In mathematics, a knot is an embedding of the circle (S1) into three-dimensional Euclidean space, R3 (also known as E3). Often two knots are considered equivalent if they are ambient isotopic, that is, if there exists a continuous deformation of R3 which takes one knot to the other.
A crucial difference between the standard mathematical and conventional notions of a knot
is that mathematical knots are closed — there are no ends to tie or
untie on a mathematical knot. Physical properties such as friction and
thickness also do not apply, although there are mathematical definitions
of a knot that take such properties into account. The term knot is also applied to embeddings of Sj in Sn, especially in the case j = n − 2. The branch of mathematics that studies knots is known as knot theory and has many relations to graph theory.
A knot in R3 (or alternatively in the 3-sphere, S3), can be projected onto a plane R2 (respectively a sphereS2). This projection is almost always regular, meaning that it is injective everywhere, except at a finite number of crossing points, which are the projections of only two points of the knot, and these points are not collinear. In this case, by choosing a projection side, one can completely encode the isotopy
class of the knot by its regular projection by recording a simple
over/under information at these crossings. In graph theory terms, a
regular projection of a knot, or knot diagram is thus a quadrivalent planar graph
with over/under-decorated vertices. The local modifications of this
graph which allow to go from one diagram to any other diagram of the
same knot (up to ambient isotopy of the plane) are called Reidemeister moves.
Reidemeister move 1
Reidemeister move 2
Reidemeister move 3
Types of knots
The simplest knot, called the unknot or trivial knot, is a round circle embedded in R3. In the ordinary sense of the word, the unknot is not "knotted" at all. The simplest nontrivial knots are the trefoil knot (31 in the table), the figure-eight knot (41) and the cinquefoil knot (51).
Several knots, linked or tangled together, are called links. Knots are links with a single component.
Tame vs. wild knots
A polygonal knot is a knot whose image in R3 is the union of a finite set of line segments. A tame knot is any knot equivalent to a polygonal knot. Knots which are not tame are called wild, and can have pathological behavior. In knot theory and 3-manifold theory, often the adjective "tame" is omitted. Smooth knots, for example, are always tame.
Framed knot
A framed knot is the extension of a tame knot to an embedding of the solid torusD2 × S1 in S3.
The framing of the knot is the linking number of the image of the ribbon I × S1 with the knot. A framed knot can be seen as the embedded ribbon and the framing is the (signed) number of twists. This definition generalizes to an analogous one for framed links. Framed links are said to be equivalent if their extensions to solid tori are ambient isotopic.
Framed link diagrams are link diagrams with each component marked, to indicate framing, by an integer
representing a slope with respect to the meridian and preferred
longitude. A standard way to view a link diagram without markings as
representing a framed link is to use the blackboard framing. This framing is obtained by converting each component to a ribbon lying flat on the plane. A type I Reidemeister move
clearly changes the blackboard framing (it changes the number of twists
in a ribbon), but the other two moves do not. Replacing the type I move
by a modified type I move gives a result for link diagrams with
blackboard framing similar to the Reidemeister theorem: Link diagrams,
with blackboard framing, represent equivalent framed links if and only
if they are connected by a sequence of (modified) type I, II, and III
moves.
Given a knot, one can define infinitely many framings on it. Suppose
that
we are given a knot with a fixed framing. One may obtain a new framing
from the existing one by cutting
a ribbon and twisting it an integer multiple of 2π around the knot and
then glue back again in the place
we did the cut. In this way one obtains a new framing from an old one,
up to the equivalence relation
for framed knots„ leaving the knot fixed. The framing in this sense is associated to the number of twists
the vector field performs around the knot. Knowing how many times the vector field is twisted around
the knot allows one to determine the vector field up to diffeomorphism, and the equivalence class of the
framing is determined completely by this integer called the framing integer.
Knot complement
Given a knot in the 3-sphere, the knot complement is all the points of the 3-sphere not contained in the knot. A major theorem of Gordon and Luecke
states that at most two knots have homeomorphic complements (the
original knot and its mirror reflection). This in effect turns the study
of knots into the study of their complements, and in turn into 3-manifold theory.
The JSJ decomposition and Thurston's hyperbolization theorem reduces the study of knots in the 3-sphere to the study of various geometric manifolds via splicing or satellite operations. In the pictured knot, the JSJ-decomposition splits the complement into the union of three manifolds: two trefoil complements and the complement of the Borromean rings. The trefoil complement has the geometry of H2 × R, while the Borromean rings complement has the geometry of H3.
Harmonic knots
Parametric
representations of knots are called harmonic knots. Aaron Trautwein
compiled parametric representations for all knots up to and including
those with a crossing number of 8 in his PhD thesis.
Another convenient representation of knot diagrams was introduced by Peter Tait in 1877.
Any knot diagram defines a plane graph
whose vertices are the crossings and whose edges are paths in between
successive crossings. Exactly one face of this planar graph is
unbounded; each of the others is homeomorphic to a 2-dimensional disk.
Color these faces black or white so that the unbounded face is black
and any two faces that share a boundary edge have opposite colors. The Jordan curve theorem implies that there is exactly one such coloring.
We construct a new plane graph whose vertices are the white faces
and whose edges correspond to crossings. We can label each edge in this
graph as a left edge or a right edge, depending on which thread appears
to go over the other as we view the corresponding crossing from one of
the endpoints of the edge. Left and right edges are typically indicated
by labeling left edges + and right edges –, or by drawing left edges
with solid lines and right edges with dashed lines.
The original knot diagram is the medial graph
of this new plane graph, with the type of each crossing determined by
the sign of the corresponding edge. Changing the sign of every edge corresponds to reflecting the knot in a mirror.
In two dimensions, only the planar graphs may be embedded into the Euclidean plane without crossings, but in three dimensions, any undirected graph may be embedded into space without crossings. However, a spatial analogue of the planar graphs is provided by the graphs with linkless embeddings and knotless embeddings. A linkless embedding is an embedding of the graph with the property that any two cycles are unlinked; a knotless embedding is an embedding of the graph with the property that any single cycle is unknotted. The graphs that have linkless embeddings have a forbidden graph characterization involving the Petersen family,
a set of seven graphs that are intrinsically linked: no matter how they
are embedded, some two cycles will be linked with each other. A full characterization of the graphs with knotless embeddings is not known, but the complete graphK7 is one of the minimal forbidden graphs for knotless embedding: no matter how K7 is embedded, it will contain a cycle that forms a trefoil knot.
Generalization
In contemporary mathematics the term knot is sometimes used to describe a more general phenomenon related to embeddings. Given a manifold M with a submanifold N, one sometimes says N can be knotted in M if there exists an embedding of N in M which is not isotopic to N. Traditional knots form the case where N = S1 and M = R3 or M = S3.
The Schoenflies theorem
states that the circle does not knot in the 2-sphere: every topological
circle in the 2-sphere is isotopic to a geometric circle. Alexander's theorem states that the 2-sphere does not smoothly (or PL or tame topologically) knot in the 3-sphere. In the tame topological category, it's known that the n-sphere does not knot in the n + 1-sphere for all n. This is a theorem of Morton Brown, Barry Mazur, and Marston Morse. The Alexander horned sphere is an example of a knotted 2-sphere in the 3-sphere which is not tame. In the smooth category, the n-sphere is known not to knot in the n + 1-sphere provided n ≠ 3. The case n = 3 is a long-outstanding problem closely related to the question: does the 4-ball admit an exotic smooth structure?
André Haefliger proved that there are no smooth j-dimensional knots in Sn provided 2n − 3j − 3 > 0, and gave further examples of knotted spheres for all n > j ≥ 1 such that 2n − 3j − 3 = 0. n − j is called the codimension of the knot. An interesting aspect of Haefliger's work is that the isotopy classes of embeddings of Sj in Sn
form a group, with group operation given by the connect sum, provided
the co-dimension is greater than two. Haefliger based his work on Stephen Smale's h-cobordism theorem.
