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Festive Satire: Julian's Misopogon and the New Year At Antioch*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 September 2012

Maud W. Gleason
Maud W. Gleason
Affiliation:
Redwood City, California
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Extract

One morning early in the year 363, the citizens of Antioch awoke to find, prominently displayed outside the imperial palace, a lengthy and vehement communication from their emperor. He begins with an attack on his own beard, and we know the satire today as the Misopogon, or ‘Beard-Hater’. But it also bore the title ‘Oration on Antioch’ (Antiochikos). The double title is indicative of a parodox in its rhetorical strategy. Normally an Antiochikos would be a panegyric, and normally a rhetorical description of an emperor's person and achievements should conform to the encomiastic formulae of the basilikos logos. But Julian in his satire turns the panegyrical topoi upside down, and abuses the city by joining its citizens in abuse of himself. In so doing he paints a vivid contrast between the emperor, breast shaggy like a lion, beard alive with vermin, fingers stained with ink, and the smooth-skinned Phaeacians of Antioch. Scholars have been embarrassed at the spectacle. Was Julian sufficiently conscious of the dignity of his position?

Type
Research Article
Information
The Journal of Roman Studies , Volume 76 , November 1986 , pp. 106 - 119
Copyright
Copyright © Maud W. Gleason 1986. Exclusive Licence to Publish: The Society for the Promotion of Roman Studies

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References

01 Such as the Antiochikos of Libanius, Or. xi.

02 See Menander Rhetor' paradigm for a Basilikos Logos: Russell, D. A. and Wilson, N. G., Menander Rhetor (1981), 76–94.Google Scholar

03 He is so confident of his own worth that criticism of himself in their terms amounts ultimately to an indictment of them.

04 ‘Julian the Apostate at Antioch’, Church History 8 (1939). 310.Google Scholar

05 Festugière, A. J., Antioch païenne et chrétienne (1959), 63–4Google Scholar. Festugière's approach may seem exaggerated, but the trend continues. A recent book compares Julian's behaviour with that of a wronged child: Polymnia Athanassiadi-Fowden, Julian and Hellenism: an Intellectual Biography (1981), 201–2Google Scholar.

06 The Emperor Julian (1976), 158.

07 Millar, F. G. B., The Emperor in the Roman World (1977), xiGoogle Scholar.

08 Chron. 328. 3–4. Even the illiterate should not be excluded as a potential audience, since the literate often read out loud. For further discussion of publicly posted satire see below.

09 ‘probra eivitatis infensa mente dinumerans, addensque veritati complura’ (xxn. 14. 2).

10 e.g. XII. 7. 3 (Julian jumps up in the senate to greet Maximus); xxn. 14. 3 (Julian carries sacred emblems in place of the priests).

11 See n. 92 below.

12 He alludes to it indirectly in a private letter to Julian (802. 2), referring to the city' κακοπραγία, ‘by which I mean not the scarcity of foodstuffs, but the fact that it has been judged wicked, evil, and ungracious (ὄτι πονηρὰ καὶ κακὴ καὶ ἁχάριστος κέκριται)’. Here ἁχάριστος recalls εἱς ἁχάριστα καταθέμ;ενος ἥθητὰς χάριστας in the peroration of the Misopogon (371B).

13 Historia Nova m. 11.

14 Socr., HE in. 17. Although Socrates was able to quote from Julian' Letter to the Alexandrians (in. 3), we cannot be certain that he had access to the rest of Julian' works. He does, however, give details of the lampoons against Julian, which probably were not to be found in Eunapius' eulogistic account.

15 Soz., HE v. 19. Sozomen records the contents of three more of Julian' public letters and quotes a fourth in its entirety (v. 16).

16 ‘… though at the time your imperial rank made it important’ (Contra Julianum 11. 41, PG 35. 717). The conclusion of this piece shows that Gregory thought of himself as posting metaphorically a counter-Misopogon. ‘Here is a pillar for you from me, higher and more visible than the Pillars of Heracles … which will inevitably become known everywhere by everyone as it moves about … pillorying you and your deeds’, op. cit., ch. 42.

