome, trans. Buchanan, James J. and Davis, Harold T., San Antonio 1967, pp. 165, 180, 186–7)Google Scholar; PLRE, i. 95–7
110 CZA ii. 18, pp. 88–91 at pp. 8gff.
111 Certainly Augustine, writing a generation or so later, believed the ‘peace of the church ‘ was only a temporary phenomenon: De civitate Dei xvii. 49, 51; xx. 8, 11.
112 See Finn, Thomas M., Early Christian baptism and the catechumenate: Italy, North Africa,and Egypt, Collegeville, Minn. 1992, 1–83Google Scholar, and, in general, Cramer, Peter, Baptism and change in the early Middle Ages, 200–1200, Cambridge 1994, 9–86Google Scholar
113 CZA i. 28, pp. 34–5.
114 ‘quia evidentibus dei dictis non elementą, non angelos, nec quoslibet caeli et terrae vel aeris principatus adorare permittimur. Divini enim speciale hoc nomen officii est, et altior omni terrena veneratione reverentia’ ibicl. p. 35.
115 On this whole discussion, see Feiertag, , Les Consultationes, 68–97.Google Scholar
116 See for instance Kitzinger, Ernst, ‘The cult of images before Iconoclasm’, Dumbarton Oaks Papers viii (1954), 83–150 at pp. 90–3CrossRefGoogle Scholar; McCormack, Sabine, Art and ceremony in late antiquity, Berkeley, Ca. 1981, 67–78Google Scholar; and, more generally, Price, S. R. F., Rituals and power: the Roman imperial cult in Asia Minor, Cambridge 1984.Google Scholar
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119 Harries, Jill, ‘The background to the Code’, in Harries, Jill and Woods, Ian (eds), The Theodosian Code: studies in the imperial law of late antiquity, London 1993, 1–16 at pp. 2–3.Google Scholar
120 The epitaph for Flavianus, (Corpus inscriptionum latinarum, vi. 1782 = Inscriptiones latinae selectae, ed. Dessau, H., 3rd edn, Berlin 1942, i. 2947Google Scholar, mentions his religious office as pontifex maior, though it later commends him as being historico disertissimo. In Rufinus’ Historia ecclesiastica, he performs, as would be fitting for one so adept in ancient usage, an augury, and we know from Macrobius’ Saturnalia that he was an expect in augural law.
121 For the stemma of his family, see PLRE, i. 1138, with the appropriate citations to his ancestors, parents, brothers and sisters. Most are well documented in fourth-century inscriptions, especially their devotion to the cult of Mithras.
122 Saturnalia vi. 1. 1, ed. Willis, J., Leipzig 1963, 346.Google Scholar
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124 Corpus inscriptionum latinarum, vi. 512 (= Inscriptiones latinae selectae, no. 4154), says that his brother, Ceionius Rufius Volusianus, received a second taurobolium in 390: he might have had his first at the same time as his sister Rufia Volusiana and her husband Petronius Apollodorus - on 16 June 370: Corpus inscriptionum latinarum, vi. 509.
125 PLRE, ii. 1184.6.
126 Vita Melaniae imioris 50, 54–5.
127 Augustine, epp. cxxxii, cxxxv, cxxxvii.
128 Courcelle, Histoire litteéraire, 264–70.
129 ‘Interest famae tuae, ut quaesita noverimus. Utcumque absque detrimento cultus divini in aliis sacerdotibus toleratur inscitia; at cum ad antistitem Augustinum venitur, legi deest quidquid contigerit ignorari’: Augustine, ep. cxxxv. 2, CSEL xliv. 92.
130 ‘Legi litteras tuas, in quibus vidi magni cuiusdam dialogi specimen, laudabili brevitate comprehensum’: ep. cxxxvii. 1, CSEL xliv. 96.
131 Augustine, ep. cxxxv. 2, CSEL xliv. 92.
132 One possible solution was that Augustine came to know this text in the same way that he got so much new information after about 410: through the regular number of Roman refugees who streamed to North Africa: O’Donnell, J. J., ‘The inspiration for Augustine's De civitate Dei’, Augustinian Studies x (1979), 75–9.CrossRefGoogle Scholar The text's emphasis on the power of the human will indicates that it might have been produced under the patronage of the Anicii, who were also the patrons and protectors of Pelagius. Any number of Roman refugees would have had ties to this powerful gens, and could have been carrying a copy.
133 See Brown, , ‘Christianisation of the Roman aristocracy’, 2, 10.Google Scholar
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