One of Smale's theorems is that when one deals with knots in
co-dimension greater than two, even inequivalent knots have
diffeomorphic complements. This gives the subject a different flavour
than co-dimension 2 knot theory. If one allows topological or
PL-isotopies, Christopher Zeeman proved that spheres do not knot when the co-dimension is greater than 2. See a generalization to manifolds.
Persecution of pagans in the late Roman Empire began during the reign of Constantine the Great (r. 306–337) in the military colony of Aelia Capitolina (Jerusalem), when he destroyed a pagan temple for the purpose of constructing a Christian church.
Rome had periodically confiscated church properties, and Constantine
was vigorous in reclaiming them whenever these issues were brought to
his attention. Christian historians alleged that Hadrian (2nd century) had constructed a temple to Venus on the site of the crucifixion of Jesus on Golgotha hill in order to suppress Christian veneration there. Constantine used that to justify the temple's destruction, saying he was simply reclaiming the property.Using the vocabulary of reclamation, Constantine acquired several more sites of Christian significance in the Holy Land.
From 313, with the exception of the brief reign of Julian,
non-Christians were subject to a variety of hostile and discriminatory
imperial laws aimed at suppressing sacrifice and magic and closing any
temples that continued their use. The majority of these laws were local,
though some were thought to be valid across the whole empire, with some
threatening the death penalty, but not resulting in action. None seem to have been effectively applied empire-wide. For example, in 341, Constantine's son Constantius II enacted legislation forbidding pagan sacrifices in Roman Italy. In 356, he issued two more laws forbidding sacrifice and the worship of images, making them capital crimes,
as well as ordering the closing of all temples. There is no evidence of
the death penalty being carried out for illegal sacrifices before Tiberius Constantine (r. 578–582), and most temples remained open into the reign of Justinian I (r. 527–565).
Pagan teachers (who included philosophers) were banned and their
license, parrhesia, to instruct others was withdrawn. Parrhesia had been
used for a thousand years to denote "freedom of speech." Despite official threats, sporadic mob violence, and confiscations of temple treasures, paganism
remained widespread into the early fifth century, continuing in parts
of the empire into the seventh century, and into the ninth century in
Greece. During the reigns of Gratian, Valentinian II and Theodosius I anti-pagan policies and their penalties increased.
By the end of the period of Antiquity and the institution of the Law Codes of Justinian, there was a shift from the generalized legislation which characterized the Theodosian Code to actions which targeted individual centers of paganism.
The gradual transition towards more localized action, corresponds with
the period when most conversions of temples to churches were undertaken:
the late 5th and 6th centuries. Chuvin says that, through the severe legislation of the early Byzantine Empire, the freedom of conscience that had been the major benchmark set by the Edict of Milan was finally abolished.
Non-Christians were a small minority by the time of the last
western anti-pagan laws in the early 600s. Scholars fall into two
categories on how and why this dramatic change took place: the long
established traditional catastrophists who view the rapid demise
of paganism as occurring in the late fourth and early fifth centuries
due to harsh Christian legislation and violence, and contemporary
scholars who view the process as a long decline that began in the
second century, before the emperors were themselves Christian, and
which continued into the seventh century. This latter view contends that
there was less conflict between pagans and Christians than was
previously supposed.
In the twenty-first century, the idea that Christianity became dominant
through conflict with paganism has become marginalized, while a
grassroots theory has developed.
In 529 CE, the Byzantine emperor Justinian ordered the closing of
the Academy at Athens. The last teachers of the Academy, Damascius and Simplicius were invited by a Persian ruler Khosrow I to Harran (now in Turkey), which became a center of learning. Paganism survived in Harran
until the 10th century thanks to its practitioners bribing local
officials. In 933, however, they were ordered to convert. A visitor to
the city in the following year found that there were still pagan
religious leaders operating a remaining public temple.
Roman religion's characteristic openness has led many, such as Ramsay MacMullen to say that in its process of expansion, the Roman Empire was "completely tolerant, in heaven as on earth".Peter Garnsey
strongly disagrees with those who describe the attitude concerning the
"plethora of cults" in the Roman empire before Constantine as "tolerant"
or "inclusive". In his view, it is a misuse of terminology.
Garnsey has written that foreign gods were not tolerated in the modern
sense, but were made subject, together with their communities, when they
were conquered.
Roman historian Eric Orlin says that Roman religion's willingness
to adopt foreign gods and practices into its pantheon is probably its
defining trait.
Yet he goes on to say this did not apply equally to all gods: "Many
divinities were brought to Rome and installed as part of the Roman state
religion, but a great many more were not".
Andreas Bendlin has written on the thesis of polytheistic
tolerance and monotheistic intolerance in Antiquity saying that it has
long been proven to be incorrect. According to Rodney Stark,
since Christians most likely formed only sixteen to seventeen percent
of the empire's population at the time of Constantine's conversion, they
did not have the numerical advantage to form a sufficient power–base to
begin a systematic persecution of pagans.
Brown reminds his readers, "We should not underestimate the
fierce mood of the Christians of the fourth century", and, he says, it
must be remembered that repression, persecution and martyrdom do not
generally breed tolerance of those same persecutors.
Brown says Roman authorities had shown no hesitation in "taking out"
the Christian church which they saw as a threat to the peace of the
empire, and that Constantine and his successors did what they did for
the same reasons. Rome had been removing anything it saw as a challenge
to Roman identity since Bacchic associations were dissolved in 186 BCE;
this had become the pattern for the Roman state's response to anything
it saw as a religious threat. According to Brown, that attitude and
belief in what was required to maintain the peace of the empire didn't
change just because the emperors were Christian.
According to Hans-Ulrich Wiemer, German historian of Antiquity, there
is a persistent pagan tradition that Constantine did not persecute
pagans.
However, by twenty-first century definitions, Constantine can be said
to have practiced a mild psychological and economic persecution of
pagans. There are also indications he remained relatively tolerant of
non-Christians throughout his long reign.
Nine years after Diocletian celebrated twenty years of stable
rule with sacrifices on a smoking altar in the Roman Forum and the most
severe persecution
of Christians in the empire's history, the victorious Constantine I
entered Rome and, without offering sacrifice, bypassed the altar.
He proceeded to end the exclusion and persecution of Christians,
restored confiscated property to the churches, and adopted a policy
toward non-Christians of toleration with limits.
The Edict of Milan (313) redefined Imperial ideology as one of mutual
toleration. Constantine could be seen to embody both Christian and
Greco-Roman religious interests.
Constantine openly supported Christianity after 324; he destroyed a few temples and plundered more, converted others to churches, and neglected the rest;
he "confiscated temple funds to help finance his own building
projects", and he confiscated funds in an effort to establish a stable
currency; he was primarily interested in hoards of gold and silver, but
he also, on occasion, confiscated temple land;
he refused to support pagan beliefs and practices while also speaking
out against them; he periodically forbade pagan sacrifices and closed
temples, outlawed the gladiatorial shows while still attending them,
made laws that threatened and menaced pagans who continued to
sacrifice, while also making other laws that markedly favored
Christianity; and he personally endowed Christians with gifts of money,
land and government positions.
Yet, Constantine did not stop the established state support of the
traditional religious institutions, nor did society substantially change
its pagan nature under his rule.
Constantine never engaged in a purge. Opponents' supporters were
not slaughtered when Constantine took the capital; their families and
court were not killed. There were no pagan martyrs.
Laws menaced death, but during Constantine's reign, no one suffered the
death penalty for violating anti-pagan laws against sacrifice. "He did not punish pagans for being pagans, or Jews for being Jews, and did not adopt a policy of forced conversion." Pagans remained in important positions at his court.