17 Julian' religious and economic policies were the major points of friction. For a discussion of the latter see Downey, G., op. cit. (n. 4 above), and ‘The Economic Crisis at Antioch under Julian the Apostate’, in Coleman-Norton, P. R., ed., Studies in Roman Economic and Social History in Honor of A. C. Johnson (1951), 312–21Google Scholar, and Petit, P., Libanius et la vie municipale à Antioch au TV siècle après F.-C. (1955), 109–18CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

18 Or. xvi. 35. Compare Misopogon 355C, where Julian like Libanius puts words into the citizens' mouths: ‘And yet you [Julian] think that even the charming youths in the city ought to keep quiet and, if possible, think what pleases you, but at least say what is agreeable for you to hear! But it is their independence that makes them hold revelling processions (κωμάδειν), which they're generally doing all the time, but during the festivals they're doing more than usual’. Compare also the scurrilous young men in Ammianus' excursus on lawyers who spend their time composing mimiambi and insulting their betters (xxx. 4. 14–17).

19 Meslin, M., La Fête des Kalendes de Janvier dans I'empire remain (Collections Latomus 115, 1970), 49.Google Scholar

20 In the seventh month of the emperor' stay: μῆναἕβδομον τουτονί, 344A. He arrived on 18 July. Downey, , in A History of Antioch in Syria (1961), 393 n. 4CrossRefGoogle Scholar, and some others, forgetting perhaps about inclusive reckoning, mistakenly calculate late February or early March.

21 Ammianus xxn. 7. 1, cf. Pan. Lat. xi. 28, 30.

22 Ammianus xxm. 1. 1.

23 On consular dress and attributes (and the New Year ceremonies) see Averil Cameron on Corippus, lust. iv. 90 if., pp. 197–8.

24 Meslin, op. cit. (n. 19), 56. One might compare the British coronation: ‘The crowds who turned out to see the queen … were waiting to enter into contact with the mighty powers who were symbolically and, to some extent, really responsible for the care and protection ot their basic values and who on this day had been confirmed in these responsibilities’ (Shils, Edward and Young, Michael, ‘The Meaning of the British Coronation’, in Shils, Edward, Center and Periphery: Essays in Macrosociology (1975), 147)Google Scholar.

25 Ammianus xxm. 1. 6. Compare the sinister omens that marred Nero's last Kalends (Suetonius, Nero 46.2).

26 Valentinian, for example, walking before the Emperor, is said to have struck the attendant who sprinkled him (Theodoret, HE in. 12). The procession to the temple of Tyche that Theodoret describes; took place ‘a year and a few months’ before Valentinianc became emperor. His accession took place on 26 February 364.

27 Shils, op. cit. (n. 24), 151.

28 Or. xn. 69, 79–83.

29 Or. 1. 129. Shaking the toga was a traditional gesture by which persons of authority might demonstrate approval for an orator' performance: Philostratus, V.S. 626 (Caracalla); Eunapius, V.S. 484 (a proconsul). Julian' gesture may have seemed not so much ridiculous as offensively partisan.

30 Or. 1. 129 For a hostile description of Julian' excitable and undignified deportment see Gregory of Nazianzus, Contra Julianum 11. 23 (PG 35. 692).

31 Ammianus xxi. 16. 7; cf. xvi. 10. 10.

32 Ammianus xvi. 10. 13 (in Rome). Alan Cameron, Circus Factions (1976), 157–83, offers a comprehensive discussion of the emperor' relations with his people at the games; see also id., Bread and Circuses: the Roman Emperor and his People (1973); Wallace-Hadrill, A., JRS 72 (1982), 38.Google Scholar

33 Lydus, John, De Mensibus p. 74Google Scholar Wünsch: καὶἁσεῶς τὸ τγῆθος ἁpi;έσκωπτεν εἱς τούς ἅρχοντας οὑ ρήμ;ασιν άλλὰ και σχῆμ;ασιν ἑπί τὸ γελοιῶδες ἕχουσι.

