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The Last Days of Constantine: Oppositional Versions and their Influence*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 September 2012

Garth Fowden
Garth Fowden
Affiliation:
Centre for Greek and Roman Antiquity, National Research Foundation, Athens Department of History, Princeton University
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Extract

The earliest surviving account of Constantine's last days, April to May 337, was written by Eusebius of Caesarea as instant history, since Eusebius died in May 338 or 339. Parts of this concluding section of the Vita Constantini, for example the paragraphs about the first Christian emperor's baptism and mausoleum, have attracted scholarly curiosity, others less so. Here I would like to investigate systematically, for the first time, the versions of Constantine's abortive Iranian campaign provided by Eusebius and others, and then move on to consider the origins of a famous account of Constantine's baptism. Both exercises will show how oppositional versions of Constantine's last days influenced the formation of conventionally accepted narratives—or, more specifically, how polytheist historiography helped to mould the Nicaean or ‘orthodox’ perspective, parts of which have prevailed to the present day. Discussion of the fictional accounts of Constantine's baptism by ‘Eusebius of Rome’ and Silvester of Rome will also provide an opportunity to underline the truth of Michel van Esbroeck's observation that ‘the historical aspect of propaganda literature eludes positivist history, of which it is, even so, a part’.

Type
Articles
Information
The Journal of Roman Studies , Volume 84 , November 1994 , pp. 146 - 170
Copyright
Copyright ©Garth Fowden 1994. Exclusive Licence to Publish: The Society for the Promotion of Roman Studies

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References

1 van Esbroeck, M., ‘Le soi-disant Roman de Julien l'Apostat’, Orientalia Christiana Analecta 229 (1987), 202 n. 27Google Scholar.

2 The term ‘India’ is polyvalent at this period, but here may well mean the subcontinent: see below, p. 149, on the possibility that this is an allusion to Metrodorus. In quoting from the V.C, I have made some use of E. C. Richardson's translation (1890).

3 Eus., L.C. XVI.6, trans. H. A. Drake.

4 Winkelmann, F., ‘Zur Geschichte des Authentizitäts problems der Vita Constantini’, Klio 40 (1962), 232CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

5 On the kephalaia, see F. Winkelmann's edition (1975), XLVI–XLIX.

6 This interpolation is printed by Winkelmann at the bottom of p. 144 of his edition. See also Winkelmann, op. cit. (n. 4), 232.

7 Winkelmann, F., Die Textbezeugung der Vita Constantini des Eusebius von Caesarea (1962), 71–7.Google Scholar

8 Gel. Cyz., H.E. III. 10.26–7; Winkelmann, F., Untersuchungen zur Kirchengeschichte des Gelasios von Kaisareia (1966), 41–3Google Scholar.

9 See below, p. 148, on Lib., or. LIX.72. Gelasius of Cyzicus had no direct knowledge of the V.C.: see Winkelmann's edition of the V.C. XX.

10 These are the Pythia Therma: Corsten, T. (ed.), Die Inschriften von Apameia (Bithynien) und Pylai (1987), 140–7Google Scholar and maps 1, 3.

11 On the date see Barnes, T. D., Constantine and Eusebius (1981), 258–9, 397 n. 144Google Scholar. Eus., V.C. IV.8, notes that Constantine's letter to Shapur was sent in response to an Iranian diplomatic initiative, plausibly identified by Petit, P., ‘Libanius et la “Vita Constantini”’, Historia I (1950), 574–5Google Scholar, with an embassy which, according to Lib., or. LIX.67, Shapur had sent some considerable time before the events of 337 (ibid. 71: λογτζόμενος…τῆς μελέτης τὸν χϱόνον) to request supplies of Roman iron for armaments(!)). Having granted the request (the exceptional generosity praised at V.C. IV.8), Constantine will have demanded protection for Iranian Christians as a quid quo. Eastern, including Iranian, conquests are looked forward to in various poems composed, at about the time Constantine gained control of the East, by Publilius Optatianus Porfyrius: v (referring to Crispus, d. 326), XIV, XVIN; and cf. above, p. 146. Constantine had already before 321 received diplomatic overtures from Iran according to Pan. Lat. XF[V].38.3.