Constantine ruled for 31 years and never outlawed paganism; in
the words of an early edict, he decreed that polytheists could
"celebrate the rites of an outmoded illusion," so long as they did not
force Christians to join them. His earlier edict, the Edict of Milan, was restated in the Edict of the Provincials. Historian Harold A. Drake
points out that this edict called for peace and tolerance: "Let no one
disturb another, let each man hold fast to that which his soul wishes…"
Constantine never reversed this edict.
Drake goes on to say the evidence indicates Constantine favored
those who favored consensus, chose pragmatists over ideologues of any
persuasion, and wanted peace and harmony "but also inclusiveness and
flexibility". In his article Constantine and Consensus, Drake concludes that Constantine's religious policy was aimed at including the church in a broader policy of civic unity, even though his personal views undoubtedly favored one religion over the other. Leithart says Constantine attributed his military success to God, and during his reign, the empire was relatively peaceful.
Conversion and baptism
Lenski says there can be no real doubt Constantine genuinely converted to Christianity.
In his personal views, Constantine denounced paganism as idolatry and
superstition in that same document to the provincials where he espoused
tolerance. Constantine and his contemporary Christians did not treat paganism as a living religion; it was defined as a superstitio – an 'outmoded illusion.'
Constantine made many derogatory and contemptuous comments relating to
the old religion; writing of the "true obstinacy" of the pagans, of
their "misguided rites and ceremonial", and of their "temples of lying"
contrasted with "the splendours of the home of truth". In a later letter to the King of Persia,
Constantine wrote how he shunned the "abominable blood and hateful
odors" of pagan sacrifices, and instead worshiped the High God "on
bended knee".
Church historians writing after his death wrote that Constantine
converted to Christianity and was baptised on his deathbed, thereby
making him the first Christian emperor. Lenski observes that the myth of Constantine being baptized by Pope Sylvester developed toward the end of the fifth century in a romantic depiction of Sylvester's life which has survived as the Actus beati Sylvestri papae (CPL 2235). This story absolved the medieval church of a major embarrassment: Constantine's baptism by an Arian bishop, Eusebius of Nicomedia, which occurred while on campaign to Persia. Constantine swung through the Holy Land with the intent of being baptized in the Jordan river, but he became deathly ill at Nicomedia where he was swiftly baptized. He died shortly thereafter on May 22, 337 at a suburban villa named Achyron.
Ban on sacrifices
Scott
Bradbury, professor of classical languages, writes that Constantine's
policies toward pagans are "ambiguous and elusive" and that "no aspect
has been more controversial than the claim he banned blood sacrifices".
Bradbury says the sources on this are contradictory, quoting Eusebius
who says he did, and Libanius, a historian contemporary to Constantine, who says he did not, that it was Constantius II who did so instead. According to historian R. Malcolm Errington, in Book 2 of Eusebius' De vita Constantini,
chapter 44, Eusebius explicitly states that Constantine wrote a new law
"appointing mainly Christian governors and also a law forbidding any
remaining pagan officials from sacrificing in their official capacity".
Other significant evidence fails to support Eusebius' claim of an end to sacrifice. Constantine, in his Letter to the Eastern Provincials, never mentions any law against sacrifices.
Archaeologist Luke Lavan writes that blood sacrifice was already
declining in popularity by the time of Constantine, just as construction
of new temples was also declining, but that this seems to have little
to do with anti-paganism.
Drake has written that Constantine personally abhorred sacrifice and
removed the obligation to participate in them from the list of duties
for imperial officials, but evidence of an actual sweeping ban on
sacrifice is slight, while evidence of its continued practice is great.
All records of anti-pagan legislation by Constantine are found in the Life of Constantine, written by Eusebius as a kind of eulogy after Constantine's death. It is not a history so much as a panegyric
praising Constantine. The laws as they are stated in the Life of
Constantine often do not correspond, "closely, or at all", to the text
of the Codes themselves. Eusebius gives these laws a "strongly Christian interpretation by selective quotation or other means". This has led many to question the veracity of his record.
While most scholars agree it is likely Constantine did institute
the first laws against sacrifice, leading to its end by the 350's,
paganism itself did not end when public sacrifice did.Brown explains that polytheists were accustomed to offering prayers to
the gods in many ways and places that did not include sacrifice, that
pollution was only associated with sacrifice, and that the ban on
sacrifice had fixed boundaries and limits. Paganism thus remained widespread into the early fifth century continuing in parts of the empire into the seventh and beyond.
Magic and private divination
Maijastina Kahlos, scholar of Roman literature, says religion before Christianity was a decidedly public practice.
Therefore, private divination, astrology, and 'Chaldean practices'
(formulae, incantations, and imprecations designed to repulse demons and
protect the invoker) all became associated with magic in the early imperial period (AD 1–30), and carried the threat of banishment and execution even under the pagan emperors.
Lavan explains these same private and secret religious rituals were not
just associated with magic but also with treason and secret plots
against the emperor. Kahlos says Christian emperors inherited this fear of private divination.
The church had long spoken against anything connected to magic and its uses. Polymnia Athanassiadi says that, by the mid fourth century, prophecy at the Oracles of Delphi and Didyma had been definitively stamped out. However, Athanassiadi says the church's real targets in Antiquity were home-made oracles for the practice of theurgy:
the interpretation of dreams with the intent of influencing human
affairs. The church had no prohibitions against the interpretation of
dreams by itself, yet, according to Athanassiadi, both Church and State
viewed using it to influence events as "the most pernicious aspect of
the pagan spirit".
Constantine's decree against private divination did not classify
divination in general as magic, therefore, even though all the emperors,
Christian and pagan, forbade all secret rituals, Constantine still
allowed the haruspices to practice their rituals in public.
Constantinople and temple looting
On 8 November 324, Constantine consecrated Byzantium as his new
residence, Constantinoupolis – "city of Constantine" – with the local
pagan priests, astrologers, and augurs, though he still went back to
Rome to celebrate his Vicennalia: his twenty-year jubilee.
Two years after the consecration of Constantinople, Constantine left
Rome behind, and on 4 November 328, new rituals were performed to
dedicate the city as the new capital of the Roman empire. Among the attendants were the Neoplatonist philosopher Sopater and pontifex maximus Praetextus.
A year and a half later, on 11 May 330, at the festival of Saint Mocius, the dedication was celebrated and commemorated with special coins with Sol Invictus on them. In commemoration, Constantine had a statue of the goddess of fortune Tyche built, as well as a column made of porphyry, at the top of which was a golden statue of Apollo with the face of Constantine looking toward the sun.
Libanius the historian (Constantine's contemporary) writes in a passage from his In Defense of the Temples that Constantine 'looted the Temples' around the eastern empire in order to get their treasures to build Constantinople.Noel Lenski [de] says that Constantinople was "literally crammed with [pagan] statuary gathered, in Jerome's words, by 'the virtual denuding' of every city in the East".Historian Ramsay MacMullen
explains this by saying Constantine "wanted to obliterate
non-Christians, but lacking the means, he had to be content with robbing
their temples".
Constantine did not obliterate what he took, though. He reused it.
Litehart says "Constantinople was newly founded, but it deliberately
evoked the Roman past religiously as well as politically".
Constantinople continued to offer room to pagan religions: there were shrines for the Dioscuri and Tyche. According to historian Hans-Ulrich Wiemer [de], there is good reason to believe the ancestral temples of Helios, Artemis and Aphrodite remained functioning in Constantinople. The Acropolis, with its ancient pagan temples, was left as it was.