34 Meslin, op. cit. (n. 19), 62–3.

35 Soz., HE v. 17. 2; Theodoret, HE 111. 12, immediately following his description of the Kalends procession of 363. For the date of this passage see above n. 26. Cassiodorus, Historia Tripartita vi. 30, mentions the Kalends; cf. Greg. Naz., Contra Julianum 1. 82–3; Lib., Or. XVIH. 168.

36 Contra Julianum 1. 83–4; cf. Lib., Or. xn. 84; xv. 43; XVIII. 199). Theodoret has them condemned to death and on their knees before, in a Brechtian touch, they are saved by a galloping messenger with a last-minute pardon (HE in. 17).

37 SS. Bonosus and Maximilianus (Acta Sanctorum, 21 August, vol. 4, 430–2). The story contains an impressive number of circumstantial details, as its first editor pointed out: Ruinart, T., Acta Primorum Martyrorum, 2nd ed. (1713), 592Google Scholar. He also observed that the August date is incorrect, since Count Julian, who died soon after sentencing them, met his fate early in 363 (Ammianus xxm. 1. 5–6).

38 They sang: ‘Confounded be all they who worship graven images, who boast themselves in idols’, Soz., HE v. 19; Socr., HE in. 18.

39 Julian allegedly sent for her and ordered his bodyguard to box her ears (Theodoret, HE in. 14).

40 atire regularly enlivened the pompa circensis at Rome, where men dressed as Satyrs and Sileni ‘ridiculed and mimicked the serious movements of the others, translating them into something ridiculous’ (Dion. Hal. vn. 72. 10–11).

41 σαιμ;όνων πομ;πευσάντων ἑπὶ τῆς αγορᾶς(PG 48. 953); cf. Dion. Hal. vn. 72. 13.

42 PG 48. 957.

43 This homily of e.430 gives a detailed description of the diabolical festivities: ‘Ecce veniunt dies, ecce Kalendae veniunt, et tota demonum pompa procedit, idolorum tota producitur officina.…. Figurant Saturnam, faciunt Jovem, formant Herculem, exponunt cum venantibus suis Dianam, circumducunt Vulcanum verbis anhelantem turpitudines suas, et plura quorum quia portenta sunt, nomina sunt tacenda; quorum deformitates quia natura non habet, creatura nescit, fingere ars laborat. Praeterea vestiuntur homines in pecudes, et in feminas viros vertunt, honestatem rident, violant judicia, censuram publicam rident, illudunt saeculo teste, et dicunt se facientes ista iocari. Non sunt ioca, sed sunt crimina' (Homilia de Pythonibus et Maleficiis, PL 65. 27). Although included among the works of Severianus, this homily was actually written by Peter Chrysologus, according to Arbesmann, R., ‘The “Cervuli” and “Anniculae” in Caesarius of Arles’, Traditio 35 (1979), 112 n. 100Google Scholar. I owe this reference to Bill Klingshirn.

44 Misopogon 364A, cf. 366C.

45 The account of Malalas is unfortunately not of much use (Chmn. 327–8). He does describe a crowd scene in which people insulted the emperor, but subordinates everything to a jumbled account of the martyrdom of Juventinus and ‘Maximianus’.

46 C. Th. 1. 16. 6; see Roueché, C. M., JRS 74 (1984), 186Google Scholar.

47 Ammianus xxn. 7. 2.

48 Misopogon 340A.

49 Or. xv. 75, sent to Julian in Persia, σὺ μὲν πάλαι κατεγέλασας may be as close as Libanius could bring himself to mentioning the Misopogon (but see Ep. 802, quoted in n. 12 above). My conclusion that Libanius is referring to the New Year' races is based on a series of inferences. He is not referring to the shouts of πάνταγέμ;ε;, πάντα πολλοῦ that Julian mentions in Misopogon 368C, because that incident took place in the theatre, at the beginning of his stay. Julian tells us himself that he attended the races very rarely, only on festival days (Misopogon 340A), and we know that as consul Julian had to attend the games at New Year. Cf. Lib., Or. xv. ig quoted below.