12 Eus., V.C. 1.42.1.

13 W. Portmann, ‘Die 59. Rede des Libanios und das Datum der Schlacht von Singara’, Byz.Z. 82 (1989), 1–14; Barnes, T. D., Athanasius and Constantius: Theology and Politics in the Constantinian Empire (1993), 312 n. 19.Google Scholar

14 On the Origo, EKG, Aurelius Victor, Eutropius, and Festus see Herzog, R. (ed.), Handbuch der lateinischen Literatur der Antike 5 (1989), 195–210Google Scholar. On the Origo's date, see also Barnes, T. D., ‘Jerome and the Origo Constantini Imperatoris’, Phoenix 43 (1989), 158–61CrossRefGoogle Scholar, and Zecchini, G., Ricerche di storiografia latina tardoantica (1993), 29–35Google Scholar, "Suing also (35–8) that the Origo is in fact the sole surviving fragment of the EKG. Although 35 is marred by an insertion from Orosius, the original sense is clear enough.

15 George Cedrenus 1.516–17 Bekker; Bleckmann, B., ‘Die Chronik des Johannes Zonaras und eine pagane Quelle zur Geschichte Konstantins’, Historia 40 (1991)Google Scholar, especially, on Metrodorus, 358–63 (raising the possibility of a relationship between Ammianus and the ‘Leoquelle’). Warmington, B. H., ‘Ammianus Marcellinus and the lies of Metrodorus’, C.Q. 31 (1981), 464–8CrossRefGoogle Scholar, suggests the story may have been in Eunapius too.

16 Eus., V.C. IV.7, 50; Bleckmann, op. cit. (n. 15), 360–1.

17 Eus.-Hieron., Chron. a.330: ‘Metrodorus philosophus agnoscitur’; Rufinus, H.E.X.9: ‘Metrodorus quidam filosofus inspiciendorum locorum et orbis perscrutandi gratia ulteriorem dicitur Indiam penetrasse.’

18 See e.g. Socr. Sch., H.E. III.22; Soz., H.E. VI.3.2; and, for an extreme illustration, below n. 38 (John of Nikiu).

19 Lib., or. LIX.59–61, 67, 72.

20 Lib., or. XVIII.206.

21 Lib., or. XLIX.2.

22 George Cedrenus 1.519 Bekker; Zonaras XIII.4.25–7; and cf. Leo Grammaticus 87–8 Bekker; Bleckmann, op. cit. (n. 15), 356–8.

23 Eus., V.C. IV.8: ἐπειδὴ δὲ ϰαὶ ὁ Περσω-ν βασιλεὺς Κωνσταντίνῳ γνωρίζεσθαι διὰ πρεσβείας ἠξίου…

24 I differ here from, e.g., Wirth, G., ‘Hannibalian: Anmerkungen zur Geschichte eines überflüssigen Königs’, B 190 (1990), 217–19Google Scholar; idem, ‘Die Mission des Katholikos: Zum Problem armenisch-römischer Beziehungen im 4.Jh.’., Jb.A.C 34 (1991), 41–3 (invoking at n. 102 ‘die Milde’ of Eus., V.C. IV.57, i.e. the Renaissance interpolation, though we know from Socr. Sch., H.E. 1.18, that Eusebius in fact represented Constantine as behaving very fiercely to the Iranian ambassadors). See Fowden, G., Empire to Commonwealth: Consequences of Monotheism in Late Antiquity (1993), 93–7Google Scholar, for the view that Constantine, like Eusebius, aspired to subject Iran to the authority of Christian Rome. This does not, though, exclude the possibility that Shapur too was spoiling for a fight.

25 Eus., V.C. IV.64; Cobb, P. G., ‘The history of the Christian year’, in Jones, C. and others (eds), The Study of Liturgy (2nd edn, 1992), 463Google Scholar.

26 Eus., V.C. in.7–8.

27 On the V.C.'s readership, see Fowden, op. cit. (n. 24), 86 n. 25. Petit's argument, op. cit. (n. II), that Lib., or. LIX depends on the V.C. rests on unconvincing parallels and on the view that the Renaissance humanist's interpolation at IV. 57 is genuine, at least in the sense that it had entered the text by 340: see Winkelmann, op. cit. (n. 4), 224–6, 232.