Desacralization and destruction of temples
A cult statue of the deified Augustus, deconsecrated by a Christian cross carved into the emperor's forehead
Bust of Germanicus, disfigured and with a cross engraved on the forehead
Using the same vocabulary of restoration he had used for Aelia Capitolina,
Constantine acquired sites of Christian significance in the Holy Land
for the purpose of constructing churches, destroying the temples in
those places. For example, Constantine destroyed the Temple of Aphrodite in Lebanon.
However, archaeology indicates this type of destruction did not
happen as often as the literature claims. For example, at the sacred oak
and spring at Mamre,
a site venerated and occupied by Christians, Jews and pagans alike, the
literature says Constantine ordered the burning of the idols, the
destruction of the altar, and erection of a church. The archaeology of
the site, however, demonstrates that Constantine's church along with its
attendant buildings, only occupied a peripheral sector of the precinct,
leaving the rest unhindered.
Temple destruction is attested to in 43 cases in the written
sources, but only four have been confirmed by archaeological evidence.
Archaeologists Lavan and Mulryan write that earthquakes, civil conflict,
and external invasions caused much of the temple destruction of this
era.
The Roman economy of the third and fourth centuries struggled, and traditional polytheism was expensive. Roger S. Bagnall reports that imperial financial support declined markedly after Augustus. Lower budgets meant the physical decline of urban
structures of all types. This progressive decay was accompanied by an
increased trade in salvaged building materials, as the practice of recycling became common in Late Antiquity.
Church restrictions opposing the pillaging of pagan temples by
Christians were in place even while the Christians were being persecuted
by the pagans. More common than destruction was the practice of "desacralization" or "deconsecration". According to the historical writings of Prudentius,
the deconsecration of a temple merely required the removal of the cult
statue and altar, and it could be reused. The Law Codes from around the
same time as Prudentius say that temples “empty of illicit things” were
to suffer no further damage and idols were only “illicit” if they were
still venerated.
However, this was often extended to the removal or even destruction of
other statues and icons, votive stelae, and all other internal imagery
and decoration.
Mutilating the hands and feet of statues of the divine,
mutilating heads and genitals, tearing down altars and "purging sacred
precincts with fire" were seen as 'proving' the impotence of the gods,
but pagan icons were also seen as having been “polluted” by the practice
of sacrifice. A ritual and chiseling crosses onto them cleansed them.
Once these objects were detached from "the contagion" of sacrifice,
they were seen as having returned to innocence. Many statues and temples
were then preserved as art. For example, the Parthenon frieze was preserved after the Christian conversion of the temple, although in modified form.
According to historian Gilbert Dagron,
there were fewer temples constructed empire-wide, for mostly financial
reasons, after the building craze of the 2nd century ended. However,
Constantine's reign did not comprise the end of temple construction. In
addition to destroying temples, he both permitted and commissioned
temple construction. The dedication of new temples is attested in the historical and archaeological records until the end of the 4th century.
Under Constantine, (and for the first decade or so of the reigns
of his sons), most of the temples remained open for the official pagan
ceremonies and for the more socially acceptable activities of libation
and offering of incense.
Despite the polemic of Eusebius claiming Constantine razed all the
temples, Constantine's principal contribution to the downfall of the
temples lay quite simply in his neglect of them.
Constantine's policies were largely continued by his sons though not universally or continuously.
According to the Catholic Encyclopedia, Constantius issued bans on sacrifice which were in keeping with his personal maxim: "Cesset superstitio; sacrificiorum aboleatur insania" (Let superstition cease; let the folly of sacrifices be abolished). He removed the Altar of Victory from the Senate meeting house. This altar had been installed by Augustus
in 29 BC, and since its installation, each Senator had traditionally
made a sacrifice upon the altar before entering the Senate house.
When Constantius removed the altar he also allowed the statue of
Victory to remain, therefore Thompson concludes that the removal of the
altar was to avoid having to personally sacrifice when he was visiting
Rome. In Thompson's view, this makes the altar's removal an act to
accommodate his personal religion without offending the pagan senators
by refusing to observe their rites. Soon after the departure of Constantius, the altar was restored.
Constantius also shut down temples, ended tax relief and subsidies for pagans, and imposed the death penalty on those who consulted soothsayers. Orientalist Alexander Vasiliev
says that Constantius carried out a persistent anti-pagan policy, and
that sacrifices were prohibited in all localities and cities of the
empire on penalty of death and confiscation of property.
There is no evidence that the harsh penalties of the anti-sacrifice laws were ever enforced. Edward Gibbon's editor J. B. Bury
dismisses Constantius’ law against sacrifice as one which could only be
observed "here and there", asserting that it could never,
realistically, have been enforced within a society that still contained
the strong pagan element of Late Antiquity, particularly within the
imperial machinery itself. Christians were a minority and paganism was still popular among the population, as well as the elites at the time.
The emperor's policies were therefore passively resisted by many
governors, magistrates, and even bishops, rendering the anti-pagan laws
largely impotent when it came to their application.
Relative moderation
According
to Salzman, Constantius' actions toward paganism were relatively
moderate, and this is reflected by the fact that it was not until over
20 years after Constantius' death, during the reign of Gratian, that any pagan senators protested their religion's treatment. The emperor Constantius never attempted to disband the various Roman priestly colleges or the Vestal Virgins and never acted against the various pagan schools. He remained pontifex maximus until his death.
The temples outside the city remained protected by law. At times, Constantius acted to protect paganism itself. According to author and editor Diana Bowder, the historian Ammianus Marcellinus records in his history Res Gestae, that pagan sacrifices and worship continued taking place openly in Alexandria and Rome. The Roman Calendar of the year 354 cites many pagan festivals as though they were still being openly observed.
Legislation against magic and divination
In
357, Constantius II linked divination and magic in a piece of
legislation forbidding anyone from consulting a diviner, astrologer, or a
soothsayer; then he listed augurs and seers, Chaldeans, magicians and
'all the rest' who were to be made to be silent because the people
called them malefactors.
In the fourth century, Augustine labeled old Roman religion and its
divinatory practices as magic and therefore illegal. Thereafter,
legislation tended to automatically combine the two.
Temples
There is a law in the Theodosian Code that dates to the time of Constantius for the preservation of the temples situated outside of city walls.
Constantius also enacted a law that exacted a fine from those who were
guilty of vandalizing sites holy to pagans and placed the care of these
monuments and tombs under the pagan priests.
Successive emperors in the 4th century made legislative attempts to
curb violence against pagan shrines, and in a general law issued in 458
by the Eastern emperor Leo and the western emperor Majorian, (457 to 461), the temples and other public works gained protection with strict penalties attached.
Mob violence
Mob
violence was an occasional problem in the independent cities of the
empire. Taxes, food and politics were common reasons for rioting.
Religion was also a factor though it is difficult to separate from
politics since they were intertwined in all aspects of life. In 361, the murder of the Arian bishop George of Cappadocia was committed by a mob of pagans, A Christian mob threw objects at Orestes and, finally, Hypatia was killed by a Christian mob though politics and personal jealousy were probably the primary causes.
Mobs were composed of lower-class urban dwellers, upper class educated
pagans, Jews and Christians, and in Alexandria, monks from the monastery
of Nitria.
Restoration of paganism by Julian (361–363)
Julian,
who had been a co-emperor since 355, ruled solely for 18 months from
361 to 363. He was a nephew of Constantine and received Christian
training. After childhood, Julian was educated by Hellenists and became attracted to the teachings of neoplatonists
and the old religions. He blamed Constantius for the assassination of
Julian's father, brother and other family members, which he personally
witnessed being killed by the palace guards. As a result, he developed
an antipathy to Christianity which only deepened when Constantius
executed Julian's only remaining brother in 354. Julian's religious beliefs were syncretic and he was initiated into at least three mystery religions, but his religious open-mindedness did not extend to Christianity.