50 On the claque at Antioch see Liebeschuetz, J. H. W. G., Antioch. City and Imperial Administration in the Later Roman Empire (1972), 208–18, 278–80Google Scholar. Of course, Libanius has every reason to persuade Julian that only a few idlers were responsible for the disturbances. In his speech to the senate at Antioch he anticipates their objection that those involved were foreigners without explicitly endorsing it (Or. xvi. 31–4). The claque seems to have contained dissolute youth of good family as well as foreign desperadoes (Lib., Or. XLI. 9). One might compare the organized misconduct of the student gangs at Athens university, the eversores of Augustine' Carthage (Confessions in. 3), and the ‘Abbeys of Youth’, young men' organizations dedicated to misrule and satiric charivari in medieval and early modern France (Davis, N. Z., Society and Culture in Early Modem France (1965), 104 ft.). For the age of the offenders see also n. 18 above. It might be objected that the earliest explicit evidence for the claque's role in political acclamations comes from Libanius' speeches of the 380s, and that 363 is simply too early. But with the Christian reaction after Julian' death, Libanius went into semi-retirement. We have no letters from the period 365–88, and no public orations until 378. It might also be objected that the claque could not have been operative in the hippodrome, since it had not yet become amalgamated with the circus factions. But Misopogon 339D implies that under Constantius the theatre and hippodrome had been under a joint imperial administrator (whose job Julian then eliminated), and it was precisely this sort of administrative change that promoted the consolidation of the claque and the factions (Cameron, op. cit. (n. 32), 214–29).Google Scholar

51 Or. xv. 19, trans. Norman.

52 Or. ix.

53 Descriptio v. 6.

54 Aἱ γὰρ διαβολικαὶ παννυχίδες αἱ γινόμ;εναι τήμ;ερον, καὶ τὰ σκώμ;μ;ατα, καὶ αἱ γοιδορίαι καὶ χορεῖαιαἱ nu;υκτεριναὶ, καὶἡ καταγέγαστος αὑτὴ κωμ;ῳσία (John Chrysostom, PG 48. 954).

55 ἐπιχλενάέονται, κωμῳδοῦνται λόγοις καὶ ἔργοις (PG 40. 220, in a sermon of r January 400).

56 Lib., Or. ix. 8–9; Descr. V. 5.

57 See Turner, Victor, ‘Liminality and Communitas’ in The Ritual Process: Structure and Anti-Structure (1969), passimGoogle Scholar.

58 Homily on the Night-Vigils at Antioch, 30, available in the free German translation of Landensdorfer, P. in Ausgewählte Schriften der syrischen Dichter, Bibliothek der Kirchenväter (1912). This homily has not previously been cited in discussions of the Kalends, perhaps because the author specifies simply ‘the month of Canun’, instead of First Canun (December) or Second Canun (January). But the occasion is unmistakable. Isaac was awakened, while visiting the city, by night-music in the streets: ‘The whole city was like a banqueting hall; the night was changed as if into day by the singing and merry-making that resounded in it’. Groups of common people clustered with their instruments before the houses of the great and competitively improvised rustic songs. If the songs were improvised, their content was probably topical. I thank Peter Brown for showing me this homily and Michael Guinan, Professor of Semitic Languages at the Franciscan School of Theology in Berkeley, for discussing the Syriac text with me.Google Scholar

59 V. Turner, ‘Images of Anti-Temporality: an Essay in the Anthropology of Experience’, HThR 75 (1982), 253.

60 Sermo adversus Kalendarum Festum, PG 40. 222A. Compare Weinstock, S., ‘Saturnalien und Neujahrfest in den Martyreracten’ in Mullus; Festschrift Klauser, T (1964), 391–400Google Scholar.