28 Ruf., H.E. X. 12; Philost., H.E. II. 16; Socr. Sch., H.E. I. 39; Soz., H.E. II. 34.1; Thdt., H.E. I.32.

29 See above, p. 147.

30 Mazza, M., ‘Costantino nella storiografia ecclesiastica the (dopo Eusebio)’, in Bonamente, G. and Fusco, F. (eds), Costantino il Grande dall'antichita all'umanesimo: Colloquio sul Cristianesimo nel mondo antico, Macerata 18–20 Dicembre 1990 (1992–1993), 659–92Google Scholar (without discussion of the Iranian campaign).

31 Barnes, T. D., ‘Panegyric, history and hagiography in Eusebius’ Life of Constantine’, in Williams, R. (ed.), The Making of Orthodoxy: Essays in Honour of Henry Chadwick (1989), 107Google Scholar.

32 Lib., or. LIX.60-1; Petit, op. cit. (n. 11), 576.

33 Eus.-Hieron., Chron. a.337, p. 234 Helm; Orosius, , Hist, VII.28.31Google Scholar. The EKG material also appears in the Chronicon paschale a.337, p. 532 (Dindorf), and in Theophanes, Chron. 33 de Boor, along with an allusion to Constantine's Arian baptism by Eusebius of Nicomedia/Constantinople. Theophanes makes explicit reference to an Arian source, and Bidez, J. and Winkelmann, F., Philostorgius, Kirchengeschichte (3rd edn, 1981), 208–9Google Scholar, derive both texts from the ‘Arian historiographer’, who perhaps wrote as early as the reign of Theodosius I: Brennecke, H. C., Studien zur Geschichte der Homöer: Der Osten bis zum Ende der homöischen Reichskirche (1988), 93–4, 14–16, 127Google Scholar n. 65, 152–7). That need not mean that though Jerome had made the connection by c. 380 (loc. cit., with a strongly disapprobatory remark on Arianism). On the complicated question of the Chronicon paschale's sources, see the introduction by M. and M. Whitby to their translation, esp. xvi–xviii. On whether Jerome used Ar. hist., note the comments of Portmann, op. cit. (n. 13), 5–7.

34 V. Aiello, ‘Costantino, la lebbrae il battesimo di Silvestro’, in Bonamente and Fusco, op. cit. (n. 30), 38–48.

35 See I. König's edition of the Origo (1987), 12, 15, 19.

36 Zos. 11.32.1, and see below, p. 165.

37 Io. Mal., Chron. XIII. 317 Dindorf (trans. E. Jeffreys and others).

38 John of Nikiu, Chron.LXXVII. 61–2 (with R. H. Charles's note ad loc.); LXXX.3, 28. But John's glowing account thoroughgoing travesty: LXXX.34–6.

39 F. J. Dölger, ‘Die Taufe Konstantins und ihre Probleme’, in idem, Konstantin der Grosse und seine Zeit (1913), 385–6.

40 The seventh-century Chronicon paschale, a.337, p. 532 Dindorf, has the baptism performed by ‘Eusebius of Constantinople’. This passage may derive from the ‘Arian historiographer’: see above, n. 33.

41 See below, Sections c, d.

42 Barnes, op. cit. (n. 111), 38.

43 Study of the traditions relating to Pope Silvester is now being put on a new footing by Wilhelm Pohlkamp (Münster), to whom I am obliged for offprints and other help. I refer to Pohlkamp's publications as follows: Pohlkamp (1983) ‘Tradition und Topographie: Papst Silvester I. (314–335) und der Drache vom Forum Romanum’, R.Q.A. 78 (1983), 1–100Google Scholar.

Pohlkamp, (1984) ‘Kaiser Konstantin, der heidnische und der christliche Kult in den Actus Silvestri’, F.M.S. 18 (1984). 357–400Google Scholar.

Pohlkamp (1988) ‘Privilegium ecclesiae Romanae pontifici contulit: Zur Vorgeschichte der Konstantinischen Schenkung’, in Fälschungen im Mittelalter. Internationaler Kongress der Monumenta Germaniae Historica, München, 16.-19. September 1986,2: Gefälschte Rechtstexte - Der bestrafte Fälscher (1988), 413–90Google Scholar.

Pohlkamp, (1992) ‘Textfassungen, literarische Formen und geschichtliche Funktionen der römischen Silvester-Akten’, Francia 19 (1992), 115–96Google Scholar.

44 Note though that Silvester's reign was backdated to 310 as early as Jerome, so that later generations commonly regarded him as the pope under whom the Church was recognized: Ewig, E. (ed. Atsma, H.), Spätantikes und fränkisches Gallien: Gesammelte Schriften (1952–1973) (1976–1979), 1.82–3Google Scholar; Pohlkamp (1992), 195.

