Popular religious beliefs and the late Roman historians

Arnaldo Momigliano

doi:10.1017/S0424208400005386

Popular religious beliefs and the late Roman historians

Published online by Cambridge University Press: 21 March 2016

Arnaldo Momigliano

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Arnaldo Momigliano*: Affiliation:
University College London, University of London

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Students of historiography have become increasingly gloomy in their evaluation of the Greek founding fathers of historiography. All the limits, the shortcomings, and the failures of conventional history writing – the histoire événementielle of French terminology – have been laid at the door of Thucydides. Herodotus has escaped obloquy, either because he offered a promise of variety, curiosity, humour and sensitiveness which Thucydides spoiled, or because (as Professor Seth Benardete says in a very recent book) ‘his foundations are not those of modern historiography’. Thucydides has become the great villain of historiography in so far as he identified history with political and military events. Professor Moses Finley and I may in the past have said some unkind words about Thucydides – so did the late Professor Collingwood. But we are now made to look like mild apologists of Thucydides by Hermann Strasburger. This most penetrating interpreter of ancient historians has treated Thucydides’s approach to history as the survival of a prehistoric mode of thinking, for which war was the most important event. According to Strasburger, Thucydides excluded das Humanum from history and therefore derived his scale of values from ‘prescientific and ultimately precivilised, prehistoric strata of thought’. Strasburger tries to show that some hellenistic historians, such as Agatharchides and Posidonius, showed more interest in the business of peaceful coexistence than Thucydides ever did, but he is under no illusion about their ultimate success. Thucydides’s historical approach prevailed: deviationists were silenced. The Romans inherited from the Greeks a type of historical writing for which war was the central theme. What Thucydides did not know was not history.

Type: Research Article
Information: Studies in Church History , Volume 8: Popular Belief and Practice , 1972 , pp. 1 - 18

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/S0424208400005386 [Opens in a new window]
Copyright: Copyright © Ecclesiastical History Society 1972

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References

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^{page no 1 note 2} Die Wesensbestimmung der Geschichte durch die antike Geschichtsschreibung (Wiesbaden 1966) p 71 Google Scholar.

^{page no 2 note 1} Hellenica, v, 4, 1.

^{page no 2 note 2} Ibid, 1, 7, 15.

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^{page no 3 note 2} Much information in Haussier, R., Tacitus und das historische Bewusstsein (Heidelberg 1965)Google Scholar.

^{page no 4 note 1} Livy, XLIII, 13, 1.

^{page no 4 note 2} Ibid, IV, 30, 9.

^{page no 5 note 1} Ibid, XXIX, 14, 2.

^{page no 5 note 2} Annals, XV, 44, 5.

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^{page no 5 note 4} Koets, P. J., ‘Deisidajmonia‘ (diss. Utrecht 1929)Google Scholar; Fugier, H., Recherches sur l’expression du sacré dans la langue latine (Paris 1963) p 172 Google Scholar. Cf also the general histories of Greek and Roman religion by M.P. Nilsson and K. Latte.

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^{page no 6 note 2} Ibid.

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^{page no 8 note 2} Divinae Institutions, IV, 28, 11. For editions see ODCC.

^{page no 8 note 3} Amm Marc, XXXI, 2, 11.

^{page no 8 note 4} Ibid, XXXI, 2, 23.

^{page no 9 note 1} Ibid, XXV, 4, 17; XXX, 9, 5.

^{page no 9 note 2} Ibid, XXI, 1, 7.

^{page no 9 note 3} Ibid, XIX, 12, 20.

^{page no 9 note 4} Ibid, XXII, 16, 2; XXIII, 6, 32.

^{page no 9 note 5} Ibid, XXVII, 7, 5-6.

^{page no 9 note 6} Eunapius, , [Vitae Sophistarum], ed Boissonade, J. F. (Paris, Didot edition, 1849) p 476 Google Scholar. Ed and trans W. Cave Wright (London, Loeb Library, 1922).

^{page no 9 note 7} Eunapius, p 499.

^{page no 10 note 1} Ibid, p 471.

^{page no 10 note 2} Ibid, p 475.

^{page no 10 note 3} Ibid.

^{page no 10 note 4} Zosimus, , [History of the Roman Empire], v, 6, 6Google Scholar. For editions see ODCC.

^{page no 11 note 5} Photius, , Bibliotlteca, Code LXXX, 57b, in PG, an (1860) col 261Google Scholar; ed and trans (French) R. Henry (Budé edition, Paris 1959).

^{page no 10 note 6} Ibid, LXXX, 60a, PG, CIII (1860) col 268.

^{page no 10 note 7} Zosimus, V, 38, 2.

^{page no 10 note 8} Ibid, V, 41, 2.

^{page no 11 note 1} It will be enough to refer for these pagan writers to Demandt, A.,Zeitkritik und Geschichtsbild im Werke Ammians (Bonn 1965)Google Scholar; Matthews, J. F., ‘ Olympiodorus of Thebes and the History of the West’, JRS, LX (1970)Google Scholar; Kaegi, W. E., Byzantium and the Decline of Rome (Princeton 1968) pp 59-145CrossRef Google Scholar. Cf my characterisation in Rivista Storica Italiana, LXXXI (Naples 1969) pp 286-303.

^{page no 11 note 2} XIe Congrès International des Sciences Historiques, Rapports, II, Antiquité (Uppsala 1960) PP 35-54.

^{page no 11 note 3} Moule, C. F. D. (ed), Miracles (London 1965)Google Scholar. CfMeslin, M., Le Christianisme dans l’empire romain (Paris 1970) p 168 Google Scholar.

^{page no 12 note 1} Johannes, Lydus, De magistratibus, II, 12 Google Scholar; III, 42.