61 Sermo adversus Kalendarum Festum, PG 40. 222A. Compare Weinstock, S., ‘Saturnalien und Neujahrfest in den Martyreracten’ in Mullus; Festschrift Klauser, T (1964), 391–400Google Scholar.

62 Lib., Or. xix. 48.

63 Or. xx. 27–8, trans. Norman. Libanius is writing to Theodosius on behalf of the Antiochenes after the infamous Riot of the Statues in 387, which by contrast had not taken place during a festival.

64 The chronology of Ammianus' account is confusing, since he implies that Julian wrote the Misopogon first, in response to curial intransigence about price control, and that ridicule came later: ‘volumen composuit invectivum …’ post quae multa in se facete dicta comperiens, coactus dissimulare pro tempore, ira sufflabatur interna. Ridebatur enim ut Cercops …’ (XXII. 14. 2–3). Rather than have Julian the victim of unprovoked remarks, Ammianus preferred to present him as having the first word and keeping his self-control afterward: ‘et quamquam his paribusque de causis indignaretur, tacens tamen motumque in animi retinens potestate, sollemnia celebrabat’. This comment leads naturally into an account of Julian' sacrifice on Mt Casius during which he magnanimously pardons an old enemy (xxn. 14. 4–5).

65 Misopogon 338D, 360D; Socr., HE m. 17. Julian' retort implies that they might not be tough enough to handle such ropes (338D). Two words from Homer contain a note of menace for the erudite: it was Odysseus' bowstring that hurt the suitors' ‘unworn and tender hands’ (Od. 21. 151).

66 Misopogon 345D.

67 H. A. Verus vil. 10. The lady was the famous Panthea (Lucian, Imagines 10).

68 Dio LXXVIII. 20.

69 XXII. 14. 3.

70 Metamorphoses xiv. 91. The Cercopes had stubby legs; Julian' height was not impressive even to an admirer (‘mediocris erat staturae’, Ammianus xxv. 4. 22; ‘exiguo corpore’, xxn. 2. 5). Suetonius, Peri Blasphematon 89–91, stresses the Cercopes' bad character and mentions a popular etymology derived fromκέρκος, tail or membrum virile.

71 Nonnus ap. Westermann, Mythogr. 375.

72 XXII. 12. 4.

73 HE in. 17; an example from the mint of Antioch: RIC VIII. 529–30.

74 καυσίταυρος: Greg. Naz., Contra Julianum 1. 77.

75 XXII. 14. 3. Compare Gregory' satirical description of the emperor making himself ridiculous by puffing out his cheeks like an old woman to kindle the sacrificial fire (Contra Julianum II. 22).

76 Misopogon 357A; 360D.

77 Misopogon 371A; 360D.

78 HE v. 19. Panegyrical tradition preferred to see the Emperor as lifting the world up (Lib., Or. xm. 42).

79 Of course, which way is ‘up’ depends on your point of view. Julian once wrote, ‘through the folly of the Christians almost everything has been turned upside down (ἅπαντα ἀνετράπη)’, (Ep. 37, Wright).

80 Lib., Or. xix. 49.

81 Lib., Or. xix. 19, trans. Norman.

82 Or. xx. 25. Ammianus xxvi. 10. 12 tells another story.

83 Lib., Or. xx. 6.

84 Lib., Or. xx. 6; xxm. 27; Theodoret, HE v. 20.

85 H. A. Severus ix. 4; Herodian in. 6. 9; Ulpian, Dig. L. 15. 1. 3. Julian punished the obstinately Christian Constantia in this fashion, by ‘attaching’ it to its pagan rival, Gaza.

86 Dio Lxxvin. 22. 1; Herodian iv. 9. 1–3. Destruction of statues may have been part of the provocation. See Millar, F. G. B., A Study of Cassius Dio (1964), 157Google Scholar.

87 ‘gravius rationabili responderunt’ (Ammianus xiv. 7. 2). Since Gallus allowed them all to be rescued by the intercession of the comes orientis, the death sentence may have been but a posture in a charade of intimidation.