45 Pohlkamp (1992), 187–96.

46 Pohlkamp (1992), 116–31.

47 The argument of Sections b–e is summarized in table 1 on p. 166 below. Both the argument and the diagram are meant to draw attention to relationships between various narratives, some written and others oral, some extant and some hypothetical. The process involved was, needless to say, much more diffuse and imprecise than that implied in, for example, the stemmata prefaced to text-editions and destined to show which specific manuscript(s) a given scribe worked with.

48 Levison, W., ‘Konstantinische Schenkung und Silvester-Legende’, in Miscellanea Francesco Ehrle: Scritti di storia e paleografia (1924)Google Scholar (reprinted with a few bibliographical additions in idem, Aus rheinischer und fränkischer Frühzeit: Ausgewählte Aufsätze (1948), 390 – 465), 176–7, 181–2; Pohlkamp (1992), 126–7, 149–50, 181–3, and note also 128 on a fragment of a fifth-century palimpsest manuscript of Italian origin, now at Klagenfurt, which contained at least that part of the Actus Silvestri which tells of Silvester's disputation with the Jews.

49 Fowden, G., ‘Constantine, Silvester and the church of S. Polyeuctus in Constantinople’, JRA 7 (1994Google Scholar).

50 cf., e.g., the apparently very rapid dissemination of the stories, closely related to the Actus, concerning the empress Helena's discovery of the True Cross: below, P-159.

51 Pohlkamp (1983), 31–44; idem (1984), esp. 358–9, 373–4. 377- 379. 380. 395–400; idem (1988), 464–90.

52 Note the comments of Duchesne, L., Le Liber pontificalis (2nd edn, 1955–1957)Google Scholar, I.CXIII, on his limited interest in buildings.

53 ‘Noch ans Ende des 4-Jh.’ (Pohlkamp (1992), 149 n. 160); ‘nicht vor 391’, and clearly not known to Ambrose in 395 (Pohlkamp (1988), 482 and n. 251) or for that matter to Prudentius in 402/3 (Pohlkamp (1992), 159 n. 208). At (1988), 486 n. 264, Pohlkamp allows the possibility of a date as late as c. 420.

54 Pohlkamp (1984), 370–1.

55 On the disparate origin of the Actus’ constituent parts, of which the conversion narrative is only one, see Aiello, op. cit. (n. 34), 22–4, 30–2. The Actus imply that Constantine's baptism occurred after 324, but then have him preside over a debate between Silvester and some Jews in 315.

56 The development of the manuscript tradition is surveyed by Pohlkamp (1992), 136–48.

57 Mombritius, B., Sanctuarium seu Vitae sanctorum (Milan, c. 1475–80, ff. 279V–293VGoogle Scholar, Paris, 2nd edn, 1910, 2.508–31; also in P. De Leo, Ricerche sui falsi medioevali 1: Il Constitutum Constantini: Compilazione agiografica del sec. VIII. Note e documenti per una nuova lettura (1974), 151–221). On other printed versions, see Pohlkamp (1992), 132–8.

58 W. Pohlkamp, Die Actus Silvester-Legende): Text der ältesten Fassung A(i) (forthcoming). In his articles (above, n. 43), Pohlkamp provides abundant extracts from both A(I) and the somewhat later version B(I), which he dates c. 500, and from which Mombritius’ version derives. For a comparison of versions A(I) and B(I) see Pohlkamp (1992), 170–81. The differences between the printed version and Pohlkamp's as yet unpublished edition of A(I), a draft of which he kindly sent me, appear to be insufficiently substantial to undermine the historical arguments advanced in the present article. I quote from Pohlkamp's edition, using De Leo's subdivision of the text.

59 Text at Pohlkamp (1988), 449 n. 132.

60 The MS variants are listed by Pohlkamp (1988), 451 n. 142.

61 Cyr. Al., Jul. VII, P.G. 76.876–80.

62 On the date, see Barnes, op. cit. (n. 13), 206.

63 Barnes, op. cit. (n. 11), 270, and cf. 267 on Constantius.

64 Eun., V.Phil., VI.2

65 For further evidence pointing in this direction, see below, p. 163. That the Hist, contained numerous stories designed to discredit Constantine is certain: fr. 9.1–2 (Blockley).