Julian lifted the ban on sacrifices, restored and reopened
temples, and dismantled the privileged status of the Christians, giving
generous tax remissions to the cities he favored and disfavor to those
who remained Christian. He allowed religious freedom and spoke against overt compulsion, but there was little other option open to him. By the time Julian came to rule, the empire had been ruled by Christian
emperors for two generations and the people had adapted.
Bradbury writes that Julian was not averse to a more subtle form of compulsion, and in 362, Julian promulgated a law that, in effect, forbid Christians from being teachers.
Julian wrote that "right learning" was essential to pagan reform, and
that such learning belonged only to those who showed 'piety toward the
old gods'. In a letter written by Julian that still exists, he says: "Let [the Christians] keep to Matthew and Luke". Christians saw this as a threat that barred them from a professional career many of them already held.
On his trip through Asia Minor to Antioch to assemble an army and
resume war against Persia, he found the cities falling short of pagan
revival. His reforms were met by Christian resistance and civic inertia.
Provincial priests were replaced with Julian's sympathetic associates,
but after passing through Galatia and seeing the strength of the church
and its charitable institutions, he wrote to the high priest of the
province that all the new priests were to "follow a thoroughgoing
programme of personal moral example and public institutions to outdo the
Christians at their own game... for it is disgraceful that none of the
Jews is a beggar and the impious Galilaeans provide support for our
people as well as theirs".
Julian reached Antioch on July 18 which coincided with a pagan
festival that had already become secular. Julian's preference for blood
sacrifice found little support, and the citizens of Antioch accused
Julian of "turning the world upside down" by reinstituting it, calling
him "slaughterer".Altars used for sacrifice had been routinely smashed by Christians who
were deeply offended by the blood of slaughtered victims as they were
reminded of their own past sufferings associated with such altars. "When Julian restored altars in Antioch, the Christian populace promptly threw them down again".
Blood sacrifice was a central rite of virtually all
religious groups in the pre-Christian Mediterranean, and its gradual
disappearance is one of the most significant religious developments of
late antiquity. Sacrifice did not decline according to any uniform
pattern, but...In many of the larger towns and cities of the Eastern
empire, public blood sacrifices were no longer normative by the time
Julian came to power and embarked on his pagan revival. Public
sacrifices and communal feasting had declined as the result of a decline
in the prestige of pagan priesthoods and a shift in patterns of
[private donations] in civic life. That shift would have occurred on a
lesser scale even without the conversion of Constantine... It is easy,
nonetheless, to imagine a situation in which sacrifice could decline
without disappearing. Why not retain, for example, a single animal
victim in order to preserve the integrity of the ancient rite? The fact
that public sacrifices appear to have disappeared completely in many
towns and cities must be attributed to the atmosphere created by
imperial and episcopal hostility.
Julian became frustrated that no one seemed to match his zeal for pagan revival. His reform soon moved from toleration to imperial punishment. Historians such as David Wood assert there was a revival of some persecution against Christians.
On the other hand, H. A. Drake says that "In the eighteen brief months
that he ruled between 361 and 363, Julian did not persecute
[Christians], as a hostile tradition contends. But he did make clear
that the partnership between Rome and Christian bishops... was now at an
end, replaced by a government that defined its interests and those of
Christianity as antithetical.
Scholars agree that Julian tried to undermine the church by ordering
the construction of churches for Christian “heretical” sects and by
destroying orthodox churches.
After Antioch, Julian would not be deterred from his goal of war with Persia, and he died on that campaign.
The facts of his death have become obscured by the "war of words
between Christians and pagans" which followed. It was "principally over
the source of the fatal spear... The thought that Julian might have died
by the hand of one of his own side... was a godsend to a Christian
tradition eager to have the apostate emperor accorded his just deserts.
Yet such a rumor was not solely the product of religious polemic. It had
its roots in the broader trail of disaffection Julian left in his
wake".
From Jovian to Valens (363–378)
Jovian
reigned only eight months, from June 363 to February 364, but in that
period, he negotiated peace with the Sassanids and reestablished
Christianity as the preferred religion.
Bayliss says the position adopted by the Nicene Christian emperor
Valentinian I (321–375) and the Arian Christian emperor Valens
(364–378), granting all cults toleration from the start of their reign,
was in tune with a society of mixed beliefs. Pagan writers, for example Ammianus Marcellinus,
describe the reign of Valentinian as one “distinguished for religious
tolerance... He took a neutral position between opposing faiths, and
never troubled anyone by ordering him to adopt this or that mode of
worship ... [he] left the various cults undisturbed as he found them”.
This apparently sympathetic stance is corroborated by the absence
of any anti-pagan legislation in the Theodosian Law Codes from this
era. Classics scholar Christopher P. Jones says Valentinian permitted divination so long as it was not done at night, which he saw as the next step to practicing magic.
Valens, who ruled the east, also tolerated paganism, even keeping
some of Julian's associates in their trusted positions. He confirmed
the rights and privileges of the pagan priests and confirmed the right
of pagans to be the exclusive caretakers of their temples.
Ambrose, Gratian, and the Altar of Victory
Ambrose and Gratian
In 382, Gratian
was the first to formally, in law, divert into the crown's coffers
those public financial subsidies that had previously supported Rome's
cults; he appropriated the income of pagan priests and the Vestal Virgins,
forbade their right to inherit land, confiscated the possessions of the
priestly colleges, and was the first to refuse the title of pontifex maximus. He also ordered the Altar of Victory to be removed again. The colleges of pagan priests lost privileges and immunities.
Gratian wrote Ambrose, the Bishop of Milan, for spiritual advice and received back multiple letters and books.
It has long been convention to see the volume of these writings as
evidence Gratian was dominated by Ambrose, who was therefore the true
source of Gratian's anti-pagan actions.
McLynn finds this unlikely and unnecessary as an explanation: Gratian
was, himself, devout, and "The many differences between Gratian's
religious policies and his father's, and the shifts that occurred during
his own reign, are to be explained by changed political circumstances
[after the Battle of Adrianople], rather than capitulation to Ambrose".
Modern scholars have noted that Sozomen is the only ancient
source that shows Ambrose and Gratian together in any personal
interaction. That event occurred in the last year of Gratian's reign.
Ambrose crashed Gratian's private hunting party in order to appeal on
behalf of a pagan senator sentenced to die. After years of acquaintance,
this indicates Ambrose could not take for granted that Gratian would
see him, so instead, Ambrose had to resort to such maneuverings to make
his appeal.
After Gratian
Gratian's brother, Valentinian II
and Valentinian's mother strongly disliked Ambrose and generally
refused to cooperate with him, taking every opportunity to side against
him. Yet, Valentinian II still refused to grant requests from pagans to
restore the Altar of Victory and the income of the temple priests and
Vestal Virgins or to overturn the policies of his predecessor.
After Gratian, the emperors Arcadius, Honorius and Theodosius continued to appropriate for the crown the tax revenue collected by the temple custodians. Urban ritual procession and ceremony was gradually stripped of support and funding.
Rather than being removed outright though, many festivals were
secularized and incorporated into a developing Christian calendar, often
with little alteration. Some had already severely declined in
popularity by the end of 3rd century.
John Moorhead says that Ambrose, the Bishop of Milan is sometimes referred to as having influenced the anti-paganism policies of the emperor Theodosius I to the degree of finally achieving the desired dominance of church over state.Alan Cameron
observes that this dominating influence is "often spoken of as though
documented fact". Indeed, he says, "the assumption is so widespread it
would be superfluous to cite authorities".
Modern scholarship has revised this view.
Cameron says Ambrose was only one among many advisors, and there is no
evidence Theodosius I favored him. On occasion Theodosius I purposefully
excluded Ambrose, and at times, got angry enough with Ambrose that
Theodosius sent him away from court. Neil B. McLynn
observes that the documents that reveal the relationship between
Ambrose and Theodosius seem less about personal friendship and more like
negotiations between the institutions the two men represent: the Roman
State and the Italian Church.