88 Or. xv. 55; xvi. 13–14.

89 Soz., HE v. 4 shows that Julian inflicted this punishment on Caesarea, the metropolis of Cappadocia.

90 Confiscations were used by Julian to punish Edessa for the factional excesses of its Arians. The sarcasm of this edict is worth comparing with the Misopogon: ‘Therefore, since by their own most admirable law they are bidden to sell all they have and give to the poor so that they may attain more easily to the kingdom of the skies …’ (Ep. 40, Wright).

91 Ammianus XXIII. 2. 3.

92 Or. xvin. 195–8, trans. Norman.

93 Ep. 50, Wright.

94 ‘But among the living is there anyone so silly or small-spirited as to think he deserves your attention, and would not prefer to be completely ignored by you, but if that were impossible, would rather be reviled by you–as I am now–than receive your praise? May I never have such poor judgement, may I never cease to prefer your insults to your praise!' (Ep. 50, Wright 446A).

95 446B. Note that Libanius knew all about it (Or. xvin. 198). το Nείλου κακόν may have become quasiproverbial (Ep. 758).

96 ἐπιστολὰς … πανηγυρικώτερον γράψας, πανταχοῦ κατὰ πόλεις προέθηκε διακωμlῳμ;δῶν, καὶ τῆς, παντενίας τῷ ἤθει διβαλλων αὐτόν. Socr., HE 1. 9. Hadrian' letter attacking Heliodorus may have achieved notoriety by being published in the same way: ‘litteris famosissimis lacessivit’ (H. A. Hadrian xv. 5).

97 Nero 39.

98 Lib., Or. xx. 25.

99 Sidonius Apollinaris, Ep. v. 8. 2.

100 Canon 52. Compare the famosa epistula against Maxentius that got a Carthaginian deacon into trouble (Optatus 1. 17).

101 Basil, Letter 289.

102 Wright, W., The Chronicle of Joshua the Stylite (1882, repr. 1968), 73. Contrast the discreet ‘suggestion box' for informers’ complaints set up outside his palace by the governor Alexander (ch. 29).Google Scholar

103 HE in. 24.

104 H.A. Marcus xxv.

105 Ad M. Antoninum de eloquentia 2. 7, quoted in Millar, op. cit. (n. 7), 203.

106 Millar, 319–21; 592; 598.

107 Millar, 254, with references.

108 328. 34

109 Lib., Or. xi. 205. It is not quite accurate to say, with Downey (Antioch, 394 n. 89), ‘The Tetrapylon of the Elephants is not mentioned elsewhere and it is not clear from this passage whether or not it stood at the crossing of the four main streets of the island’. Surely Lib., Or. XI. 204 describes a monument at this intersection: ‘From four arches which are joined to each other in the shape of a rectangle, four pairs of stoas proceed as from an omphalos’.

110 Even in classical times non-judicial edicts varied in style and content. A recent treatment of the subject emphasizes the influence of rhetoric: Benner, M., The Emperor says: Studies in the Rhetorical style in Edicts of the Early Empire, Studia Graeca et Latina Gothoburgensia 33 (1975), 190–1Google Scholar.

111 Instead of εὐτυχεῖτε we find, ‘In return for your good will and the honour with which you publicly honoured me, may the Gods pay you back what you deserve’ (371C). On the persistence of the final greeting even in epigraphic copies of imperial letters that omit other formal elements, see W. Williams, ZPE 17 (1975), 41.

112 διάταγμ;α (Ep. 41, Wright, 437D and C).

113 Barnes, T. D., Constantine and Eusebius (1981), 75Google Scholar. Anyone who thinks that passionate invective is a sign of an emperor who has lost his grip should compare some of the letters of Constantine, for example his letter to the bishops after the Council of Aries (Optatus, App. v) and, most spectacularly, his letter to Arius and the Arians (H.-G. Opitz, Athanasius Werke 11. 1, 69–75).