66 Eun., V.Phil, VII. 1.5; Penella, R. J., Greek Philosophers and Sophists in the Fourth Century A.D.: Studies in Eunapius of Sardis (1990), 13–19Google Scholar.

67 On Sozomen's use of Eunapius, see G. C. Hansen's Constantius. introduction to J. Bidez's edition of Sozomen (1960), li. M.

68 Eun., V.phil. VI.2.3.

69 Eus., L.C. XI.5 (trans. H. A. Drake).

70 Lact., Div. inst. III.26.

71 Porph., Chr. fr.88 von Harnack; and note also Libanius, or. XVIII.178.

72 Socr. Sch., H.E. I.10; Soz., H.E. I.22.

73 Fowden, G., ‘Constantine's porphyry column: The earliest literary allusion’, JRS 81 (1991), 119–31Google Scholar.

74 See most recently Paschoud's edition of Zosimus (1971–89), 3(2). 84–7, but also the scepticism of, e.g., Matthews, J., The Roman Empire of Ammianus (1989), 476 n. 6, 479 n. 7Google Scholar.

75 Note especially Pohlkamp's interesting suggestion, (1992), 157 n. 203, that the Actus may have in part been inspired by the reliefs on the Arch of Constantine.

76 Levison, op. cit. (n. 48), 239; Pohlkamp (1988), 430, although at (1992), 158 n. 206 he concedes that the Actus were a counterblast to Greek polytheist traditions about Constantine's conversion. He is compelled to do this because, ignoring Sozomen, he takes Zosimus’ account of Constantine's conversion to be a simple transcript of Eunapius, which I doubt: see below, Section e. But I do not, of course, dispute that such polytheist slanders circulated in the fourth century, whether or not Zosimus is a good guide to them.

77 Pohlkamp (1992), 132 n.76, lists those who have followed Duchesne, op. cit. (n.54), I.CXIII-CXIV. But Duchesne denied any connection between the polytheist versions and the Actus (I.CXVII).

78 The oldest known version of the Greek text, in an eighth- or ninth-century manuscript at S. Catherine's, Sinai, is printed by E. Nestle, ‘Die Kreuzauffindungslegende: Nach einer Handschrift von Sinai’, Byz.Z. 4 (1895), 324–31. There is no critical edition of the Greek Inventio: other versions are listed by Borgehammar, S., How the Holy Cross was Found: From Event to Medieval Legend (1991), 226–9Google Scholar, who also provides a critical edition of the Latin translation, 255–71, and discusses the Syriac translation, 246–9. On the historical environment of these successive versions, see ibid., 146–50, 201–4.

79 Borgehammar, op. cit. (n. 78), 151, 241–2.

80 van Esbroeck, op. cit. (n. 1), 193, 201–2. The first part of the fragmentary narrative printed by Hoffmann, J. G. E., Iulianas der Abtruennige: Syrische Erzaehlungen (1880)Google Scholar, ends as follows: ‘Finished is the glorious history of King Constantine the Christian and of his sons, and the history of the blessed Eusebius, Bishop of Rome’ (p. 59, trans. Gollancz, H., Julian the Apostate, Now Translated for the First Time from the Syriac Original (1928), 65Google Scholar).

81 De Leo, op. cit. (n. 57), 148; Holder, A. (ed.), Inventio Sanctae Crucis (1889), 16Google Scholar. See also below, p. 161, on Agathangelos, and Io. Mal., Chron. XIII.316–17 Dindorf, who follows the Visio's account of Constantine's campaign and vision, but then diverges by explicitly locating the baptism at Rome, and having Silvester rather than Eusebius administer it.

82 van Esbroeck, M., ‘Legends about Constantine in Armenian’, in Samuelian, T.J. (ed.), Classical Armenian Culture: Influences and Creativity (1982), 85, 93–4Google Scholar, draws attention to the way in which, c. 460, Agathangelos too (see below) draws on both the baptism and the inventio narratives. Io. Mal., Chron. XIII. 316–17 Dindorf, has the same combination: see also the previous note.

83 The solution proposed by the ‘Eusebius of Rome’ version to the intrinsic problems of Constantine's Vita is so obvious and elegant that one might be tempted to object that it needed no stimulus from any polytheist version. But note the markedly anti-polytheist slant of the ‘Eusebius of Rome’ episode in the Syriac Julian romance: above, p. 159.

