Emperors and Bishops in Late Roman Invective

Abstract

This innovative study illuminates the role of polemical literature in the political life of the Roman empire by examining the earliest surviving invectives directed against a living emperor. Written by three bishops (Athanasius of Alexandria, Hilary of Poitiers, Lucifer of Cagliari), these texts attacked Constantius II (337–61) for his vicious and tyrannical behaviour, as well as his heretical religious beliefs. This book explores the strategies employed by these authors to present themselves as fearless champions of liberty and guardians of faith, as they sought to bolster their authority at a time when they were out of step with the prevailing imperial view of Christian orthodoxy. Furthermore, by analysing this unique collection of writings alongside late antique panegyrics and ceremonial, it also rehabilitates anti-imperial polemic as a serious political activity and explores the ways in which it functioned within the complex web of presentations and perceptions that underpinned late Roman power relationships.

A misunderstood emperor?

“…4.19.10 (SC 530,254). For the rhetorical image of the tyrant, see Gaddis (2005), 17-18 andFlower (2013), 82-94. For the imagery of tyranny in the attacks against Constantius, see Flower (2013), 110-13.…”

“…In Roman literature, bad emperors are depicted as being under the influence of persons who elite writers regarded as unworthy such as women, actors, and freedmen. Leppin (1996), 96;Flower (2013) did". 30 Furthermore, according to Socrates and Sozomen, it was Eudoxius who misguided the emperor in cancelling church councils and forbidding bishops to hold their meetings.…”

Witnesses for the Persecution

“…54 I have noted before that Athanasius here presents himself as the hero of the story and makes favor or opposition towards himself the key criterion for classifying figures as orthodox or heretical. 55 Beyond that, however, he also uses these episodes to construct a sense of a Nicene community stretching across the empire and united by him. For each of these persecuted bishops, who display parrhesia in the manner of those persecuted by earlier pagan emperors, their support for -and communion with -the bishop of Alexandria is something that is intrinsically linked with their faith.…”

Panegyric and the Discourse of Praise in Late Antiquity

“…II(12)24–32) or in full length works: Claudian's In Rufinum and In Eutropium are particularly entertaining examples, In Rufinum in particular showing how invective inverts the formulae for writing panegyric. For the deployment of invective by Christian writers in attacking heresy and those who espoused it, see Flower 2013; 2016.…”