^{page no 13 note 1} Evagrius, , Historia Ecclesiastica, I, 20, 3–5 Google Scholar. The main texts on Eudocia are collected and critically sifted by O. Secck in P W, VI, 1, cols 906-10. Add Vita Sanctae Melaniae , ed Gorce, D., Vie de Sainte Melanie (Paris 1962) ch S8-9, pp 240-6Google Scholar. For the question of the chains of S. Pietro in Vincoli see Caspar, E., Geschichte des Papsttums, I (Tübingen 1930) p 421 Google Scholar; Krautheimer, R., ‘S. Pietro in Vincoli’, Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society, LXXXIV (Philadelphia 1941) pp 353–429 Google Scholar; Valentini, R. and Zucchetti, G., Codice topografico della città di Roma, III (Rome 1946) p 42 Google Scholar. We have no critical account of Theodosius II. The] best anecdotic evidence has been collected by Gregorovius, F., Athenais (Leipzig 1882) esp pp 95-102Google Scholar. Cf in particular Socrates, [Historia Ecclesiastica], VII, 22; Theodoretus, , [Historia Ecclesiastica], V, 36 Google Scholar; Iohannes Malalas, Chronographia, XIV; Nicephorus Callistus [(Xanthopoulos), Historia Ecclesiastica], XIV, 3 in PG, CXLVI (1865) col 1063. For editions of all these authors see ODCC. See also Chronicon Paschale, ed Dindorf, L., CSHByz, 2 vols (Bonn 1832) pp 575-90, reprinted in PG, XCII (1865) cols 9-1160Google Scholar.

^{page no 14 note 1} See, however, Walter, H., Die ‘ Collectanea Rerum Memorabilium ‘ des C. Iulius Solinus (Wiesbaden 1969) p XI, n 6 Google Scholar.

^{page no 14 note 2} Cf my paper in RSI, LXXXI (1969) pp 290-1.

^{page no 14 note 3} Cf the remark by Dessau, [H.], I[nscriptiones] L[atinae] S[electae] (repr Berlin 1954-s) no 809 Google Scholar.

^{page no 14 note 4} Dessau, ILS, no 802.

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^{page no 14 note 6} Sozomen, , Historia Ecclesiastica, ed Bidez, J. and Hansen, G.C., GCS, L (Berlin 1960) VII, 19 Google Scholar.

^{page no 14 note 7} The famous story- Theophanes, sub anno mundi 5941; Georgius Monachus (Hamartolos), Chronicon Syntomon , ed de Boor, C., 2 vols (Leipzig, Teubner edition, 1904) p 611 Google Scholar; Cedrenus, , Synopsis Historion, para 600, PG, CXXI (1894) col 654Google Scholar; Iohannes, Zonaras, Epitome of History, ed Pinder, M. and Biittoer-Wobst, R., 3 vols, CSHByz (1841-97)XIII, 23,44AGoogle Scholar; Nicephorus Callistus, XIV, 23, col 1130-seems to be authentic, but wrongly dated. Its source seems to be Theodoras Lector. CfGentz, G., Die Kirchengeschichte des Nicephorus Callistus (Berlin 1966) p 129, n 2 Google Scholar.

^{page no 15 note 1} Philostorgius, , [Historia Ecclesiastica], ed Bidez, J., GCS, XXI (Berlin 1913) XII, I0Google Scholar.

^{page no 15 note 2} Ibid, IX, 1.

^{page no 15 note 3} Ibid, III, 9ft.

^{page no 15 note 4} Socrates, VII, 43.

^{page no 15 note 5} Theodoretus, v, 373, 3.

^{page no 16 note 1} Historical Sketches, II (London 1876) p 315.

^{page no 16 note 2} Cf the discussion between Peeters, P., An Bol, LXI (1943) p 29 Google Scholar, and Richard, M., Mélanges de Science Religieuse, III (Lille 1946) pp 147-56Google Scholar. See also Bacht, H., ‘Die Rolle des orientalischen Mönchtums’ in, Grillmeier, A. and Bacht, H., Das Konzil von Chalkcdon, II (Würzburg 1953) pp 193–314 Google Scholar; Festugière, A.-J., Antioche Païenne et Chrétienne (Paris 1959) PP 241–401 Google Scholar. The identification of the author of the Vita Bragmanorum with the author of the Historia Lausiaca is made more probable by the important researches of Ruggini, L.Cracco, Athenaeum, XLIII (Pavia 1965) pp 3-80Google Scholar. CfPalladius, , De gentibus Indiae et Bragmanibus, ed Berghoff, W. (Meisenheim am Gian 1967)Google Scholar.

^{page no 16 note 3} PG, LXXXII (1864) cols 1406, 1473.

^{page no 16 note 4} Ibid, col 1493.

^{page no 17 note 1} V (Bonn 1970) 97-216.

^{page no 17 note 2} CfAlan, Cameron, Claudian (Oxford 1970) p 192 Google Scholar. Cameron will have more to say on Cyrus in a forthcoming study. The statement by W. E. Kaegi that Cyrus was a pagan seems to be due to a misunderstanding; see Kaegi, W. E., ‘The Fifth Century Twilight of Byzantine Paganism’, Classica et Mediaevalia, XXVII (Copenhagen 1966) p. 265 Google Scholar. Further bibliography for all the questions treated in this paper will be found in Jacques, Le Goff, ‘ Culture cléricale et traditions folkloriques dans la civilisation mérovingienne ‘, Annales: Economies, Sociétés, Civilisations, XXII (Paris 1967) pp 780-91Google Scholar.

^{page no 18 note 1} Philostorgius, II, 17.

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