84 Lact., Mort. pers. XXXIII–XXXV.

85 2 Kings v; Actus Silvestri 1.10 (= Pohlkamp (1988), 480 n. 248).

86 See the introduction to R. W. Thomson's reprint and translation (1976) of the 1914 Tiflis edition of Agathangelos (to which I am indebted for quotations, though note also the reviews by Lang, D. M., Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London 41 (1978), 175–6CrossRefGoogle Scholar, and Winkler, G., Catholic Historical Review 65 (1979), 312–16Google Scholar), xc. Thomson's discussion of Agathangelos’ sources (lxxix–xciii) says nothing about the narratives of Constantine's baptism. The connection is briefly noted by van Esbroeck, op. cit. (n. 82), 93–4 (but on this article see below, n. 88).

87 Coleman, C. Bush, Constantine the Great and Christianity (1914)Google Scholar, one of the few writers to consider, even in passing, the similarities between Agathangelos and the narratives of Constantine's baptism, concluded from them that they represent a very early stage in the evolution of the Silvester version, which therefore arose in either Armenia or Syria (157–8). Duchesne, Like, Liber pontificalis I. cxiii–cxivGoogle Scholar, Coleman rejected any connection between the Silvester version and the polytheist slander (129).

88 The sixth-century Greek translation (Ag) of the Armenian Agathangelos (Aa) has Eusebius (165: Lafontaine, G., La version grecque ancienne du livre arménien d'Agathange. Edition critique (1973), 336Google Scholar; and cf. 39 for the date), as does the early Greek Vita of Gregory (Vg), which is a different recension of the same story told by Agathangelos (182: Garitte, G., Documents pour l'étude du livre d'Agathange (1946), 110Google Scholar; and cf. 334, 344 for the early date). But V also inserts a letter not in Agathangelos, in which Constantine bids Trdat visit Rome and alludes to his own baptism by Silvester (176: , Garitte, Documents, 107Google Scholar). The early seventh-century Syriac ‘résumé of Agathangelos’ (S), which assimilated both A and V and is in fact our earliest evidence for the existence of either (van Esbroeck, M., ‘Le résumé syriaque de l'Agathange’, AB 95 (1977), 291–358Google Scholar; cf. idem, ‘Un nouveau tèmoin du livre d'Agathange’, R.E.Arm. 8 (1971), 19–20), knows only a bishop of Rome called Leontius (an allusion to Leontius of Caesarea, who consecrated Gregory the Illuminator). For a summary of the various versions of A and V, see Winkler, G., ‘Our present knowledge of the History of Agat'angelos and its oriental versions’, R.E.Arm. 14 (1980), 125–41Google Scholar. van Esbroeck, M., ‘Le résumé syriaque de l'Agathange et sa portée pour l'histoire du développement de la légende’, Handes Amsorya 90 (1976), 493–510Google Scholar, and in the article cited above, n. 82, regards the whole of V, including Constantine's letter, as a version of the Trdat-Gregory story earlier than Aa and more tolerant of Roman claims, while Aa emphasizes Armenian priority, initiative, and independence. Though a plausible analysis of the text's intention, this presupposes a very early date for the arrival of the Silvester version in the East (A being placed c. 460), and indeed for the composition of the Actus Silvestri (if we assume that Agathangelos encountered the story in a written version). There is no good evidence for either of these propositions: see above, pp. 154–5, and below, p. 164. If, then, V is to be assigned to the fifth century, Constantine's letter must be a sixth-century insertion, a strengthening of the Chalcedonian version (see Garitte's comments, Documents, 343–5) just when, as van Esbroeck himself argues, A was being adjusted to reflect a relatively (Garitte, Documents, 345 n. 1) Armenocentric viewpoint. V's sixth-century editor (or author?) left Eusebius in because he regarded him as Silvester's successor, or by oversight.

89 Influenced, perhaps, by polytheist versions of Constantine's entry into Rome and refusal to visit the Capitol, on which see Section e.

90 On Roman colour in the Actus, see Levison, op. cit. (n. 48), 182–6; Pohlkamp (1983); above, n. 75. Was the idea that Constantine was baptized in the Lateran encouraged by his lavish embellishment in porphyry and precious metals of the Lateran baptistery (Liber pontificalis 34 (1.174 Duchesne))?