114 Augustus: Suet., DAug. 42, 53, 56. 1; Tacitus, Ann. 1. 78; Tiberius: Tacitus, Ann. v. 5; Claudius: Tacitus, Ann. xi. 13; Nero: Tacitus, Ann. xiv. 45; cf. Galba: Suet., Galba 15. 2, Plutarch, Galba 17. 4.

115 Some idea of what we have lost can be gleaned from Diocletian' edict on incestuous marriages, where the full text (preserved in the Mosaicarum et Romanarum Legum Collatio vi. 4) is fourteen times longer than what remains in the Theodosian Code and contains some strongly emotive language. I owe this reference to Judith Evans-Grubbs.

116 Suet. 56. 1.

117 Suet., Nero 41–2.

118 εἴ τέ τινα γράμ;μ;ατα, οῖα εἴωθεν ῄνώνυμ;α ἐς τοὺς αὐτοκράτορας, προπηλακισμὸν αὐτῷ ψέροντα ἐξετέθη ποτέ, ἀντεξετίθει τὰ πρόσψορα μ;ηδὲν ταρατ-τόμ;ενος (Dio LXV. n ).

119 Dio LXIX. 8. 1.

120 H.A. Hadrian xvi. 3–4.

121 H.A. Macrinus xi. 3–7, xiv. 2–5; Alexander Severus xxxvm. 3–6, with the comments of B. Baldwin, ‘Verses in the Historia Augusta’, BICS 25 (1978), 52–4.

122 Dio LXXVIII. 20.

123 Ammianus xvi. 1. 4, ‘congruens Marco, ad cuius aemulationem actus suos effingebat et mores’. According to Eutropius, who accompanied him to Persia, Julian was ‘Marco Antonino non absimilis, quern etiam aemulari studebat’ (x. 16). Cf. Julian', Letter to Themistius 253AGoogle Scholar. Marcus wins the palm of imperial virtue in the Caesars.

124 v. 2. 3–4. The Antonines and the Severi had brought beards into fashion, but with Constantine they disappeared. Although in Lucian' time wearing a beard could be taken to mean ‘cultivating philosophy’ in a very general sense (Epigram 45), by the mid-fourth century beards were scarcer and more specific in their significance. After Constantine, an emperor with a beard was a walking polemic. The curious reader might wish to consult an entertaining disquisition on the history of western beards by Bagnani, G., ‘Misopogon, The Beard Hater’, Classical News and Views 12 (1968), 73–9.Google Scholar

125 ‘Iocis popularibus dicitur lacessitus’, H.A. xv. 1.

126 xxv. 17.

127 XXII. 5.6; see also 8. 1; 12. 3. Just how it was that Julian gained his rather idiosyncratic knowledge of his predecessors is still a matter of dispute. G. W. Bowersock, ‘The Emperor Julian on his Predecessors’, YCS 27 (1982), 170–2 emphasizes his ignorance of the Latin historical tradition.

128 Ammianus xiv. 1. 6–9.

129 Soz., HE III. 15.

130 Ammianus XXII. 12. 6–7.

131 Lib., Or. xix. 47; Ammianus xiv. 7. 5.

132 Lib., Or. xvi. 35.

133 Misopogon 346C, with particular reference to the festivals of the New Year.

134 When Julian left for Persia, a large delegation from the senate followed him out of town on a very rough road. They were not received until the ninth hour (Julian, Letter 58, Wright; 399C). Libanius had interceded several times before Julian left Antioch (Or. 1. 126, xv. 12; Epp. 802, 815, 824). In situations such as these, the sophist's neutrality, carefully preserved by the scrupulous avoidance of curial duties on the one hand and imperial gifts on the other, might really pay off. At the successful conclusion of the Persian campaign it was expected that he would journey out to meet the emperor and, graciously received, as one Hellene by another, beg Julian not to stay at Tarsus, but to lift up a onceflourishing city, now prostrate with mourning, by deigning to accept the triumphal welcome that awaited him at Antioch. Libanius' Or. xv is written as if it were being delivered on just such an occasion.