According to McLynn, the events following the Thessalonian massacre
cannot be used to "prove" Ambrose' exceptional or undue influence. The
encounter at the church door does not demonstrate Ambrose' dominance
over Theodosius because, according to Peter Brown, it never happened. According to McLynn, "the encounter at the church door has long been known as a pious fiction". Harold A. Drake
quotes Daniel Washburn as writing that the image of the mitered prelate
braced in the door of the cathedral to block Theodosius from entering,
is a product of the imagination of Theodoret who was a historian of the
fifth century. Theodoret wrote of the events of 390 "using his own
ideology to fill the gaps in the historical record".
Theodosius I (381–395)
Theodosius
seems to have adopted a cautious policy overall toward traditional
non-Christian cults. He reiterated his Christian predecessors' bans on
animal sacrifice, divination, and apostasy, but allowed other pagan
practices to be performed publicly and temples to remain open. Theodosius also turned pagan holidays into workdays, but the festivals associated with them continued.
A number of laws against sacrifice and divination, closing temples that
continued to allow them, were issued towards the end of his reign, but
historians have tended to downplay their practical effects and even the
emperor's direct role in them. Most of Theodosius' religious legislation
was against heresy.
Modern scholars think there is little if any evidence Theodosius
pursued an active and sustained policy against the traditional cults.
There is evidence Theodosius took care to prevent the empire's still
substantial pagan population from feeling ill-disposed toward his rule.
Following the death in 388 of his praetorian prefect, Cynegius,
who had vandalized a number of pagan shrines in the eastern provinces,
Theodosius replaced him with a moderate pagan who subsequently moved to
protect the temples.During his first official tour of Italy (389–391), the emperor won over
the influential pagan lobby in the Roman Senate by appointing its
foremost members to important administrative posts. Theodosius also nominated the last pair of pagan consuls in Roman history (Tatianus and Symmachus) in 391.
Between 382 and 384, there was yet another dispute over the Altar of Victory. According to the Oxford Handbook of Late Antiquity, Symmachus
requested the restoration of the altar that Gratian had removed and
the restoration of state support for the Vestals. Ambrose campaigned
against any financial support for paganism and anything like the Altar
that required participation in pagan practices. Ambrose prevailed. Theodosius refused the appeal. Pagans remained outspoken in their demands for respect, concessions and support from the state.
Classicist Ingomar Hamlet says that, contrary to popular myth, Theodosius did not ban the Olympic games. Sofie Remijsen [nl]
indicates there are several reasons to conclude the Olympic games
continued after Theodosius and came to an end under Theodosius II
instead. Two scholia on Lucian connect the end of the games with a fire
that burned down the temple of the Olympian Zeus during his reign.
Anti-pagan legislation
Anti-pagan
legislation reflects what Brown calls "the most potent social and
religious drama" of the fourth-century Roman empire.
From Constantine forward, the Christian intelligentsia wrote of
Christianity as fully triumphant over paganism. It didn't matter that
they were still a minority in the empire, this triumph had occurred in
Heaven; it was evidenced by Constantine; but even after Constantine,
they wrote that Christianity would defeat, and be seen to defeat, all of
its enemies - not convert them.
The laws were not intended to convert; "the laws were intended to
terrorize... Their language was uniformly vehement, and... frequently
horrifying". Their intent was to reorder society along religious lines and enable Christianity to put a stop to animal sacrifice. Blood sacrifice was the element of pagan culture most abhorrent to Christians.
If they could not stop the private practice of sacrifice, they could
"hope to determine what would be normative and socially acceptable in
public spaces".
Altars used for sacrifice were routinely smashed by Christians who were
deeply offended by the blood of slaughtered victims as they were
reminded of their own past sufferings associated with such altars.
One of the important things about this, in Malcolm Errington's
view, is how much legislation was applied and used, which would show
how dependable the laws are as a reflection of what actually happened to
pagans in history.
Brown says that, given the large numbers of non-Christians in every
region at this time, local authorities were "notoriously lax in imposing
them. Christian bishops frequently obstructed their application.
The harsh imperial edicts had to face the vast following of paganism
among the population, and the passive resistance of governors and
magistrates, thereby limiting their impact.
Twenty-first century studies on the nature of the presence of the
state, how it makes itself felt by the populace, "the subtle nature of
power" and the eventual complete elimination of public sacrifice all
show that, while the impact of imperial law was limited, it was not
completely without influence.
Secondly, the laws reveal the emergence of a language of
intolerance. The legal language runs parallel to the writings of the
apologists, such as Augustine of Hippo and Theodoret of Cyrrhus, and
heresiologists such as Epiphanius of Salamis. Christian writers and imperial legislators both drew on a rhetoric of conquest. These writings were commonly hostile and often contemptuous toward a paganism Christianity saw as already defeated.
Lastly, on the one hand the laws, and these Christian sources
with their violent rhetoric, have had great influence on modern
perceptions of this period by creating an impression of continuous
violent conflict that has been assumed on an empire-wide scale.
Archaeological evidence, on the other hand, indicates that, outside of
violent rhetoric, there were only isolated incidents of actual violence
between Christians and pagans.
Non-Christian, (non-heretical), groups such as pagans and Jews enjoyed
a tolerance based on contempt through most of Late Antiquity.
Temple destruction and conversion
Praetorian prefecture of the East
Praefectura praetorio Orientis Ἐπαρχότης τῶν πραιτωρίων τῆς Ανατολῆς Ἑῴα Ὑπαρχία
According to Brown, Theodosius was a devout Christian anxious to close the temples in the East. His commissioner, the prefect Maternus Cynegius
(384-88) commissioned temple destruction on a wide scale, even
employing the military under his command and "black-robed monks" for
this purpose. Garth Fowden says Cynegius did not limit himself to Theodosius' official policy, but Theodosius did not stop him.
The pagan historian Libanius
wrote "this black robed tribe" were acting outside the law, but Brown
says Theodosius did not enforce those laws. Theodosius voiced his
support for the preservation of temple buildings, but passively
legitimized the monk's violence by listening to them instead of
correcting them, thereby failing to prevent the damaging of many holy
sites, images and objects of piety by Christian zealots.
However, in 388 at Callinicum, (modern Raqqa in Syria), the bishop
along with monks from the area burned a Jewish synagogue to the ground,
and Theodosius responded, "The monks commit many atrocities", and he
ordered them to pay to rebuild it.
These examples were seen as the 'tip of the iceberg' by earlier
scholars who saw these events as part of a tide of violent Christian
iconoclasm that continued throughout the 390s and into the 400s.
However, archaeological evidence for the violent destruction of
temples in the fourth and early fifth centuries around the entire
Mediterranean is limited to a handful of sites. Most recorded incidents of temple destruction are known from church and hagiographical accounts which are eager to portray their subjects' piety and power. They offer vividly dramatized accounts of pious bishops doing battle with temple demons. The temples of Zeus at Apameia and of Marnas at Gaza City
are said to have been brought down by the local bishops around this
period, but the only source for this information is the biography of Porphyry of Gaza which is considered a forgery.
Trombley and MacMullen say part of why such discrepancies
(between the literary sources and the archaeological evidence) exist is
because it is common for details in the literary sources to be ambiguous
and unclear.
For example, Malalas claimed Constantine destroyed all the temples,
then he said Theodisius did, then he said Constantine converted them all
to churches.