91 Ed. and trans. Frothingham, A. L., ‘L'omelia di Giacomo di Sarûg sul battesimo di Costantino imperatore’, MAL 8 (1883), 167–242Google Scholar.

92 Cramer, W., ‘Irrtum und Lüge: Zum Urteildes Jakob von Sarug über Reste paganer Religion und Kultur’, JbAC 23 (1980), 100 n. 36Google Scholar.

93 This feature recalls the Vita Constantini: Barnes, op. cit. (n. 11), 268.

94 Gel. Cyz. ap. Phot., Bibl. 88.67a; cf. Theophanes, Chron. 17–18 de Boor.

95 Fowden, op. cit. (n. 49).

96 Damsholt, T., ‘Das Zeitalter des Zosimos: Euagrios, Eustathios und die Aufhebung des chrysargyron’, ARID 8 (1977), 89–102Google Scholar, showed that there are no irrefragable arguments for dating Zosimus more exactly than between 430 and 590, though probably he wrote after the 450s and before the 530s. Paschoud, in his edition of Zosimus, 3(2).80–1, and see also I.IX–XX, continues to regard the abolition of the chrysargyron in 498 as a virtually certain terminus post quem, and the 530s as the terminus ante quem.

97 Barnes, op. cit. (n. 11), 273–4.

98 See, e.g., Paschoud in his edition of Zosimus, 3(2).84.

99 Paschoud's edition, 3(2).83.

100 See below, n. 133.

101 e.g. Epitome de Caesaribus XLI. II – I8; and cf. G. Bonamente, ‘Eutropio e la tradizione pagana su Costantino’, in L. Gasperini (ed.), Scritti storico-epigrafici in memoria di Marcello Zambelli (1978), 43–5.

102 cf. also Zosimus’ direct transition from the passage under discussion (11.29) to an account of the foundation of Constantinople (11.30), with the addition of a fundatio narrative to certain versions of the Actus. Since Eunapius’ account of Constantine's conversion was set at Constantinople, he will not have placed the story of the city's foundation after it, so Zosimus cannot here be used as evidence for the structure of Eunapius’ narrative. But we cannot here be sure that Zosimus is following the Actus: with regard to the date of the fundatio's addition to the Actus, Pohlkamp will commit himself only to ‘spätestens im 7. Jahrhundert’, (1992), 184–7.

103 Fowden, op. cit. (n. 49).

104 J. Straub, Regeneratio imperii: Aufsätze über Roms Kaisertum und Reich im Spiegel der heidnischen und christlichen Publizistik (1972), 107.

105 This point escaped Pohlkamp (1984), 390 n. 143, who unjustifiably argued against Straub that (1) the Silvester story could only have reached the East as a text — the Actus Silvestri known to us — rather than an oral narrative and/or picture: see Fowden, op. cit. (n. 49); (2) the text Zosimus depended on must have been in Greek, not Latin — though it would have been possible for the Latin to be translated, even orally; (3) Zosimus wrote earlier rather than later in the reign of Anastasius — which can be asserted but not proved. It should also be borne in mind that the basic story (how close in detail to the Silvester version we cannot know) had long been familiar in the East in the shape of the ‘Eusebius of Rome’ version. Pohlkamp is followed in his denial of Zosimus’ use of the Silvester version by Aiello, op. cit. (n. 34), 32, 50 n. 60, who offers the somewhat desperate solution that Sozomen used the first edition of Eunapius’ Historia, and Zosimus the second.

106 F. Paschoud, ‘Ancora sul rifiuto di Constantino di salire al Campidoglio’, in Bonamente and Fusco, op. cit.(n. 30), 737–48, with all necessary references.

107 Panegyrici latini IX [XII]. 19. 3 on Constantine's entry into Rome in 312; Eus., , V.C. I.48Google Scholar, in. III.15; idem, L.C. 11.5.

108 Straub, op. cit. (n. 104), 102–5.

109 F. Paschoud, Cinq études sur Zosime (1975), 58–9. Paschoud also feels that the serious deterioration mentioned by Zosimus in relations between Constantine and Rome cannot have occurred as early as 312. But Roman views of Constantine can never have been homogeneous, and it is easy to imagine that, in the immediate aftermath of 312, one party will have celebrated his triumph over Maxentius while others sulked about the Capitol. Zosimus merely emphasizes and magnifies the significance of the latter viewpoint — surely that is what one expects of polemicists?

