The story of Thomas Huxley’s humiliation of bishop Samuel Wilberforce during their altercation in Oxford is the stuff of legend. To the Bishop of Oxford’s provocative enquiry whether Huxley would prefer to have an ape for an ancestor on his grandmother’s or grandfather’s side, Huxley famously retaliated that that he would rather have an ape for an ancestor than a bishop who pronounced on matters of which he was ignorant. A victory for Huxley and for science over religion! But was it really? In this chapter, we examine the accretion of mythology surrounding this notoriously public event. There is no denying that it took place before a raucous and animated audience. Its historical significance is not so easily interpreted. By the end of the nineteenth century, by which time most features of Darwin’s theory enjoyed acceptance, Huxley’s ‘victory’ had become a foundation myth of scientific professionalism, testimony to the importance of intellectual freedom in science and the ascendancy of expert knowledge over amateur prejudice. That retrospective interpretation can, however, distort perceptions of how matters stood in 1860. Even Huxley’s son, Leonard, conceded that talk of his father’s ‘victory’ was misplaced; Wilberforce was not the scientific ignoramus commonly supposed; and Huxley, despite his anticlericalism, considered talk of ‘conflict between science and religion’ to be a fabrication fostered in ignorance.

The status of Rome vis-à-vis the Roman empire is analyzed. Fears that it might be replaced and the imperial capital would be transferred are reported from the first century BC onward. Foundation myths suggested that Rome originated in the East, in Troy, and it was suspected that the capital might move back to the East. These suspicions did not materialize for centuries but became reality under Constantine with the refoundation of Byzantium as Constantinople. The choice of Constantinople as (eastern) capital may not have been a matter of course from the start. Other cities seem to have been considered first, and it is not certain why it was chosen. Furthermore, there is no contemporary evidence that Constantine always conceived his new foundation as the eastern capital of the empire, or that he intended that it should replace Rome. Claims, made first by Christian authors, that Constantine’s city was conceived from the start as the new or second Rome and also as a purely Christian city cannot be confirmed. The city actually took time to develop into an imperial capital. The city became the undisputed centre of the late Roman empire only in the reign of Theodosius I.

The status of Rome vis-à-vis the Roman empire is analyzed. Fears that it might be replaced and the imperial capital would be transferred are reported from the first century BC onward. Foundation myths suggested that Rome originated in the East, in Troy, and it was suspected that the capital might move back to the East. These suspicions did not materialize for centuries but became reality under Constantine with the refoundation of Byzantium as Constantinople. The choice of Constantinople as (eastern) capital may not have been a matter of course from the start. Other cities seem to have been considered first, and it is not certain why it was chosen. Furthermore, there is no contemporary evidence that Constantine always conceived his new foundation as the eastern capital of the empire, or that he intended that it should replace Rome. Claims, made first by Christian authors, that Constantine’s city was conceived from the start as the new or second Rome and also as a purely Christian city cannot be confirmed. The city actually took time to develop into an imperial capital. The city became the undisputed centre of the late Roman empire only in the reign of Theodosius I.