According to archaeologists Lavan and Mulryan:
If one
accepts all potential claims (several of which are very shaky) only
2.4% of all known temples in Gaul have evidence of being destroyed by
violence (17 out of [approximately] 711) ... In Africa, only the city of
Cyrene has produced good evidence (the burning of several temples)
whilst work in Asia Minor has produced just one weak candidate
(undated), and in Greece the only strong example may relate to a
barbarian rather than a Christian raid. Finally, Egypt has produced no
archaeologically-confirmed temple destructions at all dating from this
period, with the exception of the Serapeum,
a situation paralleled in Spain. In Italy, we have only a single
burning; Britain has produced the most evidence, with 2 Romano–Celtic
temples out of 40 ...being burnt in the 4th c., whilst another was
deliberately destroyed, with its mosaics smashed.
Earthquakes caused much of the destruction that occurred to temples
in this era, and people determined not to rebuild as society changed.
Recycling and pragmatism contributed to demolition as well, with one
building being taken down and another constructed according to the needs
of the community with no anti-paganism being involved. Civil conflict and external invasions also destroyed temples and shrines.
Lavan says: "We must rule out most of the images of destruction created
by the [written sources]. Archaeology shows the vast majority of
temples were not treated this way".
Some scholars have long asserted that not all temples were
destroyed but were instead converted to churches throughout the empire.
According to modern archaeology, 120 pagan temples were converted to
churches in the whole empire, out of the thousands of temples that
existed, and only about 40 of them are dated before the end of the fifth
century. R. P. C. Hanson
says the direct conversion of temples into churches did not begin until
the mid fifth century in any but a few isolated incidents. In Rome the first recorded temple conversion was the Pantheon in 609. None of the churches attributed to Martin of Tours can be proven to have existed in the fourth century.
Anti-paganism after Theodosius I until the collapse of the Western Empire
Anti-pagan laws were established and continued on after Theodosius I until the fall of the Roman Empire in the West. Arcadius, Honorius, Theodosius II, Marcian and Leo I
reiterated the bans on pagan sacrifices and divination and increased
the penalties. The necessity to do so indicates that the old religion
still had many followers. In the later part of the 4th century there
were clearly a significant number of pagan sympathizers and
crypto-pagans still in positions of power in all levels of the
administrative system including positions close to the emperor; even by
the 6th century, pagans can still be found in prominent positions of
office both locally and in the imperial bureaucracy.
From Theodosius on, public sacrifice definitely ended in
Constantinople and Antioch, and in those places that were, as Lavan
says, "under the emperor's nose" by around 350. However, away from the
imperial court, those efforts were not effective or enduring until the
fifth and sixth centuries.
By the early fifth century under Honorius and Theodosius II, there were multiple injunctions against magic and divination. One example was the law of 409 de maleficis et mathematicis
against astrologers ordering them to return to Catholicism, and for the
books of mathematics that they used for their computations to be
"consumed in flames before the eyes of the bishops". A fifth century writer Apponius
wrote a condemnation of methods "demons used to ensnare human hearts"
including augury, astrology, magical spells, malign magic, mathesis, and all predictions gained from the flights of birds or the scrutiny of entrails.
The prefecture of Illyricum appears to have been an attractive post for pagans and sympathisers in the 5th century, and Aphrodisias is known to have housed a substantial population of pagans in late antiquity, including a famous school of philosophy.
In Rome, Christianization was hampered significantly by the elites,
many of whom remained stalwartly pagan. The institutional cults
continued in Rome and its hinterland, funded from private sources, in a
considerably reduced form, but still existent, as long as empire lasted.
Bayliss writes that "We know from discoveries at Aphrodisias that
pagans and philosophers were still very much in evidence in the 5th
century, and living in some luxury. The discovery of overt pagan
statuary and marble altars in a house in the heart of the city of Athens
gives a very different impression from that presented by the law codes
and literature, of pagans worshipping in secrecy and constant fear of
the governor and bishop".
After the fall of the Western Empire
In 476, the last western emperor of Roman descent, Romulus Augustulus, was deposed by Odoacer, who became the first "barbarian" king of Italy. By the time the Emperor Anastasius I,
who came to the throne in 491 as the first emperor required to sign a
written declaration of orthodoxy before his coronation, the Goths had
been Christian for over a hundred years.
Peter Brown has written that, "it would be profoundly misleading" to
claim that the cultural and social changes that took place in Late
Antiquity reflected "in any way" an overall process of Christianization
of the empire.
Instead, the "flowering of a vigorous public culture that polytheists,
Jews and Christians alike could share... [that] could be described as
Christian "only in the narrowest sense" had developed. It is true that
Christians had ensured that blood sacrifice played no part in that
culture, but the sheer success and unusual stability of the
Constantinian and post-Constantinian state also ensured that "the edges
of potential conflict were blurred... It would be wrong to look for
further signs of Christianization at this time. It is impossible to
speak of a Christian empire as existing before Justinian".
The Byzantine emperor Justinian I,
also known as Justinian the Great (527-565), enacted legislation with
repeated calls for the cessation of sacrifice well into the 6th century.
Judith Herrin
writes that Emperor Justinian was a major influence in getting
Christian ideals and legal regulations integrated with Roman law.
Justinian revised the Theodosian codes, introduced many Christian
elements, and "turned the full force of imperial legislation against
deviants of all kinds, particularly religious".
Herrin says, "This effectively put the word of God on the same level as
Roman law, combining an exclusive monotheism with a persecuting
authority".
According to Anthony Kaldellis, Justinian is remembered as "the
last Roman emperor of ecumenical importance ... the arbiter of the Roman
legal tradition." Yet it is as the emperor who sought, once again, to
extend Roman authority around the Mediterranean, that he is often seen
as a tyrant and despot.
Justinian's government became increasingly autocratic. He persecuted
pagans, religious minorities and purged the bureaucracy of those who
disagreed with him. As Byzantine imperial culture became more orthodox, it led to the creation of the Monophysite church, which set Constantinople against both Rome and the Eastern provinces.
"Few emperors had started so many wars or tried to enforce cultural and
religious uniformity with such zeal... In the words of one historian,
'Justinian was conscious of living in the age of Justinian'.
Herrin adds that, under Justinian, this new full "supremacy of Christian belief involved considerable destruction".
The decree of 528 had already barred pagans from state office when,
decades later, Justinian ordered a "persecution of surviving Hellenes,
accompanied by the burning of pagan books, pictures and statues" which
took place at the Kynêgion.
Most pagan literature was on papyrus, and so it perished before being
able to be copied onto something more durable. Herrin says it is
difficult to assess the degree to which Christians are responsible for
the losses of ancient documents in many cases, but in the mid-sixth
century, active persecution in Constantinople destroyed many ancient
texts.
Evaluation and commentary
In the early 21st century, every aspect of Antiquity is undergoing revision as "a hotly debated period".
What was thought to be well-known concerning the relation between
society and Christianity "has been rendered disturbingly unfamiliar".
In the last decade of the twentieth century and into the
twenty–first century, multiple new discoveries of texts and documents,
along with new research (such as modern archaeology and numismatics),
combined with new fields of study (such as sociology and anthropology)
and modern mathematical modeling, have undermined much of the
traditional view. According to modern theories, Christianity became
established in the third century, before Constantine, paganism did not
end in the fourth century, and imperial legislation had only limited
effect before the era of the eastern emperor Justinian I (reign 527 to 565).
Even periodization is debated, but late antiquity is generally thought of as beginning after the end of the Roman empire's Crisis of the Third Century (AD 235–284) and extending to about AD 600 in the West, and AD 800–1000 in the East.
According to The Oxford Handbook of Late Antiquity (OHLA),
scholars of the late Roman Empire fall into two categories on this
topic; they are referred to as holding either the "catastrophic" view or
the "long and slow" view of the demise of polytheism.
Catastrophic view
The classic inception of the catastrophic view comes from the work of Edward Gibbon, The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. Written in the 18th century, historian Lynn White
says that Gibbon gave four reasons for the downfall of the Roman
Empire: "immoderate greatness", wealth and luxury, barbarians, and Christianization, but it was Christianization that Gibbon saw as primary.