110 Paschoud, op. cit. (n. 106), 747.

111 If Virius Nicomachus Flavianus’ Annales have to be invoked, this is where they fit best.

112 Fowden, op. cit. (n. 73), 120–1.

113 Hist. Aug., V.Elag. XV.7.

114 See on this Paschoud, op. cit. (n. 109), 126–7.

115 Theoretically Zosimus may have known the ‘Eusebius of Rome’ version and/or the combined polytheist narrative. But it seems more economical and probable to suppose he used the Silvester narrative, which was tributary to both these earlier versions, and is known to have circulated at Constantinople in Zosimus’ day.

116 Paschoud, op. cit. (n. 109), 214.

117 Evagrius, , H.E. III.40–1Google Scholar.

118 Theophanes, Chron. 17 de Boor, followed by George Cedrenus 1.476 Bekker.

119 Paschoud, op. cit. (n. 109), 126–8.

120 Sherrard, P., The Greek East and the Latin West: A Study in the Christian Tradition (1959; rev. 1992), 58–61Google Scholar.

121 Frothingham, op. cit. (n.91), 215.

122 Actus Silvestri 1.13 = Pohlkamp (1984), 391 n. 148, (1988), 483. Interpreting Lact., Mort. pers. LII.5, F. Winkelmann has wondered whether ‘Konstantin zu dieser Zeit [c. 314–15] den Christen doch noch nicht so eindeutig in seiner Haltung erschien’: ‘Konstantins Religionspolitik un ihre Motive im Urteil der literarischen Quellen des 4. und 5. Jahrhunderts’, AAnt.Hung. 9 (1961), 240Google Scholar.

123 Eus., , V.C. IV.62.3.Google Scholar

124 Dölger, op. cit. (n. 39), 426–9; H. Kraft, ‘Zur Taufe Kaiser Konstantins’, in Aland, K. and Cross, F. L. (eds), Studia patristica 1 (1957), 642–8Google Scholar. One suspects that in a less scrupulous age someone would have been found to cut the Gordian knot and remove the offending phrase.

125 Eus., V.C. IV.24.

126 On the comparison, already implicit in Eusebius, see Montgomery, H., ‘Konstantin, Paulus und das Liehtkreuz’, S.O. 63 (1988), 84–109Google Scholar.

127 See, e.g., Liber pontificalis 55 (1.275 Duchesne), with Fowden, op. cit. (n. 48); of Tours, Gregory, Historia francorum II.31Google Scholar; H. Lavagne, ‘Triomphe et baptême de Constantin: Recherche iconographique à propos d'une mosaïque médiévale de Riez’, JS (1977), 176–7, 190.

128 See, e.g., Moravcsik, G., ‘Sagen und Legenden über Kaiser Basileios I’, DOP 15 (1961), 59–126Google Scholar; A. Markopoulos, ‘Constantine the Great in Macedonian historiography: models and approaches’, in P. Magdalino (ed.), New Constantines: The Rhythm of Imperial Renewal in Byzantium, 4th-13th Centuries (1994) — I am grateful to the author for an advance copy of this article.

129 Mal., Io., Chron. XIII.317–18Google Scholar Dindorf; likewise of Nikiu, John, Chron. LXXVII.60–2Google Scholar, LXXX.3.

130 Eus.., V.C. IV.62.1–2.

131 Fowden, op. cit. (n. 49).

132 Kazhdan, A., ‘“Constantin imaginaire”: Byzantine legends of the ninth century about Constantine the Great’, Byzantion 57 (1987), 196–250Google Scholar; Bonamente and Fusco, op. cit. (n. 30); Magdalino, op. cit. (n. 128).

133 ‘Possibly in disgust at the execution of Crispus’: Barnes, op. cit. (n. 11), 384 n. 10. If so, and Ossius, as has been suggested, was Zosimus’ ‘Egyptian’, we have an example of how propaganda is often a simple inversion of the truth. For a sceptical view of Ossius’ role in Constantine's career, see Lippold, A., ‘Bischof Ossius von Cordova und Konstantin der Grosse’, ZKG 92 (1981), 1–15Google Scholar.

134 G. Dagron, Constantinople imaginaire: Etudes sur le recueil des Patria (1984); Kazhdan, op. cit. (n. 132).

135 cf. Kazhdan, op. cit. (n. 132), 250, on the Parastaseis syntomoi chronikai.