White says that, by Gibbon's own self-description, Gibbon was a
"philosophical historian" who believed that the primary virtues of
civilization were war and monarchy.
He saw Christian teaching as pacifistic and Christians as unwilling to
support the virtue of war and join the military; he said Christians were
hiding their cowardice and laziness under the cloak of religion. It was
this unwillingness to support war that Gibbon claimed was the primary
cause of Rome's decline and fall, saying: "the last remains of the
military spirit were buried in the cloister".
Gibbon disliked religious enthusiasm and zeal and singled out the monks
and martyrs for particular denigration as representative of these
"vices". According to historian Patricia Craddock, Gibbon's History is a
masterpiece that fails only where his biases effect his method, allowing
the "desertion of the role of historian for that of prosecuting
attorney".
Even so, historian Harold A. Drake writes that, "It is difficult to overestimate the influence of Gibbon's interpretation on subsequent scholarship". Gibbon's views developed into the traditional "catastrophic" view that has been the established hegemony for 200 years.
From Gibbon and Burckhardt
to the present day, it has been assumed that the end of paganism was
inevitable once confronted by the resolute intolerance of Christianity;
that the intervention of the Christian emperors in its suppression were
decisive; ... that, once they possessed such formidable power,
Christians used it to convert as many non-Christians as possible – by
threats and disabilities, if not by the direct use of force.
Long, slow demise
The modern alternative is the "long view", first stated by Peter Brown, whom The Oxford Handbook of Late Antiquity
calls the "pioneer" who inspired the study of Late Antiquity as a field
in itself, and whose work remains seminal. Brown used anthropological
models, rather than political or economic ones, to study the cultural
history of the period. He said polytheism experienced a "long slow" demise that lasted from the 200s into the 600s.
The Christian church believed that the dominance over other
philosophies had begun with Jesus; they marked the conversion of
Constantine as the end — the final fulfillment — of this heavenly
victory, even though Christians were only about 15–18% of the empire's
population at the time of Constantine's conversion. This narrative imposed a firm closure within the Christian literature on what, according to Pierre Chuvin, had in reality been a "wavering century."
Sources
According
to MacMullan, the Christian record declares pagans were not only
defeated, but fully converted, by the end of the fourth century, but he
says that this claim was "far from true". Christians, in their
triumphant exaggeration, and sheer bulk of material, have misrepresented
religious history, as other evidence shows that paganism continued.
MacMullen says this is why "We may fairly accuse the historical record
of having failed us, not just in the familiar way, being simply
insufficient, but also through being distorted".
The historical sources are filled with episodes of conflict, however, events in late antiquity were often dramatized for ideological reasons.Jan N. Bremmer
says that "religious violence in Late Antiquity is mostly restricted to
violent rhetoric: 'in Antiquity, not all religious violence was that
religious, and not all religious violence was that violent'". Brown contends that the fall of Rome is a highly charged issue that leads many to "tendentious and ill supported polemics".
Antique Christian accounts proclaim uniform victory while some current
historiography begins with the "infinite superiority" of the Roman
Empire based on an "idealized image" of it, then proceeds to vivid
accounts of its unpleasant, ignorant, and violent enemies (the
barbarians and the Christians), which is all intended to frame a
"grandiose theory of catastrophe from which there would be no return for
half a millennia". The problem with this, according to Brown, is that "much of this 'Grand Narrative' is wrong; it is a two dimensional history".
Legislation
The Theodosian Law Code has long been one of the principal sources for the study of Late Antiquity. It is an incomplete
collection of laws dating from the reign of Constantine to the date of
their promulgation as a collection in 438. Religious laws are in book
16. The code contains at least sixty-six laws targeted at heretics. Most
are found in Book XVI, ‘De Fide Catholica’, "On the Catholic Faith".
The laws fall into three general categories: laws to encourage
conversion; laws to define and punish the activities of pagans,
apostates, heretics and Jews; and laws concerned with the problems of
implementing the laws, that is, laws aimed at the conversion of the
aristocracy and the administrative system itself. Most importantly, it
details the cult activities that the emperor and the Catholic Church
considered unsuitable. The language of these religious laws is uniformly vehement and the penalties are harsh and frequently horrifying.
Contemporary scholars question using the Code, which was a legal document and not an historical work, for understanding history.
According to archaeologist Luke Lavan, reading law as history distorts
understanding of what actually occurred during the fourth century. There are many signs that a healthy paganism continued into the fifth century, and in some places, into the sixth and beyond.
Christian hostility toward pagans and their monuments is seen by most
modern scholars as far from the general phenomenon that the law and
literature implies.
Archaeology
Archaeologists
Luke Lavan and Michael Mulryan point out that the traditional
catastrophic view is largely based on literary sources, most of which
are Christian, and are therefore considered too partial.
Christian historians wrote vividly dramatized accounts of pious bishops
doing battle with temple demons, and much of the framework for
understanding this age is based on the “tabloid-like” accounts of the
destruction of the Serapeum of Alexandria, the murder of Hypatia, and the publication of the Theodosian law code.
Lavan and Mulryan indicate that archaeological evidence of religious
conflict exists, but not to the degree or the intensity to which it was
previously thought, putting the traditional catastrophic view of
"Christian triumphalism" in doubt. Rita Lizzi Testa, Professor of Roman history, Michele Renee Salzman, and Marianne Sághy quote Alan Cameron as saying that the idea that religious conflict is the cause of the swift demise of paganism is pure historiographical construction.
According to Salzman: "Although the debate on the death of paganism
continues, scholars ...by and large, concur that the once dominant
notion of overt pagan-Christian religious conflict cannot fully explain
the texts and artifacts or the social, religious, and political
realities of Late Antique Rome". Lavan says in The Archaeology of Late Antique 'Paganism':
Straightforward
readings of the laws can lead to a grossly distorted image of the
period: as thirty years of archaeology has revealed. Within religious history,
most textual scholars now accept this, although historical accounts
often tend to give imperial laws the greatest prominence... we have to
accept the fact that archaeology may reveal a very different story from
the texts... The anti-pagan legislation of the Christian emperors drew
on the same polemical rhetoric and modern scholars are now all too aware
of the limitations of those laws as historical evidence.Bayliss states that the Christian sources have greatly influenced
perceptions of this period, to the extent that the impression of the
conflict which they create has led scholars to assume that the conflict
existed on an empire-wide level.
However, archaeological evidence indicates that the decline of
paganism was peaceful in many places throughout the empire, for example Athens, was relatively non-confrontational. While some historians have focused on the cataclysmic events such as the destruction of the Serapeum at Alexandria,
in reality, there are only a handful of documented examples of temples
being entirely destroyed through such acts of aggression.
According to Bayliss, this fact means that the archaeological evidence
might show that Christian responsibility for the destruction of temples
has been exaggerated.
As Peter Brown points out with regard to Libanius’
anger: “we know of many such acts of iconoclasm and arson because
well-placed persons still felt free to present these incidents as
flagrant departures from a more orderly norm".
Scholars such as Cameron, Brown, Markus, Trombley and MacMullen have
lent considerable weight to the notion that the boundaries between pagan
and Christian communities in the 4th century were not as stark as some
prior historians claimed because open conflict was actually something of
a rarity.
Brown and others such as Noel Lenski and Glen Bowersock say that "For all their propaganda, Constantine and his successors did not bring about the end of paganism". It continued.Previously undervalued similarities in language, society, religion,
and the arts, as well as current archaeological research, indicate that
paganism slowly declined for a full two centuries and more in some
places, thereby offering an argument for the ongoing vibrancy of Roman culture in late antiquity, and its continued unity and uniqueness long after the reign of Constantine.